Public Sector Contract Job Trends in England

Public Sector
UK > England

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Public Sector in contract job vacancies in England. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Public Sector over the 6 months leading up to 6 December 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
6 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 18 17 16
Rank change year-on-year -1 -1 +6
Contract jobs citing Public Sector 3,024 2,838 3,511
As % of all contract jobs in England 9.72% 9.28% 9.16%
As % of the General category 15.50% 15.32% 15.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,109 1,718 2,495
10th Percentile £319 £306 £300
25th Percentile £413 £419 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -4.55% +1.85%
75th Percentile £594 £638 £650
90th Percentile £675 £725 £730
UK median daily rate £500 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -2.44% -2.38% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 166 100 94
10th Percentile £15.49 £14.70 £15.16
25th Percentile £17.69 £16.05 £17.25
Median hourly rate £21.40 £22.50 £25.19
Median % change year-on-year -4.89% -10.68% +26.74%
75th Percentile £25.11 £33.75 £58.87
90th Percentile £47.00 £60.28 £70.35
UK median hourly rate £21.00 £22.00 £22.50
% change year-on-year -4.55% -2.22% +15.83%

All General Skills
England

Public Sector falls under the General Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring common skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for common skills 19,509 18,527 22,868
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 62.71% 60.60% 59.66%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,414 11,178 15,516
10th Percentile £278 £300 £290
25th Percentile £400 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £538 £550
Median % change year-on-year -6.98% -2.27% -
75th Percentile £630 £650 £667
90th Percentile £738 £775 £768
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £550
% change year-on-year -4.76% -4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,258 668 1,039
10th Percentile £14.08 £15.25 £14.25
25th Percentile £16.93 £18.00 £17.18
Median hourly rate £23.79 £30.45 £32.50
Median % change year-on-year -21.88% -6.31% +26.41%
75th Percentile £46.00 £58.75 £59.75
90th Percentile £71.50 £72.50 £70.53
UK median hourly rate £24.00 £27.50 £31.71
% change year-on-year -12.73% -13.28% +26.84%

Public Sector
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Public Sector relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Public Sector job vacancy trend in England

Public Sector
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Public Sector.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Public Sector

Public Sector
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Public Sector in England over the 6 months to 6 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Public Sector in England

Public Sector
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Public Sector.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Public Sector

Public Sector
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Public Sector in England over the 6 months to 6 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Public Sector in England

Public Sector
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 Public Sector within the England region over the 6 months to 6 December 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
London -2 1,232 £513 -2.38% 298
North of England 0 576 £460 -4.17% 348
South East -5 342 £500 -9.09% 402
South West +3 330 £525 -6.25% 175
North West +1 300 £450 -10.00% 156
Midlands +3 292 £475 -5.00% 258
West Midlands +2 228 £475 -5.00% 149
Yorkshire +2 175 £513 +7.89% 133
North East +2 105 £450 +5.88% 61
East of England +7 84 £375 +7.14% 157
East Midlands +8 64 £423 -11.05% 93
Public Sector
UK

