Madam Deputy Speaker, Mr Deputy President, I am very happy that the Speaker referred to accountability lying at the heart of democracy and therefore the first strategic priority that we have is one of strengthening our oversight function.
You will forgive me if I concentrate on that for one moment. Section 42 of the Constitution gives Parliament a number of core functions, one of which is that of scrutinising and overseeing executive action. Section 55 mandates us to provide for mechanisms for that oversight and to make the executive accountable.
Parliament, I believe, has formally acted on this mandate by adopting in 2009 the oversight and accountability conceptual model. This model spelt out a number of mechanisms and processes to effect the oversight, including portfolio and select committees, Budget Votes, questions, members' statements, notices of motions, etc.
Parliament's strategic document for the 2009 to 2014 period recognises that one of Parliament's core objectives is to oversee and scrutinise the executive. It incorporates the conceptual model and recognises the need to develop and strengthen the oversight function and establish a strong culture of overseeing executive action.
I think the words "establish a strong culture" are important. You see, Mr Speaker, we have, as I have indicated, a constitutional imperative - and we have developed an excellent model - and we can strengthen mechanisms. But unless we develop a strong culture of exercising oversight, we will have no more than a faade of democracy. And this culture is one which has to be accepted and adopted, not only by Members of Parliament, but, most importantly, by members of the executive over whom oversight is exercised.
It is that culture which I want to address, because the culture, I believe, is far from being well established in this House. On the contrary, if there is a culture it is one of timidity in the willingness of many members in this House to hold Ministers to account, and in respect of many Ministers, there is an unwillingness, if not a hostility, to openly subject themselves to that oversight and accountability.
Questions to Ministers, both written and oral, are an excellent example. You referred to them as vexed questions, Mr Speaker. They are recognised in the strategy document as one of the key mechanisms to exercise oversight and ensure accountability. Yet many Ministers do not take their responsibility seriously at all. It is a matter of record how many written questions are either not answered within the timeframe set out in the Rules, or, worse still, not answered at all.
As of yesterday, 515 questions asked this year by the DA are out of time. We are still waiting for answers to 114 questions of last year. Even when questions are answered - and this is particularly the case with oral questions - the answers are very often either nonanswers, flippant, frivolous or an exercise in obfuscation.
But questions are not the only problematic area. Many Ministers seldom, if ever, appear before portfolio committees. One Minister has recently refused to appear in future before Scopa, the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, Parliament's pre-eminent watchdog.
The time set aside for members' statements in the House is poorly attended by Ministers. These statements to the House are supposed to be the opportunity for Ministers to respond on current, topical issues affecting their portfolios. This process is more often than not a waste of time, because very often the appropriate Minister isn't there and a substitute Minister very often doesn't know the subject and sometimes, even if the appropriate Minister is there, that Minister plays to the gallery as opposed to engaging in a constructive exchange with the member concerned.
So, notwithstanding the section in the Constitution, notwithstanding the oversight and accountability model, notwithstanding the Rules which have been developed over a period of time, if the culture of oversight and accountability is weak, then the very Constitution itself is subverted, the models and Rules we have produced are abused and become cynical exercises, and the integrity and credibility of the very institution to which we are elected get called into question. It is clear we all have to go through a distinct attitudinal change. We need to be vigorous in exercising oversight. And Minister Manuel is foremost in exhorting us to do just that, but Ministers also have to accept oversight and be willing to be brought to account. This requires a cultural shift.
Let me say as an aside. It is not acceptable for a Minister to refuse to appear in future before a committee and then cite some dubious technical reason to justify such nonappearance. I would have thought that section 56 of the Constitution, which gives the right to a committee of Parliament to summon any person to appear before it, is sufficient in this regard. This refusal, though, exemplifies the cultural change that is needed. We look forward, Mr Speaker, to your intervention to rectify this attitude, to reinforce the culture of oversight and to assert the supremacy of this Parliament.
The oversight and accountability model is an excellent document. We need to live that document in the context in which it is written, but we also need to extend it.
We need to ask ourselves what the mechanisms are for us as parliamentarians to exercise oversight over our own institution. In the running of Parliament, how acceptable and accountable are the presiding officers? Two bodies are important in this regard. In respect of parliamentary business, it is the Joint Rules Committee, and in respect of parliamentary oversight of services and administration, it is the Parliamentary Oversight Authority. Both bodies meet infrequently. The Joint Rules Committee has met only three times during the fourth Parliament.
During the third Parliament the DA forwarded mechanisms to enliven debate, promote the debate of current issues and enhance oversight in this House. We submitted these proposals again in the fourth Parliament, because they were not debated in the third Parliament. However, these proposals have yet to see the light of day on any agenda, at any time and in any forum. A sense of inertia pervades.
In respect of the Parliamentary Oversight Authority, it too has met only four times in the life of the fourth Parliament. When meetings are held, they are set down for a limited period of time and the agendas are always full. There is little time for anything other than a superficial examination of the documentation provided, and little scope for real interrogation and monitoring of the policy directives for various services and facilities of Parliament and the levels and extent of their implementation.
Parliament is essentially run by presiding officers, and yet there is no public mechanism, either inside the Parliamentary Oversight Authority or outside, for the raising of questions about aspects of the administration of Parliament. In effect, there is little oversight and exceptionally poor mechanisms to ensure accountability. By way of example. An article appeared in the Cape Argus in September last year alleging that a secret cartel ruled the tender process in Parliament. What public mechanism is there for us to interrogate this allegation and perhaps set the record straight? That which we demand of executive members in respect of their portfolios, we do not demand of our presiding officers in respect of their responsibilities.
Parliament also needs to look at its own internal decision-making process. The Parliamentary Oversight Authority has essentially three advisory entities: the Quarterly Consultative Forum, the Chief Whips' Forum and, of course, the Administration. Speaker, I have been a Chief Whip now for three years, and I have come to see the whole process of decision-making as a totally frustrating one. One often sees good suggestions coming out from the Quarterly Consultative Forum that go to the Administration for a report. They then go back to the Quarterly Consultative Forum, then go to the Chief Whips' Forum, then go back to the Administration, then come back to the Chief Whips' Forum, occasionally go up to the Parliamentary Oversight Authority, who kick it back down to possibly the Chief Whips' Forum, that then go back to the Administration. The whole process goes on like a merry-go-round or a bad game of football - lots of passing the ball, but no goals being scored.
Mr Speaker, this is something that we have to address as there seems to be an inability by ourselves as Parliament to actually take decisions in this regard. Quite frankly, anybody who originally proposed anything which had to go through these forums has to emerge totally confused, exhausted and, frankly, have given up hope. This is the reality. We seem, as I said, completely unable to take decisions.
In conclusion, Mr Speaker, the point I am making is simple. The strategy document is correct. We need to strengthen the culture of oversight and accountability, both in respect of the executive and indeed ourselves, and, in so doing, we need to take a hard look at our own governance model. I thank you. [Applause.]