Hansard: Appropriation Bill: Debate on Budget Vote No 36 – TRANSPORT

House: National Assembly

Date of Meeting: 12 Apr 2010

Summary

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Minutes

TUESDAY, 13 APRIL 2010

PROCEEDINGS OF THE EXTENDED PUBLIC COMMITTEE – OLD ASSEMBLY

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Members of the Extended Public Committee met in Old Assembly Chamber at 16:35.

House Chairperson Ms M N Oliphant, as Chairperson, took the Chair and requested members to observe a moment of silence for prayers or meditation.

Debate on Budget Vote No 36 – TRANSPORT, Appropriation Bill

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Ms M N Oliphant)


The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Ms M N Oliphant): Before we start, I want to appeal to hon members and the members in the gallery to switch off their cellphones. I would like to call the hon Minister of Transport to open the debate.

Hon Minister, can you please use the other microphone? It seems as if the sound of that one is faulty.

The MINISTER OF TRANSPORT


The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Ms M N Oliphant)

The MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: Hon Speaker, Deputy Minister of Transport, Mr Jeremy Cronin; Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Transport, hon Ms Ruth Bhengu; hon Members of Parliament, MECs of Transport from the provinces, mayors present, Director-General Mr George Mahlalela; Chairpersons of the Boards of all Department of Transport entities, CEOs and MDs, Chairperson of the South African National Taxi Council, SANTACO, Mr Mthembu; and Secretary General of SANTACO, Mr Taaibosch; members of the media, ladies and gentlemen, today, 13 April, marks 58 days to the start of the 2010 Fifa World Cup.

Next month, when the first group of media representatives, visiting fans and officials arrive in large numbers for the Fifa World Cup, our transport operation will kick into overdrive. We know that, of the 64 matches to be played during the tournament, 15 will be decided either at Soccer City or at Ellis Park. Another six will be played in Tshwane. This brings the number of matches to be played in Gauteng alone to 21. Furthermore, semi-final venues in Durban and Cape Town will host a total of seven and eight matches, respectively. So, three provinces will host over half of the total number of matches of the 2010 Fifa World Cup.

Cognisant of this reality, our plans are centred on transporting the visiting fans, but also the local spectators, who we know are critical to the success of any Soccer World Cup. Fan parks constitute the mass character of the Fifa World Cup. In Germany in 2006, fan parks and public viewing areas added to the festive nature of the tournament and ensured the active participation of locals.

Many fans will use our world-class airport infrastructure to fly from city to city, yet many more will travel by road and by rail. In the course of travel, we want transport to be a catalyst for the formation of a lasting memory of South Africa and the 2010 Fifa World Cup. The task of the transport system is, therefore, to provide a seamless, multimodal service throughout the World Cup period to facilitate movement to all parts of the country.

How do we plan to contribute to this? The backbone of our transport plans for the World Cup consists of long-distance rail, aviation, taxis and buses. As indicated above, Gauteng will host the bulk of the matches. Johannesburg, therefore, becomes the natural hub for the nine host cities, all of which will be accessible from any part of the country.

The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa, Prasa, will play a pivotal role in this global event. Government already invested R25 billion in passenger rail services over the last MTEF period to get us ready for the World Cup, and beyond. This programme increases to R38 billion in the current MTEF, and the investment is also intended to arrest the decline in infrastructure and address the availability of rolling stock.

Prasa is upgrading key stations and critical infrastructure. The refurbishment of 2 000 coaches and the roll-out of the South African Railway Police are key to making South Africa fully compliant in support of this major event. During the World Cup, over and above the normal services of 308 train sets, there will be 240 additional train sets arranged. A total of 85 sets have also been booked for private use, and 98 trains are on standby should they be required.

As regards buses, government has provided R1.4 billion in Treasury guarantees for Autopax to recapitalise its fleet for 2010 and for the sustainability of the service in the long term.

In Johannesburg, Cape Town and Nelson Mandela Bay, infrastructural construction of the Integrated Rapid Public Transport Network, IRPTN, is well on track. Other cities, including eThekwini and Mbombela, have invested in public transport infrastructure. Up to 2010-2011, the commitment to the IRTPN is over R4 billion in total.

Rea Vaya's Phase 1A, which operates between Johannesburg and Soweto, carried 20 000 people per day in early December 2009, up from 11 000 in August 2009. We use 28 articulated buses with a carrying capacity of 117 passengers each, and six complementary buses with a carrying capacity of 81 passengers, to operate 203 trips per day.

Over and above the normal transport services, dedicated transport services for the World Cup will include 418 trains, 420 buses allocated to Match, the Fifa-accredited hospitality agency, 200 buses for the Fifa family, 360 general spectator buses, in addition to 1 100 buses in operation, all to be managed by the Operational Management Entity.

Providing the infrastructure is necessary, but it is the coordination that will ensure the country delivers a successful World Cup. In order to coordinate and manage the implementation of the Transport Plan for the Fifa World Cup, we will have a 2010 Transport Command and Call Centre based in Gauteng. A service provider has been appointed to manage the Operational Management Entity, and over the next few weeks we will be finalising the operational plan. We are heading for an event that will, in transport terms, become the greatest operation ever to be undertaken on our continent.

During our Budget Vote in July last year, we quoted one of the foremost thinkers of our time, the former President of India, Dr Abdul Kalam, who is passionate about technology, children and development. After a talk delivered by Dr Kalam, a 10-year-old girl came up to him for an autograph, and he asked her what her ambition was. She replied without hesitation that she wanted to live in a developed India. The ambition of that 10-year old is shared by the 49 million people of this country, and 800 million on the continent. Like the rest of the world, we want development.

Speaker, during this financial year, the transport sector must play its role in moving this country from underdevelopment to a state of development, and from being a developing country to being a developed one. To turn this into concrete reality, we have identified six outcomes, which are: transport infrastructure, public transport, safety, rural development, job creation, and the environment.

As regards transport infrastructure, the Road Infrastructure Maintenance Fund will deal with the maintenance backlog that currently faces the transport sector at provincial and municipal level. The current state of our road infrastructure, particularly in provinces and municipalities, reflects the lack of sustained investment in maintenance over many years. We will develop a ring-fencing mechanism which will set aside funds earmarked for maintenance, and a passenger rail investment plan will ramp up investment in rail infrastructure and rolling stock.

We are also finalising details of the high-speed rail link between Durban and Johannesburg, and we plan to take this matter to Cabinet this financial year. We will explore the same for Johannesburg and Cape Town.

The Moloto Corridor is another project that we have identified as a priority, and we have registered the project as a PPP. We are working with the Public-Private Partnership Unit in Treasury to finalise the project plans.

