Public Sector Contract Job Trends in the North West

Public Sector
England > North West

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Public Sector in contract job vacancies in the North West. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Public Sector over the 6 months leading up to 31 July 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
31 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 22 15 10
Rank change year-on-year -7 -5 -3
Contract jobs citing Public Sector 281 192 254
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 7.49% 8.86% 10.44%
As % of the General category 14.30% 14.86% 19.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 161 134 156
10th Percentile £350 £215 £328
25th Percentile £400 £385 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £465 £493
Median % change year-on-year +7.53% -5.68% -6.10%
75th Percentile £588 £584 £603
90th Percentile £688 £661 £673
England median daily rate £515 £512 £521
% change year-on-year +0.54% -1.73% -3.02%
Number of hourly rates quoted 26 3 15
10th Percentile £22.99 £17.86 £15.70
25th Percentile - £19.05 £17.13
Median hourly rate £25.38 £21.27 £19.18
Median % change year-on-year +19.32% +10.90% +13.83%
75th Percentile £25.49 £21.52 £27.00
90th Percentile £85.00 - £35.28
England median hourly rate £25.38 £21.70 £27.00
% change year-on-year +16.96% -19.63% +29.68%

All General Skills
North West

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 general skills in the North West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for general skills 1,965 1,292 1,301
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 52.40% 59.59% 53.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,116 823 778
10th Percentile £250 £268 £295
25th Percentile £400 £384 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £490 £469 £500
Median % change year-on-year +4.48% -6.20% -
75th Percentile £588 £575 £585
90th Percentile £650 £688 £675
England median daily rate £525 £512 £538
% change year-on-year +2.54% -4.74% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 233 112 122
10th Percentile £16.50 £12.84 £15.92
25th Percentile £25.38 £14.73 £16.06
Median hourly rate £35.82 £28.75 £26.26
Median % change year-on-year +24.59% +9.48% +4.94%
75th Percentile £67.84 £50.00 £43.10
90th Percentile £85.00 £72.27 £54.00
England median hourly rate £33.99 £25.32 £38.12
% change year-on-year +34.24% -33.58% +27.07%

Public Sector
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

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

Public Sector job vacancy trend in the North West

Public Sector
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Public Sector.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Public Sector

Public Sector
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Public Sector in the North West over the 6 months to 31 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Public Sector in the North West

Public Sector
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Public Sector.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Public Sector

Public Sector
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Public Sector in the North West over the 6 months to 31 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Public Sector in the North West

Public Sector
Contract Job Locations in the North West

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 North West region over the 6 months to 31 July 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
Manchester -5 182 £470 +4.44% 77
Cheshire +5 34 £500 +26.58% 13
Merseyside -7 32 £525 -12.50% 11
Lancashire -3 14 £575 +16.16% 26
Cumbria -17 12 £424 -19.29%
Public Sector
England

