National School of Government & Public Service Commission mandate and challenges

Meeting report

National School of Government (NSG) on Its Readiness, Programmes, Projects & Collaborations
Prof Lekoa S Mollo, Director General of the NSG, introduced his delegation and began his presentation. He outlined the purpose and mandate of the NSG. It is a training institution listed as a national department under the control of the Minister for Public Service and Administration. Its mandate is outlined in the Public Service Amendment Act.

He outlined the NSG state of readiness. The current business model of the NSG has numerous elements which are attainable, it is a fully accredited public service training provider with recent accreditation in February 2014 valid through to February 2016. They have an in-house training needs analysis process and curriculum design and development capacity as well as in-house quality insurance and accreditation process. They also have an in-house monitoring and evaluation of training interventions including assessment of impact of application learning and they have an outsourced training delivery model through the utilisation of Independent Individual Contractors (IICs), higher education institutions and private training providers. They have 146 course available with 104 accredited and 42 non-accredited courses. They also have an eLearning strategy and platform in place. Their model is a cost recovery approach to training delivery. The revenue earned is managed through a training trading account, they also have the transfer funds from National Treasury as well as donor proceeds.

Their core focus areas where they roll out training are Induction, Administration, Management and Leadership as well as International Capacity building interventions. Partnerships core to the NSG interventions are with the Department of Public Service and Administration with regard to core competencies as articulated by them, the Public Service Commission, the Department of Monitoring and Evaluation with regard to the Management Performance Assessment Tool, the Department of Higher Education training through PSETA who accredits the NSG and its programmes and finally with the South African Qualification Authority. Of the 227 posts in the organisation they have filled 192 with only 35 vacant. There has been a moratorium in filling the vacant posts due to the changes taking place in the structure. The Minister had approved the lifting of the moratorium.

NSG, partially funded through the national budget appropriation process, has an additional budget raised by revenue collected from payments by departments upon their officials completing training. The budget must reflect revenue allocation informed by the anticipated number of enrolments and the course mix uptake. They are unable to fully recover the costs of all courses, however the profits made in other courses fund those courses which do not make a profit. The trading account and training fees charged are approved by National Treasury. Departments get their funds from training budgets. The trading account is used for training delivery and management, marketing, curriculum development, research, monitoring and evaluation and partly to pay salaries. The vote allocation for programme 1 is 138.5 million and there is a budget of 82.9 million for programme 2 and a 55.6 million transfer for the trade training account, compensation for programme 1 is 45.7 and goods and services is budget at 34.3 and 2.8 million for assets. Projected revenue for the training trading account is R186.4 million, made of money for the course fees of R126 million, interest on income of R2.2 million and transfer payment of R55.6 million from the vote. The projected expenditure on employees is 72.5 million and on goods and service 113.8 million.

The Learning and Development Framework allows for programmes to be categorised according to target groups or levels of competency. The core competencies are Financial Management, People Management and Empowerment, Programme and Project Management, Strategic Capability and Leadership and Change Management. The functional courses are department specific courses and the sectoral courses are developed with their partnerships. The Generic Competencies seen in the public service context are Human Resources, Finance, Cadre and Leadership Development, Good Governance and Service Delivery. These Generic Competencies are not seen in the general context.

Induction Training is one of their core businesses, their eLearning plays a fundamental role in administering this course. All newly appointed employees are on the compulsory induction programme. The programme is regulated by the Ministerial Directive linking probation and pa progression. There are five modules to the Programme. For senior managers have a welcoming induction process which takes two days. They will be hosting an Annual Induction Consultative Workshop which is inclusive of all provincial and sectoral academies, nine provinces and 45 national departments. This should be held at the end of September as a consultative process with stakeholders in terms of induction so they can assess the programme. There is an induction for unemployed graduates which is called Breaking Barriers to Entry in the Public Service. It is a five-day course in partnership with the National Youth Development Agency, the Department of Defence and Rural Development. In 2014/15 more than 300 rural unemployed graduates befitted from this programme. The programme has several learning outcomes.

Administration Training seeks to advance the anti-corruption, service delivery and gender mainstreaming frameworks and policies of the public service. Key partners to the programme are the Department of Public Service and Administration, Ministry for Women, Gender Commission and Justice and Corrections. Some of the programmes run are Project Khaedu for senior and middle managers, Anti-corruption course for practitioners, PAJA and PAIA with the department of justice, Gender mainstreaming programme and designing service delivery improvement plans for departments. Management Training seeks to advance the Financial Management Capacity Building, Job Access, Managing Disabilities, Human Resources and Development, Monitoring and Evaluation frameworks and policies of the public service. Key partners to this are the National Treasury, Competition Commission, Auditor General, Office of the Public Service Commission (OPSC), DPSA and DPME. The Financial Management Capacity Building Framework started in 2008 with National Treasury, the National Treasury offloaded some of its tasks to the NSG such as inventory and logistics Management. Other partners for management training are the institute of people management and the South African Monitoring and Evaluation Association as well as PSETA. Leadership Training seeks to advance the senior management handbook in the public service with the OPSC and DPSA as key partners. The Legislatures Capacity Building Programme with the speakers forum as key partner that seeks to members of parliament and legislatures postgraduate qualifications in governance and leadership on to a masters qualification.

