The legal rights organisation’s annual report found its telephone information and referral line answered 14,103 queries during the year, the highest figure since 2015, after receiving 66,371 calls.

Employment law queries reached a record high of 3,317, while domestic violence queries rose to 635, an increase of 18 per cent on 2024. Housing queries increased by 57.5 per cent to 1,189.

Family law remained the largest category, with 3,524 queries. FLAC said callers frequently reported difficulties accessing solicitors through the Legal Aid Board’s private practitioner panel despite being entitled to legal aid.

The organisation said this reflected the emergence of “legal aid deserts” in parts of the country.

FLAC’s Independent Law Centre provided representation to 234 people in 2025, including 127 clients involved in housing or homelessness cases and 91 in equality and discrimination cases.

The organisation said interventions helped some families access social housing or emergency accommodation, including a Traveller family who had lived on the roadside for five years. Clients in discrimination cases received €91,850 in compensation during the year.

FLAC chief executive Eilis Barry said the figures demonstrated the scale of unmet legal need and called for urgent reform of the civil legal aid system.

“FLAC’s 2025 Annual Report highlights the extent of unmet legal need that our hugely oversubscribed Telephone Information & Referral Line, Traveller Legal Service and Roma Legal Clinic encounter on a daily basis,” she said.

Ms Barry said the Legal Aid Board had acknowledged that the civil legal aid system was “not just in crisis but may collapse”, adding that reform was needed to establish a “fit for purpose system of public legal assistance”.

The report follows the publication last year of a review of Ireland’s civil legal aid system, in which Ms Barry submitted a minority report setting out FLAC’s recommendations.

FLAC also highlighted policy developments during 2025, including the enactment of the Bereaved Partner’s Pension Act, which followed the Supreme Court’s decision in the O’Meara case, in which FLAC represented the family involved. The organisation said up to 150,000 cohabiting couples and families could benefit from the legislation.

It also welcomed proposals in the General Scheme of the Equality (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill, including increased compensation for discrimination victims and stronger duties to provide reasonable accommodation for people with disabilities.

Dr Fiona Donson, FLAC chairperson, said: “Throughout 2025, FLAC was very fortunate to be able to draw on the deep commitment to access to justice within the legal profession, civil society, law schools and student societies across the island of Ireland. 

“FLAC’s work would not be possible without those who volunteer to support the organisation, including the volunteers and law firms working on the phoneline and in clinics, the barristers who assist with casework, and the members of the PILA alliance.”