Specialist jobs in Milton keynes

Salary – Grade 4 - £35,581 per annum, pro rata for part time

Hours: 1 x part time - 28 hours per week - can be worked flexibly

Contract: Fixed term until end of March 2028

Location: Home Worker with occasional travel to Manchester, Birmingham or Sheffield

Closing date: Thursday 27th August 2026 at 11:30pm

Are you a customer-focused individual with recent experience of providing specialist level debt advice? Then join Shelter as a Specialist Debt Adviser supporting client-facing debt advisers with their complex casework, contributing to resources and helping us to influence the debt advice sector.

About the Team

Our Specialist Debt Advice service works with front-line debt advisers based across England & Wales, providing support with their complex case work. The service currently operates between 9-5 Monday to Friday, with advisers offering live support to clients on a rota basis throughout the week.

About the Role

As a Specialist Debt Adviser, you will be responsible for handling phone and email enquiries to the service, using diagnostic questioning to fully establish the caller's enquiry and providing detailed and timely responses. We'll also rely on you to identify and act upon any emergency enquiries and prioritise your workload accordingly. Helping our Team to produce written and on-line content and provide service users with the latest developments in debt regulation, policy and good practice will be important too.

We are happy to talk about flexible working, personal growth, and to promote a workplace where you can be yourself and achieve success based only on your merit.

About you

You are someone who champions user-focused advice and who can take complex language and processes and make them easy to understand for professional advisers and other audiences. You will need excellent all-round understanding of debt advice, with experience of producing written and on-line resources, including guidance documents, webinars and attendance at networking events, providing service users with the latest debt regulation, policy and good practice. You have good typing skills and proficiency using Microsoft office applications and case management and reporting systems.

Benefits

We offer a wide range of benefits, including 30 days of annual leave (pro rata), enhanced family friendly policies, pension and interest free travel loans. Our employees also have access to a tenancy deposit loan, payroll giving, cycle to work scheme and an employee assistance programme.

About Shelter

Home is a human right. It’s our foundation and where we thrive. Yet every day millions of people are being devastated by the housing emergency.

We exist to defend the right to a safe home. Because home is everything.

We need ambitious, passionate people to join us. This is your chance to play a part in the fundamental change we are striving to achieve.

Our enemy is the social injustice at the core of the escalating housing emergency. To win this fight, we must be representative of the people we are here to help and those who support our movement. In all our people decisions, we take pride in being inclusive, equitable and transparent. We are committed to combating racism both within and outside Shelter. We welcome you on our journey to becoming truly anti-racist.

Safeguarding Statement

Safeguarding is everyone's business. Shelter is committed to protecting the health, wellbeing and human rights of those we support, and enabling them to live free from harm, abuse and neglect. All our staff will be expected to observe professional standards of behaviour and conduct their work in line with our Safeguarding Policies.

How to Apply

Please submit your work history and a supporting statement with responses to the four 'About You' points outlined in the job description. The supporting statement should be no more than 1500 words in total. Please provide specific examples following the STAR format and ensure you demonstrate how you address the behaviour below throughout your responses:

· We prioritise diversity and have an inclusive and open mindset

· We are open to risk and learning from our experiences

Shelter does not accept unsolicited CVs from external recruitment agencies nor accept the fees associated with them.

Are you interested in improving the lives of people with a learning disability? Can you turn complex ideas into evidence-based policy? Are you a skilled communicator able to influence decision-makers? If so, we would love to hear from you!

We are currently looking for a Policy Specialist to join Mencap. This position sits within the Policy and Public Affairs teams of Mencap’s Campaigns, Advocacy and Activism Directorate (CAA). You will work closely with our influencing, information and advice, campaigning, and research work, as well as sector partners.

This is an exciting new role to deliver policy change and enhance the rights of people with a learning disability. At a key time to influence health reform, we are seeking a policy specialist to shape policy work that reflects the needs and experiences of people with a learning disability and their families. Working within the policy team, you will be responsible for developing evidence-based policy work and influencing decision-makers. 

This is a 4-day a week position (30 hours per week). We are flexible with your work location, but there may be some occasional travel needed to our London office or Westminster.

You will: 

You will bring to this role:

If you're passionate about driving meaningful change for people with a learning disability and you're ready to use your policy expertise to make a real impact, please apply now with an up-to-date CV. Applications close on Tuesday 1st September, 2026. Interviews are scheduled to take place via Microsoft Teams during the week commencing 7th September 2026.

• Translate complex work into clear and persuasive policy briefings, consultation responses and reports.
• Work within wider coalitions of charities, building collaborative relationships and ensuring that the needs and priorities of our community are addressed.
• Develop and expand Mencap’s ‘Policy Shapers’ work, ensuring our work reflects the health needs and experiences of people with a learning disability and their families.
• Support our information and advice team, briefing them on important developments, inputting into casework discussions relevant to your areas of work, and supporting the creation of public information resources.
• Represent Mencap at meetings and events, with MPs, civil servants, and sector partners.
• Identify and analyse relevant research to develop evidence-based policy recommendations.
• Experience of working on health policy issues.
• Strong communication skills: experience tailoring your messaging to a variety of different audiences and representing an organisation.
• Experience building positive relationships and working collaboratively to achieve outcomes; able to positively challenge, negotiate and compromise.
• The ability to work on your own initiative while contributing to team priorities and sustain enthusiasm under pressure.
•  Experience analysing evidence to develop recommendations.
• Knowledge of the health issues facing people with a learning disability, as well as the health and wider parliamentary system. 
• Passion about making the world a better place for people with a learning disability. 

Benefits

Here at Mencap, we offer an impressive range of benefits designed to support and reward our employees to ensure that our teams feel valued and appreciated. 

Our benefits package offers 32 days of paid holiday (including bank holidays, pro rata), along with a range of perks such as discounts at leading high-street retailers, access to health cash plans, interest-free loans, and many more exciting offerings. 

For more details on what we have to offer, please see the attached document outlining all the fantastic benefits available to you as a member of our team! 

About Mencap

Our vision is for the UK to be the best place in the world for people with a learning disability to live happy and healthy lives. 

We're here to support people with a learning disability, their families and their carers. We fight for a kinder, fairer and more inclusive society for people with a learning disability to live in. 

At Mencap, everyone works with people with a learning disability either providing support or advice, or alongside one another as colleagues. 

Belonging at Mencap is for everyone, every day, everywhere. 

· Everyone is expected to treat people well and make Mencap an inclusive organisation. 

· Every day we grow and learn. It’s okay to make mistakes but we learn from them and make changes 

· Everywhere people will feel respected, valued, and safe to be themselves. 

We have Belonging network groups that meet online and are open to all colleagues. The groups include people who identify as Black and Asian, LGBTQIA+, disabled or with a long- term health condition, women, parents and carers, and their allies. 

We want to encourage everyone to apply to work at Mencap and we offer a variety of different contract types and working patterns. We’re not looking for specific experience. It is your personality and values that will make you a great colleague. We will train and develop you to succeed in the role you’re applying for.