Thank you, Chairperson. The reply is yes. With regard to the first part of the question, the reply is not applicable. With regard to the second part of the question, the following measures have been put in place to address drugs, including tik in the Western Cape.Drugs are addressed by means of a three-pronged approach, namely proactive policing, investigation and social crime prevention.
Minister, as part of your measures to combat drug dealing specifically at manufacturing sites in the Western Cape, are police officers being trained in the specialist skills that they need? They need hazmat skills and specialist training to take down methamphetamine laboratories - meth labs - because it's a toxic environment that is very explosive.
It is different to your normal manufacturing sites. Are they receiving that kind of treatment; because it is dangerous to their own safety to go in with loaded weapons and so on? So, I just wanted to know whether police officers are, as part of the measures to combat drug trafficking in the Western Cape, and specific to the Western Cape problem of methamphetamine or tik, actually receiving that necessary training.
Chairperson, all our officers are trained on how to handle issues of drugs in our country because if you don't do that you have a problem of police officers coming across drugs, but because they are not trained they are not able to deal with the situation. I think one of the issues is that if police are not ready to do that they are able to cordon off the area and then call the necessary expertise to come and comb the area.
So, we have police officers who are specialising in matters of drugs. But not only that, we also have them in the area of information gathering because the drug problem in the Western Cape is something for which you need to set up special task teams in order to deal with it and that is what we are doing. Hence, we are seeing a successful process in retrieving drugs in various areas, including the different laboratories which you find throughout South Africa.
Also, the success in dealing with the issue of tik in the Western Cape is currently rocketing. Unfortunately it is an issue which cannot be a police matter alone. We need communities to help us because these issues happen and drugs are being smuggled within communities. Members of communities are the ones who understand who is a drug-lord, who buys, who sells.
All that kind of information you find within the communities. So, participation by communities in giving information to the police is very critical for us to have a successful operation within the Western Cape.
Thank you, Chairperson. Can the Minister please tell us what these measures are that she refers to make sure that the police are properly trained and have these measures been sharpened to ensure that police actually concentrate on eradicating drug trafficking rather than arresting peaceful marchers in the campaign against drugs, as happened recently?
Chairperson, the police have to do their job at all times. Those who decide to be provocative and engage in illegal marches will also be arrested because they are breaking the law. Also, those who think that they will continue to support illegal actions, the police will definitely have to take action against them. They are not just focusing on trying to eradicate and combat drug trafficking and drug abuses but all those who do wrong things must be brought to book. That's the work and the function of the police. [Interjections.]
Order! Hon Watson, would you please allow the hon Minister a chance to respond to your question?
Chairperson, the point that the Minister raised about needing the eyes and ears of the community is a very valuable one. I would like to know whether you are appointing additional staff because in so many areas, particularly the one in which I work, the people know exactly where the tik houses are and yet no action is taken against these people. If the police are made aware by the community, what do you do next? Are you appointing additional staff or how are you dealing with this to accept the information that you were given which is very valid?
Chairperson, I would just say that employment of additional police or staff is not going to change the environment because now you have more policing and information flowing from communities will be better managed. The issue currently is that we have staff and we are continuously improving in employing or adding more to our police capacity.
The issue of communities where you work who know who sells tik, who runs a laboratory, I think you, as a member of a legislature and of this House also have a responsibility of making sure that you assist those communities in collating information and giving it to the relevant authorities, because in that way we will make sure that we prevent those individuals who are involved in drug smuggling on a day-to day-basis.
So, I am just saying to you that it doesn't help us to employ more police officers when that information that you know about is not passed on to the police. I believe the success of combating drugs in our country will be successful on the basis of information brought forward by you as a member of the legislature.
Thank you, Chairperson. Minister, the problem is just that the information has been passed on not only by me to policing forums and to the officers concerned but by the community. The problem is that no action is taken against the druglords. This is why I am saying perhaps we need additional staff. I know it's a difficult issue but the information is coming in and what the police are doing with it and whether they are actually following it up, that is the big question: There is no effective policing in that regard.
Hon Minister, you do not need to answer the question because it is a new question.