Furthermore, the new King Shaka International Airport at La Mercy will be launched on 1 May this year at a cost of R6,7 billion. We must say something about the future of the site of Durban International Airport, DIA. A task team, including the Department of Transport, the province of KwaZulu-Natal, eThekwini Municipality and the Airports Company South Africa, ACSA, have compiled a report on the land-use options for the DIA site. This report will be ready at the end of April this year. We will issue a request for "expressions of interest" documents, which will take into consideration all the proposals brought forward by interested parties.

The public transport strategy, which Cabinet approved in March 2007, details the case for the implementation of a public transport system in South Africa. We cannot continue to build more roads and parking in cities, as this simply encourages more traffic over the medium term. No city in the world - Shanghai, London, Paris or New York - has solved urban mobility challenges through private car use.

Secondly, switching car users to public transport, walking and cycling will make a major contribution to our global responsibilities of protecting the environment. Fourthly, public transport provides a greater level of safety and stress-free travel than private transport. We believe that the transformation of public transport is incomplete without taxis, which move more than 60% of our daily passengers in the Republic of South Africa.

In this regard, the National Joint Working Group on public transport, which includes the leadership of the minibus taxi industry and government, has the mandate to address all matters of concern to the taxi industry. We have no doubt that the National Joint Working Group will position the taxi industry to be a major player in transport services, such as the Integrated Rapid Transit Networks.

We agree with the 2020 vision of the South African National Taxi Council, SANTACO, that the industry must extend itself from one mode to being a multi-modal industry. Out of our engagement must emerge business entities which can be contracted by government and the private sector.

South African National Taxi Council will be holding an elective conference at Sun City in May, and our duty is to applaud the direction that we have taken together. This process will also create a predictable investment environment. As part of our broad-based economic empowerment, we will support initiatives of the taxi industry in developing their enterprises in the establishment of cooperatives, which will enable them to migrate from the informal nature into viable and bankable business entities. This will be a key focus area this financial year.

The department has finalised the draft implementation strategy and action plan to achieve an accessible public transport system for people with disabilities, the elderly, pregnant women, parents with prams and children.

The country has also adopted the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and Optional Protocol, which requires us to ensure equal access to transportation.

Road safety is not what you do to a community. Road safety is what you do with a community. Speaker, we pride ourselves as a nation built on ubuntu, the spirit of humanness and consideration for others. The task of ensuring safety on our roads is not just that of the taxis, government, business, or the other person. The duty to ensure safety on our roads is everybody's business.

In this regard, we will by end of May 2010 have formed the Community Road Safety Councils in all nine provinces. Road safety councils are critical in our drive for safer roads and involve the mobilisation of all stakeholders towards one vision and plan for the creation of safer roads and safe road-user communities.

Working with the Ministers of Basic and Higher Education, we will intensify road safety education in our schools. Every 16-year-old learner can now have a learner driver's licence. Every 18-year-old must have a driver's licence if we are going to be characterised as a developed country.

In this regard, we are pleased that by July this year, we will have appointed a new service provider for the tamper-proof driving licence card. The new licence specifications will introduce unquestionable integrity levels and a driver's card that is accepted internationally. As part of ensuring safer roads, we will implement the Administration and Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences, AARTO, this year. The current traffic law enforcement system is not effective.

Our courts are already overburdened with many criminal cases and traffic offences are not prioritised by the justice system. Courts are inundated with criminal cases, such as rape, murder and robberies. This has placed a tremendous strain on our court resources, resulting in traffic offences during 2008 only being heard in October 2010 to 2011.

This is further exacerbated by the lawlessness on our roads. For the Johannesburg Metro Police Department, there are 201 779 traffic offences on the court roll for 2010 for offences committed during 2008. A total of 53 809 traffic offences could not be accommodated and have court dates pending after October 2010 to 2011. For the Cape Town Metro, a total of 132 226 traffic cases are on the court roll up to October 2010. Traffic offences during the current year will of necessity have to be heard during 2011 up to 2013. Drivers simply ignore paying traffic fines and do not even bother to go to court because they know that nothing will happen to them. We say, that time is over.

This House will be aware of the R500 million the Road Accident Fund awarded to one individual - a Swiss national who was injured in a motorcycle accident while on holiday in South Africa. He had originally claimed R4,5 billion from the Road Accident Fund. While the final settlement is a lot less money, the Road Accident Fund would have been bankrupted had the original claim of R4,5 billion been granted.

It has now been confirmed by our courts that we were right in seeking to limit general damages claims to serious injuries and to cap high-income claims to R160 000. These amendments were implemented through the Road Accident Fund Amendment Act in October 2008. We are also certain that a Road Accident Fund which operates on the basis of "no fault" is the best option for a country such as ours, which has limited resources and a high number of beneficiaries.

We know that those who know are able to access the Road Accident Fund and those who do not know are left as they are, without even getting funeral expenses. And we know that part of our struggle is the struggle against ignorance. In Chapter 4, verse 6, the Book of Hosea states: "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge." We need this knowledge to be spread around so that people are able to claim what is rightfully theirs.

We opened Easter with an accident in which eight people were killed on Moloto Road. We closed Easter with the passing away of the Deputy Minister of Health, Dr Molefi Sefularo. We pay our greatest respect to Dr Sefularo and his family over his tragic passing.

Speaker, in July last year, together with other transport ministers from the African continent, we attended the international Africa Make Roads Safe Conference held in Dar es Salaam. We then continued to the Millennium Development Goals, in which we declared that 2010 is a decade of road safety.

The Global United Nations Ministerial Conference on Road Safety in Moscow, Russia, declared that we will move from here, Dar es Salaam, to Moscow. Road safety has now, for the first time ever and rightly so, been elevated to the urgent attention of the world.

The greatest tribute we can pay to the memory of Dr Sefularo, his family and the families of all those who have lost their loved ones on our roads, is to do everything to end the carnage on our roads. Our road safety strategy and the public transport strategy are our pillars to implement actions that turn the tide and start reducing road crashes.

Domestically, national and provincial road safety must become our key priority. We are going to target specific towns and municipalities and other hotspots where we can make the greatest impact to save lives.

On the aviation safety side, the airlift strategy is to promote trade and tourism to and from the Republic to increase contribution to economic growth. It is also aimed at developing a framework ... [Interjections.]

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Ms M N Oliphant): Hon Minister, in fact, your time has expired. If the Minister agrees that I can take four minutes out of his response time, then I will do so.

The MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: Yes.

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Ms M N Oliphant): Then you can continue.

The MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: The department will monitor compliance with the Cooperative Development of Operational Safety and Continuing Airworthiness Project between SADC states.

To address security and safety in the maritime sector, the department is developing a small-vessel policy and will table the Maritime Security Bill in Parliament soon.

