Senior Compliance Officer

Environmental Protection Authority NZ

Senior Compliance Officer at EPA responsible for leading compliance and enforcement functions. Supporting industries to meet regulatory obligations while conducting inspections and investigations in New Zealand.

Posted 6/9/2026full-timeWellington • 🇳🇿 New ZealandSenior💰 NZ$103,473 - NZ$155,209 per yearWebsite

About the role

Key responsibilities & impact

Lead and enhance our regulatory compliance, monitoring, and enforcement functions
Provide high-quality technical and procedural advice
Support compliance activities and maintain professional relationships with regulated parties
Conduct inspections and investigations within technically challenging areas, including hazardous substances, ozone-depleting gases, and the emissions trading scheme
Mentor team members, develop processes, and ensure quality assurance of outputs
Lead and contribute to projects aimed at enhancing and improving our internal systems and processes.

Requirements

What you’ll need

Comprehensive experience in regulatory compliance and enforcement, ideally within local or central government
Experience of applying legislation to unique and dynamic situations to identify breaches
Proven record of evidence collection and management to recognised evidential sufficiency standards
Experience of regulatory practices and responding to incidents, complaints and enquiries
An understanding of the methods and techniques for the assessment and management of risk and assessing effects in a regulatory environment
Good judgement and strong reasoning skills that can be justified
A high level of written communication skills with the ability to produce clear, concise and well-reasoned documents
Experience within a multi-jurisdictional regulatory environment
Experience leading complex investigations and proven ability to take enforcement action
Proven experience of mentoring and developing others in regulatory practice.

Benefits

Comp & perks

flexible working culture
three additional paid leave days between Christmas and New Years in addition to four weeks’ annual leave
$400 non-taxable payment to help you set up working at home
an annual paid EPA Environment Day to support the community with environmental initiatives
in-house Māori cultural capability building programme
learning opportunities, including the annual EPA Symposium
active and lively social club, and diverse groups and support networks
EPA awards recognising individual and team effort
relocation help for those moving to New Zealand from overseas.

ATS Keywords

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Applicant Tracking System Keywords

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Hard Skills & Tools

regulatory complianceenforcementevidence collectionrisk assessmentinvestigationsquality assurancelegislation applicationincident responsecomplaint managementemissions trading scheme

Soft Skills

mentoringjudgementreasoningwritten communicationrelationship managementprocess developmentproject leadershipteam collaborationproblem-solvinganalytical thinking