PLEASE NOTE THIS POST IS ONLY OPEN TO INTERNAL APPLICANTS
Organisation: Leicestershire County Council
Work Location: County Hall, Glenfield, Leicestershire LE3 8RA
Worker Category: Hybrid Worker
Salary: £55,443 - £61,116 per annum
Working Hours: 37 Hours Per Week
Contract Type: Permanent
Closing Date: 14th December 2025
Interview Date(s): TBC
About the Role
Assisting the Director of Law and Governance, Head of Law and the Assistant Head of Law (Social Care and Safeguarding) in the delivery of the Council’s legal and corporate functions. Deputising for the Assistant Head of Law as required and working closely with the other Team Leader for the child care team.
Working for Leicestershire County Council as a child care team leader –
1. Positive working relationships with client department, the local Courts, CAFCASS and private practice
2. Professional culture of proactive advice, planned applications and collaboration
3. Each lawyer and team leader having a nominated paralegal to give lawyers time and space for quality advice/drafting and preparation for court
4. High quality supervision and support from senior management (an Assistant Head of Law very experienced in this area of law) plus the support of another team leader
5. Flexible hybrid ways of working policies and IT systems supporting effective remote/home working
6. Job satisfaction – supervising and mentoring paralegals and lawyers and training social workers
7. Interesting range of legal work including the law relating to Deprivation of Liberty, Judicial Review and Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children
We also offer an attractive benefits package including:
8. Annual leave entitlement of up to 32 days depending on grade and length of service plus public holidays and leave buy back scheme
9. Generous local government pension scheme
10. Free on-site parking, restaurant and food outlet
11. Employee benefits and discount scheme
12. Payment of required professional fees
13. Employee-friendly policies including carer support and comprehensive wellbeing support services. The council is a ‘Mindful Employer’ and committed to the well- being of its staff and workplace equality initiatives.
About You
To apply for this post, you must have:
14. A Professional Qualification as a Barrister (including practice rights to conduct litigation)/Solicitor OR Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (including practice rights to conduct litigation).
15. Experience of dealing with and providing advice and guidance in relation to complex children's social care and safeguarding legal issues.
16. Relevant managerial qualification and evidence of maintaining CPD along with experience of advocacy, dealing with complex childcare litigation and local authority policies and procedures.
17. Ability to work collaboratively across service and department and with external bodies. Able to create clear, concise and well-structured written communication and advice.
18. Ability to present arguments to a range of audiences, along with leading, directing and regularly meeting with team members to inform and review performance. Taking an active lead to resolve conflict to achieve effective resolutions.
19. Excellent personal and interpersonal skills and directing/supervising staff undertaking legal work in the area of children law.
20. Detailed knowledge of children safeguarding, associated court proceedings and the relevant legislation. As well as knowledge of Judicial Review proceedings in the context of challenges to age assessments of Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children (UASC) and No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF) decisions.
21. Knowledge of current and emerging legislation, government initiatives to enable planning and application in an operational context.
You must also have an understanding of, and commitment to, equality, diversity and inclusion.
In addition, we also expect you to share and will ask you to evidence when you have demonstrated them as part of the selection process.
Reasonable adjustments will be considered for applicants with a disability.
Interested in Flexible Working?
We are keen to support employees to balance their working life with other commitments. Therefore, wherever possible, we will consider working arrangements that suit an individual's personal circumstances whilst still meeting the needs of the Council. If you would like to discuss the possible flexible working options that might be applicable to this role, please contact the person named below. This may include requests for term-time working, part-time hours, compressed hours, flexible start and finish times, home/remote working, etc.
Every role within the Council has a defined working style which determines where they can work. The worker category applicable to this post is detailed in the above advert. You can find out more about our worker categories in the page on our career site.
For more information or an informal discussion, please contact:
Michael Oliver
Telephone; 0116 305 6025
Please click here for the
How to Apply
Leicestershire County Council is an inclusive organisation which is on a journey to embed and celebrate equality, diversity and inclusion at every level. We warmly welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds, as having a diverse workforce with different perspectives and ideas is fundamental to our values and enriches the services we offer our communities. We particularly welcome applicants from Ethnically Diverse and LGBTQ Plus communities and people with disabilities to create a balanced workforce and one that reflects the communities we serve. Applicants with a disability who meet the criteria listed in the 'About You' section above will be offered an interview under the Disability Confident Employer Scheme.
To apply for this job, please click on the apply button. You will need to upload a supporting statement as part of your application which explains how you meet the criteria listed in the 'About You' section above. For more information, see the section on our career site.
We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive sufficient applications for the role. Therefore, if you are interested, please submit your application as early as possible.
If you have any technical issues when trying to apply for this post or you want to request an application pack in an alternative format, please contact our Employee Service Centre by telephoning 0300 3030222 (select option 2) or raising a ticket via our online portal:.
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