Senior Developer

As the living, growing home of our national story, The National Archives is already a special place to work. We’re an institution nearly 200 years old with a collection spanning 1,000 years of history. But it’s where we go next that makes things really interesting.

In our strategic vision: Archives for Everyone, we set ourselves the challenge of becoming the 21st Century national archive - a different kind of cultural and heritage institution: Inclusive, Entrepreneurial, Disruptive. We won’t become this overnight. It will take time, focus, effort and daring.

That’s where you come in. Because we can’t do this without you.

Job Overview

Salary: £60,000 per annum (£57,354 plus £2,646 market supplement)

Contract type: Permanent

Band: F / SEO

Closing date: Sunday 8th February at midnight

Help people find the evidence they need.

Join The National Archives’ Digital Archiving team to build and run services that open government and court records for everyone. Our Access to Digital Records products increase transparency and support open justice, while setting best practice for access to digital records.

What You’ll Work On

• Access Your Records (AYR) – secure, self service access for government departments to born digital records transferred to The National Archives (currently in private Beta).
• Find Case Law (FCL) – the public site for judgments and tribunal decisions, including data feeds under an innovative licensing approach—an important step towards open justice.
  
  

Both services are growing: AYR is moving beyond MVP, and FCL is expanding with richer metadata and new publishing workflows. Your work will help us scale features while keeping services robust and secure.

What You’ll Do

• Deliver end to end features across AYR and FCL—set technical direction, write high quality code, and work with external suppliers when needed.
• Operate production services—monitor, troubleshoot, and improve resilience, robustness and stability.
• Coach and mentor developers; line manage a junior colleague.
• Champion secure engineering and consistent standards; contribute to code reviews and quality practices.
• Stay curious and share—engage with the wider dev community, evaluate new technologies, and help colleagues keep up with digital preservation developments.
  
  

What You’ll Bring

• Strong experience delivering production applications in Python.
• Solid web fundamentals (HTML, CSS/SASS, JavaScript) with an “open by default” mindset that makes reuse easy.
• Working knowledge of Agile/TDD; confidence with JSON, SQL, XML and different data models.
• Understanding of cloud services, design patterns, infrastructure as code, and preventing common security vulnerabilities.
• Experience operating live services and explaining complex systems clearly to others.
  
  

Nice to have: Experience building accessible interfaces (WCAG 2.2 AA) and working to the Government Digital Service Standard.

Working Here

• Hybrid working: We typically ask colleagues to be on site around 60% of the time—especially early on—so you can meet users and teammates. (We can discuss home based options for this role.)
• Security: SC clearance (or willingness to obtain) is required. This requires candidates to have been resident in the UK for at least the past three years. (Please do not apply if you have been resident in the UK for less than three years as your application will be rejected).

Inclusive culture: We’re committed to improving the diversity of our workforce and warmly encourage applications from under represented groups

This is a full time post. However, requests for part-time working, flexible working and job share will be considered, taking into account at all times the operational needs of the Department.

Application Process

• Please submit your CV and a short statement highlighting relevant projects (links welcome). If you’ve built open source tools or public services, we’d love to see them.
• Interview: Interviews will be held on-site and will include a technical test
  
  

Selection for interview will be based on the ‘essential’ requirements as listed below.

• Strong track record in technical development and in delivering complex, production-quality applications in Python.
• Understanding of cloud services, design patterns and infrastructure-as-code principles
• Knowledge of common security vulnerabilities and how to prevent them, with experience implementing security controls in software
• Practical experience with JSON, SQL, XML and understanding of different data models (e.g. document, relational, graph)

Ability to understand complex systems and explain technical concepts to others

Artificial Intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action.  Please visit the Civil Service Careers website where you can find further information on the use of AI in the application guidance section.

Sponsorship

We are unable to offer sponsorship for this role.

Job Description

Job Purpose

You will deliver and integrate software to form complete services within the Access to Digital Records team, which is part of the Digital Archiving department. The Access to Digital Records team provides services for access to government records and court records, supporting people to find the evidence that they need. These important services increase transparency of how the government and the courts make decisions which shape people’s lives, as well as developing archival best practice in providing access to digital records.

We currently have two products in active development. The Access Your Records

service provides secure, self-service access to government departments and other bodies to born-digital records that have been transferred to The National Archives. It is currently in its private Beta phase. [link Brief]

Find Case Law service (https://caselaw.nationalarchives.gov.uk/) provides access to court judgments and tribunal decisions. It provides case law as data via an atom feed under an innovative licensing regime. It is an important step towards open justice and transparency of the justice system.

