Home Affairs Portfolio Committee Strategic Plan; Committee Report on Home Affairs Strategic Plan 2013

Meeting report

Strategic Plan of the Committee
Mr Adam Salmon, Committee Researcher, presented the Strategic Plan of the Committee, which had been amended to include the suggestions and comments raised at the previous meeting.

The plan outlined Parliament’s mandate, mission and core objectives. It gave an account of Parliament’s strategic objectives and key policy developments, the key issues it was faced with, and its vision, values and policies.

The key issues of the Committee on Home Affairs, as identified in the State of the Nation Address (SONA), included: youth employment, education, the presidential remuneration commission, representation of women in half of all decision making structures, fighting corruption, and social cohesion. Emanating out of the National Development Plan (NDP) were: creating jobs and livelihoods, improving education and training, building a capable state, fighting corruption and enhancing accountability, transforming society and uniting the nation.

The Committee’s main tasks were to process legislation, conduct oversight, facilitate public participation, facilitate cooperative government, and to facilitate international participation.

Upcoming legislation for the Committee included the Private Member’s proposal called the Electoral Amendment Bill [PMB 2 of 2013], and the Department was busy preparing the Electoral Amendment Bill 2013, Draft Immigration Policy, and the Border Management Agency Bill 2013.

The Committee was responsible for oversight of the Department of Home Affairs (DHA), Government Printing Works (GPW), Electoral Commission (EC), and Film and Publication Board (FPB). This would include scrutinizing strategic plans, budget allocations, briefings and reports, and annual reports, as well as site visits. Site visits were planned for the headquarters of the Department of Home Affairs and the three entities in June 2013, and for the Northern Cape in September 2013.

Facilitating public participation and involvement would require conducting public participation meetings and public hearings. In order to facilitate cooperative government, the Committee would plan, direct and review its processes in line with government imperatives, monitor HR constraints and progress in job creation and attracting skills. The DHA was particularly encouraged to cooperate with the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and the Department of Labour (DoL) on scarce skills quotas. In facilitating international participation, the Committee was to monitor international agreements, while being mindful of the impact of implementing the Prevention of Trafficking and Combating of Trafficking in Persons Act. The Committee had identified international events related to two aspects of its oversight – migration and elections. Scheduled for engagement were the Migration Dialogue for Southern Africa and national elections in Madagascar and Zimbabwe. 

Discussion
The Chairperson thanked Mr Salmon for the presentation. All issues that were raised at the previous meeting had been covered. She asked the Committee if there were any further points.

Mr M Mnqasela (DA) suggested that where the report stated that the Committee would conduct site visits, it should specify exactly which entities should be visited. 

Mr Eddy Mathonsi) noted that a visit to the Department of Home Affairs and Entity Headquarters was scheduled for the week of 3 June 2013. This would be problematic as he had been informed that there would be a plenary sitting in the National Assembly at that time.

Mr Salmon asked if there was an alternative available or if permission could be granted to go on oversight.

It was decided that further clarity on this would be sought.

Ms D Mathebe (ANC) was concerned by a comment on Metro FM that the Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs did not do its work and did not conduct enough oversight.

The Chairperson had not been aware of that. She said there was nothing they could do because they simply followed the government programme.

Mr Salmon suggested this fell under facilitating public participation, as outlined in the strategic plan of the Committee. He suggested that when Members were doing oversight in their constituencies they should not only introduce themselves as Members of Parliament but also as Members of that Portfolio Committee. This would allow for greater public awareness of what the Committee was doing. It was a small committee of only 12 members and so it was difficult for them to create a strong impression of oversight.

The strategic plan was adopted.

Committee Report on Budget Vote of Department of Home Affairs and its entities
The Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs oversaw the work of the Ministry of Home Affairs, the Department of Home Affairs, and its entities: DHA, GPW, IEC and FPB.  Mr Salmon presented the Draft Report of the Portfolio Committee on the Annual Performance Plan (APP) and Budget Vote Four of the Department of Home Affairs and its Entities. The document gave an overview of the Portfolio Committee’s interactions with the DHA and its three entities. It provided a summary of what the entities had said in their budgets, strategic plans and APPs.  Mr Salmon highlighted significant issues for the Members to consider.

