Data Protection Act Contract Job Trends in England

Data Protection Act (DPA)
UK > England

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Data Protection Act in contract job vacancies in England. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Data Protection Act over the 6 months leading up to 2 February 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 167 170 159
Rank change year-on-year +3 -11 +24
Contract jobs citing Data Protection Act 548 395 577
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.67% 1.51% 1.51%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 4.84% 4.57% 4.84%
Number of daily rates quoted 246 178 315
10th Percentile £215 £269 £219
25th Percentile £350 £363 £313
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -4.95% -0.05% -9.09%
75th Percentile £575 £601 £584
90th Percentile £653 £716 £725
UK median daily rate £463 £488 £500
% change year-on-year -5.13% -2.50% -9.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 8 12
10th Percentile £26.60 £20.30 -
25th Percentile £27.13 £23.38 £11.95
Median hourly rate £28.00 £24.50 £32.56
Median % change year-on-year +14.29% -24.75% +49.69%
75th Percentile £36.78 £31.76 £44.54
90th Percentile £41.60 - £60.70
UK median hourly rate £28.00 £24.50 £25.12
% change year-on-year +14.29% -2.45% +19.60%

All Generic Skills
England

Data Protection Act falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 11,325 8,646 11,914
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 34.51% 32.95% 31.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 7,240 5,193 7,906
10th Percentile £275 £269 £252
25th Percentile £406 £410 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -7.27% - -4.35%
75th Percentile £631 £675 £663
90th Percentile £738 £775 £775
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £531
% change year-on-year -4.76% -1.13% -3.45%
Number of hourly rates quoted 554 247 732
10th Percentile £15.28 £18.51 £14.00
25th Percentile £18.50 £24.18 £17.19
Median hourly rate £31.83 £37.50 £34.21
Median % change year-on-year -15.13% +9.62% +52.04%
75th Percentile £63.75 £66.25 £60.00
90th Percentile £74.90 £83.20 £70.00
UK median hourly rate £30.00 £35.00 £32.50
% change year-on-year -14.29% +7.69% +44.54%

Data Protection Act
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Data Protection Act relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Data Protection Act job vacancy trend in England

Data Protection Act
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Protection Act.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Protection Act

Data Protection Act
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Data Protection Act in England over the 6 months to 2 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Data Protection Act in England

Data Protection Act
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Protection Act.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Protection Act

Data Protection Act
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Data Protection Act in England over the 6 months to 2 February 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Data Protection Act in England

Data Protection Act
Contract Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Data Protection Act within the England region over the 6 months to 2 February 2026. 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
London +35 303 £500 - 10
North of England -32 117 £450 -10.00% 5
Yorkshire -29 62 £475 -13.64% 1
South East -21 56 £325 -27.78% 8
North West -24 42 £450 -9.95% 3
Midlands -41 30 £450 -7.69% 11
West Midlands -30 26 £463 -8.64% 1
South West -10 20 £525 +7.69% 6
East of England -15 15 £475 +1.33% 2
North East -21 13 £250 -44.44% 1
East Midlands -21 4 £448 +19.73% 10
Data Protection Act
UK

