Clinical Psychologist (6-Month Maternity Cover)

Job summary
Make a Lasting Difference for People with Learning Disabilities This is an exciting opportunity for an experienced and compassionate Clinical Psychologist to join our Learning Disability Service on a 6-month fixed-term maternity cover contract, with an anticipated start date of October 2026. In this rewarding role, you will provide highly specialist psychological support to adults with learning disabilities and complex needs, helping them achieve improved wellbeing, greater independence and better quality of life. You will work closely with individuals, families, carers and professionals, ensuring psychological expertise is at the heart of person-centred care. As part of a supportive multidisciplinary team, you will use advanced clinical knowledge and evidence-based approaches to assess, formulate and deliver psychological interventions for individuals presenting with highly complex needs. You will also provide consultation, advice and clinical supervision to colleagues and partner agencies, helping to embed psychologically informed practice across the service. This role offers an excellent opportunity for a skilled psychologist to contribute to an established service, make a meaningful impact within a specialist population, and support the continued delivery of high-quality care during a period of maternity leave cover. We welcome applications from both Band 8 Clinical Psychologists and strong Band 7 candidates, with salary and appointment level reflecting experience, qualifications and competencies. Location: Carrswood Day Centre

Main duties of the job
Make a Lasting Difference for People with Learning Disabilities. This is an exciting opportunity for an experienced and compassionate Clinical Psychologist to join our Learning Disability Service on a 6-month fixed-term maternity cover contract, with an anticipated start date of October 2026. In this rewarding role, you will provide highly specialist psychological support to adults with learning disabilities and complex needs, helping them achieve improved wellbeing, greater independence and better quality of life. You will work closely with individuals, families, carers, and professionals, ensuring psychological expertise is at the heart of person-centred care. As part of a supportive multidisciplinary team, you will use advanced clinical knowledge and evidence-based approaches to assess, formulate, and deliver psychological interventions for individuals presenting with highly complex needs. You will also provide consultation, advice, and clinical supervision to colleagues and partner agencies, helping to embed psychologically informed practice across the service. This role offers an excellent opportunity for a skilled psychologist to contribute to an established service, make a meaningful impact within a specialist population, and support the continued delivery of high-quality care during a period of maternity leave cover.

About us
We change lives by transforming health and care. Established in 2006, we are one of the UK's leading independent providers of community health and care services, working with health and care commissioners and communities to transform services with a focus on experience, efficiency, and improved outcomes. We deliver and transform adult and children community health services, primary care services including urgent care, sexual health, dermatology and MSK services as well as adult social care and wellbeing services. Across England, we support communities of many millions and directly help more than half a million people each year - guided by our simple values: we care, we think, we do. We're committed to equal opportunities and welcome applications from a broad, diverse range of people who want to join our team. We're a Disability Confident Committed company, so we work to provide facilities, work environment adjustments and technical solutions to be inclusive of everyone.

Job responsibilities
Package Description:
Make a Lasting Difference for People with Learning Disabilities
This is an exciting opportunity for an experienced and compassionate Clinical Psychologist to join our Learning Disability Service on a 6-month fixed-term maternity cover contract, with an anticipated start date of October 2026.
In this rewarding role, you will provide highly specialist psychological support to adults with learning disabilities and complex needs, helping them achieve improved wellbeing, greater independence and better quality of life. You will work closely with individuals, families, carers and professionals, ensuring psychological expertise is at the heart of person-centred care.
As part of a supportive multidisciplinary team, you will use advanced clinical knowledge and evidence-based approaches to assess, formulate and deliver psychological interventions for individuals presenting with highly complex needs. You will also provide consultation, advice and clinical supervision to colleagues and partner agencies, helping to embed psychologically informed practice across the service.
This role offers an excellent opportunity for a skilled psychologist to contribute to an established service, make a meaningful impact within a specialist population, and support the continued delivery of high-quality care during a period of maternity leave cover.
We welcome applications from both Band 8 Clinical Psychologists and strong Band 7 candidates, with salary and appointment level reflecting experience, qualifications and competencies.
Location: Carrswood Day Centre
Hours: 37.5 hours per week

Package Description
As a Clinical Psychologist, you will be part of our valued team in at HCRG Care Group, receiving access to exclusive rewards and benefits including:

• £57,528 - £64,750 (Band 8a AfC Salary) with NHS Pension and full Agenda for Change terms and conditions
• Membership of My Reward Hub, giving you access to discounts on every day purchases like grocery shopping as well as cashback and voucher offers for treats for you and those special to you
• Access to your wages as you earn them to help cover life's emergencies and avoid overdraft fees or high interest rates
• Online and face to face help with your mental and physical wellbeing from healthy recipes and activity challenges through to post trauma support, legal, debt and life management help, as well career coaching and counselling
• Access to eLearning, bespoke career pathways and opportunities for continuing professional development through our Outstanding learning and development team, The Learning Enterprise
• An open, just culture where you're encouraged to have and implement ideas which can help us deliver our purpose: changing lives through transforming health and care backed up by at least £100,000 of ringfenced innovation funding each year
• The pride of working for an organisation committed to the highest clinical and quality standards: with the majority of our rated services holding good or outstanding ratings from the Care Quality Commission

