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 7 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
7 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 1 2 1
Rank change year-on-year +1 -1 0
Contract jobs citing Security Cleared 2,214 788 1,854
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 37.56% 26.21% 33.45%
As % of the Qualifications category 82.12% 64.86% 74.76%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,538 555 1,129
10th Percentile £357 £360 £388
25th Percentile £457 £463 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £550 £588
Median % change year-on-year -2.27% -6.38% +8.80%
75th Percentile £630 £630 £675
90th Percentile £725 £700 £738
England median daily rate £525 £537 £550
% change year-on-year -2.28% -2.32% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 218 50 119
10th Percentile £18.30 £23.77 £22.52
25th Percentile £27.50 £25.64 £52.90
Median hourly rate £70.00 £60.25 £61.65
Median % change year-on-year +16.18% -2.26% -1.37%
75th Percentile £85.33 £73.13 £80.00
90th Percentile £91.56 £80.72 £87.47
England median hourly rate £55.00 £55.00 £57.30
% change year-on-year - -4.02% -4.50%

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 2,696 1,215 2,480
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 45.74% 40.42% 44.74%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,826 774 1,444
10th Percentile £309 £300 £316
25th Percentile £428 £425 £439
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £537 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.14% -2.45% +4.76%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £650
90th Percentile £725 £688 £738
England median daily rate £520 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -0.95% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 265 83 212
10th Percentile £16.35 £20.00 £17.51
25th Percentile £24.25 £26.13 £26.39
Median hourly rate £55.00 £56.75 £57.35
Median % change year-on-year -3.08% -1.05% +0.05%
75th Percentile £84.00 £70.63 £67.14
90th Percentile £89.25 £78.13 £85.65
England median hourly rate £47.50 £42.75 £40.00
% change year-on-year +11.11% +6.88% -23.81%

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 7 May 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 7 May 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 7 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
Thames Valley +2 1,143 £515 -8.65% 149
Hampshire 0 867 £588 +6.82% 197
Berkshire +1 679 £456 -22.18% 86
Buckinghamshire +1 373 £550 - 39
Oxfordshire +13 91 £445 -28.80% 28
Surrey +3 89 £525 -3.38% 45
West Sussex +3 61 £500 -6.89% 15
Kent +2 26 £443 +18.00% 16
East Sussex +5 7 £459 -16.55% 7
Sussex +1 7 £475 +9.83% 4
Home Counties - 2 £525 -
Isle of Wight - 1 - -
Middlesex - 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 48 (2.17%) SharePoint
2 36 (1.63%) Microsoft Exchange
3 23 (1.04%) Confluence
4 13 (0.59%) Oracle Application Server
5 5 (0.23%) ArcGIS
5 5 (0.23%) IIS
5 5 (0.23%) NetWeaver
5 5 (0.23%) Oracle Workflow
5 5 (0.23%) SAP EP
6 4 (0.18%) Apache
7 3 (0.14%) MS Project Server
8 2 (0.090%) Apache Airflow
8 2 (0.090%) Apache Spark
8 2 (0.090%) CMS
8 2 (0.090%) SAS
8 2 (0.090%) Umbraco
9 1 (0.045%) Apache Pulsar
