Parish Caretaker – Kensington

Key information

Closing date: 12pm, Monday 10 March 2025

£13.85 per hour // £10,803 per annum

Part-time, 15 hours per week

Permanent Contract

Based in London, W8

Interviews: w/c 17 March 2025

 

Please find the job description for this role below:

Caretaker and Facilities Maintenance Job Description

 

Are you a reliable, organised, and proactive individual who enjoys working in a community-focused environment? Then this could be the role for you!

 

What you’ll be doing

Based at Kensington Parish, this pivotal role will involve working closely with the Parish Priest and the parish office team. You will use your maintenance experience to support the smooth running of the parish facilities.

We are recruiting a Caretaker to undertake a variety of duties, including general cleaning and maintenance of the parish centre. Additionally, you will liaise regularly with the Parish Priest regarding any malfunctions in equipment or building defects requiring attention.

 

Key Responsibilities:

Parish Centre Servicing: Ensure the main hall, four meeting rooms, kitchen, entrance lobby, corridors, and toilets are clean and well-maintained. Replenish supplies as needed and carry out deep cleaning of kitchen appliances on a six-week rotation.

Caretaking and Maintenance: Maintain external areas, oversee external contractors, coordinate site visits for events, and conduct regular Health and Safety checks.

Facilities Caretaking: Set up and clear away chairs and tables for events, polish the main hall floors quarterly, and attend evening events as required.

General Maintenance: Clean communal areas, lavatories, floors, doors, and low-level windows. Move rubbish bins to and from the collection point and report any maintenance issues to the Parish Priest.

 

This means there’s lots to get involved in – and to be excited about.

 

What we’re looking for

To be successful in this role, you will need to be able to communicate well both verbally and in writing, be self-motivated, and capable of working unsupervised. An eye for detail and the ability to act on initiative when required are essential.

Additionally, you will have excellent organisational skills and the ability to prioritise your workload effectively and discreetly if required.

We welcome applications from those with a Catholic faith, other faiths, or none. Above all, we seek someone who respects the values we share, helping others and supporting dignified work without prejudice.

 

What we offer you

In return for your hard work and commitment to us, you will receive a competitive reward package which will include, but is not limited to:

• Life Assurance
• Access to Healthcare Cash Plan
• Discounts scheme through Reward Gateway – shopping, restaurants, cinema tickets gift cards and much more
• Specsavers Eyecare Vouchers
• Season Ticket Loan
• Cycle to Work scheme
• Access to low cost loans with Churches Mutual
• Employee assistance programme– free, independent 24/7 help and advice for work-related issues as well as problems affecting home life

 

Who are we?

We are the Roman Catholic Diocese of Westminster, a faith-based charity with offices close to Victoria Train and Underground Station and just a short walk from St James Park and Westminster Underground stations.

We are home to the Archbishop of Westminster (Cardinal Vincent Nichols) & our beautiful Westminster Cathedral. We are one of the leading Catholic dioceses in the country, delivering our charitable mission through our network of 208 schools in which over 90,000 pupils attend daily, 212 parishes and several hundred social justice initiatives. We seek to positively impact the lives of all members of society.

Our core values are Competence, Reliability, Honesty, Perseverance & Love.

Our values are at the centre of everything we do and as such we are looking for a Parish Caretaker who is able to clearly demonstrate and evidence them

 

Application details

Our people are incredibly important to us, and we value and respect diversity in all its forms (seen and unseen). We particularly welcome applications from those from Black and Asian backgrounds, as well as candidates with disabilities and from the communities in which we work. We would like to increase representation of these groups among our staff as we know greater diversity will lead to an even greater impact for our work.

To be considered for the role, please complete an online application. CVs will NOT be considered, therefore, please do not send them. Only shortlisted applicants will be contacted. Please note that you will need to be eligible to work in the UK to apply for this position. You must provide proof of Right to Work in the UK.  We reserve the right to remove the vacancy before closing date.

Equal Opportunities & Living Wage Statement:

The Diocese of Westminster is an Equal Opportunities and accredited Living Wage employer. To be successful, we aspire to be person centered at all times and place human dignity at our centre. We aim at all times to recruit the person who is best suited to the job, and we welcome applications from all communities and underrepresented groups, regardless of race, sexual orientation, disability, faith, age and gender. We guarantee an interview to disabled candidates who meet the minimum criteria. We strive to take a holistic approach to the development of our people so that we may better serve and empower the mission of our Church as ministered by the parishes, deaneries, schools and communities that we support. Our ambition is to work together to promote a more inclusive environment, which attracts all candidates and signals our commitment to celebrating and promoting diversity.

We want people from all walks of life to feel valued for their individuality, thrive in our organisation, share a sense of belonging and demonstrate our values. With this in mind, we positively celebrate Diversity & Inclusion at the Diocese of Westminster and place it at the heart of our aim which is to reflect and connect with the diverse communities that we serve.

Actions we take to provide equality of opportunity for all candidates include:

• We anonymise application forms during our shortlisting process to ensure that candidates are assessed without any consideration of their name, gender or background.
• As part of this anonymisation, we don’t take into consideration where candidates studied, or the method of that study e.g. full-time, part-time or distance learning.
• We apply a consistent approach to our question setting across our applications and interviews to ensure that everyone is assessed against the identified values, competencies and job requirements.
• Our values are important to us and as such we use a scoring framework that marks candidates based on values, behaviours and competencies.
• We provide guidance and brief all our interviewers throughout the selection processes in recruitment best-practice to mitigate against any potential for conscious or unconscious bias or discrimination.
• Whenever possible we will have multiple interviewers when assessing each candidate to ensure marking is accurate and fair.
• We ensure all our assessment venues are accessible. We offer alternative formats of our application forms to encourage applicants with disabilities or who require reasonable adjustments to perform at their best.
• We will work together with candidates with a disability or health condition to implement reasonable adjustments to enable them to feel comfortable and strive during the assessment process.