Welfare law and Community legal services

Site includes the latest annual report, news, and a section for lawyers including legal aid forms and the legal aid handbook. There is also an excellent search function to allow clients to locate firms registered to provide Legal Aid in their area.

Scotland’s largest law centre: details of its work and some free literature on welfare law topics.

Govan Law Centre’s lively blog is available here, as well as details of the firm and how to seek assistance from one of its many projects. A must for anyone interested in social welfare law.

Excellent guide to all areas of housing law, including homelessness, renting, repairs and repossessions.

The national website of Citizens Advice in the UK: provides up-to-date information on wide range of legal issues affecting the ordinary citizen; customisable by UK country/region.

Home page of the DWP, responsible for social security. DWP publications, including consultations, guidance, impact assessments and both short and detailed guides to all the main benefits can be found here.

Guidance on the new scheme for child maintenance, complete with online calculators. Information on the old scheme is also available here.

This is a very claimant-centred site, which contains among other things detailed guides to various welfare law benefits as well as links to and commentary on various court and Tribunal decisions. First rate practical advice on dealing with forms, medicals, appeals etc. Very different from the official sites.

Completely redesigned site with lots of information about the housing benefit scheme provided independently. Also contains text of regulations and circulars and much more. Most material only available to subscribers.

Sector leading site run by London welfare rights organisations. Provides up-to-date news on welfare benefits, leaflets, discussion forum and job advertisements. Decent coverage of Scottish social security developments and issues, too.

The Executive Agency dealing with devolved social security matters in Scotland. This site covers the structure, aims and governance of this nascent agency.  It also includes links to information on the various grants and payments administered by the agency.