There comes a moment when the time for talking is over and you have to set out your plans. It’s the season for political manifestos and it seems to be catching.

At workshops or conferences, whenever people ask the question, ‘What do we need to make the legal advice sector work better?’, the answer that always comes to mind is, ‘More lawyers!’ Nowhere is this more true than in North Wales, where we have fewer social welfare solicitors than in more urban areas, and legislation that is increasingly divergent from the rest of the UK and comparatively untested. Smaller private firms are finding that housing legal aid is becoming unsustainable. When you add those things together, it’s easy to see why I’ve likened finding a housing solicitor in North Wales to discovering a unicorn.

Imagine my surprise, then, when our recently advertised vacancies yielded not just one unicorn, but a small herd! I’m never one to count my chickens (or unicorns), but I’m confident that we are putting together a small but highly experienced and talented team. The relief is palpable.

My glee at finding these mythical creatures is tempered by the knowledge that we’re pulling much-needed housing lawyers from other organisations that need their skills and experience just as much as we do. There simply aren’t enough to go around. Having seen staff leave and a service become precarious, I know the sinking feeling of someone handing in their notice all too well.

We all know staffing is one of the greatest challenges, but what are the nuances within that bleak picture that show us where the key to unlocking this problem might be? I hear from other charities and private law firms that their workforces have a gap in the middle. There are (a decreasing number of) seasoned housing solicitors who’ve been in the game for a long time and know it inside out. There are caseworkers and recent graduates (not many, but still …) who come into social welfare law because it chimes with their passions and values.

What’s missing is what should be in between: mid-career lawyers doing the day-to-day work, building up their expertise, ready to become the next generation of supervisors and leaders. This essential tranche of the workforce either becomes burnt out, follows the money (and who can blame them), or gets promoted to senior positions sooner than would be ideal, because one senior solicitor retiring creates another advice desert. The model of career progression in social welfare law doesn’t function anymore (if it ever did).

What do we change that? As a relative outsider, here is my manifesto:

I’m sure none of these suggestions are new. I know there are pockets of innovation. There might not ever be enough social welfare lawyers to go around. Maybe a joined-up, sector-wide approach to recruiting and training the next generation of people using the law as a tool for social justice might help?