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 3 June 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
3 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 3 2 2
Rank change year-on-year -1 0 -1
Contract jobs citing Security Cleared 524 401 416
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 15.66% 20.61% 15.19%
As % of the Qualifications category 55.92% 57.53% 54.38%
Number of daily rates quoted 334 233 256
10th Percentile £360 £234 £375
25th Percentile £421 £412 £451
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £514 £500 £514
Median % change year-on-year +2.75% -2.68% -2.14%
75th Percentile £630 £600 £670
90th Percentile £751 £700 £725
England median daily rate £525 £537 £550
% change year-on-year -2.23% -2.36% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 43 24 64
10th Percentile £22.68 £25.15 -
25th Percentile £27.14 £25.26 £10.95
Median hourly rate £60.00 £43.86 £14.50
Median % change year-on-year +36.81% +202.45% -65.88%
75th Percentile £74.26 £60.00 £51.22
90th Percentile £83.75 £72.63 £73.75
England median hourly rate £57.35 £40.00 £56.69
% change year-on-year +43.38% -29.44% -5.51%

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 937 697 765
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 28.00% 35.82% 27.93%
Number of daily rates quoted 609 403 427
10th Percentile £336 £230 £294
25th Percentile £400 £387 £414
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £481 £490 £500
Median % change year-on-year -1.84% -2.00% -2.20%
75th Percentile £591 £575 £638
90th Percentile £680 £671 £725
England median daily rate £525 £525 £538
% change year-on-year - -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 71 44 132
10th Percentile £22.68 £17.44 £10.95
25th Percentile £29.24 £24.54 £11.94
Median hourly rate £43.96 £29.64 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year +48.34% +84.53% -60.43%
75th Percentile £74.26 £59.93 £43.26
90th Percentile £111.15 £75.50 £68.24
England median hourly rate £47.54 £32.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +46.28% -18.75% -27.27%

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 3 June 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 3 June 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 3 June 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
Cumbria 0 162 £481 -9.79% 22
Manchester -14 162 £520 +4.00% 120
Lancashire +3 92 £775 +73.38% 36
Cheshire +4 82 £445 +27.21% 16
Merseyside -19 19 £625 +4.17% 3
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 25 (4.77%) Microsoft Exchange
2 11 (2.10%) SharePoint
2 11 (2.10%) Skype for Business
3 7 (1.34%) Confluence
4 4 (0.76%) Apache Spark
5 2 (0.38%) Apache
5 2 (0.38%) CICS
5 2 (0.38%) Jupyter
5 2 (0.38%) Oracle Workflow
6 1 (0.19%) IIS
6 1 (0.19%) nginx
6 1 (0.19%) OpenStack
6 1 (0.19%) SAS
Applications
1 18 (3.44%) Microsoft Office
2 10 (1.91%) Microsoft Excel