Following our Budget Vote speech in July, the department produced a draft five-year intervention plan to integrate rural communities into the mainstream economy. Our plan includes the provision of rural transport, access roads and branch lines. We will elaborate on this matter when we address the National Council of Provinces during our Budget Vote debate in that House. In fact, we are by no means not concentrating on rural development.

Most transport modes are major contributors to climate change. This year we are expecting that contracted bus services will gradually move towards using fuel that is less damaging to the environment.

Our activities this year include quantifying the number of jobs created by transport at municipal, provincial, national and the private sector. During construction of the Gauteng freeway improvement and the construction of transport infrastructure for the World Cup, tens of thousands of jobs were created.

The International Maritime Organisation has declared 2010 the Year of the Seafarer. The identified shortage of 200 000 seafarers in the world presents an opportunity for employment, travel and professional growth of our youth. We are developing a coastal shipping strategy for the SADC region under the African Maritime Charter.

Lastly, I must thank the Deputy Minister, Mr Jeremy Cronin, for his ongoing partnership and comradeship. I thank the Director-General of the Department of Transport, Mr George Mahlalela, and his team for their hard work and dedication. Furthermore, I would like to thank all our agencies, especially our chairpersons and CEOs, for the dedication to the critical role they play in the delivery of the World Cup and the implementation of our transport agenda.

I thank the portfolio committee, particularly the Chairperson, Ms Ruth Bhengu, for the constructive way in which they engage the Department of Transport to fine-tune our programmes. I hereby request the House to pass the Department of Transport's 2010-11 Budget of R25 billion. Thank you. [Applause.]

The HOUSE CHAIRPERSON (Ms M N Oliphant): Thank you, hon Minister. Hon Members, I must tell you that I will really stick to the time allocated to you. If your time has expired, I will just say so and from then you will have to comply. I have allowed the Minister because he is the only one who has the extra minutes for response.

Ms N R BHENGU...


The MINISTER OF TRANSPORT

Ms N R BHENGU: Chairperson, hon Minister of Transport, hon Deputy Minister, hon members, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, let me start by commending the Minister of Transport, hon S'bu Ndebele, for setting clear targets and outcomes for the Department of Transport. These targets and outcomes are in line with the policies of the ANC and the service-delivery priorities of the ANC government. They are aimed at speeding up the process of service delivery.

On 19 and 20 March 2010, the Portfolio Committee on Transport held a workshop with the Department of Transport and all transport agencies. The purpose of this workshop was to assess the relevance of the strategic plan of the Department of Transport to the transformation needs and government service-delivery priorities. We also checked the congruence between the strategic plans of the transport agencies and that of the Department of Transport, as well as the allocation of financial resources and personnel in specific programmes.

We proudly stand here today, confirming to Parliament and the people of South Africa that the Director-General of the Department of Transport, Mr George Mahlalela, and chief executive officers of all transport agencies presented to the Portfolio Committee on Transport relevant strategic plans that are also aligned to each other. We have no doubt in our minds that the strategic plans presented will contribute positively to the improvement of the social and economic standards of all communities in our country.

We have noted that although the Cross-Border Road Transport Agency, CBTRA, is mandated to control road transport in and out of the South African borders, it operates only from an office in Pretoria and has no presence in the South African borders. This situation may pose a challenge to traffic control at our borders, as well as use of road transport to smuggle drugs and fake products in and out of South Africa. We are concerned that the department is not providing the necessary support of nurturing and building the capacity of this agency to a point where it is able to deliver on its mandate. We therefore urge the Department of Transport to assist these agencies in capacity building and fulfilment of its mandate.

Another agency that has challenges is the Road Traffic Management Corporation, RTMC. We appreciate the steps taken by the board and the Minister to improve the situation in the RTMC. We will monitor the progress and assess the level of improvement. We will also give support where necessary.

Chairperson and hon members, there are 11 transport agencies mandated to manage specific sectors within transport. The majority of transport agencies have fulfilled their mandates. The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa, Prasa, is excelling in improving the rail infrastructure, rail transport and bus services. The approach used by Prasa will result in integrated public services, as well as the reduced cost and time of travelling, which is currently a big challenge in South Africa. Our trains are safer than before. We pledge our full support to Prasa and appreciate the visionary leadership provided by the board members and the chief executive officer, Mr Lucky Montana. We are confident that Prasa will provide excellent services during the 2010 Fifa Soccer World Cup.

The South African National Road Agency Limited, Sanral, is one agency that has delivered on its mandate. Sanral has managed to retain adequate engineering skills that enable Sanral to provide an excellent national road infrastructure. Such skills are scarce at local government level, yet critical for provision, upgrading and maintenance of road infrastructure.

Another challenge at local government level is the lack of financial capacity in dealing with the transport infrastructure. This situation is made worse by ratepayers' associations that are not paying the municipality for rates and have instead opened trust accounts and keep the rates money in their trust accounts.

The ANC supports the view of Minister S'bu Ndebele in establishing a road infrastructure maintenance fund. We believe that such a fund will contribute positively in dealing with issues of potholes, road maintenance, skills development and local economic development.

Chairperson, the Road Accident Fund, RAF, is in a process of turning around to operate in the context of social security. The aim of this approach is to make the services provided by the RAF easily accessible to the victims of road accidents and also enable the RAF to become financially sustainable. The ANC believes that the services provided by the RAF need to improve and therefore supports the turnaround strategy of the RAF, presented to the portfolio committee during the workshop.

Chairperson, the ANC government is committed to the Broad-based Black Economic Empowerment policy and the Co-operatives Act.

We commend Minister S'bu Ndebele for committing himself and the Department of Transport to supporting the transformation of the taxi industry that will result in the participation of the taxi industry in the mainstream of the economy. We believe that the taxi industry has the financial capacity required to invest in other modes of transport. The taxi industry has the potential of diversifying its business to invest in other sectors. That, however, could be achieved when the government works together with the taxi industry to give it the necessary back-up support needed to further develop the taxi industry. The taxi industry is a true Broad-based Black Economic Empowerment sector that should participate in the mainstream of the economy. We are proud of the contribution of the taxi industry in transporting our communities.

We commend the taxi industry for creating hundred of thousands of jobs directly and indirectly. It is encouraging that the taxi industry is beginning to determine its future. Members of the taxi associations are now becoming the masters of their own destiny. We believe that challenges confronting the taxi industry can be resolved. We have full confidence in comrade S'bu Ndebele that he will provide the required support and guidance to the taxi industry.