The Training programmes rolled out with respect to service level agreements are with the Department of Rural Development and Land reform the Department of Defence, DIRCO, PSETA, eThekwini Municipality and Parliament. The Public Service Trainers Forum is a network of over 1000 HRD officials contributing to theory and practice for public service Human Resource Management through a variety of means such as provincial workshops. They have 228 full time employees who are trainers, 145 Independent Individual Contractors and ten Universities that they collaborate with to provide training services.

The NSG also has a number of International Programmes which are aligned to South Africa’s international relations policy framework, and seeks to connect the NSG to the global village of knowledge institutions as funded through National Treasury and donor proceeds. These are programmes such as the Regional Capacity Building Programme funded by CIDA and numerous courses and workshop seminars funded by South Korea and French Government.

He says The Committee must be made aware of the critical issues being faced by the NSG. He says there has been a carry-over of a business model from the 2008-2013 institution, the Public Administration Leadership and Management Academy (PALAMA) meaning they continue to operate on a cost-recovery and outsourced delivery model impacting on their ability to introduce strategic shifts to result in the desired state moving from PALAMA to the NSG. Further a stronger emphasis and alignment of programmes to the NDP and the MTSF outcomes as well as other compulsory programmes will ensure that government imperatives and developmental agenda, however this would require additional resources. Further implications of the enactment of the Public Administration Management (PAM) Bill will expand the scope of the NSG to train in local government and additional the PAM bill will impact on the legal form of the NSG and therefore its business and funding model.

Discussion
The Chairperson thanked Prof Mollo and says she can tell that he is confident in their mandate and that he believes that public servants who go through the school will understand the meaning of public service upon completion. She is happy with what she has heard and asked about the request for additional resources as new programme areas are being introduced. She asked how much they are requesting. As for the training and development of the NSG, she asked if it is based on need and whether it is aligned to government priorities, and supported the governmental agenda. She asked what direction the school will take once the PAM Bill is enacted.

Mr M Cardo (DA) asked, with regard to the previous failures, what mistakes were made and what lessons were learnt. It had previously been propositioned that in the future as of 2016 no person would be appointed to Public Service unless they had passed through the NSG. He asked if this was still the plan moving forward and what mechanisms were in place to enforce it. The NDP recommends the establishment of a formal graduate recruitment scheme for the public service and a parallel scheme in local government for mentoring and training, he asked what plans were in place to implement this. Finally in terms of the MTEF it is said that targeted measures will be put in place to support departments in attracting and developing the skills that they need, he asked for the delegation to shed light on specific measures in that regard.

Mr J McGluwa (DA) thanked the NSG and what they have done in terms of capacity building. But it is a pity looking into the future and the current state of public servants in terms of corruption, that the state of affairs is worrying and he is unsure if it will be justified to ask the department to ask their views on corruption and whether it has improved. As for the moratorium placed on the 35 posts he asked when the department intended to fill these posts given it was lifted yesterday.

Mr S Motau (DA) asked about the use of ‘cadre’ on page 17 of the presentation with respect to CADRE and leadership. The word cadre in his mind equates to the ANC and SACP and the exclusion of others who are not cadres. In the interest of social cohesion and national building they needed to avoid terms such as these and would like to hear their justification for using it. He asked about the request for funding referring to the last slide he asked if they had drawn up a plan outlining the funding model preferred and how much it would cost to do the things that they would do.

Mr A van der Westhuizen (DA) asked why training interventions had taken such a sharp decline form 50 000 to 30 000 especially in light of the fact that the public service was growing and there was an increase in need as opposed to a decrease in need. He asked why 1 in every 40 employees (rounded off) were exposed to this training in 2013/14, he asked what a realistic training target actually was. He asked about the cost of training. With respect to programmes offered through universities, he assumed they received funds from the department of higher education, and asked why it cost the NSG R5 000 a year per learner with an additional R3 000 per learner for administration costs when the various departments carried the bulk of the cost of educating these individuals. He asked what they were doing to bring down these costs. Finally he asked given SAQA is pushing for accredited training and yet the school of government only has two out of every three of its programmes accredited. He asked why this was and if they were happy with this and if not, what they planned to do about it.

Ms V Mente (EFF) asked about the absence of employee health and wellness services. She asked how they planned to incorporate this training into training offered especially under Human Resource Management. Secondly she asked how they identified their candidates for this school, how they addressed possible issues of nepotism. She asked how they rolled this down to the sphere of governance, she asked how they chose who benefitted from this training especially those that are accredited. She also asked about the decline of the number of persons trained, she wondered if this was due to outsourcing and asked what impact outsourcing had on the NSG. She asked when the state would have its own school of government and not need to outsource. She asked for clarity on the salary levels on slide 11, the last sectoral bargaining council intended to do away with levels 1-4 and yet the NSG talked about levels 1-6. They could not have a state entity employing people in a level 1 salary bracket, as this was not minimum wage.

