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 25 September 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 213 156 163
Rank change year-on-year -57 +7 -16
Contract jobs citing Data Protection Act 598 501 499
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.29% 1.80% 1.52%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 3.78% 4.99% 4.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 242 197 251
10th Percentile £250 £310 £231
25th Percentile £350 £400 £372
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £425 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year -10.53% -5.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £550 £575 £600
90th Percentile £638 £650 £713
UK median daily rate £425 £460 £500
% change year-on-year -7.61% -8.00% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 13 11 7
10th Percentile £13.00 - £17.94
25th Percentile £15.06 £15.13 £19.06
Median hourly rate £18.00 £15.25 £27.84
Median % change year-on-year +18.03% -45.22% -17.27%
75th Percentile £28.00 £34.73 £70.78
90th Percentile £33.54 £40.46 £71.88
UK median hourly rate £20.50 £15.25 £27.84
% change year-on-year +34.43% -45.22% -34.01%

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 15,840 10,035 10,145
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 34.04% 36.03% 30.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,560 6,297 6,196
10th Percentile £325 £300 £300
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year - -4.55% -
75th Percentile £638 £650 £675
90th Percentile £750 £775 £825
UK median daily rate £525 £520 £538
% change year-on-year +0.96% -3.35% -2.18%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,092 514 396
10th Percentile £14.00 £15.48 £15.28
25th Percentile £17.85 £18.87 £24.17
Median hourly rate £36.75 £30.93 £57.35
Median % change year-on-year +18.82% -46.07% +25.16%
75th Percentile £68.75 £57.13 £70.00
90th Percentile £83.00 £74.63 £75.16
UK median hourly rate £37.50 £29.27 £50.00
% change year-on-year +28.12% -41.46% +12.36%

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 25 September 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 25 September 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 25 September 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 -82 265 £425 -12.82% 76
North of England -7 187 £475 +5.56% 28
Yorkshire +14 110 £475 -13.64% 12
North West -21 71 £463 +5.11% 13
South East -47 66 £375 -12.28% 16
Midlands -39 49 £425 -5.56% 18
West Midlands -40 41 £406 -9.72% 8
South West -42 15 £425 -15.00% 14
East Midlands - 8 £425 - 10
North East -65 6 - - 3
East of England -43 5 £300 -36.84% 8
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 20 (3.34%) Confluence
2 10 (1.67%) SharePoint
3 9 (1.51%) SAS
4 6 (1.00%) Microsoft Exchange
5 5 (0.84%) Apache
5 5 (0.84%) Apache Spark
6 4 (0.67%) Apache Airflow
7 3 (0.50%) CICS
7 3 (0.50%) CMS
7 3 (0.50%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 2 (0.33%) Jupyter