I just want to say to the hon Chairperson, given the fact that she's got such crucial information, I would suggest to the member to give us that information so that we are able to investigate.
Assessment of fitness levels of police officers
138. Mr Z C Ntuli (ANC) asked the Minister of Safety and Security:
(1) whether police officers undergo fitness tests; if not, why not;
(2) how are the police officers who have graduated from training colleges and are carrying out their policing duties, keeping themselves fit;
(3) whether his department is benefiting from such exercise; if not, what is the department planning to do; if so, how?CO1783E
Chairperson, the answer to Question 138 is: Firstly, yes, all functional police officials are required to undergo the street survival assessment programme at least once a year, which includes three modules of assessments, namely, knowledge of health and fitness, legal principles and use of firearms; units performing medium to high risk duties, for example, the dog unit, national intervention unit, special task force and air wing; and they are exposed to fitness training on a more regular basis.
Secondly, the department will benefit from such exercises by our members by having an acceptable standard of physical fitness among all police personnel.
Chairperson ...
Phini likaNgqongqoshe, bengifuna ukwazi nje mayelana namaphoyisa la asemadala okungaselula ukuthi avocavoce umzimba ukuthi ngabe ikhona yini indlela abangaqeqeshwa ngayo ukuze bakwazi ukuyozisebenza bona njengoba kwenza abezokuvikela? Umbiko esiwutholile ngamasosha la asuke esekhulile owokuthi ayaqeqeshwa ukuthi akwazi ukuzenzela imisebenzi emakhaya njengozivulela amabhizinisi amancane. Ngabe ukhona uyini umqondo onjalo lapha emaphoyiseni? Ngiyabonga. IPHINI LIKANGQONGQOSHE WEZOKUPHEPHA NOKUVIKELA: Ngiyabonga lungu lale Ndlu. (Translation of isiZulu paragraphs follows.)
[Deputy Minister, I just wanted to know whether there is a programme to train those policemen who are old and cannot be physically trained so that they can start their own businesses as is done in Defence. The reports we get about the old soldiers is that they are trained so that they will be able to start their own businesses at home. Is there such an idea in the Police Service?
Thank you, hon member of this House.]
Chairperson, I agree with Minister Balfour, I think what I need to do is pick up this Deputy Minister and talk to Minister Balfour and lock him up. [Laughter.] He is very destructive.
Engingakusho ukuthi emaphoyiseni asinalo uhlelo olufana nolwezokuvikela ... [What I can say is that in the Police Service ... we do not have such a programme ...]
... where our members when they are old, can be provided with extra training to start their own private businesses. We do not have that kind of a programme because it is not part of our core business. I think the difference between us and the Defence Force is that police officers are in the police force until the age of 60. We have a programme which tends to recognise the various experiences and skills which the police have until they reach the age of 60.
As we all know, at the age of 60 or 65 one has to go on retirement, so we follow that normal procedure or process but in general those old police officers whom you might call old, are very critical due to the experience they have and they're better off. I know you might be talking about some of them who might be obese. [Laughter.]
We might have those who have health problems. We put them on a programme of trying to help them healthwise and if they are physically unfit, unfortunately, we have to find a way of boarding them from the Police Service. We don't have a programme that allows them or helps them to be trained maybe to have small businesses later in life. It is not within the police competency.
Chairperson, very good - Deputy Chair. I think practice makes perfect!
IPhini likaNgqongqoshe, le mpendulo yakho iyangigqugquzela futhi ivusa ugqozi. Into engifuna ukuyazi ukuthi yini indaba emaphoyiseni ningakwazi ukuthi nisebenzise ubuningi bezinto njengendawo yokuzivocavoca, ngoba siyazi ukuthi lo msebenzi unengcindezi enkulu okuholela ekutheni bazidubule nokunye kanti uma engaya ezindaweni zokuzivocavoca kungehlisa incindezi yomsebenzi futhi kwehle nezisu ezikhulu lezi ukuze abukeke kahle ngoba phela kufanele bebheke nezigebengu futhi bazigijimise.
