Security Cleared Contract Job Trends in the North West

Security Clearance
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the North West with a requirement for Security Cleared qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 4 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 4 2 2
Rank change year-on-year -2 0 -1
Contract jobs citing Security Cleared 492 413 442
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 15.51% 20.96% 16.38%
As % of the Qualifications category 55.85% 58.50% 54.17%
Number of daily rates quoted 322 240 291
10th Percentile £358 £250 £363
25th Percentile £413 £417 £451
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £497 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year -0.70% -4.76% -0.94%
75th Percentile £638 £588 £666
90th Percentile £751 £650 £725
England median daily rate £525 £537 £550
% change year-on-year -2.23% -2.36% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 43 18 61
10th Percentile £22.68 £25.26 -
25th Percentile £28.50 £41.04 £10.95
Median hourly rate £52.78 £60.00 £14.50
Median % change year-on-year -12.04% +313.79% -64.26%
75th Percentile £71.50 £75.63 £46.18
90th Percentile £74.26 £85.85 £73.75
England median hourly rate £55.00 £55.00 £57.30
% change year-on-year - -4.02% -4.50%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
North West

Security Cleared falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in the North West.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 881 706 816
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 27.77% 35.84% 30.24%
Number of daily rates quoted 586 404 469
10th Percentile £329 £230 £268
25th Percentile £400 £398 £415
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £494 £513
Median % change year-on-year -3.80% -3.66% +0.49%
75th Percentile £588 £575 £650
90th Percentile £688 £650 £725
England median daily rate £520 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -0.95% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 68 42 126
10th Percentile £22.68 £17.70 £10.95
25th Percentile £30.00 £25.26 £11.77
Median hourly rate £49.79 £32.50 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year +53.19% +102.37% -59.85%
75th Percentile £72.19 £60.00 £41.76
90th Percentile £111.15 £83.13 £71.32
England median hourly rate £47.50 £44.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year +7.95% +10.00% -23.81%

Security Cleared
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

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

Security Cleared job vacancy trend in the North West

Security Cleared
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Security Cleared.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Security Cleared

Security Cleared
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Security Cleared in the North West over the 6 months to 4 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Security Cleared in the North West

Security Cleared
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Security Cleared.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Security Cleared

Security Cleared
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Security Cleared in the North West over the 6 months to 4 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Security Cleared in the North West

Security Cleared
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 Security Cleared within the North West region over the 6 months to 4 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
Manchester -6 165 £500 - 105
Cumbria 0 121 £478 -11.57% 26
Lancashire +3 97 £773 +72.82% 33
Cheshire 0 76 £445 +27.21% 17
Merseyside -15 27 £625 +13.64% 5
Security Cleared
England