8 2 (0.33%) nginx
9 1 (0.17%) Apache Superset
9 1 (0.17%) Camunda
9 1 (0.17%) IIS
9 1 (0.17%) Tomcat
9 1 (0.17%) WebLogic
9 1 (0.17%) WebSphere
9 1 (0.17%) WordPress
Applications
1 14 (2.34%) Microsoft Excel
2 12 (2.01%) Microsoft Office
3 5 (0.84%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 4 (0.67%) MS Visio
5 3 (0.50%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.17%) Adobe Premiere
6 1 (0.17%) Maya
6 1 (0.17%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.17%) Zemax
Business Applications
1 9 (1.51%) Dynamics CRM
2 5 (0.84%) Aladdin
3 2 (0.33%) ION MarketView
3 2 (0.33%) Oracle EBS
3 2 (0.33%) Salesforce CRM
4 1 (0.17%) Actimize
4 1 (0.17%) Bloomberg TOMS
4 1 (0.17%) Cloudability
4 1 (0.17%) Eloqua
4 1 (0.17%) Endur
4 1 (0.17%) Oracle Applications
4 1 (0.17%) Oracle BRM
4 1 (0.17%) Oracle EBS R12
4 1 (0.17%) Sage 50
4 1 (0.17%) SAP BRIM
4 1 (0.17%) SAP FI
4 1 (0.17%) SAP FI-CA
4 1 (0.17%) SAP FS
4 1 (0.17%) SAP HR
4 1 (0.17%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 93 (15.55%) Azure
2 80 (13.38%) AWS
3 52 (8.70%) GCP
4 29 (4.85%) GitHub
5 22 (3.68%) SaaS
6 18 (3.01%) Power Platform
7 17 (2.84%) Microsoft 365
8 14 (2.34%) Azure DevOps
9 13 (2.17%) Serverless
10 10 (1.67%) GitHub Actions
11 9 (1.51%) Snowflake
12 7 (1.17%) OCI
12 7 (1.17%) OpenShift
13 6 (1.00%) Amazon EC2
13 6 (1.00%) Amazon EKS
13 6 (1.00%) AWS Lambda
13 6 (1.00%) Azure AKS
13 6 (1.00%) Entra ID
13 6 (1.00%) IaaS
14 5 (0.84%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 21 (3.51%) Firewall
2 15 (2.51%) Network Security
3 12 (2.01%) LAN
4 11 (1.84%) WAN
5 10 (1.67%) MPLS
6 8 (1.34%) DNS
6 8 (1.34%) VoIP
7 7 (1.17%) Cisco IPT
7 7 (1.17%) VPN
7 7 (1.17%) Wi-Fi
8 6 (1.00%) Cisco Nexus
9 5 (0.84%) DHCP
9 5 (0.84%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
9 5 (0.84%) SDH
9 5 (0.84%) Unified Communications
10 4 (0.67%) BIG-IP
10 4 (0.67%) Cisco ISE
10 4 (0.67%) HSRP
10 4 (0.67%) Multicast
10 4 (0.67%) OSPF
Database & Business Intelligence
1 19 (3.18%) Metadata
2 18 (3.01%) PostgreSQL
3 17 (2.84%) Power BI
4 13 (2.17%) Relational Database
5 12 (2.01%) Data Warehouse
6 9 (1.51%) BigQuery
6 9 (1.51%) SQL Server
7 7 (1.17%) Oracle Database
8 6 (1.00%) Redis
9 5 (0.84%) MySQL
9 5 (0.84%) Tableau
10 4 (0.67%) Big Data
10 4 (0.67%) Data Lake
10 4 (0.67%) Db2
10 4 (0.67%) DynamoDB
10 4 (0.67%) Elasticsearch
10 4 (0.67%) NoSQL
11 3 (0.50%) Amazon RDS
11 3 (0.50%) Pinecone
11 3 (0.50%) Weaviate
Development Applications
1 38 (6.35%) JIRA
2 24 (4.01%) Jenkins
3 18 (3.01%) Git
4 9 (1.51%) Maven
5 6 (1.00%) GitLab
5 6 (1.00%) SonarQube
6 3 (0.50%) Bitbucket
6 3 (0.50%) Selenium
6 3 (0.50%) Sonatype Nexus
6 3 (0.50%) Visual Studio
7 2 (0.33%) CMake
7 2 (0.33%) Cypress.io
7 2 (0.33%) ER Studio
7 2 (0.33%) ERwin
7 2 (0.33%) Gradle
7 2 (0.33%) JUnit
7 2 (0.33%) SpecFlow
7 2 (0.33%) XCUITest
8 1 (0.17%) Postman
8 1 (0.17%) XCTest
General
1 239 (39.97%) Social Skills