3 5 (0.95%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.57%) Microsoft Project
4 3 (0.57%) MS Visio
5 2 (0.38%) Siemens NX
6 1 (0.19%) Adobe Premiere
6 1 (0.19%) Quicktime
Business Applications
1 5 (0.95%) Oracle Payables
2 3 (0.57%) Remedy ITSM
2 3 (0.57%) SAP S/4HANA
2 3 (0.57%) Teamcenter
3 2 (0.38%) Oracle Cash Management
3 2 (0.38%) Oracle EBS
3 2 (0.38%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
3 2 (0.38%) Primavera
3 2 (0.38%) SAP MM
4 1 (0.19%) Dynamics AX
4 1 (0.19%) Payment Gateway
4 1 (0.19%) SAP PM
Cloud Services
1 81 (15.46%) AWS
2 59 (11.26%) Azure
3 24 (4.58%) Microsoft 365
4 17 (3.24%) SaaS
5 16 (3.05%) GCP
6 14 (2.67%) Power Platform
6 14 (2.67%) Serverless
7 11 (2.10%) OCI
8 10 (1.91%) Entra ID
8 10 (1.91%) GitHub
9 9 (1.72%) Google Workspace
10 7 (1.34%) Azure DevOps
10 7 (1.34%) Google Drive
11 6 (1.15%) Amazon S3
12 5 (0.95%) AWS Lambda
13 4 (0.76%) Amazon EKS
13 4 (0.76%) Azure Monitor
13 4 (0.76%) OpenShift
14 3 (0.57%) Azure Key Vault
14 3 (0.57%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 69 (13.17%) Firewall
2 42 (8.02%) VLAN
3 31 (5.92%) Wireless
4 30 (5.73%) DNS
4 30 (5.73%) Network Security
5 26 (4.96%) WAN
6 23 (4.39%) DHCP
7 22 (4.20%) Structured Cabling
8 21 (4.01%) SAN
9 20 (3.82%) Wi-Fi
10 17 (3.24%) Cisco IOS
10 17 (3.24%) LAN
10 17 (3.24%) NAS
11 16 (3.05%) NX-OS
12 12 (2.29%) VPN
13 11 (2.10%) Skype
14 10 (1.91%) BGP
15 9 (1.72%) OSPF
15 9 (1.72%) TCP/IP
16 8 (1.53%) BIG-IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 14 (2.67%) Oracle Database
2 13 (2.48%) MongoDB
2 13 (2.48%) PostgreSQL
2 13 (2.48%) Power BI
3 12 (2.29%) Relational Database
4 9 (1.72%) Elasticsearch
4 9 (1.72%) SQL Server
5 6 (1.15%) Metadata
5 6 (1.15%) MySQL
6 5 (0.95%) NoSQL
6 5 (0.95%) Oracle Database 12c
7 4 (0.76%) Hadoop
7 4 (0.76%) RDBMS
7 4 (0.76%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 4 (0.76%) Tableau
8 3 (0.57%) Data Lake
8 3 (0.57%) Data Warehouse
9 2 (0.38%) DataStage
9 2 (0.38%) Oracle Reports
9 2 (0.38%) WebFOCUS
Development Applications
1 29 (5.53%) GitLab
2 13 (2.48%) Selenium
3 12 (2.29%) JIRA
4 11 (2.10%) Git
5 9 (1.72%) Jenkins
5 9 (1.72%) REST Assured
6 6 (1.15%) Gatling
7 5 (0.95%) Cucumber
7 5 (0.95%) MSI
7 5 (0.95%) Serenity BDD
8 4 (0.76%) Cypress.io
9 3 (0.57%) JMeter
9 3 (0.57%) Postman
10 2 (0.38%) JDeveloper
10 2 (0.38%) SonarQube
10 2 (0.38%) WebDriver
11 1 (0.19%) Mocha
11 1 (0.19%) Mockito
11 1 (0.19%) Rational Robot
11 1 (0.19%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 139 (26.53%) Public Sector
2 112 (21.37%) Social Skills
3 37 (7.06%) Military
4 30 (5.73%) Documentation Skills
5 28 (5.34%) Finance
6 26 (4.96%) Analytical Skills
7 14 (2.67%) Aerospace
8 13 (2.48%) Legal
9 9 (1.72%) Banking
9 9 (1.72%) Manufacturing
10 6 (1.15%) Presentation Skills
11 4 (0.76%) Aviation
11 4 (0.76%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 4 (0.76%) Retail