Mr M Ntombela (ANC) asked when they intended to have filled the 35 vacant posts in programme 2. He also asked how the department initiates its programmes. He asked how they go about their curriculum development up to the stage of implementation. He also asked, with respect to the breaking barriers programme, whether the NSG followed up on its unemployed graduates to see if they were placed in the Public Service and if not what support services where in place to validate spending money to train these individuals.

Ms R Lesoma (ANC) thanked the NSG for their presentation. She referred to the word Wamkelekile saying that it was not a Xhosa word as stated in their presentation. She asked how the NSG ensured attendance by MPs when they are scheduled to attend parliament, she linked this to her question about new recruits who are in a probation period and are forced to attend the schools, when these individuals are employed with formal qualifications – what role was played by the universities in this regard. In terms of the PAM Bill and their current critical issues she agreed with the Chairperson that there needed to be greater insight into its effect. Finally she asked which areas are most required based on performance assessments in the various departments and which are the least required, especially in light of the reputation of the public service as being the most corrupt and slow in terms of delivery.

Prof Mollo thanked the Chairperson – they had taken in all what had been said and would get back to them on the issue of the resources they require. The training is needs driven and does respond to government strategies. They develop their courses in conjunction with strategic partners and relevant stakeholders, for example the finance training is developed with National Treasury and the Auditor General after looking at the gaps and they develop their programs to respond to their needs. After responding they develop a mechanism to ensure there is no reoccurrence of these gaps. The assessment management tool is handled in conjunction with the DPME however they have their own people who monitor and who are part of the performance monitoring and evaluation team. The DPME developed the tool in conjunction with the NSG. They also have their in-house training needs analysis to determine what exactly is required by their clients. They have embarked on a number of baseline studies both in municipalities and in a legislative capacity so they can use it to determine what they need to move up from. They work very hard to satisfy the development agenda. The NDP is their beacon, however their lack of resources has made it difficult for them to successfully respond to it although they have contingencies and plans to try raise the necessary funds, such as bringing on development partners and aggressive marketing.

The challenges he says are not insurmountable. They will return to address the questions about the PAM Bill. The South African Management Development Institute (SMDI) and PALAMA failed and they have indeed learnt from its mistakes. These lessons learnt, especially from PALAMA, prompted their move to transform the organisation. From SMDI, Cabinet had applied its mind after parliament made recommendations about the form of academy required, however during implementation of these recommendations such as to take the good of SMDI and build on it, to make it self-sufficient there were deviations and these deviations formed the basis of PALAMA's failures. As the new training institution, the NSG should and has learnt from these lessons; namely, that the cost recovery model is an unrealistic model to realise the vision of the NSG however it is their current model and they need to see how they can drive the process until they can get adequate resources. One of the greatest lessons learnt is that some of the outsourced training providers do not understand government, and as the school of government they look both at pre-entry and post-entry to the public service, and look how they can bring in former public service officials with experience to train. With respect to the former Minister saying that in the future no person would be admitted into public service without having passed the NSG, the letter and spirit of the induction programme indicates that even highly skilled individuals are required to attain further skills in Public Service to ensure they learn how to be servants of the people. So therefore that is still the path that every aspiring public service official must take. They do this in collaboration with local government and have specific interventions in other municipalities, where they have service level agreements for example. They work closely with COGTA. This period of transformation is exciting as they are now starting to focus on traditional affairs something they had never looked into before.

The MTSF and their outcome approach are their beacon. Working with DPME and the assessment tool is based on these outcomes. They have a function to ensure that they have departments with the requisite skills. They departments determine what they need training in. They only perform the training needs analysis when called on to do so. They can only impose when a course is compulsory such as induction and some of the courses developed in conjunction with national treasury. With respect to corruption in service delivery he says that as indicated there are minimum anti-corruption capacity building requirements in every building. They also have anti-corruption courses and where there are challenges in terms of corruption for example in supply chains they have checks and balances to minimise corruption. The NSG moratorium was declared over, it was only enacted during the change of PALAMA to school of government they were only hiring critical posts such as ICT during this transformation period. The numbers are decreasing due to the uncertainty of change, and they have taken note of things and are working and engaging with departments to reassure them in their continued existence and so result in the number of people being trained increase. In respect to the question of the use of the term CADRE, in his understanding as a former soldier that CADRE means entering into something with a partner with the same vision…

The Chairperson interrupted to ask for an Oxford definition of the word cadre

Mr Dirks responded by saying that according to the oxford definition cadre development is a group of people specially trained, just as one refers to a herd of cattle one would say a cadre of professionals. The correct English term coined by the ANC as the leading party is that they are training a group of cadre to provide service delivery.

