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About HM Treasury

If you’re interested in making a difference to people’s lives across the country, the Treasury is the department for you! We sit at the centre of everything that the Government does and have provided advice on economic policy and decisions that affect the public finances throughout the country’s history. A Treasury career continues to offer an exciting opportunity to be part of the decision making that affects the whole of the UK.

Working at the heart of government, we collaborate with other departments to ensure public money is spent well and to drive strong and sustainable economic growth. Our work ranges from protecting customers through to the regulation of the financial sector, helping to reduce carbon emissions and creating a greener economy, supporting people across the country through the COVID 19 furlough scheme and Plan for Jobs as well as helping first time buyers buy their first home.

HM Treasury is proud of a diverse and inclusive work environment, committed to fairness and the promotion of equality of opportunity for all. We know that having a range of experiences, ways of working and thinking makes us a stronger organisation, better at developing policy that is reflective of the communities we serve. We embrace different views and experiences and value the fresh perspective that people from a variety of circumstances bring to the work we do. We welcome applications from candidates who have not previously worked for the Civil Service, mid- and late-career changers with transferrable skills, people from all backgrounds and circumstances regardless of disability, gender, age ethnicity, LGBT+ identity and socio-economic status.

The Darlington Economic Campus is a pioneering new cross-government hub which will bring people together across departments and public organisations to play an active role in the most important issues of the day.

HM Treasury in Darlington will be joined by the Department for International Trade, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the Office for National Statistics, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, the Competition and Markets Authority, the Department for Education and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport.

About the Group

Personal Tax, Welfare and Pensions

We work to create a tax and welfare system which supports the government’s goals of deficit reduction, economic growth and fairness. In doing so, we look after high profile areas including personal taxes, labour markets, welfare, tax administration, pensions, and savings. We also coordinate spending controls for both HM Revenue & Customs and the Department for Work and Pensions. The Group also has a wider role to assess the overall impact of changes made to taxes and benefit on households across the UK.

Our work means that we are often at the centre of ministers’ decision making, and we play an important part in the Budget and the Spending Review. Our group works closely with colleagues at HMRC, DWP and the Prime Minister’s office, and with a wide variety of external stakeholders.

About the Team

Welfare Spending and Reform

The Welfare Spending and Reform team (WSR) is a friendly, inclusive, and hard-working team of 17 people from a diverse range of backgrounds from both within and outside of government. We are responsible for the Treasury’s overall welfare spending and strategy, and for ensuring that spending is sustainable and meets the government’s wider objectives.

We act as the spending team for the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), which makes up nearly 25% of all government expenditure, and lead on high-profile and complex policy and spending priorities for working age benefits, including tax credits, child benefit, disability benefits, Housing Benefit and Universal Credit. The team has also led on policies directly responding to the Covid-19 pandemic and the cost of living, including the recent Cost of Living Payment for those receiving benefits.

We have an excellent team spirit and are committed to diversity, inclusion and personal development.

Key Accountabilities

Universal Credit is the government’s flagship reform to the benefits system and currently supports the income of almost 6 million households in Great Britain. Working on this in HM Treasury puts you at the heart of policy and spending decisions that affect the living standards of a large part of our population.

The post is an opportunity to get to know a wide range of policy and delivery aspects of a major government reform and, in doing so, work in close collaboration with colleagues across the Treasury and Department for Work and Pensions.

The branch has previously worked on major Government announcements, including the labour market package and the Universal Credit childcare reforms within the Spring Budget 2023, and the Cost-of-Living Payments announced in 2022.

Key accountabilities for this role include:

• Overseeing DWP’s spending on Universal Credit, including scrutinising and approving spending, and ensuring that DWP deliver value for money and improved employment outcomes.
• Driving forward HMT’s wider approach to Universal Credit policy – working across HMT and Whitehall to establish how Government can continue to support Universal Credit claimants into employment or progress through work, looking at the full range of levers across the system.
• Work closely with DWP colleagues to track programme performance and manage fiscal risks across Universal Credit, including a pipeline of legal cases and specific policy issues that crop up. The post-holder will identify and clearly communicate risks and mitigation options to ministers and senior officials.
• Leading stakeholder engagement with public and private sector various who have an interest in Universal Credit. This involves monitoring reports and commentary on the welfare system, and leading meetings with key stakeholders to discuss their views on Universal Credits.
• Advising ministers and senior civil servants on policy options and risks across the post holder's policy areas, including both written and verbal briefings.

We are not looking for a particular type of person and would strongly encourage anybody interested in working in the Treasury, on disability, welfare or labour markets policy. Whilst not essential, we would especially encourage applications from individuals who have experience working in the welfare system (whether in operational, policy, finance, analytical or other roles).

Required Skills, Experience and Behaviours:

The below criteria will be assessed in your application form.

The lead criteria is: 1. Making Effective Decisions - Ability to analyse and use relevant, credible information from internal and external sources to support decision making.

If we receive large volumes of applications, we will conduct an initial sift on the lead criteria only, which will usually be a behaviour. This may be an experience or technical skill, but only where critical to the position.

We will assess the below further criteria in your application form;

2. Capability to work independently and proactively, and to handle a full workload delivering to short timescales (Delivering at Pace).

