Principal Highways Officer

Team: HIG – Highways Development and Control

Job Family: Enabling – CBG13
Salary: £51,471 – £55,585 per annum pro rata
Hours: 37 hours per week

Location: You will be expected to attend a CBC office location as often as needed to carry out your role, which will be no less than once per month.

Contract Type: Hybrid – Permanent

Closing Date: 16th November 2025

Interview Date: TBC

About the role:

A fantastic opportunity has arisen for an enthusiastic and ambitious individual to strengthen and help grow the Council’s Highway Development Management Team.

As part of the Highway Development Management Team, you will provide professional highways and transportation advice on planning applications and development proposals across the authority area, helping to manage the safe and sustainable delivery of ambitious growth proposals. You will also be expected to attend Development Management Committee, prepare Appeal Statements, and attend Planning Hearings and Inquiries.

Day-to-day, you will provide consultation responses to planning applications and pre-application enquiries, liaise with internal and external stakeholders and partner organisations, and negotiate highways improvements and contributions, whilst also having the opportunity to help develop the team and mentor junior staff.

To join us as a Principal Highways Officer you will have experience in a similar role, providing Highway Development Management advice in a local authority setting, or working within a related Highways DM, Highways Engineering, or Transportation Planning environment.

You will have a qualification in a relevant discipline, such as Highways Engineering or Transport Planning, or hold a professional membership with a relevant organisation with significant professional experience.

You will need to be organised, able to manage and prioritise workloads. You should also be able to communicate with the Council’s customers and stakeholders effectively, promptly, and courteously, with the ability to explain highways considerations to technical and non-technical audiences.

Join us, and take advantage of our rewards package, agile working, and the chance to learn and progress. Find your greatness by helping us to manage and deliver growth within Central Bedfordshire.

Central Bedfordshire Council has its own vision and values that are integral to everything we do. Our area vision is to make Central Bedfordshire ‘A great place to live and work’.

Key Responsibilites of Principal Highways Officer:

• Provide robust and effective end-to-end Highways development management input to schemes for major developments and other planning applications from preapplication stage through to implementation to deliver policy and corporate objectives in a consistent manner across Central Bedfordshire.
• Co-ordinate the provision of effective support and attendance from the Highways development management team at Planning Committees, Public meetings, and Member site visits, as required.
• Prepare and present evidence to support the Council’s case at appeals and public inquiries on highways issues, including acting as expert witness in planning appeals and presenting the Council’s case at Public Inquiries and Hearings as required.
• Negotiating with developers and their agents to secure funding for highway improvements and mitigation associated with the impact of proposed development schemes
• Develop effective and constructive relationships with colleagues in Planning, Economy and Housing and other Council services and with external stakeholders and partners in order to promote effective partnership arrangements and promote and secure corporate ownership of the Development Management service to maximise the delivery of high quality services.
• Develop and implement highways development management policy, procedures, delivery strategies, promotional techniques and effective communication to bring the Development Management service’s business plans and objectives into effect and secure continuous improvement.
• Deal with consultations on planning and other related applications in a manner that is consistent throughout Central Bedfordshire and complies with legislation, established procedures and policies.
• Contribute to the provision of an effective and efficient planning pre-application advice service which provides consistent, professional advice on highways matters to customers and value for money
• Contribution to the plans and strategies of other Council services and other sub-regional plans and strategies, in particular the Local Plan.
• Provide input, comment and advice as appropriate on national planning policy statements, regional strategies and plans, strategies and plans prepared by adjoining local planning authorities, internal council strategies and plans, major development proposals and planning applications and the council’s monitoring and delivery functions

We are able to offer training and development opportunities and the change to learn and progress. Join us and take advantage of our rewards package, be part of our team and find your greatness by giving our communities an exceptional highway network.

Our Offer

We have a number of rewards and benefits available to our staff, to view these please visit our Rewards and Benefits page

Our aspiration is to be a truly flexible employer. We welcome discussion on location, hours and working pattern as part of the application process.

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You will be expected to demonstrate how you meet the key accountabilities and competencies in this Recruitment Pack.

Our Competency Framework and Qualification Guidance are to be read in conjunction with our Recruitment Pack.

For an informal discussion about this position, please contact: Jethro Punter (Highways Development Management Team Leader) Jethro.punter@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk or call 0300 300 4527.

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To maintain a fair and consistent approach for applicants, it is Central Bedfordshire Council’s policy to only consider applications made via our online application system and we therefore thank you for not submitting your application offline.

Our National Careers Service team offer a free monthly workshop covering CV writing and how to complete the statement sections of the Central Bedfordshire Council online application form. This MS Teams workshop is open to anyone from the UK and lasts around 1.5 hours. Please book your place here.

More information about this service can be found here: Support getting into work or learning | Central Bedfordshire Council