Legal Jobs

Kent Refugee Action Network are looking for an exceptional individual to join KRAN’s senior management and be the full-time lead on advocacy and support, managing a team to deliver effectively for our service users.

Role Summary

You will lead KRAN’s strategic direction and delivery of a variety of advocacy and support services, ensuring safe and effective operation through your Advocacy and Support Team.

The team offers a range of services and interventions to support and empower young refugees and asylum seekers. Services include casework, mentoring partnerships, volunteer support, wellbeing activities, Youth Ambassadors and engagement. A central goal is to amplify the voice of young people with lived experiences.

As a member of KRAN’s senior management team, you will work with service users and the wider team to help shape the overall direction of KRAN, attuned to the evolving needs of young people and sector developments, while deputising for the CEO as necessary.

The deadline for applications is 5pm, Monday 27 May 2024.

Could you be our new Duty Scheme Legal Advisor? You will play a pivotal role in supporting ASAP’s duty scheme at the First Tier Tribunal (Asylum Support) which offers vital, free legal representation for people seeking asylum who need access to justice after being wrongly refused Home Office housing or financial support. 

The Asylum Support Appeals Project (ASAP) is a small national charity which was set up in 2003 to reduce the destitution of people seeking asylum by protecting their legal rights to food and shelter. ASAP delivers three strands of work:

• We offer free, high-quality legal representation at the Asylum Support Tribunal (AST) to people appealing against Home Office decisions to refuse or discontinue their support

• We provide asylum support advice and training to hundreds of frontline organisations, advice agencies and legal practitioners working with people seeking asylum each year. We operate an advice line and online forum (Asylum Support Advice Network -ASAN) for over 1000 members

• We use our strong evidence base to improve policies and procedures on asylum support through closely linked policy work and strategic litigation

Alongside this, we run a women’s project, to ensure we offer a gender sensitive service to destitute women seeking asylum, to train women’s organisations in asylum support law, and to progress policy work for women seeking asylum, currently focused on access to support for those experiencing domestic abuse

We are looking for someone who is committed to access to justice for people refused housing and financial support from the Home Office. You will assist with the day to day running of the duty scheme, ensuring it offers a quality service to appellants and referrers. You will support our volunteer advocates (volunteer solicitors and barristers) to provide high quality legal representation and advice. You will be legally-minded with a strong interest in asylum support and have the ability, after induction and with ongoing supervision from our Head of Legal, to provide advice and legal representation to appellants at the asylum support Tribunal (AST) and answer calls on our advice line. You will feed in to our wider work on asylum support policy and strategic litigation, working collaboratively with colleagues in the policy team to ensure they are kept up to date with issues arising out of appeals.

This is a new, full-time position. Our offices are in East London, near the AST. Under our hybrid working policy, full-time staff work from our offices for a minimum of 2 days per week.

About Reprieve

Reprieve is a UK charity founded in 1999. Reprieve uses strategic interventions to end the use of the death penalty globally, and to end extreme human rights abuses carried out in the name of “counterterrorism” or “national security”.

 Reprieve works with the most disenfranchised people in society, as it is in their cases that human rights are most swiftly jettisoned and the rule of law is cast aside. Thus, Reprieve promotes and protects the rights of those facing the death penalty and those who are the victims of extreme human rights abuses carried out in the name of “counterterrorism” or “national security”, with a focus on arbitrary detention, torture, and extrajudicial executions.

Reprieve’s main office is in London, UK. Reprieve also supports full-time fellows, who work as lawyers, investigators and campaigners in the countries in which we work. We work closely with a number of partner organisations in jurisdictions all over the world, who provide access to beneficiaries, expertise, knowledge and guidance on specific issues or regions. We work in cooperation with relevant government officials, individual lawyers and human rights defenders, as well as individual, corporate and foundation funders to further the cause of our shared goals.

 About the Role

The Africa Death Penalty Team Project Manager is responsible for coordinating Reprieve’s litigation and advocacy in Sub-Saharan Africa. At the moment, the team works on death penalty casework and abolition advocacy in Malawi, Tanzania, and Kenya. Our casework includes work on individual cases on behalf of people facing a death sentence; large-scale projects, such as the Kenya resentencing project, wherein we support stakeholders to ensure 5,000+ people are able to access a chance at reducing their sentence from death via a new sentence hearing; and  long-term regional projects, such as our strategic litigation before the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights, which challenges the mandatory death penalty, torture, and other associated violations of the African Charter.

Regional context

 There is a trend toward the abolition of the death penalty in Africa. In recent years, countries across the continent have taken the decision to limit the application of the death penalty or to abolish it altogether. This has been seen as a turning away from old laws and systems that were imposed by former colonial governments, which obstructed alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, and were designed to remove discretion from the local judiciary. African lawyers and judges are now at the forefront of a wave of progressive jurisprudence on issues related to the death penalty including methods of executions, torture, sentencing practice, conditions of confinement, and intersections of gender, disability, and socioeconomic status with criminal justice. This jurisprudence has become a model for the international movement to limit the death penalty, and is being held up as best practice in jurisdictions around the world.

Contract and location

This is a full-time, permanent role based in Reprieve’s London office. Reprieve operates a hybrid working model with staff working part of the week from home and part of the week from the office. Applicants must have the current right to work in the UK, which will be checked prior to interview.

