The role
As a Homeownership Litigation Assistant, you'll play a key role in supporting legal action for the recovery of service charges, garage rents, mortgage arrears, and other council debts. You will assist Litigation Officers in preparing documentation and evidence for use in court and tribunal proceedings, ensuring cases are managed efficiently, professionally, and in line with tight deadlines.
You’ll support in drafting and preparing court and tribunal applications, compiling legal bundles, collecting evidence, and helping to prepare the Council’s case for the First-Tier Tribunal (FTT). You'll also assist with administrative tasks such as working with reports, maintaining accurate case records, responding to enquiries, and supporting wider team projects.
In addition, you’ll take ownership of a personal caseload of non-defended claims, issuing proceedings, preparing legal documents, and securing payments after judgment. Your role will involve regular contact with courts, legal professionals, residents, and internal teams, giving you valuable exposure to housing litigation and real-time legal processes.
Key Responsibilities:
- Support the recovery of service charges, garage rents, and other housing-related debts through legal action.
- Assist Litigation Officers in preparing cases for court and tribunals, including gathering evidence and compiling legal bundles.
- Manage a personal caseload of non-defended claims, issuing proceedings and securing payment post-judgement.
- Draft and deliver legal documents, ensuring compliance with strict court and tribunal deadlines.
- Respond to enquiries from customers and internal teams, providing clear and accurate case updates.
- Attend court hearings to observe proceedings and act as a note taker, gaining valuable hands-on legal experience.
How will you make an impact as our Homeownership Litigation Assistant?
You’ll bring the right blend of legal understanding, attention to detail, and practical experience to help us deliver a high-quality, compliant service. To thrive in this role, you’ll need:
- Experience in litigation, leasehold management, or income recovery, ideally within a housing or local authority setting.
- Ability in handling County Court and Tribunal procedures, including MCOL, with an understanding of evidentiary rules.
- Experience preparing court bundles, witness statements, and legal documentation to a high professional standard.
- Strong knowledge of leasehold and freehold tenures, service charge construction, and related legislation or case law.
- Ability to manage multiple case files and deadlines, particularly in non-defended matters, with strong attention to detail.
- Clear and confident communicator, able to explain legal processes to colleagues and residents alike.
- Proficiency using Word, Excel, document management and service charge systems in a fast-paced office environment.
- A proactive approach to customer service, ensuring enquiries are dealt with professionally and in line with council policy.
This is a valuable opportunity to develop hands-on legal experience in a homeownership context within local government. Your contribution will directly support fair, transparent outcomes and make a meaningful difference to our residents.
Additional information
Full time, 36 hours per week, Monday to Friday. This role offers a flexible hybrid working arrangement, with 2 days working from home and 3 days based at our London Bridge office.
Employee benefits:
You’ll join a motivated, driven, and supportive team that values each of its members and strives for excellence. You’ll also be part of a successful, high-achieving service making a real difference to the lives of residents across the borough. In return for all your hard work, skills and experience, you will receive:
- A competitive base salary (pro rata for part time staff)
- Strong supportive senior management team
- Regular one to one supervision
- Professional development & training opportunities
- Clear career development pathways
- Agile and flexible working arrangements
- Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS)
- Season ticket and cycle loans
- Annual Leave starting at 27 days per year, increasing to 35 (with length of service) (pro rata for part time staff)
- Wellbeing programme
- HSF Health plan and eye care scheme
- EAP employee assistance programme, confidential counselling and support
- Social clubs and staff groups
Guaranteed Interview Scheme:
As part of our commitment to inclusion, we offer guaranteed interviews for specific groups of people. To qualify, you'll need to meet the minimum requirements for the role, and identify with one of the below criteria:
- Members of the Armed Forces and veterans
- Are currently in care, or have previously been in care
- If you consider yourself to be disabled or if you have a long-term health condition.
Why Southwark?
Southwark Council is the largest local authority social landlord in London, managing 55,000 homes lived in by 40% of Southwark’s residents. We are home to over 18,300 businesses including iconic London venues such as The Shard, The Tate Modern and Borough Market along with conservation areas, historic buildings, social enterprises and a young, diverse, and growing population.
At Southwark we are committed to making our borough just and fair and are taking positive action to tackle inequalities. Our residents and communities are our greatest asset and the passion we have for Southwark is shared by millions of Londoners who enjoy our outstanding cultural offer, use our hospitals, and attend our universities. Our refreshed borough plan and focus on Southwark 2030 and Southwark Stands Together, underpins all that we do.
Recruitment timetable
Closing date: Friday 11 July 2025 at 23:59*
*We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive sufficient applications for the role, in which case we will move the key dates for the process. Therefore, if you are interested, please submit your application as early as possible.
Interview date: Thursday 24 July 2025
We are an organisation who is passionate about our people and understands that richness of diversity is a requirement to provide the best possible services to our communities. This is demonstrated through our council-wide ambitious commitment to tackle racial inequality in our communities and workforce through our Southwark Stands Together programme. We particularly welcome applications from members of the Black, Asian and ethnic minority communities to increase representation at senior management level in the Council.
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