Uma ngabe isisu sisikhulu kakhulu, kuba nzima ukugijima. Ngisho ukuthi-ke njengoba siwuhulumeni, sizama ukuthi sithole amanani aphansi ukuze abantu baye ezindaweni zokuzivocavoca ngaphandle kokuhlukumezeka. Ngiyabonga. (Translation of isiZulu paragraphs follows.)
[Deputy Minister, your response is very encouraging. What I would like to know is why you do not use available resources in the Police Service such as the gym because we all know that this line of work is stressful which leads policemen to shoot themselves? If they could go to the gym, the stress levels due to their work could go down. They could also get rid of their big stomachs so that they look good and are able to keep up with criminals.
If they have big stomachs, it becomes difficult. I am saying that, as government, we are trying to negotiate low prices so that the police could go to these gyms for training. Thank you.]
Chairperson, I wholly agree with the member. It is one of the issues which we are considering and trying to address. I don't want to dwell too much on the issue of wellness and fitness within the Police Service but we are looking into that. Because we are talking about a very large institution or organisation that could spread all over the country, we have to make sure that in all corners of South Africa our members will be able to get that particular service.
If you look at the current situation, if we have to enter into discussions and negotiations, we must also consider that there are outskirt areas. Our members in those areas need also to get such facilities. We are looking into that. We hope in about a year or two or by the end of next year we will have managed to strike some arrangement with various fitness clubs where our members can participate at a reasonable rate.
Position regarding possible merger of Judicial Service Commission and Magistrate's Commission
139. Kgoshi M L Mokoena (ANC) asked the Minister for Justice and Constitutional Development:
(1) Whether it is necessary to have the Judicial Services Commission separate from the Magistrates' Commission; if not, what is the position in this regard; if so, what are the relevant details;
(2) whether it will serve a good purpose to combine the two commissions into one entity; if not, what will the problem be; if so, when can this be expected to happen?CO1788E
Chair, may I start by saying although Deputy Minister George hasn't said anything to me yet, I can agree with my colleagues that it would be a good idea if he was arrested and put in prison! [Laughter.]
Secondly, may I thank the hon Kgoshi Mokoena for the question. The answer to this is quite easy: Clearly, we do not want and we do not have to have two different commissions. In time we will have to create one commission to deal with the appointments of judges and magistrates, but of course we must remember that the fact that there are two commissions is a quirk of history. These institutions were created in a different time and space within the democratisation of our country.
The Magistrates' Commission, you will recall, was created by the apartheid government in 1993, just before the new government. They saw the writing on the wall and just before the new government came into place they quickly got rid of magistrates as public servants and put them under the auspices of the Magistrates Commission.
The principle of that is correct, but the manner in which they did it was wrong. It was rushed and it took the magistrates out of a legal framework in which they fitted and put them in a vacuum.
A lot of problems we're experiencing today with the magistracy in terms of discipline and rules and regulations which aren't applicable - because those that did apply were pulled out of there and new ones weren't put in place - are because of this.
Furthermore, the Judicial Service Commission was created in a completely different time in history. It was created when we had started our negotiations. We wanted a new mechanism to appoint judges so that the old mechanism under apartheid, whereby judges were appointed by the executive, would be changed, and we created the Judicial Service Commission to do that.
The other thing which we must also remember is that a lot of other functions that government used to perform in terms of the magistracy have now been made a function of the Magistrates' Commission, for example, transfers and a whole lot of issues around their salaries and so on. So, these two institutions were created for different reasons at different times.
However, as you know, the policy of the government is to create a single judiciary that must as far as possible treat all judicial officers the same. So this issue that we inherited from the people who colonised us and created a different judiciary and magistracy must be done away with together with all the artificial barriers that were created along with it.
So, in due time the policy is to create one institution; but as I've said, because they were created at different times and with different effects and so on, it's not going to be that easy.
In this policy document we're looking at the moment in the department to deal with all policy issues surrounding the judiciary, this is one of the matters that will be dealt with. So in time there will definitely be one commission but it will take a bit of time for us to get there.
Steps to address complaints about poor service rendered by Legal Aid Board 140. Mr S Shiceka (ANC) asked the Minister for Justice and Constitutional Development:
(1) Whether her department is addressing the complaints raised by people, including awaiting-trial prisoners, about the poor service rendered by the Legal Aid Board; if not, why not; if so, what action has been taken in this regard;
(2) whether she will make a statement on the matter? CO1790E
Thank you, Chairperson, and thank you to the hon Shiceka for this question.
