Lawyer

Posted by: Social Work England

Employed By: Social Work England

Job Title: Lawyer

Salary or salary range: £49,538 per year, rising to £51,768 per year after successful completion of a 6-month probationary period.

Contract type: Full-time

Location of position: Sheffield, Hybrid

Application deadline: 7th January 2026

Lawyers on the regulatory side of the team support Social Work England in relation to lawfully carrying out its regulatory functions.

These include:

- Supporting our fitness to practise and registration teams, to ensure that our regulatory processes are compliant with any legal restrictions regarding the use of information which relates to private court proceedings (or is otherwise subject to restrictions), such as Family Court proceedings and Court of Protection proceedings;

- Supporting colleagues to apply for disclosure of information from the Family Court and Court of Protection for use in fitness to practise proceedings;

- Providing advice in response to requests for reviews of case examiner decisions and applying criteria set out in our Fitness to Practise Rules;

- Providing advice on internal policies, procedures and processes to ensure legal compliance; and

- Preparing responses (under supervision) to pre-action correspondence and managing progression of potential and active litigation.

A substantial portion of the team’s work involves advising the fitness to practise teams and other areas of the organisation about the use and disclosure of Family Court and Court of Protection information and knowledge of how this affects the organisation will be required in every role. There are restrictions on the handling of information and documents from Family Court proceedings and Court of Protection proceedings. These types of information are regularly shared with the organisation and/or the organisation is required to seek disclosure of such information for the purposes of our regulatory functions.  

While the role will primarily focus on the areas listed above, there will also be opportunities to become involved in other projects relating to our regulatory functions and to participate in the work of the wider legal team.

We are recruiting for 3 Lawyers. Whilst Lawyers will work across all areas of the regulatory team’s work, it is envisaged that the three Lawyers will each have a particular focus on one of the following areas:

• Family Court and Court of Protection information;

• Civil litigation; or

• Review of case examiner decisions.

If you have a strong preference for any of the above areas, please make this clear in your application.