Housing Priorities for 2002: briefing by Minister

Meeting report

HOUSING PORTFOLIO COMMITTEE
7 May 2002
HOUSING PRIORITIES FOR 2002: BRIEFING BY MINISTER

Chair: Ms Z Kota (ANC)

Documents Handed Out:
Minister's Presentation to the Portfolio Committee

SUMMARY
The Minister of Housing spoke on the Ministerial and Departmental priorities for 2002. Topics covered were the Medium Density Housing Development Programme, the Rental Housing Policy and Subsidy, Social Housing Policy, Housing Development Programme in Emergency Circumstances, Savings Linked Housing Subsidy Scheme, the Legislative Programme and Human Settlement Policy.

She gave a briefing on the World Summit on Sustainable Development where she pointed out that preparations are well under way within the Ministry and the Department.

She also highlighted the challenges and problems faced by the various housing support institutions such as illegal land invasions, subsidy problems as well as fronting by so-called 'emerging' contractors.

MINUTES
The presentation by Minister, Ms Sankie Nkondo Mahanyele, focussed on the following areas: Priorities for 2002, World Conference on Sustainable Development, Challenges faced by the housing support (see Powerpoint presentation).

Priorities for 2002
The 2002 National Housing Policy and Strategy is made up of:

Medium Density Housing Development Programme
This aims at the promotion of higher residential densities in existing urban areas. It also looks at the identification and development of well located state-owned land for medium density housing. It aims to focus on the integration of subsidies for medium density projects. It provides guidelines on how to implement and deliver densification projects.

Rental Housing Policy and Rental Housing Subsidy
Three challenges facing the department are:
- Reducing and curtailing large financial deficits incurred on state rental stock
- Contribution to city integration, urban renewal and restructuring must be realised
- The mobilisation of the full spectrum of non-government investment and management of rental accommodations must be made a priority.

Social Housing Policy
It aims to finalise social housing policy and legislation. The specific goal is to establish 30 social housing institutions over 5 years to develop 50 000 social housing units. Essential to the success of the programme are: government incentives such as tax and VAT for the sector, sufficient capacity to manage these institutions, capacitation of the institutions by means of a once-off grant.

National Programme for Housing Development in Emergency Circumstances
This has been conceptualised as a result of the Grootboom precedent and the floods. The department is finalising policy and implementation guidelines.

Savings Linked Housing Subsidy Scheme
The department is developing policy guidelines to operationalise the new Savings Linked Housing Subsidy Scheme.

Legislative Priorities
These include the Disestablishment of the South African Housing Trust Limited Bill, the Community Reinvestment Bill, the Prevention of Illegal Eviction from Unlawful Occupation of Land Amendment Bill (shared with Department of Land Affairs as it is cross-sectional) and Housing Amendment Bill.

Human Settlement Policy priorities
The aim is the alignment of housing and land policy and strategy that comply with international agreements in respect of human settlements. Actions to be taken include:
- The provision of technical support for the development of a national rapid land release programme. She pointed out that this was consciously adopted in 1997 to help the provinces fast-track these programmes
- Bi-lateral engagement with Department of Land Affairs
- The promotion of the Habitat Agenda. Here, the department seeks to engage with the UN programme for Human Settlements (UN-Habitat).

World Conference on Sustainable Development (26 August to 4 September 2002)
The Minister outlined the anticipated outcomes, preparations and substance of WSSD.
She pointed out the crucial importance of human settlements in achieving sustainable development and noted the overall objective which is to improve the social, economic and environmental quality of human settlement and the living and working environments of all people, especially the urban and rural poor.

Housing support institutions
She noted that as committee members are aware of them, she will not dwell much on them, these include the NURCHA, People's Partnership Trust, Servcon, NHBRC, Rural Housing Loan Fund, etc.

She touched on the issue of provincial representation of these institutions. Where there was a need for these to have regional offices, these have been established, as in the case of Servcon and NHBRC. The other institutions do not justify provincial offices and as such these are run from the head office. Due to time constraints, the Minister only briefly outlined the problems encountered by each of the housing support institutions (see presentation).

Discussion
A committee member commented on integrated development that the clusters in Cabinet should work closer together so as to ensure better co-ordination and efficiency in the work that they are doing, specifically integrated development projects.

Ms Southgate (ACDP) referring to defective houses, asked what the minister meant by 'some houses' having these defects whilst others do not. She also asked why houses in Kwazulu-Natal had showers whilst others in the North West did not, yet they are geared at the same income level.

The Minister replied that the differences in houses can be attributed to the fact that the specific province is the implementing agency so that the specifications of the houses will differ from province to province. Having said this, she pointed out that it is also a matter of management monitoring. Showers for instance, which are not expensive, should be part of the deal. This could be a case of inefficiency or malpractice on the part of some project officers and developers. On the issue of default houses, she noted that they do have the statistics and she can forward them to the members if they so wish.

Ms Coetzee-Kasper (ANC) commented on social housing by pointing out that even though it is a new issue for the department, she does not think that it is or will be a problem as such. She noted that when she had visited Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 2000, people qualifying for a basic subsidy there were catered for and that this can be done here as well.

Mr. Skosana (ANC) noted that the minister had made reference to the issue of land. The location of these houses is usually close to work environments. However, in Gauteng, 50-60% of the land used for this purpose is land which 10 to 15 years ago was productive, fertile agricultural land. Informal settlements are mushrooming in these new areas and he believed that this is a problem needing urgent attention.

The Minister pointed out that when coming to office in 1994, there was much work to do and they had to prioritise where to build first within the parameters of the budget. There were about 128 000 sites in varying stages of development (townships, rural areas, etc). The issue facing the department was how to prioritise - some of the land areas have to be ignored while focusing on other more needy areas. Land is very scarce and very expensive, so acquiring land has to be counter-balanced with issues of commercial interest as well, especially in industrial regions like Gauteng.

Mr. Dhlamini (IFP) asked the minister to comment on the concern over house delivery by local governments that are expected to be economically self-sufficient, in a context where the tax base for local government is shrinking since they have to gather taxes from people in cash-strapped income brackets, especially in the disadvantaged communities.

The Minister acknowledged that raising revenue for local councils is indeed a problem. This has delayed the department in distributing its housing units, but she added that they are still engaging the councils on the matter.

Mr. Mkono (ANC) asked on the issue of subsidies, if this has been signed to by the minister as final and ready for roll-out?

The Minister pointed out that this has been signed a long time back and that there are other reasons why this has not been rolled out yet. The department will in due course announce when they are ready to roll out the scheme.

Mr. Montsitsi (ANC) asked how possible is it for a community to find out from a developer the finer details of a housing project. For example, whether there are going to be tarred roads as part of housing project?

The Minister replied that their contracts cover internal roads within the parameters of the housing project, and not connecting roads which are the responsibility of the municipality or the relevant local structure. It could be the developer was taking advantage of the community since most community members are not aware of the details of such projects.

Ms Southgate (ACDP) asked about the use of asbestos roofing which has attracted much controversy. She also asked what the department is doing about the dilapidated flats in Hillbrow.

Ms Sharon Lewis, a departmental official, responded that the department is very aware of the risk of asbestos and as a result it is no longer in use. Local manufacturers have shifted to new materials, imports however still come through including asbestos. She pointed out that the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism is busy drafting legislation to eradicate the usage of asbestos completely.

The Minister pointed out that on the issue of Hillbrow flats, the department cannot decide on them without consulting the owners. She pointed out that the Mayor of Johannesburg, Mr. Amos Masondo, had identified several blocks of flats for demolition after consultation with the owners. This is the only procedure through which this can be done.

Meeting adjourned.