Security Cleared Contract Job Trends in the South East

Security Clearance
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the South East with a requirement for Security Cleared qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 28 September 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
28 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 1 2 1
Rank change year-on-year +1 -1 0
Contract jobs citing Security Cleared 2,257 941 1,366
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 34.48% 26.76% 30.47%
As % of the Qualifications category 79.53% 68.09% 72.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,581 660 897
10th Percentile £403 £219 £360
25th Percentile £483 £413 £456
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £564 £525 £560
Median % change year-on-year +7.48% -6.25% +5.66%
75th Percentile £650 £600 £650
90th Percentile £738 £650 £725
England median daily rate £550 £538 £550
% change year-on-year +2.33% -2.27% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 224 93 97
10th Percentile £29.07 - £26.15
25th Percentile £54.38 £18.87 £48.18
Median hourly rate £71.00 £25.15 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year +182.31% -59.17% +2.67%
75th Percentile £88.00 £40.65 £76.99
90th Percentile £103.68 £73.25 £92.37
England median hourly rate £65.00 £25.15 £61.60
% change year-on-year +158.45% -59.17% +2.67%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
South East

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 South East.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 2,838 1,382 1,888
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 43.36% 39.31% 42.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,883 895 1,192
10th Percentile £325 £208 £316
25th Percentile £463 £400 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £501 £550
Median % change year-on-year +9.89% -9.00% +4.76%
75th Percentile £638 £600 £638
90th Percentile £730 £650 £700
England median daily rate £530 £525 £528
% change year-on-year +0.95% -0.57% -4.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 311 123 130
10th Percentile £18.25 - £21.20
25th Percentile £33.72 £18.87 £38.75
Median hourly rate £61.16 £25.15 £59.25
Median % change year-on-year +143.18% -57.55% -1.26%
75th Percentile £84.38 £54.38 £74.59
90th Percentile £102.10 £81.00 £90.00
England median hourly rate £52.25 £25.15 £53.00
% change year-on-year +107.75% -52.55% -0.93%

Security Cleared
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

Security Cleared job vacancy trend in the South East

Security Cleared
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Security Cleared.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Security Cleared

Security Cleared
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Security Cleared in the South East over the 6 months to 28 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Security Cleared in the South East

Security Cleared
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Security Cleared.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Security Cleared

Security Cleared
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Security Cleared in the South East over the 6 months to 28 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Security Cleared in the South East

Security Cleared
Contract Job Locations in the South East

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 South East region over the 6 months to 28 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
Thames Valley +1 1,140 £560 +12.00% 313
Hampshire 0 903 £575 +4.55% 350
Berkshire +2 662 £575 +9.52% 212
Buckinghamshire +1 383 £550 +12.24% 69
Surrey +5 117 £581 +10.57% 73
Oxfordshire +3 95 £513 +169.74% 37
West Sussex +4 70 £469 -8.93% 39
Kent +7 17 £510 +36.00% 16
East Sussex +8 9 £459 - 12
Home Counties -1 2 £550 -36.93%
Middlesex -22 2 - - 1
Security Cleared
England

