Job Description

The Senior Solicitor job delivers high quality, timely and accessible legal advice across a broad range of practice areas. The successful applicant will act as a trusted business partner to colleagues across Sellafield Ltd and the NDA group, providing clear, solution focused legal advice and guidance that supports effective decision making.

As a Senior Solicitor you will be involved in managing complex, sensitive and high-profile matters, lead on substantive procurements and other commercial projects and contribute to the delivery of the strategic objectives of both Sellafield Ltd and the wider NDA group.

You will be working as part of a Commercial Law Team that sits within a broader legal directorate.

Principal Accountabilities

• Deliver high quality, timely and accessible legal advice on a broad range of commercial law matters, including contract interpretation, intellectual property, export controls, subsidy control regime to stakeholders across the business through the provision of clear, practical and solution focused options that support effective decision making.
• Review and advise on a range of contract terms and conditions, including Sellafield Ltd.’s standard contract terms, supplier terms and standard market forms such as NEC, to provide practical legal advice including on performance risk allocation, liability, and contract security.
• Advise on the legal issues associated with regulated procurement through the full contract lifecycle, which includes procurement strategies, navigating governance, reviewing procurement documentation, providing guidance and support to competitions and the evaluation and award stages and through contract management.
• Act as a trusted adviser by applying a broad range of commercial and strategic legal skills to assist the business to secure outcomes that are risk informed and aligned with business objectives.
• Undertake legal risk analysis and manage across contentious and non-contentious matters, to support effective risk management and develop appropriate mitigation strategies; escalating issues to the Head of Legal (Specialism) and/or General Counsel where appropriate.
• Build and maintain strong internal and external relationships, engaging in proactive stakeholder management to enhance the effectiveness, credibility and influence of the legal function; through the provision of clear legislative updates, guidance and training to internal stakeholders to enhance their understanding of the relevant legal obligations and how these apply to their jobs.
• Maintain high professional and technical standards in compliance with Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Principles and regulatory obligations to ensure technical competence through ongoing professional development and regulatory obligations.
• Drive continuous improvement, value for money and efficiency in line with company values and nuclear professional standards and expectations through effective individual and team performance in order to contribute to the effectiveness and development of the legal function.

Knowledge & Experience

Authorities & Dimensions:
• Instruct and manage the provision of legal services from external providers, ensuring that they are provided with all necessary information to enable them to provide advice that is accurate, and targeted.
• Pro-actively monitor and manage external legal spend to ensure that the quality of services are appropriate, efficiencies are made and value for money is maximised.
• Act in accordance with the financial delegated powers authority relevant to the Office of General Counsel.

Essential Skills

• Qualified to practice as a solicitor or barrister in England and Wales with at least seven years post qualification experience relevant to the role.
• Strong knowledge and practical experience in commercial law.
• Substantial experience of advising on regulated public procurement matters.
• Experience of working collaboratively within multi-disciplinary teams, of building strong and effective working relationships and of communicating effectively, with differing audiences, in order to influence delivery of business objectives.
• An interest in developing an understanding of the Sellafield Ltd and the NDA group missions in order to ensure effective provision of legal advice.

Desirable Skills

• Contentious experience relevant to the principal accountabilities of the role.
• Prior in-house experience -public or private sector.
• Experience of other legal practice areas to support the wider legal team (which could include Regulatory Law, conventional and nuclear health and safety, transport, employment law, property and planning).
• Experience of line-managing, mentoring or developing junior lawyers or team members.

Additional Information

• Open VN
• Number of Vacancies: 1
• Contact/s: Leyna Stewart

ASW’s may have the right to apply for internal Sellafield Ltd vacancies. Please note if you are an Agency Supplied Worker you are required to attach evidence of all qualifications obtained to support your application. We require a minimum of A*-C (9-4) GCSE in English Language, Maths & Science/IT or equivalent / higher qualification.

As part of the interview, shortlisted candidates will be asked to complete additional preparation. Interviews will be conducted in two rounds with the first being held on Teams over 17th, 18th and 19th of June and the second as a face-to-face interview held at Hinton House, Risley on Wednesday 24th June

As part of the interview, shortlisted candidates will be asked to complete additional preparation. The interview process will include two rounds, the first will be on teams and the second will be face to face.

As part of the interview you will be asked to prepare a presentation – “Your First Three Months – What does it look like and what are your measures for success? Please include your approach to your first three months, what you think you would want / need to do and how can we help you achieve that.”

If you choose to apply for this role and your application is shortlisted by the hiring manager, you will be invited to a competency based interview. The competencies will be issued with interview invites

Please see link to the competency framework for further information:
https://slportal.ssa-intra.net/pub/SC001/00027/Competency%20Framework/Forms/AllItems.aspx

If your technical competency is not in the above framework, please refer to the profession’s share point page for further information.

As part of the interview, shortlisted candidates will be asked to complete additional preparation. Further details will be shared if you are invited to interview.

Sellafield Ltd are recognised as a Disability Confident Employer (Level 3). Disability Confident employers offer an interview to disabled applicants that meet the minimum criteria for a vacancy. Sellafield Ltd define the minimum criteria as the ‘essential skills’ which are listed on the vacancy notice. Whilst completing your application form, you will be able to indicate if you wish to be considered under the disability confident scheme. If you would prefer to discuss this directly with us, please contact the GBS Recruitment team on recruitment@sellafieldcloud.co.uk

Please ensure that you save a copy of this advert for future reference if you make an application for this role.

The closing date for this vacancy is Sunday 7th June 2026.

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