Head of Children and Families
Lead with purpose. Deliver lasting change. Transform lives.
Are you a compassionate, values-driven and visionary leader committed to improving outcomes for children and young people?
We are seeking an exceptional leader to join us as Head of Children and Families - a pivotal strategic role at the heart of our organisation.
This is a rare opportunity to shape Children’s Services across one of Wales’ largest and most ambitious authorities. You will lead a high-profile service with a strong improvement focus, ensuring the best outcomes for children, young people and families.
You will provide strategic leadership across all Children’s Services, ensuring effective, innovative and well-managed delivery of statutory responsibilities including safeguarding and corporate parenting. As an inspirational leader, you will engage and develop a large, multi-disciplinary workforce, championing the voice of children and families.
You will drive early intervention, prevention, and sustainable service design.
If you share our ambition for every child to be safe, supported and able to thrive, we would love to hear from you.
Support will be provided to develop Welsh language skills where required.
Foreword from the Cabinet Member for Integrated Health and Children and Adult Social Services
As Cabinet Member, I am delighted to invite applications for this pivotal leadership role.
The Head of Children and Families is a critical appointment for Carmarthenshire County Council, entrusted with shaping the future of services for children and young people across our county. This is a role that combines strategic influence with real-world impact.
We are ambitious for our children and young people, and we are seeking an individual who can demonstrate visionary leadership, a deep commitment to safeguarding, and a passion for delivering outstanding outcomes.
You will work collaboratively across the Council and with our partners to ensure that children and families receive the highest standard of care, support, and opportunity to thrive.
This is an opportunity to lead with purpose—to inspire, to innovate, and to make a lasting difference.
We look forward to welcoming a leader who shares our commitment to putting children and families at the heart of everything we do.
Cllr. Jane Tremlett
Carmarthenshire County Council is one of the largest and most ambitious local authorities in Wales. We are proud of our strong communities, our dedicated workforce, and our determination to deliver high-quality services that improve lives. We have a positive, values-driven culture that has its citizens at the centre of all that we do.
Our Children and Families Services are central to our vision for the County. We are committed to ensuring that every child has the best possible start in life and the opportunity to reach their full potential.
This role offers a unique opportunity to join a forward-thinking and collaborative senior leadership team, working at the forefront of change across complex and high-impact services.
We are looking for a leader who can combine strategic thinking with strong operational delivery, someone who can translate ambition into action and deliver meaningful outcomes.
If you share our ambition and are ready to make a difference at scale, we would be delighted to hear from you.
Director of Social Services and Housing
Darren Mutter
This is a pivotal strategic leadership role, offering a rare opportunity to shape the future of Children and Families Services across the county.
As our Head of Children and Families, you will lead an ambitious and high-profile service at a critical point in its journey.
You will take forward a bold and exciting agenda, including a renewed focus on accommodation and support for children and young people—ensuring that our most vulnerable residents receive the care, stability, and opportunities they deserve.
This is a role with real scale, responsibility, and impact.
Why This Role Matters
Children’s Services sit at the heart of our Council’s priorities. Your leadership will directly influence outcomes for some of the most vulnerable children and families in Carmarthenshire.
You will:
- Provide strategic direction and leadership across all Children’s Services functions.
- Ensure we deliver on our statutory safeguarding responsibilities and continuously improve services.
- Champion a culture where the voice of children and families drives everything we do.
- Translate ambitious strategy into tangible improvements in outcomes for children and young people.
- Work alongside Members, partners, and colleagues to shape a system-wide response to need.
This role is not just about leadership, it’s about making a real and lasting difference.
We are seeking a leader who combines strategic vision with operational credibility.
You will be:
- A proven senior leader in Children’s Services or a related field.
- Deeply committed to safeguarding and improving outcomes.
- An inspiring and visible leader who can bring people with you.
- Confident leading complex services and delivering change at pace.
- Passionate about innovation, early intervention, and prevention.
Above all, you will share our commitment to ensuring that children and families are at the heart of everything we do.
Our Vision
Our vision for Children and Families Services is simple but powerful:
- Keep children safe
- Support families to stay together wherever possible
- Intervene early to achieve better long-term outcomes
- Work in partnership with families and communities
We are building services that work with families, not to them, focused on strengths, relationships, and sustainable change.
We provide a wide range of services that support and protect vulnerable children and young people at home, in the community and at school ensuring that all children can reach their full potential whilst being healthy, happy and safe.
The Foster Wales Carmarthenshire team is your local fostering provider and support network. We’re not your standard fostering service; we’re far more connected.
As a not-for-profit organisation, we’re dedicated to working as a team with foster carers to help build brighter futures for local children in the Carmarthenshire area. We help them stay in their familiar local environments, when it’s right for them.
In terms of location, Carmarthenshire has it all. It is ideally placed along the M4 corridor, within just a few hours’ drive from main cities including Swansea, Cardiff, and Newport, as well as Bristol, Birmingham, and London further east ‐ and to the west we are just as well connected through the Pembrokeshire ports to Ireland.
We are proud of our beautiful sweeping coastline from the Burry Inlet with views over the Gower Peninsula, across miles of golden sands and blue flag beaches as far as Pendine in the west, which is famous for its flat speed racing terrain; and our rolling countryside which extends to our borders with Pembrokeshire, Ceredigion, Powys, Neath Port Talbot and Swansea, skirting the western edge of the beautiful Brecon Beacons.
As one of the largest local authorities in Wales, we have led an ambitious programme of investment and development which has provided first‐class services to our residents, businesses, and visitors. These include state‐of‐the‐art sporting stadiums and excellent golf courses, Parc Y Scarlets Stadium, and National Closed Road Cycling Circuit in Pembrey and Cultural attractions include, theatre, and leisure complexes, such as the National Botanic Garden of Wales, Dylan Thomas Boathouse, Burry Port Marina, Millennium Coastal Park and the recently opened Tourism Attractor facility at Pendine Seafront. It’s no wonder then that Carmarthenshire’s tourism economy is thriving, bringing in over £434million last year and growing annually.
Carmarthenshire is a truly bilingual county, with more Welsh speakers than in any other county of Wales (around 40 per cent of our 187,900 residents, according to the 2021 Census). The language is an important aspect of our history and culture, and that is why we are firmly committed to helping people live, work and access services in their language of choice, using our Language Skills Strategy to support the delivery of Welsh Language Standards. We offer a range of supportive and flexible options to allow our staff to learn Welsh or improve their existing skills. If required, we will work hard to motivate and inspire you along your Welsh language journey and support you to reach the required language level for this post. You can read more here.
We want you to enjoy working for Carmarthenshire and for it to be a rewarding experience. Our employees are at the very heart of the services we provide to the community and help us achieve our ambitions. We offer a range of benefits and working arrangements to support employees in their working and personal life. See what we offer.
This is your opportunity to join a forward-thinking, high-performing Council that is committed to:
- Continuous improvement and innovation
- Collaboration across services and partners
- Supporting and developing its workforce
- Delivering meaningful change for communities
You will be part of a senior leadership community that is ambitious, supportive, and focused on making a difference.
For further information please contact:
Darren Mutter, Director of Social Services and Housing
Email: djmutter@carmarthenshire.gov.uk
Telephone: 01267 224698
Closing Date: 13 August
Shortlisting Panel: 8 September
Welsh Language Assessment: 14 September
Assessment Centre: 16 September
Appointments Panel: 29 September
