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 16 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 171 185 195
Rank change year-on-year +14 +10 -45
Contract jobs citing Data Protection Act 634 353 452
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.55% 1.46% 1.24%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 4.81% 4.27% 4.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 273 148 223
10th Percentile £213 £300 £219
25th Percentile £331 £367 £358
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% -5.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £538 £575 £613
90th Percentile £638 £632 £738
UK median daily rate £438 £475 £500
% change year-on-year -7.89% -5.00% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 12 10 22
10th Percentile £19.88 £23.75 £11.95
25th Percentile £25.50 £24.25 £21.00
Median hourly rate £27.75 £28.32 £27.50
Median % change year-on-year -2.01% +2.98% -26.67%
75th Percentile £34.67 £31.76 £29.69
90th Percentile £57.88 £31.92 £62.50
UK median hourly rate £27.75 £28.32 £27.50
% change year-on-year -2.01% +2.98% -29.03%

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 13,186 8,258 11,162
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 32.14% 34.04% 30.70%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,329 5,410 7,319
10th Percentile £313 £300 £269
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £538 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.19% -2.27% -4.35%
75th Percentile £626 £673 £675
90th Percentile £750 £788 £800
UK median daily rate £509 £525 £543
% change year-on-year -3.05% -3.23% -1.36%
Number of hourly rates quoted 670 328 812
10th Percentile £16.01 £16.58 £12.25
25th Percentile £21.00 £20.64 £15.16
Median hourly rate £46.00 £33.96 £32.56
Median % change year-on-year +35.47% +4.29% +44.80%
75th Percentile £70.00 £64.50 £61.30
90th Percentile £88.00 £84.65 £70.00
UK median hourly rate £42.50 £31.76 £31.25
% change year-on-year +33.82% +1.63% +38.98%

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 16 May 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 16 May 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 16 May 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 +36 318 £471 +2.00% 10
North of England -14 168 £475 - 5
Yorkshire -7 108 £475 -9.52% 3
South East -36 69 £371 -1.00% 1
North West +1 56 £463 -5.13% 1
Midlands -45 53 £436 -14.88% 5
West Midlands -50 40 £450 -14.29% 3
East Midlands -15 13 £425 +13.71% 2
South West -35 11 £425 +13.33% 7
East of England -30 8 £413 +37.50% 3
North East -39 4 £250 -39.39% 1
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 17 (2.68%) Confluence
2 12 (1.89%) Microsoft Exchange
3 10 (1.58%) SharePoint
4 5 (0.79%) Oracle SOA Suite
4 5 (0.79%) SAS
5 3 (0.47%) Apache Spark
5 3 (0.47%) CMS
6 2 (0.32%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 2 (0.32%) Apache
6 2 (0.32%) Apache Airflow
6 2 (0.32%) Drupal
6 2 (0.32%) Jupyter
6 2 (0.32%) WebSphere
7 1 (0.16%) Camunda
7 1 (0.16%) Oracle Workflow