2 173 (28.93%) Finance
3 89 (14.88%) Analytical Skills
4 88 (14.72%) Banking
5 32 (5.35%) Public Sector
6 30 (5.02%) Legal
7 24 (4.01%) Influencing Skills
7 24 (4.01%) Organisational Skills
8 23 (3.85%) Documentation Skills
9 21 (3.51%) Front Office
10 16 (2.68%) Telecoms
11 14 (2.34%) Retail
12 12 (2.01%) Billing
13 11 (1.84%) Investment Banking
13 11 (1.84%) Marketing
13 11 (1.84%) Presentation Skills
14 10 (1.67%) Financial Institution
15 9 (1.51%) Publishing
16 6 (1.00%) Pharmaceutical
17 5 (0.84%) Law
Job Titles
1 83 (13.88%) Architect
2 70 (11.71%) Analyst
3 45 (7.53%) Developer
4 44 (7.36%) Lead
5 43 (7.19%) Business Analyst
6 34 (5.69%) Senior
7 32 (5.35%) Solutions Architect
8 26 (4.35%) Consultant
8 26 (4.35%) Project Manager
9 15 (2.51%) Java Developer
10 14 (2.34%) DevOps Engineer
10 14 (2.34%) Support Engineer
11 11 (1.84%) Data Protection Officer
11 11 (1.84%) Product Manager
11 11 (1.84%) Product Owner
11 11 (1.84%) Software Engineer
12 10 (1.67%) Designer
12 10 (1.67%) Python Engineer
12 10 (1.67%) Tester
13 8 (1.34%) Data Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 39 (6.52%) REST
2 35 (5.85%) Terraform
3 20 (3.34%) Spring
4 19 (3.18%) Spring Boot
5 17 (2.84%) Kafka
6 16 (2.68%) React
7 13 (2.17%) JSON
8 12 (2.01%) Node.js
9 11 (1.84%) GraphQL
9 11 (1.84%) YAML
10 10 (1.67%) .NET
11 9 (1.51%) Pandas
11 9 (1.51%) RESTful
12 8 (1.34%) Middleware
12 8 (1.34%) OAuth
13 7 (1.17%) AngularJS
13 7 (1.17%) HTML
13 7 (1.17%) OAuth2
14 6 (1.00%) OpenID
14 6 (1.00%) SLSA
Miscellaneous
1 42 (7.02%) Product Ownership
2 37 (6.19%) Cloud Native
3 28 (4.68%) Onboarding
3 28 (4.68%) Virtual Team
4 26 (4.35%) Distributed Systems
5 20 (3.34%) Data Centre
6 19 (3.18%) Management Information System
7 16 (2.68%) Legacy Systems
7 16 (2.68%) Mobile App
8 14 (2.34%) Freedom of Information
9 13 (2.17%) Data Structures
9 13 (2.17%) Mainframe
10 11 (1.84%) Derivative
11 10 (1.67%) Analytical Mindset
12 9 (1.51%) Enterprise Software
12 9 (1.51%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
12 9 (1.51%) Self-Motivation
13 8 (1.34%) AI Agents
13 8 (1.34%) Fixed Income
13 8 (1.34%) Freedom of Information Act
Operating Systems
1 29 (4.85%) Linux
2 26 (4.35%) Windows
3 15 (2.51%) Android
4 12 (2.01%) Unix
5 11 (1.84%) Apple iOS
6 9 (1.51%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 8 (1.34%) zOS
8 6 (1.00%) Windows Server
9 5 (0.84%) Mac OS
10 3 (0.50%) Windows 10
11 1 (0.17%) CentOS
11 1 (0.17%) MVS
Processes & Methodologies
1 598 (100.00%) Data Protection
2 163 (27.26%) Stakeholder Management
3 122 (20.40%) Agile
4 109 (18.23%) Problem-Solving
5 106 (17.73%) Continuous Improvement
6 98 (16.39%) AI
7 86 (14.38%) Migration
8 85 (14.21%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 82 (13.71%) CI/CD
10 70 (11.71%) Decision-Making
11 68 (11.37%) Analytics
12 62 (10.37%) DevOps
13 60 (10.03%) Roadmaps
14 53 (8.86%) Risk Management
15 50 (8.36%) Software Engineering
16 47 (7.86%) Data Modelling
