Chairperson, the municipalities, of course, are owed about R64 billion by households, government and businesses. Government owes municipalities, sadly - shamefully, I might add - 4%, amounting to some R2,9 billion.
National Treasury, through their provincial treasury forums, looks at the debt owed to municipalities. The report, however, focuses on what is owed and very little attention is given to the payment of the debt, although this is increasingly being attended to. In fact, only yesterday in our Cabinet Committee meeting we discussed this very issue. Deputy Minister Nene made a submission about a report that is going to be in the public domain, I think, in the next month or so.
A task team has been established, comprising the Presidency, the National Treasury, our department and the Department of Public Works. The team has developed an action plan to systematically resolve the outstanding government debt and they also have a pilot project going in eThekwini Municipality and the King Sabata Dalindyebo Municipality in the Eastern Cape. The lessons learned from this pilot project will also be applied more generally, so that municipalities are better able to secure the funding that is owed to them.
Obviously we are improving the revenue enhancement strategies of municipalities, the billing systems and so on. In respect of government departments, sometimes they say, rightfully so - and sometimes it is just an excuse - that the billing that they have been given is not accurate, so the government departments are unable to pay.
The issue of securing the funds that are owed to municipalities is directly related to the issue of improvement of the billing systems of municipalities and we are giving attention to both. This is a big issue and we would like Parliament to take this up more stridently. We would also like the parliamentary committees, both in finance and our committee, to take this up more and more. This is a big issue and we look forward to Parliament's playing a more active role in this regard. We welcome the question, obviously. Thank you.