Question NW2088 to the Minister of Social Development

Reply:

Yes, upon learning of the non-payments. I requested all MEC’s furnish me with the updated report from all provinces.

The non-payments were experienced in the Eastern Capeand North West Provinces.

Reasons given are as follows:

1. Eastern Cape Province non-payments were due to lockdown and other factors including six months strike of Social Work Managerswho are responsible for various programmes. This created a void resulting in non-payments and delays in the entire process as the finalization of the master-lists took longer and the verification of the information which was also rejected by the IT payment system causing errors.The Province is also experiencing challenges with office accommodation as the building is not safe for occupation and this wascoupled with the closure of offices due to covid-19 positive cases.

2. North Westdelays were due to the migration from BAS system to LOGIS which delayed the paymentsas NPOs were required to register on the Central Supplier Database.

a) There were no budget cuts to (i) old age and (ii) children’s homes of over three months during the lockdown as residential care facilities are prioritised for full subsidy payments. The budget cutswere applied to other programmes that were not fully operational during the lockdown period. These NPOs that were not funded fully, they were paidfor personnel and operational costs. Also, budget cuts for other programmes were as a result of a call from the Provincial Treasuries for the Departments to cut budgetsin response to the Covid-19 budget adjustment. These measures impacted on the allocations that were initially considered for the NPOs as the available budget had to be reviewed and re-prioritised.

b) payment delays to (i) old age and (ii) children’s homes of over three months during the lockdown were experienced in the Eastern Cape, due to reasons mentioned under (a) above and also due to newly funded organisations that had to go through the BAS registration process, and correct documents for this process could not be obtained from the NPOs due to lockdown. Document correction and verification took longer than anticipated due to lockdown restrictions which affected movement between the Department and NPOs. For North West and Limpopo delays are due to migration from BAS payment system to LOGIS which requires registration on the Central Supplier Database. Delays in Free State, Gauteng and Mpumalanga for the second quarter payments were due to covid-19 positive cases resulting to office closures, delayed signing of Service Level Agreements by the NPOs and non-compliant NPOs.

Measures to curb the spread of the virus were put in place by the various provinces in the residential care facilities, including adherence to the regulations issued by the National Department. The gazetted regulations on the management of Covid-19 pandemic were shared with NPO’s that manage residential care facilities.The facilities were encouraged to observe Covid-19 protocols such as social distancing, washing of hands and wearing of masks, creation of spaces for isolation rooms, no discharges allowed and staff members who attended funeral to report to the manager and be put on quarantine.

The current status of the specified payments nationally is as follows:

(i) Old Age Homes

	#Of Homes	#Paid 1stQtr	% Paid 1stQtr	#Paid 2ndQtr	#Outstanding	% Paid 2ndQtr
EC	43	0	0%	43	0	100%
LMP	7	7	100%	4	3	57%
NW	26	26	100%	20	6	77%
FS	35	35	100%	19	16	54%
MPU	23	22	96%	19	4	86%
GP	73	73	100%	70	3	95%
KZN	40	40	100%	40	0	100%
NC	25	25	100%	25	0	100%
WC	117	117	100%	117	0	100%

(ii) Child and Youth Care Centres

Province	Number of CYCCs	# Paid 1stQtr	%Paid 1stQtr	# Paid 2ndQtr	No Outstanding	% Paid 2ndQtr
LMP	12	12	100%	6	6	50%
NW	9	9	100%	0	9	0%
MPU	23	23	100%	22	1	96%
GP	95	95	100%	73	22	76%
NC	8	8	100%	8	0	100%
WC	53	53	100%	53	0	100%
FS	15	15	100%	15	0	100%
EC	27	0	0%	27	0	100%
KZN	19	19	100%	19	0	100%

The provinces that have outstanding payments are working towards clearing the backlog for the second quarter by the end of September 2020 and the status is improving on a weekly basis. For Eastern Cape the NPOs are being paid both the first and second tranches simultaneously during the second quarter.

National AssemblyWritten Reply: 2088 of 2020

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Approved by the Minister of Social Development

Date……………………….