Chairperson, comrades and hon members, I am privileged to present to the House the first report of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, Scopa, being the first one for the fourth Parliament.
It will be recalled that it was in the third Parliament that the convention to have debates on the Scopa reports when they come before the House was started. The intention of debating is not to grandstand, nit-pick or engage in party politics around the issues in the report, but solely to use the platform of the House to highlight the important work that Scopa does as a committee of Parliament, and as a chance to enhance public awareness thereof.
In the third Parliament, we had consolidated within the committee this perspective which we have already spoken about in this committee. We believe that this does go a long way in enhancing our work. We are still of the view that more could and should be done to place Scopa in its proper position as a protector of the public purse, and we believe that the fourth Parliament has that unique opportunity and responsibility to finally close the cold and bitter chapter of the second Parliament arising out of the challenges around the arms deal.
Chief Whip, in your absence, and all parties in this House, I want to thank you on behalf of the committee for having taken the first step in the direction of issues of time allocation, as well as speakers. I'm sure that we will bring to your consideration other issues of relevance in due course.
Today, we are presenting before the House the report of the Auditor-General on a performance audit of service delivery at police stations and the ten thousand one hundred and eleven, generally known as 10111, the call centres of the SA Police.
We are in engagement with the police management on the report, and therefore this report before the House does not only reflect what the Auditor-General said in his report, but also takes into account the responses from police management during the hearing, as well as additional information they sent to us after the hearing.
I must state that the police, from the time of the then national commissioner, Jackie Selebi, have always responded timeously to any request for additional information. This has greatly assisted our work.
The overall picture that emerges form this report shows weaknesses and omissions that could have been avoided. Except for sector policing, not all the areas of challenge pointed to a lack of policy or procedural guidelines, but to a lack of implementation and effective management or supervision. This is a recurrent theme, not only for the police, but throughout the Public Service.
We are certain that if the recommendations that are contained in this report are implemented, the weaknesses and the concerns raised by the Auditor-General will be eliminated.
The issues identified by the Auditor-General and contained in this report deal with important issues of police work like sector policing; vehicle management, which includes the fitting and functioning of the automated vehicle location system, repairs of vehicles, control weaknesses with regard to vehicle registers, keys and garaging authorities; training, that is in-service training for police officers; community service centres; lack of compliance with the obligations imposed by the Domestic Violence Act of 1998 and National Instruction 7/1999; the issuing of bulletproof vests to officers; and the optimal functionality of the 10111 call centres.
I'm sure that my comrades in the committee will elaborate on the substance of the issues and, most importantly, the recommendations.
Lastly, the last paragraph of our report imposes timeframes. The accounting officer must submit to the National Assembly, within 60 days of this report being adopted by the House, a report on progress made in implementing these recommendations.
The issue of timeframes is going to be a permanent feature in all our reports to ensure that departments take our recommendations seriously. The responsibility, beyond today, lies with the Speaker's Office to ensure that it has the requisite capacity and systems to track resolutions adopted by this House.
I therefore present to the House Scopa's first report for adoption. I thank you. [Applause.]
House Chairperson, members, in its 2009 election manifesto, the ANC stated boldly that fighting crime and fighting the causes of crime will be a priority of the ANC government in the next five years. Therefore, it is appropriate that the very first Standing Committee on Public Accounts, Scopa, report tabled in the House today deals with service delivery at police stations and police 10111 call centres.
This police audit is a performance audit as opposed to what can be called compliance audits. Compliance audits are mainly concerned with ensuring that the rands and cents of expenditure add up and that laws such as the Public Finance Management Act are adhered to. Performance audits, on the other hand, go further and assess whether there is value for money. As departments and entities hopefully and increasingly meet compliance criteria, we are likely to see more value-for-money performance audits.
