Shape the future of play and early intervention services for disabled children while leading strategic innovation at one of the UK's most impactful disability charities.
About Newlife
As one of the UK's leading charities providing essential specialist equipment to children with disabilities, Newlife is dedicated to making life better - for the families we serve, and for the people who help us to make that happen.
Through grants and emergency equipment loans, we ensure children get the vital equipment they need, when they need it, while our free nurse helpline offers crucial support and information – as well as a listening ear. Our campaigns help to give children with disabilities and their families a voice, advocating for change to benefit the families we serve.
Across the whole of Newlife, our teams are crucial to our success – it's not just a job; here you'll be helping us to change lives every day.
What you'll be doing
You will lead the development and delivery of innovative services that improve the lives of disabled children and their families through play, early intervention and inclusive practice. Working closely with families, healthcare professionals, education providers and community partners, you will identify emerging needs, drive service improvement and develop approaches that increase impact, reach and sustainability.
A key focus will be shaping the future of Newlife's play offer, including Community Play programmes, Play Pods and the development of new Early Years services. You will ensure services are informed by evidence, family insight and best practice in child development, inclusion and play.
If you're ready to lead transformational change in early intervention services and make a lasting impact on the lives of disabled children and their families, we'd love to hear from you.
Please note DBS check will be required for this role.
Registered Charity
101 - 500
The UK’s largest charitable provider of specialist equipment for disabled children.
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.
Thank you!
Job Title: Senior Press Officer
Salary: £33,268 - £36,000 dependent on experience
Contract Type: Permanent, full-time (35 hours).
Location: We fully support flexible working, from our superb offices in Holborn and from home. We do require staff to spend 20% of their time in the office. This is subject to role requirements.
About us
Do you want to change healthcare for the better?
Join the Royal College of Surgeons of England (RCS England) and you will be part of a professional membership organisation and registered charity that is committed to advancing surgical care.
We provide world-class education, assessment and development to 30,000 surgeons and dental surgeons at all stages of their career. Our vision is to see excellent surgical care for everyone. We do this by setting professional standards, facilitating research and championing the best outcomes for patients.
Our heritage home in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, Holborn
Nestled in the heart of bustling London, our beautiful heritage building in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, Holborn, offers an easily accessible location steeped in history. Now transformed into a centre of excellence for surgery, it provides a welcoming place for all our members to train, meet or network, wherever they live and work.
About the role
We are looking for an outstanding Senior Press Officer to work in our fast-paced press office, helping run it to the highest standard. RCS England is one of the most high-profile health commentators in the UK. You will regularly see us advocating for patients and the surgical workforce in the national press. Candidates should have experience of successfully pitching stories to national media and know what makes a good health story. You will have a fluent writing style and be confident working with senior stakeholders to brief them before interviews.
Responsibilities
- Handle incoming enquiries and provide accurate, timely and appropriate responses, briefing journalists in line with RCS England key messages and priorities.
- Participate in an out-of-hours rota for media enquiries. Time off in lieu is offered for significant out-of-office hours worked.
- Research, write and distribute press releases, features, letters and other editorial material.
- Draft articles, quotes and opinion pieces on behalf of RCS England spokespeople.
- Provide press office support to the Faculty of Dental Surgery and its Dean, as required.
- Brief the President, Council Members and senior managers on issues arising in the media.
- Act as the press lead for key projects such as RCS England guidance or campaigns. Devising and implementing communications plans, sharing project updates with the wider communications team, and maintaining a good understanding of surgical and wider health issues.
- Horizon scan for media opportunities and develop your own ideas for health coverage based on data, insights or RCS England priorities.
- Brief, support and prepare RCS England spokespeople for media interviews.
- Establish and maintain professional and trusted relationships with national and trade journalists.
- Represent the RCS England at internal and external meetings, and maintain professional relationships with press and communications leads at stakeholder organisations.
- Monitor daily media coverage relevant to surgery and the RCS England. This includes pulling together the team’s daily press cuts to be shared with Council members, Trustees, and key RCS England staff by 10am (subject to urgent media enquiries).
- Maintain and update the media sections of the RCS England website, working with the web team to develop rich digital content. Actively participate in developing our social media profile using Twitter, Facebook, and commissioning and editing relevant blogs.
- Produce evaluation reports of media coverage and communications activity.
- Undertake such duties appropriate to the grade, as required by your line manager.
About you
- Degree educated or proven extensive experience that can demonstrate the essential criteria below.
- At least two years’ experience of working in a press office.
- Experience of writing and editing for a variety of media including print and the internet.
- Good working knowledge of Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint packages.
- Demonstrable experience of placing stories in the media.
- Rigour in researching and reviewing content: able to identify key points, summarise findings and report data and conclusions accurately.
- Excellent writing skills: able to write fluent, compelling copy free from grammatical or other errors.
- Excellent telephone manner: diplomatic and persuasive verbal communication skills.
- Able to prioritise effectively and deliver work to deadlines.
- Demonstrable understanding of journalists’ needs and priorities.
- Ability to understand policy documents and formulate a media response.
