South African Police Service and Independent Complaints Directorate Budget 2009/10: Preparatory Workshop

Meeting report

South African Police Service Budget 2009/10: input by Portfolio Committee Researcher
The first presentation was by the portfolio committee’s researcher, Mr Mpisi. The researcher noted the Strategic Priorities for 2009/10:
▪ Ensure proper management of capital, financial, and human resources by the SAPS,
▪ Strive to improve police service delivery to communities,
▪ Intensify the fight against organized crime and corruption,
▪ Strengthen efforts aimed at combating crimes against women and children
▪ Facilitate the amalgamation of the investigating members of the DSO into the SAPS.

Mr Mpumelelo Mpisi outlined the five programmes of the department which were: Administration, Visible Policing, Detective Services, Crime Intelligence, and Protection and Security Services. A budget analysis was presented to the policy showing changes in the budget allocation to the different programmes. For Administration, the nominal change for 2008/09 was 11.61%, Visible policing 10.58% , Detective Services 13.56%, Crime Intelligence 18.31% and Protection and Security Services programme 13.72%. The real changes for 2009/10 stood at 5.90% for Administration, 4.92% for Visible Policing, Detective Services 7.74%, Crime Intelligence 12.25% and Protection and Security Services 7.89%.  The speaker highlighted that all programmes had received an increased allocation of 6.12% in real terms with intelligence receiving the highest percentage increase of 12.25, however much of the allocated funds went to Visible Policing.

The researcher pointed out that even though this budget was large, 70% of the budget went to the compensation of employees and expenditure on goods and services was estimated at around R 10.9 billion which was about 23% of the Department’s budget. The reason that Visible Policing received 19 billion was due to security preparations for the 2010 World Cup.

With regards to the sub programmes Border line Security in 2008/09 received R220 million, in the 2009/10 financial year it received R225 million. In real terms the allocation reflected a decrease of minus 3.23%.

Mr Mpisi said that crimes need to be investigated after arrest and that was where the detective services programme fitted in. The programme was to receive R7.6 billion compared to R6.7 billion that was allocated for 2008/09. This marked a percentage increase of 13.5% in nominal terms and 7.7% in real terms.

Discussion
The Chairperson asked if the outcomes were equal to the outputs. The budget had increased, but what impact would that have on outcomes?

Mr Mabaso (ANC) added that it was one thing to increase the number of police, but the Committee was interested in the outcomes. How did the department measure its outcomes?

Mr M George (COPE) pointed out that there were no SAPS representatives in the meeting to answer the questions and that the researcher was in no position to answer for the SAPS.

Mr Schneemann (ANC) agreed with Mr George, and said that the researcher was in no position to answer these questions unless the committee wanted merely his opinion.

Independent Complaints Directorate Budget 2009/10
Mr Peter Daniels (Committee Researcher) said that the ICD’s policy priorities for 2009/10 were:
▪ oversee directorate for priority crimes investigations,
▪ streamline programmes 2 and 3 identified as national priorities,
▪ increase visits by analysts to holding police cells,
▪ establish of an asset management unit,
▪ complete of old cases,
▪ increase community access,
▪ ensure retention of staff (in response to the directorate’s loss of staff).

An analysis of the ICD’s 2009/10 budget showed a nominal increase of 16.35 and a real increase of 10.58% in the ICD budget. The budget increased from R98.5 million in 2008/09 to R114.8 million in 2009/10. These funds would be split between three programmes: Administration; Complaints Processing, Monitoring and Investigation (CPM&I); and Information Management and Research (IM&R). Administration would receive R48.9 m in 2010/11 from R35.6 m in 2008/09. This large increase was done to increase capacity in Support Services and to expand Asset Management at Headquarters.

The Complaints Processing, Monitoring and Investigation programme received 48% of the total budget. Mr Daniels noted that one of the major tasks of the ICD in this programme was to monitor police compliance with the Domestic Violence Act.

The Information Management and Research Programme was set to receive R15.9m. After going through the rest of the figures presented in the briefing document, Mr Daniels discussed the key issues for parliamentary consideration. These issues were: monitoring implementation of recommendations on police action deaths, oversee the functioning of new satellite offices, monitor rates of deaths in police custody (as from 2005 there has been an increase in the number of deaths in custody). He also pointed out that the Unit had been faced with a huge backlog and thus they needed to find out where they stood with old cases.

Discussion
Ms Kohler- Barnard (DA) asked if the ICD has increased its staff numbers, because the SAPS was increasing its staff capacity.

Mr Daniels said that he was unable to this question and would get back to the committee with an answer.

Mr Schneemann asked if the issue of resignations in the ICD was a trend and what were the reasons behind the resignations.

Mr Daniels replied that there were many reasons for the resignations. However ICD was trying everything in its power to retain staff. The ICD had increased salaries and also promoted some of their staff members to ensure that they remained within the unit.

Justice and Protection Services Chief Directorate - National Treasury
Mr Rendani Randela, Director: Justice and Protection Services: National Treasury, said that one of the purposes of his unit was to monitor budgets and expenditure trends for departments on a monthly and quarterly basis. The National Treasury also evaluated policy proposals submitted by departments for additional funding.

Over the medium term, SAP’s priorities were on combating organized crime, serious and violent crime, crimes against women and children and improving service delivery to communities. Mr Rendani said that the majority of the R46.4 billion allocated to the SAPS went to the Visible Policing programme which received R19 billion. This programme was where the majority of personnel were employed. Overall the compensation of employees stood at R32 603 373 000. The allocation was influenced by the non- recurrent expenditure of R 1.3 billion on the 2010 Soccer World Cup.

Protection and Security Services was the fastest growing programme with an average annual growth of 21% over the seven year period.  Current payments had an average annual growth of 10.7 percent between 2005/06 and 2011/12.

However what stood out in the report was the fact that SAPS had received an unqualified audit report for the 2007/08 financial year despite the point that asset registers were not always properly maintained.

Discussion
Mr Schneemann (ANC) opened the discussion by asking why vehicle expenditure always remained high and why additional allocations were being asked for by the SAPS.

Mr Randela replied that there were many reasons for the allocation or non-allocation of additional funds. Sometimes they could not give the department the full amount as they depended on what was available. They thus gave priority to urgent matters and would later give a department such additional allocation. These additional allocations were not going into new projects. It was based on what the SAPS had requested.

He said that expenditure on vehicles always remained high. The more personnel the SAPS employed, the more vehicles the crime fighting division required. There was a link between the number of vehicles the unit had and the number of personnel.

Ms D Schafer (DA) asked what rights did the Portfolio Committee have with regard to addressing its dissatisfaction on matters pertaining to the budget.

Mr Randela said that the Committee had rights; they could shift money from one programme to the next.

Mr Mbesi (Portfolio Committee Researcher) asked what Treasury’s take was on the Public Private Partnership for the building of the Police Head Offices.

Mr Randela replied that in the Treasury‘s experiences, PPP were much cheaper for the government and also produced the desired results.

Ms Mocumi (ANC) asked how the SAPS received an unqualified audit report but yet there were some discrepancies  with the SAPS asset register.

Mr Randela replied that generally the situation with the asset register was understandable. The assets were not stolen or lost, it was just that they were not where they were thought to have been. For example a chair meant to be in one room could have been shifted to another room. There would only be a problem in a situation where the department could not account for something.

The Chairperson asked what about a department that received a lot of money and got unqualified audit reports but yet had very few outcomes.

Mr Randela replied that the outcomes were affected by the deployment of resources. They could increase the budget by R2 billion or more, but that would not resolve some of the problems.

The meeting was adjourned.