7 1 (0.16%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 17 (2.68%) Microsoft Office
2 15 (2.37%) Microsoft Excel
3 6 (0.95%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 4 (0.63%) Spreadsheet
5 3 (0.47%) MS Visio
6 2 (0.32%) AutoCAD
6 2 (0.32%) Microsoft Project
7 1 (0.16%) Adobe After Effects
7 1 (0.16%) Adobe Creative Suite
7 1 (0.16%) Adobe Illustrator
7 1 (0.16%) Adobe Premiere
7 1 (0.16%) Blender
7 1 (0.16%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.16%) CINEMA 4D
7 1 (0.16%) Maya
7 1 (0.16%) Photoshop
7 1 (0.16%) Trello
7 1 (0.16%) Zemax
Business Applications
1 12 (1.89%) Aladdin
2 4 (0.63%) SAP S/4HANA
3 3 (0.47%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
3 3 (0.47%) SAP GRC
4 2 (0.32%) Dynamics CRM
4 2 (0.32%) Oracle General Ledger
4 2 (0.32%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 2 (0.32%) Salesforce CRM
5 1 (0.16%) Eloqua
5 1 (0.16%) ION MarketView
5 1 (0.16%) Loan IQ
5 1 (0.16%) Odoo
5 1 (0.16%) Oracle FAH
5 1 (0.16%) Oracle Receivables
5 1 (0.16%) Remedy ITSM
5 1 (0.16%) SAP MDG
5 1 (0.16%) SAP PLM
5 1 (0.16%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
5 1 (0.16%) Veritas eDiscovery
5 1 (0.16%) Workfront
Cloud Services
1 70 (11.04%) Azure
2 59 (9.31%) AWS
3 33 (5.21%) GCP
4 25 (3.94%) Power Platform
5 19 (3.00%) Microsoft 365
6 18 (2.84%) GitHub
6 18 (2.84%) SaaS
6 18 (2.84%) Snowflake
7 16 (2.52%) Entra ID
8 9 (1.42%) Figma
8 9 (1.42%) Serverless
9 8 (1.26%) AWS Lambda
9 8 (1.26%) OpenShift
10 7 (1.10%) Azure DevOps
10 7 (1.10%) Microsoft Purview
10 7 (1.10%) PaaS
11 6 (0.95%) Amazon EC2
11 6 (0.95%) Amazon S3
11 6 (0.95%) Microsoft Copilot
12 5 (0.79%) OneDrive
Communications & Networking
1 21 (3.31%) Firewall
2 18 (2.84%) MPLS
3 16 (2.52%) Network Security
4 12 (1.89%) LAN
5 10 (1.58%) Wi-Fi
6 8 (1.26%) VPN
6 8 (1.26%) WAN
7 7 (1.10%) DNS
7 7 (1.10%) Ethernet
8 6 (0.95%) BGP
8 6 (0.95%) Cisco Nexus
8 6 (0.95%) TCP/IP
9 5 (0.79%) NetScaler
10 4 (0.63%) DHCP
10 4 (0.63%) SDH
10 4 (0.63%) VLAN
10 4 (0.63%) VoIP
11 3 (0.47%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
11 3 (0.47%) Internet
12 2 (0.32%) Cisco IOS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 23 (3.63%) Power BI
2 18 (2.84%) PostgreSQL
3 16 (2.52%) Metadata
4 11 (1.74%) Relational Database
5 10 (1.58%) Tableau
6 9 (1.42%) Data Lake
6 9 (1.42%) Data Warehouse
6 9 (1.42%) SQL Server
7 7 (1.10%) MongoDB
8 4 (0.63%) Amazon RDS
8 4 (0.63%) DynamoDB
8 4 (0.63%) Oracle Database
8 4 (0.63%) Pinecone
8 4 (0.63%) Weaviate
9 3 (0.47%) Big Data
9 3 (0.47%) Hadoop
9 3 (0.47%) MySQL
9 3 (0.47%) NoSQL
9 3 (0.47%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 2 (0.32%) KDB
Development Applications
1 42 (6.62%) JIRA
2 19 (3.00%) Git
3 12 (1.89%) Jenkins
4 11 (1.74%) SpecFlow
5 7 (1.10%) Sonatype Nexus
6 6 (0.95%) Maven
7 5 (0.79%) GitLab
8 4 (0.63%) Bitbucket
8 4 (0.63%) Gradle
8 4 (0.63%) JUnit
8 4 (0.63%) Postman
9 3 (0.47%) Katalon Studio
9 3 (0.47%) Liquibase
9 3 (0.47%) TestNG
10 2 (0.32%) Cypress.io
10 2 (0.32%) Flyway
10 2 (0.32%) Gatling
10 2 (0.32%) REST Assured
10 2 (0.32%) SonarQube