Security Cleared
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 22 (4.47%) Microsoft Exchange
2 10 (2.03%) SharePoint
3 8 (1.63%) Skype for Business
4 7 (1.42%) Confluence
5 5 (1.02%) Apache Spark
6 3 (0.61%) Apache
6 3 (0.61%) Jupyter
7 2 (0.41%) Adobe Experience Manager
7 2 (0.41%) CICS
7 2 (0.41%) SAS
8 1 (0.20%) Apache Airflow
8 1 (0.20%) CMS
8 1 (0.20%) IIS
8 1 (0.20%) nginx
8 1 (0.20%) OpenStack
Applications
1 14 (2.85%) Microsoft Office
2 10 (2.03%) Microsoft Excel
3 6 (1.22%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.61%) Microsoft Project
5 2 (0.41%) MS Visio
5 2 (0.41%) Siemens NX
6 1 (0.20%) Adobe Premiere
6 1 (0.20%) Quicktime
Business Applications
1 3 (0.61%) Remedy ITSM
1 3 (0.61%) SAP S/4HANA
2 2 (0.41%) Oracle Payables
2 2 (0.41%) Primavera
2 2 (0.41%) SAP MM
2 2 (0.41%) SAP VC
2 2 (0.41%) Teamcenter
3 1 (0.20%) Dynamics AX
3 1 (0.20%) Oracle EBS
3 1 (0.20%) Payment Gateway
3 1 (0.20%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 79 (16.06%) AWS
2 54 (10.98%) Azure
3 24 (4.88%) Microsoft 365
4 17 (3.46%) GCP
5 15 (3.05%) Power Platform
5 15 (3.05%) SaaS
5 15 (3.05%) Serverless
6 11 (2.24%) GitHub
7 10 (2.03%) Entra ID
8 9 (1.83%) Google Workspace
9 8 (1.63%) Azure DevOps
9 8 (1.63%) OCI
10 7 (1.42%) Amazon EKS
10 7 (1.42%) Amazon S3
11 6 (1.22%) Google Drive
12 4 (0.81%) AWS CloudFormation
12 4 (0.81%) AWS Lambda
12 4 (0.81%) Azure Monitor
12 4 (0.81%) GitHub Actions
12 4 (0.81%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 57 (11.59%) Firewall
2 31 (6.30%) VLAN
3 24 (4.88%) Network Security
4 23 (4.67%) WAN
5 20 (4.07%) DNS
5 20 (4.07%) Wi-Fi
6 13 (2.64%) DHCP
6 13 (2.64%) LAN
6 13 (2.64%) Wireless
7 10 (2.03%) SAN
8 9 (1.83%) BGP
8 9 (1.83%) TCP/IP
9 8 (1.63%) OSPF
9 8 (1.63%) Skype
10 7 (1.42%) Cisco IOS
10 7 (1.42%) Ethernet VPN
10 7 (1.42%) SD-WAN
10 7 (1.42%) Structured Cabling
10 7 (1.42%) VPN
10 7 (1.42%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 17 (3.46%) PostgreSQL
2 14 (2.85%) Power BI
3 11 (2.24%) Oracle Database
4 10 (2.03%) MongoDB
5 9 (1.83%) Elasticsearch
5 9 (1.83%) Relational Database
5 9 (1.83%) SQL Server
6 8 (1.63%) MySQL
6 8 (1.63%) NoSQL
7 7 (1.42%) Metadata
8 6 (1.22%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 5 (1.02%) Oracle Database 12c
10 4 (0.81%) Hadoop
10 4 (0.81%) Tableau
11 3 (0.61%) Data Lake
11 3 (0.61%) RDBMS
12 2 (0.41%) Amazon Redshift
12 2 (0.41%) DataStage
12 2 (0.41%) DynamoDB
12 2 (0.41%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 27 (5.49%) GitLab
2 17 (3.46%) Git
3 13 (2.64%) JIRA
4 7 (1.42%) Jenkins
5 6 (1.22%) MSI
6 4 (0.81%) Postman
6 4 (0.81%) Selenium
7 3 (0.61%) REST Assured
8 2 (0.41%) Cucumber
8 2 (0.41%) Cypress.io
8 2 (0.41%) Gatling
8 2 (0.41%) Jasmine
8 2 (0.41%) JMeter
8 2 (0.41%) Mockito
8 2 (0.41%) Serenity BDD
8 2 (0.41%) SonarQube
9 1 (0.20%) ClearCase
9 1 (0.20%) InstallShield
9 1 (0.20%) Rational Robot
9 1 (0.20%) Visual Studio
General
1 151 (30.69%) Public Sector
2 98 (19.92%) Social Skills
3 30 (6.10%) Finance
4 24 (4.88%) Analytical Skills
