Occupational Hygiene Specialist Inspector

HSE

Summary

At HSE, we work with one goal in mind – to help keep Britain’s workforce safe and healthy. Our work touches virtually every sector of Great Britain’s industry. We don’t just inspect workplaces and enforce the law. We campaign for better risk control, providing guidance, regulations, crucial research and statistics, and specialist products and services both here and overseas.

Our team of occupational hygiene specialists work in a wide range of industries with thousands of workers. This role provides a unique opportunity to apply your technical knowledge and practical experience, influencing whole industry sectors as well as helping individual employers understand the right controls to have in place. Contributing to the policy development and industry guidelines will broaden your knowledge and your professional credibility like no other role can. You will see a clear line of sight between your input and reducing ill-health in the workplace.

A career with HSE gives you a rare opportunity to visit and interact with many different and diverse employers and work activities – one day you could be working in a large food factory and the next in a local woodworking shop. You’ll work alongside general inspectors and other technical specialists to ensure work activities are operating within the law by inspecting, investigating, intervening and supporting companies. Working with the widest range of health and safety specialists in Britain, you’ll be helping to protect thousands of people, whilst working in an inclusive environment where all of our people can thrive and be themselves.

 

Job description

Occupational hygiene specialist inspectors are involved in frontline regulatory work and developing technical policy. You will work as a member of a specialist regulatory team, led by a Principal Specialist Inspector, regulating workplaces to ensure that workplace health risks have been identified, evaluated and eliminated or adequately controlled. Field Operations Division is the largest operational inspectorate in HSE, covering many employment sectors including agriculture, general manufacturing, engineering, waste and recycling, education, health services, utilities and transport, government departments and domestic gas safety.

Frontline regulating is managed regionally in geographically dispersed areas across offices in England, Wales and Scotland. You will provide in-depth technical expertise through planned and reactive support to regulatory inspectors gaining occupational hygiene experience across a wide range of issues and industries, whilst developing skills in intervening in businesses and enforcing the law. You may also be asked to provide independent expert witness input to court, securing justice for sufferers of ill health in the workplace.

Developing operational and technical policy is about influencing and raising standards of control and clarifying legal requirements. You will work with others on projects and initiatives to review and inform health and safety policy, developing guidance and identifying any changes needed to expected standards and published information. You will also work with specialist and non-specialist colleagues helping to influence strategic stakeholders and campaigns.

This is a hugely varied and rewarding role. Whilst there are technical challenges to overcome, you will be working with many different people at every level and every part of your work will be geared to achieving one goal: protecting people’s health and safety at work.

At the HSE, in order to fully understand the legal and enforcement requirements of this frontline role, you develop your regulatory expertise by completing a 2 year specialist training programme (the STP). This includes a mixture of e-learning and face-to-face tutorials. As well as learning on-the-job, you will continue your development. You will also have wider learning opportunities through your Civil Service access. You will receive appropriate training and will need to complete and pass a legal assessment.

You will be office-based but as part of your role, you will be required to inspect and visit sites across Great Britain. This will require regular travel and overnight stays.

 

Qualifications

Essential

  • BOHS Certificate of Operational Competence in Occupational Hygiene or the International Certificate of Operational Competence in Occupational Hygiene, or an equivalent qualification.

Desirable

  • Science-based honours degree or an equivalent academic/ professional qualification.
  • BOHS Diploma of Professional Competence in Occupational Hygiene.

 

Memberships

You must be a current professional member of the British Occupational Hygiene Society Faculty of Occupational Hygiene at a minimum grade of Licentiate or Specialist Licentiate Grade (i.e. LFOH or LFOH(S)) or higher.

 

Benefits

We invest in our people with:

  • Competitive rates of pay
  • Access to the highly competitive Civil Service Pension Scheme to which HSE contribute 27.9%, far more than in the private sector.
  • Family friendly policies and working hours to help balance your home life and career.
  • 25 days’ annual holiday increasing to 30 days after 5 years’ service, plus bank holidays and 1-day Civil Service privilege leave.
  • Parental leave benefits: Maternity, adoption or shared parental leave of up to 26 weeks full pay followed by 13 weeks statutory pay and a further 13 weeks unpaid, and paternity leave of 2 weeks full pay.

 

To apply, please visit our website.

 

Closing date: 11:55pm on Sunday 4 September 2022.

Diverse perspectives and experiences are critical to our success and we welcome applications from people from all backgrounds with the experience and skills needed to perform this role. We look forward to receiving your application.

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.

 

BOHS is committed to ensure that Occupational Hygiene services are provided by suitably qualified and experienced professionals, in line with our Buyer’s Guide BOHS-Buyers-Guide-Sep-19.pdf and Consultants Guide Good-Practice-Guide-Version-2-rebranded-2021-1.pdf (bohs.org). In order to promote the recruitment of professional occupational hygienists to appropriate posts, we advertise roles on behalf of other organisations. When we advertise roles, please do not to take this as an endorsement or promotion of the organisation concerned, nor is BOHS in a position to screen or alter advertisements or verify their contents.