It could be useful, therefore, as this police audit is the first to be dealt with by Scopa, to identify any lessons we have learned in our engagement with the department and apply such lessons to future engagements between Scopa and departments. I would suggest that there are three lessons we learned in our engagement with the Police department which we can usefully apply to future interrogations of audit reports: Firstly, and this is a lesson for Scopa, members of Scopa may be clear and specific on what it is that departments must answer to; but we must ensure that departments are also quite clear on what is required of them. At our first meeting with the police in July, we seemed to be speaking at cross purposes. The result was that the hearing had to be abandoned. Scopa needs to seriously consider supplying the department and entities that appear before it with a predetermined set of key questions, in particular those matters that require detailed responses.
Secondly, and this is a lesson for departments, departments need to have read and understood the Auditor-General's report and be as thoroughly prepared as Scopa to engage on the report. This might sound very obvious, but in all the hearings we had this year, it has been apparent that either the Auditor-General's report has not been understood or there has been a lack of preparation.
The audit report makes specific findings. Departments need to be ready to give reasons for shortcomings and the remedial actions that have been taken in those regards. Perhaps we need to recirculate to departments our very useful little booklet published by Scopa in 2003 titled Guidelines for Accounting Officers, Ministers and Other Persons Appearing before the Committee. The booklet sets out very succinctly Scopa's mandate and role, its procedures and what is required of accounting officers and others appearing before it. The key to what is expected of accounting officers is contained on page 15, section 3 of the handbook. Accounting officers called to give evidence before Scopa will be expected to furnish Scopa with explanations with regard to any irregularities or problems to which their attention has been drawn by the Auditor-General in the audited financial statements of the relevant department and any other matter identified by Scopa.
It is probably this "any other matter identified by Scopa" which could be the cause of our difficulty in the hearing with the police. In fact, in all of the hearings we had this year, officials may have been unprepared for these "other matters". Therefore, my earlier suggestion that these "other matters" be formulated in specific questions and be communicated to officials before the hearing applies in this regard.
Thirdly, there is also a lesson for Ministries and portfolio committees. After our unsuccessful hearing with the police, the Minister and the Deputy Minister and the chairperson of the portfolio committee intervened to ensure that the issues raised in the Auditor-General's report and subsequently by Scopa were properly addressed.
The role of relevant portfolio committees in matters brought before Scopa is especially important. This will be more so in the case of performance audits. We must ensure that the portfolio committees play a more active role in discussions around audit reports, which needs to go beyond merely inviting the chairs of the portfolio committee to attend Scopa hearings. Portfolio committees, after all, have overall oversight responsibility for relevant departments on an ongoing basis. Therefore, there needs to be a closer working relationship between Scopa and portfolio committees from the very first briefing by the Auditor-General to the formulation of recommendations to be considered by the House. These are some of the lessons we can apply going forward.
In the few minutes remaining, I want to deal with a finding in the Auditor- General's report that there was a lack of an approved policy for sector policing. My colleagues speaking in the debate will deal with a number of other key findings made by the Auditor-General, and listed in the report tabled today.
Sector policing is a major tool in the fight against crime. It is an approach to policing where services of an area of a police station are divided into smaller manageable areas known as sectors. Resources are allocated according to the sectors' crime trends. The sector commander and the community become active partners in ensuring local safety and security.
At a hearing with the police on 1 July, this became a major issue of concern. It became apparent that members of the police delegation themselves disagreed as to whether there was policy or not. They gave contradictory replies to questions and the committee was left in the dark as to whether there was policy and whether it was being implemented. To the credit of the Minister, Deputy Minister and the chairperson of the portfolio committee who almost immediately intervened in the matter, the important issue of sector policing has been clarified, together with other matters, in a comprehensive document from the police.
The committee was informed that national instructions on sector policing were approved on 13 July and had already been circulated to all provincial and station commissioners. The Standing Committee on Public Accounts was also informed that the policy on sector policing will be implemented and rolled out to all 1 116 police stations within the next three years. We were also informed that a monitoring mechanism for the implementation of sector policing has been developed. This monitoring mechanism will be implemented at all levels in the police force, from national to station level. An important aspect of compliance with sector policing is that performance agreements for provincial commissioners and operational plans for station commissioners include indicators according to which they will be assessed.
