SC Cleared Contract Job Trends in the West Midlands

Security Check (SC) Clearance
England > West Midlands

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the West Midlands with a requirement for SC Cleared qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 17 October 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Oct 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 4 5 10
Rank change year-on-year +1 +5 +7
Contract jobs citing SC Cleared 318 236 225
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 16.76% 12.57% 11.13%
As % of the Qualifications category 46.09% 39.27% 39.40%
Number of daily rates quoted 227 171 147
10th Percentile £366 £358 £323
25th Percentile £430 £455 £405
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £550 £525
Median % change year-on-year -6.36% +4.76% +5.00%
75th Percentile £588 £630 £634
90th Percentile £700 £685 £688
England median daily rate £525 £525 £550
% change year-on-year - -4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 21 2 13
10th Percentile - - £29.50
25th Percentile - - £62.50
Median hourly rate £18.87 £35.00 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year -46.09% -46.15% -
75th Percentile £25.15 - £67.50
90th Percentile - - £69.75
England median hourly rate £25.15 £62.50 £56.49
% change year-on-year -59.76% +10.64% -5.85%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
West Midlands

SC Cleared falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in the West Midlands.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 690 601 571
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 36.37% 32.02% 28.24%
Number of daily rates quoted 456 386 345
10th Percentile £263 £313 £300
25th Percentile £411 £414 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £506 £540 £525
Median % change year-on-year -6.25% +2.86% +5.00%
75th Percentile £588 £631 £600
90th Percentile £673 £725 £700
England median daily rate £525 £526 £550
% change year-on-year -0.19% -4.36% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 52 13 31
10th Percentile £18.02 £20.65 £17.13
25th Percentile £18.87 £23.60 £23.00
Median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £27.50
Median % change year-on-year -28.14% +27.27% +20.88%
75th Percentile £40.46 £50.00 £67.50
90th Percentile £50.00 £56.30 £70.00
England median hourly rate £25.15 £52.50 £53.58
% change year-on-year -52.10% -2.02% +19.07%

SC Cleared
Job Vacancy Trend in the West Midlands

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing SC Cleared relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands.

SC Cleared job vacancy trend in the West Midlands

SC Cleared
Daily Rate Trend in the West Midlands

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing SC Cleared.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing SC Cleared

SC Cleared
Daily Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SC Cleared in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 17 October 2025.

Daily rate histogram for SC Cleared in the West Midlands

SC Cleared
Hourly Rate Trend in the West Midlands

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing SC Cleared.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing SC Cleared

SC Cleared
Hourly Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing SC Cleared in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 17 October 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for SC Cleared in the West Midlands

SC Cleared
Contract Job Locations in the West Midlands

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing SC Cleared within the West Midlands region over the 6 months to 17 October 2025. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
Birmingham +23 95 £475 -20.83% 30
Shropshire 0 81 £519 +11.21% 14
Warwickshire -4 57 £496 -18.29% 9
Worcestershire +11 41 £650 +36.84% 4
Herefordshire +1 36 £700 +14.38% 4
Solihull -3 15 £475 +6.26% 3
Coventry - 5 £275 -
Staffordshire 0 4 £343 -23.89% 16
Wolverhampton - 3 £138 - 1
SC Cleared
England