Improving service delivery across the board is something that government continuously strives for, including those services afforded to it by the Legal Aid Board. The Minister has continued to engage with the department and related bodies such as the board and the National Prosecuting Authority in this regard. These engagements obviously also touched on matters such as access to sufficient services and complaints on or perceived lack and/or low standards of service delivery in some areas.
I wish to inform hon members that considerable progress has been made by the board in terms of service delivery and the way in which it is perceived and markets itself.
The following are interventions and monitoring tools introduced by the board to improve service delivery: firstly, a client-focused programme which comprises complaint registers, suggestion boxes and an ethics hotline managed by an independent company. Secondly, senior legal aid legal practitioners do random court observations on actual court work. This assists supervisors in reviewing the quality of work of practitioners.
Thirdly, once a year the Legal Aid Board contracts an external legal practitioner to make an assessment of the quality of work done by its in- house lawyers and the results thereof are assisting the Legal Aid Board in improving their monitoring systems.
Fourthly, legal aid justice centre executives periodically interact with Justice cluster stakeholders, including judges, magistrates and prosecutors to engage on matters of common interest, as well as to get feedback on the performance of the lawyers under the Legal Aid Board.
Lastly, awaiting-trial prisoners are visited once every two months through the Legal Aid Board prison-linked project. The visits are meant to reaffirm the mandate of the Legal Aid Board to assist awaiting-trial prisoners so that they can take an informed position on deciding who is to represent them in a matter.
In conclusion, we also want to congratulate and commend the board for its unqualified audit report it has received once again.
So, what is important here is that there can be no doubt in a big organisation such as the Legal Aid Board. It has a budget of R500 million with 56 legal aid centres and a lot of work being done by lawyers, so clearly there's going to be a difference in the level of work that is performed.
It has to be through training and monitoring systems that we better that, and also, particularly, that members of this House, when they do their oversight work, tell us where there're weaknesses in the system because I do not accept the criticism that all lawyers of the Legal Aid Board are bad. Of course that's nonsense. You get good ones and then you also get some bad ones.
I also think we must be careful of this criticism because, clearly, a legal aid system - if you go and study any legal aid system anywhere in the world, I don't care if it's in the richest country you can find - per se is geared to give legal representation but not legal representation at a senior counsel level.
I mean, there is no system in the world that does that. Clearly, legal aid practitioners are, in some instances, relatively junior. In some instances they are, of course, more experienced but the important thing is that we must monitor it.
Please, members, bring to our attention where you find weaknesses, for example we've been told that Mafikeng's legal aid centre is particularly weak and is having problems, and so on. So we'll go and investigate and talk with the Legal Aid Board to have a look at that. So we'll try and keep on making the work that they provide more professional and, of course, better than it is now. So please, we do request information wherever you find that.
Chairperson, I would like to put it to the Minister that when we were doing the oversight visits to the provinces, wherever we went we found that the Legal Aid Board officials themselves complained that they were using junior officers, some of whom are fresh out of school. Can he elaborate why particularly the Legal Aid Board must get the junior people fresh out of school?
You're naughty, you know! I mean, they are doing those jobs and if they come and complain to Parliament about these things, it's really foolish of them. We must realise that it's not just them, it's the prosecutors as well. When prosecutors are employed, they don't necessarily employ people with five years' experience. They employ the people who have just come out of school.
In fact, if we want to complain we should complain about the prosecuting authority. In Gauteng, for example - Mr Shiceka would know this - in many of our regional courts we now have prosecutors with two years' experience. Because of the high turnover of prosecutors - there is a question about that coming later - we have that problem. So it's a general problem in our system. I mean, the Legal Aid Board mustn't try and make as if they're precious about this. That's number one.
Number two: It's the Legal Aid Board that's responsible for training their people, for keeping their people and for giving them the best opportunities. So, I say again: a legal system anywhere - I'll challenge anyone to go anywhere in the world - of course, stretches its money as much as it can to get as many lawyers as it can to assist people, but nowhere in the world does legal aid provide money for senior advocates or senior lawyers and upwards.
