Chairperson and hon members, during the department's Budget Vote on 3 July, we made the point that a country is only developed once its people have unfettered access to water, energy, transport and communications, but of course that should be preceded by peace and democracy.
Today is an important day because we are addressing provinces. It is in provinces and municipalities where we can best answer the question of whether South Africa is a developing or a developed country. It is in provinces where we will confront the question on how long will we be satisfied with being a developing and not a developed country. It is provinces where the issue of uneven development is revealed in all its starkness. It is in provinces and municipalities that are at the coalface of service delivery, right up to village and street level.
When President Jacob Zuma delivers the state of the nation address, and when premiers talk of the state of provinces, someone should be concerned and talk of the state of the village. Development is national, provincial, but it is also, and primarily, local. Therefore, someone should speak about this particular sphere. This government has strengthened its capacity to undertake long-term development planning. This is to assist national, provincial and local government, as well as all state entities to better plan, prioritise and co-ordinate their service delivery programmes.
Consequently, as the Department of Transport, our plans should relate to the national plan, which in turn links the provinces and municipalities into the national planning grid. We have started this co-ordination through our public transport plan, the 2010 Fifa World Cup transport plans, transport infrastructure development, freight logistics and corridor development.
In line with President Zuma's state of the nation address on 3 June 2009, we have adopted a zero-tolerance stance when it comes to corruption. At the Department of Transport, we are committed to the reform and tightening of the regulatory regime and instruments dealing with anticorruption, particularly with regards to supply chain management, driving licence testing and the Road Accident Fund. Through this House, as well as platforms such as the extended Minmec, which includes provincial departments of transport, municipalities and Department of Transport agencies, we will instil this culture throughout the transport family. In this regard, our first extended Minmec and transport family meeting last Thursday on 2 July 2009 was very promising.
In order to address fraud and corruption in the driving licence system, we are moving towards computerised testing systems and have rolled out mobile and fixed stations in parts of the country. KwaZulu-Natal already has 21 fixed stations and two mobile stations; Gauteng has one fixed station and two mobile stations; and Mpumalanga has three fixed stations and one mobile station. One of our key focus areas will therefore relate to advancing the co-ordination, implementation and integration of transport activities across the three spheres of government.
Just before the elections in April, the taxi industry approached President Zuma about the bus rapid transit, BRT, system, and he told them to defer negotiations until after the elections. During the state of the nation address, hon President Zuma indicated that the Minister of Transport would resume discussions with the industry by 11 June 2009. Indeed, on 11 June we met with over 2 000 representatives of the industry made up of taxi associations and their organised structures at Gallagher Estate in Johannesburg. At this meeting we announced the formation of a national joint working group on public transport.
This week we are finalising the names of the representatives for the working group. From the side of government, the working group will comprise of representatives from the national and provincial Department of Transport, as well as the 2010 host cities. We have agreed that members of the working group, both on the side of government and the taxi industry, should have a full mandate from their structures because they will be making binding decisions. We aim that, hopefully, by the end of September, there will be no outstanding matters with regard to the taxi industry. There should be a normal relationship with this important economic sector. You cannot always have a problem.
Government is taking this matter very seriously and therefore it has received attention from the highest level. We also want to commend the taxi industry for the serious manner in which they have been engaging with us on this issue. Both government and the taxi industry are committed to finding a lasting solution to all outstanding matters. The taxi industry plays a key role in the transportation of our people. Roughly 65% of our people use taxis as public transport.
Therefore we have tailored our approach to address real issues in the taxi industry. The pillars of this engagement are: integrated public transport networks; implementation of the bus rapid transit system networks; Taxi Subsidisation and Taxi Recapitalisation Programmes; enterprise development; and legislation, licensing and regulatory issues. The challenge facing the taxi industry is to take part in the transport sector in its entire value chain. As government, we recognise that this industry represents a critical entrypoint for black people into the mainstream economy of South Africa. The challenge is to agree on how best this could be done in a meaningful way within a proper regulatory framework.
In terms of road safety, we would like to focus on the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences Act, Aarto, the point demerit system and improved security features on the card licences. We would like to ensure that the process to roll out Aarto and the demerit system is fully under way. In the interim, we will consider certain road traffic amendments in order to ensure the suspension and/or cancellation of driving licences as mandatory penalties on a wider basis. It is not really left loose, depending on the presiding officer in the judiciary.
