Focus Area Environmental Advisers

Natural England are seeking enthusiastic individuals wishing to take their knowledge of Ecology and Environmental Management further and pursue a career as an Environmental Adviser.

We're the government’s adviser for the natural environment in England, helping to protect England’s nature and landscapes for people to enjoy and for the services they provide. We have 14 Area Teams across England, each delivering our frontline services in advice, incentives and regulation; they deliver locally across the breadth of our work with customers, partners and other stakeholders, to make a significant contribution to outcomes for the natural environment.

We are recruiting Focus Area Advisers across a number of our Areas to work on a local level, supporting Lead Advisers with their daily work and other project management duties. During your first year at Natural England, you will enjoy working flexibly with all Focus Area teams, reacting to the fast-paced nature of our working environment. This will involve moving across different focus areas depending on where the demand for work delivery is within each area.

As a Focus Area Adviser, your activities, amongst others, will include:

• Working to deliver “favourable condition” on Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs) (and European sites where relevant) with land managers and others, monitoring SSSI conditions and undertaking regulation and enforcement as necessary to protect maintain and improve interest features including, species, habitats and geology.
• Promoting and using Natural England's discretionary advice service (DAS) to provide chargeable advice on planning pre-applications, consents and assents.
• Working with our regional wildlife licencing team working to assess incoming wildlife licencing applications to assess them for impacts to protected species.
• Where needed champion farmland advice by assisting in managing a portfolio of existing Agri-Environment agreements, carrying out HLS agreement aftercare to ensure the agreements deliver the required environmental benefits.

Successful applicants will have a broad understanding of agri-environment schemes and the legislation relevant to SSSIs and European sites, practical knowledge of ecological/environmental management, and a basic knowledge of the Wildlife and Countryside Act, Habitats Directives, CRoW and Town and Country Planning Act.

Equally important will be your good communication skills, your ability to suggest new ideas and your drive to learn and further improve your technical knowledge and apply it to the job in a flexible, pragmatic and outcomes focused way. 

For more information and to apply please here.

Closing date: 11^th January 2018.

Natural England recruits by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles. We embrace diversity and promote equality of opportunity. There is a guaranteed interview scheme (GIS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.