May I just suggest...?
Of course, access to justice is part of a key mandate of the law society, and it's one of our priorities. In fact, last year, at the strategic planning day at the law society, the suggestion of making pro bono mandatory for all lawyers did come up as one solution. However, it was very quickly shot down for a number of reasons. One was that it actually does not get to the heart of the problem that all of us are talking about today. In fact, it may penalize people who are already doing a lot of work, such as legal aid lawyers. It is not the solution at all.
But to address your first question, at our clinic, 25% of the clients who contact us for help seek help in the family law area. The majority of them are women. A significant proportion of them are in domestic violence situations, and a significant number of them will not get legal aid because of the very low income requirement to qualify for legal aid. Even with the new funding from the provincial government for Legal Aid Ontario, people still have to live way below the poverty line in order to qualify for legal aid. They have a slightly higher eligibility for people in domestic violence situations, but again, it's still very low and it doesn't cover all areas of law within the family law context.