Chairperson, the Portfolio Committee on Transport has engaged with the taxi industry and the host cities of the 2010 Fifa Soccer World Cup. These engagements were aimed at assessing the levels of participation of the taxi industry in 2010. They are involved in transporting fans during the 2010 Fifa Soccer World Cup, as well as issuing of permits by Operating Licensing Boards. The majority of the host cities have developed transport plans that include the taxi industry in transporting fans from park-and-ride sites.

The taxi industry is one black economic empowerment sector that will benefit more from the 2010 Fifa Soccer World Cup. Taxis that will not transport fans from park-and-ride sites will transport fans from different cities to the host cities. The Fifa Soccer World Cup will bring additional income to the taxi industry, as almost all games will be played late in the afternoon or at night.

Chairperson, the committee on transport adopted the report of the strategic plan and the budget of the Department of Transport in a meeting held yesterday, 12 April 2010.

In conclusion, we thank the Deputy Minister of Transport, hon Jeremy Cronin, the officials of the Department of Transport, and transport agencies for their commitment to the transformation of the transport sector. The ANC supports the Budget Vote of the Department of the Transport. I thank you. [Applause.]

Mr S B FARROW


Ms N R BHENGU

Mr S B FARROW: Chairperson, in many respects the past budget year can be classified as a bit of an annus horribilis for the Minister. You became a Minister in a hot seat with the cloud of the Mercedes-Benz "donation" hanging gloomily over your head, and you inherited a Ministry, I might add, that was suffering the effects of poor management brought about by undercapacity, skills migration, incompetence and underinvestment.

At the time when we welcomed you to your position, I must say that I expected more of you. Knowing your no-nonsense approach, which you practised in Kwazulu-Natal, I expected that you would open up the communication gap left by your predecessor, Jeff Radebe. The hon Minister came to me afterwards and said he agreed to make himself more contactable, and he even gave me his card and cell-phone number. I promise you, that thing does not get answered.

Our first test appeared to have been ignored for many months, despite letters and documents which I delivered to his office in an effort to raise the alarm about what was happening in the Road Traffic Management Corporation, RTMC.

Despite subsequent assurances given in this House some six months later, the matter became public in June 2009, I might add. Nothing substantive has transpired, and the embattled RTMC limps along despairingly, dogged by allegations of corruption, mismanagement and the fruitless and wasteful expenditure of public monies. It is no wonder that it does not even merit a mention in your department's new strategic plan.

However, this is not the only dilemma facing our Minister, and despite the DA's positive contributions towards the budget debate over many years, his department is now faced with massive underfunding - and I am now talking outside of the Fifa projects and their legacy of spending that you had over the last five years - and a number of dysfunctional entities.

The RTMC aside, it is common cause that the Road Accident Fund, RAF, is technically insolvent to the tune of R40 billion and even with the "no fault" system being proposed, the demands on the fund and the public institutions that you proposed to support it cannot be sustained at the current high level of fatalities and accidents in our country, and that's a fact.

Millions of rand were spent by the RTMC in conducting stakeholder workshops on road safety in each of the nine provinces, without as much as even involving the portfolio committee or reporting back to it, to say look, these were the outcomes. It is indicative of how dismissive they are of finding solutions to this very serious problem.

Yet ever-mounting deaths and injuries occur daily on our roads without any serious fresh or innovative ideas to counter what appears to be a failing Arrive Alive Campaign. My deputy, the hon De Freitas, will discuss some further thoughts on this matter later in the debate, but the bottom line is that we cannot continue to lose the more than 12 000 lives a year that we lose on our roads.

The time has come for all of us to put our heads together to find a solution to saving lives, and the DA would support any initiative for an urgent road safety indaba in South Africa, Minister, not in Kenya or abroad. We need to establish the facts of what is causing this and then, once we've got that, we will know how to redirect or reappropriate funds towards a safer road environment in our country.

The RTMC and RAF are not the only clouds hanging over the Minister's head. The Minister has also failed to roll out the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences Act. This Act was passed in 1999 with a view to introducing a demerit system. To date it still hasn't happened, and you don't have to look far to understand why. If the controversial e-NATIS database, which is run by a steering committee while both national and provinces claim ownership of its use, isn't working, then fines won't be paid and we won't be able to contact the people who have committed these offences.

This contract, by the way, is continuing; it has just been extended, and no database has been handed over to the department yet, as has been indicated in an answer to me. This same e-NATIS involved itself in massive overexpenditure before your time, sir, and in order to recover that, National Treasury introduced a fee on every transaction that involved the licensing of cars, to the amount of R36 per transaction. That R36 should have been collected by RTMC and paid back to Treasury, and it has not happened. Something is horribly wrong here and no doubt they will require further interrogation and explanation to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, Scopa.

Let me dwell on some other areas of concern which need urgent intervention. These were raised at the strategic workshop which the chairperson spoke about. The Cross Border Road Traffic Agency, CBRTA, is dysfunctional. In its existence it has had seven chief executive officers. At this critical time of the Fifa Soccer World Cup, we can't even determine how many people are coming across the border as passengers, so that we can actually do some sort of planning.

The South African Maritime Safety Authority, Samsa, has had allegations of mismanagement and corruption circling around it for a number of years. Not only has that not been adequately addressed but there's a forensic report which apparently doesn't give us any answers.

The supposedly self-funding entities like Airports Company of South Africa, Acsa, Air Traffic Navigations Services, ATNS, and the Civil Aviation Authority, CAA, all have balance-sheet deficits arising from capital expenditure which was necessary to meet airport construction, expansion, renovating and recapitalisation for the purpose of international safety requirements, all of which they cannot afford or recover from tariff increases alone. All of these entities applied to their respective regulating authorities for tariff increases but were declined. The question now arises, where and from whose budget will these deficits be funded? The Independent Ports Regulator faces a similar dilemma and has insufficient funding to fulfil its mandate. The same can be said of the Railway Safety Regulator.

Turning to other entities, the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa, Prasa, claims also to have insufficient funds to meet the safety requirements of its rolling stock, signalling and perways. The ironic thing is that Transnet, from whom Prasa concessions its line usage, charges Prasa R300 million per annum, yet Prasa expends millions upgrading and maintaining the very infrastructure that they use. This does not sound right to me, and it is a typical case of robbing Peter to pay Paul.

In any case, Minister, rail freight services should be under the jurisdiction of your Ministry, if we can ever claim to provide South Africa with a seamless and integrated transport system. One could say the same for air and port entities. The DA has lobbied for this integration for many years and will continue to do so - it makes total sense, and I trust that you will follow this up with your counterparts in public enterprises.

