Birmingham Law Centre has launched a last-ditch campaign to convince the local authority to fund some of its services, in order to stave off imminent closure.

The charity’s chief executive is meeting the leader of Birmingham City Council, Albert Bore, at 3pm today in an eleventh-hour bid to secure support to enable it to stay open.

The charity is facing a massive reduction in income due to the government’s legal aid cuts and, unlike most law centres, it receives no funding from the Labour local authority.

Its chief executive Pete Lowen told civilsociety.co.uk that without funding from the council, the Birmingham agency is “in a worse position than almost all other law centres around the country”.

“We’ve never had core funding; never any cushion to help us get through a cashflow crisis,” he said.

The cliff-edge looming ahead of the charity has been created by the gradual erosion of a number of grants and contracts, he said. “What we really need is some modest ongoing support from the local authority, or at the very least a one-off injection of funds.”

He said he wanted to remind Mr Bore that “well supported and sustainable law centres are proven to relieve the burden on local authority funding by working to relieve poverty and social injustice”.

If the centre has to close, around 2,000 Birmingham citizens per year will lose out on free legal advice that could keep them in their home, help them appeal complex benefits decisions or access help from social services.  The law centre also advises people in debt or who have lost their job.

Lowen added: “We have over 1,200 signatures to our petition and overwhelming support from lawyers, barristers and judges locally and nationally as well as many of our partners and clients. Three ex-ministers are intervening on our behalf.”

Last year the Centre had income totalling £670,000 but Lowen said it had been operating at a deficit for some time.

Twenty jobs are at risk if the Centre has to wind up.