- Collaborative and inclusive approach to build relationships with colleagues across the organisation, to encourage timely information sharing with the press office.
- Diplomacy and persuasiveness, to foster the trust of senior spokespeople you are briefing and advising.
- Excellent interpersonal skills and integrity, to protect the College’s reputation for providing accurate and reliable information to the media.
- Strong prioritisation skills and a flexible approach to respond to changing priorities and needs and manage reactive queries.
- Enthusiasm and creativity to seek out interesting stories and pitch them.
What’s in it for you?
- 27 days paid holiday + bank holidays and up to 4 college closure days over the festive period & other leave entitlements (carers leave, fertility treatment leave, etc.)
- Hybrid and flexible working. We require staff to spend a minimum of 20% of their time in the office, subject to role requirements.
- Enhanced contributory pension scheme
- Equal access to enhanced parenthood leave
- A range of staff and peer networks
- Employee health and wellbeing committed (Healthcare cash plan, menopause friendly, disability confident employer, mental health first aiders, EAP etc.)
- Retail discount platform
- Sabbatical and volunteering opportunities
- Variety of learning and development opportunities
Interested Candidates:
If you wish to apply or if you have any questions about this position please email your CV together with a
cover letter to [email protected].
Any personal data collected from you, or that you provide to us, will be processed by us in accordance with our recruitment processes. If unsuccessful in your application, your information will be held by us on our database for a period of 6 months before deletion. If you would like your information removed sooner, please contact [email protected]
Closing date: Thursday 27 August 2026
The Royal College of Surgeons of England is an Equal Opportunities Employer. We are open to all talent and we actively ensure that all qualified applicants will receive equal consideration for employment without regards to age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage or civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex or sexual orientation.
The Royal College of Surgeons of England is committed to protecting your privacy. We are registered as a data controller with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). All College employees are responsible for records held,
created and used as part of their work for the College including patient/client, corporate and administrative records. Records are managed according to the requirements of the
Data Protection Act 2018 and ensure confidentiality. The College ensures that staff are trained to handle the information you submit to us with care and discretion, seeking advice where necessary.
Thank you!
Actively Interviewing
This organisation is scheduling interviews as applications come in. They're ready to hire as soon as they find the right person. Don't miss your opportunity, apply now!
About us
Carers UK is the leading national charity for unpaid carers. Our support, advice, information and campaigning work are needed now more than ever, with unpaid carers providing more hours of care than ever before, which is adversely impacting on their finances, health and wellbeing. We exist to make life better for carers and bring about lasting change.
About the role
This is an exciting opportunity to join a small, high performing team. This varied role sits at the heart of the policy and campaigns team, working in the policy detail to support key campaigns as well as media functions, including lots of interaction with supporters and carers. The role plays a vital part in delivering the charity’s core aims to make life better for carers by. Working closely with our communications team, this role spans across media, policy, public affairs and campaigns.
About you
Do you thrive in a fast-paced environment? Do you have media or campaigns work experience? Do you want to make life better for unpaid carers? Then this could be the ideal role for you!
We’re looking for a diligent and organised individual, who has an eye for details and the ability to juggle a varied workload. Collaborative in approach, you’ll have exceptional written communication skills and an interest in media and policy.
Diversity and inclusion
Carers UK is committed to becoming a diverse and truly inclusive organisation; fostering an environment and working culture that celebrates and promotes diversity and inclusion. We strive to create a workplace where our colleagues and volunteers can truly be themselves and feel like they belong and constantly seek to ensure all voices are heard.
To embrace this culture of diversity, our employee and volunteer recruitment should reflect our stakeholders and the society that we serve and support, regardless of age, race, gender, sexual orientation, physical abilities, disabilities or religious practices. We value individual diversity and are actively building diverse teams here at Carers UK and value our colleagues from a wide range of backgrounds.
As a membership charity for carers, we particularly seek employees and volunteers with a real understanding of the issues faced by carers. Reasonable adjustments can be made to the process and role, dependent on the needs of the applicant.
We are proud to be an Employers for Carers member. We have signed the Menopause Workplace Pledge and achieved the Disability Confident Employer accreditation. We aim to offer interviews to those who have a disability covered under the definition outlined in the Equality Act 2010 and who meet the minimum criteria for the role. The minimum criteria can be found under the Essential section of the Person Specification of the recruitment pack. Please let us know if your application is being made under the Disability Confident Scheme. You are not required to share the nature of your disability or long term health condition. You will need to state in your email application that you are making your application under the Disability Confident Scheme as you consider yourself to be disabled, or as having a disability. If you meet the minimum criteria then you will be offered an interview.
At Carers UK we want our application process to be as accessible as possible. If you need any adjustments to apply please contact us to discuss.
The closing date for applications is 5pm, Tuesday 22 September.
.Carers UK anonymises all applications prior to shortlisting.
Carers UK reserves the right to appoint at any stage, should an outstanding candidate emerge.
Carers UK are actively interviewing as we receive applications.
Carers UK may carry out online and social media checks before a formal offer is made.
The client requests no contact from agencies or media sales.