While on the topic of these other entities, the South African National Roads Agency Limited, Sanral, is the only entity that claims not to want any more money. That sounds very strange to me, given maintenance backlogs which your department confirms at R156 billion for provincial and national roads together. Yet they are busy borrowing money on the open market. Despite this, they are doing a good job, I might add, in keeping our national roads in reasonable condition, albeit at the motorist's cost. I agree there is no such thing as a free road but for how much longer can we carry on tolling and tolling every time a section of road reaches the end of its lifespan or needs reconstruction?

We, as the DA, like what you and your department are saying about a dedicated road fund. After all, this has been part of our policy proposals to your Ministry for a number of years now, and I am sure Mr Cronin will confirm that. The time has come to consolidate all the fund streams for this fund - let's call it a central asset management fund, for lack of a better word. The public and road users out there don't know the difference between a pothole and bad road surface occurring in the national, provincial or municipal networks, yet they all contribute to road taxes via the general fuel levy.

Nobody is better placed than Sanral to do the necessary national audit of road conditions, determine the methodology of spending priorities and contract out the necessary work in the three spheres of government. Believe me, Minister, this is the only way forward. As was mentioned by my colleague there, engineering skills just do not exist at many of the provincial and local authority levels and, collectively, Sanral, with its high skills base and experience, will be able to optimise both the scarce human and financial capital required to keep our roads safe and pothole free.

Regarding the department's entities, Minister, new board appointments are required and many of these entities need a talking to by you, because clearly their roles are more about collecting the cheque at the end of the month and rubber-stamping management reports, as opposed to contributing to the objectives of the entity and ensuring good governance.

I say this in the knowledge of what I have reported to you in my speech today: too many of your entities are becoming financial burdens on the department. We rely entirely on you to keep a tight reign on these boards and on their chairpersons, who report directly to you. For instance, very few of the chairpersons attend the presentations by their chief executive officers at the various portfolio committee budget and annual-report hearings. This is a worrying trend. Furthermore, the department's representation on these boards has little or no power to intervene or to promote your department's policy in an ex officio capacity.

Finally, let me just discuss two of the other aspects of your annus horribilis. The first is the continued underfunding - unless Scopa agrees to appropriate more funds - of the bus subsidies. I am aware of National Treasury directives in this regard but, sir, I think it is time to rethink this funding model. We cannot continue having shortfalls year after year and no provision for budgetary increase.

The DA is of the belief that the subsidising of public transport is essential. It happens throughout most countries of the world, but many of these countries have looked at subsidising the commuter, as opposed to the operator, as a way of ensuring the optimum and fair use of the available resource. Whether your communities rely on rail, or whatever mode of transport it might be, you need to find a model to deal with that matter. [Time expired.] I thank you.

Mr P D MBHELE: Chairperson, we in Cope have five profound concerns when it comes to the issue of transportation, which is, by the way, the life blood of our economy.

The concerns that we have are as follows: the massive congestion experienced in our major cities; our total reliance on costly imported crude oil, which is rapidly depleting resources; the taxi issue; the underutilisation of rail; and corridor developments.

Congestion wastes millions of hours and contributes to millions of litres of fuel being wasted and millions of tons of carbon being emitted into the air, thus impacting on air quality and health. Scientists estimate that transportation accounts for about 20% of worldwide CO2 emissions. Vehicles also release particulate matter, which has been linked to an increased risk of cancer.

The busiest cities in our country are Johannesburg, Cape Town, Tshwane, Durban and Port Elizabeth. These are the major drivers of the South African economy. It is imperative that government must start to take a multiplicity of measures to sort out congestion in our country.

Oil is expected to last another 30 years or so, and then we will have a resource depletion problem. Therefore, we need to plan ahead to stay ahead. The question that needs to be asked is: does the government have a 10-year plan for transportation?

Cope acknowledges that the development of the Bus Rapid Transport, BRT, system is a positive move. Alongside that, we strongly suggest that government take a leaf out of the book of New Delhi in India. I'm happy that the Minister spoke about India to a certain extent. I would, therefore, learn from the example they have set.

In the last decade, that city has managed to decrease carbon monoxide levels by 32% and sulphur dioxide levels by 39% because New Delhi's entire public transport fleet of 80 000 vehicles and 9 000 buses now run on compressed natural gas, CNG. This happened because of sustained judicial pressure. Now New Delhi has created the infrastructure necessary for the fuelling of vehicles using CNG. Today it has established 110 CNG stations in the city.

Cope strongly believes that the issue of sustainability in respect of transportation has to be given top priority. In addressing the question of sustainability, attention must be given to the increasing cost of importing oil, the environmental damage done by its use, and the long-term economic impact if we continue to rely on crude oil.

In all our major cities, a very large number of commuters have over time become reliant on their cars to get to and from the city. These commuters will not easily be persuaded to abandon their cars, Mr Minister. Government will, however, have to consider encouraging single car users either to use public transport or, alternatively, to create transport pools to diminish the number of cars on our busy roads.

As a society, we must burn less oil than we are doing at the present time, and every individual must contribute to that effort.

Cope recognises that our economy is in a very vulnerable position because no one has any idea where the price of crude oil is going to be five years from now. Whenever the price of fuel goes up – which, in any case, has kept going up time and again - other costs also go up, unfortunately. The increasing cost of transportation will make local, regional and international trade difficult. Our economy will, therefore, continue to come under increasing pressure. Our country needs to know if this government has put alternative plans into operation or if it is waiting for a crisis to occur and plunge us into chaos before it takes any action.

On the taxi issue, this is one hurdle that the government has, unfortunately, just not been able to overcome. It is not in the interest of our economy for the taxi-industry problem to remain unresolved. Commuters have a right to good service, legal cover and safety. People in our country are waiting to hear when and how the problem with the taxi industry is going to be put to rest. The people in our country who are most affected by taxi strife are the working classes of South Africa, who reside in far-removed townships established to suit apartheid-era planning. These are the people who suffered in the past, and they continue to suffer today.

On the question of rail transport, looking forward, Cope is very concerned that only half of our country's 20 000km of track is being fully utilised. Even more alarming is the fact that 35% of the nation's track has either very little or no activity whatsoever. This is a sad state of affairs and will have serious implications for our economy. We would like the Minister to explain what priority the country is giving to rail transport.

Finally, let me turn to corridor development. It is now time for the government to produce a report on what investments government has made in corridor development, the economic growth that had taken place along such corridors and the number of jobs that have thus been created.

Transport is pivotal to our economy and to our survival. The ramifications of energy scarcity and its impact on the design of future supply chains is a matter we should be addressing in some detail in this debate. Unfortunately, we get the impression that it is business as usual, and that government is giving the impression that the present mode of transport is guaranteed for the foreseeable future.

The lack of a fall-back plan for transportation must make all of us apprehensive. The world has already gone through a terrible financial crisis. Neither the world nor our country can experience another massive crisis. We, therefore, want the government to produce plan B so that we are not left stranded. I thank you. [Applause.]