Mr Cardo (DA) added that cadre has a variety of meanings though it has specific meanings according to Marxist theory as referring to professional revolutionaries which he thinks has made its way to ANC and SACP discourses

The Chairperson said the best reference they can use for the meaning of cadre is the oxford dictionary.

Mr Motau (DA) said he had made his point.

Mr Ntombela (ANC) said a cadre ought to be distinguished from cadre deployment, definition of cadre stays as it is a group of people organised for a particular purpose. He may be a cadre of the ANC to pursue the visions of the ANC and honourable Motau may be a cadre of the DA…

Mr Motau (DA) interrupted to say that he is not a cadre of the DA

The Chairperson said they would stand by the oxford decision the word cadre need not be aligned to the ANC and they should not interpret it in that manner. She handed back to the NSG.

Prof Mollo continued by discussing the required extra funding. Have developed a funding model and are prepared to bring it before the Committee. looking at the qualifications matrix, there are clearly necessary interventions at different levels and that the target was to have public servants at different levels attain training at the NSG. They did not have any sort of 1 in 40 or 1 in 10 goal. The argument is that it should not be compulsion that should make people attend training but rather the added value afforded to them through training at the NSG. The universities do receive funding from government but as the NSG when they collaborate with these universities they pay for those services. They have to fight for their intellectual property so that they are not dependent on a particular university to ensure that they remain in control and it often takes many negotiations to get the universities to understand their objective. The majority of their courses are accredited, with 104 of 146. The reason why some of their courses are not accredited is some of them are very short and some do not always fulfil the minimum SAQA requirements.

He talks to outsourcing saying that this is one of their weaknesses because as stated previously some of these people do not understand working in public service and in their new model they intend to address it by using people with experience in the public service. They are working hard to develop their capacity and so minimise their reliance on outsourcing, however outsourcing is not responsible for the decrease in training, that was the result of their uncertainty brought about change. With the assistance of Ms Mandisa Manjezi, the Deputy Director General of the NSG, he confirmed that they did not have anyone in their organisation at level one of the salary scale and that the lowest level of salary was level five in their organisation. They have already started out the roll-out into local government, and in preparation for the PAM Bill they have started recruiting qualified trainers with previous experience in the public service to conduct the courses. Breaking barriers to entry is worked in partnership with various departments such as the Department of Rural Development and Department of Defence. It looks to address the challenges of people not having enough skills to enter into public service. These 3000 trained people either go on to work for these departments, other departments or become a pool for human resources in the public service sphere. They take into account the formal qualifications of members who attend the NSG and do not interfere with them. The work skills programmes developed in different departments determine the skills needed and the number of people who need to be trained in what, and this information gets passed on to the NSG. This is an ongoing programme.

The Chairperson asked if the members if were satisfied with the responses thus far.

Mr van der Westhuizen (DA) said he would like further clarity in the number of persons trained and asked when they could expect to see a turnaround in this regard.

Mr Sipho Manana, NSG Acting Deputy Director General: Training Management and Delivery, addressed the remaining queries. He addressed the wellness question saying the NSG has a framework to deal with all wellness questions, they even offer courses to managers and senior managers to teach them about the impact of HIV/AIDS and its impact on the workplace. They also train HR practitioners on how to tackle the frameworks developed by government in this regard. The tripartite between themselves, Social Development and the DPSA on the issue of the numbers the impact of designing a 26 day program from a two day program, and the departments registering for a new programme contributed heavily to the dwindling numbers because looking at the graph, one sees the decline in the induction course from about 20 to 25 000 to 10 000 which was affected by a number of issues such the late introduction of the programme to the departments, post submission of their budgets and the lengthy preparation time. They are seeing a peak in these programmes and are mindful that their other programmes need to be taken up by members in-service and there are marketing efforts to work on these programmes.

The Chairperson thanked the NSG for their presentation.

Public Service Commission on its Mandate & Role in Strengthening Oversight Role of Parliament
Mr Ben Mthembu, PSC Chairperson, outlined the power afforded the PSC as well as the mandate imposed on it by the constitution. He further elaborated on their role and legislative mandate which are derived from Sections 195 and 196 of the Constitution which is further elaborated in Public Service Commission Act, 1997, Public Service Act, 1994 and Public Finance Management Act, 1999, read with the Treasury Regulations. The PSC is accountable to the National Assembly and interacts with Parliament and the Provincial Legislatures regularly, reporting on its activities and the performance of its functions as required by sections 196(4)(e) and 196(6) of the Constitution. The PSC’s main objective is to provide effective technical oversight over the public service nationally and provincially. The PSC is composed of 14 members, 9 of whom were nominated by the premier and the other 5 nominated by the NCOP for appointment by the president. The President designates one commissioner as chairperson and another as deputy chairperson of the PSC. The SPC is supported by provincial officer in the various provinces. The chief stake holders are The Executive, institutions supporting democracy, consultative forums, strategic partners such as NGOs, departments and organised labour.