Public Sector
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North West 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 23 (8.19%) SharePoint
2 16 (5.69%) Microsoft Exchange
3 9 (3.20%) Confluence
4 4 (1.42%) SharePoint 2013
5 2 (0.71%) CICS
5 2 (0.71%) CMS
5 2 (0.71%) Jupyter
5 2 (0.71%) Oracle Workflow
5 2 (0.71%) WordPress
6 1 (0.36%) Apache
6 1 (0.36%) Apache Airflow
6 1 (0.36%) Apache Spark
6 1 (0.36%) SAS
6 1 (0.36%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 3 (1.07%) Microsoft Excel
2 2 (0.71%) Chatbot
2 2 (0.71%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.36%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 1 (0.36%) Microsoft Project
3 1 (0.36%) MS Visio
3 1 (0.36%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 4 (1.42%) SAP S/4HANA
2 3 (1.07%) Dynamics CRM
2 3 (1.07%) Oracle EBS
3 2 (0.71%) Oracle Cash Management
3 2 (0.71%) Oracle Payables
3 2 (0.71%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
4 1 (0.36%) Primavera
4 1 (0.36%) Salesforce CRM
4 1 (0.36%) SAP ERP
Cloud Services
1 68 (24.20%) Azure
2 60 (21.35%) AWS
3 38 (13.52%) Microsoft 365
4 18 (6.41%) Microsoft Copilot
5 15 (5.34%) SaaS
6 14 (4.98%) Power Platform
7 13 (4.63%) Dynamics 365
7 13 (4.63%) OCI
8 10 (3.56%) Entra ID
8 10 (3.56%) Google Workspace
8 10 (3.56%) Serverless
9 8 (2.85%) Azure DevOps
9 8 (2.85%) GCP
9 8 (2.85%) OneDrive
9 8 (2.85%) Power Automate
10 7 (2.49%) Google Drive
11 6 (2.14%) PowerApps
12 5 (1.78%) Amazon EC2
12 5 (1.78%) Amazon S3
12 5 (1.78%) GitHub
Communications & Networking
1 15 (5.34%) Firewall
2 11 (3.91%) Wi-Fi
3 10 (3.56%) BGP
3 10 (3.56%) OSPF
4 8 (2.85%) BIG-IP
4 8 (2.85%) Ethernet VPN
4 8 (2.85%) VXLAN
4 8 (2.85%) WAN
5 7 (2.49%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
5 7 (2.49%) SD-WAN
6 6 (2.14%) WLAN
7 4 (1.42%) DNS
8 3 (1.07%) Cisco ASA
8 3 (1.07%) Cisco Firepower
8 3 (1.07%) DKIM
8 3 (1.07%) DMARC
8 3 (1.07%) EIGRP
8 3 (1.07%) HSRP
8 3 (1.07%) IPsec
9 2 (0.71%) LAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 15 (5.34%) MongoDB
2 9 (3.20%) Relational Database
3 6 (2.14%) Oracle Database
3 6 (2.14%) RDBMS
4 5 (1.78%) Metadata
4 5 (1.78%) PostgreSQL
4 5 (1.78%) Power BI
5 4 (1.42%) Oracle Exadata
5 4 (1.42%) SQL Server
6 2 (0.71%) Data Mining
6 2 (0.71%) DataStage
6 2 (0.71%) DocumentDB
6 2 (0.71%) MySQL
6 2 (0.71%) NoSQL
6 2 (0.71%) Oracle BI Publisher
6 2 (0.71%) Oracle Reports
6 2 (0.71%) Tableau
7 1 (0.36%) Data Lake
7 1 (0.36%) EDMS
7 1 (0.36%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 19 (6.76%) GitLab
2 16 (5.69%) JIRA
3 9 (3.20%) Cucumber
3 9 (3.20%) Mockito
3 9 (3.20%) Selenium
4 6 (2.14%) Jenkins
5 5 (1.78%) REST Assured
6 3 (1.07%) Cypress.io
6 3 (1.07%) Git
6 3 (1.07%) JUnit
7 2 (0.71%) Gatling
7 2 (0.71%) JDeveloper
7 2 (0.71%) Postman
7 2 (0.71%) SonarQube
7 2 (0.71%) WebDriver
8 1 (0.36%) JMeter
8 1 (0.36%) Serenity BDD
8 1 (0.36%) TestNG
8 1 (0.36%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 57 (20.28%) Social Skills
2 36 (12.81%) Military
3 30 (10.68%) Finance
4 22 (7.83%) Analytical Skills
5 19 (6.76%) Local Government
6 8 (2.85%) Legal
7 5 (1.78%) Banking
7 5 (1.78%) Organisational Skills
8 4 (1.42%) Presentation Skills
9 3 (1.07%) Documentation Skills
9 3 (1.07%) Influencing Skills
9 3 (1.07%) Marketing
10 2 (0.71%) General Ledger
10 2 (0.71%) Police
11 1 (0.36%) Corporate Banking
11 1 (0.36%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 1 (0.36%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 55 (19.57%) Developer
2 51 (18.15%) Lead
3 39 (13.88%) Senior
4 31 (11.03%) Architect
5 26 (9.25%) Java Developer
6 16 (5.69%) Analyst
7 14 (4.98%) Administrator
7 14 (4.98%) Senior Developer
7 14 (4.98%) Tester
8 13 (4.63%) Lead Developer
9 12 (4.27%) Business Analyst
9 12 (4.27%) Infrastructure Engineer
9 12 (4.27%) Senior Java Developer
10 11 (3.91%) Consultant
10 11 (3.91%) Designer
10 11 (3.91%) Security Architect
11 10 (3.56%) Software Developer
11 10 (3.56%) Test Engineer
12 9 (3.20%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
12 9 (3.20%) Technical Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 19 (6.76%) Node.js
2 15 (5.34%) Kafka
2 15 (5.34%) Spring
3 14 (4.98%) Spring Boot
4 10 (3.56%) REST
5 8 (2.85%) ActiveMQ
5 8 (2.85%) JAX-RS
5 8 (2.85%) OAuth
