Deputy Chair, on the issues of districts, as I said earlier on, we must review the structures of government, including the NCOP. Does the NCOP as a structure fulfil what is expected of it? Is the NCOP really representing the interests of provinces? Now, one of the critical things that is a challenge to me is when you say that the NCOP is a lawmaking body but the delegations that must come from provinces must be led by premiers - the executive. Why is it like that?
On the issue of Salga or organised local government, why does local government have people here as observers? Why can't local government have people here permanently, and then the numbers become better? Will it not assist the NCOP to deal with many issues if you look at that? If you look at the districts, should they continue being here? Are they serving in the way that they were established to do?
You go to some municipalities, and what do you think about them? The same applies to the provinces. Do we think that the configuration of provinces as they are still serves the purpose? Let's take the example of the North West or Free State. You have 30 members, and out of 30 you take 11 who become the executive, and 19 remain. The committees are generally up to 16. There are 16 chairpersons, and you are left with four people who are ordinary members. The issue is that when they call departments to come to give an account of themselves - and we have done a study in the North West - they take 10 to 15 minutes. These members have to go to other committees, and there is no time. Look at the amount of time that is taken by the department to prepare to come to the committee and the value thereof that is added.
All I'm saying is that it goes a long way; I think you will recall in the previous administration that the Free State proposed in the Constitutional Review Committee that their numbers should increase. I'm saying that there should be no holy cows when we look at the structures of government. We must look at everything and say what we are proposing, what we think will work. It is in that context, Mr Worth, that you must look at the nature of districts, even Gariep, the one that you are raising. I know it is poor and struggling a lot, and I must say that you represent the interests of the Free State very well. You always look at examples from the Free State when you speak.
Section 139 is something that we are looking at now. We are coming with a Bill which is in the draft stage now. This Bill focuses on two areas. There is section 100, interventions by national government in provinces and, while we look at support and monitoring, intervention is the last resort, because it is not done most of the time, although the first thing that people want is to intervene. This is also the case with section 139, because if you look at section 139(8), you see it raises the issue that there must be national legislation to regulate this section in regard to intervention. That has never been done. Therefore, we are looking at coming with this law to look at section 100 and section 139. Our basis is support and monitoring, and an intervention must be a measure of last resort.
The current interventions as they are, looking at them in terms of successes, are successful, but they are not where we want them to be. We want to change the approach in the way things are done so that we are able to ensure that whatever interventions are made are sustainable, but also that there are early warning systems that will tell us when there are problems there, and these are not there as we speak. Thank you very much, Deputy Chair.