The strategic goals of the PSC for the period 2009 to 2014 are geared towards the promotion of good governance for a successful developmental state and improved performance of government in equitable service delivery. This is achieved by way of three key goals. The outcomes are to improve service delivery and ensure that it meets standards of equity, effectiveness, efficiency and economy. The first goal is good governance in developmental public administration. The second goal is improved service delivery and the third goal is institutional development of the PSC. The outputs are the public service barometer, the state of the public service, citizen’s forums, investigations, inspections, resolution of grievances, Research on public admin practices, Advice on Performance Agreements of Heads of Departments, Evaluation of Heads of Departments, Management of the Financial Disclosure Framework, Management of the NACH, Citizen Satisfaction Surveys. These outputs are regarded as tools that the Portfolio Committees can utilise in performing their oversight function over national and provincial government.

The PSC structure is divided into four key programmes: The Administration programme, the Leadership and Management Practice, the Monitoring and Evaluation programme and the Integrity and Anti-Corruption Programme. The mandate has been further broken down into six key performance areas. Labour Relations Improvement which entails looking at Public Service labour relations and practices enhanced through timely investigation of all properly referred grievances and provision of best practices. Leadership and Human Resource Reviews seek to identify and promote sound Human Resource Management Practices in public administration. Governance monitoring which seeks to provide institutional assessments and programme evaluations that support policy and management decisions. Service delivery and compliance evaluations which seek to provide participative evaluations as well as evaluations of service delivery models and processes to support policy and management decisions. Public Administration Investigations which seeks to investigate and improve public administration practices and to make recommendations to departments on the promotion of good governance and issue directions regarding compliance with the Public Service Act, 1994. Lastly, Professional Ethics which seeks to promote ethical conduct amongst public servants through the management of the Financial Disclosure Framework (FDF), the NACH and provide advice on professional and ethical conduct in the Public Service.

He discussed how Parliament processes the PSC's outputs. The PSC report is tabled and referred to the portfolio committees who deliberate on the report and pass resolutions to ensure compliance. He suggested ways that the Portfolio Committee could utilize the PSC outputs. For example, they could request written submissions from departments. They could hold interactive meetings with departments to account for the progress made in implementing the PSC recommendations. The PSC can make presentations on the report to assist the PCs; they could raise parliamentary questions to obtain responses from departments. And further, in order to supplement the PSC’s reports, information could be sourced through public hearings or inspections at departments.

He went on to discuss the issues facing the PSC that require attention. The PSC feels that the Portfolio Committee as a key stakeholder could contribute to the PSC’s vision of being a champion of public administration excellence in democratic governance in South Africa. It could enable the PSC to play a more meaningful role in the creation of a professional public service. He felt that the power held by the Portfolio Committee to call the executive to account was incredibly useful and for example the instance where the Portfolio Committee called on the executive to account for non-submission of Head of Department performance agreements. This proved very useful as most Executives complied immediately after being called to account. This is a practice the PSC wishes to see continued. On the issue of joint oversight in provinces, he felt that it could be improved if the PSC were involved in planning of these oversight visits more timeously so that its work programme could be aligned with that of the PC prior to embarking on the oversight. The PSC provides evidence-based information relating to the areas the oversight visits would focus on for example in the North West in 2006. This is an effective collaboration, the PSC provides reports so that the Committee can properly interact with the community. The PSC also conducts inspections to service delivery sites as part of its work programme and produces reports on findings and makes recommendations that are forwarded to the Executive to address. The PC may be invited to be part of these inspections if it so wishes. Otherwise the recommendations emanating from these inspections will be presented to the PC once the reports on the inspections are finalized.

On citizen’s forums piloted in 2005 in the Eastern Cape and Mpumalanga, they are unique to South Africa, and similar to Operation Phakisa it is very useful and involves participation and the quick retrieval of results. It can improve service delivery and ensure participation by citizens in their own development. With respect to the PSC alignment with Chapter 13 of the NDP, it provides that consideration should be given to the following to strengthening the role for the PSC to make it a robust champion of a meritocratic public service by promoting and monitoring key norms and standards. Further, consideration should also be given to whether the PSC’s mandate should be extended to include the primary responsibility for setting key norms and standards, especially for recruitment processes. The PSC should play a direct role in the recruitment of the most senior posts. In order for the PSC to play a direct role as envisaged in the NDP, this would require amendments to legislation because there is no provision giving powers to the current PSC. The PSC can play a role in the professionalisation and creation of a meritocratic public service and they submit this to the Committee for their approval.

