Moving from engineering to IT as a project manager

I started my career managing engineering projects in aerospace/defence (mostly design and manufacture) simply because that was where my first job was and what my degree was in. I have no real interest in it and most of the companies and salaries are not very attractive (engineers are much lower status in the UK than the continent/USA). I sat out the recession in engineering companies but now I’m trying to move into IT which for years is where I want to be working: faster moving, more innovation, better pay and prospects.

My IT knowledge is reasonable; I can program in a number of web and non-web languages to basic level which after having spent eight years managing technical people and projects certainly feels like enough to do a decent job. I have also worked with a software supplier writing our requirements, mapping our processes and getting the ERP system rolled out.

My phone is ringing off the hook for engineering PM roles but anything software related gets deathly silence even taking a pay cut, relocating and security cleared defence industry jobs. Any ideas form people in the industry on how I can try and step over? One of the reasons I chose project management was more flexibility is being able to transfer across technical industries but looks like this is more difficult than planned. My long term goal is to work as a business analyst but I need to move into IT first.