Job summary
- Main area
- Ashworth Psychological Services
- Grade
- Band 4
- Contract
- Fixed term: 12 months (None.)
- Hours
- Full time - 37.5 hours per week
- Job ref
- 350-SC7413713
- Employer
- Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust
- Employer type
- NHS
- Site
- Ashworth Hospital
- Town
- Maghull
- Salary
- £27,485 - £30,162 per annum
- Salary period
- Yearly
- Closing
- Today at 23:59
Employer heading

Assistant Psychologist
Band 4
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Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust celebrates diversity and promotes equal opportunities; we are committed to challenging and eliminating racism and other forms of discrimination and advancing and promoting equality of opportunity in the provision of services and creating an inclusive environment for all employees. We believe that everyone has the right to be treated with dignity and respect.
We take positive action to support disadvantaged groups and also particularly encourage applications from ethnically diverse, disabled and LGBTQIA+ people that are under-represented in our workforce. Furthermore we welcome applications from reservists and ex-armed forces personnel as we recognise the benefits of the values, skills, training and experience that they bring to their work with us. We encourage all applicants to share their equality information with us.
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Job overview
Ashworth Hospital High Secure Psychological Services are seeking to recruit an enthusiastic and dynamic full time assistant psychologist for a twelve month fixed term period. You will need a drive to assist in the delivery of high quality psychological assessment and treatment to patients detained under the Mental Health Act and require placement within a high secure hospital due to the complexity of their presentations and associated risks. Within the hospital, psychological services deliver a wide range of assessments and treatments in relation to mental health, personality difficulties and offending behaviour risks. We provide treatment with a focus on those factors that will allow patients to a progress to lower secure placements in line with a least restrictive approach. Ideally, you will need experience of working with complex individuals.
Main duties of the job
The department consists of a mix of clinical and forensic psychologists, a cognitive behavioural therapist and a nurse therapist. We have close links with both local and international universities and provide placements for trainee clinical and trainee forensic psychologists. The service has developed innovative clinical interventions and research.
We will welcome applications from enthusiastic, highly motivated and resourceful individuals who are keen to work as part of a team.
Working for our organisation
Mersey Care is one of the largest trusts providing physical health and mental health services in the North West, serving more than 1.4 million people across our region and are also commissioned for services that cover the North West, North Wales and the Midlands.
We offer specialist inpatient and community services that support physical and mental health and specialist inpatient mental health, learning disability, addiction and brain injury services. Mersey Care is one of only three trusts in the UK that offer high secure mental health facilities.
At the heart of all we do is our commitment to ‘perfect care’ – care that is safe, effective, positively experienced, timely, equitable and efficient. We support our staff to do the best job they can and work alongside service users, their families, and carers to design and develop future services together. We’re currently delivering a programme of organisational and service transformation to significantly improve the quality of the services we provide and safely reduce cost as we do so.
Flexible working requests will be considered for all roles.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
Please refer to the attached detailed job description for a full list of duties and responsibilities.
Person specification
Qualifications
Essential criteria
- A First or Upper Second honours degree in psychology OR a lower class with a post-graduate qualification. (e.g., Master’s degree)
- Entitlement to graduate membership of the British Psychological Society (GBR)
- ECDL or demonstrable proficiency with Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft Publisher and SPSS
Desirable criteria
- Degree included study of psychopathology/clinical/forensic issues.
- Further training in relevant areas of professional psychology, mental health practice, positive behaviour support, autism, personality disorder and/or research design and analysis
Knowledge/Experience
Essential criteria
- Knowledge of psychological approaches to working with people who have mental health needs or behaviours that challenge (e.g., Positive Behaviour Support, Trauma Informed Care, Person Centred Care etc)
- Good written and spoken English.
- Good keyboard skills
- Good inter-personal skill
- Good organisational skills
- Ability to carry out instructions, use own initiative but recognise own limits and can utilise and tolerate supervision effectively.
Desirable criteria
- Has experience of face-to-face work within psychology, mental health and/or with clients with behaviours that challenge.
- Has experience of working in a setting comparable to that in which the post is based
- Experience of working in a multidisciplinary team/ experience of working alongside staff from other disciplines.
- Experience of research methods, audit or other service evaluation techniques
- Has worked with qualified psychologists and/or mental health professionals and has an awareness of professional standards/issues
Values
Essential criteria
- Continuous Improvement
- Accountability
- Respectfulness
- Enthusiasm
- Support
- High professional standards
- Responsive to service users
- Engaging leadership style
- Strong customer service belief
- Transparency and honesty
- Discreet
- Change oriented
Skills
Essential criteria
- High level communication skills (written and verbal) including an ability to communicate and work in settings in which the atmosphere may be highly emotive.
- An understanding of the needs and difficulties of people with mental health problems, learning disabilities and/or behaviours that challenge.
- An understanding of psychology applied to health care.
- Able to use library effectively, conduct literature searches, etc.
- Ability to accept and use supervision appropriately and effectively.
- Recognises the limits of own competence and need for supervision.
- Ability and willingness to travel for work.
Desirable criteria
- Experience using computers for databases or data-analysis, especially SPSS for Windows
- High standard of report writing
- An ability to apply existing psychological knowledge to a learning disability context.
Applicant requirements
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.
Documents to download
Further details / informal visits contact
- Name
- Neil Jackson
- Job title
- Consultant Clinical Psychologist
- Email address
- [email protected]
- Telephone number
- 0151 472 4534
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