About the job

Job summary

The adviser role includes regular face to face contact with local authorities, stakeholders and civil service colleagues in a variety of locations across the country and can require extensive travel commitments and overnight stays.  This means it is highly likely that you will undertake official business from sites other than your official DLUHC office, alongside homebased working in accordance with DLHUC policies.

 

The job of the Department of Levelling Up Housing and Communities is to create great places to live and work, and to give more power to local people to shape what happens in their area. The Government has committed to eliminating rough sleeping in the term of this parliament, and to fully enforce the Homelessness Reduction Act.

This is an exciting time to join a high-profile team and provides a great opportunity for excellent individuals to work collaboratively across sectors and help influence the shape of homelessness service delivery, and make a real difference to thousands of lives.

The Homelessness Reduction Act came into force in April 2018 and significantly reformed England’s homelessness legislation by placing duties on local authorities to intervene earlier to prevent homelessness in their areas. An early review of the implementation of the Act carried out during 2019-20 found that much had been achieved by local authorities and partners to improve services to prevent homelessness, but there is much still to do.

The Homelessness Advice and Support Team (HAST) provides advice and guidance to local areas implementing the HRA, and the team has continued to work closely with local authorities on delivery of the new duties, improving homeless services and performance. HAST advisers also work alongside the Rough Sleeping Initiative team to support local areas to reduce rough sleeping, and are working with local areas across a range of accommodation programmes to increase the supply of safe and suitable housing.

We are now recruiting for two new advisers to join the HAST team. The roles are offered as a secondment opportunity (on existing salary) or as a permanent contract.

Job description

• This role shall involve: 
  Visiting and working with local authorities across England, providing advice, support and challenge that is relevant to local context and issues.
• Supporting work to embed the Homelessness Reduction Act, including helping local authorities build a preventative problem-solving culture and deliver results for single homeless people.
• Working with local authorities to deliver the government’s target to end rough sleeping, including providing support with bids for DLUHC funded programmes, and holding authorities to account for delivery.
• Supporting local authorities to develop their homelessness strategies and governance, and to collaborate effectively with partners to prevent homelessness.
• Providing targeted challenge and support to help local areas to improve practice and performance.
• Supporting the development and sharing of effective practice.
• Supporting implementation of improved data collection, as well as learning from experience round the country to inform on-going policy development.
• Delivering presentations, workshops and events, disseminating good practice information and advice.
• Effective recording and sharing of key information to support programme management and policy development.

Person specification

The successful candidate will:

1. Have a minimum of 2 years’ experience of leadership at a senior and strategic level preferably within a local authority, including a track record of working in partnership to achieve consistent and sustainable improvements in services and outcomes for homeless people.
2. Be an expert and leader in the field of homelessness, with an understanding of the factors which contribute to individuals and families becoming homeless and a proven track record in developing and delivering services which effectively prevent homelessness and support vulnerable people.
3. Have comprehensive knowledge and understanding of legislation, policy and practice relating to homelessness in England.
4. Have excellent knowledge and understanding of local government, key partners and stakeholders, their roles and interests, and the operational and political context in which services are provided to people at risk of homelessness.
5. Have excellent communication and interpersonal skills, including ability to motivate and inspire individuals and groups and to support the development of partnerships around shared commitments to improve outcomes.
6. Have strong verbal and written presentation skills including the ability to able to speak at conferences and events.
7. Have an excellent understanding of equality and diversity and issues surrounding disadvantage and discrimination, and the ability to advise and support local authorities to provide excellent customer care to all sections of their community.
8. Experience of working within a political environment, providing advice and guidance to Elected Members/Boards and Senior Leadership Teams

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £51,934, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities contributes £14,022 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

Things you need to know

Selection process details

We are for everyone 

 

At DLUHC we value diversity and inclusion and actively encourage and welcome applications from everyone, including those that are underrepresented in our workforce. We promote equality of opportunity in all aspects of employment and a working environment free from discrimination, harassment, bullying and victimisation. 

  

We would strongly recommend that applicants get in touch with the vacancy manager to find out more information about this role.  

 We are for everyone 

 DLUHC want to bring in a diverse workforce at all levels.  

 Our application system is designed to remove as much bias as possible from the recruitment system – this means that a hiring manager does not know your name, your details, see your whole application in one go (or have your CV at review stage unless stated otherwise).  

 

At application stage you will be asked to upload a CV document. Unless stated otherwise in the advert, your CV will not form part of the assessment but will be used for information purposes and only shared with the panel at interview stage. 

 

Your answers are randomised and chunked up. This means that each assessor views sets of responses to questions for example all candidates’ responses to ‘Seeing the Big Picture’ rather than seeing a candidate’s full application. The science behind this is that recruitment can be subject to ordering and fatigue effects and we want to reduce this as much as possible.  

Most of our campaigns utilise multiple assessors and so it is possible that each of your answers would be viewed by different assessors. 

When writing your application, remember: 

• The assessor won’t be reading your answers sequentially.  
• Do not assume that the same assessors will have read all of your answers.  
• If talking about something in your first answer, make sure that you write the second answer as if you had not written the first (and so on!) 

At sift, we will be assessing 

 

Behaviour 1-  Seeing The Big Picture: What are the top three challenges you would advise local housing authorities to prepare for in their work to prevent homelessness over the next two years?

