Public Sector Contract Job Trends in Scotland

Public Sector
UK > Scotland

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Public Sector in contract job vacancies in Scotland. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Public Sector over the 6 months leading up to 2 July 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 5 1
Rank change year-on-year -5 -4 +1
Contract jobs citing Public Sector 264 319 559
As % of all contract jobs in Scotland 12.24% 19.23% 27.22%
As % of the General category 20.53% 26.54% 42.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 171 205 359
10th Percentile £313 £186 £156
25th Percentile £406 £313 £257
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £450 £450
Median % change year-on-year +5.56% - -3.12%
75th Percentile £573 £505 £538
90th Percentile £725 £585 £628
UK median daily rate £513 £500 £504
% change year-on-year +2.50% -0.86% -3.24%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 10 14
10th Percentile - £16.88 £12.00
25th Percentile £25.19 £18.80 £13.22
Median hourly rate £25.39 £22.08 £16.25
Median % change year-on-year +14.97% +35.88% +5.83%
75th Percentile £25.58 £27.13 £19.07
90th Percentile - £30.12 £23.50
UK median hourly rate £23.41 £22.90 £23.99
% change year-on-year +2.24% -4.54% +19.35%

All General Skills
Scotland

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 Scotland.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for general skills 1,286 1,202 1,304
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Scotland 59.62% 72.45% 63.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 669 696 781
10th Percentile £250 £226 £173
25th Percentile £363 £363 £313
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £463 £465 £450
Median % change year-on-year -0.43% +3.22% -5.26%
75th Percentile £575 £538 £550
90th Percentile £675 £600 £638
UK median daily rate £518 £501 £525
% change year-on-year +3.40% -4.67% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 108 45 75
10th Percentile £12.60 £16.02 £12.12
25th Percentile £13.45 £16.55 £13.38
Median hourly rate £16.18 £20.00 £18.00
Median % change year-on-year -19.10% +11.11% -4.46%
75th Percentile £45.47 £26.21 £34.38
90th Percentile £62.55 £44.37 £60.75
UK median hourly rate £32.00 £27.35 £31.71
% change year-on-year +17.00% -13.75% +3.97%

Public Sector
Job Vacancy Trend in Scotland

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

Public Sector job vacancy trend in Scotland

Public Sector
Daily Rate Trend in Scotland

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

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

Public Sector
Daily Rate Histogram in Scotland

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Public Sector in Scotland over the 6 months to 2 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Public Sector in Scotland

Public Sector
Hourly Rate Trend in Scotland

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

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

Public Sector
Contract Job Locations in Scotland

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 Scotland region over the 6 months to 2 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
Edinburgh -2 126 £450 - 21
Glasgow +4 112 £525 +11.11% 27
South Lanarkshire -2 12 £669 +42.23%
Lanarkshire -1 2 £431 +231.73% 6
West Lothian -3 2 £388 +106.67% 1
East Lothian +4 1 - -
Moray -1 1 - -
North Lanarkshire -3 1 £350 -12.50%
Aberdeen -3 1 £138 -17.91%
Dundee -5 1 - -
Inverclyde - 1 £675 -
Fife - 1 - -
Public Sector
UK

