Head of Legal

About Foxglove

Foxglove is a litigation and campaigning nonprofit that exists to make the use of technology fair. When governments and major tech companies use technology to abuse their power, we investigate, litigate and campaign to make it right. 

Big Tech companies have become so large – gobbling up a huge slice of the global marketplace and an unprecedented treasure hoard of user data – that they’re now more powerful than many states. The harmful effects of this concentration of power are everywhere – threats to our democracy, to our privacy, decimated workers’ rights and platforms rife with disinformation and hate. Governments are ploughing ahead with the use of algorithms and mass data systems to cut costs and increase efficiency often resulting in digital tools that entrench unfairness and leave the most vulnerable in society in crisis. All these problems are only getting worse with generative AI.   

Foxglove works to bring the rule of law to the tech and AI giants who have upended our public square, workplaces, and social lives. We fight to reduce these anti-democratic behemoths’ size and power and we challenge them for abusing their workers. We also work to ensure public bodies use data and algorithms openly, fairly, and legally. 

We have a strong track record. We’ve launched landmark cases seeking structural changes to big tech’s harmful business models, supported 180+ Facebook content moderators fired for trying to form a union to sue Facebook and their outsourcing company, Sama – winning world-first judgements. We helped launch Africa’s first content moderators’ union and are urging UK and EU regulators to halt Big Tech’s maneuvers to hoover up generative AI as it has the rest of our online world. We have forced disclosure of secret contracts between tech giants and the NHS, stopped a racist Home Office visa streaming algorithm, helped make grading fair for UK A level students, forced the government to pause the NHS Data Grab and challenged the Department of Work and Pension’s use of an algorithm unfairly flagging disabled people for benefit fraud investigations.   

We are a small but growing team of lawyers, communications experts, and campaigners. Our work is global, and we work in partnership with lawyers, civil society, unions, and impacted people. 

About you:

You are an experienced lawyer with a strong interest in using the law to hold governments and companies to account. You understand change doesn’t only take place within the walls of the court. And that movements only succeed when they’re inclusive, making as many people as possible see they have a stake in these issues. You are a self-starter with the initiative to find opportunities, but the team-spiritedness to contribute to a shared goal and celebrate others’ work. If that’s you, and the Foxglove mission excites you, we would love to hear from you.

The role:

The post holder will be responsible for managing Foxglove’s legal team and legal work. You will drive forward a range of cases, including the development of case theories, investigating and collecting evidence, drafting correspondence, evidence and submissions. You will also be responsible for coordinating and managing external legal teams. UK and international travel is required. 

Key responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

Case Development and Management

• Listen to affected communities, unearth issues caused by tech injustice, and come up with innovative legal solutions.
• Build and maintain relationships with impacted community members, unions, other lawyers, experts, co-counsel, intervenors, civil society organisations and the public.
• Draft and comment on technical and legal documents and correspondence.
• Effectively work with the co-Executive Director to implement Foxglove’s legal strategy
• Manage and supervise the legal team.
• Lead evidence gathering.

Compliance and Risk Management 

• Manage court deadlines and time limits where applicable.
• Ensure regulatory compliance in all aspects of your work and our cases.
• Always maintain the strictest standards of client confidentiality.
• Always maintain the strictest concern for and awareness of data protection and Foxglove policies.
• Keep up to date with the global litigation landscape concerning tech justice.

Other

• Help ensure communities’, workers’ and affected individual’s voices are heard in our campaigns, communications and advocacy work.  
• Contribute to social media posts, blogs and op-eds. 
• Speak to the press about Foxglove’s cases as required. 
• Contribute to the development of materials for advocacy purposes including video or audio testimony, photographs etc.
• Other ad hoc tasks as required.

Person specification

• A strong interest in using the law to hold government and companies to account. 
• Qualified lawyer in any jurisdiction with at least senior legal experience. 
• Ability to learn new areas of law quickly and develop new areas of work.
• Demonstrable knowledge in conduct of cases from initial advice through to trial.
• Relevant experience in analysing complex factual and legal situations and helping to advise clients in accordance with their aims.    
• Experience in dealing sensitively with clients and experts. 
• Experience in working on complex matters, which require analysis of large amounts of documents and data.
• Excellent communication skills, demonstrated by ability to communicate accurately, clearly and concisely, both verbally and in writing. 
• Excellent time management skills demonstrated by ability to organise and prioritise a complex workload and work to tight deadlines.
• Experience in working and contributing to a team environment.

Length and Salary

The role is permanent. The annual salary is £70,075 per annum less any required deductions for income tax and national insurance. 

Our team works remotely, and this role can be based anywhere. We would prefer you to work within or close to UK office hours, but this is flexible. Our team travels every two months for team days and twice a year for team retreats. This role will include significant UK and international travel. Only candidates with the right to work in their location will be considered.

How to apply

Please make your application via Applied here, answering the application questions and uploading your CV. We will not review applications sent via a job board or to our email. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis with first round interviews likely to take place in mid to late-May for selected candidates.

Foxglove does not use AI in its recruitment processes, except to detect applications for AI use. As a tech-justice organisation, we ask the same of our candidates.

Foxglove is growing and we are striving to build a team that is inclusive. We will create a diverse and adaptable environment where we support people to do their best work. We believe an effective and creative team is made up of people from different walks of life. You can read more about how we work and what we offer our staff here. 

If you require any reasonable adjustments to complete this process, or have any questions, please get in touch with us: applications@foxglove.org.uk. 

If you would like to know more about how we process your data as part of the recruitment process you can read our recruitment data use policy here.