Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many and what proportion of digital roles within his Department were vacant as of 26 February 2024.

The Ministry of Defence (MOD) has 925 vacant posts aligned to digital roles which makes up 27.5% as the proportion of the total civilian digital workforce across Defence. Please note that these vacant posts may not be under any recruitment action at this time.

As part of the 2022 to 2025 roadmap for digital and data, all departments made a commitment to reduce their digital and data vacancies to under 10% of total Government Digital and Data headcount by 2025. MOD has adopted the Central Digital and Data Office Digital Data and Technology pay framework and introduced a new Digital Skills Allowance in September 2023 across the entire digital function. This is to enable improved attraction and retention in critical digital and cyber security roles. Recruitment using the Digital Skills Allowance is underway, with some early success in attracting external applicants to some Data and Software Development roles.