Public sector jobs in Exeter

Exeter has a lot of headquarters for a city of its size. Devon County Council, Devon and Cornwall Police, the South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust and the Met Office are all run from the city, alongside the Royal Devon University Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust and Exeter City Council. You can find county-wide and regional jobs here as well as the usual hospital, school and council posts. Pay for most of them follows national scales, so a band 5 nurse or a constable earns the same in Exeter as in Leeds.

Two councils, two sets of jobs

Devon has two tiers of local government, and the split decides which employer a job sits with. Devon County Council runs adult and children’s social care, education services, highways, libraries and trading standards across the county, and many of its office-based staff work at County Hall in Exeter. Exeter City Council is the district council, responsible for housing, planning, bin collections, leisure and council tax. A children’s social worker post will be with the county, and a housing options officer post will usually be with the city. How councils are organised explains the set-up in more detail.

Both councils use the NJC pay spine for most roles. From 1 April 2026 the bottom point, SCP 3, is £25,614 (about £13.28 an hour). Each council grades its own jobs, so two posts with similar titles can sit at different points.

Hospital, mental health and ambulance work

The Royal Devon University Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust was formed in 2022 when the Exeter and North Devon trusts merged. It runs the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital at Wonford and community services across much of the county. Devon Partnership NHS Trust provides mental health and learning disability services. South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust has its headquarters in Exeter and recruits 999 and 111 call handlers, emergency care assistants, paramedics and control room staff for a region that runs from Cornwall to Gloucestershire.

All three pay Agenda for Change rates for England. Exeter is outside the London high cost area zones, so there is no supplement on top.

Band	Pay from 1 April 2026	Typical jobs
2	£25,272	Domestic, porter, healthcare assistant
3	£25,760 to £27,476	Senior healthcare assistant, ward clerk
4	£28,392 to £31,157	Nursing associate, emergency care assistant
5	£32,073 to £39,043	Newly qualified nurse, therapist
6	£39,959 to £48,117	Paramedic, specialist nurse

Shift work on wards and in ambulances adds unsocial hours payments to these figures. If you are weighing up ambulance work, how to become a paramedic covers the degree and apprenticeship routes.

Police and fire

Devon and Cornwall Police has its headquarters at Middlemoor in Exeter. Alongside officer recruitment it hires PCSOs, call handlers, investigators and specialists in IT, finance and forensics. A constable appointed now starts on £32,255 from 1 September 2026 and reaches £52,015 at the top of the scale after several years. The force sets PCSO pay on the police staff spine, so check the advert.

Devon and Somerset Fire and Rescue Service covers the city and a huge rural area. Wholetime firefighters earn £31,539 in development and £40,358 once competent, from 1 July 2026. On-call firefighters, who live or work nearby and are paid a retainer plus fees for each call, crew a large share of stations in Devon, and the service publishes the current rates with its on-call adverts.

The Met Office and other national bodies

The Met Office has had its headquarters in Exeter since the early 2000s. It employs meteorologists and climate scientists, but also software developers, data engineers, procurement and HR staff, and facilities teams. The Met Office sets its own pay and grades, with no national scale behind them, so compare the salary range on each advert. Other national employers in and around the city tend to advertise on Civil Service Jobs.

Schools

Primary and secondary schools in Exeter are a mix of council-maintained schools and academies in multi-academy trusts. Teachers outside London start on £34,069 (M1) from 1 September 2026 under the award the government accepted in July 2026. The formal pay document was still in draft in October 2026, so maintained schools pay the new rates, backdated, once it is in force. Teaching assistants and other support staff are usually on the NJC spine and paid term-time only, which brings the actual salary below the full-time figure on the advert. Most school jobs are listed on Teaching Vacancies and on trust websites, and using Teaching Vacancies explains how to set up alerts for a set distance from Exeter.

If you are willing to commute, Plymouth’s hospitals, naval base and council add a lot more vacancies within reach by train. Public sector jobs in Plymouth covers those employers.