SC Cleared
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the West Midlands by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 38 (11.95%) Confluence
2 28 (8.81%) SAS
3 14 (4.40%) WebLogic
4 12 (3.77%) Apache
4 12 (3.77%) nginx
5 7 (2.20%) Apache Airflow
6 4 (1.26%) SharePoint
7 3 (0.94%) Oracle Workflow
8 1 (0.31%) NetWeaver
8 1 (0.31%) SAP EP
8 1 (0.31%) Tuxedo
Applications
1 11 (3.46%) Mozilla Thunderbird
2 7 (2.20%) Microsoft Office
3 4 (1.26%) Microsoft Project
3 4 (1.26%) Spreadsheet
4 3 (0.94%) Microsoft Excel
5 1 (0.31%) AutoCAD
5 1 (0.31%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 1 (0.31%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 3 (0.94%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (0.63%) SAP ERP
3 1 (0.31%) Oracle Assets
3 1 (0.31%) SAP CRM
Cloud Services
1 78 (24.53%) Azure
2 74 (23.27%) AWS
3 33 (10.38%) Amazon S3
4 32 (10.06%) Amazon EC2
5 30 (9.43%) Amazon CloudWatch
6 27 (8.49%) AWS KMS
7 25 (7.86%) Amazon ELB
7 25 (7.86%) Virtual Private Cloud
8 24 (7.55%) GitHub
9 16 (5.03%) Microsoft 365
10 15 (4.72%) Route 53
11 13 (4.09%) Azure Monitor
12 12 (3.77%) Amazon Glacier
13 11 (3.46%) Amazon ECS
14 10 (3.14%) Power Platform
14 10 (3.14%) Serverless
15 9 (2.83%) Azure DevOps
15 9 (2.83%) PaaS
16 8 (2.52%) Azure Key Vault
16 8 (2.52%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 47 (14.78%) Firewall
2 40 (12.58%) DNS
3 33 (10.38%) VPN
4 31 (9.75%) WAN
5 29 (9.12%) IPsec
6 27 (8.49%) SMTP
7 25 (7.86%) MPLS
8 22 (6.92%) FTP
9 21 (6.60%) HTTP
9 21 (6.60%) SSH
10 20 (6.29%) BGP
11 11 (3.46%) IMAP
11 11 (3.46%) OpenLDAP
11 11 (3.46%) SSL
12 10 (3.14%) Wireless
13 9 (2.83%) Cisco IPT
13 9 (2.83%) DMVPN
14 8 (2.52%) Network Security
15 5 (1.57%) Internet
15 5 (1.57%) Junos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 30 (9.43%) Amazon RDS
1 30 (9.43%) PostgreSQL
2 20 (6.29%) Pentaho
3 18 (5.66%) Amazon Aurora
4 12 (3.77%) Oracle Database
4 12 (3.77%) SAS Enterprise Guide
5 9 (2.83%) SAS Visual Analytics
6 8 (2.52%) Redis
7 6 (1.89%) Elasticsearch
7 6 (1.89%) Power BI
8 5 (1.57%) Data Warehouse
8 5 (1.57%) DynamoDB
9 3 (0.94%) Big Data
9 3 (0.94%) SAS Data Integration Studio
10 2 (0.63%) DataStage
10 2 (0.63%) Oracle Database 12c
10 2 (0.63%) SAP BW
10 2 (0.63%) SQL Server
11 1 (0.31%) Azure SQL Database
11 1 (0.31%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 70 (22.01%) JIRA
2 57 (17.92%) Git
3 51 (16.04%) Jenkins
4 23 (7.23%) Vagrant
5 18 (5.66%) SonarQube
6 12 (3.77%) GitLab
7 9 (2.83%) JUnit
7 9 (2.83%) Maven
7 9 (2.83%) Mockito
8 4 (1.26%) Bitbucket
8 4 (1.26%) Bitbucket Server
8 4 (1.26%) DbUnit
8 4 (1.26%) jMock
8 4 (1.26%) PVCS
9 3 (0.94%) Cucumber
10 2 (0.63%) NeoLoad
10 2 (0.63%) Postman
10 2 (0.63%) ScriptRunner
10 2 (0.63%) Selenium
11 1 (0.31%) ClearCase
General
1 87 (27.36%) Social Skills
2 74 (23.27%) Public Sector