With respect to the implementation of Parliament Resolutions, in November 2011, the National Assembly adopted as its resolutions the following recommendations of the Portfolio Committee with regards to the PSC: that the PSC reports on the implementation of Section 195(1) by the administration of all spheres of government, organs of state and public enterprises in South Africa every year; that the PSC report is contained in the annual report of the entity that the PSC is reporting on every year; that the National Assembly seeks to locate the budget of the PSC with Parliament’s budget vote and that the Speaker of the National Assembly should, in future, refer the PSC’s reports to Committees for consideration and report. In order to implement these resolutions, the PSC would require further resources as they will only be able to implement the resolution in an incremental manner. Further the PSC is in a process of developing a roadmap to progressively realise the resolution of Parliament and in order for the PSC to fully implement the resolution, such as the promotion of democratic values and principles in all spheres of government, this would require legislative amendments. He called on the Portfolio Committee for further guidance on this.

He concluded by acknowledging the importance of a positive working relationship with the Portfolio Committee and said that the PSC believes that strengthening the relationship with the Portfolio Committee would serve as a catalyst to effective oversight over the Executive and the Administrative arms of government. Through its products and outputs, the PSC would enable the PCs to perform its political oversight roles over the Executive. Lastly, the PSC looks forward to fruitful engagements with the PCs and to strengthening working relations with the Committees

Discussion
The Chairperson thanked the PSC for the presentation, saying that the Committee looked forward to a fruitful working relationship with the PSC. She alerted the members to a letter sent to them by the PSC in apology for the incident in the last meeting. The PSC should indicate which of their key issues were a priority in order that they may assist the PSC accordingly. They noted the good relationship the PSC held with the previous committee and said that the current committee is dedicated to upholding this tradition especially with respect to the task of oversight. She raised a comment on slide 20 asking for the number of reports tabled on an annual basis as this would help with recommendations and for assistance from the committee. She asked if the PSC is happy with the execution of the recommendation made to the public service on issues that needs to be rectified. She asked if the public service was affording the Commission the support required. On their strengths and weaknesses regarding approaching and conducting monitoring and evaluation, she asked if they were able to produce meaningful results and if they had the capacity to conduct these investigations. She asked for the main causes behind the deterioration of their ethical standards and accountability in the public service and what needed to be done to address this particularly in provincial departments. She asked about strengthening the role of the PSC with respect to the NDP and asked how they would market their work to provincial legislatures and if possible to municipal councils. She asked what their relationship was with local government. She asked about their role in ensuring that competent senior public servants were appointed especially in provincial departments and local government.

Mr Cardo (DA) asked what the plans were to enforce the recommendations enshrined in the NDP regarding the strengthening of the PSC oversight role in the absence of political will to give them greater powers of enforcement. The NDP chapter 13 on public service revolves around shielding public service from political interference and one of the measures in this regard is to create an administrative head of the public service, that is to say a super Director General in the presidency. He asked if they supported this idea and if so how they have envisaged the role and if the idea was to isolate the public service form political interference would it not be easier to scrap the cadre deployment policy. Finally with respect to the NDP suggestion that the PSC play a more involved role in the appointment of senior officials in public service such as heads of department, he asked if they supported this idea and what it meant for the rights of Ministers and Director Generals to choose their own heads of departments.

Mr McGluwa (DA) thanked the PSC for the presentation, he talked about enforcement of compliance by the PSC relating to technical oversight. They are facing a position where the country is 93 billion rand in debt and the primary reason for this, and the most common misbehaviour by public servants is financial misconduct and irregular expenditure and when the PSC visited the first time they started that as far as their recommendations are concerned they cannot do anything because some of these recommendations are not implemented by the various departments. The legacy report by the 4^th parliament highlights a need to increase the budget to allow the PSC to do its work in all sphere of government however in 2009 and 2010 criminal proceedings increased by 22% in various departments it went down by 2% for the 2011 financial year however 28% of those cases did not give way to criminal charges and that related to the fact that the PSC hands this off and 40% of departments could not say whether the cases gave rise to criminal charges. He asked why they would seek to expand their empire. The Committee would have a workshop but that he was very curious that the PSC submits all cases to this committee and that this committee, mandated by the Constitution enforces its powers as far as monitoring and oversight is concerned and so therefore he felt that it was necessary to have all these actions. In his province, the committee has made recommendations and yet nothing has been done months later. So he would like them to be presented with all the cases in their workshop so that they could have a discussion on this and get back to the PSC about it.

The Chairperson said that they would find a separate time to look at cases

Mr Motau (DA) referred to page 21 of the slides and aligned himself to the plea made by the previous chair of the commission to help them enforce their recommendations. He asked how the PSC envisaged the power that they had to enforce their decisions, otherwise there was no point to having an investigation commission that could be ignored. He was bothered by the PSC's need for the Committee's support to have their recommendations attended to.

The Chairperson asked what the stumbling blocks were to them achieving their constitutional mandate.

Mr Van der Westhuizen (DA) asked if the PSC had undertaken any investigations into allegations of political interference in the appointment of cadres in government and if so what were the findings and if not, why not. He asked about any investigations into political interference in issues such as the distribution of social service for example where it has been reported that during certain elections the department of social services will give special attention to certain areas of the country and if they have not conducted such an investigation since it is their duty to protect the public service from such allegations.

