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A day in the life of a housing and social welfare solicitor

Read about Thea's work as a housing and social welfare solicitor

Photo of Thea from GT Stewarts

Hi. Please tell us what your role is and who you work for.

I'm Thea and I am a housing and social welfare solicitor at GT Stewart Solicitors. Housing covers issues related to homelessness, possession proceedings, disrepair, and anti-social behaviour injunctions. The focus of my role involves bringing statutory reviews and judicial review challenges in the context of homelessness, suitability of accommodation and housing needs assessments.

What does your law firm do?  

GT Stewart Solicitors is a leading legal aid law firm in the areas of housing, crime, actions against the police, community care, mental health, and family law. We are known for our tenacity when representing those engaged in challenging the State or defending themselves against a prosecution.

What attracts clients to this firm?

In the GT Stewart housing team we are dedicated, consistent, and will go above and beyond to ensure a client receives the best outcome. In the team we also have some of the leading lawyers in housing law and individuals with decades of experience. The supervision structure and general morale within the team is great, and I think all these things reflect in the outcomes we achieve, and why clients are attracted to the team.

It is also important to keep in mind that most clients present to us at their lowest point when they have reached homelessness. By this stage, nearly all our clients have been failed by one organisation or another, whether that is a local authority, housing association or other advice agency. They may not have been listened to properly, and many will feel like they don’t have options.

One of the most fundamental skills of a solicitor is being able to listen carefully, take accurate instructions, and make sure sufficient time is taken to action those instructions and advise clients of their options. Given the housing situation in London, and severe lack of legal aid housing law solicitors, we are nearly always working at capacity, so as a team we do not actively seek out new cases or business. However, in the housing team at GT Stewart, we are exceptionally careful to ensure we do not work over capacity, and that each client’s case is dealt with considerately and with care so that clients know they are being properly listened to. 

What attracted you to a career in law generally and to your particular area of law specifically?

I studied philosophy at university with the intention that I would go into law. The skill of a lawyer is being able to present, in as few words as possible, complex arguments and make them accessible to a lay person. The same skill is required in philosophy.

I think most young people wishing to study law do so with the intention of helping people, normally within a human rights type of field, and that was the same for me. During my GDL studies at BPP University I did an internship at Bristol Law Centre and it was there that I realised human rights do literally start at home. It was here that I first had exposure to housing law and realised how important the area is to me. 

What was your route into law?

I went around the houses quite a bit in order to qualify as solicitor. Originally, I had intended to become a barrister. I studied an undergraduate degree in philosophy at Birmingham University, with the intention of studying law afterwards. I then obtained a scholarship from Lincoln’s Inn to study the GDL which I did full-time at BPP in Bristol.

After completing the GDL, I completed Part 1 of the BPTC with The Inns of Court College of Advocacy. Before starting Part 2, I realised that I wanted to gain more experience in social welfare law, and I obtained a paralegal position at GT Stewart Solicitors. I quickly realised what I enjoy most is talking to our clients and seeing their cases through to the end. I realised that the barristers I instruct rarely speak to clients, and that my skillset was far better suited to the role of a solicitor than a barrister. I looked into routes to qualifying. 

At the time, Young Legal Aid Lawyers had just announced their new qualifying fund linked with City of London Law Society and BARBRI called the Social Welfare Solicitors Qualifying Fund or ‘SWSQF’ for short. I applied to be part of the first cohort of the SWSQF programme. My application and interview were successful and I received a scholarship which paid for me to study the SQE part-time alongside my full-time position at GT Stewart Solicitors. I passed SQE1 and SQE2 at first attempt and qualified as a solicitor in March 2024. 

What attracted you to this particular law firm?

GT Stewart Solicitors is a leading legal aid law firm with an excellent housing team. I only had an interest in doing legal aid housing and public law work – nothing where I would have to represent landlords or local authorities – and GT Stewart seemed like a good fit.

At the time I could see that they were expanding and also willing to pay competitively for the sector. The firm also has an emphasis on in-house recruitment and progression, which is very important to me.

I got the paralegal position and after two years decided to apply for the trainee position alongside my SQE course. My supervisor was really supportive, and the team was flexible in relation to making time for my examinations.

The firm signed off on my QWE and then promoted me to the position of solicitor after I qualified in March 2024.

What do you think made you stand out from others wanting to work for the same law firm? 

What made me stand out was my willingness to want a long-term career in legal aid, and passion for social welfare law. This was demonstrated by my involvement in social justice groups throughout university etc.

I also did very well at university in terms of my academic results. I placed second in my cohort and used my application to the firm to demonstrate my ability to write succinctly and with conviction.

