Immigration is a particularly niche area of law and is a service not available at most law firms. Many firms that do offer immigration do so seemingly as a fringe service or focus purely on ‘business immigration’ as an add-on to their employment law department. Not so at Truth Legal, where helping immigrants is a core value and focus of ours.
Because the immigration practitioner world is relatively small and niche, we are thrilled when we come across individuals interested in immigration. Immigration does not traditionally have the cachet, or the eye-watering high wages associated with other areas of law. But from our daily experience, we can attest that immigration gets top marks in areas such as making a positive impact on peoples’ lives, and for learning about different cultures. Working in immigration you often feel like you are at a kind of coalface of harsh, uncaring government policies – trying to mitigate their impact and defend the rights of individuals, many of whom are vulnerable.
So, we love to hear from people who have a similar passion for immigration – in particular, we want to hear from anyone either is interested in a career in immigration, and/or who wants to write a blog for us on immigration.
Could you work for us?
The Immigration department was launched in December 2019, by me, when I joined Truth Legal. I had previously worked for various immigration-specialist firms, including Bindmans LLP, Asylum Aid and Refugee and Migrant Justice.
And despite the pandemic, things have gone well for this fledgling department. At the start, it was me on my own, but we now have a full-time immigration solicitor in Michelle Lee, as well as a part-time immigration consultant, Jennie Chau.
We intend to grow the team so that we can help more people and become the leading immigration specialists in the UK. Apart from anything else, we need a bigger team so that we can meet the demands of a legal aid contract, which will in turn allow us to do more asylum and human rights work.
Now, there is an elephant in the room right now – at the time of writing, we do not have an immediate vacancy. However, more and more clients are coming to us for support. The overall trajectory looks healthy: further expansion is imminent.
Who do we look for?
First and foremost, you must have a genuine interest in immigration. This could be from prior experience helping migrants (paid or unpaid), or perhaps from writing blogs on immigration.
Our next hire is most likely to be in a junior admin/paralegal role, with the potential for a training contract/solicitor qualification. A degree might help – and where we are considering graduates, we are particularly interested by individuals who have a non-law degree. But we are most interested in people motivated by a wish to help people – for which no degree is necessary.
You should be able to write clearly and concisely (or at least have some potential and be keen to hone your skills).
Could you write a blog for us?
By late 2020 we were considering expanding the Immigration team. Michelle then wrote a couple of blogs for us which that impressed us such that we felt compelled to offer her a position as a solicitor within the Immigration team, without further prevarication.
We welcome articles on immigration law (and in fact in other areas), whether you have half an eye on a job here or not. We appreciate that writing content can seem daunting, but we will support you. The benefits of writing a blog for us are:
- Establishing your credentials with employers (including us) – Truth Legal rank highly on Google. Write a blog for us and chances are that the blog will appear high on the search results, when an employer inevitably ‘Googles’ your name.
- We will pay you – if we publish your article, then we will pay you a modest but meaningful fee for your work.
- We will support you in writing a strong article – we will review your article and suggest amendments. You will get the credit, but it will be a collaborative process.
You might write about a specific new law or court case. You might write a thought piece. If you fancy a shot, run your idea past us first – check you are on the right lines. Have a look at the blogs section of our website. Many blogs have been written by law students rather than Truth Legal employees: Latest News
Get in touch
Whatever your interest, please do get in touch. We love to hear from people who are interested in immigration.
Louis MacWilliam,
Head of Immigration, Truth Legal Solicitors