Ms Mente (EFF) emphasized the question raised by Mr Mcgluwa in terms of cases that are ignored and the protection that the PSC has to enforce their recommendations. The Constitution itself mandates that the PSC is protected and the portfolio committee has to ensure they are protected in their struggle to enforce their recommendations. The Constitution clearly outlines that no favour should be afforded to anyone for one's alignment to a political party. Thus they should not feel scared to table certain recommendations that are ignored due to the force of political will. She asked them to clarify what is meant by the Public Service Barometer. She asked about organised labour as a stakeholder, speaking to the tendency in organised labour for collective agreements to not be implemented and asked how they as the PSC address this. She welcomed the citizen’s forum as they give clear information to the people about what the government is actually doing.

Mr Dirks (ANC) requested that in the future the PSC reports all their cases to the Committee, as well as all transgression from PSC recommendations. The Committee was the means by which they could see that PSC recommendations are enforced. There was no need to make this about politics because regardless of party or affiliation everyone wanted to see the country improve and that was what this was about. Some of the questions put to the PSC should be put to the ANC directly, and that as the ANC they would give assistance to the poor before after and during elections and they were not ashamed about it and that they had nothing to hide. He supported the call for an investigation by the PSC.

Mr Mthembu responded by thanking the Chairperson for her kind words regarding their work. With respect to the requests for reports they have prepared all their reports since 1999 and that whilst some of the reports may be old they are still relevant and that the members could go through them at their leisure and when they are ready they can call the PSC back to present. With respect to the execution of PSC recommendations, he would concur with their observations and he appreciates the support echoed by the members in allowing them to bring to them their problems. They have emphasised and still emphasise that they are there to provide critical support and recommendations and if the Portfolio Committee aids them in enforcing them, results are forthcoming and so they truly welcome The Committee’s support. That said, with respect to some of the issues raised, looking at their mandate it is very clearly that their role is to recommend, advice, direct and report. The PSC's power is mostly persuasive currently because their recommendations require engagement and interaction as well as very well compiled reports. He recommendations are often adhered to and when they are not they will report, the only area in which they have the power to direct is to given direction on personnel matters. They do not have the power to enforce but to direct to a limited degree.

They will have a workshop to explain the process around direction and how it links to the National Development Plan. With respect to chapter 13 recommendations, they have placed them before the Portfolio Committee and some of these recommendations were developed by way of their own research such as the request for a head of civil service to try and mitigate the unhealthy relationship between political heads and administrative heads. This can only be mediated if they separate political accountability from bureaucratic accountability. Heads of department have political accountability in terms of policy but in terms of bureaucratic accountability there must be a head of civil service and the PSC supports the creation of the so called super Director General, a head of civil service who can deal with career incidences and bureaucratic issues involving heads of Department. The issue about the need to adjust the recommendations to fit the South African context because the political configuration of South Africa is unlike that of other countries and so there is a need to conduct further studies into this so that they can have a context specific solution and this will hopefully be done by 2016/17.

On the issue of recruitment prior to the new dispensation brought about the 1996 Constitution, there was a Public Service Commission which did not have the powers to make policy or to recruit. This PSC requires constitutional and legislative amendments because the current Constitution in terms of chapter 10 clearly outlines the powers of the PSC. It is a watchdog, and so it is not proper for the PSC to be both a player and referee at the same time. They cannot appoint and conduct oversight at the same time otherwise they must change the legislative framework. There is a need for the Portfolio Committee to see whether this is desirable and if so how they will change it otherwise the PSC is comfortable as they are expected to be guided by the government to be impartial, to be neutral without fear or favour so any political dispensation will be abided to by the PSC. Certain compromises can be made depending on the debates going around that issue. He calls on other members of his delegation to respond to some of the other questions.

Prof Richard Levin, PSC Director General, addressed the question on the Public Service Barometer saying that what they have done with this was to take the values and principles in section 195 of the Constitution and developed certain indicators and drew on official information. It is an instrument that can turn around quite quickly because they are using official information such as reports from National treasury and use it to compile information to show the indicators for example in professional ethics they look at the financial disclosure framework and the management of corruption complaints coming from the corruption hotline, financial misconduct reports from departments and this gives them a sense of the performance of a department in relation to their constitutional responsibilities. They do the same for all these constitutional values and principles.

Mr Mthembu added that the institute is becoming very popular within the provinces such as KZN and Gauteng because they can provide a picture, very quickly, on how service is being doled out in these communities. So this is one tool that has proven to be very effective.