Public Sector
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Scotland 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 11 (4.17%) Confluence
2 4 (1.52%) SharePoint
3 3 (1.14%) CMS
4 2 (0.76%) Apache
4 2 (0.76%) Drupal
5 1 (0.38%) Apache Airflow
5 1 (0.38%) CICS
5 1 (0.38%) Exchange Server 2013
5 1 (0.38%) JBoss
5 1 (0.38%) Microsoft Exchange
5 1 (0.38%) OpenStack
5 1 (0.38%) SharePoint 2013
Applications
1 7 (2.65%) Microsoft Excel
2 4 (1.52%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (0.76%) Microsoft Project
3 2 (0.76%) MS Visio
4 1 (0.38%) Adobe Creative Suite
4 1 (0.38%) Adobe Illustrator
4 1 (0.38%) InDesign
4 1 (0.38%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.38%) Photoshop
Business Applications
1 5 (1.89%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.38%) Dynamics GP
2 1 (0.38%) IntelliMatch
2 1 (0.38%) iTrent
2 1 (0.38%) Oracle Applications
2 1 (0.38%) Oracle ERP
2 1 (0.38%) Payment Gateway
2 1 (0.38%) SAP GRC
2 1 (0.38%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 50 (18.94%) AWS
2 46 (17.42%) Azure
3 19 (7.20%) Power Platform
4 18 (6.82%) Azure DevOps
5 16 (6.06%) Microsoft 365
6 14 (5.30%) OCI
7 13 (4.92%) Amazon S3
7 13 (4.92%) Serverless
8 9 (3.41%) AWS Lambda
9 8 (3.03%) GCP
10 7 (2.65%) AWS CloudFormation
11 6 (2.27%) Amazon EKS
11 6 (2.27%) GitHub
11 6 (2.27%) GitHub Actions
12 5 (1.89%) Azure AI
12 5 (1.89%) Azure Cognitive Search
12 5 (1.89%) Azure Cognitive Services
12 5 (1.89%) Azure Cosmos DB
12 5 (1.89%) Azure Key Vault
12 5 (1.89%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 7 (2.65%) DNS
1 7 (2.65%) Wi-Fi
2 5 (1.89%) Cisco Nexus
2 5 (1.89%) Firewall
2 5 (1.89%) LAN
3 4 (1.52%) Network Security
3 4 (1.52%) WAN
4 3 (1.14%) Remote Desktop
4 3 (1.14%) SD-WAN
4 3 (1.14%) SSH
4 3 (1.14%) SSL
4 3 (1.14%) VPN
4 3 (1.14%) Wireless
5 2 (0.76%) BGP
5 2 (0.76%) Fibre Channel
5 2 (0.76%) HTTPS
5 2 (0.76%) Intranet
5 2 (0.76%) OSPF
6 1 (0.38%) DSL
6 1 (0.38%) Structured Cabling
Database & Business Intelligence
1 16 (6.06%) Power BI
2 10 (3.79%) Metadata
2 10 (3.79%) Relational Database
3 9 (3.41%) MySQL
4 6 (2.27%) MongoDB
4 6 (2.27%) SQL Server
5 5 (1.89%) MariaDB
5 5 (1.89%) PostgreSQL
6 4 (1.52%) Amazon Aurora
6 4 (1.52%) Oracle Database
7 3 (1.14%) Amazon RDS
7 3 (1.14%) DynamoDB
7 3 (1.14%) Geospatial Data
8 2 (0.76%) Azure SQL Database
8 2 (0.76%) Elasticsearch
8 2 (0.76%) GIS
8 2 (0.76%) Power Query
8 2 (0.76%) SQLPlus
9 1 (0.38%) Data Lake
9 1 (0.38%) OpenStack Swift
Development Applications
1 14 (5.30%) JIRA
2 12 (4.55%) Git
3 9 (3.41%) Cypress.io
3 9 (3.41%) Jenkins
4 7 (2.65%) Selenium
5 5 (1.89%) Cucumber
5 5 (1.89%) Subversion
6 3 (1.14%) GoCD
6 3 (1.14%) Gradle
6 3 (1.14%) JProfiler
6 3 (1.14%) JUnit
6 3 (1.14%) Maven
6 3 (1.14%) WebDriver
7 2 (0.76%) Appium
7 2 (0.76%) Postman
7 2 (0.76%) REST Assured
7 2 (0.76%) Sonatype Nexus
7 2 (0.76%) Terragrunt
