Main area Psychology Grade Band 8a Contract Permanent: Available to band 7 on preceptorship Hours Full time - 37.5 hours per week Job ref 270-TG434-MH
Employer Northamptonshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust Employer type NHS Site HMP Swinfen Hall Town Lichfield Salary £55,690 - £62,682 pa pro rata Salary period Yearly Closing 27/10/2025 23:59 Interview date 10/11/2025
Clinical Lead
Band 8a
Job overview
The Inspires service is part of the national Offender Personality Disorder (OPD) Pathway and comprises of 4 services within HMP Swinfen Hall: a Psychologically Informed Planned Environment (PIPE), a residential treatment (Delta Enabling Environment), a non-residential treatment service (NRTS) and an Enhanced Support Service (ESS) working with service users housed across the prison. Our service users, who are aged between 18 and 28, have histories of trauma and complex presentations.
We are looking for a Clinical Lead for our ESS service which provides psychological interventions and support for a small number of service users who cause significant disruption within the prison. The successful candidate may be an experienced psychologist or psychotherapist eligible for an 8a post or a more recently qualified band 7 as a preceptorship. This is an exciting opportunity for an experienced Psychologist or Psychotherapist to lead a successful, and innovative service working with young adults in prison. The successful candidate will join a large, multi-disciplinary team providing outstanding opportunities for professional development. You will also benefit from being part of NHFT’s Specialist and Secured Services Psychology network.
Main duties of the job
Your role will involve:
· Clinical responsibility for all aspects of the service
· Delivering person centred interventions to young adults presenting with challenging behaviour
· Providing clinical supervision and reflective practice for the team
· Consultation and advice for wider prison
· Delivering training to wider prison
· Service evaluation and development
The service utilises a relational approach and a flexible, person-centred model to meet the needs of individual service users. The ESS team comprises of a Clinical Lead, a Prison Officer, a mental health nurse and an administrator.
You will be expected to provide clinical supervision to the team. This will include contributing to the reflective practice, training and critical thinking of the team and in meetings for service improvement.
You will also need to be able to provide core psychological and therapeutic interventions in line with trauma informed care. In doing so, you will be responsible for adhering to relevant service Operational Procedures and Trust policies along with professional ethics and standards.
Working for our organisation
NHFT is an integrated primary care and mental health Trust, providing physical, mental health and specialty services in both hospital settings and out in the community. Because we put the person at the centre of all we do, we focus on delivering care that is as easy to access as possible. This means many of our services can be provided at home, work or in schools.We also provide health services to various prisons and detention centres in Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire.
NHFT promotes a culture of learning to improve the care and safety of our patients and staff, which focuses on people who enable our Trust to be ‘outstanding’ by supporting opportunity, innovation, development and growth.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
For further information on the advertised role, please refer to the job description located under the Supporting Documents heading. The full person specification can be accessed under the ‘About You’ Section of the document.
Person specification
Experience
* Experience of working in prison setting
* Experience of supervising multi-disciplinary teams including Prison staff
Qualifications
* Professional registration
* Trained and experienced in delivering at least 2 psychological therapies
* Able to work autonomously
* Experience of working in OPD services
By completing an application you are giving authorisation for the transfer of your data. In submitting an application form, you authorise us to confirm any previous NHS service details via the Electronic Staff Record (ESR) Inter Authority Transfer (IAT) process. Including factual reference, occupational health clearance and statutory and mandatory training records and full service history.
You must ensure that your application, including supporting statements and behaviour examples, are truthful and factually accurate. Please note plagiarism can include presenting the ideas and experience of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own.
Correspondence regarding your application will be sent to you via a TRAC system account.
Please submit your application as soon as possible; due to the high volumes of applications we receive we reserve the right to close any adverts before the closing date once we have received sufficient applications.
We are an equal opportunities employer, which aims to employ a workforce that reflects the diverse communities we serve. We welcome applications from all suitably qualified persons from all backgrounds.
All roles are subject to the home office immigration rules and therefore eligibility must meet certain requirements for any sponsorship to be considered. Please visit the government website for more information regarding eligibility,
At NHFT we support many of our colleagues to work flexibly and we will consider requests for flexible working from day one. For this role, we are open to discussing a range of options including flexible hours, agile/home working, compressed hours and part time hours. Please have a conversation with the recruiting manager about the flexibility you need and we will promise to explore what is possible with you.
Applicants who have a disability and meet the essential criteria for the job will be considered under the Guaranteed Interview Scheme. If you require a reasonable adjustment at any stage of the recruitment process please make the recruitment services team aware as soon as possible.
All posts that are engaged in a regulated activity will be subject to a Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check and a DBS re-check on a three yearly basis whilst employed in such a role. Staff employed in these posts will therefore be asked to register with the DBS Automatic Update Service upon receipt of their DBS certificate and must update yearly, the annual fee will be reimbursed subject to Trust policy. For further information please visit: DBS Update Service: applicant guide - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Please note if a DBS is applicable for the position then a charge will be deducted from your first salary or upfront cost if a staff bank position.
Please note that all new starters to the trustare subject to a probationary period.
Employer certification / accreditation badges
You must have appropriate UK professional registration.
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.
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