5 22 (4.47%) Documentation Skills
5 22 (4.47%) Military
6 13 (2.64%) Aerospace
6 13 (2.64%) Legal
7 12 (2.44%) Banking
8 8 (1.63%) Manufacturing
9 7 (1.42%) Presentation Skills
10 4 (0.81%) Aviation
11 3 (0.61%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 3 (0.61%) Influencing Skills
11 3 (0.61%) Retail
12 2 (0.41%) Corporate Banking
12 2 (0.41%) Law
12 2 (0.41%) Marketing
12 2 (0.41%) Organisational Skills
12 2 (0.41%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 66 (13.41%) Architect
2 53 (10.77%) Lead
3 50 (10.16%) Developer
4 35 (7.11%) Network Engineer
5 31 (6.30%) Analyst
5 31 (6.30%) Senior
6 27 (5.49%) Administrator
7 19 (3.86%) Lead Architect
8 18 (3.66%) Unix Engineer
9 17 (3.46%) DBA
9 17 (3.46%) Wintel Engineer
10 16 (3.25%) Consultant
10 16 (3.25%) Data Engineer
10 16 (3.25%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
10 16 (3.25%) Technical Architect
11 15 (3.05%) Coordinator
12 13 (2.64%) Business Analyst
12 13 (2.64%) Java Developer
12 13 (2.64%) Security Assurance Coordinator
13 12 (2.44%) Security Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 29 (5.89%) Spring
2 25 (5.08%) Spring Boot
3 16 (3.25%) Node.js
4 13 (2.64%) Kafka
5 12 (2.44%) RESTful
6 11 (2.24%) 802.1X
7 10 (2.03%) OAuth
8 8 (1.63%) REST
9 7 (1.42%) HTML
9 7 (1.42%) Playwright
10 6 (1.22%) CSS
10 6 (1.22%) Hibernate
10 6 (1.22%) React
11 5 (1.02%) Apache NiFi
11 5 (1.02%) Jest
11 5 (1.02%) JSON
11 5 (1.02%) Leaflet
11 5 (1.02%) OAuth2
11 5 (1.02%) OpenID
11 5 (1.02%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 34 (6.91%) Data Centre
2 25 (5.08%) Product Ownership
3 22 (4.47%) Clustering
3 22 (4.47%) Replication
4 19 (3.86%) Onboarding
5 14 (2.85%) Cloud Native
6 10 (2.03%) Operational Technology
7 8 (1.63%) Enterprise Software
8 7 (1.42%) Cyber Threat
9 6 (1.22%) Management Information System
10 5 (1.02%) Mobile App
10 5 (1.02%) Private Cloud
10 5 (1.02%) Security Posture
11 4 (0.81%) Data Protection Act
11 4 (0.81%) Distributed Systems
11 4 (0.81%) Fat Client
11 4 (0.81%) Hybrid Cloud
11 4 (0.81%) Legacy Systems
11 4 (0.81%) Thin Client
12 3 (0.61%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 53 (10.77%) Windows
2 26 (5.28%) Linux
3 25 (5.08%) Unix
4 22 (4.47%) Windows Server
5 19 (3.86%) Solaris
6 17 (3.46%) Windows 10
7 8 (1.63%) Windows 7
8 4 (0.81%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 3 (0.61%) AIX
10 2 (0.41%) Android
10 2 (0.41%) Apple iOS
10 2 (0.41%) Mac OS X
10 2 (0.41%) VMS
11 1 (0.20%) Mac OS
11 1 (0.20%) Windows Server 2012
11 1 (0.20%) Windows Server 2016
11 1 (0.20%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 76 (15.45%) Agile
2 61 (12.40%) Project Delivery
3 58 (11.79%) High Availability
4 55 (11.18%) Migration
5 53 (10.77%) DevOps
6 52 (10.57%) CI/CD
7 51 (10.37%) Problem-Solving
7 51 (10.37%) Stakeholder Management
8 45 (9.15%) Disaster Recovery
9 44 (8.94%) Continuous Improvement
10 42 (8.54%) ITSM
11 36 (7.32%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 33 (6.71%) Service Management
13 32 (6.50%) Cybersecurity
