The watchdog tasked with handling complaints against government agencies is grappling with delays as it attempts to manage more than 7000 unresolved complaints.
The Commonwealth and ACT Ombudsman, Iain Anderson, has told The Canberra Times his office was "juggling" 7361 active complaints as of July 17.
Mr Anderson said 418 of those matters had "sat unresolved" for more than one year and acknowledged his office's performance in handling individual complaints was not meeting its own expectations.
"Managing complaints is the Office of the Commonwealth Ombudsman's core business and we are focused on improving our complaint handling performance," Mr Anderson said.
"When people contact my office with a complaint, we want them to feel heard, receive an explanation on the action we have taken, or not taken, and why."
Mr Anderson said every complaint was assessed and treated as important but each one was managed based on different individual circumstances.
"The office decides what action is warranted when the circumstances of the complaint are assessed and identifies issues that require consideration at a systemic level," Mr Anderson said.
"Our performance with individual complaints is not where we want it to be, but we are working on improving our processes," he added.
Mr Anderson said the Commonwealth Ombudsman's office had statutory functions which were either "not funded or under-funded", and this took resources away from other roles such as complaint handling.
Mr Anderson said the office was combatting the volume of matters by improving its ability to investigate broader issues, and assessing individual complaints to identify systemic problems.
"We are already undertaking a number of activities to improve our timeliness in the handling of individual complaints, and we are seeing some positive results, which will increase as we bed down the changes," Mr Anderson said.
The time standards provided on the Commonwealth Ombudsman website state the office aimed to resolve 50 per cent of complaints within 30 days and 99 per cent within one year.
The office received nearly 23,000 complaints in 2024-2025 and revealed a decline in performance in managing complaints in its annual report citing prioritisation of aged cases.
Mr Anderson is the ACT Ombudsman among six other specialist roles - such as the Australian Defence Force, immigration, and law enforcement - and his office's responsibilities include handling complaints, conducting investigations, audits, inspections and reviewing decisions related to freedom of information (FOI) requests.
The ACT Ombudsman aimed to finalise 95 per cent of FOI review requests within six months, however, in its latest annual report said it was only able to resolve 55 per cent of requests within that timeframe.
This masthead sought Mr Anderson's comments on delays following a rejected FOI request submitted for review in January this year.
