Cyber Essentials Contract Job Trends in the North of England

Cyber Essentials
England > North of England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the North of England requiring Cyber Essentials skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 21 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
21 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 239 184 159
Rank change year-on-year -55 -25 +16
Contract jobs citing Cyber Essentials 20 8 9
As % of all contract jobs in the North of England 0.26% 0.20% 0.22%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 1.74% 1.28% 1.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 15 6 6
10th Percentile £323 £256 £331
25th Percentile £413 £306 £428
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £450 £500
Median % change year-on-year - -10.00% -
75th Percentile £523 £631 £525
90th Percentile £546 £731 £563
England median daily rate £513 £575 £500
% change year-on-year -10.87% +15.00% -9.09%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
North of England

Cyber Essentials falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills in the North of England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 1,149 624 521
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North of England 15.20% 15.74% 12.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 722 444 308
10th Percentile £313 £269 £310
25th Percentile £400 £360 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £463 £450 £492
Median % change year-on-year +2.78% -8.44% +1.13%
75th Percentile £568 £566 £585
90th Percentile £638 £638 £669
England median daily rate £513 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +2.50% -4.76% -2.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 117 21 24
10th Percentile £17.07 £17.48 £11.88
25th Percentile £29.96 - £12.00
Median hourly rate £50.00 £22.14 £16.00
Median % change year-on-year +125.84% +38.38% -47.61%
75th Percentile £70.00 £63.40 £27.25
90th Percentile £72.70 £71.45 £43.10
England median hourly rate £33.00 £32.50 £33.07
% change year-on-year +1.54% -1.72% -8.14%

Cyber Essentials
Job Vacancy Trend in the North of England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Cyber Essentials relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the North of England.

Cyber Essentials job vacancy trend in the North of England

Cyber Essentials
Daily Rate Trend in the North of England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing Cyber Essentials.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing Cyber Essentials

Cyber Essentials
Daily Rate Histogram in the North of England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Cyber Essentials in the North of England over the 6 months to 21 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Cyber Essentials in the North of England

Cyber Essentials
Contract Job Locations in the North of England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Cyber Essentials within the North of England region over the 6 months to 21 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
North West -43 11 £450 +50.00% 42
Yorkshire -32 8 £540 -1.82% 17
North East -41 1 £500 -29.82% 9
Cyber Essentials
England

Cyber Essentials
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North of 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:

Cloud Services
1 7 (35.00%) Microsoft 365
2 6 (30.00%) Azure
3 4 (20.00%) Entra ID
4 3 (15.00%) Azure Sentinel
4 3 (15.00%) Power Platform
5 2 (10.00%) Microsoft Purview
6 1 (5.00%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 5 (25.00%) Firewall
2 2 (10.00%) Network Security
3 1 (5.00%) DHCP
3 1 (5.00%) DMZ
3 1 (5.00%) DNS
3 1 (5.00%) VPN
3 1 (5.00%) Wi-Fi
General
1 15 (75.00%) Social Skills
2 1 (5.00%) Documentation Skills
2 1 (5.00%) Finance
2 1 (5.00%) Financial Institution
2 1 (5.00%) Inclusion and Diversity
2 1 (5.00%) Public Sector
2 1 (5.00%) Retail
Job Titles
1 5 (25.00%) Cybersecurity Engineer
1 5 (25.00%) Security Engineer
2 3 (15.00%) Analyst
2 3 (15.00%) Cloud Engineer
2 3 (15.00%) Compliance Manager
2 3 (15.00%) Consultant
2 3 (15.00%) Governance Manager
2 3 (15.00%) Risk Manager
3 2 (10.00%) Information Security Engineer
4 1 (5.00%) Cybersecurity Analyst
4 1 (5.00%) Infrastructure Engineer
4 1 (5.00%) Integration Engineer
4 1 (5.00%) IT Consultant
4 1 (5.00%) Lead
4 1 (5.00%) Microsoft 365 Engineer
4 1 (5.00%) Risk Analyst
4 1 (5.00%) Security Analyst
4 1 (5.00%) Security Risk Analyst
4 1 (5.00%) Technology Manager
4 1 (5.00%) Vulnerability Management Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 1 (5.00%) 802.1X
1 1 (5.00%) OAuth
1 1 (5.00%) OpenID
1 1 (5.00%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 3 (15.00%) Security Posture
2 2 (10.00%) Management Information System
2 2 (10.00%) Operational Technology
2 2 (10.00%) Security Operations Centre
3 1 (5.00%) Cyber Security Posture
3 1 (5.00%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 2 (10.00%) Windows
1 2 (10.00%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 17 (85.00%) Cybersecurity
2 9 (45.00%) Incident Response
3 8 (40.00%) Information Security
3 8 (40.00%) Risk Management
3 8 (40.00%) Vulnerability Management
4 6 (30.00%) Security Operations
4 6 (30.00%) SIEM
4 6 (30.00%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 5 (25.00%) Data Loss Prevention
5 5 (25.00%) Security Monitoring
6 4 (20.00%) Decision-Making
6 4 (20.00%) RBAC
6 4 (20.00%) Stakeholder Management
6 4 (20.00%) Vulnerability Remediation
7 3 (15.00%) Continuous Improvement
7 3 (15.00%) GAP Analysis
7 3 (15.00%) Identity Management
7 3 (15.00%) Incident Management
7 3 (15.00%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 3 (15.00%) Roadmaps
Programming Languages
1 5 (25.00%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 3 (15.00%) Degree
1 3 (15.00%) Microsoft Certification
2 2 (10.00%) CompTIA Security+
2 2 (10.00%) Network+ Certification
3 1 (5.00%) SC Cleared
3 1 (5.00%) Security Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (60.00%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 10 (50.00%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
3 7 (35.00%) GRC
3 7 (35.00%) NIST
4 2 (10.00%) IASME
5 1 (5.00%) ISO/IEC 27005
System Software
1 5 (25.00%) Active Directory
2 1 (5.00%) VMware ESXi
2 1 (5.00%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 2 (10.00%) SCCM
2 1 (5.00%) FortiGate
2 1 (5.00%) Microsoft Intune
2 1 (5.00%) Nessus
2 1 (5.00%) Single Sign-On
2 1 (5.00%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 10 (50.00%) Microsoft
2 4 (20.00%) Cisco
3 3 (15.00%) ServiceNow
4 2 (10.00%) Sophos
5 1 (5.00%) Citrix
5 1 (5.00%) Tenable
5 1 (5.00%) VMware
5 1 (5.00%) Zscaler