10 2 (0.32%) webpack
General
1 184 (29.02%) Social Skills
2 146 (23.03%) Finance
3 77 (12.15%) Banking
4 57 (8.99%) Analytical Skills
5 28 (4.42%) Front Office
6 27 (4.26%) Telecoms
7 25 (3.94%) Documentation Skills
8 20 (3.15%) Organisational Skills
8 20 (3.15%) Public Sector
9 18 (2.84%) Marketing
10 14 (2.21%) Legal
11 11 (1.74%) Influencing Skills
11 11 (1.74%) Presentation Skills
12 8 (1.26%) Investment Banking
13 7 (1.10%) Financial Institution
13 7 (1.10%) Pharmaceutical
13 7 (1.10%) Private Banking
14 5 (0.79%) Police
14 5 (0.79%) Publishing
14 5 (0.79%) Retail
Job Titles
1 72 (11.36%) Architect
2 70 (11.04%) Analyst
3 67 (10.57%) Developer
4 43 (6.78%) Senior
5 40 (6.31%) Business Analyst
6 39 (6.15%) Consultant
7 35 (5.52%) Project Manager
8 34 (5.36%) Lead
9 27 (4.26%) Solutions Architect
10 23 (3.63%) Java Developer
10 23 (3.63%) Network Engineer
11 14 (2.21%) Data Engineer
12 13 (2.05%) Software Engineer
12 13 (2.05%) Tester
13 12 (1.89%) Automation Tester
13 12 (1.89%) DevOps Engineer
13 12 (1.89%) Product Manager
13 12 (1.89%) Python Developer
14 10 (1.58%) Data Analyst
14 10 (1.58%) Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 32 (5.05%) React
2 25 (3.94%) REST
3 14 (2.21%) Playwright
3 14 (2.21%) Spring
4 13 (2.05%) .NET
4 13 (2.05%) RESTful
4 13 (2.05%) Spring Boot
5 12 (1.89%) Kafka
6 10 (1.58%) JSON
7 8 (1.26%) GraphQL
7 8 (1.26%) Middleware
7 8 (1.26%) PySpark
7 8 (1.26%) Vue
8 7 (1.10%) AngularJS
8 7 (1.10%) XML
9 6 (0.95%) HTML
9 6 (0.95%) Model Context Protocol
9 6 (0.95%) OpenTelemetry
9 6 (0.95%) Oracle Fusion
10 5 (0.79%) LangChain
Miscellaneous
1 34 (5.36%) Product Ownership
2 28 (4.42%) Cloud Native
3 25 (3.94%) Onboarding
4 22 (3.47%) Virtual Team
5 20 (3.15%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
6 17 (2.68%) Distributed Systems
7 15 (2.37%) Derivative
8 13 (2.05%) Mobile App
9 11 (1.74%) Data Centre
10 10 (1.58%) Equities
11 8 (1.26%) AI Agents
12 7 (1.10%) Algorithms
12 7 (1.10%) Replication
13 6 (0.95%) Equity Derivative
13 6 (0.95%) Fixed Income
13 6 (0.95%) Mainframe
13 6 (0.95%) Management Information System
14 5 (0.79%) Freedom of Information
14 5 (0.79%) Greenfield Project
14 5 (0.79%) Hedge funds
Operating Systems
1 27 (4.26%) Linux
1 27 (4.26%) Windows
2 12 (1.89%) Android
3 8 (1.26%) Apple iOS
3 8 (1.26%) zOS
4 6 (0.95%) Unix
4 6 (0.95%) Windows Server
5 4 (0.63%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 1 (0.16%) CentOS
6 1 (0.16%) Oracle Linux
6 1 (0.16%) Rocky
6 1 (0.16%) Solaris
6 1 (0.16%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 634 (100.00%) Data Protection
2 120 (18.93%) Agile
3 117 (18.45%) Stakeholder Management
4 104 (16.40%) Problem-Solving
5 76 (11.99%) Migration
6 74 (11.67%) AI
6 74 (11.67%) Continuous Improvement
7 73 (11.51%) DevOps
8 69 (10.88%) CI/CD
9 65 (10.25%) Analytics
10 57 (8.99%) Roadmaps
11 55 (8.68%) Project Management
12 48 (7.57%) Decision-Making
13 47 (7.41%) Test Automation
14 40 (6.31%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 38 (5.99%) Observability
15 38 (5.99%) Risk Management
