Referral & Advice Officer

Team: Integrated Front Door

Job Family: Providing - CBG7

Salary: £28,598 - £31,022 per annum

Hours: 37 hours per week (3 vacancies)

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: 26th April 2026 
Interview Date: w/c 4th May 2026

About the role:

Central Bedfordshire Council is excited to offer an opportunity for two Referral and Advice Officers within our Integrated Front Door (IFD/MASH). This is a multi-agency and Integrated team at the Front Door of Children’s Services delivering an innovative and inspiring way of bringing services together to best benefit children, young people and families.

The team provides a single point of contact for reporting concerns about child safety and well being, bringing together agencies and departments to enable ‘real-time’ sharing of information and support, helping families to access the support they need at the right time. We help vulnerable children who may benefit from additional Universal Services to Early Help services as well as children in need of social work support, protection and care. We work closely with a wide range of professionals; Education, Children’s Centres, Community Partners, Education Health Care (SEND), Early Years SEND, Youth Services as well as professionals from partner agencies; Police, Health, IDVA, KIDVA and Drug and Alcohol Services.  

As a Referral & Advice Officer you will be required to be undertaking daily safeguarding referrals by; gathering information, liaising with parents, carers, children/young people, families and internal and external colleagues in order to form recommendations in regard to safeguarding decisions, and ensure that families are getting the right support at the right time from the right services. You will also be required to participate in phone duty which involves taking telephone enquiries from colleagues and the community taking accurate details, asking relevant questions and giving advice /information where applicable. You may be required to deal with some high level safeguarding situations, assimilating this information, and taking advice and guidance as appropriate. The team operates to tight deadlines and timescales so being efficient is essential to the role.

Essentially for this role you will have had experience of working within safeguarding parameters and procedures in a previous role and have a good understanding of what this means. We welcome applicants with previous experience in schools, those who have been working with children and families and working with partner agencies to children’s social care.

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.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

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:  Claire Gibb Claire.Gibb2@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk 0300 300 4749  or Emily French at Emily.French@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk or call 0300 300 6922.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------