Security Cleared
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 64 (2.84%) SharePoint
2 31 (1.37%) Confluence
3 18 (0.80%) Oracle Application Server
4 14 (0.62%) Microsoft Exchange
5 9 (0.40%) Apache Airflow
6 7 (0.31%) Documentum
6 7 (0.31%) SAS
7 6 (0.27%) Apache
8 5 (0.22%) Apache Spark
9 4 (0.18%) NetWeaver
9 4 (0.18%) Oracle Workflow
10 3 (0.13%) CMS
10 3 (0.13%) IIS
10 3 (0.13%) Palantir Foundry
11 2 (0.089%) Apache Superset
11 2 (0.089%) ArcGIS
11 2 (0.089%) nginx
11 2 (0.089%) SAP EP
11 2 (0.089%) Tomcat
11 2 (0.089%) Umbraco
Applications
1 73 (3.23%) Microsoft Excel
2 47 (2.08%) Microsoft Project
3 40 (1.77%) Microsoft Office
3 40 (1.77%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 7 (0.31%) MS Visio
5 2 (0.089%) Adobe Creative Suite
5 2 (0.089%) Houdini
5 2 (0.089%) NUKE
5 2 (0.089%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.044%) Chatbot
6 1 (0.044%) InVision
6 1 (0.044%) Simulink
6 1 (0.044%) Sketch
6 1 (0.044%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 49 (2.17%) SAP S/4HANA
2 28 (1.24%) Oracle ERP
3 21 (0.93%) SAP PSCD
4 20 (0.89%) Remedy ITSM
5 16 (0.71%) Teamcenter
6 12 (0.53%) Siebel CRM
7 10 (0.44%) SAP BRIM
8 9 (0.40%) SAP Hybris
9 8 (0.35%) Primavera
9 8 (0.35%) Remedy AR System
10 7 (0.31%) iTrent
11 5 (0.22%) SAP FI
11 5 (0.22%) SAP FI-CA
12 4 (0.18%) Dynamics CRM
12 4 (0.18%) SAP EWM
12 4 (0.18%) SAP MM
12 4 (0.18%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
12 4 (0.18%) Workday HCM
13 3 (0.13%) Oracle Financials
13 3 (0.13%) SAP PP
Cloud Services
1 378 (16.75%) Azure
2 200 (8.86%) AWS
3 84 (3.72%) Azure DevOps
4 82 (3.63%) Entra ID
5 68 (3.01%) Power Platform
6 66 (2.92%) GCP
7 54 (2.39%) Microsoft 365
8 46 (2.04%) OpenShift
9 36 (1.60%) OCI
10 32 (1.42%) SaaS
11 25 (1.11%) IaaS
12 22 (0.97%) Azure Monitor
13 20 (0.89%) GitHub
14 19 (0.84%) Azure Sentinel
15 18 (0.80%) GitHub Actions
16 17 (0.75%) PaaS
17 13 (0.58%) Azure Logic Apps
17 13 (0.58%) SuccessFactors
18 12 (0.53%) Serverless
19 11 (0.49%) AWS CloudFormation
Communications & Networking
1 118 (5.23%) DNS
2 90 (3.99%) Firewall
3 61 (2.70%) Network Security
4 59 (2.61%) WAN
5 57 (2.53%) VPN
6 50 (2.22%) DHCP
6 50 (2.22%) LAN
7 36 (1.60%) BGP
8 34 (1.51%) IPsec
9 32 (1.42%) TCP/IP
10 26 (1.15%) MPLS
11 21 (0.93%) SSL
12 17 (0.75%) OSPF
13 16 (0.71%) VSAN
14 15 (0.66%) Cisco Firepower
14 15 (0.66%) VLAN
14 15 (0.66%) Wireless
15 14 (0.62%) BIG-IP
15 14 (0.62%) SD-WAN
16 13 (0.58%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 56 (2.48%) Power BI
2 51 (2.26%) Data Warehouse
3 45 (1.99%) SQL Server
4 29 (1.28%) Oracle Reports
5 28 (1.24%) Metadata
6 24 (1.06%) Oracle Database
7 21 (0.93%) Oracle ODI
8 20 (0.89%) Relational Database
9 19 (0.84%) PostgreSQL
10 8 (0.35%) Geospatial Data
10 8 (0.35%) MySQL
10 8 (0.35%) Pentaho
10 8 (0.35%) Siebel EIM
10 8 (0.35%) Tableau
11 5 (0.22%) Azure SQL Database
11 5 (0.22%) Data Lake
11 5 (0.22%) Elasticsearch
11 5 (0.22%) NoSQL
11 5 (0.22%) Oracle BI Publisher
11 5 (0.22%) Oracle Database 11g
Development Applications
1 78 (3.46%) JIRA
2 60 (2.66%) Git
3 58 (2.57%) GitLab
4 35 (1.55%) Jenkins
5 21 (0.93%) SonarQube
6 16 (0.71%) Selenium
7 11 (0.49%) MSI
8 6 (0.27%) MLflow
8 6 (0.27%) Sonatype Nexus
9 5 (0.22%) Artifactory
10 4 (0.18%) JMeter
11 3 (0.13%) JUnit
11 3 (0.13%) LoadRunner
11 3 (0.13%) Rational DOORS