6 6 (2.14%) React
7 4 (1.42%) AngularJS
7 4 (1.42%) Nunjucks
7 4 (1.42%) OpenID
7 4 (1.42%) Oracle GoldenGate
7 4 (1.42%) Playwright
8 3 (1.07%) ARM Templates
8 3 (1.07%) CSS
8 3 (1.07%) HTML
8 3 (1.07%) Middleware
8 3 (1.07%) RESTful
9 2 (0.71%) Pandas
Miscellaneous
1 18 (6.41%) Cloud Native
2 12 (4.27%) Legacy Systems
3 11 (3.91%) Data Centre
3 11 (3.91%) Product Ownership
4 8 (2.85%) Management Information System
4 8 (2.85%) Onboarding
5 6 (2.14%) Hybrid Cloud
5 6 (2.14%) NHS
5 6 (2.14%) Operational Technology
5 6 (2.14%) Public Cloud
6 5 (1.78%) Replication
6 5 (1.78%) Self-Motivation
6 5 (1.78%) Taxonomies
7 4 (1.42%) Enterprise Software
8 3 (1.07%) Freedom of Information
8 3 (1.07%) Housing Association
9 2 (0.71%) CSOC
9 2 (0.71%) Distributed Systems
9 2 (0.71%) Educational Technology
9 2 (0.71%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 22 (7.83%) Linux
2 13 (4.63%) Unix
3 6 (2.14%) AIX
3 6 (2.14%) Mac OS X
3 6 (2.14%) Windows
4 5 (1.78%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 3 (1.07%) Solaris
5 3 (1.07%) Windows 10
6 2 (0.71%) Mac OS
7 1 (0.36%) Android
7 1 (0.36%) Apple iOS
7 1 (0.36%) CentOS
7 1 (0.36%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 75 (26.69%) Agile
2 47 (16.73%) CI/CD
3 43 (15.30%) DevOps
4 38 (13.52%) Continuous Improvement
5 35 (12.46%) Test Automation
6 33 (11.74%) Stakeholder Management
7 32 (11.39%) Microservices
8 31 (11.03%) Migration
9 30 (10.68%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 25 (8.90%) Technical Leadership
11 23 (8.19%) Roadmaps
12 22 (7.83%) Digital Transformation Programme
13 21 (7.47%) Infrastructure as Code
13 21 (7.47%) Mentoring
13 21 (7.47%) Problem-Solving
14 20 (7.12%) Cybersecurity
14 20 (7.12%) User Experience
15 18 (6.41%) TDD
16 16 (5.69%) AI
16 16 (5.69%) Risk Management
Programming Languages
1 44 (15.66%) Java
2 24 (8.54%) JavaScript
3 23 (8.19%) Python
4 19 (6.76%) SQL
5 8 (2.85%) TypeScript
6 7 (2.49%) PowerShell
7 2 (0.71%) C#
7 2 (0.71%) COBOL
7 2 (0.71%) PHP
7 2 (0.71%) PL/SQL
8 1 (0.36%) Bash
8 1 (0.36%) Bicep
8 1 (0.36%) Kotlin
8 1 (0.36%) Scala
8 1 (0.36%) Shell Script
8 1 (0.36%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 123 (43.77%) Security Cleared
2 89 (31.67%) SC Cleared
3 14 (4.98%) BPSS Clearance
4 12 (4.27%) Degree
5 7 (2.49%) Microsoft Certification
6 3 (1.07%) PMI Certification
7 2 (0.71%) Azure Certification
7 2 (0.71%) CCNA
7 2 (0.71%) Cisco Certification
7 2 (0.71%) DBS Check
7 2 (0.71%) ISTQB
7 2 (0.71%) ITIL Certification
7 2 (0.71%) PMP
8 1 (0.36%) CCNP
8 1 (0.36%) Computer Science Degree
8 1 (0.36%) Master's Degree
8 1 (0.36%) MBA
8 1 (0.36%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
8 1 (0.36%) SAFe Agilist
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 23 (8.19%) Accessibility
2 13 (4.63%) QA
3 9 (3.20%) Data Quality
3 9 (3.20%) PMO
3 9 (3.20%) WCAG
4 5 (1.78%) GDPR
5 4 (1.42%) NIST
6 2 (0.71%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 2 (0.71%) NCSC
6 2 (0.71%) NIST 800
7 1 (0.36%) Basel III
7 1 (0.36%) GRC
7 1 (0.36%) SLA
7 1 (0.36%) Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment)
System Software
1 20 (7.12%) Docker
2 18 (6.41%) Active Directory
3 5 (1.78%) Oracle RAC
4 2 (0.71%) VMware Infrastructure
5 1 (0.36%) BitLocker
5 1 (0.36%) GPFS
5 1 (0.36%) NFS
5 1 (0.36%) Virtual Desktop
5 1 (0.36%) VMware ESXi
5 1 (0.36%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 33 (11.74%) Terraform
2 18 (6.41%) Kubernetes
3 15 (5.34%) Ansible
4 5 (1.78%) Data Guard
5 4 (1.42%) Oracle RMAN
6 3 (1.07%) Grafana
6 3 (1.07%) Single Sign-On
7 2 (0.71%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 2 (0.71%) Microsoft Intune
7 2 (0.71%) Prometheus
8 1 (0.36%) Argo
8 1 (0.36%) CASB
8 1 (0.36%) Cisco CUCM
8 1 (0.36%) Oracle ZFS
8 1 (0.36%) Packer
8 1 (0.36%) SCCM
8 1 (0.36%) vRealize
8 1 (0.36%) VxRail
Vendors
1 43 (15.30%) Microsoft
2 13 (4.63%) Oracle
3 12 (4.27%) Palo Alto
4 10 (3.56%) Google
4 10 (3.56%) ServiceNow
5 8 (2.85%) Aruba
5 8 (2.85%) F5
6 7 (2.49%) Arista
7 6 (2.14%) SAP
8 5 (1.78%) Cisco
9 4 (1.42%) CheckPoint
10 3 (1.07%) IBM
10 3 (1.07%) Virgin Media
10 3 (1.07%) VMware
11 2 (0.71%) BeyondTrust
11 2 (0.71%) Databricks
11 2 (0.71%) OpenAI
11 2 (0.71%) Tanium
11 2 (0.71%) Thycotic
11 2 (0.71%) Trend Micro