Principal Java / Bespoke Software Engineer Rate Guide: $1,200–$1,450 per day

Location: Canberra, ACT

Contract Duration: 12 months

Extension Options: 2 × 12-month extensions

Estimated Start Date: 1 September 2026

Working Arrangements: Hybrid – ability to attend the Canberra office with regular work from home available.

Maximum Hours: 40 hours per week

Security Clearance: Baseline Security Clearance

Experience Level: Principal (EL2 Equivalent) About the Role

Our government partner is seeking two experienced Principal Java / Bespoke Software Engineers to join a highly skilled software engineering team responsible for developing and supporting a mission-critical operational platform.

This platform supports nationally significant search and rescue and emergency response operations, requiring highly reliable, secure and maintainable software solutions. You will work alongside experienced technical specialists responsible for maintaining and enhancing enterprise Java, cloud and database services that underpin critical operational capabilities.

This is an excellent opportunity for a senior software engineer who enjoys solving complex technical problems, modernising enterprise systems and contributing to software that directly supports operational outcomes. Key Responsibilities

Design, develop and maintain enterprise-grade Java applications.

Develop and enhance cloud-native solutions using AWS services.

Design, implement and optimise Oracle database solutions, including data models and stored procedures.

Develop RESTful APIs, SOAP services and enterprise integration components.

Build and maintain up-to-date web interfaces using ReactJS, HTML and CSS.

Develop and maintain automated build, deployment and testing pipelines.

Produce high-quality technical documentation, design artefacts and specifications.





Participate in software releases and production deployments.

Support continuous improvement of software engineering practices.

Provide technical advice to senior ICT leadership.

Participate in an on-call support roster for critical production systems.

Essential

Criteria To be successful you will demonstrate experience across most of the following:

Minimum 8 years' experience developing enterprise Java applications.

Strong experience with

Java

Spring / Spring Boot

JPA / Hibernate ORM

Enterprise Design Patterns

Java EE (highly regarded)

Extensive experience developing

REST APIs

SOAP Web Services

OpenAPI Specifications

XML

JSON

XSD Schemas

Strong Oracle Database development experience including:

Data modelling

Stored procedures

SQL optimisation

AWS development experience including

EC2

Lambda

API Gateway

S3

SQS

CloudFormation

Unix/Linux administration and Bash scripting.

Maven lifecycle management.

Continuous Integration and DevOps practices.

Automated testing and system integration testing.

Strong technical documentation skills.

Excellent written and verbal communication.

Demonstrated commitment to engineering best practice and maintainable software.

Highly

Desirable

Experience with any of the following will be highly regarded:

Reactive programming.

Jenkins.

Git.

Apache Ant.

Enterprise messaging technologies (JMS).

Object-relational mapping frameworks.

Complex systems integration.

Mission-critical or highly available enterprise applications.

GIS or spatial technology exposure (ArcGIS).

Experience supporting operational or emergency management systems.

Additional

Requirements

Applicants must be willing to:

Participate in a shared 24/7 on-call roster.

Support critical production incidents when rostered (historically very low call volume).

Work collaboratively within a highly experienced multidisciplinary engineering team.

📌 Principal Java/Bespoke Software Engineer (Developer) (Canberra)
🏢 Babylon Data
📍 Canberra