Public Sector Contract Job Trends in the West Midlands

Public Sector
England > West Midlands

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Public Sector in contract job vacancies in the West Midlands. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Public Sector over the 6 months leading up to 27 January 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 14 18 12
Rank change year-on-year +4 -6 -7
Contract jobs citing Public Sector 240 131 187
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 10.00% 8.45% 10.16%
As % of the General category 17.78% 13.59% 18.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 163 78 126
10th Percentile £335 £288 £211
25th Percentile £430 £393 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% -
75th Percentile £575 £553 £588
90th Percentile £645 £596 £653
England median daily rate £500 £523 £538
% change year-on-year -4.37% -2.72% -0.46%
Number of hourly rates quoted 9 8 8
10th Percentile £16.97 - £13.42
25th Percentile £17.09 £14.70 £18.53
Median hourly rate £23.00 £20.87 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year +10.23% -40.39% +98.64%
75th Percentile £25.00 £28.77 £69.06
90th Percentile £35.45 £41.68 £72.93
England median hourly rate £22.00 £25.50 £21.00
% change year-on-year -13.73% +21.43% +5.63%

All General Skills
West Midlands

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 the West Midlands.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for general skills 1,350 964 1,007
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 56.27% 62.19% 54.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 874 591 679
10th Percentile £229 £200 £220
25th Percentile £400 £375 £376
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £513 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.44% +2.50% -
75th Percentile £588 £608 £600
90th Percentile £675 £700 £688
England median daily rate £500 £528 £545
% change year-on-year -5.21% -3.21% -0.91%
Number of hourly rates quoted 60 37 84
10th Percentile £13.95 £14.70 £11.83
25th Percentile £15.73 £18.13 £14.71
Median hourly rate £19.50 £23.82 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year -18.14% +5.87% +27.70%
75th Percentile £27.21 £30.00 £38.75
90th Percentile £35.60 £42.00 £58.75
England median hourly rate £23.00 £29.12 £26.00
% change year-on-year -21.02% +11.98% +1.13%

Public Sector
Job Vacancy Trend in the West Midlands

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

Public Sector job vacancy trend in the West Midlands

Public Sector
Daily Rate Trend in the West Midlands

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing Public Sector.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing Public Sector

Public Sector
Daily Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Public Sector in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 27 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Public Sector in the West Midlands

Public Sector
Hourly Rate Trend in the West Midlands

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing Public Sector.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing Public Sector

Public Sector
Hourly Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Public Sector in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 27 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Public Sector in the West Midlands

Public Sector
Contract Job Locations in the West Midlands

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 West Midlands region over the 6 months to 27 January 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
Birmingham +3 90 £475 -3.06% 50
Shropshire -14 50 £515 -4.63% 15
Warwickshire +26 46 £575 +9.52% 14
Coventry -6 23 £463 +1.37% 1
Staffordshire -1 5 £413 -17.50% 6
Solihull -6 4 £363 -3.97% 1
Worcestershire -27 1 £363 +13.73%
Public Sector
England