The Department of Home Affairs
The DHA’s strategic goals and outcomes over the medium term were to:
• Secure South African citizenship and identity through regulating and overseeing the provision of enabling documents such as identity documents and passports, and maintaining the National Population Register
• Ensure effective and secure management of immigration to facilitate the movement of people through ports of entry
• Provide services to the public that were efficient, accessible and corruption free

Significant achievements during the 2012/13 financial year included :
• The DHA was on target to achieve the annual target of 594 000 birth registered within 30 days. In addition, the annual target of 80 additional health facilities connected for online registration of births and deaths was likely to be achieved.
• Between October and December 2012, the DHA finalized 27 750 Late Registration of Births cases out of the 30 900 received
• The DHA issued 787 949 IDs to those 16 years old and above by the end of quarter three and progress was made in the terms of developing specifications and testing the ID Smart Card
• The unabridged birth certificate was launched on 4 March 2013
• The DHA contributed to the successful hosting of the African Cup of Nations (AFCON) in 2013
• The DHA had secured office accommodation in Cape Town Harbour that would house all departments that function in the maritime environment
• The Home Affairs Learning Academy, working with providers, had delivered several certificate courses of high quality to officials
• The settlement of invoices within 30 days had increased from 54% to 86% following the introduction of an invoice/payment tracking register

Mr Salmon drew the Committee’s attention to the DHA’s key strategic priorities for the next five years, which were significant for the Committee to consider and had been amended:
• The new policy and legislation on immigration was a key priority and had already involved the Committee. This would likely not be finalized in 2013 but progress was expected.
• Asylum seeker management
• Establishing the Border Management Agency (BMA)
• Permit transformation
• Infrastructure at Ports of Entry
• Eradication of the Late Registration of Births and duplicates
• Ensuring all citizens of 16 years or older received identification documents
• The DHA and its officials would take steps to protect the National Population Register (NPR)
• The implementation of Live Capture, ID Smart Card, e-document management, a paperless environment and the National Identification System
• All necessary controls, processes and systems were to be in place
• Establishing sound leadership, management and organizational discipline at all levels and building a strong monitoring and evaluation function.

The budget of the DHA was divided amongst its three programmes: Administration, Citizens Affairs, and Immigration Services. The DHA received a total allocation of R6.56 billion in 2013/14. This was a 22.7% increase in nominal terms from its 2012/13 budget. When the nominal increase for 2013/14 was considered against the 5.6% projected inflation for the year, the real increase to the budget was 16%, or R866 million. This increase was primarily due to the 72% growth in real allocation to the Electoral Commission amounting to R624.2 million. This increase was to the allow for the preparations for the 2014 Provincial and National elections. If the increase to the Electoral Commission was omitted, the increase to the overall budget of the DHA was 5.4% in real terms.

Spending over the medium term would focus on the following:
• Implementing the modernization programme of the DHA
• Developing and implementing a risk based approach to immigration and policies supporting national priorities
• Strengthening the effectiveness and efficiency of the refugee status determination and refugee management processes
• Establishing the Border Management Agency (BMA), and
• Establishing and maintaining secure identity systems and issuing of enabling documents

Government Printing Works (GPW)
GPW had three key strategic priorities which had been identified for the medium term:
• Developing the printing works as a government component organization that performed flexibly and within regulated parameters, as a sustainable ring fenced business entity
• Optimizing processes and facilities to increase operational effectiveness and improve customer service
• Developing an efficient, effective, well trained and appropriately remunerated workforce

It’s strategic objectives focused on operations and production, strategic management, financial services and human resources. The GPW generated revenue from its printing services and anticipated that it would not require funding from government from 2014/15 onwards.

Film and Publication Board (FPB)
FPB’s strategic goals over the medium term were to:
• Provide consumer advice that would enable adults to make informed viewing, reading and gaming choices for themselves and the children in their care
• Protect children from exposure to disturbing and harmful materials and from premature exposure to adult experiences
• Make publishable the use of children in, or their exposure to, pornography

FPB’s main source of revenue was a transfer from DHA, as well as fees from classification and registration.

