Highway Inspector Role B

Brighton & Hove City Council; Hove; On-site; GBP 36,000 - 40,000; Full time

Job summary

Brighton & Hove City Council is recruiting a Highway Inspector for the Hove area. The role focuses on inspecting and maintaining the public highway to ensure safety for all users, with duties including scheduled inspections, defect identification, and supervising repairs by contractors and utilities.

The post requires a proactive professional who can coordinate with multiple partners, manage emergencies, and contribute to winter maintenance and network management as needed.

Qualifications

• Experience in highways maintenance or engineering environments.
• Strong communication with members of the public, contractors and stakeholders.
• Ability to prioritise workloads and work independently with minimal supervision.
• Good IT, record-keeping and report-writing skills.
• Understanding of highways legislation such as Highways Act, New Roads and Street Works Act, Traffic Management Act.

Responsibilities

• Inspect and monitor the condition of the public highway to ensure safety for all users.
• Carry out scheduled inspections, identify defects, arrange repairs and monitor contractor works.
• Investigate highway maintenance complaints and assess risks; support emergency responses.
• Coordinate highway activities with council colleagues, utility companies, contractors and residents to minimise disruption.

Skills

Highways/engineering experience

Communication skills

Decision making

Independent working

IT and record-keeping

Legislation knowledge

Job description

Location Hove Town Hall, Norton Road, Hove, BN3 3BQ

Highway Inspector Role B

The job requirements are detailed below. Where applicable the skills, qualifications and memberships required for this job have also been included.

Job details

Salary £35,570 - £40,444

Contractual hours 37

Package We are pleased to offer a wide range of benefits to support you and your wellbeing. You can read about them on our Why work for us pages.

Date posted 08/09/2026

Job reference REQ0001454

Job description

Do you have experience working in a highways, highways maintenance or street works environment?

Are you confident making decisions independently while managing competing priorities and responding to incidents?

Do you enjoy working collaboratively to keep road users safe and minimise disruption across a busy highway network?

Would you like to play a key role in maintaining and improving Brighton & Hove's highways while developing specialist skills in highway inspections, winter maintenance and network management?

The Highway Inspection Team plays a vital role in keeping Brighton & Hove's road network safe, resilient and accessible for everyone who lives, works and travels in the city. This role helps ensure the highway is maintained in accordance with statutory requirements and national guidance, while supporting the delivery of winter maintenance and emergency response activities across the network.

Contract type: Permanent

Interviews to be held: week commencing monday 9th November

There is full information about the role below and attached but, if you would like an informal discussion, please contact Doug Paddick - highway inspection manager on 07395283645 or email [e-mail]

About the role

As a Highway Inspector, you will be responsible for inspecting and monitoring the condition of the public highway to ensure it remains safe for all users. You will carry out scheduled inspections, identify defects, arrange repairs and monitor works completed by contractors and utility companies.

The role combines technical inspection work, problem solving and customer service. You will investigate highway maintenance complaints, assess risks, gather evidence for insurance claims and work with contractors to ensure required standards are achieved. You will also support emergency responses to incidents such as flooding, highway defects and severe weather events.

A key aspect of the role is working closely with colleagues across the council, utility companies, contractors and residents to coordinate highway activities and minimise disruption to the city's transport network.

For candidates appointed at the higher grade, additional responsibilities include coordinating winter maintenance operations, acting as a Duty Officer, managing more complex highway maintenance schemes and contributing to contractor performance management.

What we're looking for

You will have experience working in a highways or engineering environment and be able to demonstrate an understanding of relevant highways legislation and industry standards.

You will bring:

• Experience of working within a highways maintenance, street works, highway inspection or engineering environment.


• Strong communication skills, with the ability to deal confidently and professionally with members of the public, contractors and stakeholders.


• The ability to make sound decisions, prioritise workloads and work independently with minimal supervision.


• Good IT, record-keeping and report-writing skills.


• An understanding of relevant legislation including the Highways Act, New Roads and Street Works Act and Traffic Management Act, or the ability to quickly develop this knowledge.


• A practical and organised approach, with strong attention to detail when assessing defects and gathering evidence.


• A commitment to delivering excellent public services and ensuring the safety of all highway users.

For progression within the role, opportunities are available to develop specialist knowledge and qualifications in highway inspections, winter maintenance, project delivery and traffic management.

Why join our team?

This is an excellent opportunity to develop a rewarding career in highway asset management and network safety. You will be supported through training, professional development and nationally recognised qualifications including highway inspection and winter maintenance training.

Our team works across a diverse city environment, helping communities remain connected and ensuring roads, footways and transport infrastructure are safe and accessible. We pride ourselves on collaborative working, knowledge sharing and supporting colleagues to develop their careers.

You'll have the opportunity to:

• Develop technical expertise in highway inspections, asset management and winter maintenance.


• Work on a varied portfolio of inspections, investigations and maintenance schemes.


• Contribute to the council's emergency response and resilience planning.


• Access training and development opportunities that support career progression.


• Be part of a team that directly improves safety and accessibility for residents, businesses and visitors.

Additional information

Your starting salary will be pro rata if the above position is less than 37 hours or term-time only.

We are a workplace that supports flexibility and employee wellbeing in the way we work whilst providing the best service for our customers. Team and service working arrangements are designed to support both employee work life balance and team collaboration. These would be part of your individual working arrangements alongside any personal preference agreed with your manager in advance of joining. Your contractual location will be the designated council office for your team and travel to and from your contractual location would be at your own expense.

Encouraging a diverse workforce

Our city is known and loved for its diversity. Not only is the mixture of people, culture and skills vital to the economic and social development of the city, it's what makes Brighton & Hove such a great place to live, work and visit. We are committed to developing and retaining a workforce that is representative of the diverse communities we serve so we welcome applications from individuals from all backgrounds. In order to achieve our aims of proportionate representation, we particularly encourage applicants from a BME or White Other background as well as those who identify as disabled, male or trans.

Find out more about our commitment to being a fair and inclusive place to work where everyone can achieve their potential by reading about our fair and inclusive actions, our anti-racism strategy and the work we are doing to encourage a diverse workforce (brighton-hove.gov.uk).

Why work for us?

• be connected


• be confident


• be innovative and creative


• be diverse and inclusive


• be healthy and psychologically safe

For more information about our values and the benefits of working at the council, visit Why work for us which gives details of our wellbeing support, our benefits including leave and pensions as well as details of our training and development.