In conclusion, I can do no better than to quote from Deputy President Motlanthe in giving a keynote address at the annual Association of Public Accounts Committees, Apac, conference in Cape Town on 28 September 2009 when he said:
It is crucial that public accounts committees do not only react to bad management and corruption but also assist in ensuring that financial affairs are managed properly. Public accounts committees must scrutinise problem areas within departments and public entities, and propose corrective action and changes where required.
I believe that the report Scopa tabled before you today is testimony to the fact that we have diligently executed the Deputy President's instructions. [Interjections.] [Time expired.] [Applause.]
Madam Chairperson, hon members, this report before the House marks a mid-point in a process which began more than two years ago. I use the word "mid-point" deliberately because this is not the end of the process, nor is it the beginning. If we take our oversight and our accountability seriously, this is an ongoing process which is going to use this report that we table today in a productive and useful way.
In July 2007 the DA spokesperson on the SA Police Service, the hon Kohler- Barnard, wrote to the Auditor-General requesting that his office implement a case study audit of selected police stations to determine their performance. The DA's request for a special audit was repeated in September 2007 following the annual report on the SAPS which stated that there was a lack of monitoring of policies, procedures and standing instructions.
In June 2008 the DA requested that the audit should focus particularly on the 10111 call centres, this following alarming information received from members of the public and serving officers of poor service levels and a lack of police responsiveness.
The Auditor-General's final report of March 2009 which was considered before the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, Scopa, this year reveals, amongst other problems, systemic service delivery failures, particularly in the performance of the 10111 call centres, and a failure to develop and implement a coherent sector policing policy.
Scopa reports usually deal with audit irregularities such as the failure to maintain proper records of assets. It is rare that an audit report deals with what are, literally, life or death matters, and this is exactly what the 10111 call centres do on a daily basis. When a member of the public is faced with a critical emergency and people call 10111, they need help and they need it really fast; not 30 or 40 minutes later, or worse, not at all. The norm for reaction time to a code A complaint is six minutes. At one audited centre the response time ranged from 11 to 66 minutes, with none approaching the prescribed norm. Even worse, this deficiency was noted at no less than eight out of the nine audited call centres.
Sector policing policy was also sharply criticised by the Auditor-General. Inconsistencies in the implementation of sector policing and resource allocation are arising between different police stations, with no proper explanation for this discrepancy being provided. This discrepancy could, of course, put a crime victim in a life-threatening situation if they happen to be in the wrong sector in terms of resource allocation.
Scopa's recommendations to the House will require the SAPS management to report to Parliament on exactly what plans they have implemented to address each of the identified deficiencies. Both Scopa and the Portfolio Committee on Police will have a role to play in holding the SAPS leadership accountable. We believe that if this report leads to a serious engagement with the problems of the police management structures, accountability and service delivery, then it will have achieved some useful purpose.
In commending this report to the House, I would like to thank the other members of Scopa for the spirit of co-operation and consensus-seeking that characterised our discussions. I look forward to further engagement with the police on the subject of this report. Thank you.
House Chairperson, the lives of all South African citizens depend on the work that policemen and women do. Crime-fighting is a national priority and an essential service. There can be no compromises, cutting of corners or excuses raised. Because the work of the police is of the highest precedence, everything has to run smoothly as they must be 100% prepared and equipped to bring criminals to book. But there are still too many reports of serious deficiencies and nonadherence to keeping up the standards. The report of the Auditor-General and the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, Scopa, has an overload of these. It is unacceptable and utterly disappointing that the very people who are the last barrier between us and chaos are not rendering the expected and demanded quality of service due to all the deficiencies listed in the report.
There are many recommendations to ensure conformity and progress. But the true test will be if the political leadership, starting from the Minister, takes full responsibility in ensuring enforcement and proper control. We have to keep our men and women in uniform optimally trained, equipped, and empowered to do sterling work against the evil people who rob and rape the innocent. When I say this, I first want to commend all the police personnel who are loyal to our country, Constitution and citizens. They protect us and hunt down the perpetrators.
