On Access to Justice - excerpt from response on LAW TIMES

This is a complex problem that will require the profession to address a number of external issues as well as internal ones. Access to justice can be denied by the court system as people with valid claims can be scared away by the specter of paying substantial costs to the other side if they lose. Access to justice can be denied to people who cannot find lawyers who speak the same language. Access to justice can be affected by the adversarial system and the unwillingness of either counsel or client to make concessions thereby prolonging dispute and making it prohibitively expensive for less wealthy parties. High legal fees can also be a barrier to justice. However, simply reducing fees can ultimately lead to the degradation in the quality of legal services. Instead, just as the advent of the video conferencing, email, and online researching tools reduced overheads while increasing efficiency, the profession should be looking for new ways to implement current advances to ameliorate legal costs through efficiency. I also believe that lawyers do provide legal assistance pro bono every day without realizing it, we are problem solvers by nature. We would likely do more if we practiced law on our own terms.