A birth certificate, identity document, driver's licence and passport are the most important documents for an individual. The first two define that you exist and the other two define your wellbeing. To this end, we have extended the contract of the current service provider of the smart card driving licenceses to December of this year, since it lapsed in April. We will use the tender process to ensure that the latest product is tamperproof and has improved security features. From next year, you should not be in possession of a driver's licence and a death certificate at the same time. [Laughter.] A death certificate should automatically cancel a driver's licence. Once there is a death certificate, your registration as a voter is automatically cancelled. Today, we have many people with death certificates, but their driver's licences are still being used quite regularly.
Working with Home Affairs, we will ensure that the new driver's licences have enhanced security and unquestionable integrity to be accepted in our country and internationally. This could assist towards ensuring that a driver's licence forms part of our primary identification documents. In the United States, social security documents and the driver's licences are the primary identification documents. Here the integrity of the driver's licence is not yet accepted, neither at Home Affairs, nor by banks.
Rural development is one of the key focus areas of this government. The role of transport in this regard cannot be overstated. A number of our people in rural areas are poor, but one of the characteristics of poverty is the inability to access essential services of government. Rural poverty is therefore also characterised by transport asset poverty, where roads and public transport are not available. We should have a balanced enhancement of our institutional arrangements for us to achieve increased investment, job creation, poverty alleviation and sustainable social and economic development.
We are also planning to extend the rural road maintenance and the contractor development programme to other provinces using labour-intensive methods that have been tried and tested, particularly in KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga, Limpopo and other provinces where infrastructure development creates thousands of jobs. This will form part of our contribution to job creation so that we have a significant contribution to what the President announced as the creation of 500 000 jobs by December this year.
We are going to make the following transport infrastructure investments during the current Medium-Term Expenditure Framework, MTEF, period: about R18 billion for passenger rail infrastructure; R70 billion for infrastructure, the bulk of which is road infrastructure; R20 billion for airports infrastructure; and R19,6 billion for public transport infrastructure for the 2010 Fifa World Cup.
Among important projects that are funded by the public transport infrastructure and systems grant are the following: public transport links and facilities; public transport interchange facilities; rail infrastructure and systems upgrade; intermodal facilities; Intelligent Transport Systems facilities; and nonmotorised transport facilities.
Hon members, we are moving very fast towards an integrated public transport system. This is necessary to ensure efficiency and to move us closer to the status of a developed economy. The transport modes should be integrated in order to deal with the challenge of the last mile. The last mile refers to people not being able to get home because, for instance, they arrive at a train station when the taxis and buses have already stopped operating. This could be avoided through better integration of the various modes. Distances between these modes must also be cut down drastically.
We are already implementing integrated ticketing to facilitate the movement of various transport modes in municipalities. In as far as buses are concerned, the operator of Durban Transport has cited inadequate subsidies and escalating fuel costs as key to their difficulties. Together with the eThekwini Metro and the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Transport we will find alternative operators as a matter of urgency. We will appoint new operators who will start on 1 August 2009 for a period of 12 months. The city is finalising discussions with taxi and bus services to provide additional trips during July to maintain ongoing services. Buses remain part of our plans to move our people.
During the 2010 Fifa World Cup, all host cities and their respective municipalities should be able to transport soccer fans within transport plans. In this regard, in our discussions with Fifa representatives and Minmec, we agreed to have dedicated officials from national and provincial departments who would be dealing with matters of transport and who will be answerable to the department of transport in the cities, provinces and nationally.
Rea Vaya in Johannesburg is there at a cost of R329 million. Nelson Mandela Bay has the Khulani Corridor. Inner City Distribution and BRT networks in Tshwane cost R104 million. There is the BRT on the Klipfontein Corridor along the N2 Airport City in Cape Town; the Warwick Junction in Durban; and the infrastructure upgrading projects in Limpopo. We hosted a successful Confederations Cup and there should be no reason why we should not be able to do so next year.
Government has invested R25 billion over the MTEF period to upgrade passenger rail, and this is going well. Part of that includes rail security. We have already rolled out more than 1 700 rail police who are currently active in patrolling in the rail environment so that people use the rail transport in a more secure manner.
On the question of aviation, the Airports Company South Africa, Acsa, is progressing with its five-year investment programme - O R Tambo International at R2,65 billion; Cape Town International Airport at R714 million; Upington at R33 million; Bloemfontein at R43 million; Durban at R65 million; East London at R91 million; La Mercy in Durban at R6,5 billion, which is almost R7 billion; and Port Elizabeth at R52 million.
I hereby table our budget for the 2009-10 financial year which is R23,7 billion. I thank you. [Applause.]