About the role
Are you an experienced Child Care Lawyer looking to expand your skills, progress your career and step into a leadership role? We are creating a brand new in-house Legal Team to support the Northamptonshire Children’s Trust. Join the existing Legal Team at West Northants Council, one of the newest and the fourth biggest Unitary Council in England.
What will you be doing?
As Principal Child Care Lawyer you will sit within our People legal team, supporting the Head of Legal (People) in the management of the team and working collaboratively with our Officers and elected Members in the work they undertake.

You will be our technical specialist with duties including:

• Managing a caseload of child protection cases.
• Advising clients, including elected members and senior officers.
• Advising on policy, strategy and procedure relating to Child Care issues.
• Building highly effective working relationships with clients.
• Supervising and delivering training to a dedicated legal team.
• To provide training to clients where required.

Whilst experience of advising on Child Care Law is essential, local government experience is not. What’s more important is a passion for delivering an excellent legal service, a desire to help shape and deliver an exemplar local authority legal service and a drive to progress and achieve your own ambition.
About you
West Northants is a great place to work. With a focus on career development, wellbeing, flexibility and support, this is an opportunity for you to take the next step on your career journey in a supported environment. We have mentoring, buddying, coaching, training and many other opportunities available to assist and develop you.
We will also consider any version of flexible working you can come up with and encourage those looking to change sector or return to work after a career break to apply.
For more information please contact Julia Rickards, Head of Legal (People), on 07585 405339 for a confidential discussion.
Interviews will take place the weeks commencing 18 March 2024 and 25 March 2024.
Please also join us at one of our virtual collaboration sessions where we welcome your thoughts about what the future of Child Care legal teams holds and help us to shape that future.
Attendees will include representatives from West Northants Council, Northamptonshire Children’s Trust and Child Care lawyers from private practice, together with Pam Burrows, the wellbeing expert supporting West Northants Council to shape a strong and resilient legal team with wellbeing at its core. Details of these sessions will be shared on our social media pages, LinkedIn and our designated legal recruitment pages.
About us
At West Northants Council, it’s about our people. People who thrive with ambition, bubble with new ideas, demand better ways of working, caring about every detail, and who never shy away from a challenge. Our culture is a gateway for new experiences. A place to forge new opportunities. To empower you in your career and unite you with like-minded people.
Our vision is ‘to make West Northants a great place to live, work, visit and thrive’. We truly stand by this and work hard every day to make this a reality. Our corporate values, THRIVE, stand for: Trust, High Performance, Respect, Innovate and Empower, they underpin everything we do and how we deliver services.
Hear more from our Chief Executive, Anna Earnshaw, about what it’s like to work at West Northants Council https://youtu.be/lV0EfeUF4aU
We are committed to ensuring diversity, equality, equity, and inclusion is woven into the fabric of WNC and everything we do, to enable all colleagues to develop and maximize their full potential. We are a disability confident employer, a member of the Armed Forces Covenant, and a Care Leaver Covenant partner
The following film was created by us to communicate our intentions - watch WNC colleagues explain what DEI means to us.
If you need additional support or reasonable adjustments during the application process, including needing the job description in another format or language, please email careers@westnorthants.gov.uk for support.

WEST NORTHANTS COUNCIL, WHERE CAREERS THRIVE.

Our benefits

We offer a wide range of benefits to our employees, these include:

• Generous annual leave entitlement starting at 28 days annual leave per year, 29 days for senior managers (pro rata, depending on how many hours per week you work), plus bank holidays. An additional 5 days, linked to continuous service, and ability to purchase up to 6 weeks additional leave per year.
• Cycle to Work scheme.
• Local Government Pension Scheme plus immediate life cover (3 times your annual salary from day one) and ill-health protection.
• Employee discounts with local and national retailers, days out, finance, health and beauty, travel and eating out plus lots more.
• Car Lease scheme via Tusker.
• Payment of professional subscription / membership - If your job description requires that you are registered with or are a member of a professional body, WNC will pay for your professional subscription or membership fees.
• Employee Assistance Programme - We have an employee support programme run by Health Assured, an independent, external organisation. Health Assured is available for you and your immediate family members, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year and includes telephone counselling, legal advice, bereavement support and medical information.
• Commsave- Free membership to Commsave Credit Union who provide a variety of savings accounts, loans, a monthly lottery draw and more!
• Ongoing training and development opportunities.
• A variety of flexible working options to support your work/life balance, including full or part time, term time, 9-day fortnight, etc. (subject to business needs).
• Our West Ways of Working – We want our workforce to thrive, and we equip our employees with the right technology to support hybrid and collaborative working, on or off site, depending on the role.
• Making a difference - If you want to use your skills and experience with an organisation that are genuinely invested in making a difference, are committed to improving people’s lives, and whose success has a direct impact on the wellbeing of your family, friends and people in your local area, then West Northamptonshire Council is the place for you.

• Managing a caseload of child protection cases.
• Advising clients, including elected members and senior officers.
• Advising on policy, strategy and procedure relating to Child Care issues.
• Building highly effective working relationships with clients.
• Supervising and delivering training to a dedicated legal team.
• To provide training to clients where required