Data Protection Act
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England 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 25 (4.56%) Confluence
2 8 (1.46%) Apache Airflow
3 7 (1.28%) Microsoft Exchange
3 7 (1.28%) SharePoint
4 6 (1.09%) Apache
5 5 (0.91%) Apache Spark
5 5 (0.91%) CMS
6 4 (0.73%) Palantir Foundry
7 3 (0.55%) SAS
8 2 (0.36%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 2 (0.36%) CICS
8 2 (0.36%) Drupal
8 2 (0.36%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 2 (0.36%) WebSphere
9 1 (0.18%) Luigi
9 1 (0.18%) Oracle Workflow
9 1 (0.18%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 16 (2.92%) Microsoft Office
2 12 (2.19%) Microsoft Excel
3 6 (1.09%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 5 (0.91%) Microsoft Project
5 4 (0.73%) Chatbot
6 3 (0.55%) AutoCAD
6 3 (0.55%) MS Visio
6 3 (0.55%) Sketch
6 3 (0.55%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.36%) Adobe After Effects
7 2 (0.36%) Adobe Illustrator
7 2 (0.36%) InVision
7 2 (0.36%) Photoshop
8 1 (0.18%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 1 (0.18%) Adobe Premiere
8 1 (0.18%) Blender
8 1 (0.18%) CINEMA 4D
8 1 (0.18%) Final Cut Pro
8 1 (0.18%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 9 (1.64%) Aladdin
2 5 (0.91%) SAP S/4HANA
3 3 (0.55%) Dynamics CRM
3 3 (0.55%) Fidessa
3 3 (0.55%) Oracle Receivables
3 3 (0.55%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
4 2 (0.36%) ION MarketView
4 2 (0.36%) Oracle EBS R12
4 2 (0.36%) Oracle General Ledger
4 2 (0.36%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 2 (0.36%) Salesforce CRM
4 2 (0.36%) VisionPLUS
5 1 (0.18%) Adobe Campaign
5 1 (0.18%) Loan IQ
5 1 (0.18%) Oracle FAH
5 1 (0.18%) Oracle Payables
5 1 (0.18%) SAP EWM
5 1 (0.18%) SAP MDG
5 1 (0.18%) Veritas eDiscovery
5 1 (0.18%) Workfront
Cloud Services
1 63 (11.50%) AWS
2 48 (8.76%) Azure
3 23 (4.20%) GCP
3 23 (4.20%) Power Platform
4 22 (4.01%) Snowflake
5 17 (3.10%) Amazon S3
6 16 (2.92%) AWS Lambda
6 16 (2.92%) Serverless
7 15 (2.74%) GitHub
7 15 (2.74%) Microsoft 365
8 13 (2.37%) SaaS
9 12 (2.19%) Amazon EC2
10 8 (1.46%) Dynamics 365
11 7 (1.28%) Amazon EKS
11 7 (1.28%) Azure DevOps
11 7 (1.28%) Entra ID
11 7 (1.28%) Figma
11 7 (1.28%) GitHub Actions
12 6 (1.09%) Power Automate
13 5 (0.91%) Amazon ECS
Communications & Networking
1 15 (2.74%) Firewall
1 15 (2.74%) MPLS
2 11 (2.01%) LAN
3 9 (1.64%) Network Security
4 8 (1.46%) WAN
4 8 (1.46%) Wi-Fi
5 7 (1.28%) VPN
6 6 (1.09%) Ethernet
7 5 (0.91%) BGP
7 5 (0.91%) Wireshark
8 4 (0.73%) DNS
8 4 (0.73%) Kerberos
8 4 (0.73%) NetScaler
8 4 (0.73%) SD-WAN
8 4 (0.73%) SSH
8 4 (0.73%) TCP/IP
8 4 (0.73%) VLAN
9 3 (0.55%) DWDM
9 3 (0.55%) Internet
9 3 (0.55%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 22 (4.01%) Power BI
2 15 (2.74%) PostgreSQL
3 11 (2.01%) NoSQL
4 10 (1.82%) SQL Server
5 9 (1.64%) Tableau
6 8 (1.46%) Hadoop
7 7 (1.28%) Amazon RDS
7 7 (1.28%) Metadata
8 6 (1.09%) Data Warehouse
8 6 (1.09%) MongoDB
8 6 (1.09%) Relational Database
9 5 (0.91%) Amazon Aurora
10 4 (0.73%) Big Data
10 4 (0.73%) Data Lake
10 4 (0.73%) DynamoDB
11 3 (0.55%) Apache Iceberg
11 3 (0.55%) MySQL
11 3 (0.55%) Neo4j
12 2 (0.36%) RDBMS