Mr E J LUCAS


Mr P D MBHELE

Mr E J LUCAS: Chairperson, the Department of Transport has acknowledged the importance of an efficient and sustainable transport system, one which will boost the economy of our country while at the same time providing commuters with a cheaper and more reliable system of transport.

The department's challenges in 2010 are big, but not insurmountable. Government has acknowledged these challenges and allocated R25 billion to the department to see that these challenges are met and overcome. The Budget, however, is not unlimited, and in this regard the IFP urges the department to do things correctly the first time.

In Limpopo province, substandard bridges and roads were washed away within weeks of their completion. This is totally unacceptable. In this regard, the IFP urges the department to conduct the necessary due diligence before awarding tenders to unsuitable companies.

Many of our roads are in dire need of immediate repair, particularly in KZN, where many of the roads in the province are in a very poor state of disrepair. In fact, poor road maintenance is directly responsible for the large number of deaths on our roads. Furthermore, these poor road conditions have a negative impact on our economy, which we can not afford at this time.

Are we ready for 2010? Will all of our transport upgrades and infrastructure development be completed by then? Are we prepared to handle a taxi strike during the World Cup? Are the negotiations around cabotage with the major airlines concluded yet? We are 58 days away from the biggest sporting event ever hosted in Africa, and its success or failure will depend largely on our transport readiness.

The IFP is very concerned that the department is not doing enough to calm tensions that are rising in the taxi industry as a result of some provinces rolling out the BRT system. We therefore urge the Minister to engage to a greater extent with the taxi industry to ensure that we have no upsets during or after the World Cup.

The revamping of our airports has been a great success and the Department must be commended for this. We are really proud of our airports.

It is vitally important to improve our rail infrastructure in order to reduce the number of heavy-duty vehicles on our roads. These heavy-duty vehicles, which often carry loads far in excess of legal limits, are destroying our roads, and a great number of these vehicles are coming in from neighbouring countries.

The Road Accident Fund must take cognisance of the great responsibility they shoulder on behalf of all road accident victims in this country. To this end, we urge the fund to engage itself in greater public awareness and educational campaigns regarding claim procedures and policy so that the man in the street is able to lodge a claim should he be involved in a motor vehicle accident on our roads.

The IFP welcomes the increase of visible policing by the municipalities. Visible policing sends a clear message to citizens that we are serious about road safety and that we will not tolerate transgressions thereof. In this vein, we commend the Minister and the department on the decrease in road accidents over the Easter weekend. This is a sure sign of the success of the Arrive Alive and visible policing campaigns.

In conclusion, we would like to reiterate the Minister's own words when he said in the 2009 Budget Vote speech that "It's not the wealth of a country that builds roads; it is roads that build the wealth of a country".

The IFP supports the Vote. I thank you. [Applause.]

Ms P C NGWENYA-MABILA


Mr E J LUCAS

Ms P C NGWENYA-MABILA: Chairperson, hon Minister, hon Deputy Minister, hon members and guests, following decades of neglect and racially skewed transport legislation, planning and development, the ANC government embarked in 1994 on a process of improving public transport and infrastructure, both in urban and rural areas. Public transport plays a significant role, both in urban and rural areas, in enhancing urban mobility, reducing road congestion, decreasing the impact on the environment through harmful emissions and better serving the community.

South Africa has different modes of transport. Each one of them has a specific role to play. The aim of the department is to develop an integrated transport infrastructure plan at national and provincial level; and this is welcome. The purpose of the plan is to facilitate long-term sustainable socioeconomic growth in South Africa.

The responsibility of the South African National Road Agency Limited, Sanral, is to maintain and develop South Africa's national road network from 16 170km to 20 000km by October 2010. There is an improvement made by Sanral in planning, designing, building and rehabilitating our roads. Sanral is also responsible for toll-road development. While there is an improvement, the agency must consider the creation of alternative roads for those who cannot afford high toll fees. In Mpumalanga, when travelling from Komatipoort to Johannesburg, you need to have approximately R220 for toll fees for the return trip. This is a matter of concern.

The lack of bridges in rural areas is still a major challenge. In some areas learners are unable to attend schools during heavy rains because they cannot walk from one area to another.

The safety of property and life at sea depends on the South African Maritime safety authority, Samsa. The challenge faced by Samsa is to transform the industry and to deal with the high rate of pollution of the maritime environment. The Samsa turnaround and reposition plan and training of seafarers will improve its operation. We welcome the establishment of a national maritime industry and the roll-out of the implementation of the small vessels and Inland Waterways regulations while waiting for the tabling of the Maritime Security Bill.

Airports Company South Africa, Acsa, is responsible for the development of airports infrastructure, retail and car parking facilities. We congratulate Acsa for upgrading and improving the standards of our airports, especially OR Tambo International, Cape Town and other airports. We again commend Acsa for building the King Shaka Airport in Durban and the upgrading of parking at all the airports.

Acsa has also tried to improve the security measures in our airports. The major challenge remains the theft of passengers' possessions from their luggage. This is a matter for concern and needs urgent attention.

Chairperson, we are ready for the 2010 World Cup. We would like to congratulate Acsa for a job well done.

The South African Civil Aviation Authority, Sacaa, is responsible for providing, regulating, supporting and ensuring safety throughout civil aviation. Its intensive oversight resulted in fewer incidents and accident investigations. There were fewer court cases against Sacaa in 2008-09 compared to previous years. We also accept the shift of transferring this programme to the department, hoping that it will be given the serious attention it deserves to ensure safety in civil aviation.

Air Traffic and Navigation Services, ATNS, plays a vital role in economic development and poverty reduction in Africa. I appreciate the work done by ATNS in providing traffic services and technical training to South African students and those from other countries. It is facing the challenge of recruiting and retaining skilled personnel like air traffic controllers. It has lost close to 150 air traffic controllers to the Middle East.

As ATNS is faced with the challenge of scarce skills, the provision of bursaries to students and of engineering and technical learnerships is a step in the right direction in dealing with this problem.

The other matter to be attended to is the delay of flights, which seems to be a daily event nowadays. It really inconveniences passengers. To minimise delays, let us correct what we can.

The function of Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa, Prasa, is to ensure that rail commuter services are provided in the best public interest and to expand public transport by providing buses. Previously, Prasa had the following challenges: ageing rolling stock; vandalism and theft, which negatively affected the service of railway lines; limited funding, resulting in the decline of the condition of the infrastructure; criminal activities taking place in stations and inside the trains; and the diminishing of the skills base.