But it is the exposed weaknesses in this report that are in the spotlight today. No member of the police can do a good job if there is no proper policy to ensure that sector policing functions optimally with due resource allocations. Well-kept vehicles are vital. Broken ones cannot wait too long before their service intervals. Weak controls of vehicle registers are still prevalent. Private use or abuse of state vehicles must be stopped. Too many operational members still do not have driving licences, despite programmes to address this.
Although we need a maximum number of crime fighters at the front line, they must not stay away from training and capacity-building. The front desk to the community may not go without water, electric power, working telephones and computers.
Family violence is still not taken seriously enough. All police members should be trained to deal with domestic violence appropriately within the guidelines and the law.
Our operational members also need proper protection. Why they are not issued with bulletproof vests that are also welldesigned to fit policewomen, is beyond comprehension.
We support this report of Scopa and we are looking forward to further engagement with the process. I thank you. [Applause.]
Madam Chairperson, for a medical practitioner to be able to cure a patient, he or she not only needs to come up with the correct diagnosis, but must have the right tools at his or her disposal to treat the patient. In a similar vein, in a country where crime is rampant, our policemen and women need to be equipped and skilled to fight crime successfully and vigorously.
Yet, if we ask the ordinary man in the street whether they believe that the SA Police Service is adequately equipped and skilled to protect them, or whether they believe that phoning the 10111 centre will get them the help they need, we will be greeted with a resounding no. Today violent crime is the cancer that erodes the fabric of the nation. Rampant crime prevents us from classifying our country as a normal democracy or a country at peace with itself. We live in a country where criminals rob us of our precious lives and property.
A quick look at the findings of the Auditor-General's report adds to this list of woes and does not give one any comfort that our police force is up to the task of fighting crime successfully. The report revealed that, due to a lack of an approved policy, there were inconsistencies in the implementation of sector policing and in the resource allocation between different police stations. Furthermore, there were instances where operational members did not possess driving licences. The report also revealed that there was nonattendance and noncompliance with regard to training courses, while not all the SAPS members were being issued with bulletproof vests.
With regard to the 10111 call centres, the report found, shockingly, that there is no fully functional 10111 call centre in Mpumalanga province. With regard to the other call centres there were deficiencies when it comes to the reaction time between the call centre and the policing units. What, then, must be done to keep us safe and secure and to improve the effectiveness of the SAPS?
The IFP believes that we need, first and foremost, to develop a highly qualified, well-paid and highly motivated cadre of crime fighters to make South Africa a safe place. We need to upgrade our training system with a special focus on investigative skills and forensics. Government must provide adequate resources for effective, efficient and professional policing. This must be extended to our 10111 call centres as well.
The report also suggests that sector policing is not working in its current form. We are therefore calling for policing powers to be decentralised, even to the local level. We therefore urge government to look at this report and to recognise the urgent need to fix the many problems that are currently paralysing and rendering the SAPS ineffective. Only then will we be able to start making headway in our fight against rampant crime in South Africa. I thank you, Chair.
Chairperson, we must thank the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, Scopa, for the work they have done in interrogating this report of the Auditor-General which has presented shocking results. Many South Africans have become accustomed to police arriving at a crime scene many hours after the crime was reported. In some instances, especially where I come from, you call the police today and they arrive the next day. Now we know that the reason for this is not just because they don't have vehicles, which is a common excuse we get. The real reason is that there are hundreds of police officers who still cannot drive or do not even have driving licences, or the vehicles are used to fetch colleagues from their homes. We know now that the real reason so many police officers are being slaughtered by criminals is because many of them don't have bulletproof vests.
It is sickening that 98% of the police stations surveyed show that proper procedures have not been followed in respective domestic violence cases. When you read the results of this report, you realise just why we are unable to reduce the high levels of crime in our country, especially when simple records of meetings are not being kept.
If we do not address the shortcomings and the recommendations of Scopa in this report in an urgent basis, our fight against crime will amount to absolutely nothing. Thank you.
Thank you, Chairperson and hon members. The special performance audit undertaken by the Auditor-General rightly chooses to limit the scope to those areas directly affecting members of the public.