12 2 (0.36%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 41 (7.48%) JIRA
2 11 (2.01%) Git
3 10 (1.82%) Jenkins
4 9 (1.64%) SpecFlow
5 6 (1.09%) Sonatype Nexus
6 5 (0.91%) GitLab
6 5 (0.91%) Gradle
6 5 (0.91%) JUnit
6 5 (0.91%) Maven
7 4 (0.73%) Bitbucket
7 4 (0.73%) Fiddler
8 3 (0.55%) CircleCI
9 2 (0.36%) ChangeMan
9 2 (0.36%) DBeaver
9 2 (0.36%) IntelliJ
9 2 (0.36%) Katalon Studio
9 2 (0.36%) Visual Studio
9 2 (0.36%) webpack
10 1 (0.18%) QADirector
10 1 (0.18%) TestNG
General
1 149 (27.19%) Social Skills
2 117 (21.35%) Finance
3 72 (13.14%) Banking
4 61 (11.13%) Analytical Skills
5 29 (5.29%) Telecoms
6 20 (3.65%) Documentation Skills
6 20 (3.65%) Front Office
7 16 (2.92%) Legal
8 14 (2.55%) Public Sector
9 12 (2.19%) Organisational Skills
10 10 (1.82%) Marketing
11 9 (1.64%) Influencing Skills
11 9 (1.64%) Presentation Skills
12 7 (1.28%) Investment Banking
12 7 (1.28%) Publishing
13 6 (1.09%) Aerospace
13 6 (1.09%) Financial Institution
14 5 (0.91%) General Ledger
14 5 (0.91%) Retail Banking
15 4 (0.73%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 75 (13.69%) Analyst
2 66 (12.04%) Developer
3 39 (7.12%) Architect
4 38 (6.93%) Business Analyst
5 37 (6.75%) Project Manager
6 33 (6.02%) Lead
7 27 (4.93%) Senior
8 25 (4.56%) Consultant
9 18 (3.28%) Network Engineer
10 15 (2.74%) Support Engineer
11 14 (2.55%) Software Engineer
11 14 (2.55%) Solutions Architect
12 13 (2.37%) Data Analyst
12 13 (2.37%) Data Engineer
12 13 (2.37%) Full-Stack Engineer
12 13 (2.37%) Java Developer
13 12 (2.19%) Python Developer
13 12 (2.19%) Tester
14 9 (1.64%) Network Architect
14 9 (1.64%) Technical Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (4.74%) React
2 17 (3.10%) REST
3 13 (2.37%) RESTful
4 11 (2.01%) OAuth
4 11 (2.01%) Playwright
5 10 (1.82%) .NET
6 9 (1.64%) PySpark
6 9 (1.64%) SAML
6 9 (1.64%) Spring
7 8 (1.46%) HTML
7 8 (1.46%) Kafka
7 8 (1.46%) LangChain
7 8 (1.46%) Spring Boot
8 7 (1.28%) AngularJS
9 6 (1.09%) FIX Protocol
9 6 (1.09%) Middleware
9 6 (1.09%) Model Context Protocol
9 6 (1.09%) OpenTelemetry
9 6 (1.09%) Oracle Fusion
9 6 (1.09%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 21 (3.83%) Onboarding
2 16 (2.92%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
3 14 (2.55%) Cloud Native
4 12 (2.19%) Product Ownership
5 11 (2.01%) Derivative
5 11 (2.01%) Freedom of Information
6 9 (1.64%) Data Centre
6 9 (1.64%) Equities
7 8 (1.46%) Management Information System
8 7 (1.28%) Distributed Systems
9 6 (1.09%) AI Agents
9 6 (1.09%) Algorithms
9 6 (1.09%) Fixed Income
10 5 (0.91%) Virtual Team
11 4 (0.73%) Credit Risk
11 4 (0.73%) Data Structures
11 4 (0.73%) Enterprise Software
11 4 (0.73%) Equity Derivative
11 4 (0.73%) Mobile App
11 4 (0.73%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 31 (5.66%) Linux
2 24 (4.38%) Windows
3 8 (1.46%) Unix
4 6 (1.09%) zOS
5 5 (0.91%) Android
6 4 (0.73%) AIX
6 4 (0.73%) Solaris
6 4 (0.73%) Windows 10
7 3 (0.55%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 3 (0.55%) VMS
7 3 (0.55%) Windows Server
8 1 (0.18%) Apple iOS
8 1 (0.18%) VME
Processes & Methodologies
1 548 (100.00%) Data Protection
2 101 (18.43%) Stakeholder Management
3 91 (16.61%) Problem-Solving