Public Sector
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
1 112 (3.70%) Confluence
2 91 (3.01%) SharePoint
3 32 (1.06%) Microsoft Exchange
4 27 (0.89%) SAS
5 26 (0.86%) nginx
6 24 (0.79%) Apache Airflow
7 15 (0.50%) Skype for Business
8 14 (0.46%) Apache
9 13 (0.43%) Apache Spark
10 12 (0.40%) CMS
11 6 (0.20%) Anypoint
11 6 (0.20%) WebLogic
12 5 (0.17%) Documentum
12 5 (0.17%) Oracle SOA Suite
12 5 (0.17%) SharePoint Server
13 4 (0.13%) ArcGIS
13 4 (0.13%) Exchange Server 2013
14 3 (0.099%) Exchange Server 2007
14 3 (0.099%) Smallworld
14 3 (0.099%) SugarCRM
Applications
1 101 (3.34%) Microsoft Office
2 92 (3.04%) Microsoft Excel
3 38 (1.26%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 19 (0.63%) Microsoft Project
4 19 (0.63%) MS Visio
4 19 (0.63%) Spreadsheet
5 11 (0.36%) Trello
6 9 (0.30%) Mozilla Thunderbird
7 6 (0.20%) Sketch
8 5 (0.17%) Adobe Illustrator
8 5 (0.17%) Chatbot
8 5 (0.17%) InVision
8 5 (0.17%) Photoshop
9 4 (0.13%) Adobe XD
10 3 (0.099%) OmniGraffle
10 3 (0.099%) UXPin
11 2 (0.066%) Adobe After Effects
11 2 (0.066%) Oracle Smart View
12 1 (0.033%) SPSS
12 1 (0.033%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 44 (1.46%) SAP S/4HANA
2 30 (0.99%) Dynamics CRM
3 16 (0.53%) SAP PSCD
4 14 (0.46%) Oracle EBS
5 13 (0.43%) Oracle ERP
5 13 (0.43%) SAP BRIM
5 13 (0.43%) SAP ERP
5 13 (0.43%) SAP Hybris
6 9 (0.30%) iTrent
6 9 (0.30%) SAP Payroll
7 7 (0.23%) Oracle Assets
7 7 (0.23%) Oracle Receivables
7 7 (0.23%) SAP HR
8 6 (0.20%) Oracle General Ledger
8 6 (0.20%) Oracle Payables
9 5 (0.17%) Oracle Cash Management
9 5 (0.17%) Oracle Payroll
9 5 (0.17%) Primavera
9 5 (0.17%) Remedy ITSM
9 5 (0.17%) Unit4 Business World
Cloud Services
1 575 (19.01%) AWS
2 543 (17.96%) Azure
3 195 (6.45%) Power Platform
4 148 (4.89%) Microsoft 365
5 138 (4.56%) Serverless
6 136 (4.50%) GitHub
7 133 (4.40%) GCP
8 107 (3.54%) Azure DevOps
9 87 (2.88%) AWS Lambda
10 75 (2.48%) Amazon S3
11 74 (2.45%) GitHub Actions
12 67 (2.22%) AWS CloudFormation
13 65 (2.15%) Entra ID
14 63 (2.08%) SaaS
15 62 (2.05%) PowerApps
16 57 (1.88%) Amazon CloudWatch
17 54 (1.79%) Power Automate
18 53 (1.75%) Amazon ECS
19 52 (1.72%) Dynamics 365
20 49 (1.62%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 114 (3.77%) Firewall
2 82 (2.71%) DNS
3 64 (2.12%) VPN
4 51 (1.69%) WAN
5 44 (1.46%) Wireless
6 40 (1.32%) LAN
7 39 (1.29%) Network Security
8 33 (1.09%) BGP
8 33 (1.09%) TCP/IP
9 29 (0.96%) DHCP
10 28 (0.93%) Wi-Fi
11 25 (0.83%) HTTP
12 23 (0.76%) SD-WAN
13 22 (0.73%) OSPF
14 21 (0.69%) Internet
14 21 (0.69%) SSL
15 20 (0.66%) SSH
16 19 (0.63%) FTP
16 19 (0.63%) SMTP
16 19 (0.63%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 133 (4.40%) Power BI
2 85 (2.81%) PostgreSQL
3 53 (1.75%) MongoDB
4 45 (1.49%) Metadata
5 38 (1.26%) SQL Server
6 37 (1.22%) Relational Database
7 34 (1.12%) Amazon RDS
8 33 (1.09%) NoSQL
9 29 (0.96%) Oracle Database
10 28 (0.93%) Data Lake
10 28 (0.93%) Data Warehouse
11 26 (0.86%) MySQL
12 24 (0.79%) Redis
13 22 (0.73%) Azure SQL Database
14 21 (0.69%) Oracle Reports
15 18 (0.60%) BigQuery
15 18 (0.60%) Tableau
16 14 (0.46%) Big Data
17 13 (0.43%) Amazon Redshift
17 13 (0.43%) Electronic Patient Records
Development Applications
1 202 (6.68%) JIRA
2 168 (5.56%) Git
3 138 (4.56%) Jenkins
4 93 (3.08%) GitLab
5 39 (1.29%) Postman
6 34 (1.12%) Selenium
7 28 (0.93%) Cucumber