Our committee deals with numbers and technical details not for its own sake, but to better serve the interests of our people. This is important to remember, particularly as the performance audit was focused on a government body, the SA Police Service, entrusted with the immense responsibility of protecting the lives of all citizens.
This is a responsibility and a justified expectation on the part of all our people. That is one of the values encapsulated in the Constitution of the democratic, nonracial and nonsexist South Africa.
I have chosen to focus on the following areas covered in the audit: training, domestic violence, community service centres and 10111 call centres. Before I elaborate on the shortcomings identified by the Auditor- General on each of these, I must first point out that the audit was carried out in five police stations and one 10111 call centre per province. This gives us a sample of 45 police stations and nine 10111 call centres. I must also commend the management of the SAPS for a speedy response to some of these issues raised not only in the audit, but also in the committee's hearings. I shall refer to some of those as I continue in the detailed report.
On training, the Auditor-General found that in the vital area of training, information available was not accurately updated to reflect all training courses attended by members, thereby compromising the accuracy of management information. More troubling were the instances where there was nonattendance and noncompletion of certain courses. Since 2004, the SAPS has developed 20 outcomes-based programmes which focus on specific needs within the organisation.
The feedback from the department is that in the 2008-09 financial year, a total of 105 670 individual members were trained and there were 208 754 training interventions.
In light of these figures, the committee is of the view that appropriate training should be available to all members within reasonable timeframes, and the training database should be rectified and recorded correctly. More importantly, the training budget must be properly utilised; failing which appropriate disciplinary measures must be instituted against those responsible.
On domestic violence, I don't need to remind members of this House what a blight this is on our country. The SAPS is involved in various activities relating to social crime prevention, especially the Domestic Violence Act of 1998 that imposes certain obligations on the SAPS members who receive complaints of domestic violence.
National Instruction No 7 of 1999 introduced prescribed recording of incidents reported to the police. Sadly, according to the Auditor-General's audit, citizens reporting domestic violence are still being let down, notwithstanding the existence of measures intended to alleviate their plight.
The committee therefore recommends that a progress report on domestic violence, regarding the number and particulars of matters reported, should be submitted to the National Assembly after the adoption of this report by the House.
On community service centres, I think most of us will agree that, in essence, the community centres are the front lines of police stations. It is the first interface that the public has when reporting complaints to the police. It is imperative therefore that I mention briefly some of the Auditor-General's findings. The layout of community service centres did not cater for persons with disabilities; basic infrastructure such water, electricity, telephones and computers in some centres was not in good working condition; proper identification parade rooms did not exist and service charters in relation to the public were not prominently displayed; and some holding cells could not be used due to dilapidation.
Whilst the committee notes that police stations built since 2003 have incorporated access and ablution facilities for people living with disabilities, we strongly recommend, as a matter of urgency, the prioritisation of upgrades for all centres with deficiencies, be it ramps for access, telephones, computers, etc.
With regard to the 10111 call centres, if community centres are the front line for the public, a telephone call to the police is the second most widely used way to communicate with the police. We all have experience of being put on hold by call centres. Well, with the SAPS it should never happen as it could literally be a matter of life and death.
It came as a shock therefore when the Auditor-General reported that Mpumalanga does not have a fully functional 10111 call centre. The flagship Gauteng call centre, identified as a model for other provinces, has seven reaction talk groups which had not been activated despite the centre being equipped with both equipment and systems necessary for its activation. These are crucial as they facilitate communication between call centres and policing units outside the ambit of the call centre. The minimum service level of 90% was not adhered to at six of the nine call centres audited nationally.
The committee, fully cognisant of the role that 10111 call centres play, calls upon the SAPS management to ensure that reliable information and statistics are generated to permit proper management and monitoring of call centre performance. Appropriate training should be provided to members at centres so that the public can get a return on this investment. Further, we recommend that the accounting officer submit a report on all the recommendations in this report within 60 days after its adoption. Thank you. [Applause.]
