There is still a digital skills shortage across UK industry and the public sector and, in December 2022, the NAO found that Defra had found it difficult to recruit and retain people with the right digital skills. Between October 2021 and October 2022, Defra ran recruitment campaigns for 244 digital, data and technology roles but could not fill 31% of these roles.26 CDDO told us that this problem was not unique to Defra: in October 2022, 14% of roles in the digital and data community were vacant across government. In June 2022, CDDO committed to reducing vacancies in the digital community across government departments to less than 10% by 2025.27 We asked the Department what it was doing to fill the digital roles that it had so far been unable to fill. Defra told us it used contractors to fill the gap in its workforce.28 CDDO clarified that using some contingent labour was good for flexibility, but that it can be up to twice as expensive for some roles. Defra explained that it had reduced its reliance on contractors and temporary staff over the last year from 30% to 22%.29