Mr Mike Seloane, PSC Commissioner, discussed some of their work in provinces. In 2004 they engaged with stakeholders of the PSC such as the executive, provincial legislation and even municipalities and made use of the barometer to give them the state of the public service in each province with respect to the administration of constitutional values and principles. They are doing this in all provinces, and have covered 6 provinces thus far. In these discussions local government were most interested in the work of the PSC at that level but the PSC are constrained by the legislative mandate however there is a nothing that stops them, on the request by local government, to work with them on issues that concern them. With respect to the speed at which the investigation of cases are handled and why departments do not deal with these cases on financial misconduct and the like, they are finalising a report on the state of integrity in the public service that will look at issues of minimum anti-corruption and capability, conflict of interest, promotion of the code of conduct and this report will be finalised within the next month and tabled to parliament so they can look at the capacity of all departments both national and provincial as far as integrity is concerned.

Mr Matome Mawasha, PSC Commissioner, spoke to their monitoring and evaluation and said that they have a number of products, the state of the public service report is to give a global overview of the public service based on the work that they have done over the course of the year. They also do programme specific evaluations and have done a number in the various provinces sometimes on an issue basis and sometimes when they would look into specific sectors they would look at groups of departments across the national and provincial departments within a particular sector to allow them to look at particular issues and programmes within that sector. The fundamental guiding principle for the PSC is to enforce constitutional values and principles and they have over and above the SOPS a monitoring and evaluation framework that is indicator based and takes all the values and principles and subjects the departments or groups of departments to those indicators so that they are able to come to a conclusion about whether the department is complying. The resolution of parliament referred to emanated from the recommendations of the SOPs and this work, parliament said they need to be able to do a comparison on the performance of departments from one year to the next and should feature in the Annual Report of a department but there would be issues of capacity and this is why they are saying they need to look to an incremental approach to implementing this recommendation of parliament. The Committee may assist when it comes to making a decision about resources in light of the decision by parliament. If they are required to be able to assess departments over time on a comparative basis they need to look at the capacity of the PSC to implement this.

Ms Moira Marais-Martin, PSC Commissioner, spoke about how they conduct their work. Regarding the questioned raised by the issue of financial misconduct, in terms of the Public Finance Management Act, Heads of Department are required to report to the PSC all completed cases of financial misconduct in the various departments and then the PSC issues a report that highlights the number of cases across government reported to them and the PFMA makes provisions to have this money returned that is linked to financial misconduct. These are not matters enforceable by the PSC, and it is the responsibility for the department to recuperate these losses as this is what the law dictates. If it is revealed that there were unethical and dishonest practises including fraud they are supposed to report these matters to the police, when the PSC report is made public they go back to these departments to find out how and if they have recovered the lost money and most often they have not. A few years ago, the PSC would present to the various executive authorities (EAs) how much money has been lost by government by departments in the particular province by way of financial misconduct. It is in this manner that the PSC make departments aware and hopefully encourage them to take the necessary steps to ensure that government does not lose more money and to have lost money returned. It would be useful if this report could be presented to The Committee as this would give them a province by province over view on what has been found out and what has been presented back to EAs and to what extent EAs have acted on this. It is in this way that the PSC can become an institution more able to enforce its recommendations because they would like to make use of all avenues of persuading and bringing something to the public domain. It is not just about taking their reports to the media but about taking responsible actions to encourage departments to take the necessary steps to see the money returned. These are some of the recommendations the PSC would like to bring to the Portfolio Committee to help them to enforce and realise their recommendations to bring EAs before The Committee and hold them accountable for their inaction. This would allow the PSC to do the legwork which could assist The Committee to see the necessary oversight is strengthened over the administration.

Mr Mthembu resumes and addressed the question regarding the strengths and weaknesses of the PSC around investigations. They do have experience in investigations in public administration, complaints around appointments and certain malpractices however the disadvantage the perception that if one gets some of the PSC’s more experienced professionals they can improve so quite a few of the PSC’s more experienced professionals have moved on to other institutions and so they now have to start afresh in building their capacity and this is a challenge. On the issue of recommendations they are about to complete a report on the extent which their recommendations are being implemented and they will share this with the Committee to give them a picture on the extent to the efforts made by the PSC to ensure that their recommendations are implemented. With regard to food parcels, they have not investigated this issue but they will adhere to the request by The Committee to look into it.

Prof Levin addressed the question raised by The Chairperson regarding what some of the main courses were for declining ethical standards, especially in provinces and this may emanate poor discipline management and lack of consequences and this is one of the issues that the PSC looks in to.

The Chairperson asks if this is a consequence of cadre deployment

Prof Levin responded that they have done a bit of work in relation to Chapter 13 and have benchmarked it against a number of countries and the OECD reports show that the USA has the highest number of cadre deployments in terms of the political administrative interface, political appointments at the top three levels, so the discipline management is not a consequence of cadre deployment.

The Chairperson asked the members if they were satisfied.

Mr Van der Westhuizen (DA) raised two issues. He congratulated the Chairperson on completing her honours at the University of Pretoria. He asked about the upcoming workshop.

The Chairperson responded that they would address this in their house-keeping discussions. She thanked the PSC for their presentation.

Meeting adjourned.