8 21 (0.69%) SonarQube
9 19 (0.63%) Cypress.io
9 19 (0.63%) REST Assured
9 19 (0.63%) Vagrant
10 18 (0.60%) Mockito
11 17 (0.56%) JUnit
12 15 (0.50%) Bitbucket
13 11 (0.36%) MSI
13 11 (0.36%) Oracle Forms
14 9 (0.30%) CircleCI
15 8 (0.26%) JMeter
16 7 (0.23%) Burp Suite
16 7 (0.23%) Mocha
General
1 886 (29.30%) Social Skills
2 499 (16.50%) Finance
3 268 (8.86%) Analytical Skills
4 243 (8.04%) Telecoms
5 204 (6.75%) Manufacturing
6 196 (6.48%) Marketing
7 185 (6.12%) Electronics
8 136 (4.50%) Military
9 117 (3.87%) Local Government
10 69 (2.28%) Documentation Skills
11 67 (2.22%) Legal
12 54 (1.79%) Influencing Skills
12 54 (1.79%) Organisational Skills
13 41 (1.36%) Presentation Skills
14 40 (1.32%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 39 (1.29%) Retail
16 35 (1.16%) Law
17 27 (0.89%) Banking
18 26 (0.86%) Police
19 22 (0.73%) Billing
Job Titles
1 363 (12.00%) Developer
2 349 (11.54%) Architect
3 313 (10.35%) Analyst
4 297 (9.82%) Senior
5 284 (9.39%) Lead
6 199 (6.58%) Consultant
7 128 (4.23%) Business Analyst
8 126 (4.17%) DevOps Engineer
9 88 (2.91%) Project Manager
10 81 (2.68%) AWS Engineer
11 78 (2.58%) Solutions Architect
12 75 (2.48%) Technical Architect
13 74 (2.45%) Designer
14 64 (2.12%) Support Engineer
15 57 (1.88%) Java Developer
15 57 (1.88%) Network Engineer
16 52 (1.72%) Data Engineer
16 52 (1.72%) Senior Developer
17 48 (1.59%) IT Support
18 46 (1.52%) AWS DevOps
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 120 (3.97%) REST
2 86 (2.84%) RESTful
3 85 (2.81%) React
4 82 (2.71%) Node.js
5 75 (2.48%) .NET
6 67 (2.22%) Oracle Fusion
7 66 (2.18%) Spring Boot
8 64 (2.12%) Spring
9 63 (2.08%) Kafka
10 62 (2.05%) HTML
11 60 (1.98%) JSON
12 54 (1.79%) CSS
13 53 (1.75%) SOAP
14 52 (1.72%) AngularJS
15 48 (1.59%) Web Services
16 40 (1.32%) XML
17 28 (0.93%) OAuth
18 26 (0.86%) Playwright
19 22 (0.73%) Lightning Web Components
19 22 (0.73%) Middleware
Miscellaneous
1 108 (3.57%) Cloud Native
2 105 (3.47%) Onboarding
3 97 (3.21%) NHS
4 80 (2.65%) Product Ownership
5 77 (2.55%) Data Centre
6 68 (2.25%) Legacy Systems
7 66 (2.18%) Management Information System
8 39 (1.29%) Replication
9 33 (1.09%) Public Cloud
10 32 (1.06%) CMDB
10 32 (1.06%) PKI
11 31 (1.03%) Security Posture
12 27 (0.89%) Data Structures
13 25 (0.83%) Hybrid Cloud
14 24 (0.79%) AI Agents
14 24 (0.79%) Distributed Systems
15 23 (0.76%) Analytical Mindset
16 22 (0.73%) Driving Licence
16 22 (0.73%) Self-Motivation
17 21 (0.69%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 241 (7.97%) Windows
2 157 (5.19%) Linux
3 52 (1.72%) Windows 10
4 45 (1.49%) Windows Server
5 43 (1.42%) Android
6 41 (1.36%) Mac OS
7 27 (0.89%) Unix
7 27 (0.89%) VMS
8 20 (0.66%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 19 (0.63%) Amazon Linux
10 18 (0.60%) Apple iOS
11 12 (0.40%) Ubuntu
12 10 (0.33%) Windows Server 2012
13 8 (0.26%) Mac OS X
14 7 (0.23%) Windows Server 2003
14 7 (0.23%) Windows Server 2016
14 7 (0.23%) Windows Server 2019
15 3 (0.099%) CentOS
15 3 (0.099%) Windows 7
15 3 (0.099%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 755 (24.97%) Agile
2 432 (14.29%) CI/CD
3 430 (14.22%) DevOps
4 409 (13.53%) Problem-Solving
5 394 (13.03%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 345 (11.41%) Business Intelligence
7 304 (10.05%) Stakeholder Management
8 296 (9.79%) Migration