9 1 (0.045%) BizTalk Server
9 1 (0.045%) Palantir Foundry
9 1 (0.045%) Smallworld
Applications
1 67 (3.03%) Microsoft Excel
2 57 (2.57%) Microsoft Office
3 35 (1.58%) Microsoft Project
4 30 (1.36%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 12 (0.54%) MS Visio
6 3 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.090%) CPLEX
7 2 (0.090%) Lectora
7 2 (0.090%) Oracle Smart View
8 1 (0.045%) Autodesk Inventor
8 1 (0.045%) CATIA
8 1 (0.045%) InVision
8 1 (0.045%) MicroStation
8 1 (0.045%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.045%) Sketch
8 1 (0.045%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 34 (1.54%) SAP S/4HANA
2 29 (1.31%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 14 (0.63%) SAP PSCD
4 8 (0.36%) iTrent
4 8 (0.36%) Remedy ITSM
4 8 (0.36%) SAP BRIM
4 8 (0.36%) SAP Hybris
5 7 (0.32%) Oracle ERP
6 6 (0.27%) Oracle Assets
6 6 (0.27%) Oracle Payables
6 6 (0.27%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
7 5 (0.23%) SAP CRM
8 4 (0.18%) Primavera
8 4 (0.18%) Teamcenter
9 3 (0.14%) Payment Gateway
9 3 (0.14%) SAP EWM
9 3 (0.14%) SAP HCM
9 3 (0.14%) SAP MM
10 1 (0.045%) Oracle Receivables
10 1 (0.045%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 337 (15.22%) Azure
2 209 (9.44%) AWS
3 84 (3.79%) GCP
4 82 (3.70%) Entra ID
5 67 (3.03%) Azure DevOps
6 64 (2.89%) Power Platform
7 61 (2.76%) Microsoft 365
8 39 (1.76%) PaaS
9 34 (1.54%) IaaS
10 33 (1.49%) OpenShift
11 23 (1.04%) GitHub
12 19 (0.86%) SaaS
12 19 (0.86%) SuccessFactors
13 17 (0.77%) GitHub Actions
14 14 (0.63%) Serverless
15 12 (0.54%) OCI
16 11 (0.50%) AWS CloudFormation
16 11 (0.50%) Azure Monitor
16 11 (0.50%) Power Automate
17 10 (0.45%) Datadog
Communications & Networking
1 166 (7.50%) Firewall
2 112 (5.06%) LAN
2 112 (5.06%) WAN
3 102 (4.61%) DNS
4 86 (3.88%) BGP
5 79 (3.57%) OSPF
6 74 (3.34%) DHCP
7 69 (3.12%) Network Security
8 49 (2.21%) VPN
9 41 (1.85%) TCP/IP
10 36 (1.63%) Wireless
11 32 (1.45%) IPsec
11 32 (1.45%) Junos
12 31 (1.40%) Ethernet VPN
12 31 (1.40%) VXLAN
13 28 (1.26%) BIG-IP
13 28 (1.26%) Cisco ISE
14 26 (1.17%) VLAN
15 24 (1.08%) MPLS
15 24 (1.08%) SD-WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 59 (2.66%) SQL Server
2 54 (2.44%) Power BI
3 31 (1.40%) Data Warehouse
4 27 (1.22%) PostgreSQL
5 23 (1.04%) Oracle Reports
6 16 (0.72%) Oracle Database
7 14 (0.63%) Oracle ODI
8 13 (0.59%) Metadata
9 12 (0.54%) Redis
9 12 (0.54%) Relational Database
10 10 (0.45%) Azure SQL Database
11 7 (0.32%) NoSQL
11 7 (0.32%) Oracle Database 12c
12 6 (0.27%) Tableau
13 5 (0.23%) Metadata Repository
13 5 (0.23%) MySQL
14 4 (0.18%) Amazon RDS
14 4 (0.18%) Big Data
14 4 (0.18%) MongoDB
14 4 (0.18%) Oracle BI Publisher
Development Applications
1 60 (2.71%) JIRA
2 46 (2.08%) Git
3 41 (1.85%) GitLab
4 37 (1.67%) Rational DOORS
5 27 (1.22%) Jenkins
6 16 (0.72%) Burp Suite
6 16 (0.72%) Metasploit
7 12 (0.54%) SonarQube
8 10 (0.45%) Postman
8 10 (0.45%) Visual Studio
9 7 (0.32%) Robot Framework
9 7 (0.32%) Subversion
10 6 (0.27%) Android Studio
10 6 (0.27%) Sonatype Nexus
11 5 (0.23%) Artifactory
11 5 (0.23%) Bitbucket
11 5 (0.23%) JUnit
11 5 (0.23%) Maven
12 4 (0.18%) Gradle
12 4 (0.18%) Selenium
General
1 495 (22.36%) Social Skills
2 277 (12.51%) Public Sector
