NATIONAL COUNCIL OF PROVINCES
FOR WRITTEN REPLY
QUESTION 238
DATE OF PUBLICATION OF INTERNAL QUESTION PAPER: 04/06/2010
(INTERNAL QUESTION PAPER: 15-2010)
Mrs E C van Lingen (DA-EC) to ask the Minister of Basic Education:
(1) Whether there is a policy in place with regard to the (a)
maintenance of school hostels and (b) presenting of such an
annual budget to each provincial department; if not, why not; if
so, (i) what formula is used to calculate such maintenance
budget, (ii) how does this calculation relate to the size of the
hostel building, (iii) what percentage of the education budget
should be utilised for such maintenance and (iv) what are the
further relevant details;
(2) (a) what is the maintenance budget in the Eastern Cape for each
school hostel, (b) in which towns are they located, (c) what is
the total number of learners residing in each hostel and (d) how
do school hostels feature in the school rationalisation
programme of her department? CW309E
Reply
1) (a) The Department of Basic Education is currently in the process of
developing a Hostel policy to guide the building and maintenance of
hostels. The policy will be finalised by March 2011.
(b) The Department of Basic Education currently does not have figures
to indicate how much provinces have set aside for the maintenance of
hostels specifically, as the maintenance budget is not aggregated per
hostel. Provinces have only recently began to set aside a small
percentage of their total infrastructure budget allocations for the
maintenance of all facilities. This percentage is determined by the
provinces based on their budget allocation and pressures. However, a
request has been sent to provinces to provide information on what has
been set aside for hostel maintenance and the information will be
provided as soon as it is available.
(2) (a) There is currently no maintenance budget for each school hostel
in the Eastern Cape due to a lack of funds. Each school however
receives a day to day maintenance allocation and the schools with
hostels are expected to use this allocation for minor maintenance on
their schools and hostels. (see the attached spread sheet ) The major
renovations at hostels are referred to the Infrastructure unit at the
provincial office. In the current plan for the 2010/11 financial year
the following hostels appear for renovations:
Jansenville HS â R19 000.00
Nyanga SSS â R 94 000.00
Spandau HS â R 104 000.00
A large amount of the infrastructure budget had to be spent on new
hostels in the past two financial years. In total an amount of R 355
million was spent on schools with hostels; which includes a Youth Care
Centre at a cost of R 255 million.
(b) On the attached spread sheet there is a field that indicates in
which town a school with a hostel is situated.
(c) Only the enrolment of the pupils at the schools with hostels is
available on the spread sheet
(d) The rationalization process of schools in the Eastern Cape is
still in the consultation phase and when schools with hostels
eventually merge, so will their hostels.