8 1 (0.38%) Karma Test Runner
8 1 (0.38%) SpecFlow
General
1 74 (28.03%) Social Skills
2 35 (13.26%) Finance
3 22 (8.33%) Analytical Skills
4 11 (4.17%) Legal
5 10 (3.79%) Influencing Skills
6 9 (3.41%) Documentation Skills
7 8 (3.03%) Organisational Skills
8 4 (1.52%) Banking
8 4 (1.52%) Military
9 3 (1.14%) Police
9 3 (1.14%) Presentation Skills
10 2 (0.76%) Local Government
10 2 (0.76%) Marketing
10 2 (0.76%) Telecoms
11 1 (0.38%) Back Office
11 1 (0.38%) Law
11 1 (0.38%) Publishing
11 1 (0.38%) Social Housing
Job Titles
1 30 (11.36%) Analyst
2 28 (10.61%) Architect
3 27 (10.23%) Senior
4 23 (8.71%) Developer
5 17 (6.44%) Lead
5 17 (6.44%) Project Manager
6 14 (5.30%) Consultant
7 11 (4.17%) DevOps Engineer
7 11 (4.17%) Solutions Architect
8 10 (3.79%) Network Engineer
9 9 (3.41%) Cloud Engineer
10 8 (3.03%) Cloud Consultant
10 8 (3.03%) Oracle Consultant
11 7 (2.65%) Administrator
11 7 (2.65%) DBA
12 6 (2.27%) Designer
12 6 (2.27%) Help Desk Consultant
12 6 (2.27%) HR Consultant
12 6 (2.27%) Oracle HRMS Consultant
12 6 (2.27%) User Researcher
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 13 (4.92%) .NET
2 12 (4.55%) React
3 9 (3.41%) REST
4 7 (2.65%) AWS CDK
4 7 (2.65%) RESTful
5 6 (2.27%) Spring
5 6 (2.27%) Spring Boot
5 6 (2.27%) Web Services
6 5 (1.89%) Playwright
7 4 (1.52%) Jest
7 4 (1.52%) Middleware
7 4 (1.52%) Node.js
7 4 (1.52%) SOAP
8 3 (1.14%) FreeMarker
8 3 (1.14%) Gherkin
8 3 (1.14%) JSF
8 3 (1.14%) JSON
9 2 (0.76%) ADO
9 2 (0.76%) ASP.NET
9 2 (0.76%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 23 (8.71%) Product Ownership
2 12 (4.55%) Legacy Systems
3 11 (4.17%) Management Information System
4 8 (3.03%) Data Protection Act
5 7 (2.65%) Data Centre
6 6 (2.27%) Cloud Native
7 5 (1.89%) Enterprise Software
7 5 (1.89%) NHS
8 4 (1.52%) Data Structures
8 4 (1.52%) Legacy Applications
9 2 (0.76%) Freedom of Information
9 2 (0.76%) NVMe
9 2 (0.76%) Onboarding
9 2 (0.76%) PKI
9 2 (0.76%) Self-Motivation
10 1 (0.38%) CCTV
10 1 (0.38%) Replication
10 1 (0.38%) Smartphone
10 1 (0.38%) VSAM
10 1 (0.38%) W3C
Operating Systems
1 20 (7.58%) Linux
2 19 (7.20%) Windows
3 7 (2.65%) Windows Server
4 6 (2.27%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 5 (1.89%) Windows 10
6 2 (0.76%) Unix
7 1 (0.38%) Android
7 1 (0.38%) Apple iOS
7 1 (0.38%) Mac OS
7 1 (0.38%) Rocky
7 1 (0.38%) Ubuntu
7 1 (0.38%) Windows Server 2012
7 1 (0.38%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 75 (28.41%) Agile
2 45 (17.05%) Stakeholder Management
3 41 (15.53%) DevOps
4 37 (14.02%) Continuous Improvement
5 35 (13.26%) CI/CD
5 35 (13.26%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 30 (11.36%) Migration
7 27 (10.23%) AI
8 26 (9.85%) Problem-Solving
9 25 (9.47%) Project Delivery
10 24 (9.09%) Infrastructure as Code
11 22 (8.33%) Roadmaps
12 21 (7.95%) Decision-Making
13 19 (7.20%) Scrum
14 16 (6.06%) Business Intelligence
14 16 (6.06%) Data Protection
