CLEO, the Clinical Legal Education Organisation, is an independent charity dedicated to "promoting the advancement of legal education and the study of law".
CLEO has the following goals and aims:
Help address unmet legal need and the improvement of access to justice generally
Provide legal clinicians with advice, support and guidance on the development of clinical legal education
Provide and promote a wide range of best practice guidance on clinical legal education issues
Promote collaboration between universities (collectively and individually) and third sector and public sector organisations to identify legal needs and provide clinical legal education and pro bono services to address these needs
Continue to develop a reputation as a non-partisan and objective organisation with expertise in the areas of access to justice, clinical legal education and associated policy areas
Background & Legal Status
For over 25 years, CLEO has been providing encouragement, expertise and support to develop clinical legal education in UK law schools. As an informal organisation, CLEO encouraged legal clinicians to share their experiences and best practices and facilitated (sometimes in conjunction with LawWorks) the emergence of new clinical legal education initiatives in a large number of universities.
CLEO operated as an unincorporated entity for many years, organising workshops and training events for those involved in, or wanting to set up, pro bono clinics. At its conference in November 2013 a decision was taken to formally constitute the organisation with a view to better representing its members and making a more structured contribution to national debates on legal services and educational provision.
CLEO is now a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) registered with the Charity Commission (number 1161457).
CLEO Constitution
Further details regarding the formal organisation of the charity and terms and conditions regarding membership and trustee duties can be found in the organisation's constitution. The constitution is available to all registered members. A copy is available in the resources section of the site.
Our Trustees
Andrea Todd
Andy is Associate Professor of Active Citizenship at the University of Chester. She is the Law School’s Director of Pro Bono and Community Engagement, and supervising solicitor for the University of Chester Legal Advice Clinic. Andy has taught and led practice-focussed modules, and supervised clinic work, for LLB and LPC students across a range of Higher Education institutions. Andy is currently co-chair of CLEO.
Lucy Blackburn
Lucy Blackburn is Deputy Associate Dean of the School of Law and Policing at the University of Lancashire. She is a qualified solicitor and prior to joining higher education, she was a practising solicitor specialising in all aspects of Commercial Property. Lucy is an active member of the Clinical Legal Education community and her research focuses on Clinical Legal Education, law clinics and legal practice. Her articles have been published in various international journals and she has spoken extensively about Clinical Legal Education at conferences in Canada, Italy, South Africa and Slovakia, as well as within the UK. She is a leading authority on Qualifying Work Experience gained in Law Clinics and she has been consulted by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and the Law Society of England and Wales on this subject. In September 2022, Lucy launched the Advice and Resolution Centre at the university, which houses the university’s CLE clinics.
Malcolm Combe
Malcolm has been a trustee at CLEO since 2017 and a Senior Lecturer in Law at the University of Strathclyde since December 2019. Prior to joining Strathclyde, he was a Senior Lecturer at the University of Aberdeen, and before that he was a solicitor in private practice in a Scottish law firm (where he qualified in Scotland and in England and Wales). As an academic Malcolm's work has tended to have a property law focus, with particular interests being land law reform, public access to land, and landlord and tenant law. He also has an interest in access to justice and clinical legal education. He was an undergraduate at the University of Strathclyde and joined the law clinic there as one of its founding members. He remained involved with pro bono as a volunteer solicitor at the Free Legal Advice Centre at the University of Edinburgh and then as Faculty Supervisor at the Aberdeen Law Project, and acted as Chair of the Scottish University Law Clinic Network before that role passed to fellow CLEO trustee Rebecca Samaras. He was instrumental in setting up the Scottish University Land Unit, a partnership between Scottish law students and the Development Trust Agency for Scotland’s Community Ownership Support Service. He sits on the Law Society of Scotland’s Access to Justice Committee.
Amanda Crutchley
Before moving into Higher Education in 2012, Amanda was a Criminal Defence Solicitor for 20 years in Bristol , specialising in youth crime. She is currently Pro Bono Supervising Solicitor and National Employability Manger for University of Law and a Lecturer in Clinical Education for Bath Spa University.
Mathew Gray
Mathew is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Law with a specialism in Constitutional Law, Human Rights and Dispute Resolution. He was previously a Pro Bono Coordinator and Supervising Solicitor and maintains a keen interest in Clinical Legal Education.
Hannah Menard
Hannah is the Director of the Legal Advice Clinic at the University of South Wales (USW), and is responsible for the delivery and implementation of clinical legal education across the law school. Prior to working in higher education, Hannah qualified as a solicitor with a large legal aid firm in South Wales, specialising in Family Law. Hannah was responsible for the firm’s contracts with the Legal Aid Agency, which included contracts to provide both face to face and telephone advice in the areas of Family, Employment, Housing, Debt and Welfare Benefits. Hannah is also an experienced consultant working with legal consultancy firm cpm21. She specialises in assisting law firms with quality mark implementation and compliance, and delivers training on the Professional Skills Course for trainee solicitors.
Frances Ridout
Frances Ridout is a Senior Lecturer at Queen Mary University of London and leads on clinical legal education in the Law Department. She is a practising Barrister and the Director of the Queen Mary Legal Advice Centre. She module convenes two clinical legal education modules and has a particular interest in the area of Street Law. Prior to working in higher education, Frances practiced at the self-employed criminal bar from 15 New Bridge Street Chambers. Frances has been a CLEO Trustee since 2018 and is part of the team of trustees working to ensure CLEO hosts an interesting and diverse range of events for its members.
Francine Ryan
Francine Ryan is a Senior Lecturer in Law at The Open University and Co-Director of the Open Justice Centre. As the Director of the Open Justice Centre, Francine has worked to develop a range of innovative and technology enhanced opportunities for OU students. Francine created and is now the Director of the Open Justice Online Law Clinic. Francine was a finalist in The Law Teacher of the Year 2020 . She is also a co-author of Digital Lawyering: Technology and Legal Practice in the 21st Century that will be published by Routledge later this year.
Rebecca Samaras
A practising solicitor, Rebecca was appointed Director of Clinical Legal Education and Senior Lecturer in Law at the University of Dundee in April 2023 where she is responsible for leading Dundee Law School’s clinical legal education programme. This includes the development of the recently launched University of Dundee Law Clinic which serves Dundee and the surrounding areas. A former Director of the Diploma in Professional Legal Studies and more recently, the Director of Clinical Legal Education and Pro Bono at the University of Edinburgh (where she was also the Director of the Free Legal Advice Centre), she has extensive experience in teaching legal and core skills. Rebecca is a member of the Law Society of Scotland’s Access to Justice Committee, the Access to Justice Foundation Scotland Committee and the Scottish University Law Clinic Network. She is a Trustee of both the Clinical Legal Education Organisation and the Access to Justice Foundation. Rebecca is the Communications Trustee for CLEO.
Linden Thomas
Linden Thomas is a Reader in Clinical Legal Education and Pro Bono at The University of Birmingham. She is supervising solicitor for Birmingham Law School’s Clinical Legal Education programme, which engages over 240 students each year in law clinics, Streetlaw, externships and research and policy based pro bono initiatives. She has been co-Chair CLEO since 2017 and is co-founder of the annual UK and Ireland Streetlaw Best Practices conference. She researches and publishes on Clinical Legal Education and was lead editor of the 2018 edited collection ‘Reimagining Clinical Legal Education’. She is also co-editor of the Clinical Legal Education Handbook, a free, open access guide to CLE, published by The University of London in May 2020.