About the job

Job summary

The Electoral Integrity Programme at DLUHC is a Tier A Government Major Programme in the Infrastructure and Projects Authority’s Government Major Projects Programme Portfolio. During the lifetime of this Parliament we will implement the key Government manifesto and ministerial commitments framed by the Elections Act 2022. The Act requires a substantial programme of change to the way in which elections work in the UK.     

Commitments:   

• The introduction of voter identification at polling stations in Great Britain. 
• The removal of the 15-year limit on overseas electors' voting rights; making it easier for British expatriates to vote in UK Parliamentary elections.
• Improving the security and integrity of elections (including on digital imprints, political finance and intimidation). 
• Ensuring reciprocal voting and candidacy rights of EU citizens. 
• Making the change to the first-past-the-post electoral system for Mayoral and Police and Crime Commissioner elections. 
• Making changes to processes for proxy and postal voting.   
• Improving accessibility of voting in polling stations for disabled voters. 
• Electoral Commission reform. 

The Electoral Integrity Programme will deliver this transformational work, giving effect to the Elections Act and a substantial volume of secondary legislation. The Programme has a substantial digital transformation element and continues to develop and deliver new policy and processes to  support the successful delivery of the Government’s vision.    

This is an exciting time to join our dynamic and growing Programme team and make your contribution to the most significant set of changes to electoral law by the UK Government in many years. This high profile and ambitious programme of work continues to draw significant attention within Parliament, across the media and from a wide variety of commentators interested in how our democracy works.   

The Programme works with a range of stakeholders including local government elections teams, the Electoral Commission, ministers, parliamentarians, the devolved administrations, civil society organisations and other government departments.   

The Business Change Team within the Programme is responsible for ensuring the readiness of the electoral sector to absorb and deliver the changes.   

We are looking for Implementation Advisors to support implementation within the Team, working across each project in the Programme to align activities and with local authorities and valuation joint boards across England, Scotland and Wales, to monitor delivery confidence and support two way communication with the sector.  

Job description

You will be part of a dynamic team in a fast paced environment delivering a major government change programme. You will be working across all aspects of programme implementation working with the Head of Implementation to monitor and report on readiness to internal and external stakeholders including the Senior Responsible Owner and ministers. You will act as a bridge between the Business Change Team and each local authority and valuation joint boards across England, Scotland and Wales, to understand the impact of the changes being delivered.   

You will build strong relationships with electoral services teams, with responsibility for collating and escalating the delivery confidence and risks arising from each local authority or valuation joint board. You will support the Senior Implementation Advisors with engagement in your regions.  

You will work collaboratively with teams and senior officials to deliver relevant and high quality readiness checks, producing dashboards or reports of the local implementation picture.   

This role is a great opportunity to develop your stakeholder management and problem solving skills and build a profile within the wider department.  

 

Key responsibilities may include:  

• Providing high quality, timely and accurate advice and feedback to ministers and senior officials on the impact of changes and the local implementation picture.
• Supporting the Senior Implementation Advisors to monitor the readiness of local authorities and valuation joint boards to absorb the changes in the Elections Bill, via 121 engagement, surveys and other channels.
• Supporting the management of local authority funding allocations via New Burdens grants and Justification Led Bids.
• Creating readiness reports and dashboards for ministers, senior officials and those in the Business Change Team and Programme Management Office.
• Building relationships with electoral services managers in the Business Change Network across England, Scotland and Wales.
• Working with the communications team to contribute to regular written updates and newsletters for circulation to stakeholders across the sector.
• Monitoring and reviewing risk registers, project plans, with knowledge of upcoming milestones, checkpoints and end to end processes.  
• Maintaining an up to date picture of the priorities and concerns of key stakeholders, and an awareness of upcoming risks.
• Ensuring regular contact with key stakeholders, by scheduling meetings, preparing agendas and drafting minutes.  
• Maintain an understanding of the wider delivery context and political environment to be able to align project decisions and activities accordingly.

Person specification

Essential:  

• Good relationship management skills and the ability to build productive working relationships with internal and external stakeholders  
• Excellent planning and organisation skills  
• The ability to absorb details and filter the relevant information  
• Strong written and verbal communication skills including being able to translate complex messages into quality written products and verbal advice to a range of audiences  
• The ability to work flexibly and under pressure on changing priorities and actively prioritise multiple issues/tasks at pace  

  

Desirable:

• Experience producing surveys, dashboards or reports.
• Understanding of project management methodologies, tools, and techniques.

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £32,178, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities contributes £8,688 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

This vacancy is using Success Profiles (opens in a new window), and will assess your Behaviours, Strengths and Experience.

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

Experience (lead element)

Behaviour 1: Seeing the Big Picture

Behaviour 2: Communicating and Influencing

Behaviour 3: Working Together

There is a 250 word limit per question.

  

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

Behaviours: Seeing the Big Picture, Communicating and Influencing, Working Together.

Experience: Yes

Strengths: The strength based questions will require natural responses from the candidates.

 

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

Behaviours: Seeing the Big Picture, Communicating and Influencing, Working Together.

Experience: Yes

Strengths: The strength based questions will require natural responses from the candidates.

 

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.

 

 HEO salary

• The salary for this role is £32,178.
• For existing civil servants, the usual policy on level transfer and promotion will apply and is non-negotiable. If you apply for a role that requires a transfer of location, for example if you are transferring from London to a National location, your salary will be adjusted in accordance with our policy on transfer between HQ pay ranges.

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:

• Wolverhampton
• Darlington*
• Leeds

 

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.

*Please note: The Darlington Economic Campus (DEC) is a pioneering new cross-government hub which will bring together people across departments and public organisations to play an active role in the most important economic issues of the day. The work of the Campus will make a real difference to people both across the UK and internationally. There will be substantial career opportunities and exciting prospects - a career at the Campus means you will be working at the heart of Government, with access to the benefits and fantastic opportunities offered by the civil service.

For further information on the DEC, please take a look at the attached DEC candidate pack.

 

Sift and interview dates:

Sifting is envisaged to take place W/C 19/02/2024 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.

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. 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.