OFFICIAL - SENSITIVE

JOB DESCRIPTION

Job Title	Director of Legal and Policy
Department	Legal & Policy	Team	Senior Leadership Team (SLT)
Job Grade	6	Number of Posts	1
Reports to	COO
Job Purpose	To provide legal advice and policy support to the Parole Board
Scope of Responsibilities:	To provide legal advice to the Parole Board including to the Chair, Vice-Chair, CEO, senior leadership and PB members. To attend Management Committee, Senior Leadership Group (SLG) and SLT, Standards Committee, and other Committees or working groups as necessary from time to time To lead the development of policy, guidance and legislation To contribute to the delivery of training for staff, members and stakeholders To oversee the Board’s research work To oversee and direct all litigation to which the Board is a party To be responsible for complex and high profile legal challenges in the higher courts To direct and oversee the work of the Legal and Policy Function To be responsible for the Legal and Policy Function’s budget To lead the Legal & Practice team in dealing with legal queries To support specialist workstreams within the Board, including reconsideration, set aside, public hearings, non disclosure, public hearings, TACT cases and CLOSED proceedings To represent the Board to internal and external stakeholders events and meetings, including with senior officials, the senior judiciary and on occasion with Ministers To sit on external working groups from time to time Such other responsibilities are as assigned by management from time to time
Primary Deliverables	Legal advice Policy and guidance Legislation Conduct of litigation Budget management
Person Specification
Essential	Qualified to provide professional legal services (solicitor, barrister, or equivalent) Deep experience of public law and litigation Deep experience of policy and legislative development Excellent written and oral communication skills including adept at relaying complex information in a simple, digestible format Ability to interact confidently with internal and external stakeholders, including senior officials, Ministers and members of the judiciary. Ability to combine both a strategic outlook with forensic attention to detail Experience of budget management Experience of managing teams Experience in using Microsoft programmes
Desirable	Experience in civil litigation Experience in criminal litigation Experience in prison law Security clearance to DV level or willingness to undergo screening to obtain it

About the Parole Board:

The Parole Board is an independent court-like body that carries out risk assessments on prisoners to determine whether they can be safely released into the community We do that with great care and public safety is our number one priority.

All Parole Board decisions are solely focused on whether a prisoner would represent a significant risk to the public after release. Not all decisions Members make are popular, but they make these decisions fairly and objectively.

The Board is made up of about 230 secretariat staff based in our and approximately 380 Members who make decisions on risk and hold hearings at prisons around the country.

The Parole Board is an executive non-departmental public body, sponsored by the Ministry of Justice. Staff who work for the Parole Board Secretariat are Public Servants and not Civil Servants.

About the role:

This is an exciting role on the Senior Leadership Team of the Parole Board. You will be the principal legal advisor at the Parole Board, providing legal advice and support to Parole Board members, the Chair, Vice-Chair, CEO, the senior leadership team and across the Parole Board secretariat. You will also lead and manage the legal and policy team, consisting of a mix of other legally qualified and policy staff. The team handles all legal challenges to which the Board is a party, oversees those parts of the Parole Board process with a legal nature, develops policy, guidance and practice advice for the membership, and co-ordinates the Board’s research functions. You will assist in the development of policy, guidance, training and new legislation for the Parole Board (both secondary and primary). You will attend senior management meetings and form part of the Board’s Senior Leadership Team. You will work collaboratively with and represent the Board to external stakeholders.

Main Duties:

As set out in the job description above.

Behaviours

We will assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

Managing a Quality Service
Leadership
Communicating and Influencing
Changing and Improving

Security:

Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed, which is to be security cleared to SC-level. Candidates must be willing to undergo screening to Developed Vetting (DV) level.

Accessibility

The Parole Board is a disability confident recruiter. Accessibility requests will be carefully considered and, where reasonable, actioned.

Whilst the Parole Board office is principally located in London, and, for the purposes of organisational management and administration, it is not required to conduct business in Welsh. However, the Parole Board welcomes applications from candidates who speak Welsh and English as part of its commitment to treat both languages on a basis of equality in the conduct of public business and administration of justice in Wales, as far as is both appropriate and reasonable, and to reflect the community it serves.

Office requirements

This role is hybrid. You will be required to spend a minimum of 20% of your time in person contact. For some SLT and MC meetings as well as member staff away days, training, or other events, you will be required to attend in person either in London or at other locations within the UK.

Selection process details

This vacancy is using Success Profiles, and will assess your Behaviours and Experience. At the interview stage you will be assessed against Behaviours, Strengths and Experience and may be required to prepare a presentation.