Chairperson, one of the principal roles of the state is to safeguard its citizens. However, we all accept that the levels of crime are unacceptably high and that citizens do not feel safe in their homes, on the road or at their businesses. It is for this reason that this report is opportune.
Serious deficiencies regarding sector policing, vehicle management, training and community service centres were highlighted.
The ACDP particularly welcomes the attention given to reporting on deficiencies in training, in reporting to Parliament on domestic violence issues, and more seriously, various instances of operational members not being issued with bulletproof vests and deficiencies with 10111 call centres.
The ACDP commends the department on its speedy response on some of the issues highlighted. The question arises, however, as to why it took a special Auditor-General's report and then the Scopa hearing to bring the spotlight to bear on these issues. Surely, the portfolio committee should also have looked into these issues. Possibly they did, but not with the desired outcome leading to the request for the Auditor-General to investigate. Well done, hon Dianne Kohler-Barnard, for bringing this issue to Parliament and to the attention of the Auditor-General and Scopa.
One wonders how many of the members who died or were injured in the line of duty could have been protected had they been properly trained and equipped. Considering the seriousness of these issues, the ACDP fully supports Scopa's recommendation that the department's accounting officers submit a report on all these outstanding issues to this House within 60 days after the adoption of this report. I trust that the portfolio committee will also follow up and work with Scopa in this area.
In conclusion, I wish Inspector Uncle Charles Verryne of the Parliamentary Police Unit a very happy retirement tomorrow after more than 30 years of service, many of them here in Parliament, and I am sure many of you have seen him walking around very smartly in his full dress and his medals. That is an example of a very dedicated and committed official. I wish him well with his retirement. Thank you. [Applause.]
Chairperson, true accolades, indeed, must be awarded to all policemen and policewomen for an excellent job working under difficult circumstances. The MF is glad to note in view of the report that the department is addressing some of the fundamental issues that have a negative impact on service delivery.
Policies, monitoring controls and procedures are very important to ensure efficient and effective management of daily activities. We note that the call centre causes difficulty, leading to havoc. This needs to be given attention. The problem of service delivery is the lack of logistical support services such as vehicles, manpower, etc. These need urgent attention.
There is no sense in having more policemen when you have fewer facilities. The MF hopes that all the deficiencies are addressed and systems are put in place speedily. We welcome the fact that the issue of sector policing has been resolved. This has a tremendous impact on safety and security at a local level.
We welcome the report and thank the committee led by hon Godi for excellent work done. Thank you.
Chairperson, on 6 September 2006, the DA pointed out for the first time that the extraordinarily expensive experiment, the 10111 call centres, was an unutterable failure. Naturally, because the ANC is convinced that any criticism of its performance is an attack on its very foundations, the information and the facts put forward by the DA were ignored.
However, hon members, the Auditor-General and his reports cannot be ignored. These reports are fundamental in drawing attention to problems at hand. The Auditor-General agreed to do this report at our request and has agreed to undertake various other investigations, one of which will now feature in the SAPS's annual report regarding the correct recording of crime statistics. We have seen a few ANC members promise to fall on their swords should they fail in their duties as public servants. Gauteng community safety MEC, Firoz Cachalia, said he would resign from office if he failed to achieve the targets he set for the province in his crime strategy. The previous Minister, Charles Nqakula, of course did not. One of the many promises the MEC made was that he would improve the functioning of the 10111 call centres.
Sadly, the ANC today works on the premise of their collective so that no individual is ever held accountable. The MEC failed, yet he is still collecting his cheque monthly, now as the Gauteng Economic development MEC, in much the same way that those convicted in the Travelgate matter and for the many other felonies the DA has detailed sit unashamedly in this House.
When we requested a full audit of the 10111 emergency response systems, it was because we believed that such an audit was imperative, given, firstly, the inordinate amount of public money spent on the systems and, secondly, the endless complaints from the public in this regard. The reality is that not one single shift in the 10111 centres investigated came even close to reaching the minimum stipulated service level of 90% - not even close.