3. Ability to work collectively with others, including those in other organisations, to build strong working relationships and deliver joint objectives (Working together).

Candidate Guidance on Completing your Application Form

Where will we assess success profiles across your application form.

• Behaviours - these will be assessed individually with a 250-word statement per behaviour. The application form will indicate which behaviour is being assessed each time you provide a statement, and we are ideally looking for an example using the below STAR method to demonstrate this behaviour in line with the full criteria stated

All elements of the success profiles will be linked to a defined criterion that demonstrates the behaviour, experience or technical skills. It is beneficial to ensure your answer focuses on the full criteria, and not just the related success profile, to give you the best chance or providing the evidence the panel wants to assess.

In your statements, it is best to focus on one example in each section to allow you to provide enough detail in your answer and use all the words you have been allocated. Examples from a range of roles across your application will demonstrate that you have the skills, experience and behaviours we are looking for. We would also advise you to use examples that best meet the criteria, even if it is a few years old.

How to Structure your Answer

Please use the STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Result) approach when writing your application answers.

• Situation - Describe the situation you found yourself in and what happened.
• Task - The Hiring Manager will want to understand what you tried to achieve from the situation that you found yourself in.
• Action - What actions did you take and how did you do it. Make sure to use “I”, not “we” to explain how your actions lead to a result.
• Result - Use facts and statistics to demonstrate the results that your actions produced. Explain whether it was a successful outcome, and if not, what you learned from the experience.

Notes to Candidates

• Please refer to the candidate FAQ document which is a link on the job advert – this will provide you with guidance on completing the application form. Please contact [email protected] if you have any issue accessing this document.
• At HM Treasury, to maximise diversity and inclusion within our workforce, we operate a fair, open and anonymous recruitment process. This means that the sift panel will only be able to assess you on the written evidence supplied in your application answers. They will not have access to personal information.
• You may be asked to provide some CV details during your application; however these will NOT be assessed during the process, but will be used to support discussions at interview – please ensure you put all information you would like to be scored against in your behaviour, experience and technical skill statements .
• You will be assessed on your skills, experience and behaviours through the online application form. When completing your application form, please outline how you meet the requirements as detailed in the ‘Essential Criteria ‘section of this job description. This will give you the best chance to provide the evidence that the panel wants to assess. More guidance can be found here – completing your application.
• If we receive a large number of applications, applications will be assessed initially against the lead criterion alone. You will then be assessed against the other criteria if you have met the minimum score on the first criterion.
• Find out more about how the Civil Service assesses candidates and uses Success Profiles to test skills, experience and behaviours in applications and interviews.
• Applications are not reviewed until the closing date has passed. You will be notified of the outcome of your application as soon as the recruitment panel has reviewed all the applications.

Support to Candidates

Candidate Guidance Support Session

We will be running an overview of Success Profiles and the STAR approach; top tips for the application and interview process and an opportunity to ask general questions around our recruitment practices. If you would like to join us, then use the link below to join the call at the right time.

Wednesday 24th May 17:00 – 17:30 Click here to join the meeting

Candidate Drop-In Session

We will be running a candidate drop-in session for this role to give you greater insight about the role as well as the chance to learn more about HM Treasury and the recruitment process. If you would like to join us, then use the appropriate link below to join the call at the right time.

Thursday 25th May 2023 10:00 – 10:30 Click here to join the meeting

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Making Effective Decisions
• Delivering at Pace
• Working Together
• Seeing the Big Picture

We only ask for evidence of these behaviours on your application form:

• Making Effective Decisions
• Delivering at Pace
• Working Together

• 25 days’ annual leave (rising to 30 after 5 years), plus 8 public holidays and the King's birthday (unless you have a legacy arrangement as an existing Civil Servant)
• Flexible working patterns (part-time, job-share, condensed hours)
• A Civil Service Pension which provides an attractive pension, benefits for dependants and average employer contributions of 27%
• Onsite restaurant and coffee bar. The London office also offers a gym, showers and prayer room
• Access to a cycle-to-work salary sacrifice scheme, season ticket advances and payroll giving
• Access to a retail discounts and cashback site
• A Rental Deposit Advance Scheme to help meet the total costs of deposits for privately rented homes
• A range of active staff networks, based around interests (e.g. analysts, music society, sports and social club) and diversity (e.g. women in the Treasury, ethnic minority network, LGBT* network, faith and belief network)

Flexible working arrangements:

HM Treasury views flexible working as essential in enabling us to recruit and retain talented people, ensuring that they are able to enjoy a long-lasting career with us. All employees have the right to apply for flexible working and there are a range of options available including; working from home, compressed hours and job sharing. Additionally, we operate flexitime systems, allowing employees to take up to an additional 2 days off each month, providing you work enough hours to meet business need.

We also offer a generous parental and adoption leave package.

At HM Treasury we have an incredibly broad remit; our work touches every citizen of the country. So, it’s important our employees come from the widest possible range of backgrounds, bringing us the widest possible range of perspectives and ways of thinking. We are committed to ensuring that all staff are able to realise their potential and achieve a healthy work-life balance.

Job contact :

Name :
Sam Mitchell
Email :
[email protected]

Recruitment team

Email :
[email protected]