11 3 (0.13%) Zephyr
12 2 (0.089%) Gatling
12 2 (0.089%) LabVIEW
12 2 (0.089%) Oracle Forms
12 2 (0.089%) Postman
12 2 (0.089%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 533 (23.62%) Social Skills
2 228 (10.10%) Analytical Skills
3 225 (9.97%) Public Sector
4 182 (8.06%) Aerospace
5 141 (6.25%) Finance
6 81 (3.59%) Documentation Skills
7 60 (2.66%) Organisational Skills
8 57 (2.53%) Influencing Skills
9 45 (1.99%) Military
10 37 (1.64%) Manufacturing
11 35 (1.55%) Telecoms
12 23 (1.02%) Legal
13 22 (0.97%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 18 (0.80%) Billing
15 15 (0.66%) Aviation
16 13 (0.58%) Law
17 11 (0.49%) Presentation Skills
18 9 (0.40%) Electronics
19 7 (0.31%) Automotive
20 6 (0.27%) Police
Job Titles
1 315 (13.96%) Architect
2 208 (9.22%) Senior
3 207 (9.17%) Lead
4 171 (7.58%) Analyst
5 166 (7.35%) Consultant
5 166 (7.35%) Developer
6 125 (5.54%) Infrastructure Engineer
7 83 (3.68%) Cloud Engineer
8 67 (2.97%) Security Architect
9 65 (2.88%) Support Engineer
10 64 (2.84%) SAP Consultant
11 61 (2.70%) Technical Architect
12 54 (2.39%) Project Manager
13 53 (2.35%) Delivery Manager
13 53 (2.35%) Solutions Architect
14 43 (1.91%) Network Engineer
15 42 (1.86%) Azure Engineer
15 42 (1.86%) SOC Analyst
16 39 (1.73%) Administrator
16 39 (1.73%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 107 (4.74%) Terraform
2 61 (2.70%) REST
3 31 (1.37%) OAuth
4 27 (1.20%) SAML
5 26 (1.15%) OpenID
5 26 (1.15%) SOAP
6 24 (1.06%) .NET
6 24 (1.06%) LDAP
7 22 (0.97%) ARM Templates
8 20 (0.89%) AngularJS
9 19 (0.84%) HTML
9 19 (0.84%) Web Services
10 17 (0.75%) 802.1X
10 17 (0.75%) OAuth2
10 17 (0.75%) RESTful
11 16 (0.71%) JSON
11 16 (0.71%) Kafka
11 16 (0.71%) React
11 16 (0.71%) SailPoint
12 15 (0.66%) CSS
Miscellaneous
1 108 (4.79%) Onboarding
2 75 (3.32%) Product Ownership
3 72 (3.19%) Data Centre
4 67 (2.97%) PKI
5 55 (2.44%) Management Information System
6 52 (2.30%) Operational Technology
7 49 (2.17%) Hybrid Cloud
8 36 (1.60%) Cloud Native
9 22 (0.97%) Greenfield Project
9 22 (0.97%) Public Cloud
10 21 (0.93%) Cyber Threat
10 21 (0.93%) Enterprise Software
11 20 (0.89%) PMI
12 17 (0.75%) CMDB
12 17 (0.75%) Distributed Systems
12 17 (0.75%) Private Cloud
12 17 (0.75%) Virtual Team
13 14 (0.62%) Data Protection Act
14 13 (0.58%) Security Posture
15 12 (0.53%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 280 (12.41%) Windows
2 195 (8.64%) Linux
3 126 (5.58%) Windows Server
4 41 (1.82%) Unix
5 29 (1.28%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 25 (1.11%) Windows 10
7 24 (1.06%) Windows Server 2019
8 17 (0.75%) Ubuntu
9 16 (0.71%) CentOS
10 7 (0.31%) Mac OS
11 5 (0.22%) Embedded Linux
11 5 (0.22%) Oracle Linux
12 4 (0.18%) Debian
13 3 (0.13%) Rocky
13 3 (0.13%) Solaris
14 2 (0.089%) AIX
14 2 (0.089%) Android
14 2 (0.089%) Apple iOS
14 2 (0.089%) Windows Server 2012
14 2 (0.089%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 448 (19.85%) Agile
2 339 (15.02%) Continuous Improvement
3 329 (14.58%) Stakeholder Management
4 264 (11.70%) Problem-Solving
5 251 (11.12%) ITIL
6 250 (11.08%) Cybersecurity
7 243 (10.77%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 228 (10.10%) CI/CD
9 211 (9.35%) ITSM
10 209 (9.26%) DevOps
11 195 (8.64%) Service Management
12 167 (7.40%) Roadmaps
13 166 (7.35%) Infrastructure Engineering