Of all these challenges, Prasa has been able to refurbish its coaches in 2009-10. There is also a budget of R8 billion that has been set aside for the maintenance of rail infrastructure. This indicates that the government has prioritised the challenges of infrastructure maintenance. Prasa has also been able to build bridges for the safety of pedestrians and it has improved Shosholoza Meyl. I have experienced their service and I am inviting members to book Shosholoza Meyl. There is improved security in the stations and trains and their condition is much improved. They are always kept clean. It is true that Prasa has been able to transform the rail industry. We need to congratulate them.

The responsibility of the port regulator is the economic regulation of the South African port system, consistent with the government strategic objectives. The agency has been able to establish offices and recruit staff. There are challenges that affected them in the execution of their functions: the issue of part-time regulators; delays in the approval of directives, which are the guidelines for the regulators; noncompliance of regulators with the Public Finance Management Act, Act 1 of 1999, PFMA and Treasury regulations, such as strategic plans which are not finalised and approved in time; the failure to report predetermined objectives in the annual report; and the failure of the agency to report performance against the predetermined objectives as required by PFMA.

The department and the regulator need to attend to these challenges and ensure that the regulator has effective, efficient and transparent internal control systems in place to do performance management.

The department has conducted feasibility studies on the Moloto Developmental Corridor. There is slow progress in the development of that corridor. I am happy that the Minister said something about it. The department has underspent on this programme from 2007-08 and 2009-10; especially in 2009, when close to 70% of the budget was not spent.

The department has reviewed the overloading strategy because overloading is contributing to the destruction of our roads and it is costing the country millions of rand per year to fix them. We have weighbridges and mobile weighbridges to be used in dealing with these challenges. The shortage of staff and space at some of the bridges, and the lack of visibility of traffic officers in some areas, remain challenges that need to be addressed.

Government has done much to improve road infrastructure. The challenge was to balance the building of new roads with the maintenance of the existing ones. Therefore, government made the maintenance of road and rail infrastructure a priority in the transport sector as it embarked on a programme of increased infrastructure spending.

On the other side, there was the challenge of the maintenance versus the renewal of road infrastructure. We know that the causes of poor roads condition can be attributed to many factors, such as damage by continuous heavy rains; lack of a maintenance plan and budget; skill shortages of such people as engineers and artisans; institutional change, especially in local government; and the long time it takes to fix potholes. We are aware that the lack of road maintenance compromises road safety.

As far as the development of our roads is concerned, there are challenges but also successes, which need to be appreciated. We commend the fact that learner drivers from 16 to 18 years can now have learner driver's licences, but the greatest challenge is the issue of attitude, intolerance and non-compliance, which should also be dealt with.

We welcome the finalisation of the draft of the implementation strategy and action plan to achieve accessibility to public transport. It has been long overdue.

While people might be interested in walking, our roads are a problem because some of them don't have cyclist and pedestrian walkways. This should be attended to when new roads are built.

Buses and trains are being subsidised, but the taxi industry is still not. The department should consider the matter and ensure that the industry is being empowered. We appreciate the fact the Minister mentioned the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences, Aarto, because it was a matter of concern. Aarto and the Implementation of the National Land Transport Act, Act 5 of 2009, are overdue. Some of the clauses of the National Land Transport Act, Act 5 of 2009, cannot be implemented because the regulator has not been appointed so far.

The department needs to strengthen its oversight public entities that are accountable to it and it should ensure that they respond to the public mandate, acting in terms of economic transformation objectives. Much has been achieved by the ANC-led government in the past 15 years. As the ANC, we are still committed to doing more. As we know, voting for the ANC is voting for a better life for all South Africans.

With the support of the people, and the dedicated departmental staff, the ANC-led government can take the country forward. Therefore, I move that the House should accept the budget for the Department of Transport. I thank you. [Applause.] [Interjections.]

Mr T S FARISANI: Hon previous speaker, justice delayed is justice denied. Did I pronounce your surname correctly? Are you Ngwenya-Mabila?

Ms P C NGWENYA-MABILA: Chairperson, yes, I am Ngwenya-Mabila.

Mr T S FARISANI: Thank you, I should have enquired before I called you.

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: Temporary Chairperson, Minister of Transport, Comrade Sbu Ndebele, Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee, Comrade Ruth Bhengu, hon members, MECs who I see in the audience, the DG and his staff, CEOs from entities and many stakeholders from the transport family, the Minister already provided a comprehensive overview of the Department of Transport's 2010 budget allocation. I would just like to focus on a couple of additional matters.

Two days before the Easter weekend, Judge Fabricius delivered a landmark judgment in the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria. Perhaps because it was just before the Easter weekend and it was a long judgment of 204 pages, or perhaps - this is more likely - because the outcome of that particular judgment was not liked much by those who often use up a lot of space in the commercial media, including, sometimes, my colleagues from over there on the other side of the House, the DA, or for one reason or another, the judgment didn't get much reportage in the newspapers. And yet this 204-page judgment is of considerable significance and importance to the broad South African public.

Those of you who have followed the occasional reporting of this matter will know that the Law Society of South Africa, LSSA, and the SA Association of Personal Injury Lawyers, SAAPIL, challenged the constitutional validity of the Road Accident Fund Amendment Act, which came into operation in 2008.

In delivering his long judgment, the judge first prefaced it with a number of contextualisations - the context within which this case had been brought to his court. He noted that the legal costs for the fund in the year ending 31 March 2009 were a whopping R1,6 billion. These were merely the so-called "party and party" legal costs, that is, the costs paid directly to lawyers by the fund itself. The attorney-client costs, the judge noted, were a matter of conjecture since they were privileged information. However, the judge accepted as plausible the Road Accident Fund's estimate that these costs amounted to somewhere near R4,3 billion in the financial year 2008-09. That's a total of nearly R6 billion going to lawyers.

The hon Farrow says to us that there's a crisis at the RAF and so on. It has challenges, for sure, but we need to ask why there is a crisis. The good judge had the good sense to give us a good sense of what the problem might be.

The figures produced in the judgement are roughly similar to those that were also suggested by the Satchwell Commission in 2002, which said that roughly half of the fuel levy which the RAF gets, which we all contribute to as road users and which is currently standing at about R12 billion, ends up not going to hospitals or people injured in accidents but to professional fees.

So, against this background - because this was just background - they then considered the legal arguments. Judge Fabricius found against the LSSA and the SAAPIL on every single count of their attempt to prove that this Amendment Act was illegal, bar one minor technicality in the regulations of the judgment, and the judge was quite right there.

With regard to the unconstitutionality of removing a claimant's right to take up a civil case for the balance of a claim not paid by the fund, he noted that contrary to the applicants' - the lawyers' - assertion that it took away more than it gave, the judge said:

The substitution of a statutory claim ...

In other words, the claim against the fund in law ...