12 2 (0.38%) Corporate Banking
12 2 (0.38%) General Ledger
12 2 (0.38%) Influencing Skills
12 2 (0.38%) Organisational Skills
13 1 (0.19%) Local Government
13 1 (0.19%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 76 (14.50%) Architect
2 67 (12.79%) Lead
3 41 (7.82%) Network Engineer
4 31 (5.92%) Analyst
4 31 (5.92%) Senior
5 30 (5.73%) Developer
6 29 (5.53%) Unix Engineer
7 25 (4.77%) Administrator
8 24 (4.58%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
9 21 (4.01%) Technical Architect
10 19 (3.63%) Consultant
10 19 (3.63%) Lead Architect
10 19 (3.63%) Wintel Engineer
11 18 (3.44%) Data Engineer
12 17 (3.24%) DBA
13 15 (2.86%) Coordinator
14 13 (2.48%) Business Analyst
14 13 (2.48%) Security Architect
14 13 (2.48%) Security Assurance Coordinator
15 12 (2.29%) Test Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (4.96%) Spring
2 22 (4.20%) Spring Boot
3 18 (3.44%) Node.js
4 16 (3.05%) Kafka
5 10 (1.91%) OAuth
5 10 (1.91%) REST
6 9 (1.72%) Playwright
7 8 (1.53%) 802.1X
8 6 (1.15%) OpenID
8 6 (1.15%) React
8 6 (1.15%) RESTful
9 5 (0.95%) Apache NiFi
9 5 (0.95%) Leaflet
9 5 (0.95%) Nunjucks
9 5 (0.95%) Spring Cloud
10 4 (0.76%) AWS CDK
10 4 (0.76%) Web Services
10 4 (0.76%) XML
11 3 (0.57%) CSS
11 3 (0.57%) HTML
Miscellaneous
1 42 (8.02%) Data Centre
2 26 (4.96%) Clustering
3 24 (4.58%) Replication
4 20 (3.82%) Onboarding
4 20 (3.82%) Product Ownership
5 16 (3.05%) Cloud Native
6 13 (2.48%) Operational Technology
7 9 (1.72%) Enterprise Software
8 7 (1.34%) Cyber Threat
8 7 (1.34%) Management Information System
9 6 (1.15%) Hybrid Cloud
10 5 (0.95%) Private Cloud
10 5 (0.95%) Security Posture
11 4 (0.76%) Data Protection Act
11 4 (0.76%) Driving Licence
11 4 (0.76%) Legacy Systems
11 4 (0.76%) Mobile App
12 3 (0.57%) Freedom of Information
12 3 (0.57%) PKI
12 3 (0.57%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 57 (10.88%) Windows
2 35 (6.68%) Unix
3 30 (5.73%) Solaris
4 25 (4.77%) Linux
5 24 (4.58%) Windows Server
6 19 (3.63%) Windows 10
7 11 (2.10%) Windows 7
8 4 (0.76%) AIX
8 4 (0.76%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 2 (0.38%) Android
9 2 (0.38%) Apple iOS
9 2 (0.38%) VMS
10 1 (0.19%) Mac OS
10 1 (0.19%) Mac OS X
10 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2012
10 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2016
10 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 73 (13.93%) Agile
2 68 (12.98%) High Availability
3 67 (12.79%) Project Delivery
4 61 (11.64%) CI/CD
5 57 (10.88%) DevOps
6 56 (10.69%) Continuous Improvement
6 56 (10.69%) Migration
7 55 (10.50%) ITSM
7 55 (10.50%) Stakeholder Management
8 53 (10.11%) Disaster Recovery
9 46 (8.78%) Problem-Solving
10 44 (8.40%) Service Management
11 43 (8.21%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 41 (7.82%) Cybersecurity
13 32 (6.11%) Technical Leadership
13 32 (6.11%) Test Automation
14 31 (5.92%) Risk Management
