Question NW2601 to the Minister of Social Development
13 December 2021 - NW2601
Abrahams, Ms ALA to ask the Minister of Social Development
(1)What is the total number of cases of abuse of the SA Social Security Agency (SASSA) Child Support Grant that have been reported to her department in each province since 1 January 2015; (2) what is the total number of cases in which the Child Support Grant (CSG) has successfully been transferred to an alternative caregiver; (3) what happens to the (a) CSG and (b) child in question in cases where there is no alternative caregiver; (4) what mechanisms have been put in place by her department and/or the SASSA to mitigate against the abuse of the CSG grant by the caregiver; (5) what support does her department and/or SASSA offer in order to assist the caregiver who has been reported as allegedly abusing the CSG grant?
Reply:
The data requested from 2015 is not readily available and a script has to be written to retrieve information from Socpen. The Business Intelligence System used by SASSA for reporting was only commissioned in 2018. This has resulted in SASSA needing to retrieve historical data from Socpen.
It is also extremely difficult to separate cases where the reason for the change of care giver is attributed to abuse of the grant, as this information is not captured on the system. However, information will be provided on change of care givers which were processed.
The expected date by which this may be ready is 17 December 2021.