Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy

The OPSS Chief Legal Officer, Legal & Governance, will report direct to the OPSS CEO and will be responsible for a range of accountabilities and activities that will ensure that the Office for Product Safety and Standards operates within an effective legal and regulatory framework. As head of the legal profession at the OPSS, you will lead and shape our regulatory policies and practices as part of our Leadership Team, bringing a legal voice to that discussion; help structure processes and delivery and provide trusted advice on regulatory and operational matters. You will organise additional legal resource as needed as well as continuing to develop your own legal team, and leading additional teams with a regulatory specialism.

As our Chief Legal Officer, Legal & Governance, key responsibilities will include:

• Providing risk-based, solution focused legal advice to the CEO and OPSS’s Boards on matters of key regulatory and strategic importance to the Office;

• Overseeing the provision of legal advice on all regulatory and operational matters;

• Developing and implementing effective policies and practices that ensure the Office operates in accordance with legal and regulatory requirements;

• Leading and developing effective working relationships with Government Legal Department staff that provide legislation and policy legal advice services to OPSS to ensure a seamless approach to regulatory and policy legal advice;

• Providing advice and oversight of enforcement and prosecution cases, including instructing external Counsel where appropriate;

• Leading a best practice Office approach to data acquisition, processing and sharing, including developing ways to streamline within legal constraints the way organisations working in the product regulation landscape acquire and share data;

• Overseeing the operation of the Office’s complaints and appeals processes and operations and Primary Authority determinations procedures.

You will lead a team based predominantly in Birmingham and London and be responsible for the provision of legal advice in respect of all OPSS delivery. You will report directly to Graham Russell, CEO, and will have direct line management responsibility for several G6 Functional Team Leads. As a key member of the OPSS’s leadership team, you will play an active role in the leadership, management and development of the organisation. We expect all our senior leaders to be:

Inspiring – about our work and its future

Confident – in our engagement with others

Empowering – to allow our teams to deliver

As a departmental office with policy and delivery responsibilities we are working to achieve a supportive, diverse culture that values our staff and the work they do, supports a close engagement with the department but recognises our specific role.

Apply HERE before 11:55 pm on Sunday 20th February 2022.