The Legal Education Foundation (LEF) is an independent grant-making foundation operating across the UK to build a society that fosters the principles of justice and fairness, where people understand and use law to bring about positive change and to prevent harm, and where public systems and structures uphold the rule of law. It was founded in 1962 as The College of Law and constituted in its present form in 2012.

History

The charity began in 1962 when the Law Society's own law college (founded in 1903) merged with the tutorial firm

Gibson and Weldon Gibson and Weldon was a law practice at 27 Chancery Lane in London and the name of its tutorial firm which from 1876 until 1962 prepared hundreds of thousands of future solicitors and barristers in England and Wales for their examinations. Gibson a ...

(founded in 1876) to form the College of Law with branches in London and

Guildford Guildford () is a town in west Surrey, England, around south-west of central London. As of the 2011 census, the town has a population of about 77,000 and is the seat of the wider Borough of Guildford, which had around inhabitants in . The nam ...

.Abel, (1998)
''The Making of the English Legal Profession 1800–1988''
pp. 145–146. Beard Books (reprint of the 1988 edition). The College of Law was a private teaching institution which operated as a charity. It was incorporated by royal charter in 1975 and officially registered as a charity in 1976 "to promote the advancement of legal education and the study of law in all its branches".

Charity Commission for England and Wales The Charity Commission for England and Wales is a non-ministerial government department, non-ministerial department of Government of the United Kingdom, His Majesty's Government that regulates Charitable organization, registered charities in En ...

Legal Education Foundation, Charity No. 271297
Retrieved 16 June 2016. It never received Higher Education Funding Council funds and was dependent solely on its own resources to operate the college and finance its growth. In 2006, the college was granted degree-awarding powers and began a collaboration with the

Sutton Trust The Sutton Trust is an educational Charitable organization, charity in the United Kingdom which aims to improve social mobility and address educational disadvantage. The charity was set up by educational philanthropist, Sir Peter Lampl in 1997. ...

to fund the trust's Pathways to Law program which encourages and supports disadvantaged secondary school students who wish to study law. Until 2012, the College of Law was in the top 100 of UK charities ranked by expenditure. In 2012, the College Of Law underwent a major restructuring which split off the educational institution from its parent charity. College of Law Ltd. was created as a

limited company In a limited company, the Legal liability, liability of members or subscribers of the company is limited to what they have invested or guaranteed to the company. Limited companies may be limited by Share (finance), shares or by guarantee. In a c ...

to take on its educational and training business on a for-profit basis. The parent charity changed its name to the Legal Education Foundation and remained under the royal charter. In November of that year the college was granted university status. Shortly thereafter it was sold to

Montagu Private Equity Montagu is a mid-market private equity firm. The primary investment focus of Montagu is on management buyouts of performing businesses with enterprise values typically ranging from €200 million to €1 billion. History The firm was founded in 19 ...

for £200 million. The proceeds of the sale went to the Legal Education Foundation, while the £177 million debt incurred by Montagu for the purchase was transferred to the college itself. The college subsequently changed its name to the

University of Law The University of Law (founded in 1962 as The College of Law of England and Wales) is a Private university, private Proprietary college, for-profit university in the United Kingdom, providing undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in law, busi ...

Activities

The newly constituted Legal Education Foundation officially launched on 10 July 2013 with the announcement of its first six grants and the appointment of Matthew Smerdon as its first CEO. Smerdon was recruited from the Baring Foundation, where he specialised in funding the legal advice sector. The charity had begun investing its £200 million endowment in April 2013 with its investment managers instructed to preserve the value of the fund in real terms and produce an annual income of 3.5%. By the beginning of 2015, it had distributed approximately £5m in grants to nearly 70 projects which were designed to increase accessibility to legal services or to increase public understanding of the law. The foundation also initiated and runs the Justice First fellowship program which funds trainee

solicitor A solicitor is a lawyer who traditionally deals with most of the legal matters in some jurisdictions. A person must have legally defined qualifications, which vary from one jurisdiction to another, to be described as a solicitor and enabled to p ...

s who wish to work in the

social welfare Welfare spending is a type of government support intended to ensure that members of a society can meet basic human needs such as food and shelter. Social security may either be synonymous with welfare, or refer specifically to social insurance p ...

sector. In 2014 , it awarded Justice First fellowships to eight law graduates recruited from a field of 161 applicants. In 2016, the program was expanded to include two further fellowships for trainee

barrister A barrister is a type of lawyer in common law jurisdiction (area), jurisdictions. Barristers mostly specialise in courtroom advocacy and litigation. Their tasks include arguing cases in courts and tribunals, drafting legal pleadings, jurisprud ...

s. Rozenberg, Joshua (16 February 2015)
"Access to learning fund"
''

Law Society Gazette ''The Law Society Gazette'' (also known as the ''Gazette'' or the ''Law Gazette'') is a British weekly legal magazine for solicitors in England and Wales published by the Law Society of England and Wales. While it is available to buy and on su ...

''. Retrieved 16 June 2016. The charity has continued and expanded its collaboration with the Sutton Trust in the Pathways to Law program and also collaborates with the Baring Foundation in widening public access to legal advice.Baksi, Catherine (1 September 2014)
"Law centres: Picking up the pieces"
''

''. Retrieved 16 June 2016. In addition to the income from its own endowment, the Legal Education Foundation also receives grants for its projects from general funding organizations such as

Comic Relief Comic Relief is a British charity, founded in 1986 by the comedy scriptwriter Richard Curtis and comedian Sir Lenny Henry in response to the 1983–1985 famine in Ethiopia. The concept of Comic Relief was to get British comedians to make t ...

and the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation.

References

External links

*
The Baring Foundation
{{Legal services in the United Kingdom Educational charities based in the United Kingdom Educational foundations based in the United Kingdom Educational organizations established in 1962 Legal education in the United Kingdom