15 30 (5.73%) Microservices
16 24 (4.58%) ITIL
16 24 (4.58%) Roadmaps
Programming Languages
1 58 (11.07%) Python
2 48 (9.16%) Java
3 47 (8.97%) PowerShell
4 25 (4.77%) JavaScript
5 24 (4.58%) SQL
6 13 (2.48%) TypeScript
7 11 (2.10%) VB
7 11 (2.10%) VBScript
8 5 (0.95%) Go
8 5 (0.95%) Rust
9 3 (0.57%) Bash
10 2 (0.38%) C#
10 2 (0.38%) COBOL
10 2 (0.38%) PL/SQL
11 1 (0.19%) Kotlin
11 1 (0.19%) Perl
11 1 (0.19%) Ruby
11 1 (0.19%) Scala
11 1 (0.19%) Shell Script
11 1 (0.19%) VB6
Qualifications
1 362 (69.08%) SC Cleared
2 64 (12.21%) DV Cleared
3 45 (8.59%) Cisco Certification
4 42 (8.02%) CCNA
5 36 (6.87%) CCNP
6 29 (5.53%) BPSS Clearance
7 24 (4.58%) Degree
8 22 (4.20%) Microsoft Certification
9 16 (3.05%) MCSA
9 16 (3.05%) MCSE
9 16 (3.05%) VCAP
9 16 (3.05%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 15 (2.86%) Network+ Certification
10 15 (2.86%) Server+ Certification
11 13 (2.48%) CISSP
12 9 (1.72%) AWS Certification
12 9 (1.72%) Azure Certification
12 9 (1.72%) ITIL Certification
13 7 (1.34%) CISM
13 7 (1.34%) Computer Science Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 21 (4.01%) PMO
2 20 (3.82%) Accessibility
2 20 (3.82%) NIST
3 15 (2.86%) QA
4 14 (2.67%) SLA
5 13 (2.48%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 12 (2.29%) JSP 440
7 11 (2.10%) GDPR
8 7 (1.34%) Data Quality
9 5 (0.95%) GRC
10 4 (0.76%) NCSC
10 4 (0.76%) WCAG
11 3 (0.57%) NIST 800
12 2 (0.38%) IFRS
12 2 (0.38%) IFRS 17
12 2 (0.38%) PCI DSS
13 1 (0.19%) Cyber Essentials
13 1 (0.19%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 1 (0.19%) RMADS
13 1 (0.19%) SOC 2
System Software
1 27 (5.15%) Active Directory
2 23 (4.39%) VMware Infrastructure
3 22 (4.20%) Docker
4 21 (4.01%) Virtual Machines
5 20 (3.82%) VMware ESXi
6 19 (3.63%) vSphere
7 12 (2.29%) BitLocker
8 4 (0.76%) Firmware
9 2 (0.38%) Hyper-V
9 2 (0.38%) Oracle RAC
9 2 (0.38%) Virtual Desktop
10 1 (0.19%) GPFS
10 1 (0.19%) NFS
10 1 (0.19%) Squid
Systems Management
1 35 (6.68%) Terraform
2 30 (5.73%) Ansible
3 26 (4.96%) Kubernetes
4 19 (3.63%) vCenter Server
5 16 (3.05%) SCCM
6 9 (1.72%) Grafana
7 7 (1.34%) Oracle RMAN
7 7 (1.34%) Prometheus
8 5 (0.95%) Single Sign-On
9 3 (0.57%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 2 (0.38%) Data Guard
10 2 (0.38%) Failover Clustering
10 2 (0.38%) Microsoft Clustering
10 2 (0.38%) Nagios
10 2 (0.38%) WSUS
11 1 (0.19%) Cisco Prime
11 1 (0.19%) Netcool
11 1 (0.19%) Norton AntiVirus
11 1 (0.19%) Tivoli
11 1 (0.19%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 73 (13.93%) Cisco
2 64 (12.21%) Microsoft
3 46 (8.78%) Oracle
4 37 (7.06%) ServiceNow
5 31 (5.92%) Palo Alto
6 27 (5.15%) SAP
7 24 (4.58%) VMware
8 15 (2.86%) Aruba
9 10 (1.91%) Google
10 8 (1.53%) F5
11 7 (1.34%) Splunk
12 6 (1.15%) Arista
12 6 (1.15%) CheckPoint
12 6 (1.15%) Ekahau
12 6 (1.15%) SolarWinds
13 5 (0.95%) IBM
14 4 (0.76%) Citrix
14 4 (0.76%) Dell
14 4 (0.76%) EMC
14 4 (0.76%) NetApp