The system has a built-in problem in that it, of course, attracts a lot of young people into the system but we must remember that instead of having no legal representation at all, which is really bad news, at least they have a lawyer with, hopefully, the basic lawyers' skills who can at least help them with their cases.
But I say this again and I don't want to be defensive about it because there's nothing to be defensive about. We must try, by giving more money to the Legal Aid Board, by attracting a higher-quality lawyer to it, through training and through monitoring, to make sure that we provide the best quality services that we can. Remember, we're a young democracy. This Legal Aid Board, when we came into Parliament, anyone who is a lawyer will tell you, was a complete and utter shambles. They used to work on the sub judice system.
Judge Navsa, bless his heart, came in and cleaned that place up and now we have a completely different Legal Aid Board system that isn't based on sub judice anymore but on these legal aid clinics. These are new clinics; they're only a few years old, so we must give them a chance to develop. We must give them a chance to find their feet in our system.
They're already making a huge difference, as far as I'm concerned, in the sense that for the first time ever, in many courts now, when you have a prosecutor you also have a public defender. We never used to have that. The vast majority of our people used to go straight to prison without ever being represented by anyone.
So I accept the fact that in some instances there may be a lack of experience among these people but we must over time - we can't fix this in one day - build this institution because this is one institution we can be proud of. It shows an unqualified report and it has been turned around completely from what it was a few years ago to something that we really now look at as one of our really good institutions in the criminal justice system.
Chair, it's more of a pointed question, pointed in the sense that it is dealing with the response of the Deputy Minister with regard to the Legal Aid Board. There is a discussion that we have taken up as parliamentary committees dealing with Justice that says there must be a review of all people deployed in government and, of course, structures related to government around the legal profession to ensure that there is parity in salaries.
This means that you must be able to ensure that you avoid a situation in which people, because they are in a certain organisation, are paid less while others who are in another organisation are paid more, although they are employed by institutions in the same government.
That responsibility, we said, must be taken by the Department of Justice. If and when that work is done, are you going to look at the Legal Aid Board to ensure that people don't move from the Legal Aid Board to the prosecuting authority or other structures because of a lack of parity? Thank you very much, Chair.
Chairperson, we've also got another question here that I'll answer in a bit more detail but there is definitely consensus, if you look at a statement the Minister for the Public Service and Administration has made, that for qualified people in government we want to create an occupation-specific dispensation, an OSD. That has been accepted in principle. The department has received at least two or three verbal report-back.
In fact, we had a meeting about a month ago with the last reporter to try and look at the practicalities of this and the institutions such as the department itself, the prosecuting authority, the Legal Aid Board and Chapter 9 institutions where there are legal professionals and other departments as well.
One of the problems we have - Mr Rodman who heads our legislative drafting is here and he'll tell you - is that just as soon as they get young, black and female lawyers into that section of the department and train them, then the provinces in particular snap them up and employ them at two or three levels higher than they were paying them because those skills are needed so badly. Now this has created a huge destabilisation in government.
Under apartheid they had a very clever system - well, it's not a clever system; it was a very oppressive system, but it worked effectively. Let me rather say that in the sense that when you were in the department they controlled completely whether you could move somewhere or not. You couldn't just apply for a post. If you applied for something they'd say no, you're not going to move there. That's how they kept their system balanced.
Under the new democracy, we've just opened up everything. So everyone is moving everywhere else. As soon as you get a chance to get employed two or three levels higher, then you should really be employed. I just gave an example; those people with two years' experience should never be working in the regional courts as regional prosecutors. They just don't have the experience. They're going to come up against senior lawyers and so on and they wouldn't have a chance in this matter.
So what we've got is this dispensation that's being worked out but it's become very difficult to try and get everyone to buy into the idea that not only should there be one salary level but then, if you're working in, say, legal aid and you're at a certain level, if you want a promotion somewhere else in another institution, you must be at the same level. If we don't have a rule like that it's not going to work because otherwise people are just going to get higher salaries again, but they'll employ them at a higher level as well.
