Southwark Council is planning to cut IT spending in 2026/27, according to reports from the Joint IT Committee (Brent, Lewisham and Southwark) meeting held on 8 July 2025. While the exact amount of the planned IT spending cuts is not specified, the meeting information indicates that discussions are underway regarding further saving requirements in 2026/27, and these are likely to be more substantial.

The savings are likely to be more substantial and will have operational impacts on Southwark Council's services and residents, according to the Public reports pack.

The Joint IT Committee convened to review updates concerning the Shared Technology Service (STS), covering service level performance and project advancements. A cyber security update was also on the agenda during a closed session.

Shared Technology Services Performance

According to the Public reports pack, the STS has shown improvements in several key areas:

  • Priority 3 (P3) operational incident issues improved by approximately 5%.
  • Priority 4 (P4) operational request calls service level agreements (SLAs) were maintained.
  • The second-lowest number of open issues and requests from staff since the Shared Service's inception was achieved, despite the largest user base on record.
  • A new Customer Experience survey is in place to gather feedback on customer interactions, with actions taken since January 2025.
  • The Telephony Service Desk was re-procured with stricter service levels, effective from 1 April 2025.
  • Recent audit reviews were positive, with the fewest outstanding audit actions remaining.
  • Laptop projects are progressing for Brent, and business cases for Lewisham and Southwark have been approved.
  • A new third-party Security Operations Centre went live at the end of January 2025 for all three councils.
  • A new vulnerability management tool was purchased for laptops, offering better insights and automated deployment.

Chart showing the volume of open calls within STS operational queues over the past year.
Chart showing the volume of open calls within STS operational queues over the past year.
The volume of open calls within the STS operational queues has declined since December 2024.

The Public reports pack also included details of service level performance, including:

  • A chart illustrating the volume of open calls within the STS operational queues over the past year, noting a peak between October and December 2024, with open tickets surpassing 2,200, and a consistent decline since then, culminating in the current total of 1,465 open tickets.
  • A breakdown of open tickets raised prior to 2024, with the majority of the remaining pre-2025 tickets related to project requests that necessitate system upgrades.
  • A graph identifying the trends of logged tickets into STS queues over the last 3 years and into 2025, noting that the number of supported users has grown from 10,500 users in 2020 to 12,693 in 2025 (21% increase).
  • Details of eight Priority 1 (P1) incidents related to STS infrastructure, with 61% (5 of 8 MI restored service within 4 hours).
  • Details of 20 Priority 2 (P2) calls raised in STS Hornbill operational queues during this reporting period, with the target KPI being 30 or less per month.
  • Details of Priority 3 (P3) incidents logged during this reporting period, with STS Operational teams (front office include the service desk and on-site teams) logging 9,763 with an overall SLA performance of 85%, and all STS teams (back office includes infrastructure and EUC teams) logging 10,126 with an overall SLA performance of 84%.
  • Details of Priority 4 (P4) requests logged during this reporting period, with STS Operational teams logging 6788 with an overall SLA performance of 90%, and all STS teams logging 10,126 with an overall SLA performance of 89%.
  • Information on onsite support, noting that the onsite teams across the three partner councils typically take care of four major functions: local on-site support in the main partner offices (Brent Civic, Lewisham Laurence House and Southwark Tooley Street), non-main office site support, Starters, Movers and Leavers (SMaL) acceptance and processing, and conducting and organising hardware repairs, both in and out of warranty.
  • Information on telephony support, noting that Node4 serves as the primary telephone service provider for the IT Service Desk.
  • Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) survey results for the reporting period, with an average score of 4.4 out of 5.
  • Overall call number statistics, noting that STS had 36,158 tickets logged between March May 2025 for all council Application/Service teams as well as the Shared Service, against 40,947 in Dec 24 – Feb 25.
  • Service improvements, including the expansion of the rollout of a Teams chat service between the on-site team, executive office and the cabinet office in Lewisham, and enhanced Qminder support.
  • Continuous service improvement, with a focus on improving the Hornbill Customer Portal.

Project Updates

The Public reports pack included updates on several projects, including:

Future Laptop Windows 11

Microsoft will end support for Windows 10 in October 2025, and this project is part of STS transition strategy to ensure all systems and operations continue without interruptions or security risks linked to unsupported software and hardware.

Laptop Always On VPN

The council's remote working system, Microsoft Direct Access, was useful during the pandemic; however, it experienced speed and connection limitations, and Microsoft has announced that it will no longer develop this product. Consequently, a new solution, AlwaysOn VPN, has been introduced to provide seamless connectivity to all Microsoft services.

Network Upgrades

The proposed solution involves implementing SD-WAN technology to replace the current dedicated leased line site-to-site circuits.

Windows 2012 Upgrades

All councils operate multiple Windows 2012 servers, with their support stated to end in October 2023, and it is crucial that these systems are upgraded.

Financial Considerations

Charts showing Shared Technology Services performance metrics, including first-time fix rate, average queue time, call reachability, and ticket volume by council.
Charts showing Shared Technology Services performance metrics, including first-time fix rate, average queue time, call reachability, and ticket volume by council.

The Public reports pack noted the following financial considerations:

  • The total budget of £17.84M for FY 2025/26 is made up of a combination of non-controllable expenditure of £8.6M and controllable expenditure (staffing and consultancy) of £9.1M.
  • The YTD spend (April 25) for FY 2025/26 is £3.19M against a full-year budget of £17.84M.
  • The YTD Spend for the year excludes recharges which are made up of bulk stock orders, project costs that are covered by different funding pots and rechargeable consumables.
  • STS are in discussions with councils for additional savings which will start in 2026/27, and these are likely to be more substantial and will have operational impacts.