Public Sector
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the West Midlands 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 20 (8.33%) Confluence
2 19 (7.92%) SAS
3 9 (3.75%) SharePoint
4 8 (3.33%) nginx
5 5 (2.08%) Apache Airflow
6 3 (1.25%) WebLogic
7 2 (0.83%) SugarCRM
8 1 (0.42%) Anypoint
8 1 (0.42%) Microsoft Exchange
8 1 (0.42%) Oracle Workflow
8 1 (0.42%) Tuxedo
Applications
1 7 (2.92%) Mozilla Thunderbird
2 6 (2.50%) Microsoft Excel
3 5 (2.08%) Spreadsheet
4 3 (1.25%) Microsoft Office
4 3 (1.25%) MS Visio
5 2 (0.83%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.42%) Adobe Illustrator
6 1 (0.42%) Adobe XD
6 1 (0.42%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 1 (0.42%) Oracle Smart View
6 1 (0.42%) Photoshop
6 1 (0.42%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 5 (2.08%) SAP ERP
2 2 (0.83%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (0.83%) Maximo
2 2 (0.83%) SAP FI
2 2 (0.83%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.42%) MIS ActiveH
3 1 (0.42%) Oracle Assets
3 1 (0.42%) Primavera
3 1 (0.42%) SAP HR
3 1 (0.42%) SAP PSCD
Cloud Services
1 46 (19.17%) AWS
2 42 (17.50%) Azure
3 14 (5.83%) Virtual Private Cloud
4 13 (5.42%) Amazon CloudWatch
5 12 (5.00%) Amazon S3
5 12 (5.00%) AWS KMS
6 11 (4.58%) Amazon EC2
6 11 (4.58%) Amazon ELB
6 11 (4.58%) Microsoft 365
6 11 (4.58%) Power Platform
7 8 (3.33%) Amazon ECS
8 7 (2.92%) GitHub
8 7 (2.92%) PaaS
8 7 (2.92%) Route 53
9 6 (2.50%) Azure DevOps
10 5 (2.08%) Dynamics 365
10 5 (2.08%) Entra ID
10 5 (2.08%) SaaS
11 4 (1.67%) Azure Data Factory
11 4 (1.67%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 19 (7.92%) Firewall
2 14 (5.83%) DNS
3 12 (5.00%) VPN
4 11 (4.58%) FTP
4 11 (4.58%) HTTP
4 11 (4.58%) SMTP
4 11 (4.58%) SSH
5 10 (4.17%) WAN
6 7 (2.92%) IMAP
6 7 (2.92%) IPsec
6 7 (2.92%) OpenLDAP
7 6 (2.50%) BGP
7 6 (2.50%) MPLS
7 6 (2.50%) Wireless
8 4 (1.67%) LAN
9 3 (1.25%) SD-WAN
9 3 (1.25%) SSL
10 2 (0.83%) Internet
10 2 (0.83%) Network Security
10 2 (0.83%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 12 (5.00%) Amazon RDS
1 12 (5.00%) PostgreSQL
2 10 (4.17%) Power BI
2 10 (4.17%) SAS Enterprise Guide
3 9 (3.75%) Pentaho
4 7 (2.92%) Amazon Aurora
4 7 (2.92%) Oracle Database
5 6 (2.50%) MongoDB
5 6 (2.50%) Relational Database
5 6 (2.50%) SAS Visual Analytics
6 4 (1.67%) Electronic Patient Records
7 3 (1.25%) MySQL
7 3 (1.25%) NoSQL
7 3 (1.25%) Oracle Reports
8 2 (0.83%) Data Hub
8 2 (0.83%) Metadata
8 2 (0.83%) QlikView
8 2 (0.83%) SAP BW
8 2 (0.83%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 2 (0.83%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 30 (12.50%) Git
1 30 (12.50%) JIRA
2 24 (10.00%) Jenkins
3 11 (4.58%) Vagrant
4 5 (2.08%) GitLab
5 3 (1.25%) Toad
6 2 (0.83%) Atlassian Bamboo
6 2 (0.83%) JUnit
7 1 (0.42%) Bitbucket
7 1 (0.42%) Liquibase
7 1 (0.42%) Maven
7 1 (0.42%) Mockito
7 1 (0.42%) MSI
7 1 (0.42%) Oracle Forms
7 1 (0.42%) Selenium
General
1 67 (27.92%) Social Skills
2 24 (10.00%) Finance
3 14 (5.83%) Analytical Skills
4 13 (5.42%) Police
5 10 (4.17%) Presentation Skills
6 8 (3.33%) Legal
6 8 (3.33%) Organisational Skills
7 7 (2.92%) Local Government
7 7 (2.92%) Telecoms
8 6 (2.50%) Influencing Skills
9 5 (2.08%) Documentation Skills
9 5 (2.08%) Law
10 4 (1.67%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 4 (1.67%) Manufacturing
10 4 (1.67%) Military
11 2 (0.83%) Banking
11 2 (0.83%) General Ledger
11 2 (0.83%) Retail
12 1 (0.42%) Electronics
12 1 (0.42%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 29 (12.08%) Analyst
2 23 (9.58%) Developer
3 20 (8.33%) Lead
3 20 (8.33%) Senior
4 19 (7.92%) Architect
5 15 (6.25%) Consultant
5 15 (6.25%) DevOps Engineer
6 12 (5.00%) AWS Engineer
6 12 (5.00%) Release Manager
7 11 (4.58%) Cloud Platform Engineer
7 11 (4.58%) Platform Engineer
8 10 (4.17%) AWS DevOps
8 10 (4.17%) AWS DevOps Engineer
9 9 (3.75%) Support Engineer
10 8 (3.33%) Business Analyst
10 8 (3.33%) Data Engineer
10 8 (3.33%) Network Engineer
10 8 (3.33%) Solutions Architect
11 7 (2.92%) 2nd Line Engineer
11 7 (2.92%) AWS Platform Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 10 (4.17%) REST
1 10 (4.17%) RESTful