Lastly, I think my interview also went very well. At the end of the day when an employer is recruiting for a new position, they want to fill the position with someone that they think they will want to work alongside day in day out. In the interview I came across as friendly, knowledgeable, and willing to work hard to help others.

It is also important to keep in mind that to have a successful career as a legal aid solicitor, you must be able to gain the trust of some of the most vulnerable people in our society. These may often be people with mental health challenges or survivors of serious trauma.

Soft social skills, like gaining trust and knowing how to listen, are, in my opinion, essential for the role, and I think these soft social skills came across clearly in my application and during interview. 

Please provide some insight into the training you received leading up to qualification as a solicitor. 

In legal aid law firms, due to the nature of the sector and the lack of funding, as a paralegal you are given a lot of interesting and important tasks from day one. Most of these tasks will be client facing and will often require you to deal with challenging client situations. In that sense, you are thrown in the deep end a little bit, and your client care skills are tested immediately.

Notwithstanding that, at my firm there is an excellent supervision structure in place and responsibility never lies with paralegals or trainees. The buck stops with the solicitor who is responsible for the case, and it is them who will guide trainees and paralegals and ensure that tasks are carried out correctly and competently.

Within my team we have regular ‘knowledge sharing’ sessions and paralegals and trainees are actively encouraged and given time off to attend housing law seminars and conferences.

My entire training schedule was done within the housing team. I did not do any other seats in any other department of the firm. I met all my QWE as a housing paralegal and then as a trainee solicitor in the firm. Prior to becoming a SQE trainee, I had already worked for 2 years as a paralegal in the team and had enough QWE to qualify via the SQE route. This meant that when I started my trainee position, my position lasted for as long as it took me to complete SQE 1 and SQE 2 assessments. 

My training schedule was informal and consisted of my day-to-day casework, alongside attending additional seminars and conferences in housing law. I also completed a training diary and presented this to my supervisor before she signed off on my QWE.

The trainees who qualify via the LPC route at my firm have a more structured training programme and will usually spend time in different departments. At the end of the LPC course they then must take the Professional Skills Course. I did not have to do this as part of the SQE route. 

What additional training have you done, if any, for your particular legal specialism?

We regularly undertake in-house training and ‘knowledge sharing’ sessions. Recent sessions have involved the role of experts and how to obtain the best information from expert reports.  

We also attend specialist conferences and seminars with the Housing Law Practitioners Association (HLPA), Junior HLPA, and with barristers’ chambers who have specialisms in housing law such as Doughty Street Chambers and Garden Court Chambers.

I am personally a member of the Young Legal Aid Lawyers group and Junior HLPA who have regular meet ups.  

Describe a ‘typical’ day at work in your area of practice

There truly is no ‘typical’ day, however, I normally start my day at 9am by checking my electronic post tray and cleaning up my mailbox. I will have flagged what work requires my urgent attention, and tasks that I intend to complete that day.

I have an electronic task list. I will check which tasks I need to complete myself and which tasks I can delegate to a paralegal colleague. The tasks I delegate will usually be more of the administrative tasks like billing files, opening files, chasing documents and SARs, calling the court etc.

Most of my cases involve homelessness challenges and judicial review – for example I normally have 2 or 3 cases at any one time in which I am challenging the failure of a local council to provide my client suitable temporary accommodation. Those types of challenges often require urgent work to prepare and file an application in the High Court.

For judicial review applications, I will have to attend on my client and obtain emergency legal aid funding. A paralegal will assist me to complete the legal aid funding application and check that the client is financially eligible for assistance.

Once legal aid funding is in place, I will contact a barrister’s chambers and seek counsel’s assistance to draft the ‘Statement of Facts and Grounds’ of judicial review. This is the document which sets out the decision/failure we are challenging, the legal grounds of challenge and what remedy my client is seeking.  

I will then have an appointment with the client to draft their witness statement which will go with the application. I will consider important medical or supporting evidence to support their application. I will draft the necessary court forms and bundle the application so that it meets the High Court’s requirements.

On days that I do not issue judicial review claims, I will be taking steps to progress other cases. This will involve attending on clients and taking their instructions, drafting advice letters to clients and updating them on developments in their case. I will consider client housing/medical files and decide whether anything contained in them is helpful or important to the case. I will correspond with opponents to meet court deadlines or reach a settlement agreement.  

I will complete legal aid funding applications and liaise with the legal aid agency about the amount of funding available to us. I will check work completed by paralegals and keep in contact with our billing team about cases I have in billing.

At the end of the day, I will normally take at least 15 minutes to read Nearly Legal which is a housing law blog which provides helpful daily updates of developments in housing legislation and case law.  

