Legal Counsel
Job Title: Legal Counsel
Location: Barrow-in-Furness (3 days per week onsite)
Salary: £75,000+ depending on skills and experience, plus car allowance and performance bonus
What you’ll be doing:
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Providing legal support and advice across all functions within the Submarines business
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Negotiating, drafting and advising colleagues on a wide range of contractual arrangements with the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) and suppliers
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Advising on regulatory issues, including nuclear, health and safety, product liability and export controls (previous specialist experience in these areas is not essential)
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Helping to drive improvements in business processes and contributing to training on legal and contractual issues
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Working closely with senior stakeholders across BAE Systems, the UK MoD, suppliers and regulators, while acting as a trusted legal advisor
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Playing a central role in maintaining the Submarines business’ licence to trade
Your skills and experiences:
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Qualified lawyer with expertise across a broad span of law and contracting
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Proven experience advising on complex commercial contracts
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Comfortable working in regulatory environments where pragmatic and defensible decisions are required
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Ability to engage effectively with colleagues across diverse functions, from engineers and hazardous materials specialists to commercial, supply chain, finance and tax teams
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Clear communication skills with the capacity to distil and explain key issues
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Able to build trust and influence senior stakeholders both internally and externally
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Collaborative approach, with the ability to take the lead on legal matters within complex projects
Benefits:
As well as a competitive pension scheme, BAE Systems also offers employee share plans, an extensive range of flexible discounted health, wellbeing and lifestyle benefits, including a green car scheme, private health plans and shopping discounts – you may also be eligible for an annual incentive.
The Submarines Legal team:
The Submarines Legal team is operating in a complex, challenging and busy environment supporting the national endeavour of delivering submarines to the Royal Navy. As Legal Counsel within the Submarines Legal team, you will play a key role in supporting some of the most complex and high-profile defence programmes in the UK. We offer relocation support packages across all Submarines roles, subject to meeting eligibility criteria.
Why BAE Systems?
This is a place where you’ll be able to make a real difference. You’ll be part of an inclusive culture that values diversity of thought, rewards integrity, and merit, and where you’ll be empowered to fulfil your potential. We welcome people from all backgrounds and want to make sure that our recruitment processes are as inclusive as possible. If you have a disability or health condition (for example dyslexia, autism, an anxiety disorder etc.) that may affect your performance in certain assessment types, please speak to your recruiter about potential reasonable adjustments.
Please be aware that many roles at BAE Systems are subject to both security and export control restrictions. These restrictions mean that factors such as your nationality, any nationalities you may have previously held, and your place of birth can restrict the roles you are eligible to perform within the organisation. All applicants must as a minimum achieve Baseline Personnel Security Standard. Many roles also require higher levels of National Security Vetting where applicants must typically have 5 to 10 years of continuous residency in the UK depending on the vetting level required for the role, to allow for meaningful security vetting checks.
Closing Date: 23rd September 2025
We reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive sufficient applications for the role. Therefore, if you are interested, please submit your application as early as possible.
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