Dorset Council Jobs | 2 Live Vacancies

Dorset Council is the unitary authority for most of the county of Dorset. It provides the full range of local government services in one organisation, including adult and children's social care, housing, planning, highways, waste and libraries, across market towns such as Dorchester, Weymouth, Bridport, Blandford, Sherborne, Shaftesbury, Gillingham, Wimborne, Wareham, Swanage, Portland and Lyme Regis, and the rural areas between them. The council's aim, in its own words, is to make Dorset a great place to live, work and visit.

Housing Options and homelessness

The council's Housing Options team gives free, impartial and confidential advice to anyone who is homeless or worried about losing their home, and encourages people to get in touch as early as possible so that homelessness can be prevented. The team carries out homelessness assessments, agrees personal housing plans, and where someone is eligible and in priority need it arranges emergency accommodation, often bed and breakfast at first, followed by longer-term temporary accommodation until settled housing is found. Residents in temporary accommodation sign a licence agreement and pay a weekly top-up. There is an out-of-hours service for people with nowhere to stay when the council is closed, and dedicated guidance for young people, care leavers, veterans and people experiencing domestic abuse. Public bodies can use the Duty to Refer route.

Rough sleeper outreach across the Dorset Council area is delivered with the charity Alongside (formerly Julian House), which runs street outreach, links people into accommodation, health and wellbeing services, and operates a severe weather protocol that opens emergency shelter when temperatures are forecast at zero or below for three consecutive nights, with welfare checks during summer heatwaves. The wider housing service also runs the housing register, which is currently being reviewed, and provides advice on affordable housing, mutual exchanges, rent and mortgage problems, private landlord and tenant matters, home adaptations and empty homes.

Who the council supports

The service works with single people and families facing eviction or relationship breakdown, people sleeping rough or sofa surfing, survivors of domestic abuse, young people leaving care, and older or disabled residents who need adapted or supported housing. Partners include Citizens Advice, Shelter, adult and children's social care and local housing associations.

Working at Dorset Council

The council describes itself as a team with diverse skills, backgrounds and experiences, and is a Disability Confident employer with staff networks that give different groups a voice. Benefits include a Local Government pension, a holiday purchase scheme, flexible working, paid family leave and career breaks, salary-sacrifice car and bike schemes, national and local retail discounts, an employee assistance programme and access to coaching, mentoring and learning opportunities. Roles are based at offices and sites across the county, and the council lists flexible working among its benefits.

Typical roles

The council's jobs portal is a shared platform that also carries adverts for Dorset schools and academies, Coastland College, Dorset Police, Dorset and Wiltshire Fire and Rescue Service and some town councils, so each advert states its employer. Dorset Council's own housing roles typically include housing options and homelessness prevention officers, temporary accommodation and rough sleeping co-ordinators, housing register and allocations officers, private sector housing officers, and housing enabling and strategy posts, alongside social work, adult services and commissioning roles. Housing Options can be reached on 01305 221000; rough sleeping outreach on 01305 236585.