Your presence is important during core office hours, whether remotely or in the office. You will also be available outside of office hours in the event of an emergency, for example case developments that require urgent action. This is a role that may require travel. 

The annual salary is £50,571 full-time per annum, less any required deductions for income tax and national insurance.

Further details and how to apply

Please see the job description for full details including a person specification and information on how to apply. The deadline for applications is 02 June 2024. 

Applicants should note that CVs, cover letters and other documents cannot be considered.

Job description

Caseworker Role (OISC Level 1, 2 and 3)

About us

The Refugee and Migrant Centre (RMC) is an established, multi award winning charity that provides a safe, welcoming environment to thousands of refugees and migrants living in the Black Country and Birmingham.

Our highly skilled and diverse staff team provide a broad range of services including advice and support on immigration (OISC regulated level 1, 2 & 3), employment, welfare, education, ESOL, housing, homelessness, destitution, citizenship, health and wellbeing.

RMC have been assisting beneficiaries to access and sustain appropriate accommodation and improve their housing and living conditions for nearly two decades. RMC also deals with many aspects of homelessness, destitution, rough sleeping, exploitation, etc.

Why work for us

Our culture is what makes us unique. We encourage an open, honest working environment where people are valued. We're always challenging each other to learn and improve, because we know when we work together, we can deliver better outcomes.

 

 

What you will be doing

All Caseworkers (Levels 1,2 and 3) will be required to carry out the tasks shown below. The skill level to progress from one level to the next level is also detailed below.

· To provide professional and effective OISC regulated casework as well as advice, guidance and support to a broad range of RMC’s service users.

· To assist/support the team and the management to meet the needs of the beneficiaries and achieve targets.

· To support and supervise colleagues on a lower level of OISC regulation and designated volunteers.

· To deliver presentations and represent RMC at meetings/events when required by management.

· To take responsibility of projects related to the job

Working within the team

· To ensure the requirements of OISC are respected and met during the delivery of immigration-related advice and casework.

· To assist the senior colleagues and managers in order to drive efficiency, quality, systems improvement and target achievement.

· To supervise and/or manage colleagues on a lower level of OISC-regulation and designated volunteers.

Casework and advice

· To offer advice & casework to service users with various aspects related to their immigration case.

· To deliver the appropriate level of casework either independently or under supervision, depending on the level of OISC registration.

· To provide appropriate support and mentoring to any caseworkers and/or advisors that are under this role’s supervision.

· To maintain confidentiality in all dealings with service users and ensure their needs are met in a satisfactory and sensitive manner.

Other

· To be responsible for the day to day delivery of specific projects if requested by the Senior Management Team–this is flexible and could change depending on the nature of funding.

· To represent RMC at external meetings and events when required by senior colleagues.

· To maintain effective working relationships with partners and stakeholders.

 

 

 

Flexibility
In order to deliver the stated aims of this post, a degree of flexibility is needed and the post holder may be required to perform work not specifically referred to above. Such duties will fall within the scope of the job within the appropriate pay grade. The job description will therefore be subject to periodic review with the post holder to ensure it accurately reflects the duties that are being performed
___________________________________________________________________

OISC Level 1

Skill / experience Essential Desirable

· OISC Level 1 Accreditation or equivalent

· Commitment to working towards level 2

· Experience of advice work dealing with asylum seekers, refugees and vulnerable migrants.

· Ability to communicate complex information clearly to distressed clients.

· Commitment to equality and diversity.

· A proven high standard of communication skills, including written, oral, presentational and inter-personal skills.

· An ability to self-motivate and work independently.

· Fluent in a community language

· Experience of working in a multicultural environment and sensitivity towards other cultures.

· Educated to degree level or equivalent.

· A proven record of team work and flexibility.

· Excellent listening skills and ability to empathise as well as establish boundaries to avoid emotional over involvement.

OISC Level 2

Essential Desirable

· OISC Level 2 Accreditation or equivalent

· Commitment to working towards Level 3

· Experience of complex advice work dealing with asylum seekers, refugees, vulnerable migrants and ‘outside of rules applications

· Ability to communicate complex information clearly to distressed clients

· Commitment to equality and diversity.

· A proven high standard of communication skills, including written, oral, presentational and inter-personal skills.

· An ability to self-motivate and work independently.

· Fluent in a community language

· Experience of working in a multicultural environment and sensitivity towards other cultures.

· Educated to degree level or equivalent.

· A proven record of team work and flexibility.

· Excellent listening skills and ability to empathise as well as

· establish boundaries to avoid emotional over involvement.

OISC Level 3

Essential Desirable

· OISC Level 3 Accreditation or equivalent

· Experience of delivering complex advice work dealing with asylum seekers, refugees, vulnerable migrants, ‘outside of rules applications’ and representation at tribunal.

· Ability to communicate complex information clearly to distressed clients.

· Commitment to equality and diversity.

· A proven high standard of communication skills, including written, oral, presentational and inter-personal skills.

· An ability to self-motivate and work independently.

· Fluent in a community language

· Experience of working in a multicultural environment and sensitivity towards other cultures.

· Educated to degree level or equivalent.

· A proven record of team work and flexibility.

· Excellent listening skills and ability to empathise as well as establish boundaries to avoid emotional over involvement.