3 197 (8.90%) Analytical Skills
4 134 (6.05%) Finance
5 102 (4.61%) Aerospace
6 81 (3.66%) Documentation Skills
7 51 (2.30%) Military
8 35 (1.58%) Legal
9 31 (1.40%) Influencing Skills
9 31 (1.40%) Telecoms
10 24 (1.08%) Law
10 24 (1.08%) Manufacturing
11 20 (0.90%) Organisational Skills
12 18 (0.81%) Presentation Skills
13 15 (0.68%) Billing
14 12 (0.54%) Advertising
15 10 (0.45%) Marketing
16 8 (0.36%) Aviation
16 8 (0.36%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 8 (0.36%) Police
Job Titles
1 335 (15.13%) Architect
2 225 (10.16%) Senior
3 174 (7.86%) Lead
4 157 (7.09%) Analyst
4 157 (7.09%) Developer
5 129 (5.83%) Network Engineer
6 102 (4.61%) Consultant
7 91 (4.11%) Project Manager
8 76 (3.43%) Technical Architect
9 62 (2.80%) Delivery Manager
10 61 (2.76%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 60 (2.71%) Security Architect
12 57 (2.57%) DevOps Engineer
13 53 (2.39%) Tester
14 50 (2.26%) Enterprise Architect
15 49 (2.21%) Product Manager
16 46 (2.08%) SOC Analyst
17 41 (1.85%) Cloud Engineer
17 41 (1.85%) Software Engineer
18 40 (1.81%) Senior Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 44 (1.99%) REST
2 40 (1.81%) .NET
3 35 (1.58%) LDAP
4 30 (1.36%) React
5 28 (1.26%) 802.1X
6 27 (1.22%) RESTful
7 25 (1.13%) JSON
8 23 (1.04%) AngularJS
9 21 (0.95%) SailPoint
10 19 (0.86%) Oracle Fusion
10 19 (0.86%) XML
11 15 (0.68%) Kafka
11 15 (0.68%) SOAP
12 14 (0.63%) OAuth
13 12 (0.54%) Web Services
14 11 (0.50%) CSS
14 11 (0.50%) Keycloak
14 11 (0.50%) OAuth2
14 11 (0.50%) Quarkus
14 11 (0.50%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 104 (4.70%) Data Centre
2 91 (4.11%) PKI
3 77 (3.48%) Product Ownership
4 66 (2.98%) Onboarding
5 34 (1.54%) Data Structures
5 34 (1.54%) Management Information System
5 34 (1.54%) Self-Motivation
6 30 (1.36%) Clustering
6 30 (1.36%) Replication
7 26 (1.17%) Distributed Systems
8 25 (1.13%) Cloud Native
9 24 (1.08%) Security Operations Centre
10 23 (1.04%) Analytical Mindset
11 22 (0.99%) Public Cloud
12 21 (0.95%) Cyber Threat
12 21 (0.95%) Security Posture
13 20 (0.90%) Greenfield Project
14 19 (0.86%) Operational Technology
15 17 (0.77%) Virtual Team
16 16 (0.72%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 277 (12.51%) Windows
2 202 (9.12%) Linux
3 85 (3.84%) Windows Server
4 36 (1.63%) Unix
5 30 (1.36%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 16 (0.72%) Android
7 12 (0.54%) Ubuntu
7 12 (0.54%) Windows 10
8 8 (0.36%) Embedded Linux
9 7 (0.32%) Mac OS
9 7 (0.32%) Windows Server 2016
9 7 (0.32%) Windows Server 2019
10 5 (0.23%) Debian
10 5 (0.23%) Windows 7
11 4 (0.18%) Apple iOS
11 4 (0.18%) CentOS
12 2 (0.090%) VMS
12 2 (0.090%) Windows Server 2012
13 1 (0.045%) Data ONTAP
13 1 (0.045%) OpenVMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 425 (19.20%) Agile
2 236 (10.66%) Problem-Solving
3 219 (9.89%) ITIL
4 214 (9.67%) DevOps
5 210 (9.49%) CI/CD
6 195 (8.81%) Stakeholder Management
7 193 (8.72%) Cybersecurity
8 192 (8.67%) Continuous Improvement
9 168 (7.59%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 153 (6.91%) Migration
11 135 (6.10%) ITSM
12 128 (5.78%) Service Management
13 120 (5.42%) Roadmaps
14 117 (5.28%) Project Management