14 163 (7.22%) Technical Leadership
15 153 (6.78%) Change Management
16 134 (5.94%) Project Delivery
17 129 (5.72%) Service Delivery
18 128 (5.67%) Validation
19 125 (5.54%) Infrastructure as Code
20 121 (5.36%) Risk Management
Programming Languages
1 217 (9.61%) Python
2 191 (8.46%) PowerShell
3 140 (6.20%) SQL
4 77 (3.41%) Bash
5 65 (2.88%) Java
6 46 (2.04%) JavaScript
7 30 (1.33%) Bicep
8 25 (1.11%) PL/SQL
9 13 (0.58%) C#
10 12 (0.53%) Shell Script
11 11 (0.49%) C++
12 10 (0.44%) ABAP
12 10 (0.44%) Go
12 10 (0.44%) Kusto Query Language
13 9 (0.40%) TypeScript
14 8 (0.35%) C
15 5 (0.22%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 5 (0.22%) Groovy
16 4 (0.18%) Rust
17 2 (0.089%) Scala
Qualifications
1 1,406 (62.30%) SC Cleared
2 843 (37.35%) DV Cleared
3 179 (7.93%) Degree
4 60 (2.66%) CISSP
5 54 (2.39%) Azure Certification
6 53 (2.35%) BPSS Clearance
7 46 (2.04%) PMI Certification
8 38 (1.68%) Cisco Certification
8 38 (1.68%) ISTQB
9 35 (1.55%) PMP
10 30 (1.33%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 28 (1.24%) Microsoft Certification
12 26 (1.15%) Computer Science Degree
13 25 (1.11%) CISM
14 20 (0.89%) AWS Certification
15 19 (0.84%) TOGAF Certification
16 18 (0.80%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
17 17 (0.75%) VCAP
18 16 (0.71%) (ISC)2 CCSP
18 16 (0.71%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 104 (4.61%) NIST
2 98 (4.34%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 83 (3.68%) PMO
4 59 (2.61%) QA
5 58 (2.57%) NCSC
6 39 (1.73%) GDPR
7 32 (1.42%) Data Quality
8 29 (1.28%) SLA
9 26 (1.15%) JSP 440
10 24 (1.06%) ISO/IEC 20000
11 16 (0.71%) GRC
12 15 (0.66%) Cyber Essentials
13 14 (0.62%) NIST 800
14 12 (0.53%) ISO 9001
15 11 (0.49%) Def Stans
16 9 (0.40%) Accessibility
16 9 (0.40%) ISO 31000
17 7 (0.31%) RMADS
18 3 (0.13%) GMP
18 3 (0.13%) WCAG
System Software
1 197 (8.73%) Active Directory
2 149 (6.60%) VMware Infrastructure
3 70 (3.10%) VMware NSX
4 67 (2.97%) VMware ESXi
5 65 (2.88%) Docker
6 25 (1.11%) vCloud
6 25 (1.11%) vSphere
7 24 (1.06%) Hyper-V
8 18 (0.80%) Virtual Machines
9 16 (0.71%) Virtual Desktop
10 12 (0.53%) Firmware
11 8 (0.35%) Oracle RAC
11 8 (0.35%) Virtual Servers
12 6 (0.27%) Embedded Firmware
12 6 (0.27%) Microsoft Virtual Server
13 4 (0.18%) KVM
14 3 (0.13%) BitLocker
15 2 (0.089%) Dovecot
15 2 (0.089%) Postfix
15 2 (0.089%) UAG
Systems Management
1 119 (5.27%) Kubernetes
2 79 (3.50%) vCenter Server
3 74 (3.28%) Ansible
4 62 (2.75%) SCOM
5 25 (1.11%) Microsoft Intune
6 24 (1.06%) SCCM
7 20 (0.89%) Grafana
8 19 (0.84%) Argo
9 17 (0.75%) Avamar
9 17 (0.75%) WMI
10 16 (0.71%) Prometheus
11 12 (0.53%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 12 (0.53%) FortiGate
12 10 (0.44%) Oracle RMAN
13 8 (0.35%) Cisco CUCM
13 8 (0.35%) Data Guard
14 7 (0.31%) Podman
14 7 (0.31%) Red Hat Satellite
14 7 (0.31%) Single Sign-On
15 5 (0.22%) Istio
Vendors
1 387 (17.15%) Microsoft
2 217 (9.61%) VMware
3 171 (7.58%) Oracle
4 146 (6.47%) SAP
5 135 (5.98%) ServiceNow
6 65 (2.88%) Cisco
7 47 (2.08%) Red Hat
8 37 (1.64%) Google
9 36 (1.60%) Juniper
9 36 (1.60%) SolarWinds
10 27 (1.20%) Citrix
11 26 (1.15%) F5
11 26 (1.15%) Palo Alto
12 25 (1.11%) CyberArk
13 24 (1.06%) Remedy
14 22 (0.97%) BeyondTrust
14 22 (0.97%) Broadcom
15 20 (0.89%) Siebel
16 19 (0.84%) Dell
17 16 (0.71%) BMC