How You'll Make an Impact

• Deliver highly specialist psychological assessment, formulation and intervention for adults with learning disabilities, supporting individuals with complex psychological, emotional and behavioural needs.
• Provide person-centred psychological support to individuals, families and carers across a range of settings, including home, work, educational and community environments.
• Use advanced communication and therapeutic skills to engage people with communication difficulties, limited understanding, or those who may be distressed, anxious or reluctant to participate in intervention.
• Lead on supporting service users whose behaviours may challenge, developing effective strategies that promote wellbeing, independence and quality of life.
• Work within a Positive Behaviour Support framework, applying psychological theory and behavioural approaches to develop robust support plans and risk management strategies.
• Manage and prioritise a varied caseload, using clinical judgement to balance risk, complexity and service demands effectively.
• Coordinate and collaborate with multidisciplinary teams and partner agencies to deliver integrated care and ensure interventions remain responsive to changing needs.
• Develop and deliver training, consultation and specialist advice to carers, families, healthcare professionals and partner organisations to promote psychologically informed practice.
• Contribute to service development, clinical audit, research and quality improvement initiatives, helping to enhance outcomes and share best practice across the Learning Disability Service.
• Maintain accurate clinical records and utilise digital systems effectively, ensuring documentation meets professional, legal and organisational standards.

What We're Looking For
Essential

• Qualifications: DClinPsy (or equivalent), current HCPC registration, and eligibility for Chartered Clinical Psychologist status.
• Experience: Psychological assessment and intervention in complex cases; experience working with people with learning disabilities; experience providing consultation.
• Specialist Knowledge: Advanced psychological assessment, formulation and therapeutic intervention skills; Positive Behaviour Support; current best practice for people with learning disabilities; knowledge of research methods and design.
• Professional Skills: Strong communication, emotional resilience, and ability to manage complex and challenging situations.
• Practical Requirements: Ability to balance responsibilities across teams and maintain accurate electronic records.

Desirable

• Significant post-qualification experience and ongoing CPD.
• Experience providing clinical supervision to trainee and qualified psychologists.
• Involvement in service development, quality improvement, research, or project work.
• Experience in a leadership or senior clinical role.
• Specialist interest within the field of learning disabilities.
• Knowledge of Liquidlogic and/or SystmOne.

Please see the attached Job Description and Person Specification for full details of the role and requirements.

About the Company
We change lives by transforming health and care. Established in 2006, we are one of the UK's leading independent providers of community health and care services, working with health and care commissioners and communities to transform services with a focus on experience, efficiency, and improved outcomes. We deliver and transform adult and children community health services, primary care services including urgent care, sexual health, dermatology and MSK services as well as adult social care and wellbeing services. Across England, we support communities of many millions and directly help more than half a million people each year - guided by our simple values: we care, we think, we do.
We're committed to equal opportunities and welcome applications from a broad, diverse range of people who want to join our team. We're a Disability Confident Committed company, so we work to provide facilities, work environment adjustments and technical solutions to be as inclusive of everyone.
While it doesn't happen often, sometimes a role is very popular, and we'll need to close it earlier than the date we've shown here. If you're keen to join our team, we'd love to hear from you so please apply as soon as you can.
As you'd expect, safeguarding and protecting the children, young people and vulnerable adults that we work with is of the utmost importance so we have policies and procedures in place to promote safeguarding and safer working practices and everyone who joins the team is subject to a safer recruitment process, including the disclosure of criminal records and vetting checks.
Finally, we need to let you know that the company you'll work for is part of HCRG Care Group Holdings Limited and by applying for this job we'll need to process and hold information about you. If you would like to know a little more about how we use your information, please see our website's privacy policy.

Person Specification
Qualifications
Essential

• Qualifications: DClinPsy (or equivalent), current HCPC registration, and eligibility for Chartered Clinical Psychologist status.

Disclosure and Barring Service Check
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

UK Registration
Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).

Employer details
Employer name HCRG Care Group
Address HCRG Care Group, Bath, BA2 1RS, United Kingdom
Employer's website (Opens in a new tab)

Employer contact details
For questions about the job, contact: Recruitment Team, HCRG Care Group, View email address on meeveem.com

We're committed to equal opportunities and welcome applications from a broad, diverse range of people who want to join our team. We're a Disability Confident Committed company, so we work to provide facilities, work environment adjustments and technical solutions to be as inclusive of everyone.