Local Government Contract Job Trends

Local Government (Local Authority, Local Council)
UK

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Local Government in contract job vacancies. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Local Government over the 6 months leading up to 16 June 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 274 250 224
Rank change year-on-year -24 -26 +158
Contract jobs citing Local Government 438 311 453
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.87% 1.05% 1.04%
As % of the General category 1.61% 1.65% 1.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 315 214 314
10th Percentile £330 £300 £313
25th Percentile £413 £396 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £509 £450 £450
Median % change year-on-year +13.11% - -
75th Percentile £619 £550 £556
90th Percentile £700 £638 £638
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £409 £475
% change year-on-year +22.25% -13.89% +9.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 49 42 61
10th Percentile £16.68 £12.47 £15.39
25th Percentile £20.27 £20.45 £16.00
Median hourly rate £25.38 £28.12 £25.00
Median % change year-on-year -9.74% +12.48% +12.31%
75th Percentile £27.74 £32.67 £34.88
90th Percentile £32.97 £57.50 £42.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.12 £20.87 £20.70
% change year-on-year +20.36% +0.85% +2.81%

All General Skills
UK

Local Government 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.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for general skills 27,130 18,804 24,846
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 54.04% 63.47% 57.03%
Number of daily rates quoted 16,392 11,853 15,564
10th Percentile £313 £281 £275
25th Percentile £413 £402 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £514 £503 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.29% -4.29% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
90th Percentile £738 £750 £767
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £473 £488
% change year-on-year +5.82% -3.08% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,817 890 2,005
10th Percentile £13.99 £13.46 £12.78
25th Percentile £18.22 £16.93 £15.50
Median hourly rate £32.00 £27.97 £30.83
Median % change year-on-year +14.41% -9.26% +0.93%
75th Percentile £60.46 £53.95 £52.50
90th Percentile £80.02 £75.00 £67.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £31.46 £24.42 £29.50
% change year-on-year +28.83% -17.22% +10.28%

Local Government
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Local Government relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Local Government job vacancy trend in the UK

Local Government
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Local Government.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Local Government

Local Government
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Local Government over the 6 months to 16 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Local Government in the UK

Local Government
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Local Government.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Local Government

Local Government
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Local Government over the 6 months to 16 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Local Government in the UK

Local Government
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Local Government within the UK over the 6 months to 16 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
England -25 424 £509 +13.11% 366
UK excluding London -21 228 £500 +22.25% 337
London -52 194 £525 +10.53% 85
Work from Home -9 141 £525 +16.67% 243
Midlands +23 105 £525 +5.53% 65
West Midlands +7 72 £525 - 33
North of England -71 32 £513 +24.24% 83
South East -51 30 £550 +10.00% 75
East Midlands -2 29 £500 +5.26% 31
East of England -11 28 £373 +24.17% 42
South West -45 26 £500 +25.00% 31
North West -29 19 £350 -12.50% 41
Yorkshire -63 12 £550 +41.94% 31
Scotland -9 4 £198 -50.63% 29
Wales -11 3 £425 - 12
North East -35 1 £500 -23.08% 13

