Overview

The JLT Public Sector Risk Report is one of Australia's leading publications examining the strategic risks facing local government.

Developed from insights gathered across councils throughout Australia, the report identifies the emerging issues influencing executive decision-making, governance and long-term organisational resilience.

It has become a widely used reference for executive teams, Audit and Risk Committees and Local Government Associations when reviewing strategic priorities and enterprise risk.

Why it Matters

For Councils reviewing their Strategic Risk Register or Enterprise Risk Management Framework, this report provides an external benchmark of the issues currently shaping the sector.

Rather than prescribing how risks should be managed, it highlights the strategic challenges that are consistently demanding executive attention across Australian local government.

Used alongside an organisation's own strategic planning and risk assessment processes, it provides valuable context for testing whether key strategic risks remain complete, current and appropriately prioritised.

Key Themes

The report highlights several recurring strategic issues influencing Australian local government, including:

• Financial sustainability and long-term organisational resilience.

• Cyber security and digital risk.

• Workforce capability, capacity and organisational culture.

• Governance, accountability and increasing regulatory expectations.

• Infrastructure and asset management.

• Community resilience and service continuity.

• Strategic planning in an increasingly uncertain operating environment.

Keystone Reflection

One observation from this report is that many of the sector's highest-ranked risks are no longer operational problems—they are organisational capability challenges.

Financial sustainability, cyber security, workforce capability and governance cannot be managed by individual departments alone. They require coordinated executive leadership, informed governance and organisation-wide decision-making.

This reinforces an important principle of enterprise risk management:

A Strategic Risk Register should describe an organisation's most significant enterprise exposures—not simply aggregate operational risks.

A Question Worth Considering

If your organisation reviewed its Strategic Risk Register today, how closely would it align with the strategic issues emerging across Australian local government?

Read the Original Report

The full JLT Public Sector Risk Report – Edition 8 is available from the JLT Public Sector website.