Behaviour 2 - Changing and Improving: Please give an example of a piece of work you have led that has led to sustainable improvements in services and outcomes for homeless people

Technical - As at 31 March 2023, the number of households in B&B accommodation with dependent children increased 131.2% to 3,930 households. Of the households with children in B&B, 1,840 had been resident for more than the statutory limit of 6 weeks. This is up 174.6% from 670 on 31 March 2022, and up 14.3% from 1,610 in the previous quarter. 
What steps could local authorities take to reduce or eliminate the use of unsuitable B&B accommodation for families?

Experience (Lead Sift): Please set out how you meet the person specification requirements on experience, which includes having experience of delivering homelessness services at a senior management and strategic level.

There is a 250 word limit per question. 

 

The interview will be of a blended nature consisting of the following success profiles elements:    

Behaviour – Making Effective Decisions, Leadership, Communicating and Influencing, Working Together

Technical - Yes

Strength - The strength based questions will require natural responses from the candidates.  

Candidates invited to interview will be expected to prepare a presentation 1 hour before the interview. More detail on this will be sent with invite to interview.

 

In the full campaign we will test the below Success Profile Elements: 

 

Behaviours: Making Effective Decisions, Leadership, Communicating and Influencing, Working Together, Changing and Improving, Seeing The Big Picture

Experience:  (if no, remove) 

Technical: Yes

Strengths: Yes

 

We do not consider direct CV applications to our Recruitment mailbox – you must apply for this role via the application link on Civil Service Jobs 

Please note that near miss offers may be made at the lower grade to candidates who do not meet the grade criteria for this campaign. 

Grade 7 salary 

• The posts can be offered as a secondment on existing salary, or as a permanent contract within the salary ranges £51,934 - £61,562 (National) and £57,091- £66,677 (London) depending on location and experience. For existing civil servants, standard terms and conditions on lateral transfer and promotion will apply.

 
Please note that the average employer pension contribution is based upon the National minimum salary for this role. Should your agreed starting salary for this role be different, the average employer pension contribution will be calculated accordingly. If you are a Secondee, this will not apply as you will remain on your home organisation’s terms and conditions.   

 

BENEFITS: 

Transfers across the Civil Service on or after 4 October 2018: 
Any move to DLUHC from another employer will mean you can no longer access childcare vouchers. This includes moves between government departments. You may however be eligible for other government schemes, including Tax-Free Childcare. Determine your eligibility at https://www.childcarechoices.gov.uk 

For further information about the benefits available to DLUHC employees, please see the attached Candidate Pack. 

  

GEOGRAPHICAL LOCATION: 

• London 
• Wolverhampton 
• Bristol
• Manchester 

 

There may be opportunities for candidates to work flexibly depending on the business needs. This will be discussed with the vacancy manager on a case-by-case basis if you are successful for the role. 

SIFT AND INTERVIEW DATES: 

Sifting is envisaged to take place W/C  1/3/2024 with interview dates to be confirmed. All interviews are currently being held remotely via videocall. 

Reserve List 
 
In the event that we identify more appointable candidates than we currently have posts available, we will hold applicant details in a reserve list for a period of 6 months from which further appointments can be made. This may include roles at a lower grade. Candidates placed on a reserve list will be informed of this. Those candidates who do not wish to remain on the reserve list should contact recruitment@levellingup.gov.uk to be removed from the reserve list. 

 

CTC (Counter-terrorism Clearance): 

Important note 

 
Successful candidates for roles based in our 2 Marsham Street building must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is counter-terrorist check and the process can take up to 8 weeks to complete. 
 
Please note that successful candidates will need to pass the CTC security checks – this requires you to have been resident in the UK for the past 3 years. Please refer to the DLUHC Notes on Security Clearance section of our Candidate Pack for further information on Counter Terrorism Clearance (CTC). Thank you. 
 
Candidates should also note that with effect from 1st August 2018 the department will also check all applicants who are successful at interview, against the Internal Fraud Database (IFD) held by the Cabinet Office. In accordance with the Civil Service Internal Fraud Policy, any applicant who is included on the IFD will be refused employment by DLUHC. Please see the Candidate Pack for further information on the Internal Fraud Database. 

 

Candidate Pack Information 

Please see attached Candidate pack for further information. 

Before starting your application it’s very important to make sure that you are eligible to apply and meet the Civil Service nationality requirements. All candidates are expected to read the information provided in the DLUHC candidate pack regarding nationality requirements and rules 

 

Internal Fraud Database 

The Internal Fraud function of the Fraud, Error, Debt and Grants Function at the Cabinet Office processes details of civil servants who have been dismissed for committing internal fraud, or who would have been dismissed had they not resigned. The Cabinet Office receives the details from participating government organisations of civil servants who have been dismissed, or who would have been dismissed had they not resigned, for internal fraud. In instances such as this, civil servants are then banned for 5 years from further employment in the civil service. The Cabinet Office then processes this data and discloses a limited dataset back to DLUHC as a participating government organisations. DLUHC then carry out the pre employment checks so as to detect instances where known fraudsters are attempting to reapply for roles in the civil service. In this way, the policy is ensured and the repetition of internal fraud is prevented.  

For more information please see- Internal Fraud Register 

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check. Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is counter-terrorist check (opens in a new window).

See our vetting charter (opens in a new window). People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window). The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria. The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.