Local Government
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 18 (4.11%) SharePoint
2 7 (1.60%) Oracle Workflow
3 5 (1.14%) CMS
4 4 (0.91%) OpenEdge
5 3 (0.68%) Confluence
5 3 (0.68%) Drupal
6 2 (0.46%) Apache Airflow
6 2 (0.46%) Apache Spark
6 2 (0.46%) govService
6 2 (0.46%) WordPress
7 1 (0.23%) IBM HTTP Server
7 1 (0.23%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 22 (5.02%) Microsoft Excel
2 7 (1.60%) Microsoft Office
3 5 (1.14%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 5 (1.14%) Spreadsheet
4 3 (0.68%) MS Visio
5 2 (0.46%) Microsoft Project
5 2 (0.46%) Trello
Business Applications
1 25 (5.71%) SAP S/4HANA
2 20 (4.57%) NEC Housing
3 16 (3.65%) Oracle Receivables
4 13 (2.97%) Oracle General Ledger
4 13 (2.97%) Oracle Payables
4 13 (2.97%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
5 9 (2.05%) ContrOCC
6 5 (1.14%) Dynamics CRM
6 5 (1.14%) iTrent
7 4 (0.91%) Oracle Financials
7 4 (0.91%) SAP ERP
8 2 (0.46%) Oracle Applications
9 1 (0.23%) MIS ActiveH
9 1 (0.23%) Oracle EBS
9 1 (0.23%) Payment Gateway
9 1 (0.23%) SAP CO
9 1 (0.23%) SAP FI
9 1 (0.23%) SAP FI/CO
9 1 (0.23%) SAP HR
9 1 (0.23%) SAP MM
Cloud Services
1 41 (9.36%) Azure
2 27 (6.16%) Power Platform
3 24 (5.48%) Microsoft 365
4 17 (3.88%) AWS
4 17 (3.88%) SaaS
5 14 (3.20%) Dynamics 365
6 9 (2.05%) Entra ID
7 7 (1.60%) Azure DevOps
8 5 (1.14%) GCP
8 5 (1.14%) Microsoft Copilot
8 5 (1.14%) Power Automate
9 4 (0.91%) Azure Sentinel
9 4 (0.91%) OCI
9 4 (0.91%) PowerApps
9 4 (0.91%) SuccessFactors
10 3 (0.68%) Azure Logic Apps
10 3 (0.68%) GitHub
10 3 (0.68%) Miro
10 3 (0.68%) OneDrive
11 2 (0.46%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 10 (2.28%) Firewall
2 7 (1.60%) DHCP
2 7 (1.60%) DNS
2 7 (1.60%) Network Security
3 6 (1.37%) Broadband
4 3 (0.68%) LAN
4 3 (0.68%) VPN
4 3 (0.68%) WAN
4 3 (0.68%) Wi-Fi
5 2 (0.46%) Intranet
5 2 (0.46%) PSTN
6 1 (0.23%) SD-WAN
6 1 (0.23%) Unified Communications
6 1 (0.23%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 24 (5.48%) Power BI
2 22 (5.02%) Oracle Reports
3 8 (1.83%) SQL Server
4 5 (1.14%) GIS
5 4 (0.91%) BusinessObjects
6 3 (0.68%) NoSQL
6 3 (0.68%) Star Schema
7 2 (0.46%) Amazon Aurora
7 2 (0.46%) Amazon RDS
7 2 (0.46%) Apache Hudi
7 2 (0.46%) Big Data
7 2 (0.46%) Crystal Reports
7 2 (0.46%) Data Lake
7 2 (0.46%) MongoDB
7 2 (0.46%) OLTP
7 2 (0.46%) PostgreSQL
7 2 (0.46%) Power Query
7 2 (0.46%) Presto
7 2 (0.46%) Spatial Data
8 1 (0.23%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 7 (1.60%) JIRA
2 2 (0.46%) GitLab
2 2 (0.46%) Jenkins
3 1 (0.23%) JUnit
3 1 (0.23%) Oracle APEX
General
1 193 (44.06%) Public Sector
2 145 (33.11%) Finance
3 115 (26.26%) Social Skills
4 42 (9.59%) Analytical Skills
5 23 (5.25%) Legal
6 21 (4.79%) Organisational Skills
7 16 (3.65%) Influencing Skills
8 15 (3.42%) Social Housing
9 10 (2.28%) Police
10 9 (2.05%) Retail
11 8 (1.83%) Fire and Rescue
12 7 (1.60%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 5 (1.14%) Documentation Skills
13 5 (1.14%) Manufacturing
14 3 (0.68%) Banking
15 2 (0.46%) Back Office
15 2 (0.46%) General Ledger
15 2 (0.46%) Law
15 2 (0.46%) Presentation Skills
15 2 (0.46%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 58 (13.24%) Lead
2 57 (13.01%) Analyst
3 52 (11.87%) Senior
4 31 (7.08%) Accountant
5 30 (6.85%) Systems Accountant
6 25 (5.71%) Developer
7 24 (5.48%) Business Analyst
8 23 (5.25%) Project Manager
9 21 (4.79%) Consultant
10 20 (4.57%) Architect
11 17 (3.88%) Finance Manager
12 14 (3.20%) Senior Analyst
13 13 (2.97%) Support Officer
14 11 (2.51%) Finance Systems Manager
14 11 (2.51%) Senior Accountant
14 11 (2.51%) Senior Systems Accountant
14 11 (2.51%) Solutions Architect
14 11 (2.51%) Team Leader
14 11 (2.51%) Tester
15 10 (2.28%) Security Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 44 (10.05%) Oracle Fusion
2 5 (1.14%) Middleware
2 5 (1.14%) SAP Fiori
3 4 (0.91%) CSS
3 4 (0.91%) HTML
4 3 (0.68%) REST
