Hon Chairperson, firstly, I would like to convey my heartfelt condolences, on behalf of the IFP, to the ANC and the Padayachie family on the untimely passing of the former Minister of this department, the late Roy Padayachie. May his soul rest in peace!
Secondly, I would like to compliment the department and other role-players for successful negotiations in 2011, which ensured that we did not witness any large-scale industrial action that had become the norm in the civil service and which is extremely disruptive, especially to the education system and the provisions of health care. Thank you for a job well done and please keep it up! These are some of the reasons why the IFP supports this Budget Vote.
However, hon Chairperson, this is only one side of the coin. On the other side, I can only express the IFP's indignation that, despite all efforts to fight the scourge of corruption, it continues unabated as the statistics of the National Anti-Corruption Hotline indicate. It would be hard to think of any more steps to take or instruments to use to curb corruption than the ones that have already been put in place by the Public Service Commission and government.
These include the National Anti-Corruption Hotline, the case management system and a plethora of anticorruption legislation. In spite of all these, we are still swamped with more and more reports of noncompliance, bribery, fraud, corruption, mismanagement and maladministration. What more should still be done?
No one can deny that corruption has reached frightening proportions when whole departments in some of our provinces are placed under administration orders. The Gauteng Department of Health, for example, is in a shambles. It faces 101 legal claims due to negligence, totalling R235 million. This prompted the IFP to call for an urgent appointment of a commission of enquiry to investigate this debacle.
In spite of the intervention by the national government in the Eastern Cape Department of Education, the situation has not yet returned to normal. One wonders whether the dismal state of last year's matric results in this province will not be repeated. Once again, where did we go wrong? The answer is to be found in human nature.
What is fundamentally lacking is the political will to confront corruption head-on by our Ministers, MECs and officials. For instance, in their 2011 report titled Profiling and Analysis of the Most Common Manifestations of Corruption, the Public Service Commission made the following observations, among others: firstly, the current anticorruption infrastructure is focused mainly on the investigation of cases of corruption instead of focusing on a holistic approach, which includes investigation, detection and prevention.
Secondly, 40% of departments have anticorruption policies of reasonable quality with evidence of implementation. The remaining 60%, however, either have no policies or have very basic policies of poor quality.
Thirdly, departments are often lenient in imposing disciplinary sanctions against officials found guilty of corruption. Instead, they simply furnish them with written final warnings.
Fourthly, only 15% of the departments were found to have advanced investigative capacity. The remaining departments had no investigative capacity at all.
Hon Chairperson, this is far from satisfactory. The situation is without a doubt absolutely appalling. The department needs to do a lot better than this. I thank you. [Applause.]