16 36 (5.68%) Software Engineering
17 34 (5.36%) Data Modelling
18 32 (5.05%) Microservices
Programming Languages
1 110 (17.35%) Python
2 70 (11.04%) SQL
3 64 (10.09%) Java
4 31 (4.89%) C#
4 31 (4.89%) JavaScript
5 22 (3.47%) TypeScript
6 18 (2.84%) PowerShell
7 13 (2.05%) Bash
7 13 (2.05%) C++
8 9 (1.42%) Kotlin
9 6 (0.95%) Go
9 6 (0.95%) Kusto Query Language
10 5 (0.79%) R
10 5 (0.79%) Shell Script
11 4 (0.63%) JCL
11 4 (0.63%) PL/SQL
12 3 (0.47%) Apex Code
12 3 (0.47%) Scala
13 2 (0.32%) ActionScript
13 2 (0.32%) Groovy
Qualifications
1 49 (7.73%) Security Cleared
2 47 (7.41%) Degree
3 46 (7.26%) SC Cleared
4 16 (2.52%) Computer Science Degree
5 9 (1.42%) PMI Certification
5 9 (1.42%) PMP
6 6 (0.95%) Azure Certification
6 6 (0.95%) CCNP
6 6 (0.95%) Cisco Certification
6 6 (0.95%) Master's Degree
7 5 (0.79%) AWS Certification
8 4 (0.63%) CISSP
9 3 (0.47%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
9 3 (0.47%) Microsoft Certification
9 3 (0.47%) Microsoft Certified Professional
10 2 (0.32%) CCNA
10 2 (0.32%) JNCIA
10 2 (0.32%) JNCIS
10 2 (0.32%) PhD
11 1 (0.16%) ISTQB
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 34 (5.36%) QA
2 30 (4.73%) GDPR
3 19 (3.00%) Data Quality
4 15 (2.37%) PMO
5 11 (1.74%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 10 (1.58%) Accessibility
7 8 (1.26%) NIST
7 8 (1.26%) SLA
8 6 (0.95%) GRC
9 5 (0.79%) Actionable Recommendations
10 3 (0.47%) IFRS
10 3 (0.47%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 2 (0.32%) Basel III
11 2 (0.32%) GAAP
11 2 (0.32%) IFRS 17
11 2 (0.32%) IFRS 9
11 2 (0.32%) ISO 20022
11 2 (0.32%) SEPA
11 2 (0.32%) WCAG
12 1 (0.16%) PSD2
System Software
1 28 (4.42%) Docker
2 19 (3.00%) Active Directory
3 12 (1.89%) VMware Infrastructure
4 7 (1.10%) Virtual Desktop
5 6 (0.95%) KVM
6 5 (0.79%) NFS
7 4 (0.63%) Time Sharing Option
8 3 (0.47%) IAG
8 3 (0.47%) Virtual Machines
8 3 (0.47%) Virtual Servers
8 3 (0.47%) vSphere
8 3 (0.47%) XenApp
8 3 (0.47%) XenDesktop
9 2 (0.32%) GPFS
9 2 (0.32%) Microsoft App-V
9 2 (0.32%) Oracle RAC
9 2 (0.32%) VMware ESXi
10 1 (0.16%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 37 (5.84%) Kubernetes
2 31 (4.89%) Terraform
3 24 (3.79%) Ansible
4 9 (1.42%) Grafana
5 6 (0.95%) Microsoft Intune
6 5 (0.79%) Prometheus
6 5 (0.79%) Tivoli Storage Manager
7 4 (0.63%) Control-M
8 3 (0.47%) Single Sign-On
9 2 (0.32%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 2 (0.32%) Data Guard
9 2 (0.32%) IBM Guardium
9 2 (0.32%) Nessus
9 2 (0.32%) Oracle RMAN
9 2 (0.32%) Packer
9 2 (0.32%) QRadar
9 2 (0.32%) SCCM
10 1 (0.16%) Kibana
10 1 (0.16%) Progress Chef
10 1 (0.16%) SELinux
Vendors
1 57 (8.99%) Microsoft
2 30 (4.73%) Cisco
3 27 (4.26%) Databricks
4 23 (3.63%) Oracle
4 23 (3.63%) SAP
5 16 (2.52%) ServiceNow
6 13 (2.05%) Informatica
6 13 (2.05%) Salesforce
7 12 (1.89%) VMware
8 11 (1.74%) Citrix
8 11 (1.74%) Workday
9 10 (1.58%) Adobe
9 10 (1.58%) Google
9 10 (1.58%) IBM
10 8 (1.26%) Red Hat
11 7 (1.10%) ADVA
11 7 (1.10%) F5
11 7 (1.10%) Nokia
11 7 (1.10%) Palo Alto
12 5 (0.79%) CyberArk