Youth Justice Sessional Worker

Bexley is an outer London Borough with the best of both worlds, located between the hustle and bustle of London and the Garden of England, Kent. Within the borough we have award winning parks, open spaces and listed heritage sites.  

Bexley Youth Justice Service (YJS) is a multi-disciplinary team that works with other agencies including the police, health, and schools to help keep children aged between 10 and 17 years out of trouble.  If a child has committed an offence, we work with them, their families and anyone else affected by the crime to try and prevent them from offending again. 

As part of their court orders, many children must undertake a set number of hours of reparation in the community. An exciting opportunity has arisen to support us with the running of our reparation projects during the week and on weekends. Currently we run reparation activities once or twice weekly, on a weekday, between the hours of 4pm and 7pm, as well as on Saturdays.

As a Sessional Worker, you will be responsible for working alongside children, undertaking a wide range of tasks such as gardening, art & craft, bicycle repair, or cooking.  You will help children learn new skills and develop their confidence and pro-social identity.  

Some young people are required to be seen 7 days a week as part of their court orders or conditions of their court bail, on what is known as Intensive Supervision and Surveillance (ISS) programmes. We occasionally require sessional staff to work with children on a 1-2-1 basis, mostly on weekends to support the running of ISS. This can, for example, include supporting the child to access constructive activities or exploring education/training/employment opportunities.  

Please refer to the Job Description attached for more information. 

For an informal discussion about the role please contact Teresa Creighan, Team Manager, 02030455780, teresa.creighan@bexley.gov.uk.  

We will offer you in return a package that includes a competitive salary, an excellent pension scheme and generous annual leave plus bank holidays. For more information on the benefits package on offer please refer to the We will offer you in return a package that includes a competitive salary, an excellent pension scheme and generous annual leave plus bank holidays.

For more information on the benefits package on offer please refer to the Candidate Information document attached. 

We reserve the right to close adverts earlier than the closing date. 

Preferably, with a youth service qualification, you will have experience of working with children between the ages of 10 and 17 and have excellent organisational, ICT and communication skills.  

It is important that you have a creative and flexible approach, good time management skills and the ability to build professional relationships with children and work in close partnership with other agencies and the voluntary sector.   

For the full list of essential and desirable criteria for this role then please refer to the Person Specification within the Job Description attached. 

Appointment to this post will be subject to the outcome of an Enhanced Disclosure obtained through the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS).  

This authority is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children and young people and vulnerable adults and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment. 

This post is considered by the authority to be a customer-facing position; as such it falls within scope of the Code of Practice on English language requirement for public sector workers. The council therefore has a statutory duty under Part 7 of the Immigration Act 2016 to ensure that post holders have a command of spoken English sufficient for the effective performance of the job requirements. The appropriate standards are set out in the JD/Person Specification. These will be applied during the recruitment/selection and probationary stages.     

Use the ‘Apply for vacancy’ button. 

Please note that the system has a one-hour time limit. We would advise you to prepare your answers separately and then copy and paste into the online form once finalised and have your CV and/or Supporting statement ready to upload. 

If any mandatory fields are missing, a pop-up box will appear at the top of the page advising which sections require completion. Please check your Junk email for any correspondence. 
 
Additional Information 

As a disability confident employer Bexley welcomes applications from people with all disabilities, including hidden disabilities and mental health conditions. We will interview any disabled applicant who meets the minimum criteria. If you require reasonable adjustments to be made to any part of the recruitment process due to your disability, please contact us on  recruitment@bexley.gov.uk