Job reference: 262153
Salary: Band 8A (£65,125 - £70,303)
Job closing date: 02/11/2026
Job Type: Other Therapeutic
Location: NHS Lothian
Employment type: Fixed-term
Hours Per Week: Various
Job posted date: 12/10/2026
Employer (NHS Board): NHS Lothian
Department: Clinical Psychology

Clinical Psychology, Learning Disabilities Psychology
Fixed term 12 months
Part Time Band 8A
32.4 (0.9 WTE) 2 Posts

We have an exciting opportunity for a 12 month fixed term Clinical Psychologist in NHS Lothian’s Learning Disabilities Psychology Service. You will have opportunity to provide specialist clinical psychology input into both community and inpatient tiers of the service. 6.5 sessions of your time will focus on representing clinical psychology within the North West and North East Edinburgh Community Learning Disability Teams, with an additional 2.5 sessions of your time spent providing clinical psychology input to the William Fraser Centre, one of the Learning Disability Service’s inpatient units on the Royal Edinburgh Hospital site.

The post presents an excellent opportunity for you to further develop and consolidate your skills in supervision, teaching, and consultation, as well as building on your existing experience of providing specialist assessment and intervention for people with learning disabilities presenting with a wide range of presenting difficulties. You will also provide clinical supervision to pre-qualified psychology team members, as well as having opportunity to participate in the wider Learning Disability Psychology Service’s quality improvement, audit, and research activities.

We are looking for a clinical psychologist who is passionate about the rights of people with a learning disability, and can display the skills and creativity to ensure psychological assessment and intervention are accessible for people with learning disabilities and their carers. You will also have an aptitude for developing collaborative relationships with multidisciplinary colleagues and supporting other staff to develop their skills in psychological work. As this is a Lothian wide post you may be required to provide input to other areas of NHS Lothian’s Learning Disability services across the Lothians. We would be happy to consider applications for this post on a secondment basis.

NHS Lothian’s Learning Disability Psychology Service provides a friendly, supportive and stimulating environment in which to work. Staff within our service have a range of clinical interests reflecting a variety of theoretical and therapeutic orientations, and an emphasis is placed on good clinical supervision and support.

Potential applicants are encouraged to contact us for an informal conversation to find out more about the service. For informal enquiries please contact Dr Reed Cappleman, Consultant Clinical Psychologist / Professional Lead for Learning Disabilities.
Email: reed.cappleman@nhslothian.scot.nhs.uk Tel: 0131 537 6270.

To work in the United Kingdom, there is a legal requirement for an individual to demonstrate that they have the relevant permission to work in the country. This permission is, without exception, granted by the UK Visa and Immigrations Service. Further information on what NHS Scotland Boards are required to do to check this as well as what your responsibilities include can be found in the further information for this vacancy.

Please note: we anticipate a high level of interest in this position and may close the vacancy early once a sufficient amount of applications are received. Therefore, please make sure you complete and submit your application at an early stage.

We will fully support disabled candidates, and candidates with long-term conditions or who are neurodivergent by making reasonable adjustments to our recruitment policy and practices.

This post requires the post holder to have a PVG Scheme membership/record. If the post holder is not a current PVG member for the required regulatory group (i.e. child and/or adult) then an application will need to be made to Disclosure Scotland and deemed satisfactory before they can begin in post.

Please note: As this post is part-time, the salary will be pro-rata.

NHS Scotland is committed to encouraging equality and diversity among our workforce and eliminating unlawful discrimination. The aim is for our workforce to be truly representative and for each employee to feel respected and able to give their best. To this end, NHS Scotland welcomes applications from all sections of society.