Deputy Speaker, the hon member is right. However, as we speak, there are already 7 000 people working at Home Affairs. The new recruits will thus be fewer than the staff already employed at Home Affairs. So, besides reviewing our recruitment policy, we also need to keep training the existing staff, while dismissing those whom we can't do much about.
We also need to take a closer look at society, because, for every corrupt act, there is somebody who is doing the corrupting - in other words, there is somebody employed at Home Affairs who is corrupt - but there is also some member of society who is corrupt.
I think we should all be working towards making sure that society understands that corruption at Home Affairs is very serious. It can undermine the security of the country. I think we should all be preaching that, so that people know that they are endangering our security as a country by being corrupt.
Nevertheless, I agree with you that, when we recruit, we have to scrutinise everything and get the national security agencies to also look into the person's background, as we do with senior managers in government.
Discussions regarding lifting of recently announced visa requirements for SA citizens visiting the UK
134. Mr N J J van R Koornhof (Cope) asked the Minister of International Relations and Co-operation:
Whether she held discussions with her United Kingdom, UK, counterpart to lift the recently announced visa requirements for South African citizens visiting the UK; if not, why not; if so, what was the outcome of such discussions? NO1828E