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Gill Aitken

The opportunity to influence public law drew Senior Civil Service lawyer Gill Aitken to the GLS like a magnet – despite taking a salary cut when she left the city.

“I’d been working for six years in a city firm which specialised in product liability pharmaceutical regulation,” she says. “I was due to become a partner, but my heart wasn’t in it. I’d become aware of Government legal work because my firm seconded lawyers to the Department for Health to do medicines work, and they’d found the ethos highly attractive."

“I knew I wanted to make legislation that mattered and to be at the centre of new and exciting policies. So I paid off my mortgage, packed my bags and got myself a job at the Department of Health. That was in January 1993, and I’ve never looked back."

“Within six months I was twice the lawyer I’d been before. My first job related to children’s welfare, and the first regulations I drafted were to do with complex surrogacy arrangements. That meant I had adapt to my new world very quickly - but it was fascinating work of real importance. I loved the variety and responsibility.”

Gill stayed at the Department of Health (DH) for 11 years, during which time she covered just about every area of health policy. “DH lawyers are employed by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), an arrangement which dates back to when the two Departments were one: the Department for Health and Social Services,” she says. “It was an interesting place to be, and I quickly gained the public law skills which enable GLS lawyers to move with relative ease from one area of work to another."

“I am essentially an advisory lawyer. My role is to work with Government policy makers in shaping effective policy, and then making that policy work in legal terms using the range of regulatory options - from advertising campaigns to primary legislation. The emphasis for lawyers is increasingly on being integrated with Government policy teams and enhancing their work rather than keeping to a purely legal role.”

Within two years of joining the GLS, Gill was promoted to the Senior Civil Service and became the legal adviser to the Medicines Control Agency (now known as MHRA - the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency). This introduced her to a corporate role through her participation in board meetings. It also broadened her skills through the need to bring together the agency’s enforcement and advisory legal work and to represent it in Europe.

She then went on to do three more Senior Civil Service jobs in the space of six years. “The ‘biggest’ of these involved heading up a team which advised on hospitals and other NHS bodies,” she says.

“The team took a Bill on NHS reform through Parliament every year for three years, including the 2003 Bill which created foundation hospitals. The job was pressured but filled with buzz and excitement. The lawyers were at the heart of the policy making, and this convinced me that this was the best and most professionally rewarding way to operate.”

Gill took up her current post, heading one of two Legal Directorates within the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), in September 2004.

“I have a corporate role both within the Department and within the GLS,” she says.

“As a member of the GLS Human Resources Group, for example, I’m actively engaged in developing a more joined-up approach to a range of HR issues affecting GLS lawyers across Government Departments, not least through the Government’s Professional Skills agenda. In Defra I am a member of the group led by Sir Brian Bender as head of profession for policy delivery - seeking to professionalise the policy function - where I promote the contribution of lawyers and represent their interests. A far cry from the city!"

“When I was at the Department of Health, I had a flexible working arrangement. At periods I worked part-time but reverted to full-time when the job required it, while doing as much of the extra as possible from home. I had to be prepared to work full-time in my current job, although I still work from home occasionally."

“Overall, the GLS gives lawyers the opportunity to have a good work/life balance as well as to develop their careers in a structured way. It’s developing fast as an organisation, helped greatly by LION (Legal Information Online Network), which gives lawyers access to colleagues and areas of knowledge right across Government. Like the GLS itself, it’s a fantastic resource to have.”