Chairperson, the chronic underfunding of welfare services, particularly to children, can no longer be tolerated. The government states that children are at the top of its agenda, yet they choose to underfund the Child Care Act by a staggering R3,1 billion, or 65%. This results in hundreds of thousands of vulnerable children simply not receiving precious services.
Another factor compounding the situation is the severe lack of social workers in the public sector, which can be attributed to the perpetual underfunding. There are currently about 5 063 social workers in the public sector and in two and a half years' time we will need 66 329. This figure is stated in government's own costing report on the Children's Act. At the current rate of 1 066 new students each year, and assuming that all of them graduate and no social workers retire or resign in the meantime, it will take another 58 years before we reach the 2010 target.
Clearly government has been found wanting and the DA cannot support this budget.