The Standards and Audit Sub Board met to discuss IT service improvements, review housing complaints, and note updates from the Local Government Ombudsman¹, internal audit, the strategic risk register, and freedom of information performance. The board reviewed the Housing Service annual complaints performance and service improvement report, and noted the completed self-assessment form for scrutiny and challenge.

Housing Service Complaints Performance

The board considered the Housing Service annual complaints performance and service improvement report for the period 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025. The report was produced in accordance with the Housing Service Complaints Policy and the Housing Ombudsman Complaint Handling Code. The board was asked to note the completed self-assessment form for scrutiny and challenge.

Key highlights from the report included:

• The majority of complaints related to property services (48%), particularly property condition. Other themes included tenancy management, staff conduct and repair quality.
• Complaints increased by 79% from 49 (2023/24) to 88 (2024/25), indicating improved accessibility and engagement.
• 100% of stage 1 complaints were responded to within the required timescales. 19 complaints were formally extended in line with policy, demonstrating a continued commitment to resolve issues at the earliest opportunity for residents.
• 82% of stage 2 complaints were responded to within the target timeframe. Delays were primarily due to limited staff resources, but this issue has now been addressed by increasing the number of stage 2 responders, enhancing capacity and ensuring greater resilience moving forward.
• 19% of stage 1 complaints were escalated to stage 2; a reduction from 22% in 2023/24, which indicates improved resolution at first contact.
• Stage 1 outcomes: 49% not upheld, 32% partially upheld, 19% upheld.
• Stage 2 outcomes: 82% upheld, 18% not upheld.
• Three cases were referred to the Housing Ombudsman, where two resulted in compensation and service improvements and one remains under investigation.
• Service improvements to date include the recruitment of Head of Assets and Policy & Performance Officer, implementation of call recording to support complaint resolution, and recommendation of a dedicated IT case management system.
• The annual self-assessment against the Housing Ombudsman's Complaint Handling Code has been completed, confirming the council's full compliance.

The annual complaints performance and service improvement report, the self-assessment form, and the Housing Service Complaints Policy are available as appendices to the Standards Audit sub-board report.

IT Services Position Update

The board received an update on the IT service following the retirement of the previous Head of IT. Gavin Muncaster, Head of IT at Southampton City Council, has been providing support on a part-time basis through a service level agreement. A full-time IT Operations manager started on 1 September 2025.

The report noted that Gosport Borough Council faces specific challenges as a small organisation, as core platforms require the same level of management and upgrades as much larger organisations with greater levels of resource.

Updates and improvements are detailed below, split into three key areas:

• Resourcing (staffing and skills): Much of the IT service have been long-standing employees of Gosport Borough Council and collectively they have a significant knowledge of the IT systems and hardware in use within the authority. However, with a relatively small team it is well understood there are areas where knowledge and experience sit with individuals as well as a small number of people that are heavily relied onto to keep systems running.
• Technology (software systems and hardware): System resilience and disaster recovery capabilities had been raised in audits as an issue. As a result, a programme of work was started to ensure that mission critical systems were reviewed and migrated to be cloud hosted. This work has been on-going, and progress has been made. For migrated systems not only does this give greater resilience from a disaster recovery standpoint it also means that upgrades to the platforms are typically managed by the software provider. This means a reduced burden on internal resource and systems remain on up-to-date versions.
• Service Improvements (Process and Practice): As noted above there has been some focus on improving the communication from IT to the wider council. There has been positive feedback in this area around the pro-active nature of messaging and the information that is provided within the updates. As service changes happen this will remain a key area of focus, along with reviewing how service desk / support functions are offered and how this can be more consistent for users.

The report concluded that there has been some progress within IT across staffing, technology and process, and that on-going process and control improvements will be important in delivering the specific actions identified in IT audits.

Local Government Ombudsman Annual Review

The board was advised of the Annual Review Letter 2025 received from the Local Government Ombudsman. The Ombudsman writes to all local authorities on an annual basis summarising the complaints about the authority which have been dealt with by the Ombudsman during the previous year ending 31 March.

The Ombudsman received six complaints during 2024/25. The service areas and outcomes of the complaints are detailed in the Local Government Ombudsman Annual Review 2024-2025.

Internal Audit Progress Report

The board received an update on the progress of the Audit Plan 2025/26. The purpose of the report was to provide an overview of internal audit activity against assurance work completed in accordance with the approved internal audit plan.

The Audit Progress Covering Report noted that there are 33 audits in the Audit Plan for 2025/26. To date, 6 audits have been issued, 2 are in draft and 6 currently work in progress.

Strategic Risk Register Update

The board was presented with the strategic risk register as at August 2025, in line with the Risk Management Policy. The Risk Register Covering Report noted that risk management is a fundamental part of how the council operates and forms part of its corporate governance framework.

Freedom of Information Performance

The board received a report on the performance of the administration of Freedom of Information (FOI) requests. The Freedom of Information Report noted that the Freedom of Information Act 2000 provides public access to information held by public authorities.

The report included the following data:

The report also included a Freedom of Information Requests Flowchart.