Chairperson and hon members, South Africa is increasingly becoming a desired destination for major international sporting, recreational, political and socioeconomic events. It is government's policy to attract and support the hosting of such major events in the country.
Our experience in hosting major events has equally brought with it the occurrences of disasters in sports such as the Ellis Park in Johannesburg and the Oppenheimer stadium in Orkney. These disasters have taken place despite the fact that the provincial sports federations were charged with the responsibility not only to host the events but also to ensure the safety and security of persons attending the events.
Often event organisers fail to accept or resist accepting their responsibility to provide adequate security at events, and many events have been hosted without proper or sufficient public liability being in place. Government has a duty to ensure the following: The safety and the protection of the physical wellbeing of both persons attending sports and recreational events and their property at stadia and other such venues; the protection of rights of persons who attend sports and recreational events; and that the planning, management and enforcement of safety and security at sports and recreational events held at stadia, other venues and at events in the form of a race, tour or procession along a route are handled by people that are experienced in the field of safety and security.
The Safety at Sports and Recreational Events Bill aims to protect the primary stakeholder at the events, which is the general public, who attend thousands of sporting and recreational events held across the country each year. Compared to comparable legislation in other countries, the Bill is reasonable. An example is the United Kingdom system, which is overreaching and intrusive, whereas the South African Bill adopts a more reasonable middle-ground approach, which incorporates the necessary constitutional safeguards.
The Bill has been created to cater specifically for the needs of South Africa and its Constitution. Although the Bill is a reasonable piece of legislation, it still has teeth. For instance, it provides for the issuing of exclusion notices to deal with hooliganism and provides for sub prohibition notices and for heavy penalties in respect of noncompliance.
The Bill provides that the powers that the provincial sports federations have to convene sports events and ensure safety and security is overridden by the powers of the SA Police Service through their command structures to take control of any sporting event in any geographical area. In this regard, the SAPS will make a determination on any event and, where it deems it necessary, it will take control of that event.
In terms of the Bill, the proper event safety and security measures would rest with the controlling body, event organiser or stadium or venue owner, who, if a natural person, must be at least 21 years of age.
Although the 2010 Fifa World Cup South Africa Special Measures Act, Act 11 of 2006, has been passed and regulations under it were issued, this Act deals with specific issues. The Act does not deal with key safety and security areas such as ticketing matters, minimum measures to ensure safety as opposed to security of the general public and the establishment of general offences and penalties for antisocial behaviour inside and immediately in the vicinity of the 2010 stadia.
The Bill provides that a controlling body, an event organiser or stadium or venue owner must appoint sufficient persons to be responsible for safety and security at an event, including an event safety officer, security officers or such other persons as prescribed. Stewards are responsible for the marshalling and overseeing of the safe general flow of spectators. An event organiser must ensure that a detailed written safety plan, which includes the following, is prepared: Event risk assessment; event details, including duration; stadium, venue or route design; and safe capacity and compliance with other relevant safety certification.
If the National Commissioner of the SAPS, event safety and security planning committee, authorised member or venue operations centre, VOC, commander have reasonable grounds to believe that there is a threat that the attendance of a person or group of persons may result in the disruption of the event or cause injury to a person or damage the property, the authorised member or the VOC commander may issue a spectator exclusion notice to a person or group of persons. During our deliberations as the NCOP, we have raised the following questions: The requirement that the organiser of an event be at least 21 years of age; that there is no obligation on the part of the authority to issue safety certificates; the attendance of the members in safety committee meetings; the adequacy of the capacity of security personnel; and public liability insurance and the meaning of gross negligence.
The Select Committee on Education and Recreation supports the passing of the Safety at Sports and Recreational Events Bill and in doing so it acknowledges that the Bill has been passed by the select committee without amendments.
The Select Committee on Education and Recreation supports the Bill. I thank you. [Applause.] Debate concluded.
Bill agreed to in accordance with section 75 of the Constitution.