I am a trainee solicitor, currently in my third seat of my training contract. I have previously undertaken seats in Real Estate Finance, and Tax, Trusts, and Wills, and am now in the Health & Social Care team. The Health & Social Care team sits within the firm’s Commercial Group, which is made up of the Corporate team, the Health & Social Care team, and the Employment team.

What does the Health & Social Care team do?

The Health & Social Care team’s work is very varied and covers a range of different matters relating to care.

Firstly, the team represents care providers and its day-to-day work involves working with the regulations and assessments carried out by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), which is the regulator for health and social care in England. CQC inspects care homes to ensure that they are adequate and providing the sufficient care that would be expected for that kind of care home. The team works with a variety of different care homes, including those for more able-bodied residents, to residents with dementia and Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DOLS) in place, to care homes for younger adults with special needs. The team helps care homes respond to draft inspection reports from CQC, where the home feels that the inspection was unfair or incomplete, by drafting a response in the form of pointing out the factual inaccuracies in the report.

The Health & Social Care team also helps care homes with criminal enforcement from CQC. CQC can bring a prosecution against a care home or its Registered Manager if certain regulations are breached. In such cases, the Health & Social Care team would support the client to respond to the enforcement action accordingly. CQC has significant prosecution powers, so it is important that we help clients to act quickly to protect the reputation of providers from adverse publicity including press releases and BBC/ITV TV news interviews, for example!

Secondly, the Health & Social Care team works with children’s services, including children’s homes, supported accommodation for 16-18 year olds, and early years education. These services are registered with and inspected by Ofsted. The team works with children’s services to ensure that they become properly registered and have the right people employed as the Registered Manager and Responsible Individual, for example. The team helps services where Ofsted may have refused their registration, by submitting written representations as to why the refusal may have been unfair or is factually inaccurate. The team also helps services where they have recently undergone an Ofsted inspection, and want to complete a factual accuracy check in response to the outcome of the inspection or complain about the inappropriate conduct of the inspector. The team also has experience in challenging Ofsted inspection reports in the High Court through judicial review action and breach of contract claims against the Department of Education.

The Health & Social Care team also supports their clients through the Coronial inquest process. An inquest is an investigation by a Coroner (similar to a judge) into a death that might be unexpected, or under certain statutory circumstances. The team represents care homes and children’s homes that may be involved in the inquest. The team helps the home with applying to have Interested Person status in the inquest, which means that they have certain rights in the Coroner’s Court including having access to the disclosure bundle and being able to ask questions during the inquest hearing. The team helps the home prepare any witnesses for the inquest, by explaining the purpose of an inquest and what it will involve and drafting witness statements. This can be emotive work, where sometimes a witness may have found the deceased individual or seen them just before their passing. The team then either represents the home at the inquest or instructs a barrister to attend Court and facilitate any preparation conferences with witnesses and the barrister. The team can also assist the home if there is particular media interest in an inquest.

The Health & Social Care team would also help the home after the inquest too, depending on the outcome. The Coroner can make a Prevention of Future Deaths report, which means that the Coroner considers that an organisation needs to make certain changes or take action to ensure that prevent any future similar deaths. If this happens, the Health & Social Care team would help the home in responding to the Coroner and drafting submissions and further witness statements. The team can also advise the home if the Coroner gives an adverse finding, such as a neglect rider.

The Health & Social Care team also undertakes a variety of other matters, including safeguarding matters for private individuals, SEN (special education needs) matters and challenging local authorities and EHCP (education, health and care plans), and also regulatory due diligence projects for transactions in the sector and procurement matters. The team also assists clients with the judicial review process.

My Experience

This has been a great third seat for me, where I have more confidence and experience of working with the firm and a better understanding of concise drafting and the importance of empathetic and clear communication.

I have been able to hone my communication skills and adapt accordingly depending on my audience; whether it be a barrister or their clerk, or a care home manager or other members of staff that may have witnessed a traumatic death or an altercation. I have attended multiple client meetings and conferences with witnesses and with counsel. It is a seat where it is important to create and maintain professional relationships, but also remain empathetic to the potentially distressing nature of the matter in question. I am also able to ring back enquiries to obtain further information about the advice they may need and direct them to the right fee earner.

I have had the opportunity to draft a variety of documents, from witness statements to instructions to counsel on inquest matters, to drafting factual accuracy tables in response to CQC draft reports and complaint letters to Ofsted. I have been involved in drafting response letters to complainants and endeavouring to respond to all a complainant’s concerns as comprehensively as possible.

I have had the amazing opportunity of attending an inquest in person, along with our instructed barrister and our care home’s witnesses. This was a great opportunity to visit a Coroner’s Court in person and to first-hand experience the workings of a Coroner’s Court and the way that Coroners deal with evidence and witnesses and relatives of the deceased. I was able to liaise directly with our witnesses and keep them updated as to the proceedings of the day’s hearing. This experience allowed me to hone my professionalism and emotional maturity, understanding that the death was a rather unusual one and one that needed to be treated with sincerity and respect.

This is a particularly niche area of law and one in which the fee earners in the team are experts on. The team regularly provides training for care home managers or senior head office staff and speaks at events and seminars. It is a team where commercial awareness is really important, particularly in order to keep up to date with CQC and Ofsted regulations and changes. I personally have enjoyed the learning aspect of this seat and recognise how important it is to stay up to date, in order to provide the most helpful advice to your client.

Training Contracts

It is thanks to the varied and personalised training contract at Lester Aldridge that I have been able to experience this diverse and niche area of law and gain so much hands-on experience. The window for training contracts beginning in 2027 is now open and applications with close on 26 May 2025. Find out more and apply here.

Contact Us

If you would like to find out more about the Health & Social Care team or need any assistance, please contact the Lester Aldridge team at online.enquiries@LA-law.com.