Committee Legacy Report; Oversight Reports: adoption

Public Service and Administration

12 March 2014
Chairperson: Ms J Moloi-Moropa (ANC)
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Meeting Summary

The Committee adopted its draft Legacy Report, without any amendments. It was noted that it was a fair reflection of the work done in the last five years that would help to guide the incoming Committee on matters still needing to be followed up. The Committee staff were thanked for doing a fine job.

The Committee considered minutes from 2013 and 2014. Minutes of meetings on 13 September and 6 November were adopted without amendments. Those from 14 February and 26 February 2014 were minutes that involved the subcommittee and thus would have to be approved by that subcommittee. There were amendments and corrections noted to the minutes of 30 October 2013 and 19 February 2014, as documents still had to be attached. The Chairperson noted that some minutes that still had to be corrected would have to be adopted later.
 

Meeting report

Consideration and adoption of Committee minutes for 18 September 2013
The minutes were adopted without amendments

Consideration and adoption of Committee minutes for 30 October 2013
The Chairperson said that she would like the Committee content advisor and researcher to include the outcomes of the meeting in the minutes. There was a presentation that the minutes referred to, which also needed to be attached to the minutes.

Mr S Marais (DA) asked if the minutes could be adopted without the required attachment.

The Chairperson replied in the affirmative. She noted that the Committee section had a server on which all presentations were loaded after being presented at meetings. She asked if the same was done for minutes, and the Committee Secretary confirmed that this was done.

Mr Marais was worried that if the Committee approved a report whilst documents were not attached then it was incomplete, and at the least the minutes should reflect that documents filed elsewhere must be read together with the minutes. However, he said that there was always a risk that the wrong file might have been loaded to the server.

The Chairperson summarised that the minutes would be approved but subject to the amendment noting that the presentation still must be attached.

Members adopted the minutes, subject to that amendment.

Consideration and adoption of Committee minutes for 06 November 2013
The minutes were adopted without amendments

Consideration and adoption of Committee minutes for 14 February 2014
Mr E Nyekemba (ANC) said that in his view there was nothing wrong with the recording of those minutes, and that the sub-committee had brought its recommendations to the Committee, which were endorsed.

The Chairperson accepted that the minutes would be noted, but they could not be adopted, because the Subcommittee had been delegated by the Committee.

Those minutes were not adopted.

Consideration and adoption of Committee minutes for 19 February 2014
The Chairperson said that, in similar vein to the minutes of 30 October discussed earlier, the Committee would insist on the attachments to the minutes, and that must be noted as an amendment.

The minutes were adopted with amendments.

Consideration and adoption of Committee minutes for 26 February 2014
The Chairperson said that these minutes would also need to be noted, but could not be processed as they also involved the Subcommittee.  She said that that set of minutes also needed amending.
She suggested that the support staff get a venue so that the sub-Committee could correct the minutes that had been put aside.

Consideration and adoption of Committee minutes for 27 February 2014
Mr Marais noted that this meeting had taken a briefing on the Public Administration Management (PAM) Bill, but it had been said that it was not an “official” briefing.

The Chairperson said that did not need to be reflected in the report. This meeting was an ordinary Committee meeting. The procedure was that a briefing only became “official” after the legislation had been to the National Council of Provinces (NCOP). However, there ha been a number of briefings on that Bill. She did not want to go back over all the briefings to decide whether or not they were deemed “official”.

Mr Nyekemba noted that he had sent an apology, but the minute had not captured his apology. That should be corrected. He asked what was to be done with minutes sent back for correction.

The Chairperson said that had been noted that when corrections were to be done, separate from amendments, then they would be specified as such.
 
The minutes of this meeting were adopted with amendments and corrections.

The Chairperson noted that there were some minutes that the Committee had sent back for correction, that would then go over to the fifth Parliament

Committee’s draft Legacy Report: Adoption
The Chairperson noted that the draft Legacy Report tried to capture key activities over the last five years. She thanked the staff for their effort in drafting that report to life, saying that she had been exceptionally demanding over the structure of the report, as well as the content. She asked for deliberation on it.

Mr Marais said that he had perused the report against the backdrop that it needed to be a reflection of the work that had been done over the five years, and that he thought that draft was indeed such a fair reflection. He was satisfied with what the report contained overall.

The Chairperson said she would like a proper cover for the report so that the final report would look like a booklet.

Mr Nyekemba concurred with the Chairperson and Mr Marais. He also wanted to express thanks on behalf of the Committee to the staff. He referred to the key areas, and said this report was giving guidance to the incoming Committee on matters that still needed further engagement. He noted that the capturing of the PAM Bill and how it had been processed had been very well done. He also thanked the Chairperson for her leadership.

Mr Marais interjected that the Committee had had a meeting in Pretoria with the Public Service Commission, and the Sector Education and Training Authority (SETA) for the Public Service where it had had an Acting Chairperson; whom he found to have been very strict.

Mr Nyekemba said that this report explained why the Committee had needed to sit every week.

The Chairperson added that she had had an interesting Committee, in that it always had a quorum. She said that the staff had been very receptive to her demands and that she was very grateful for that support.

The report was adopted without amendments.

Closing remarks
Ms C Mohale (ANC) wanted to express her thanks to the whole Committee. She noted that this Committee had done more than many others on issues of disability than most, because BUSILE School for the Blind had received a computer lab, through the efforts of the Committee.

Mr Marais quipped that he was “not a typical DA politician” and that he had always tried to interrogate the issues and apply his mind from an ideologically objective perspective.

Mr Nyekemba noted humorously that the Research Unit of Parliament talked about Members of Parliament (MPs) instead of researching. That was not a bad thing because it was corrective as well as constructive.

Mr Marais said that the human resources were the most valuable part of any organization, therefore he concurred with Mr Nyekemba completely.

The Chairperson said that she had learnt that the current structure of Parliament was flawed, in that it did not discourage working in silos, with some units operating quite separately from others. She said her biggest highlight was when Parliament had looked at the research capacity of legislative institutions. She had invited Speakers and their secretaries from different legislatures, which had almost landed her in trouble with Parliament, because Speakers had met other Speakers without the strict protocol being followed, but this had led to some extremely informative meetings. Through this interaction, it had come out that offices of the Speakers were sometimes an obstacle to the work of committees. 

The Chairperson enumerated some of the other highlights in the last term.

Finally she announced that the Committee was invited to a breakfast meeting with the Minister for Public Service and Administration.

The meeting was adjourned.
 

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