15 106 (4.79%) SIEM
16 99 (4.47%) Software Engineering
17 90 (4.07%) Change Management
17 90 (4.07%) Computer Science
17 90 (4.07%) DevSecOps
17 90 (4.07%) Infrastructure Engineering
Programming Languages
1 199 (8.99%) Python
2 170 (7.68%) PowerShell
3 94 (4.25%) SQL
4 69 (3.12%) Java
5 48 (2.17%) C#
6 47 (2.12%) JavaScript
7 46 (2.08%) Bash
8 29 (1.31%) C++
9 22 (0.99%) Go
10 18 (0.81%) Kusto Query Language
11 17 (0.77%) C
12 14 (0.63%) TypeScript
13 13 (0.59%) Shell Script
14 12 (0.54%) PL/SQL
15 10 (0.45%) Bicep
16 9 (0.41%) Korn
17 8 (0.36%) ABAP
18 7 (0.32%) T-SQL
19 4 (0.18%) Embedded C++
20 3 (0.14%) Embedded C
Qualifications
1 1,386 (62.60%) SC Cleared
2 766 (34.60%) DV Cleared
3 170 (7.68%) Degree
4 77 (3.48%) Cisco Certification
5 53 (2.39%) CCNP
6 52 (2.35%) BPSS Clearance
7 48 (2.17%) CISSP
8 32 (1.45%) PMP
9 29 (1.31%) CISM
9 29 (1.31%) PMI Certification
10 20 (0.90%) CCNA
11 18 (0.81%) Azure Certification
11 18 (0.81%) Computer Science Degree
11 18 (0.81%) GIAC
12 17 (0.77%) JNCIS
13 16 (0.72%) AWS Certification
13 16 (0.72%) ISTQB
14 15 (0.68%) CHECK Team Member
15 13 (0.59%) CREST Certified
15 13 (0.59%) Cyber Scheme
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 107 (4.83%) NIST
2 105 (4.74%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 64 (2.89%) NCSC
4 62 (2.80%) PMO
5 58 (2.62%) QA
6 54 (2.44%) GDPR
7 30 (1.36%) Data Quality
8 20 (0.90%) SLA
9 18 (0.81%) Accessibility
10 17 (0.77%) PCI DSS
11 15 (0.68%) JSP 440
11 15 (0.68%) NIST 800
12 14 (0.63%) Cyber Essentials
12 14 (0.63%) GRC
13 12 (0.54%) ISO/IEC 20000
14 6 (0.27%) Government Security Classifications
14 6 (0.27%) ISO 31000
15 5 (0.23%) COBIT
16 4 (0.18%) Actionable Recommendations
16 4 (0.18%) RMADS
System Software
1 179 (8.08%) Active Directory
2 112 (5.06%) VMware Infrastructure
3 44 (1.99%) VMware NSX
4 43 (1.94%) Docker
5 30 (1.36%) VMware ESXi
6 25 (1.13%) vSphere
7 17 (0.77%) Firmware
8 15 (0.68%) vCloud
9 12 (0.54%) Hyper-V
10 11 (0.50%) Oracle RAC
10 11 (0.50%) Virtual Desktop
10 11 (0.50%) Virtual Machines
11 4 (0.18%) Embedded Firmware
12 3 (0.14%) NFS
12 3 (0.14%) UAG
13 1 (0.045%) KVM
13 1 (0.045%) Sendmail
13 1 (0.045%) Terminal Services
13 1 (0.045%) Virtual Servers
13 1 (0.045%) Xen
Systems Management
1 93 (4.20%) Kubernetes
2 70 (3.16%) Terraform
3 58 (2.62%) Ansible
4 50 (2.26%) vCenter Server
5 31 (1.40%) Grafana
6 30 (1.36%) FortiGate
7 29 (1.31%) Prometheus
8 25 (1.13%) Argo
9 18 (0.81%) Microsoft Intune
9 18 (0.81%) Nmap
9 18 (0.81%) SCCM
10 17 (0.77%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 17 (0.77%) SCOM
11 13 (0.59%) Oracle RMAN
11 13 (0.59%) WMI
12 11 (0.50%) Single Sign-On
13 10 (0.45%) Forefront Identity Manager
13 10 (0.45%) Kibana
13 10 (0.45%) NetIQ Identity Manager
14 9 (0.41%) Nagios
Vendors
1 233 (10.52%) Microsoft
2 213 (9.62%) VMware
3 147 (6.64%) Cisco
4 116 (5.24%) SAP
5 94 (4.25%) Oracle
6 84 (3.79%) ServiceNow
7 81 (3.66%) Juniper
8 63 (2.85%) Splunk
9 62 (2.80%) Red Hat
10 51 (2.30%) F5
11 44 (1.99%) SolarWinds
12 38 (1.72%) Palo Alto
13 36 (1.63%) BeyondTrust
14 35 (1.58%) CyberArk
15 31 (1.40%) Google
16 30 (1.36%) IBM
16 30 (1.36%) Sparx
17 27 (1.22%) Aruba
18 25 (1.13%) CheckPoint
19 23 (1.04%) Extreme Networks