What has been a particularly memorable matter to work on?

There are many memorable matters. The one which most confirmed my passion for housing law was my first memorable moment as a paralegal. I think it was a few months into starting my paralegal role, and my supervisor asked me to draft a pre-action letter to a local authority. Our client, a survivor of domestic abuse, and her young baby were living in hostel accommodation used to accommodate single males and ex-offenders. Understandably our client felt very scared and vulnerable at this hostel. I drafted the pre-action letter, had it approved by my supervisor, and sent it to the local authority.  Within a matter of hours, the local authority moved our client to a self-contained garden flat on the corner of a big local park. Our client was happy with the property, and she said it felt really safe and secure.  

Tell us about the positive impact a lawyer in your area of law can make to people’s lives.

The impact of a safe home is phenomenal. Without a safe and secure home every other aspect of a person’s life will likely be negatively impacted, whether that is education, family issues, physical or mental health challenges, involvement in crime or falling into debt. As a housing solicitor my goal is to try and ensure that my clients have safe and secure homes to return to at the end of the day. For me, there are few areas of law that are as important. 

What do you enjoy most about your work?

I am a big people person and what I most enjoy is the amazing people that I get to meet in this work. I have great colleagues and barristers that I work alongside – some of the most interesting people I have met. My clients typically are also very generous people simply stuck in impossible circumstances. I really enjoy talking with clients, listening to their stories and goals, and taking steps to assist them.

The most interesting part of my job is learning about the developments in housing law. It is an area of law where there are lots of technical legal points rife for challenge.  I also really enjoy analysing local authority ‘allocations policies’ which are policies explaining how a local authority allocates its social housing stock. I like to pick holes in these policies and if necessary, bring challenges in relation to the lawfulness of them.  

The most rewarding bit is obviously seeing my clients housed in suitable and safe accommodation. This feels particularly rewarding when the client has children, and you know that because of them being housed locally, the children can have stability and security.

The bits I least like are some of the mind-boggling decisions made by local authority homelessness teams, and the absurd bureaucracy that must be navigated when liaising between different departments of the council i.e. getting the homelessness team to talk to social services and vice versa! 

What would you tell an aspiring or newly qualified lawyer about the area of law you are currently working in?

Different areas of law have vastly different salary brackets. This was something I did not really appreciate when studying. Unfortunately, a career in legal aid comes with a salary far more limited than what you can expect as an NQ at a City law firm.

However, for me the pros of a career in legal aid far outweigh the pros of working in a City law firm. Firstly, I have excellent work like balance.  I arrive at work at 9am and leave work at 5.30pm most days unless there is an urgent reason which requires me to stay late. I have a life outside of work and have time for hobbies and exercise.

I love the area of law I work in, and the legal challenges I am involved with day in day out are exciting. I have exposure to the type of litigation that you would not necessarily see as a NQ solicitor in a City law firm.  As a team we have a number of cases in the High Court, Court of Appeal and one in the Supreme Court, and I have the option of attending regularly.

I also know the cases I work on will have a positive impact on a person's life. As a housing solicitor my job is to try and ensure my client safe and suitable housing. For me there is nothing more important than a safe home, so it is unsurprising this passion dictates my career goals.

How do you ensure your well-being when working in such a challenging sector of the law?

Unless there is an urgent reason I need to remain past 5.30pm, I do stick to my contracted working hours. I relax by exercising and getting outdoors mainly!

I also enjoy a pint at a pub with friends and trying out new creative activities like upholstery. I recently did a 12-week adult learning course with Southwark Council which taught me the essentials of upholstery. 

What advice would you give to those wanting to gain experience in your particular area of law?

To have a career in legal aid, my top tip is to simply ensure you have a passion for social welfare and justice issues.

It is likely that your university or college will have a free legal advice clinic or may be linked with a local Law Centre. I strongly encourage you to participate in the free legal clinics or with the law centres. When I studied the GDL I did an internship at the Bristol Law Centre.

If your university doesn’t have established links with a law clinic (my undergraduate university didn’t) I recommend getting involved in student groups which have a social welfare focus.

When I was at Birmingham University I was involved with STAR (Student Action for Refugees) and took part in campaigns and English language sessions at an asylum accommodation centre in town. At these English language sessions, I met so many amazing people from all different walks of life each seeking the same thing – a safe home.

If you aren’t a student or social welfare groups are not available on your campus, I recommend just getting involved in your local community. You could attend community campaign or protest groups, get involved with a local day centre or youth group or maybe help at a nearby food bank.

Getting involved with anything which demonstrates your passion for helping others, particularly those who are marginalised or failed by the State, will be a great first step into a career in legal aid.   

 

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