Chairperson, hon Minister, MECs and members, we support this Budget Vote in full recognition of the millions of destitute South Africans who cannot survive without social welfare services in the rural and urban areas. We are engaged in this debate, motivated by a desire to improve the lives of our masses and create a world-class nation. In doing this, we have to contend with the harsh realities of life in South Africa, as one of the most unequal countries in the world in racial and geographic terms.
Those situated in the rural areas suffer the worst hardships, many of them still living below the minimum household subsistence level. Their distances from the main service centres and the lack of communication networks reduce their access to information, including the information that is essential to their livelihood. This means that we must make extra effort to communicate the policies, programmes and grants that we offer, so that the intended beneficiaries actually take advantage of the benefits to reduce poverty and inequalities. I have in mind the example of the child support grant. I found that many in our communities did not know about this at one time. We need documents such as birth certificates and identity documents to pre- empt corruption and promote clean and effective administration.
UMphathiswa uyayazi le nto kuba isinqe sakhe siseDikeni, kwesikaNdlambe. Wayesakuthi uNozamile, waqala ukuva inimba ngoBhesengile, xa ooGaseti nooNathawu babevela kuhlamba ingceke esizibeni, bephuma ethontweni ngonyaka weentlumayo. [Uwele-wele.] (Translation of Xhosa paragraph follows.)
[The Minister is aware of this because his place of birth is Alice, the land of amaNdlambe. Nozamile used to say that she felt, for the first time, the pangs of childbirth with Bhesengile, when Gaseti and Nathawu returned from washing off the clay at the river pool as they came out of the traditional hut of the initiation school in the year when the cowpeas grew in abundance.]
The impact of this on our processes will be felt long after we have put modern measures in place to eliminate it. The officers who therefore call for the documents must use a socially accountable and customer-centred approach which conscientises them to deal with the members of the public with empathy and in terms of the time standards set.
It is not good performance management which disregards the duration of the task performed and the quality of the service delivery. We appreciate the department's integration of the welfare systems to keep more reliable data on beneficiaries and strengthen the management of social grants. However, we must confront the fact that there are deserving beneficiaries who fell out as we integrated, and that we must reinstate them.
The Minister has set up corrective measures to make the use of poverty relief funds more efficient. Firstly, I would like to suggest that we continue to monitor the distribution to ensure that the funds are given in terms of the criteria laid down, and that partisanship does not influence the choice of project beneficiaries, especially given the role of the councillors in some of the allocation processes. Secondly, we must capacitate not only the intermediaries, but also the beneficiaries, especially in the rural areas where illiteracy levels are higher. Lastly, we have oversight responsibilities as public representatives. These charge us to monitor the implementation of these plans, so that when we are confronted with failure to deliver, we understand that we also have to accept our fair share of the blame, and not only the Minister or the department alone. [Applause.]