4 90 (16.42%) Agile
5 66 (12.04%) Migration
6 63 (11.50%) AI
7 57 (10.40%) Project Management
8 46 (8.39%) Analytics
8 46 (8.39%) CI/CD
9 43 (7.85%) DevOps
10 41 (7.48%) Roadmaps
11 39 (7.12%) Software Engineering
12 36 (6.57%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 35 (6.39%) Decision-Making
14 31 (5.66%) Business Analysis
14 31 (5.66%) Machine Learning
15 30 (5.47%) Continuous Improvement
16 28 (5.11%) LLM
17 26 (4.74%) Business Intelligence
17 26 (4.74%) Test Automation
Programming Languages
1 109 (19.89%) Python
2 77 (14.05%) SQL
3 38 (6.93%) Java
4 34 (6.20%) C#
5 29 (5.29%) JavaScript
6 19 (3.47%) TypeScript
7 16 (2.92%) PowerShell
8 13 (2.37%) C++
9 9 (1.64%) Bash
9 9 (1.64%) Shell Script
10 5 (0.91%) Scala
11 4 (0.73%) PHP
12 3 (0.55%) COBOL
12 3 (0.55%) Go
12 3 (0.55%) Groovy
12 3 (0.55%) Kotlin
13 2 (0.36%) Bicep
13 2 (0.36%) PL/SQL
13 2 (0.36%) SPARQL
14 1 (0.18%) JCL
Qualifications
1 53 (9.67%) Degree
2 40 (7.30%) Security Cleared
3 33 (6.02%) SC Cleared
4 16 (2.92%) Computer Science Degree
5 13 (2.37%) Master's Degree
6 9 (1.64%) AWS Certification
7 6 (1.09%) DV Cleared
7 6 (1.09%) PMI Certification
7 6 (1.09%) PMP
8 5 (0.91%) Cisco Certification
9 4 (0.73%) CCNP
9 4 (0.73%) CISSP
10 3 (0.55%) Microsoft Certification
11 2 (0.36%) CCNA
11 2 (0.36%) ISEB
11 2 (0.36%) ISEB Practitioner
11 2 (0.36%) JNCIA
11 2 (0.36%) JNCIS
11 2 (0.36%) MBA
11 2 (0.36%) PhD
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 27 (4.93%) GDPR
2 25 (4.56%) QA
3 17 (3.10%) Data Quality
4 11 (2.01%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 11 (2.01%) PMO
5 8 (1.46%) NIST
6 7 (1.28%) Accessibility
7 4 (0.73%) PCI DSS
7 4 (0.73%) SLA
8 3 (0.55%) IFRS
8 3 (0.55%) Sarbanes-Oxley
9 2 (0.36%) Basel III
9 2 (0.36%) California Consumer Privacy Act
9 2 (0.36%) GAAP
9 2 (0.36%) GRC
9 2 (0.36%) IFRS 17
9 2 (0.36%) IFRS 9
9 2 (0.36%) SOC 2
9 2 (0.36%) Software Quality Assurance
9 2 (0.36%) WCAG
System Software
1 19 (3.47%) Docker
2 14 (2.55%) Active Directory
3 11 (2.01%) Virtual Desktop
4 8 (1.46%) VMware Infrastructure
5 2 (0.36%) KVM
5 2 (0.36%) NFS
5 2 (0.36%) Virtual Servers
6 1 (0.18%) Firmware
6 1 (0.18%) HDFS
6 1 (0.18%) Virtual Machines
6 1 (0.18%) VMware ESXi
6 1 (0.18%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 25 (4.56%) Kubernetes
2 20 (3.65%) Terraform
3 13 (2.37%) Ansible
4 4 (0.73%) Control-M
4 4 (0.73%) Grafana
4 4 (0.73%) Microsoft Intune
4 4 (0.73%) Prometheus
5 3 (0.55%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 3 (0.55%) PingFederate
5 3 (0.55%) Puppet
5 3 (0.55%) vCenter Server
6 2 (0.36%) CA Endevor
6 2 (0.36%) Progress Chef
6 2 (0.36%) SCCM
6 2 (0.36%) Single Sign-On
7 1 (0.18%) CSIRT
7 1 (0.18%) Nessus
7 1 (0.18%) PowerCLI
7 1 (0.18%) SCOM
7 1 (0.18%) Tivoli Storage Manager
Vendors
1 42 (7.66%) Microsoft
2 24 (4.38%) Cisco
3 20 (3.65%) Databricks
4 16 (2.92%) Oracle
5 14 (2.55%) Google
5 14 (2.55%) ServiceNow
6 12 (2.19%) SAP
7 10 (1.82%) Adobe
7 10 (1.82%) Salesforce
8 9 (1.64%) Nokia
9 8 (1.46%) VMware
10 7 (1.28%) ADVA
10 7 (1.28%) Citrix
10 7 (1.28%) Informatica
11 6 (1.09%) F5
11 6 (1.09%) Juniper
11 6 (1.09%) Workday
12 5 (0.91%) Foundry
12 5 (0.91%) ION Trading
12 5 (0.91%) Meraki