NATIONAL ASSEMBLY
INTERNAL QUESTION
QUESTIONS FOR WRITTEN REPLY
1615. Ms A M Dreyer (DA) to ask the Minister for the Public Service and
Administration:
(1) Whether his department developed and adopted a policy providing
guidelines for the appointment of persons with a criminal
record; if so, (a) when was the policy (i) developed and (ii)
adopted and (b) where can a copy of the policy be obtained; if
not.
(2) whether his department has any plans in place to develop and
adopt such a policy; if not, why not; if so, what are the
relevant details;
(3) whether his department does any pre-employment screening of
potential employees for criminal records; if not, why not; if
so, what are the relevant details;
(4) whether any employees with criminal records are currently
employed by his department; if so, (a) how many and (b) what is
their (i) job level and (ii) occupational category?
NW2021E
REPLY:
1. The Minister for Public Service and Administration issued a
directive on 23 November 2007 to determine which areas must be
covered when verifications on appointments in the public service
are conducted.
The Directive stipulates that the verification prescribed under
Part VII D.8(a) of Chapter 1 of the Public Service Regulations,
2001 as amended, shall with effect from 1 January 2008 cover at
least the following:
a) Criminal record checks;
b) Citizenship verification;
c) Financial/asset record checks;
d) Qualification/study verification; and
e) Previous employment verification.
The National Intelligence Agency issued Guidelines for the
Interpretation and Evaluation of records checks during
November 2007. With regard to the evaluation of criminal
offences, the test applied is whether the criminal record has or
holds a direct threat to the security competency of the
individual.
In light of the above, there is no need for my department
to issue guidelines as the existing public service
prescripts, including the NIA guidelines are sufficient to
provide the necessary guidance to departments when it need to
consider an appointment of a person with a criminal record.
2. In light of the above, existing public service prescripts
including the NIA guidelines are sufficient to provide the
necessary guidance to departments when considering an
appointment of a person with a criminal record.
3. Yes. Pre-employment criminal record checks have been conducted
for all potential employees recruited by the department through
the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) with the assistance of
the Criminal Record Centre of the South Africa Police Service
(SAPS). The outcome of each case, with the comments from the
Security Section where applicable is then submitted to the
decision maker and dealt with on merit of the specific case.
4. No, there are no employees with criminal records in the
department.