If anyone in this room could explain how a service level of 39% during the busiest time of the day, from 2:00 pm until 10:00 pm, is acceptable, I would like to hear the explanation. Mostly, no one bothers to answer the phone and if they do, frankly, one wishes they hadn't bothered. The calls are frequently answered with merely a grunt and an utter debacle ensues while the disaster they are so desperate to report plays out in front of the citizen's eyes.
Even our most civic-minded citizens finally throw in the towel when they have wasted endless time repeating their ID numbers and personal details to someone incapable of taking them down, who then puts them on hold simply to get rid of them.
Of course, in the unlikely event that one manages to navigate one's way through all the levels and grab the gold ring, it is only to discover that it is brass. Our citizens have found out the hard way that no one can be told about their plight because police vehicles are not all equipped with radios and have to use their own private cellphones to communicate. Certainly, this is the case at the West Rand Flying Squad. So, the entire debacle grinds to a halt there.
The SAPS has spent, at latest count, R600 million on the Gauteng 10111 system, an amount next to which the excesses in relation to five-star hotels, pimp-my-ride vehicles and new mansions by the Minister, his deputy and the National Police Commissioner pale into insignificance.
Seventy-nine percent of the calls made to 10111 centres are abandoned by frantic citizens who actually believed that there was a number that they could call if they had an emergency. Will it take a 2010 visitor, as they seem to have a far greater value than the average South African citizen, to be hung up on when they make an emergency call to wake the members of the current governing party out of their stupor in this regard?
I have refused to stay quiet when I've heard sobbing, recently widowed women on the phone relating tales of how they were put on hold six times while their husband, who was shot, bled to death in their arms. That is my job, and it is my sincere wish that today someone, anyone, within the ranks of the ANC, will actually stand up and do theirs. [Applause.]
House Chairperson, colleagues, no amount of revolutionary proclamations will adequately articulate the melancholy causing pain to our people as a consequence of crime in our society. Crime subscribes to no ideology or social class. It is a common experience of all members of society from all walks of life. Therefore, all of us have a political and social duty to roll up our sleeves and join in the collective slog to combat the scourge of crime.
A lot of the points that I thought I was going to traverse were covered by colleagues who are members of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, Scopa, who clearly had a very constructive engagement with the Ministry of Police and the National Police Commissioner.
When an audit was undertaken by the Auditor-General in relation to fleet management, there were 13 631 police vehicles that had the so-called automatic vehicle location system.
In terms of this system, the police are able to locate a police vehicle. They are able to determine the speed profile of the car and to know whether it is travelling beyond the boundaries it is supposed to be operating in. When we met with the police, they reported that 24 254 vehicles now have that system. This is progressive improvement. [Applause.] Yet, as Scopa, we feel that more is required, particularly in relation to operational vehicles, so that we are able to track the performance of our deployed police.
We all agree that the police are the front-line guardians of our laws. Therefore, their conduct must epitomise the highest moral rectitude and the National Police Commissioner should be able to act very swiftly against any police officers that are exposed abusing the limited resources for fighting crime in our country.
However, as we engage robustly on the performance of the police, we should also have space in our criticism to acknowledge some of the positive things that happen on the part of the police.
Yesterday, at Orlando Community Hall in Soweto, one former boxing champion, Baby Jake Matlala, was involved in an agonising five-hour training session with the police to make sure that, as our slogan says, Washa Tsotsi, the police on the ground are prepared to engage our enemy, namely crime. [Applause.] This is the duty of everybody.
Lastly, Parliament is the ultimate platform for intellectual combat and in the ANC ... [Interjections.] ... Whatever you call it. That's why ... [Interjections.] ... You see, you are afforded your moment to waffle with little disturbance. [Laughter.] As I was saying, that is the purpose of Parliament, so that there could be clear intercourse between members of society about how to improve their land.
As Scopa, we feel that the bottlenecks that are there have to be dealt with effectively. It is not a lost opportunity that collapses at the feet of lamentations and trying to get a vote for distant elections. Thank you. [Applause.]
Debate concluded.
Chairperson, I move -
That the report be adopted.
Motion agreed to. Report accordingly adopted.