The Access to Digital Records team is committed to improving and developing these products, as well as developing or enhancing additional services to facilitate better access to digital records.

Working closely with the Lead Developer, you will plan and lead development on sets of related stories across our products, including the Access Your Records service and Find Case Law service.

As a Senior Developer, you will have a strong understanding of the whole system and take responsibility for teaching this to others. You will work collaboratively across multidisciplinary teams, coach and mentor more junior colleagues, and operate the production services you build while continuously finding ways to improve system robustness, resilience and stability.

This role would suit someone who is motivated to increase access to public digital records, who thinks hard about how the technological landscape is changing, enjoys working in agile teams, and wants to take ownership of significant technical deliverables while developing their leadership skills.

Role and Responsibilities

• Plan and lead development on sets of related stories, delivering complete features end-to-end, setting technical direction, developing code, supporting less experienced members of the team and working with external suppliers when necessary

Working Conditions

• Normal office environment
• Display Screen Equipment user
  
  

Person Specification

Essential Skills And Experience

• Strong track record in technical development and in delivering complex, production-quality applications in Python.
• Working knowledge of Test-driven / Agile methodologies.
• Highly motivated and able to work independently or as part of a multi-disciplinary team, maintaining strong working relationships both within an organisation and externally.
• Excellent ability to analyse and solve problems, and good organisational skills coupled with the ability to work to a high degree of accuracy
• Understanding of cloud services, design patterns and infrastructure-as-code principles
• Knowledge of common security vulnerabilities and how to prevent them, with experience implementing security controls in software
• Practical experience with JSON, SQL, XML and understanding of different data models (e.g. document, relational, graph)
• Ability to understand complex systems and explain technical concepts to others
• Excellent analytical abilities to troubleshoot issues and design solutions

Ability to explain technical ideas to diverse audiences and work effectively across multidisciplinary teams

Experience coaching or mentoring junior developers or willingness to develop this skill

Experience operating production services, monitoring systems and responding to incidents

Strong skills in the fundamental frontend technologies - HTML, CSS (including pre-processors such as SASS) and JavaScript to create clean code that is open by default and easy for others to reuse.

Desirable Skills And Experience

• Experience coding clear, usable, accessible digital interfaces that work across a range of devices and browsers, which meet WCAG 2.2 at level AA, following the principle of progressive enhancement.
• Experience of working to the Government Digital service standard.
  
  

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is

found. To learn more please see the Civil Service People Plan and the Civil Service

D&I Strategy.

Benefits

Generous benefits package, including pension, sports and social club facilities, onsite gym, discounted rates at our on-site cafe and opportunities for training and development. Annual leave entitlement of 22 days per calendar year (rising to 25 after the first year, and incrementally to 30 days after six years) and 10½ days public and privilege holidays per annum.

Any move to The National Archives from another employer will mean you can no longer access childcare vouchers. This includes moves between government departments. You may however be eligible for other government schemes, including Tax-Free Childcare. Determine your eligibility at  https://www.childcarechoices.gov.uk/ (opens in new window)

Reasonable adjustments

If a person with disabilities is put at a substantial disadvantage compared to a non-disabled person, we have a duty to make reasonable changes to our processes.

If you need a change to be made so that you can make your application, you should:

• Contact The National Archives via careers@nationalarchives.gov.uk as soon as possible before the closing date to discuss your needs
• Complete the ‘Reasonable Adjustments’ section of your application form to tell us what changes or help you might need further on in the recruitment process. For instance, you may need wheelchair access at interview, or if you’re deaf, a Language Service Professional
  
  

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must pass a disclosure and barring security check.

People working with government assets must complete basic personnel security standard checks (opens in new window)

Nationality Requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK

nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)

nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)

individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020

Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in new window)

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code  (opens in new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles. (opens in new window)

The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.

The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.

This vacancy is part of the Great Place to Work for Veterans initiative. (opens in new window)

Contact Point For Applicants

• Name: The National Archives Recruitment Team
• Email: careers@nationalarchives.gov.uk
  
  

Further information

If you feel your application has not been treated in accordance with the Recruitment Principles and you wish to make a complaint, in the first instance, you should contact The National Archives via email: careers@nationalarchives.gov.uk If you are not satisfied with the response you receive from the Department, you can contact the Civil Service Commission at https://civilservicecommission.independent.gov.uk/recruitment/recruitment-complaints/ (opens in new window)