Hon Chairperson, hon Minister and Deputy Minister, hon members seated here today, visitors in the gallery and all protocol observed. Hon Chairperson, I'd like to congratulate all of us who have made it here, to the Sixth Parliament. I hope that we all work together to better the lives of our people.
During this month of tata Nelson Mandela, I would like to pay tribute to those who came before us, to those who are still here with us, who fought and gave their lives to the struggle for a non- sexist, non racist and democratic South Africa.
The office of the Chief Justice, OCJ, was a newly established as a national department proclaimed by the President of the Republic of South Africa in August 2010.
The objectives of the OCJ include the following; to ensure that the Chief Justice can properly handle his mandate and that of the Constitutional Court and the judiciary, to enhance the institutional, administrative and financial independence of the OCJ
as well as to improve organisational governance and accountability, to effectively and efficiently use resources.
Over the medium term, the SA Judicial Education Institute, Sajei, plans to provide 246 judicial educational courses, including case- flow management and constitutional imperatives.
Other planned courses include courses on record keeping, general issues impeding debt collections and debt reviews related to the National Credit Act of 2005; in addition to criminal court skills, child justice skills, new legislation on domestic violence, spousal and child maintenance, immigration and other topics.
Expenditure in the Sajei subprogramme is expected to increase from R51 4 million in 2018-19 to R53 8 million in 2021-22.
Hon Chairperson and hon minister I would like to highlight the following matter. In the United Nations Convention on Rights of People with disabilities, article 13 under access to justice in clause two that:
In order to help ensure effective access to justice for persons with disabilities, State parties shall promote appropriate
training for those working in the field of the administration of justice, including police and prison staff.
I would like the Minister to know that we, in the Deaf community, are very concerned about the lack of access to justice for deaf people, whether they are criminals or victims. This includes young deaf children and deaf women who were either sexually molested or raped, and this also includes the lack of quality access.
What I mean by this is that the lack of SA Sign Language interpreters and when the court says there are sign language interpreters are available, those interpreters are not competent enough to interpret in the court environment.
Therefore, for the deaf person appearing in court they will not understand the proceedings because court interpreters are appointed without consultation with the Deaf Federation of South Africa or similar organisations who work with deaf communities.
I am appealing to the minister, and to the Chief Justice to put in place training programmes to provide training to the judiciary about deaf people, SA Sign Language, deaf culture as well as sensitivity
training regarding people with other disabilities, who may also be victims or criminals and in need of access to justice.
There are currently two cases, one in the Eastern Cape and the other in KwaZulu Natal, where there are deaf people awaiting trials, and their court cases are continually postponed due to lack of sign language interpreters or because the sign language interpreters are just not available.
l also note the concerns raised by the Pan South African Language Board, PanSALB, about the continuous exclusion of historically marginalised South African indigenous official languages by our courts.
I also note that the Chief Executive Officer, CEO, of PanSALB has been trying to get together the heads of courts in order to solve the issue of language used in courts. l hope that the Minister and the Deputy Minister, will assist in addressing this issue.
In keeping with the fourth industrial revolution, the Office of Chief Justice plans to modernise and digitise its systems and processes in order to respond to the growing need for court services and also to stay abreast of technological developments.
The implementation of an electronic filing system for the superior courts by 2020/2021 is intended to increase efficiency. The project forms part of the Integrated Justice Systems, IJS, programme led by the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development, in the Justice Crime Prevention Security cluster.
An amount of R14.3 million is allocated over the medium term for the system in the administrations programme.
The OCJ plans to further improve the quality of its performance information by implementing an automated system in order to monitor court performance. In addition to the electronic filing system for superior courts, it is expected to simplify monitoring and evaluation of the norms and standards.
Digitising automating systems will assist in minimising crime and in coordinating information about citizens and government services in the justice cluster.
Chairperson, I would now like to use this moment to talk about the Information Regulator. The Protection of Personal Information Act of 2013, POPIA, regulates the processing of personal information by providing a framework that sets out the minimum standards that
responsible parties must comply with when processing personal information.
The Information Regulator has been established in terms of section
39 of the POPIA and it has a wide range of powers and functions relating to promoting and enforcing the right to privacy.
Currently only parts of the Act relating to the establishment of the regulator and making regulations are operational. Once the regulator is fully operational, the remaining provisions will come into force. The committee is of the view that the establishment of the regulator is a priority, and unless the regulator is fully capacitated, the remaining provisions of the POPIA will not be declared operational.
It is important in South Africa that there is a legislative framework that protects personal data. The committee, thus, urges that the delays be addressed urgently and that the Minister assists the information regulator in its engagements with the minister of finance and national treasury to find a solution as soon as possible in the matter of the information regulator's organogram.
The budget provided to the regulator is R28 9 million in 2019-20 and R30 5 million in 2020-21 with R32 2 million in 2021-22, and the
information regulator will be tasked with approving and implementing the following; the public awareness strategy plan, the communication and branding strategy, the stakeholder engagement strategy plan, the guidelines for codes of conduct, the guidelines for the registration of information officers as well as implementing the memorandum of understanding between the information regulator and the SA Human Rights Commission.
The committee notes that the SA Human Rights Commission will continue to fulfil its largely unfunded mandate with regard to access to information until the regulator is fully operational and the remaining provisions of the POPIA can come into effect.
With that hon Chairperson, I would like to announce that the ANC supports this Budget Vote 22. I thank you.