Committee Report on Department of Public Works budget vote: adoption
Meeting Summary
The Committee considered the report on vote 7 of the Department of Public Works. Deliberations were done page by page. Members made minor grammatical and spelling corrections. They amended the recommendations by rephrasing the sentence that spoke to the use of consultants. The recommendation had to say that contracts with consultants had to be better managed and tightly monitored. The idea of skills transfer had to be stated clearly.The Committee also amended the conclusion to acknowledge the poor health of the Department to recommend that it (the Department) had to reclaim its mandate.
The report was adopted with amendments.
Meeting report
The Committee considered the report on vote 7 of the Department of Public Works. Deliberations were done page by page. Members made minor grammatical and spelling corrections. They amended the recommendations by rephrasing the sentence that spoke to the use of consultants. The recommendation had to say that contracts with consultants had to be better managed and tightly monitored. The idea of skills transfer had to be stated clearly.The Committee also amended the conclusion to acknowledge the poor health of the Department to recommend that it (the Department) had to reclaim its mandate.
The report was adopted with amendments.
Minute
Consideration of Vote 7 of the Department of Public Works
The Chairperson informed the Members that they would consider the report page by page.
Page 1 and 2
No comments were made.
Page 3
Ms P Ngwenya-Mabila (ANC) stated that the programmes needed to be “fleshed” out more as there were no findings on the page.
The Chairperson asked Members to read through the recommendations to see if the programmes were covered. She noted that each and every programme seemed to be covered.
Page 4
The Chairperson made a correction to a minor spelling error.
Page 5
There were no comments or amendments from the Members.
Page 6
The Chairperson amended the third sentence on the page concerning the Department of Public Work’s (DPW’s) reasoning for non-reporting. She felt that the sentence had to be rephrased to say that the Committee needed to know what the reason was for non-reporting.
Mr L Gaehler (UDM) suggested that the sentence show that the Committee was concerned about the non-reporting of payments made by the DPW for 2012/13.
The Chairperson agreed. The sentence was amended.
Page 7
No amendments were made.
Page 8
No amendments were made.
Page 9
Minor spelling and grammatical corrections were made.
Page 10
Mr Gaehler suggested that “The Minister should come and present before the Committee” had to be replaced by must.
The Chairperson replied that the Committees were told not to instruct, saying “should” was more polite.
Mr K Sithole (IFP) agreed that the Committee could not instruct the Minister to come to present to the Committee; they could request that he come before the Committee.
Ms A Dreyer (DA) raised another concern. She recalled that the Minister had said that consultants were important under the right conditions. The Minister had stressed that there were not enough skilled people in the DPW to do the turnaround strategy. The DPW was bringing in consultants now on the condition that there was an element of skills transfer. She suggested a rephrasing of the recommendation that spoke to the use of consultants. The recommendation had to say that contracts with consultants had to be better managed and tightly monitored. The idea of skills transfer had to be stated clearly.
Mr Gaehler agreed that the transfer of skills was very important. He agreed that the recommendation had to capture these sentiments properly.
The Chairperson noted that this amendment would be captured.
Mr Gaehler added that there should be another recommendation included in the report that spoke to the DPW needing to reclaim its mandate.
The Chairperson asked Mr Gaehler to expand on his statement. She understood that it was the DPW’s mandate to put up buildings. However, other departments such as the education departments were starting to build schools. There should be a recommendation for the DPW to reclaim its mandate for building structures.
Mr Gaehler added that everyone knew it was the DPW’s job to construct buildings. When other departments started building it affected the Committee’s job as an oversight committee.
Ms Dreyer noted that other departments started building on their own for a real reason. The Committee could not ask these departments to stop if they had lost trust in the DPW. They would only stop once the DPW was rehabilitated. Once the DPW could deliver on its mandate, then the client departments would start using it again.
Mr Gaehler stated that the Committee had to take a very strong stance on the matter and tell the DPW to reclaim its mandate.
Mr M Swathe (DA) noted that it was easy for Members to say that the DPW should reclaim its mandate; however, the Committee had to look at the state the DPW was in. The DPW was not in a good state to keep building for the state and to meet its clients’ needs. If it could be reorganised, then the client departments would come back.
Mr Gaehler stated that the Committee’s duty was oversight and it had to ask the DPW to reclaim its mandate. The Minister had to show the Committee what mechanisms the DPW had in place to reclaim this mandate. The Committee could not allow a situation where other departments were doing what the DPW was mandated to do. This created corruption.
The Chairperson noted that this concern would be included in the conclusion of the report and the poor health of the DPW would be acknowledged. A recommendation would be made that the DPW had to reclaim their mandate. She asked if anyone wanted to move for the adoption of the report.
Mr Sithole moved for the adoption.
Mr N Magubane (ANC) seconded the adoption.
The report was adopted with amendments.
The meeting was adjourned.
Follow this committee and get free email alerts whenever we get new information about it.
Audio
Documents
No related documents
Present
- We don't have attendance info for this committee meeting
Download as PDF
You can download this page as a PDF using your browser's print functionality. Click on the "Print" button below and select the "PDF" option under destinations/printers.
See detailed instructions for your browser here.