9 264 (8.73%) Continuous Improvement
10 225 (7.44%) Roadmaps
11 213 (7.04%) Programme Management
12 195 (6.45%) Microservices
13 194 (6.42%) ITIL
14 193 (6.38%) Infrastructure as Code
15 185 (6.12%) Analytics
16 184 (6.08%) Digital Marketing
17 179 (5.92%) Decision-Making
18 169 (5.59%) AI
19 165 (5.46%) Containerisation
20 164 (5.42%) Test Automation
Programming Languages
1 357 (11.81%) Python
2 254 (8.40%) SQL
3 245 (8.10%) Java
4 145 (4.79%) JavaScript
5 124 (4.10%) PowerShell
6 81 (2.68%) TypeScript
7 71 (2.35%) Bash
7 71 (2.35%) C#
8 33 (1.09%) Go
9 24 (0.79%) Groovy
9 24 (0.79%) Ruby
10 23 (0.76%) PL/SQL
11 22 (0.73%) C++
12 20 (0.66%) Apex Code
12 20 (0.66%) Perl
13 19 (0.63%) Shell Script
14 15 (0.50%) C
15 14 (0.46%) PHP
16 13 (0.43%) Bicep
17 11 (0.36%) Data Analysis Expressions
Qualifications
1 1,852 (61.24%) Security Cleared
2 1,260 (41.67%) SC Cleared
3 174 (5.75%) DV Cleared
4 131 (4.33%) Degree
5 77 (2.55%) BPSS Clearance
6 52 (1.72%) CISSP
7 43 (1.42%) AWS Certification
7 43 (1.42%) Microsoft Certification
8 42 (1.39%) Azure Certification
9 38 (1.26%) ITIL Certification
10 34 (1.12%) Cisco Certification
11 27 (0.89%) CISM
12 26 (0.86%) Computer Science Degree
13 24 (0.79%) CCNP
14 20 (0.66%) ISTQB
15 19 (0.63%) ISEB
16 16 (0.53%) CCNA
17 15 (0.50%) OSCP
18 14 (0.46%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
18 14 (0.46%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 124 (4.10%) Accessibility
2 119 (3.94%) QA
3 91 (3.01%) GDPR
4 89 (2.94%) Data Quality
5 82 (2.71%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 69 (2.28%) NIST
7 56 (1.85%) NCSC
8 45 (1.49%) PMO
9 41 (1.36%) SLA
10 40 (1.32%) WCAG
11 24 (0.79%) Cyber Essentials
12 20 (0.66%) GRC
13 17 (0.56%) COBIT
13 17 (0.56%) JSP 440
14 16 (0.53%) HIPAA
15 13 (0.43%) Actionable Recommendations
16 12 (0.40%) PCI DSS
17 10 (0.33%) HL7
18 9 (0.30%) HMG Security Policy Framework
19 8 (0.26%) RMADS
System Software
1 215 (7.11%) Docker
2 127 (4.20%) Active Directory
3 61 (2.02%) VMware Infrastructure
4 19 (0.63%) DFS Replication
4 19 (0.63%) Virtual Desktop
4 19 (0.63%) VMware ESXi
5 15 (0.50%) vSphere
6 14 (0.46%) Hyper-V
6 14 (0.46%) Virtual Machines
7 13 (0.43%) VMware NSX
8 9 (0.30%) Dovecot
8 9 (0.30%) Postfix
8 9 (0.30%) Squid
9 6 (0.20%) Virtual Servers
10 5 (0.17%) ISA Server
10 5 (0.17%) Microsoft Virtual Server
10 5 (0.17%) UAG
11 3 (0.099%) Brightmail
11 3 (0.099%) Firmware
11 3 (0.099%) NFS
Systems Management
1 288 (9.52%) Terraform
2 224 (7.41%) Kubernetes
3 81 (2.68%) Ansible
4 66 (2.18%) Grafana
5 53 (1.75%) Prometheus
6 39 (1.29%) Microsoft Intune
7 38 (1.26%) SCCM
8 20 (0.66%) Single Sign-On
9 19 (0.63%) Packer
10 17 (0.56%) vCenter Server
11 12 (0.40%) Jamf Pro
11 12 (0.40%) Nessus
12 11 (0.36%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 11 (0.36%) Argo
13 10 (0.33%) SCOM
14 9 (0.30%) Consul
14 9 (0.30%) Proxmox
14 9 (0.30%) Puppet
15 8 (0.26%) Nmap
15 8 (0.26%) vRealize
Vendors
1 416 (13.76%) Microsoft
2 307 (10.15%) SAP
3 189 (6.25%) Oracle
4 151 (4.99%) Cisco
5 115 (3.80%) ServiceNow
6 91 (3.01%) VMware
7 66 (2.18%) Salesforce
8 59 (1.95%) Google
9 57 (1.88%) Splunk
10 50 (1.65%) Juniper
11 40 (1.32%) Aruba
12 38 (1.26%) Dell
13 37 (1.22%) Apple
13 37 (1.22%) HP
14 36 (1.19%) Palo Alto
14 36 (1.19%) Virgin Media
15 33 (1.09%) Databricks
16 28 (0.93%) SolarWinds
17 26 (0.86%) F5
17 26 (0.86%) Fortinet