Occupational Therapist

Hackney Borough Council; Greater London; On-site; GBP 34,000 - 52,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Employee Assistance Programme

Occupational Health support

Gym memberships discounts

Eye test vouchers

Carer and family-friendly leave

Job summary

Hackney Council is seeking a qualified Occupational Therapist to join the Occupational Therapy and Sensory Service. You will assess and advise on equipment, adaptations, and Tech Enabled Living solutions, carrying a caseload with a strengths-based approach and contributing to multi-disciplinary collaboration.

The role requires HCPC registration in England, an Enhanced DBS, and experience in social care to support independent living and community-based outcomes for residents.

Qualifications

• Qualified Occupational Therapist
• HCPC registration (England)
• Enhanced DBS required
• Experience in social care setting preferred
• Ability to work within an anti-racist and trauma-informed care framework

Responsibilities

• Carry a caseload and undertake assessments using a strengths-based approach
• Participate in the duty rota, triaging referrals and urgent visits
• Provide occupational therapy interventions to promote independence and enable Tech Enabled Living solutions

Skills

Assessment skills

Analytical skills

Communication skills

Education

HCPC registered Occupational Therapist

Job description

Hackney is one of the most dynamic and progressive local authorities in the UK. We are a resilient, vibrant, and creative borough in the heart of London, with strong, diverse communities and a powerful set of shared values. Hackney Council is passionate about our people and understands that richness of diversity is a requirement to provide the best possible services to our communities. This is demonstrated through our council-wide ambitious commitment to tackle racial inequality in our communities and workforce through our Anti-Racism framework, formally adopted in February 2024.

Over the past twenty years, the Council has built up first-class services, outstanding public infrastructure, and a reputation for excellence, innovation, and ambition. We are leading the way on essential work such as our fight for equity in Hackney with a particular focus on becoming an actively anti-racist borough. But the work doesn’t stop there, we are proactive in our approach to bringing fairness to all aspects of life including gender, neurodiversity and across the poverty divide.

We are committed to enabling independence and supporting residents to live safely in their own homes through our ‘Waiting Well’ approach, ensuring our assessments lead to the best possible outcomes. To further improve our services, we recently achieved significant milestones, including the insourcing of our Home Improvement Agency (HIA) to minimise delays in home adaptations and the redesign of our reablement service.

Hackney has a strong strengths-based and person-centred approach in which we prioritise maintaining and promoting people’s independence. We are proud that 85% of the people who use our services live in the community, with 78.8% of residents living independently after receiving reablement support and 89.4% of older residents living at home 91 days after hospital discharge—outcomes significantly higher than the London average.

We are serious about collaboration and co-production, building strong multidisciplinary links across Housing, Health, and Benefits teams to ensure adults facing multiple vulnerabilities receive holistic support. We believe accessible learning opportunities are crucial to performance and staff wellbeing, supported by a dedicated Practice Innovation and Workforce Capability team developing our Continuous Professional Development offer.

We are looking for an Occupational Therapist in our Occupational Therapy Team

Occupational Therapy

We coordinate the provision of occupational therapy services, advising on equipment and adaptations for short-term interventions as well as complex specialist and long-term support. We are responsible for Hackney’s Integrated Community Equipment Services (ICES), including Telecare, across many partner agencies. We undertake assessments with a strengths-based approach and make recommendations for a range of interventions including but not exclusively; educative techniques, equipment, adaptations, moving and handling and Tech Enabled Living solutions. Our team includes senior practitioners, occupational therapists, occupational therapy assistants and Telecare officers.

About the Role:

This is an exciting opportunity to join our dynamic Hackney Occupational Therapy and Sensory Service.

This is a dynamic and challenging role, which puts the customer at the heart of service delivery, providing excellent occupational therapy interventions, which promotes independence in all daily living activities with an ethos of co-production to give choice and control to our residents.

You will carry a caseload and undertake assessments with a strengths-based approach and make recommendations for a range of interventions including but not exclusively; educative techniques, equipment, adaptations, moving and handling and Tech Enabled Living solutions. You will participate on the duty rota, assisting in triaging referrals and carrying out urgent visits.

We go the extra mile for our residents, supporting them to achieve their full potential to fulfil their aspirations. We have a strong commitment of integrated working across health and social care through our alignment with the neighbourhoods which has given us opportunities to work closer with social workers, health professionals, care navigators and local assets to achieve the very best holistic outcomes for our residents.

Hackney has an adult social care practice framework which will support you to adapt your interventions to each individual you work with. So you’ll need to be a proactive person, with a creative approach to working with service users and their families. We know that staff are key to our success and we are seeking an Occupational Therapist who is passionate about social care and has ambition, creativity and commitment to our values to help us achieve the best for the people of Hackney. If you are an enthusiastic Occupational Therapist who has experience of working in a social care setting and can help us drive forward our vision of a dynamic, outcome-based organisation using digital innovation and partnership working, then we want to hear from you.

What do we offer?

Hackney Adult Social Care (ASC) has undergone a significant transformation and remains dedicated to our three-year Adult Social Care transformation plan (2023-26). Our work is driven by four key guiding principles: ensuring services are easy to access, preventative, personal to you, and good quality and safe. Our Practice Framework supports staff to deliver strengths-based, anti-racist, and trauma-informed care to all residents, upholding our commitment to promoting independence and tackling inequality.

Staff can access a range of benefits, an outstanding focus on Health and Wellbeing, including our Employee Assistance Programme and Occupational Health support, discounted gym memberships, eye test vouchers, and a comprehensive range of carer and family-friendly leave options.

This post is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act and will require an Enhanced DBS.

This role requires you to be a qualified Occupational Therapist and must be registered with HCPC England.

If you are an HCPC registered Occupational Therapist with excellent assessment, analytical, and reflective skills, dedicated to improving practice, and are ready to be part of our exciting journey then we want to hear from you.

As a Council, our most outstanding asset is our staff, who are highly dedicated to serving our residents and committed to our goals as an organisation.

Closing date for applications

05 October 2026 (22.59)

Interview date

TBC

We are also working towards our vision, which is to be a place for everyone; where residents and staff can be proud; a place that celebrates diversity and where everyone can feel valued, included and involved. In order to achieve this, we look for people who are: Proud; Ambitious; Pioneering; Open; Proactive; Inclusive.

Hackney Council works to eradicate discrimination on the basis of age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, and sexual orientation.We also recognise that people can be disadvantaged by their social and economic circumstances, so we will also work to eliminate discrimination and disadvantage caused by social class. We also welcome those interested in flexible working. We particularly welcome applications from disabled people, as this group is currently under represented in our workforce.

The Council has a dedicated employment support service (Hackney Works), which offers Hackney residents guidance in relation to applying for jobs. If you are thinking about applying for a job, please contact the Hackney Works team to find out what support is available: [e-mail]