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Over a quarter (27 per cent) of all the IT contractors in the UK now work in the public sector.
The survey, conducted among over 2,500 IT contractors, shows that the financial services sector has risen from third to second largest user of IT contractors, now accounting for 24 per cent of the market, up from 19 per cent in 2003. Meanwhile, the telecoms sector has slumped from second to fourth place, now utilising just 12 per cent of the UK’s IT contractors compared to 21 per cent in 2003.
According to giant group, the research reveals the true extent to which the public sector, along with financial services, have become the prime drivers of growth in the IT industry in recent years, eclipsing the once dominant telecoms sector.
Top four sectors
Matthew Brown, Managing Director, giant group, said: “The degree to which the public sector has shown willingness to utilise external consultants in recent years in areas such as IT has surpassed all expectations.
“The public sector has always been the poor relation in terms of its utilisation of temporary IT staff, but efficiency drives and increased scrutiny of major IT projects have persuaded civil servants of the necessity of bringing in private sector expertise.”
Bidding war
According to giant group, with growth in government IT spending expected to continue to outperform the market, and the City ramping up spending on security and compliance, the public sector will be going head-to-head with the City for the best IT staff.
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“With the need to control public finances pressing, and the City’s requirements for IT contractors growing, the Government could find itself locked into a costly bidding war. If key IT personnel are poached by the City, there could be serious consequences for the Government’s IT agenda.
“The recent wave of M&A activity, spending on Basel II and data security, is expected to boost the uptake of temporary IT staff in the City as these large-scale projects get under way."
Telecoms suffering
According to giant, one of the most striking aspects of its research is the decline in the importance of the telcoms sector in terms of its utilisation of IT personnel over the last two years, but the rollout of new networking technologies, such as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), and 3G mobile services, should give a long-awaited boost to the sector.
Matthew Brown said: “The telecoms sector is expected to drag itself up with technologies delivering multimedia content via the Internet and on mobile handsets, which should drive future demand for IT networking skills.
“As ever in the telecoms sector, where new technology tends to be cyclical, heavy use of IT contractors to provide flexible skills will be an important staffing strategy.”
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Susie Hughes © Shout99.com 2005
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