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Presentation to Portfolio Committee on Social Development

socialdevelopmentPresentation to Portfolio Committee on Social Development by Minister Of Social Development and team from DoSD, on changes to Social Assistance Act Regulations & Child Support Grant extension

Selwyn Jehoma (DDG: Social Development):
Thank you Chair Honourable Members, Minister, Deputy Minister and colleagues. Chairperson we have provided the committee members with slides that go through the detail of the regulations, but as the Minister indicated and you yourself alluded to, the focus would be on the extension of the Child Support Grant.



Again, by way of introductory remarks, the Minister indicated that in November, Cabinet approved the phased extension of the Child Support Grant to children up to the age of eighteen years. It was shortly thereafter, that we prepared draft regulations, which was then published for comment. I should indicate, Chair and Members, key amongst the issues raised, by means of submissions, in respect of the regulations related to the phased extension and the concern that institutions and advocacy groups had, that previously when the Child Support Grant was extend, it resulted that people were getting onto the system, then when they reach the age when they are no longer eligible the grant was stopped and again by following, on-going, periods of time and then when they get to the next age, they then qualify. That was a key concern raised.

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Challenges on National Lotteries Distribution Fund

Rob DaviesSummary:
The National Lotteries Board said that it had ironed out its communication problems with its distributing agencies. Its presentation focused on the distribution of the National Lotteries Distribution Trust Fund, the internal process for processing applications and the figures for distributing agency output and other relevant distribution statistics. There was currently over R6 billion in the Fund.

The Department of Trade and Industry’s presentation focused on the challenges that it had identified in a series of meetings with the distributing agencies and the NLB and the proposed solutions to some of the problems. The presentation provided details of progress achieved and the proposed solutions.

There were corporate governance issues in terms of the management and the administration of the Fund. On the role of the distributing agencies, the legislation was not clear on accountability and corporate governance responsibilities. The DTI had also identified significant administrative constraints in the handling of funding applications which contributed to huge backlogs and turnaround times of up to two years when processing them.

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Send a message to the Minister of Finance!!!!!

ForumYour Forum is continuing to campaign for improved national and provincial budgets for social welfare services delivered by NPOs. Minister of Finance Pravin Gordhan has invited people to send him suggestions for the national budget, and we propose to do just that! Let's deluge him with suggestions from our sector while he prepares his budget speech for 17 February!

Please send the MInister a message calling for a large allocation for every province, to enable all of them to improve funding for their social welfare NPO partners. This must be a conditional grant - i.e. a ring-fenced allocation that has to be spent as specified, and cannot be diverted into health services, or go into the provincial pot to be used as the provincial government chooses. In your message, please make a brief but strong statement about what your organisation does, and what the effect is on the people you serve of your services being inadequately funded. If you have had to shut down or cut back a service, please highlight this.

You can send the message via the Treasury website, on www.treasury.gov.za, via the "Budget Tips for 2010" button which is near the top of the page.

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Call for Interest: Creating a new Legislative Environment...
Call for Interest: Creating a new Legislative Environment for Social Welfare and Development Services in South Africa

An opportunity currently exists for developing a new legislative environment for social and development services in South Africa. Many NGOs & CBOs provide core social and development services, or work in this arena, providing and contributing to critical care for poor and marginalised communities and our society in general.  Right now, there is an absence of legislation regarding the non-profit sector, particularly in the area of social and development services.

The current legislative frameworks have left a vacuum in guiding the relationship between the Department of Social Development and organisations, the provision of funding for NGOs and CBOs, a shared vision and purpose for social services and development and the registration of social service organisations.

Development of a new framework could provide clarity for areas such as:
  • The creation of an enabling framework for social service and development practice through a genuinely consultative process,
  • Discussion and development of human resources policies that relate to critical issues, such as, the recruitment and retention of scarce social service workers in the NGO sector
  • Discussion and development of financing strategies for the sector including costing models and parity between government and the non-profit sector.
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