Commercial Lawyer

Job Title: Commercial & Procurement Lawyer
Starting Salary: £53,806 plus £5,691 market enhancement rising to £59,497 plus £5,738 market enhancement. Plus a one-off Welcome Payment of £4000*
Hours: 37
Location: Stevenage
Contract Type: Permanent
Directorate: Resources

About the team

With more than 100 colleagues in the team Herts Legal is one of the largest and most successful legal teams in local government and offers a complete legal service to clients across the County Council, District Councils and other public sector bodies.

Our lawyers are crucial to the County Council's continued success. We have high standards for our services and we are pleased to be recognised as a Centre of Excellence by the Law Society's Lexcel quality standard assessor.

Herts Legal provides a fantastic opportunity for ambitious, passionate and organised Lawyers who want to join a supportive and flourishing public sector legal team.

We offer flexible hybrid working and have recently moved to newly refurbished modern offices in Stevenage.

About the role

The role will be a client facing role providing high quality legal services to Council officers and Members, committees, and other council bodies.

This role is focussed on the provision of public procurement and commercial contracts advice.

You will also contribute to the maintenance of Legal Services’ Lexcel accreditation

Role Responsibilities

• Manage your own case load of routine and more complex matters
• Provide quality practical advice and support to clients on public procurement, subsidy control and commercial contracts (including contract negotiation, drafting and contract disputes).
• Participate in training courses and seminars to Members, officers and others.
• Ensure that the decisions made by client departments are lawful, accord with the Council’s constitution and internal policy and achieve their aims and objectives efficiently

• Maintain an awareness of all relevant legislation, policy and regulations, investigate and advise on implications of changing legislation, case law and codes of practice and policy and provide Client updates and training where necessary
• Make recommendations to the Principal Lawyer and Assistant Chief Legal Officer on improvements in practice and procedure in the Team to ensure that the Team retains pre-eminence in its practice area.
  
  

About you

Essential

• A solicitor, barrister or legal executive
• Knowledge and experience of public sector procurement law
• Knowledge and experience of commercial contracts
• Demonstrable understanding of the issues facing local authorities, legal service departments and lawyers
• Ability to work collaboratively, manage and prioritise workloads to achieve Client outcomes to timescale and within budget
• Excellent client care skills and the ability to develop relationships with Client Officers and colleagues at all levels
• Excellent inter-personal, written and oral communication and negotiation and drafting skills
• Self-sufficient in the production of all documents and correspondence without the need to rely on secretarial staff
• Attention to detail and a pragmatic, flexible and commercial approach to problem solving.

Desirable

• Experience of working in a local authority legal environment is welcome.

We welcome applications from candidates who currently reside in the UK with established proof of right to work documentation. We are not able to offer sponsorship at this time for this role.

This job role is Level 13. Please locate the job profile here:

Job profiles - Corporate services

To hear more about this opportunity please contact Craig.Athorn@hertfordshire.gov.uk for an informal discussion about the role.

Interview Date: Week commencing 29th June 2026

Benefits of working for us
* Welcome payment will be paid on satisfactory completion of the successful candidate's probationary period and is subject to the Herts Legal Welcome Payment Policy.

How to apply

As part of your application, please upload your most recent CV. Ensure your CV is up to date with your employment history (including any employment gaps), and including any training/qualifications. We encourage you to include examples of where you have demonstrated the requirements/criteria in the advert / job profile to allow the panel to fully recognise your skills and abilities. You will have the opportunity to include a short covering paragraph within your application to give us a little more information about your skills, knowledge, and experiences.

Additional information

Disability Confident
We are proud to be a Disability Confident employer and guarantee an interview to anyone disclosing a disability whose application meets the minimum criteria for the post.

English Fluency
The ability to converse at ease with members of the public and provide advice in accurate spoken English is essential for the post (for those whose language is a signed language the provision of a sign language interpreter who speaks English to the necessary standard of fluency will be required). Further information about the legal requirement can be found here.