Government Legal Department
Senior Planning Knowledge Development Lawyer (KDL)
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GOVERNMENT LEGAL DEPARTMENT
Senior Planning Knowledge Development Lawyer
Salary: £74,960 National, £76,405 Croydon/London
Job Reference: 481394
Location: Bristol, Croydon, Leeds, London, Manchester
Contract: Permanent
Closing date for applications: Monday 12th October 2026 at 12:00 midday
Much more than law
The Government Legal Department (GLD) is the largest provider of legal services across government, working with all the main Whitehall departments. From energy to security, and from roads and rivers to health and human rights, our work touches on most aspects of public life. Developing and drafting legislation, helping to secure economic and trade relationships, providing legal advice on polices and ensuring value from contracts, our work is as varied as it is stimulating.
Our Legal Operations directorate is dedicated to enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of GLD's legal services and includes Legal Knowledge and Learning (LKL), Legal Delivery, the AI Programme and the Bona Vacantia divisions. LKL equips government lawyers with the relevant knowledge, skills and tools to provide outstanding legal advice to ministers and officials, and as a multi-disciplinary team, we provide a portfolio of services spanning legal learning, knowledge development, online information services and knowledge systems.
Your role
Join us in this significant new role and you’ll enjoy the unique opportunity to develop your skills and expertise as you equip GLD’s lawyers with the planning knowledge and legal training to advance the government’s planning priorities. Collaborating with other senior lawyers and colleagues in our organisation, you’ll focus on building and increasing awareness of planning law knowledge, working to ensure our people are up to date with the latest developments in this area. In detail, this will involve:
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- Collaborating with your colleagues to create, develop and review objectives and action plans
- Monitoring, evaluating, promoting and explaining relevant planning law developments
- Creating, curating and promoting planning law expertise for GLD/GLP lawyers across a variety of knowledge and learning platforms
- Enhancing our efforts to develop client planning law awareness and building on our current gld.digital and legal awareness offer
- Collaborating across GLD to ensure individual legal team needs in relation to planning law capabilities are met effectively and efficiently
About you
This is an intellectually challenging role with a high level of autonomy, and to be a success you should be an inspirational leader and creative self-starter with the desire to enhance your skills in stakeholder engagement, communication and project delivery. With practical experience of advising and managing expertise relating to planning law issues, you should have reliable legal judgement and a well developed appreciation of risk. Able to think strategically and see legal issues in their wider context, you’ll be a confident and sound advisor and capable of using secure legal research to produce timely and fit for purpose legal knowledge resources.
You should be a qualified Solicitor, Barrister or Chartered Legal Executive in England and Wales, and will have completed a training contract, pupillage or qualifying employment, or been exempted from this by the Law Society, the Bar Council or CILEx. You’ll also need a minimum of a 2.1 honours degree in any subject in your first degree (or its overseas equivalent), or evidence of high-level academic or professional achievement, such as a Graduate Diploma in Law, Legal Practice Course or Bar Professional Training Course, any of which must be underpinned by practical experience.
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Chartered Legal Executives are eligible to apply where a qualifying law degree is held or the Graduate Diploma in Law has been completed, or where CILEx Level 6 exams have been passed at 50% or above in Contract Law, Criminal Law, Equity and Trusts Law, European Union Law, Land Law, Public Law and the Law of Tort.
All GLD employees must hold Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS) vetting. If you are based in our London offices you must also hold or be willing to obtain CTC level clearance. More information about the vetting process can be found here.
Benefits
While your previous experience may be relevant, Government work is likely to involve a rapid learning curve as you acquire a number of legal skills and knowledge not required in private practice. However, we will provide you with the support you’ll need to acquire the necessary expertise, and have a thriving CPD-accredited in-house training programme.
GLD encourages its people to develop their skills in a nurturing environment. Other benefits include access to a valuable civil service pension and flexible working arrangements.
Our vision is to be an outstanding legal organisation and a brilliant place to work where everyone can thrive and fulfil their potential. This is an exciting time for GLD, with cutting edge legal work on global issues and a transformation agenda which is ensuring the Department exemplifies the Modern Civil Service.
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