3 24 (7.55%) Analytical Skills
4 13 (4.09%) Telecoms
5 12 (3.77%) Finance
6 10 (3.14%) Presentation Skills
7 5 (1.57%) Marketing
8 3 (0.94%) Documentation Skills
8 3 (0.94%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 3 (0.94%) Legal
9 2 (0.63%) Aerospace
9 2 (0.63%) Electronics
9 2 (0.63%) General Ledger
9 2 (0.63%) Influencing Skills
9 2 (0.63%) Manufacturing
10 1 (0.31%) Automotive
10 1 (0.31%) Banking
10 1 (0.31%) Military
10 1 (0.31%) Police
10 1 (0.31%) Retail
Job Titles
1 32 (10.06%) Developer
2 29 (9.12%) DevOps Engineer
3 27 (8.49%) Platform Engineer
4 24 (7.55%) AWS Engineer
5 20 (6.29%) AWS DevOps
5 20 (6.29%) AWS DevOps Engineer
5 20 (6.29%) Cloud Platform Engineer
5 20 (6.29%) Support Engineer
6 19 (5.97%) Network Engineer
7 17 (5.35%) Analyst
7 17 (5.35%) Senior
8 13 (4.09%) 3rd Line Engineer
8 13 (4.09%) Administrator
9 12 (3.77%) 3rd Line Support
9 12 (3.77%) 3rd Line Support Engineer
9 12 (3.77%) Consultant
10 11 (3.46%) AWS Platform Engineer
10 11 (3.46%) DevSecOps Engineer
10 11 (3.46%) Java Developer
10 11 (3.46%) Security Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 18 (5.66%) REST
2 13 (4.09%) LDAP
3 12 (3.77%) Spring
3 12 (3.77%) Spring Boot
3 12 (3.77%) YAML
4 9 (2.83%) 802.1X
4 9 (2.83%) SOAP
5 8 (2.52%) FastAPI
5 8 (2.52%) Flask
5 8 (2.52%) GraphQL
5 8 (2.52%) JPA
5 8 (2.52%) WebSockets
6 7 (2.20%) ActiveMQ
6 7 (2.20%) gRPC
7 6 (1.89%) AngularJS
7 6 (1.89%) Bootstrap
7 6 (1.89%) React
7 6 (1.89%) RESTful
7 6 (1.89%) Spring Cloud
7 6 (1.89%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 24 (7.55%) Data Centre
2 22 (6.92%) Replication
3 20 (6.29%) PKI
4 15 (4.72%) Onboarding
4 15 (4.72%) SCADA
5 13 (4.09%) Driving Licence
6 10 (3.14%) Cloud Native
7 6 (1.89%) Distributed Systems
7 6 (1.89%) Hybrid Cloud
7 6 (1.89%) Self-Motivation
8 5 (1.57%) Algorithms
8 5 (1.57%) Data Protection Act
8 5 (1.57%) FPGA
8 5 (1.57%) VHDL
9 3 (0.94%) IoT
9 3 (0.94%) Private Cloud
9 3 (0.94%) Product Ownership
10 2 (0.63%) Management Information System
10 2 (0.63%) Security Operations Centre
11 1 (0.31%) CMDB
Operating Systems
1 66 (20.75%) Linux
2 65 (20.44%) Windows
3 23 (7.23%) Amazon Linux
3 23 (7.23%) VMS
4 21 (6.60%) Unix
5 9 (2.83%) Ubuntu
6 8 (2.52%) Windows Server
7 6 (1.89%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 4 (1.26%) Android
9 1 (0.31%) AIX
9 1 (0.31%) Apple iOS
9 1 (0.31%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.31%) Mac OS X
9 1 (0.31%) Solaris
9 1 (0.31%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 101 (31.76%) DevOps
2 75 (23.58%) CI/CD
3 56 (17.61%) Agile
4 50 (15.72%) Analytics
5 47 (14.78%) Problem-Solving
6 42 (13.21%) Change Management
6 42 (13.21%) Containerisation
6 42 (13.21%) Platform Engineering
7 40 (12.58%) Configuration Management
8 38 (11.95%) Business Intelligence
9 35 (11.01%) Continuous Improvement
10 33 (10.38%) Test Strategy