14 30 (6.10%) Microservices
14 30 (6.10%) Risk Management
14 30 (6.10%) Technical Leadership
14 30 (6.10%) Test Automation
15 28 (5.69%) Change Management
16 25 (5.08%) Roadmaps
Programming Languages
1 56 (11.38%) Python
2 48 (9.76%) Java
3 43 (8.74%) PowerShell
4 25 (5.08%) SQL
5 21 (4.27%) JavaScript
6 14 (2.85%) TypeScript
7 8 (1.63%) VB
7 8 (1.63%) VBScript
8 5 (1.02%) Go
8 5 (1.02%) Rust
9 4 (0.81%) Ruby
10 2 (0.41%) Bash
10 2 (0.41%) C#
10 2 (0.41%) COBOL
10 2 (0.41%) Kotlin
11 1 (0.20%) ABAP
11 1 (0.20%) Bicep
11 1 (0.20%) Perl
11 1 (0.20%) Search Processing Language
11 1 (0.20%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 320 (65.04%) SC Cleared
2 67 (13.62%) DV Cleared
3 34 (6.91%) BPSS Clearance
4 32 (6.50%) Cisco Certification
5 29 (5.89%) CCNP
5 29 (5.89%) Degree
6 26 (5.28%) CCNA
7 18 (3.66%) Microsoft Certification
8 14 (2.85%) MCSA
8 14 (2.85%) MCSE
8 14 (2.85%) VCAP
8 14 (2.85%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 13 (2.64%) CISSP
10 11 (2.24%) Computer Science Degree
11 9 (1.83%) AWS Certification
11 9 (1.83%) ITIL Certification
12 8 (1.63%) Azure Certification
13 7 (1.42%) CISM
14 6 (1.22%) Network+ Certification
14 6 (1.22%) Server+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 20 (4.07%) NIST
2 16 (3.25%) QA
3 15 (3.05%) Accessibility
3 15 (3.05%) SLA
4 13 (2.64%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 12 (2.44%) JSP 440
6 9 (1.83%) PMO
7 6 (1.22%) Data Quality
7 6 (1.22%) GDPR
8 5 (1.02%) GRC
9 4 (0.81%) WCAG
10 3 (0.61%) IFRS
10 3 (0.61%) NCSC
11 2 (0.41%) IFRS 17
11 2 (0.41%) NIST 800
11 2 (0.41%) PCI DSS
11 2 (0.41%) PSD2
12 1 (0.20%) Basel III
12 1 (0.20%) RMADS
12 1 (0.20%) SOC 2
System Software
1 26 (5.28%) Active Directory
1 26 (5.28%) Docker
2 20 (4.07%) VMware Infrastructure
3 18 (3.66%) Virtual Machines
3 18 (3.66%) VMware ESXi
4 17 (3.46%) vSphere
5 9 (1.83%) BitLocker
6 4 (0.81%) Firmware
7 2 (0.41%) Hyper-V
7 2 (0.41%) ISA Server
8 1 (0.20%) GPFS
8 1 (0.20%) NFS
8 1 (0.20%) Oracle RAC
8 1 (0.20%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 32 (6.50%) Terraform
2 31 (6.30%) Kubernetes
3 26 (5.28%) Ansible
4 17 (3.46%) vCenter Server
5 13 (2.64%) SCCM
6 7 (1.42%) Grafana
7 6 (1.22%) Oracle RMAN
8 5 (1.02%) Prometheus
9 4 (0.81%) Single Sign-On
10 3 (0.61%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 2 (0.41%) Failover Clustering
11 2 (0.41%) Microsoft Clustering
11 2 (0.41%) Nagios
11 2 (0.41%) Norton AntiVirus
11 2 (0.41%) WSUS
12 1 (0.20%) Cisco Prime
12 1 (0.20%) Data Guard
12 1 (0.20%) Netcool
12 1 (0.20%) Tivoli
12 1 (0.20%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 62 (12.60%) Microsoft
2 61 (12.40%) Cisco
3 38 (7.72%) Oracle
4 34 (6.91%) Palo Alto
5 30 (6.10%) SAP
6 28 (5.69%) ServiceNow
7 21 (4.27%) VMware
8 13 (2.64%) Aruba
9 10 (2.03%) Google
10 8 (1.63%) F5
10 8 (1.63%) Meraki
11 6 (1.22%) CheckPoint
11 6 (1.22%) Ekahau
11 6 (1.22%) SolarWinds
11 6 (1.22%) Splunk
12 5 (1.02%) Arista
12 5 (1.02%) Citrix
12 5 (1.02%) IBM
13 4 (0.81%) NetApp
13 4 (0.81%) RedGate