Electoral Commission (EC)
The Electoral Commission had identified five strategic goals:
• Achieving pre-eminence in the area of managing elections and referenda
• Strengthening electoral democracy
• Strengthening a cooperative relationship with political parties
• Strengthening institutional excellence and professionalism at all levels of the organization
• Strengthening institutional governance

The spending focus for the EC over the medium term would be the 2014 National and Provincial elections and voter registration drives. The expenditure by the EC increased from R806 million in the 2012/13 FY to R1.49 billion in 2013/14 and R1.6 billion by 2015/16 due to preparations for the 2014 National and Provincial elections and the 2015 local elections.

Recommendations
Based on its engagement between the Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs and the DHA as well as its entities, the Committee recommended the following to the Minister for Home Affairs:
• Consider ways of preventing the increase in spending on deportation of illegal foreigners
• Ensure that the outstanding issues of the Foreign Affairs Trading Account be finalised
• Ensure that unfilled posts at DHA were filled within four months as directed by the President during the State of the Nation Address
• Ensure that the DHA expedite on employing persons with disabilities in order to work towards achieving the benchmark of 2% set by government
• Ensure that the Department’s APP should be better aligned with the NDP
• Ensure that the mobile offices were functionally in order to assist in eradicating Late Registered Births, especially in rural areas
• Ensure that there was a better working relationship between DHA and the Department of Health about online registration of births in health facilities
• Ensure that DHA worked with other government departments in the JCPS in order to protect the coastline.
• The DHA should have more accurate numbers of undocumented migrants.
• There was to be considered planning in the establishment of the BMA by the DHA as it was a great responsibility to establish an entity such as that
• Ensure that DHA reduce the amount of time to processing permanent and temporary residence permits because there was a delay in the processing and finalizing of these permits
• The IT support systems of the DHA were still not sufficiently integrated, therefore the Committee was in support of the IT Modernisation Project of the DHA and recommended speedy finalization of the integration
• Ensure that the DHA should address the 2011/12 audit findings raised by the Auditor-General
• Ensure that the DHA should in future submit the Draft APP/Strategic Plan to the Portfolio Committee before it was tabled to Parliament

The recommendations for the EC were still outstanding.

Discussion
Mr De Freitas suggested that where the report made the recommendation that unfilled posts should be filled within four months, it should say something to the effect of “as the budget allows” or “within budgetary constraints”.

Mr A Gaum (ANC) said that the outstanding recommendations for the EC would prevent adoption of the report. 

Mr Salmon said that they would be included and sent out to Members.

The Chairperson said the report could be adopted in the next meeting. 

Mr Mnqasela commented on the recommendation that DHA reduce the amount of time it took to process Permanent and Temporary Residence Permits. There were many outstanding permits, both permanent and temporary. Recently he had heard that DHA had advertised for a private company to take over some of its functions at a provincial level. What was the Committee’s position on this? Last time they had discussed this with DHA, the Committee was uncomfortable with privatization. He was concerned that this would create more problems and make the process lengthier and more expensive. There was a need for clarity from the Department on whether they were going to do this, and what the mitigating measures were going to be.

Mr De Freitas suggested that they ask the Department for an urgent presentation to discuss this. The Committee should approach the topic with an open mind, and hear from them what the logic for this was. He assumed that they would not make a decision that would slow them down or cost more. At first glance privatization seemed like a bad idea, but there could be other information or justification that the Committee was not privy to.

The Committee agreed that this should be prioritized.  The Chairperson pointed out that the Department could make mistakes.

Mr Mnqasela said that the Department had previously privatized the document filing system. This had been greatly successful and had improved the system immensely. The benefit of this was that it could be done onsite instead of sending everything to Pretoria. However, when it was offsite it became risky. He had thought that when this was last discussed with the Department it had been agreed that this was a bad idea. He was concerned that they had taken a decision which was opposed to what the Committee had advised.

The Chairperson shared his concerns and agreed that this should be raised with the Department.

The report would be adopted in the next meeting when the IEC recommendations were included.

Final Comments
A performance monitoring and evaluation report had been circulated to some members and to DHA. It was entitled National Findings Report: June 2011 To December 2012. The Chairperson asked if all Members had received it. Some had not.

It was agreed that copies would be circulated to the Members. Not all the provinces had been included, only certain provinces were highlighted. It mentioned the lack of transport and accommodation for officials at some Ports Of Entry. The document needed to be discussed.    

The meeting was adjourned.