11 32 (10.06%) Cloud Security
11 32 (10.06%) Test Automation
12 31 (9.75%) Scrum
13 30 (9.43%) Migration
14 26 (8.18%) Data Integration
15 25 (7.86%) Incident Response
15 25 (7.86%) Infrastructure as Code
16 23 (7.23%) ETL
Programming Languages
1 65 (20.44%) SQL
2 50 (15.72%) Python
3 38 (11.95%) PowerShell
4 28 (8.81%) Java
5 25 (7.86%) Groovy
6 12 (3.77%) Perl
7 11 (3.46%) Go
8 9 (2.83%) Bash
9 8 (2.52%) JavaScript
10 5 (1.57%) MATLAB
10 5 (1.57%) TypeScript
11 3 (0.94%) ABAP
11 3 (0.94%) C#
11 3 (0.94%) PL/SQL
11 3 (0.94%) Shell Script
12 1 (0.31%) Bicep
12 1 (0.31%) Korn
12 1 (0.31%) Kusto Query Language
12 1 (0.31%) Scala
12 1 (0.31%) Search Processing Language
Qualifications
1 318 (100.00%) Security Cleared
2 30 (9.43%) DV Cleared
3 17 (5.35%) Degree
4 16 (5.03%) Azure Certification
5 14 (4.40%) AWS Certification
6 11 (3.46%) BPSS Clearance
7 6 (1.89%) CISSP
8 4 (1.26%) CCNA
8 4 (1.26%) Cisco Certification
8 4 (1.26%) DBS Check
8 4 (1.26%) Microsoft Certification
8 4 (1.26%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
9 3 (0.94%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
9 3 (0.94%) CCNP
9 3 (0.94%) CEH
9 3 (0.94%) CISM
10 2 (0.63%) CCA
10 2 (0.63%) GCIH
10 2 (0.63%) OCP
10 2 (0.63%) Oracle Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 17 (5.35%) Data Quality
2 12 (3.77%) NCSC
3 7 (2.20%) QA
4 4 (1.26%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 4 (1.26%) NIST
4 4 (1.26%) SLA
5 3 (0.94%) Accessibility
6 2 (0.63%) WCAG
7 1 (0.31%) IEC 61131
7 1 (0.31%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 87 (27.36%) Docker
2 24 (7.55%) Active Directory
3 21 (6.60%) DFS Replication
4 19 (5.97%) Postfix
5 15 (4.72%) Dovecot
6 11 (3.46%) Squid
7 10 (3.14%) VMware Infrastructure
8 4 (1.26%) Firmware
9 3 (0.94%) Terminal Services
10 2 (0.63%) Hyper-V
10 2 (0.63%) Oracle RAC
11 1 (0.31%) Snort
11 1 (0.31%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 52 (16.35%) Kubernetes
2 45 (14.15%) Terraform
3 40 (12.58%) Grafana
4 39 (12.26%) Prometheus
5 11 (3.46%) Nessus
6 9 (2.83%) Proxmox
7 8 (2.52%) Ansible
8 5 (1.57%) Kibana
9 4 (1.26%) SCCM
10 3 (0.94%) logstash
10 3 (0.94%) Podman
10 3 (0.94%) Single Sign-On
11 2 (0.63%) Data Guard
11 2 (0.63%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
11 2 (0.63%) Oracle RMAN
11 2 (0.63%) QRadar
12 1 (0.31%) Fluentd
12 1 (0.31%) HP ALM
12 1 (0.31%) NetBackup
12 1 (0.31%) Rsyslog
Vendors
1 44 (13.84%) Oracle
2 42 (13.21%) Cisco
2 42 (13.21%) Microsoft
3 33 (10.38%) Juniper
4 32 (10.06%) ServiceNow
5 20 (6.29%) Talend
6 19 (5.97%) Denodo
7 18 (5.66%) Splunk
8 15 (4.72%) Dynatrace
8 15 (4.72%) Jaspersoft
9 14 (4.40%) Atlassian
10 13 (4.09%) AppDynamics
10 13 (4.09%) CheckPoint
10 13 (4.09%) F5
11 11 (3.46%) VMware
12 10 (3.14%) CyberArk
12 10 (3.14%) SAP
13 9 (2.83%) Blue Coat
14 8 (2.52%) Broadcom
15 7 (2.20%) Red Hat