This division provides a full legal service to the Council. This includes advising councillors, officers and committees and implementing decisions taken (if necessary, by instituting proceedings in the Courts). Specialist expertise in particular subjects may be obtained from private firms of solicitors, or from Counsel, via the legal division.

Below is the hierarchy of the department.

Dept. Dir. Head of Law - Andrew Gardiner

Land Charges Officer - Jacqui Ryan

Assistant Solicitor - Bruce Bennet

Senior Lawyer - Paul Druce

Senior Legal Assistant - Sarah Keenan

Legal Assistant - Karen Shand

PRINCIPAL TASKS (in alphabetical order)

Corporate Legal Advice

The legal division monitors developments in both statute and case law and advises councillors and officers of likely implications of any such developments on the Council's work. Legal staff attend committee meetings to give advice on law and procedure.

Propriety Role

The legal division should ensure good formal procedures within the authority and has a central role in drafting standing orders which govern the conduct of Council and committee meetings, as well as the letting of contracts.

Propriety is concerned not only with identifying actual and potential breaches of the law by the Council, and their prevention, but also with the general oversight of all the Council's decision-making processes, so as to ensure that the Council does not act beyond its powers or create other legal difficulties for itself.

Providing Legal Services

The legal division can give oral or written legal advice on all matters affecting local government, and undertakes conveyancing, landlord and tenant and compulsory purchase work as well as debt recovery and tenancy repossessions in the County Court. It conducts prosecutions for offences under highways, planning, housing, road traffic and environmental law and drafts a variety of agreements and contracts. A Council lawyer may appear to put the Council's case in public inquiries and tribunals, or act as instructing solicitor when briefing a barrister on the Council's behalf in public inquiries, or, Crown Court or High Court cases.

Local Land Charges

The Land Charges section maintains the register of local land charges against which prospective purchasers of property can search and discover whether there are any public law obligations affecting the land. There may for instance be a "financial charge" where the authority has carried out works on the land and not recovered its expenditure, or a "planning charge" restricting the use of the land.

Please visit Land Charges for more information including up-to-date information on the fees charged, e-mail addresses and the turnaround time for searches.