4 3 (0.68%) RESTful
5 2 (0.46%) JSON
5 2 (0.46%) Play Framework
5 2 (0.46%) SOAP
6 1 (0.23%) .NET
6 1 (0.23%) ARM Templates
6 1 (0.23%) FHIR
6 1 (0.23%) Node.js
6 1 (0.23%) PySpark
6 1 (0.23%) Spring
6 1 (0.23%) Spring Boot
6 1 (0.23%) Web Services
6 1 (0.23%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 34 (7.76%) Management Information System
2 20 (4.57%) Public Cloud
3 16 (3.65%) Legacy Systems
4 12 (2.74%) Data Structures
4 12 (2.74%) NHS
5 10 (2.28%) Freedom of Information
5 10 (2.28%) Onboarding
6 9 (2.05%) Product Ownership
7 8 (1.83%) Housing Association
8 7 (1.60%) Driving Licence
9 6 (1.37%) Enterprise Cloud
10 5 (1.14%) Enterprise Software
10 5 (1.14%) Security Posture
11 3 (0.68%) Cloud Native
11 3 (0.68%) Cyber Security Posture
11 3 (0.68%) PKI
11 3 (0.68%) Virtual Team
12 2 (0.46%) Data Protection Act
12 2 (0.46%) Hybrid Cloud
12 2 (0.46%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 19 (4.34%) Windows
2 7 (1.60%) Linux
3 5 (1.14%) Windows 10
3 5 (1.14%) Windows Server
4 2 (0.46%) Unix
5 1 (0.23%) Android
5 1 (0.23%) VMS
5 1 (0.23%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 90 (20.55%) Stakeholder Management
2 72 (16.44%) Continuous Improvement
3 70 (15.98%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 55 (12.56%) Migration
5 54 (12.33%) Service Delivery
6 53 (12.10%) ERP
7 48 (10.96%) Agile
8 46 (10.50%) Decision-Making
9 44 (10.05%) Problem-Solving
10 35 (7.99%) Change Management
10 35 (7.99%) Roadmaps
11 34 (7.76%) Project Delivery
12 33 (7.53%) User Acceptance Testing
13 31 (7.08%) Data Migration
13 31 (7.08%) Data Protection
13 31 (7.08%) Digital Transformation Programme
14 29 (6.62%) Cybersecurity
15 28 (6.39%) Analytics
15 28 (6.39%) Validation
16 27 (6.16%) Collaborative Working
Programming Languages
1 28 (6.39%) SQL
2 5 (1.14%) Java
2 5 (1.14%) JavaScript
2 5 (1.14%) Python
3 4 (0.91%) Data Analysis Expressions
3 4 (0.91%) PowerShell
4 3 (0.68%) ABAP
4 3 (0.68%) C#
4 3 (0.68%) PL/SQL
5 2 (0.46%) ProC
5 2 (0.46%) Scala
5 2 (0.46%) Shell Script
5 2 (0.46%) T-SQL
6 1 (0.23%) Apex Code
6 1 (0.23%) Bicep
6 1 (0.23%) Go
6 1 (0.23%) Groovy
6 1 (0.23%) Search Processing Language
6 1 (0.23%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 17 (3.88%) Security Cleared
2 15 (3.42%) Degree
3 13 (2.97%) SC Cleared
4 12 (2.74%) DBS Check
5 11 (2.51%) BPSS Clearance
6 6 (1.37%) NVQ Level 3
7 5 (1.14%) DV Cleared
8 4 (0.91%) CIPFA
8 4 (0.91%) Cisco Certification
8 4 (0.91%) CISSP
9 3 (0.68%) CCNA
9 3 (0.68%) CCNP
9 3 (0.68%) CISM
9 3 (0.68%) SAP Certification
10 2 (0.46%) Azure Certification
10 2 (0.46%) Computer Science Degree
10 2 (0.46%) IIBA
10 2 (0.46%) ITIL Certification
10 2 (0.46%) Master's Degree
10 2 (0.46%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 26 (5.94%) Data Quality
2 24 (5.48%) GDPR
3 13 (2.97%) Accessibility
4 12 (2.74%) PMO
5 10 (2.28%) SLA
6 7 (1.60%) NCSC
6 7 (1.60%) QA
7 6 (1.37%) Cyber Essentials
7 6 (1.37%) PCI DSS
7 6 (1.37%) WCAG
8 4 (0.91%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 3 (0.68%) ISO/IEC 27001
9 3 (0.68%) PERC
10 2 (0.46%) GRC
11 1 (0.23%) BS7666
11 1 (0.23%) Disclosure Scotland
11 1 (0.23%) IFRS
11 1 (0.23%) NIST
System Software
1 10 (2.28%) Active Directory
2 5 (1.14%) Hyper-V
2 5 (1.14%) VMware Infrastructure
3 4 (0.91%) Docker
4 1 (0.23%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 7 (1.60%) Terraform
2 5 (1.14%) Kubernetes
3 2 (0.46%) Grafana
3 2 (0.46%) Kibana
3 2 (0.46%) Microsoft Intune
3 2 (0.46%) Prometheus
3 2 (0.46%) SCCM
4 1 (0.23%) FortiGate
Vendors
1 66 (15.07%) Microsoft
2 60 (13.70%) Oracle
3 44 (10.05%) SAP
4 21 (4.79%) NEC
5 8 (1.83%) Civica
5 8 (1.83%) Liquidlogic
6 6 (1.37%) VMware
7 5 (1.14%) Ariba
7 5 (1.14%) ServiceNow
8 4 (0.91%) Google
8 4 (0.91%) Orchard
8 4 (0.91%) Palo Alto
9 3 (0.68%) Cisco
9 3 (0.68%) Infoblox
9 3 (0.68%) Kronos
9 3 (0.68%) Salesforce
9 3 (0.68%) Splunk
10 2 (0.46%) Juniper
10 2 (0.46%) Ribbon
10 2 (0.46%) Sitecore