17 46 (7.69%) Cybersecurity
17 46 (7.69%) Project Management
17 46 (7.69%) Test Automation
18 41 (6.86%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 82 (13.71%) Python
2 62 (10.37%) SQL
3 56 (9.36%) Java
4 17 (2.84%) JavaScript
4 17 (2.84%) TypeScript
5 14 (2.34%) Kotlin
6 11 (1.84%) Go
6 11 (1.84%) PowerShell
7 8 (1.34%) Bash
8 7 (1.17%) C#
8 7 (1.17%) C++
9 6 (1.00%) Groovy
10 5 (0.84%) Apex Code
10 5 (0.84%) Bicep
10 5 (0.84%) COBOL
10 5 (0.84%) Perl
11 4 (0.67%) C
11 4 (0.67%) R
12 2 (0.33%) REXX
12 2 (0.33%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 38 (6.35%) Security Cleared
2 35 (5.85%) SC Cleared
3 25 (4.18%) Degree
4 8 (1.34%) PMI Certification
4 8 (1.34%) PMP
5 7 (1.17%) Azure Certification
5 7 (1.17%) CISSP
6 6 (1.00%) AWS Certification
6 6 (1.00%) Cisco Certification
7 4 (0.67%) BPSS Clearance
7 4 (0.67%) CCNP
7 4 (0.67%) CRISC
8 3 (0.50%) CISA
8 3 (0.50%) CISM
9 2 (0.33%) CCIE
9 2 (0.33%) Computer Science Degree
9 2 (0.33%) DBS Check
9 2 (0.33%) DV Cleared
9 2 (0.33%) ISEB
9 2 (0.33%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 44 (7.36%) Data Quality
2 43 (7.19%) GDPR
3 32 (5.35%) QA
4 10 (1.67%) PMO
5 8 (1.34%) Accessibility
6 6 (1.00%) NIST
6 6 (1.00%) PERC
7 4 (0.67%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 4 (0.67%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 3 (0.50%) Actionable Recommendations
8 3 (0.50%) Cyber Essentials
8 3 (0.50%) EMIR
8 3 (0.50%) GRC
8 3 (0.50%) MiFID
9 2 (0.33%) COBIT
9 2 (0.33%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 2 (0.33%) SLA
10 1 (0.17%) CDISC
10 1 (0.17%) PCI DSS
10 1 (0.17%) WCAG
System Software
1 18 (3.01%) VMware Infrastructure
2 17 (2.84%) Active Directory
2 17 (2.84%) Docker
3 8 (1.34%) Virtual Desktop
4 7 (1.17%) Virtual Machines
5 4 (0.67%) NFS
6 2 (0.33%) GPFS
6 2 (0.33%) Virtual Servers
6 2 (0.33%) VMware ESXi
6 2 (0.33%) vSphere
7 1 (0.17%) Hyper-V
7 1 (0.17%) KVM
7 1 (0.17%) Time Sharing Option
7 1 (0.17%) Varnish
7 1 (0.17%) XenApp
7 1 (0.17%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 43 (7.19%) Kubernetes
2 27 (4.52%) Ansible
3 4 (0.67%) Cisco CUCM
3 4 (0.67%) Microsoft Intune
4 3 (0.50%) Grafana
4 3 (0.50%) Kustomize
4 3 (0.50%) Prometheus
5 2 (0.33%) Argo
5 2 (0.33%) Control-M
5 2 (0.33%) Istio
5 2 (0.33%) Packer
5 2 (0.33%) Progress Chef
5 2 (0.33%) Puppet
5 2 (0.33%) QRadar
5 2 (0.33%) SCCM
5 2 (0.33%) Single Sign-On
5 2 (0.33%) Tivoli Storage Manager
5 2 (0.33%) vCenter Server
6 1 (0.17%) CA Single Sign-On
6 1 (0.17%) ITRS Geneos
Vendors
1 73 (12.21%) Microsoft
2 27 (4.52%) Cisco
3 23 (3.85%) Google
4 21 (3.51%) Databricks
4 21 (3.51%) Oracle
5 20 (3.34%) ServiceNow
6 18 (3.01%) VMware
7 16 (2.68%) SAP
8 12 (2.01%) Salesforce
9 11 (1.84%) F5
9 11 (1.84%) IBM
10 10 (1.67%) Red Hat
11 8 (1.34%) Citrix
12 6 (1.00%) CheckPoint
12 6 (1.00%) Sonatype
13 5 (0.84%) Informatica
13 5 (0.84%) Murex
13 5 (0.84%) Palo Alto
13 5 (0.84%) Splunk
13 5 (0.84%) Workday