Planner - Career Grade

Planner - Career Grade

Norwich City Hall / Hybrid

Salary band £29,540 - £42,839 (pro-rata, per annum)

Norwich City Council has a successful and busy planning team who work to enhance the beautiful city of Norwich. Two opportunities have arisen to join the development management team in career grade planner posts. Please note we have two opportunities available, one for a permanent contract and the other for a temporary contract up to May 2027. Please indicate within your application whether you are interested in one or both opportunities.

As part of the permanent post, the successful candidate would have the opportunity to study for a postgraduate degree and progress through the Grades on your route to chartered membership of the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI). For both posts, your position on the career grade scale will be dependent on your skills and experience.

Norwich City Council has a high performing planning team and we now have an exciting opportunity to join the development management service. The city is a thriving and dynamic place to both live and work and offers a real range of planning challenges as we prepare for very significant levels of growth within the context of a historic city with a legacy of fine buildings and 17 conservation areas.

The successful candidate will be enthusiastic about gaining experience of urban planning and passionate about making Norwich an even better place to live and work.

• To take responsibility for the management of a caseload of development proposals providing a high quality service to applicants and meeting performance and quality targets.
• To provide planning advice to, and negotiate with applicants or agents and with other bodies on planning applications, in pre-application discussions, and to respond to general planning enquiries.
• To prepare reports and make recommendations on planning and related applications, including instructing, checking and monitoring compliance with related legal agreements.
• To ensure compliance with planning and related permissions and take action to enforce planning control. To investigate allegations of the breach of planning control and to make recommendations on appropriate enforcement action. Where necessary to liase with specialist enforcement and legal staff on how to reolve matters.
• To assist with the preparation of development plan documents, supplementary planning doucments and other policy and projects as required. To contribute to collaborative working across Council services, and between other authorities and agencies on planning issues, including the Greater Norwich Growth Board and through work on the Greater Norwich Local Plan.
• To assist in the preparation, monitoring, review and update of all aspects of the statutory Development Plan, including data collection, survey and analysis, maintaining monitoring systems, carrying out public consultation and community participation.
• To prepare evidence and be the Council’s expert witness in connection with planning appeals and policy development whether dealt with by written representations or  present reports to the Planning Applications Committee, Sustainable Development Panel and at other meetings as required.

• Display general level of ability in letter & report writing; exhibit a clear & comprehensible writing style in line with Plain English principles.
• Experience of working in an office environment, including the appropriate use of information technology.
• Good organisational and analytical skills.
• Time/priority management: developing ability & understanding of techniques.
• Ability to work effectively under pressure.
• Methodical & attention to detail.
• Logical thinker & ability to analyse & weigh issues.
• Appreciation of team working.
• Polite, helpful & building confidence.
• Verbal communication: effective in most situations.
• Presentation skills: willingness to develop skills.
• Customer care awareness.
• Capable of dealing with straightforward planning matters with minimal supervision and more complex matters with a degree of supervision.
• Capable of dealing with proposals for prior approval and the discharge of conditions.
• Capable of…