2 9 (3.75%) CSS
2 9 (3.75%) LDAP
2 9 (3.75%) React
3 7 (2.92%) HTML
4 6 (2.50%) AngularJS
4 6 (2.50%) XML
5 5 (2.08%) .NET
5 5 (2.08%) Oracle Fusion
5 5 (2.08%) Spring
5 5 (2.08%) Spring Boot
6 4 (1.67%) EDI
6 4 (1.67%) Play Framework
6 4 (1.67%) Playwright
7 3 (1.25%) JSON
7 3 (1.25%) OAuth
7 3 (1.25%) OAuth2
7 3 (1.25%) SailPoint
7 3 (1.25%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 14 (5.83%) Management Information System
2 13 (5.42%) Replication
3 9 (3.75%) Legacy Systems
4 8 (3.33%) Product Ownership
5 6 (2.50%) Cloud Native
5 6 (2.50%) Onboarding
5 6 (2.50%) PKI
6 5 (2.08%) Driving Licence
6 5 (2.08%) NHS
7 4 (1.67%) Analytical Mindset
7 4 (1.67%) Data Centre
7 4 (1.67%) Data Structures
7 4 (1.67%) Hybrid Cloud
8 3 (1.25%) Mobile App
8 3 (1.25%) Self-Motivation
9 2 (0.83%) e-Learning
9 2 (0.83%) Learning Management System
9 2 (0.83%) Linux Command Line
9 2 (0.83%) Security Operations Centre
9 2 (0.83%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 21 (8.75%) Linux
1 21 (8.75%) Windows
2 11 (4.58%) Amazon Linux
2 11 (4.58%) VMS
3 7 (2.92%) Ubuntu
4 3 (1.25%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 3 (1.25%) Unix
5 1 (0.42%) Mac OS X
5 1 (0.42%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 56 (23.33%) Agile
2 51 (21.25%) DevOps
3 47 (19.58%) CI/CD
4 33 (13.75%) Problem-Solving
5 31 (12.92%) Migration
6 30 (12.50%) Analytics
7 28 (11.67%) Continuous Improvement
8 27 (11.25%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 26 (10.83%) Stakeholder Management
10 24 (10.00%) Change Management
11 21 (8.75%) Configuration Management
12 20 (8.33%) Records Management
13 19 (7.92%) Data Modelling
14 16 (6.67%) Data Integration
14 16 (6.67%) Scrum
14 16 (6.67%) Test Automation
15 15 (6.25%) Business Intelligence
15 15 (6.25%) Containerisation
15 15 (6.25%) Validation
16 14 (5.83%) Integration Patterns
Programming Languages
1 46 (19.17%) SQL
2 27 (11.25%) Python
3 20 (8.33%) Java
4 15 (6.25%) PowerShell
5 14 (5.83%) JavaScript
6 12 (5.00%) Groovy
7 6 (2.50%) Perl
7 6 (2.50%) TypeScript
8 5 (2.08%) Scala
9 3 (1.25%) ABAP
9 3 (1.25%) Bash
9 3 (1.25%) C#
9 3 (1.25%) PHP
9 3 (1.25%) PL/SQL
9 3 (1.25%) Shell Script
10 2 (0.83%) Go
10 2 (0.83%) R
11 1 (0.42%) C++
11 1 (0.42%) COBOL
11 1 (0.42%) Data Analysis Expressions
Qualifications
1 110 (45.83%) Security Cleared
2 62 (25.83%) SC Cleared
3 15 (6.25%) Degree
4 11 (4.58%) AWS Certification
4 11 (4.58%) Azure Certification
5 7 (2.92%) DV Cleared
6 5 (2.08%) BPSS Clearance
6 5 (2.08%) Computer Science Degree
7 3 (1.25%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
7 3 (1.25%) DBS Check
7 3 (1.25%) Microsoft Certification
8 2 (0.83%) ACCA
8 2 (0.83%) CCA
8 2 (0.83%) CCNP
8 2 (0.83%) CIMA
8 2 (0.83%) Cisco Certification
8 2 (0.83%) PMI Certification
8 2 (0.83%) PMP
9 1 (0.42%) CCNA
9 1 (0.42%) CISSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 13 (5.42%) Data Quality
2 12 (5.00%) QA
3 7 (2.92%) Accessibility
4 4 (1.67%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 4 (1.67%) WCAG
5 3 (1.25%) NIST
6 2 (0.83%) GDPR
6 2 (0.83%) PCI DSS
6 2 (0.83%) SLA
7 1 (0.42%) NCSC
System Software
1 28 (11.67%) Docker
2 11 (4.58%) Active Directory
2 11 (4.58%) DFS Replication
3 7 (2.92%) Dovecot
3 7 (2.92%) Postfix
3 7 (2.92%) Squid
4 6 (2.50%) VMware Infrastructure
5 2 (0.83%) vSphere
6 1 (0.42%) Hyper-V
6 1 (0.42%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 20 (8.33%) Kubernetes
2 19 (7.92%) Terraform
3 13 (5.42%) Prometheus
4 12 (5.00%) Grafana
5 7 (2.92%) Nessus
5 7 (2.92%) Proxmox
6 2 (0.83%) Ansible
6 2 (0.83%) EMC NetWorker
6 2 (0.83%) Kibana
6 2 (0.83%) vRealize
6 2 (0.83%) VxRail
7 1 (0.42%) FortiGate
7 1 (0.42%) logstash
7 1 (0.42%) QRadar
7 1 (0.42%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 35 (14.58%) Oracle
2 23 (9.58%) Microsoft
3 13 (5.42%) SAP
3 13 (5.42%) ServiceNow
4 10 (4.17%) Talend
5 9 (3.75%) Juniper
6 8 (3.33%) Cisco
6 8 (3.33%) Denodo
7 7 (2.92%) Jaspersoft
7 7 (2.92%) VMware
8 6 (2.50%) Ariba
8 6 (2.50%) Splunk
9 5 (2.08%) IBM
9 5 (2.08%) Salesforce
10 4 (1.67%) F5
11 3 (1.25%) Databricks
11 3 (1.25%) Dell
11 3 (1.25%) SolarWinds
12 2 (0.83%) AppDynamics
12 2 (0.83%) Virgin Media