So it's a very complicated system we're looking at. Let me just lastly say, what it doesn't solve is the problem between magistrates and prosecutors. You see, over the past few years the magistrates' salaries have rapidly jumped higher. A magistrate and a prosecutor always used to get the same salary under the previous dispensation. So there was no reason for them to move.
In the past few years, particularly with the introduction of that allowance, a magistrate now would get R70 000 to R80 000 more for a car allowance than a prosecutor at the same level of five years' experience.
So what we have now is that we train prosecutors until they have five years' experience - they've just become competent prosecutors - when they all apply to become magistrates, because at the same level, just by getting the new job, they get R70 000 to R80 000 more than they would be getting as a prosecutor.
We haven't solved that problem yet. We don't have a solution for it at the moment and it's something we're going to seriously have to look at. In fact, I've got statistics here that show you - let me actually give you the figures - in 2002-2003 there was something like three or four prosecutors who became magistrates. This year, with this new allowance, 43 senior prosecutors were appointed as magistrates. So it's a completely fragmented salary system that is causing it to implode on itself.
That is why we're trying to create this occupation-specific dispensation but we're going to have to get everyone to buy into that once we've got that and we're giving them higher salaries, it means that if they want to move to the other post they must move at the same level and not go higher unless there's been a specific evaluation done which shows that they should go to a higher post. Otherwise we'll have the same problems with the system.
Deputy Chair, thanks to the hon Deputy Minister for the reply. Arising from that response, during our oversight function as "oversight practitioners" in Northwest, KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo, the concerns of awaiting-trial prisoners was, number one, that these student attorneys were doing what you could call double-booking, in terms of which they were supposed to appear in two courts at the same time.
So what happens? They just run around to postpone cases and nothing is done. This was confirmed by the heads of the Legal Aid Boards in those particular provinces. How do we address this attitude of these student attorneys?
Number two, there were complaints that these student attorneys were encouraging those awaiting-trial prisoners to plead guilty because then they would plead for mitigation for them. That's what they were doing. Hence many awaiting-trial prisoners are refusing the services of these Legal Aid Board representatives who are student attorneys because of this attitude. How do we address this? Thanks, Chair.
Chairperson, I practised myself and many of my clients would probably say the same thing when they've done something wrong and you can't help them out of trouble and they're not happy with the result. Then everyone else in the world is to blame except them, which is a problem, but I'm not saying that there aren't really problems.
Look, firstly, a legal aid lawyer falls under the same rules as any other lawyer and it's an ethical rule for lawyers that you're not allowed to double-book. If they double-book then, clearly, they should be reported like anyone else and they should be punished accordingly.
What is interesting is that you tell me that the supervisor himself was saying that they were double-booking. Now, I think we should sack that supervisor for telling you that because why is the supervisor, who is a senior lawyer, allowing his people to double-book when he knows it is totally and utterly against the rules for any practising lawyer to do it?
I mean, it's one of the cardinal sins. As an advocate you would definitely get hauled before the Bar Council and be very severely reprimanded and punished if you ever double-booked. So that is clearly not on.
Regarding the second issue, I think we should take, with a big pinch of salt, whether the lawyers are telling them to plead guilty or not. It is a lawyer's duty, when you think that the best result for your client would be achieved if he pleaded guilty and, for example, to get a plea bargain to get a particular sentence and not necessarily go through the process, to recommend that. So in some instances, if a lawyer doesn't do that and advise you accordingly, then that person wouldn't be acting ethically.
If you are trying as a lawyer to pressure a client to do something they do not want to do, then clearly that would be incorrect. Again, if there's a complaint such as that then that particular complaint should be referred to the law societies and so on. Clearly our lawyers in the Legal Aid Board have to act with the same ethics as any other lawyer who deals with the law.
Role of Legal Aid Board in ensuring a speedy trial for awaiting-trial prisoners
141. Ms F Nyanda (ANC) asked the Minister for Justice and Constitutional Development:
Whether the Legal Aid Board assists in the reduction of overcrowding in prisons through ensuring that awaiting-trial prisoners get a speedy trial; if not, why not; if so, what are the relevant details?