14 16 (6.06%) Microservices
14 16 (6.06%) Project Management
15 14 (5.30%) Cybersecurity
15 14 (5.30%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 26 (9.85%) Python
2 22 (8.33%) SQL
3 21 (7.95%) Java
4 18 (6.82%) JavaScript
5 13 (4.92%) C#
6 12 (4.55%) TypeScript
7 10 (3.79%) PowerShell
8 6 (2.27%) Bicep
9 4 (1.52%) Bash
10 2 (0.76%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 2 (0.76%) PL/SQL
11 1 (0.38%) C++
11 1 (0.38%) COBOL
11 1 (0.38%) JCL
11 1 (0.38%) Perl
11 1 (0.38%) Shell Script
11 1 (0.38%) SPARQL
11 1 (0.38%) VBA
11 1 (0.38%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 59 (22.35%) Security Cleared
2 43 (16.29%) SC Cleared
3 20 (7.58%) BPSS Clearance
4 12 (4.55%) Degree
5 9 (3.41%) DV Cleared
6 5 (1.89%) PMI Certification
6 5 (1.89%) PMP
7 4 (1.52%) ITIL Certification
8 3 (1.14%) AWS Certification
8 3 (1.14%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
8 3 (1.14%) CCAB
8 3 (1.14%) CCNP
8 3 (1.14%) Cisco Certification
8 3 (1.14%) IIBA
8 3 (1.14%) Microsoft Certification
9 2 (0.76%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
9 2 (0.76%) AWS Certified SysOps Administrator
9 2 (0.76%) Computer Science Degree
9 2 (0.76%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
9 2 (0.76%) Six Sigma Green Belt
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (6.06%) Accessibility
1 16 (6.06%) QA
2 13 (4.92%) Disclosure Scotland
3 11 (4.17%) Data Quality
3 11 (4.17%) GDPR
4 6 (2.27%) PMO
5 5 (1.89%) WCAG
6 4 (1.52%) NIST
7 3 (1.14%) Actionable Recommendations
7 3 (1.14%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 3 (1.14%) NCSC
8 2 (0.76%) SLA
9 1 (0.38%) COBIT
9 1 (0.38%) Cyber Essentials
9 1 (0.38%) GRC
9 1 (0.38%) ISO 20022
9 1 (0.38%) ISO 8583
System Software
1 9 (3.41%) Active Directory
2 5 (1.89%) Docker
2 5 (1.89%) VMware Infrastructure
3 4 (1.52%) Hyper-V
3 4 (1.52%) VMware NSX
4 3 (1.14%) Ceph
5 2 (0.76%) Squid
5 2 (0.76%) vSphere
6 1 (0.38%) IAG
6 1 (0.38%) iptables
6 1 (0.38%) NFS
6 1 (0.38%) Samba
6 1 (0.38%) Virtual Machines
6 1 (0.38%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 17 (6.44%) Terraform
2 11 (4.17%) Kubernetes
3 10 (3.79%) Ansible
4 6 (2.27%) Istio
5 5 (1.89%) Grafana
5 5 (1.89%) Microsoft Intune
6 3 (1.14%) Argo
7 2 (0.76%) SCCM
7 2 (0.76%) Single Sign-On
7 2 (0.76%) vMotion
8 1 (0.38%) PowerCLI
8 1 (0.38%) Prometheus
8 1 (0.38%) Rundeck
8 1 (0.38%) SELinux
8 1 (0.38%) systemd
8 1 (0.38%) vRealize
8 1 (0.38%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 38 (14.39%) Microsoft
2 31 (11.74%) Oracle
3 10 (3.79%) Cisco
3 10 (3.79%) Salesforce
4 8 (3.03%) Google
5 7 (2.65%) VMware
6 5 (1.89%) MuleSoft
6 5 (1.89%) OpenAI
6 5 (1.89%) Palo Alto
7 3 (1.14%) F5
7 3 (1.14%) SAP
8 2 (0.76%) Arista
8 2 (0.76%) Atlassian
8 2 (0.76%) Juniper
8 2 (0.76%) Okta
9 1 (0.38%) AppNeta
9 1 (0.38%) IFS
9 1 (0.38%) Openreach
9 1 (0.38%) UiPath
9 1 (0.38%) Workday