Principal Planner

Principal Planner

£46,175 - £49,695 per annum (Pay award pending)

37 Hours per week PermanentWitney

Are you motivated by the reward of delivering an exceptional planning service?

West Oxfordshire District Council is focused on enabling a fulfilling and meaningful quality of life for our residents with opportunities for all to flourish. We provide a range of important services including planning, housing, waste and recycling collections, leisure, community safety and environmental health.  The Council has an ambitious Council Plan focused on a range of important priorities including putting residents first, climate and ecological action, affordable housing, and helping our economy to grow.  We want to deliver excellent services whilst ensuring the financial sustainability of the Council.  We also want to continue working in close partnership with our local communities and other important partners.

About the role…

A rare opportunity to join our excellent planning service at West Oxfordshire District Council as a Principal Planner, leading a fantastic tight knit team to shape a variety of high value and complex planning cases, whilst delivering an outstanding service of customer care through an innovative and practical solutions based approach.

This permanent role offers the flexibility of working within the offices at Witney and agile working, allowing you that extra freedom and work life balance.

You will head up one of the development management teams and lead on a variety of high profile and challenging projects as well as looking at innovative ways to make a difference in delivering quality and sustainable places.

The successful candidate will be accustomed to dealing with a wide range of pre-application enquiries, planning applications, appeals and post application work. You will need to be self-motivated and a well organised worker with a positive outlook who is able to deliver good performance and high standards. Experience of Planning Committee and Appeals is required and the candidate will be a member of the RTPI or eligible for membership.

Fundamentally, we want to give you the tools to support you, harness your potential and grow within your role long term.

You will need…

• Planning or related degree.
• Full Membership or eligibility for of the RTPI.
• Substantial (likely to be more than 5 years) relevant professional experience.
• Experience of being involved in continuously improving services and developing products to meet customer need
• Ability to remain calm and confident when dealing with challenging customers and environments
• Ability to resolve complex issues by negotiation
• Deliver commitments and take ownership of own caseload, reshaping of plans to deliver required outcomes

Special Conditions…

• Ability to travel
• This post designated as politically restricted in accordance with the Local Government and Housing Act 1989. Politically restricted post holders are restricted from canvassing on behalf of a political party or for a person who is, or seeks to be, a candidate for election to a local authority, the House of Commons, or the European Parliament.

For more information about this role please see the Job Description/Person Specification.

What can we do for you…

• Agile working allowing a mix of home and office working
• Flexible working arrangements (depending on the role)
• 26 days paid annual leave (pro rata if you are working part time) plus bank holidays, which increases to 29 days after five years’ service and 32 days following 10 years’ continuous service
• In addition you will have an extra two volunteering days a year for you to support a charity of your choice
• Renewed again for another year there is a Health cash plan giving you cash back on health, dental and eye care
• Generous contributory local government pension scheme
• Employee Assistance Programme 24/7, providing positive, preventative and supportive advice and counselling to deal with everyday events and issues
• Cycle to work scheme
• Salary sacrifice car lease scheme with significant tax and NI savings to be made on electric cars
• Generous sickness cover above statutory entitlements

Terms and conditions apply

These are just a handful of the benefits that you can enjoy when you join us!

If you feel this is the role for you please email your CV and supporting statement detailing how you meet the criteria above by clicking on the ‘Apply for this Position’ icon within this page.

Your application will not be considered if you have not provided a supporting statement, in addition to your CV.

Accredited of the disability confident scheme, we guarantee to interview all disabled applicants who meet the minimum criteria for the vacancy/ies - Please state this within your covering statement or in a separate email.

Safer recruitment practices are applied to all job vacancies. Successful candidates will be required to complete a pre-employment medical questionnaire; provide references;  proof of identity; nationality and immigration status; three years’ employment or education history (if applicable) and, in some cases, verification of criminal record.