GreaterGood South Africa

Our pointers for Pravin
Sunday, January 31st 2010

Minister of Finance Pravin Gordhan will make his first Budget speech on 17 February 2010. This speech takes place against a backdrop of a civil society funding crisis and an economy just coming out of recession. In a letter to the minister, we highlight some of our pointers for the minister.

Dear Pravin,

On 17 February 2010 we hear your first budget speech. We know it’s going to be a tough year. South Africa hosts the World Cup this year; and the budget needs to take stock of that. We are also still feeling the effects of a global recession, with the number of available jobs continuing to shrink as retrenchments and business closures take place.

To inform your budget speech, we’d like to share our insights into what particular challenges civil society is facing. We believe these are profound and will have a long-term impact on the South African landscape.

Funding crisis

South African civil society organisations face the worst funding crisis since well before the end of apartheid. With massively reduced funding available through traditional channels, such as international development aid and philanthropic foundations, the primary remaining sources of income are giving and social investment platforms such as mggsa.co.za and sasix.co.za, Corporate Social Investment funds and government department funding for service delivery. This trend is likely to become entrenched over coming years, resulting in a substantial contraction of the number of formally registered organisations. Current decisions on the part of government about where it allocates funds for the sector will play a large role in shaping civil society over the next decade.

In principle, we believe that the role of government is to ensure the provision of accessible and high quality services to all South Africans. At present non profit organisations provide much of this service provision on behalf of government. In managing the registration of NPOs, the Department of Social Development plays a critical role in ensuring accountability and verification. We have the following suggestions to make:

• Allocate funds specifically to the department for an overhaul of the NPO Directorate. The department has taken the first step in identifying this as a strategic priority: now it needs the support of treasury to make it a reality.
• Put aside funding for the development of policy for the reimbursement of lay workers who provide essential services. These people do critical work to support vulnerable community members. Whether they are home based carers, carers of orphaned children or community educators, they should be entitled to a basic monthly stipend from government.

Watchdog

A robust and articulate civil society which is able to advocate for change is a cornerstone of any effective democracy. Non profit organisations often pick up on new trends in their communities, largely because they work so close to the ground. Here are some critical points of focus for funding that can ensure that we continue to build our democracy into the future:

• Allocate funding to national research institutions for studies which track national trends, encourage innovate project models and seek practical solutions to job creation in South Africa.
• Earmark funds for skills development in monitoring and evaluation skills. Make these funds available to local community based organizations that can support municipalities to collect critical data required for effective planning and service delivery.
• This year alone, close to a million youth have just left secondary school and are entering the job market. Channel youth development funding into programmes that produce concrete outcomes, such as CVs which reflect skills gained through volunteer experience. Provide incentives to businesses of all sizes to take on youth as volunteers, interns and part-time workers.
• Support the establishment or ongoing functioning of civic advice bureaus, such as community advice offices and skills development resource centres. Centres like this are at the cutting edge of ensuring the protection of individual and community rights.

Quality of life

The quality of life is under threat in many communities. We would like to highlight two additional areas for improvement: literacy and waste management. Here are our recommendations:

• Literacy is a fundamental core skill. We cannot afford to treat books as a luxury item. Remove the VAT on all books, whether they be educational or not.
• We know that the general public will support taxpayers’ money being allocated to encouraging childhood literacy. We recommend each child being provided with 5 free readers, in their mother tongue, at the time s/he goes for first vaccinations. Literacy is as essential to a child\\'s future well-being as vaccines. This will promote a culture of familiarity with books and produce generations of increasing literate children and young adults.
• If there is something concrete that every household, institution or business can do to address the environmental crisis, it is in the area of waste management. We would like to see national government leading the way in a campaign to raise awareness on waste manangement. Along with this, we want to see funds being allocated through Municipal Infrastructure Grants to local waste management systems which involve the collection, sorting and recycling of waste at local level, along with the job opportunities this can create.

Most of all, we ask that your budget speech takes stock not only of current challenges facing civil society but the developmental priorities which lie ahead of us in years to come. Good luck from all of us working towards social change in South Africa!

Minister of Finance Prahvin Gordhan will make his Budget 2010/2011 speech on 17 February 2010. The National Treasury website is inviting comments from the public on the Budget. To submit your comments, go to www.treasury.gov.za and click on ‘Budget tips 2010’.

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