Hon Chairperson, hon Minister of Social Development, hon Deputy Minister, hon MECs in the House, hon members of the NCOP, guests, ladies and gentlemen, in the tradition of the West Coast, good afternoon. I want to congratulate the Minister on her appointment and that of the Deputy Minister to the portfolio of Social Development. I also want to express my gratitude for being part of a team whose mandate is to contribute to the fulfilment of the ideals enshrined in the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa.
To the hon Minister and the Deputy Minister, thank you for your leadership during our first Minmec meeting last week in Johannesburg. In her budget speech, the Minister outlined the government's programme for the next financial year.
It is important that we embarked on a road that has, as a commitment, our dedicated service to the people of our country, especially, in the language of the Minister, the poorest of the poor.
Our commitment in this House should be not as a slogan of government, but as a deep personal commitment of people first. Whilst the global economic recession has affected us immensely, we should pull our strings together to ensure that all South Africans have a share in the unfolding of the South African promise, a promise of opportunities for all.
In complementing the work of the government's programme of action in the Western Cape province, we are deeply concerned about the current state of abuse against children in this province. It has reached crisis proportions, and we are currently mapping out a strategic government response to the abuse of children. The nature, the magnitude and the depth of this problem requires an intersectoral and intergovernmental approach with clear targets to create a safe environment for all children in South Africa.
A report from the Human Sciences Research Council has also revealed that most of these things happen in the presence of family, friends, neighbours and people living on the same land where children are abused.
The Western Cape government has already accorded the establishment of an office for a commissioner of children as its top priority. In line with the Western Cape provincial constitution, we are planning to appoint a commissioner for children. The Department of Social Development in the Western Cape's key deliverables for 2009-10 moves from the premise that to realise a self-reliant society, opportunities need to be created for all citizens of the Western Cape who are poor, vulnerable and have special needs.
For 2009-10, the department received the total budget of R1,1 billion. Of that budget 59,4% goes for payments for nongovernmental organisation, NGOs. This represents 4% of the total provincial budget.
This will be cost-effective and efficiently spent to create social economic opportunities for all, but it is a deep concern for me. If you have a budget of R1,1 billion and you spend 59% of that budget towards NGOs and faith-based organisations, you must ensure deep quality control over the allocation of this money.
Since accepting office, the Western Cape government has outlined four broad strategic objectives: Firstly, is to modernise service delivery. This goal will address service delivery challenges at the service delivery points, at district offices and facilities under the management of this department. They will be subjected to effectiveness and efficiency audits in this financial year. This goal is closely linked to the theme "people first".
Later this month, the Department of Social Development will also sign a service level agreement with the SA Social Security Agency, Sassa, to ensure effective and efficient service delivery. I am glad that the Minister referred to this in her budget speech when she spoke about business process re-engineering to improve service delivery within Sassa. You can only modernise service delivery, colleagues in this House, if you appoint the right person into the right job. Therefore, in the Western Cape, every manager will undergo a compulsory competency assessment to get the right mixture of competencies to serve the people of the province. [Interjections.] Customer satisfaction surveys will also be conducted in this financial year to ensure that the department is responsive to the needs of the people of the Western Cape. There will be no cadre deployment in my province. [Applause.]
Finally, the modernisation programme will also allow the department to measure its performance through a provincial-wide dashboard system. Officials are already preparing to migrate from the current management information system to a province-wide dashboard system to monitor the performance of government.
The second objective of this department will be to improve financial governance. Part of this governance is to make sure that every one of the 1 800 organisations that our department is funding from the department will comply with the highest standards of corporate governance.
This province has already published live on the Internet for anybody in this House to click and see which organisations of these 1 800 are receiving government money through NGO networks. That's the depth of transparency in the Western Cape government.
We will also publish on the Internet not only the name, address and other details of these organisations, but their annual reports, MNE reports and the Auditor-General reports. Every single detail you require of these organisations will be published live before the end of this financial year. This will also be done to ensure accountability and transparency to the fullest. The third objective of this department is what we call social entrepreneurship. The vision of the department is to create a self-reliant society. If you want to create a self-reliant society, you need to ensure that you create opportunities for people.
We need to create opportunities so that people will benefit as a result of it. And I am glad that the Minister in her budget speech spoke about social entrepreneurship.
What is new is this, Market fundamentalism has proved not to be the tool for creating opportunities. State fundamentalism - that's new to you - has also proved not to be able to deliver self-reliance. Market fundamentalism fails because it lacks compassion - that's new to you.
State fundamentalism fails because it creates a handout system - a dependency culture which is not sustainable in the long run - that's new to you. [Interjections.] In order to navigate this government out of this predicament, we are committed to social entrepreneurship - that's new to you. [Interjections.]
Social entrepreneurship is an approach that unlocks opportunities in society. With regard to innovation and creativity, that's new to you. Thank you very much. [Interjections.] [Applause.]