Question NW196 to the Minister of Social Development:
12 August 2019 - NW196
van der Merwe, Ms LL to ask the Minister of Social Development:
(1) Whether, with regard to the low subsidies paid to non-profit organisations (NPOs) that provide vital services on behalf of the State, she intends to (a) prioritise and (b) review the funding model of NPOs, especially those that look after the interests of vulnerable women and children; (2) what plans will she and/or her department put in place to ensure that care workers and/or social workers do not earn less than the prescribed national minimum wage?
Reply:
1. (a) The Department has embarked on the review of the sector funding policy and in the revised Policy, the Department has sought to align its policy to include a method of planning and prioritising developmental social services. A list of high priority prevention and early intervention focus areas will be developed within which the provinces must plan, budget and implement specific priority services. The prioritized list of social welfare services will be categorized according to their relative priority. The categorization and prioritization will ensure that services that are most important are ranked high and prioritized during the allocation of funds.
(b) As part of implementing the Funding Policy, the Department is testing the Sector Funding Policy in selected provinces with focus on services that address government’s core constitutional and statutory obligation to provide care and protection to children, older persons, and those who are most vulnerable. During the testing, process mapping will be conducted on the following services namely; child protection, services to older persons; gender-based violence and anti-substance abuse.
2. The Department conducted an audit of social sector employees within the funded NPOs in all nine Provinces earning below the national minimum wage. From this audit, a national database has been consolidated and submitted to National Treasury for analysis in order to determine the funding gap. The results of the data analysis will form part of a motivation on DSD budget submission that the department is preparing for submission to National Treasury for the 2020/2021 MTEF period.
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Approved by the Minister on
Date……………………….