Thank you, hon member. Indeed, what you say is true. These are some of the things that do happen. The school environment is a microcosm of our life in South Africa and the reason we have a situation where this kind of criminal behaviour happens in our schools has to do with the broader society and the things that happen within this broader society. Again my appeal is that, indeed, the law- enforcement agencies will do their work but it would be even better if we were able to mobilise the communities.
Parents who have children in these various schools should work together with the law-enforcement agencies in order for us to at least, have an early-warning signal. The early-warning signal will be of two kinds. Firstly, some of those children, as I have indicated in my initial response, will tell us if there are problems in their homes. They will tell us about problems in the environments where they live and in the schools where they are, when they have confidence that their parents are participating in a programme like the Safer Schools Programme.
I would like to make a call to the members that we should all be preaching the same thing over and over again and involve our people right through the country in measures that are designed to reduce the levels of crime in South Africa because it is only when we have that kind of response which will be a national response to the scourge of crime that, in the end, we will succeed.
Application by a certain person to attend MK Veterans Association conference at Luthuli House
359. Mr J Selfe (DA) asked the Minister of Correctional Services:
(1) Whether a certain person (name furnished) applied for permission to attend the recent MK Veterans Association three-day national conference held at Luthuli House; if not, why not; if so,
(2) whether any conditions were attached to the said person leaving the Cape Town Magisterial District in this regard; if not, why not; if so, what conditions;
(3) whether the said person was required to report to anyone; if not, why not; if so, to whom;
(4) whether the said person did indeed report to the relevant person; if not, why not; (5) whether any other parolees attended this conference; if so, who are they? NO2354E