Hon Deputy Speaker, His Excellency Deputy President, Ministers, Deputy Ministers, hon members, fellow South Africans, the Appropriation Bill reflects political and economic choices. Pro-poor macroeconomic planning requires going beyond the usual growth and stability focus. It requires a nexus between stability, growth, sustainable development and employment creation.
It is the Appropriation Bill, together with the division of revenue, which we regard as the vehicle to deliver on the policies and priorities that our people have endorsed when it voted the ANC back into power, proving that it is the ANC, its policies and programmes that our people are still endorsing.
Whilst we have constitutional and legal obligations, what is of fundamental importance is the economic and political considerations that inform the Appropriation Bill. In exercising its oversight role, the standing committee, in so far as passing the Appropriation Bill is concerned, has the responsibility to ensure that there is a link between the budget and the policy outcomes in the Medium-Term Strategic Framework and the delivery agreements around the 12 outcomes.
The Appropriation Bill assists in prioritising socioeconomic and developmental priorities and benchmarks. The Bill is used to guide planning and resource allocation, as well as to monitor and evaluate new approaches.
With regard to managing our financial resources and the economy, the Bill has been tabled in the context of reprioritised expenditure, with the overall ceiling set in the October Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement of 2013. Sound public finances are a necessary platform for the implementation of the National Development Plan and a framework for collaboration with all stakeholders in driving social and economic transformation forward.
The reprioritisation of resources aims to give greater impetus to programmes with the greatest developmental impact and proven implementation capacity. The Appropriation Bill provides support for the economy. The emphasis falls, therefore, on ensuring that the expenditure is allocated efficiently, enhancing management, cutting wastage and eliminating fraud and corruption. A series of initiatives are focused on these concerns.
Spending reviews are underway to examine the programme's performance and value for money. These are conducted by the National Treasury, the Department of Performance Monitoring and Evaluation and the provincial treasuries. The Office of the Accountant-General has stepped up efforts to strengthen the financial control environment, leading to both criminal investigations and internal disciplinary action. As part of efforts to combat waste, cost-containment instructions have been issued. The budget for consultants, travel, accommodation and venue hire has been curtailed, which will contribute to savings over the next three years.
The review of the validity and cost-effectiveness of all government property leases has taken place and the exercise has exposed several deficiencies. The intervention also identified a backlog of more than half of the lease portfolio review. As a result of this initiative, the Department of Public Works now has a turnaround strategy which will enable it to regularise the lease portfolio, while ensuring continuity of services to client departments.
With regard to efficient and effective spending at provincial and local government levels in pursuit of service delivery, the National Development Plan calls for an efficient, effective and development-oriented Public Service. Another key objective of the National Development Plan is the development of a responsive, accountable, effective and efficient developmental local government system. There is no doubt that the allocation made in the 2014 Appropriation Bill goes a long way towards the realisation of these key objectives of the National Development Plan.
The provincial government and municipalities, in particular, are at the coalface of service delivery. Therefore, there is no better way of building better and more sustainable communities other than to budget for programmes and projects that provinces and municipalities are in a position to efficiently and effectively deliver services to our people. It is important that, as a point of departure, the 2014 Appropriation Bill applies a concerted bias in favour of provinces and municipalities; especially small and rural municipalities. It is without a shadow of a doubt that this budget is on course with the realisation of the priorities set in the ANC's 2009 manifesto.
With regard to capacity building across provinces and municipalities, the 2014 budget allocates a significant slice of 52,5% to provinces and municipalities in order for these spheres of government to speed up service delivery and the building of social and economic infrastructure. However, there are challenges that need to be sorted out.
For instance, in its 2009 manifesto, the ANC noted that many municipalities are functioning well, but many others, especially in the rural areas, are still struggling, lacking the capacity and resources they need to fulfil their functions. This has led to some municipalities being unable to provide even a core of basic municipal services effectively and efficiently.
Over and above the need for greater co-operative governance, the government has devised a number of programmes and mechanisms aimed at improving the capacity of local government towards efficient and effective service delivery.
Ziningi izindlela uhulumeni wethu oze nazo zokusiza komasipala ukuze bakwazi ukunikezela izinsiza kubantu bakithi, enye yazo yile ebizwa ngokuthi phecelezi i-Project Consolidate. Kulolu hlelo uhulumeni kazwelonke uthumela ithimba labantu abanamakhono, abazokwazi ukusiza kuhulumeni wasekhaya futhi baphinde badlulisele nalawo makhono ukuze bakwazi ukuletha izinsiza ngendlela elindelekile kubantu. Lolu hlelo olwenziwe uhulumeni kazwelonke selwenze umehluko omkhulu komasipala njengoba sibona ukuthi sebeyazama ukusebenzisa, ikakhulukazi, isabiwomali esikhulu. (Translation of isiZulu paragraph follows.)
[There are a number of mechanisms that our government has come up with in order to assist our municipalities so that they can deliver services to our people; one of them is called Project Consolidate. Through this programme, the national government delegates skilled people to assist local government and to impart those skills towards the required for service delivery. This programme, which was devised by the national government, has made a big difference at the municipalities and we note that they are now trying to use more of their budget.]
Furthermore, as indicated in the 2014 Budget Review, over the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework period more than R3,9 billion has been allocated to various capacity-building programmes aimed at contributing to the National Development Plan's vision of building a capable state, especially at local government level.
With regard to enhancing revenue-raising capacity, most rural municipalities are in fiscal distress, mainly because they lack revenue streams. However, municipalities also struggle to collect monies owed to them and this is mainly due to weak debt-collection strategies. As correctly pointed out by the National Treasury in the same report, the problem of high debtor levels as a percentage of total own revenue shows a lack of effective credit and debt collection strategies in municipalities.
As part of co-operative governance, national and provincial governments should help weaker rural municipalities to improve their revenue and expenditure performance. Grant funding needs to be linked to capacity- building initiatives so that municipalities can improve their ability to collect revenue and their quality of spending.
Improving the collection of revenue in municipalities will go a long way to supplementing their capital budgets. It is also important that National Treasury, in partnership with the Department of Co-operative Governance, develop and implement strategies aimed at enhancing revenue generation and debt-collection capacity of provincial and local government, especially small and rural municipalities. In conclusion, since 1994 the process of reconstructing and developing the country has consistently placed the previously excluded, the poor, women and youth in particular, at the centre of our country's development. As a result, millions of South Africans who were excluded from participating in the political, social and economic life of the country under apartheid now benefit directly from the democratic governance. Indeed, government, in all spheres, has achieved remarkable success over the past 20 years, despite other challenges that we are still facing as a country.
I want to indicate to South Africans, all South Africans, that we are no strangers to Bantu education which eroded our right to choose what we want to be. This has left us with the challenges which we are experiencing today, namely of a lack of capacity and an unskilled society. I do not think there is any false propaganda that can substitute the wisdom of our people, their knowing that they are in this mess today because of the apartheid government and some people who were part of it.
Also, I must indicate that most people, in particular the Leader of the Opposition, have benefited from this democracy and freedom. When you go back and look at the Immorality Act, Act 21 of 1950, which made sexual relations with a person of a different race a criminal offence, it is clear that some people here today have benefited from this democracy and freedom.