Head of Safety, Health & Environment

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Location: MSSC, National Support Centre, 200B Lambeth Road, London, SE1 7JY (Hybrid)

Contract: Full time, Permanent

Salary: £60,000 - £63,000 gross per annum, depending on experience

Closing Date: Sunday 8 February 2026

Interviews: Tuesday 17 February 2026 (Interviews to be held in London)

Application: CV & Supporting Statement

The Marine Society & Sea Cadets (MSSC) is the leading maritime charity for youth development and lifelong learning. We are a vibrant and growing charity inspiring young people to achieve their potential through challenge and nautical adventure and also enabling seafarers and maritime professionals to realise their potential through learning and career development.

Working with our employees, cadets, and volunteers, we have built a strong vision and five-year Future Ready strategy to meet the growing demand for what we provide, both for young people, seafarers and maritime professionals - and the thousands who aspire to be the sea cadets and marine professionals of the future. It is also about equipping them to achieve their potential and thrive in a rapidly changing world, while growing our charity to benefit even more people - including those from under-represented or marginalised groups.

About the role

If you have significant experience of delivering and guiding health and safety in a large organisation as well as providing advice and guidance on health and safety issues on both a strategic and operational level this could be the role for you. You will have first class leadership skills, with the ability to manage a disbursed staff team as well as the excellent interpersonal skills to support and influence colleagues, senior managers, volunteers and others. The successful candidate will be able to build effective relationships, manage a diverse workload as well as being able to analyse and deal with complex or difficult situations, with skill and discretion.

Responsibilities:

• Manage all safety, health and environmental issues within the MSSC, working closely with the Director of Young People, Volunteer & Business Support and other members of the senior management team, the area, offshore, training and other teams as appropriate.
• Manage a disbursed team of Safety Assurance Officers with the support of a Deputy Head of Safety, Health & Environment.
• Monitor changes to legislation and advise CEO and Trustees of their impact on the MSSC and any required actions and/or policy changes.
• Report and analyse safety data and identifying trends or issues.

Requirements:

• Hold a formal qualification in Health & Safety (NEBOSH Certificate or higher).
• Up to date knowledge of H&S legislation, developments, practice and management.
• Experience of risk management and compliance systems.
• Significant experience of providing advice and guidance on H&S issues at a senior professional level; both operational and strategic.
• Experience of managing and supporting a staff team.

Benefits:

• 25 days annual leave per annum, pro rata for part time employees, increasing with length of service.
• Hybrid working for many roles.
• Volunteering Leave.
• Life assurance (4x salary).
• Private medical insurance.
• Generous pension (employer contribution up to 10%).
• Cycle to work scheme.
• Access to the Marine Society Digital Library.
• Wellbeing portal and EAP with 121 counselling.
• Employee development: We are investing in our employees' development and have an annual calendar of learning and development opportunities, designed to support employees to develop into their roles and stretch them to achieve their full potential.

Additional Information:

MSSC positively encourages applications from suitably qualified and eligible candidates from all backgrounds. Equity, diversity, and inclusion really matters to us, so we can best serve our beneficiaries from every community. We work to ensure a fair and consistent recruitment process and aim to be a charity where diversity of experience, identity and skills are valued and welcomed. MSSC is an equal opportunities employer.

We recognise our responsibilities to safeguard and protect the young people and vulnerable adults with whom we work. We do all we can to promote their health, safety and wellbeing, and we expect our staff to share this commitment and work in line with safeguarding policy, the MSSC's values and ethos of inclusivity. We adhere to safer recruitment practices and therefore employment is subject to detailed pre-employment checks for successful candidates, including references and criminal disclosure checks and the completion of a disclosure questionnaire. All successful applicants are required to attend safeguarding training and undergo pre-employment checks including a criminal record check.