... for the common-law claim against a driver is to the advantage of claimants insofar as they now have a debtor with a "deep pocket": the RAF. They would otherwise have been at risk of having a good common-law claim, perhaps, on the one hand, but against someone who might not be able to pay at all. The substitution of the risky common-law claim with a statutory claim against a public fund is a significant advantage.

That was a critical finding by the judge. Looking at the same issue from the perspective of a driver who might be at fault, the judge further noted that while we all pay into the fund through the fuel levy, those who would be unable to afford additional personal insurance for indemnity - the poor - might be forced into bankruptcy as a result of what might have been simply a moment's inattention on the road – because sometimes it does occur.

As for the other allegations of a lack of fairness in the Act - because we capped the amount in terms of loss of future income, for instance; we said that general damages can be awarded only for serious injuries, and so on - the judge ruled exactly opposite to what the lawyers were claiming. He said:

While contributing the same fuel levy, the poor obtained much less because they can claim less, if anything, for loss of earnings. They are less likely to institute large claims for medical expenses because they cannot afford to pay for the treatment upfront, and they are less likely to obtain the same amount of general damages as the rich, having regard to the consistency and quality of treatment in respect of general damages.

In short, in reaching his findings in favour of the Department of Transport and the RAF, the judge found that the Road Accident Fund Amendment Act was not irrational or unconstitutional, and that it advanced the objectives of a road accident compensation system that was more equitable, reasonable, affordable and sustainable.

In warmly saluting – as I hope that at least the majority of the members on this side of the House will do - the content and the contextualisation of the judge's findings, we should note that there is every reason to believe that the LSSA and the SAAPIL will take this judgment on appeal to the Constitutional Court.

I am quite convinced that the Constitutional Court will find in the same way. But, certainly, as the Department of Transport, through our Minister of Transport, we commit ourselves to actively taking up the defence of what we've achieved through this Amendment Act, not for the sake of winning a legal case but in order to defend public interest in this matter. [Applause.]

These findings are related to an Amendment Act which is related to the current RAF. In other words, they are, in effect, transitional measures, as we lay the basis for a complete overhaul of the system of road accident compensation in South Africa. Members will remember that earlier this year we presented to the portfolio committee the Department of Transport's draft policy document on a no-fault road accident benefit scheme. We intend for this to be an integral part of a comprehensive social security net. No longer will R6 billion go to professional fees and not to medical care or to the assistance of people who are injured and to families who suffer the loss of a breadwinner. We absolutely need to fight this case and make sure that we win it. We salute what the judge has done so far in the North Gauteng High Court.

I also make this point, hon Farrow, because of course there are challenges in some of the agencies and entities falling under our budget. The hon member tended to present all entities as if in crisis – unfortunately, he said "anus horribilus", but I think he meant "annus horribilus" [Laughter.] It sounded as if there was this fog of depression and negativity in which everything simply became grey. I think that's unfair. The RAF, in difficult circumstances and needing major transformation - I think generally we agree on that – is doing not badly. We need to change the operation, but it is not as though there is some failure at the level of the CEO or a board or whatever. There might be some other issues, but let's not be so negative that we fail to analyse fairly what the challenges are. [Applause.]

The RAF judgment got scant attention in the media. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the state of our roads and the potholes in our roads in South Africa. There has been a great deal of adverse publicity around these matters.

First of all, a word of qualification - but I don't want to be overly defensive, and others have also said it, including opposition parties - not all of our road system is in a bad shape, specifically the 17 000km, more or less, that the SA National Road Agency, Sanral, is responsible for. It is generally in excellent or good shape. Often foreign visitors to South Africa are quite surprised by the state of those roads that they see and they comment favourably on them.

However, there are some really serious problems on our roads. I don't want to imply that we don't have serious challenges. The Department of Transport asked Sanral to conduct an evaluation of the total national road network. The report makes for very sobering reading. About 80% of our road network in South Africa is older than the 20-year design lifespan for which it was originally built. Even more sobering is the fact that in making its assessment of the entire network, Sanral was able to rely on data for only 64% of the roads falling under the nine metros. When it came to municipalities, there was data available for only 4% of 340 000km of roads. In other words, the majority of municipalities, let alone maintaining or looking after their roads, are not even doing a basic evaluation of what is happening on them. Unless you do that, how can you spend the budget effectively; how can you allocate your budget effectively?

It would be tempting for Minister Ndebele and me to shrug our shoulders and say that's a provincial and municipal issue. But we cannot do that; none of us can do that. We need to accept collective responsibility for the state of our road system.

So, what can be done? A whole number of things are necessary, and other members have already suggested many of them. Indeed, we are actively engaged with these measures.

First of all, yes, we have got to get our rail system working again - freight rail, for instance. Although there has been further investment and some capitalisation in Transnet Freight Rail, TFR, over the last few years it has continued to lose freight market to road haulers. That is hugely problematic and we have got to turn that situation around. As the Department, we don't necessarily want to take over TFR but we do want to introduce a rail economic regulator in order to get a better handle on what is happening there, including some of the other issues that were mentioned here, for instance, the issue of charges to Prasa by TFR. So, we need an economic regulator.

We also need – and other members have mentioned this – to improve our road freight control and inspection measures, working together with the Road Traffic Management Corporation, RTMC - when we get it right, and there are challenges there – with the Road Freight Association, RFA, with labour, and so on. There are responsible road haulers out there, but there are also many fly-by-night operators. They are damaging the roads terribly.

We need to ramp up road construction and maintenance as a major component of our Expanded Public Works Programme, EPWP. Already, there are very important experiences in several provinces, not least the pioneering work that Minister Ndebele introduced when he was MEC in KwaZulu-Natal in terms of rural roads and low-cost, labour-intensive methods of maintaining them.

Others have mentioned that we need to ring-fence budget allocations. Whether or not it becomes a national fund is a further debate we need to have, but we certainly need to ring-fence budget allocation to roads. Too often money is notionally allotted to provinces and municipalities for road construction and road maintenance but then disappears in all kinds of other directions.

Many small municipalities and even some provinces have limited in-house engineering capacity. Project management capacity is often weak and, therefore, wide open to abuse and corruption, not least from a stratum of "tender-preneurs". There is a well-known case in a particular province up north in South Africa that has come up. But that's symptomatic of the broader problem: lack of effective management capacity. So, we need to pay a lot of attention - maybe that's something that Sanral can do – and take responsibility for the whole road network in South Africa, but also to assist with capacity development at municipal and provincial level.

There's good news in the bad news. For instance, many of our pothole problems can be eliminated through very basic road maintenance, which is eminently suited to EPWP's labour-intensive work. We're talking about such tasks as clearing drains, cleaning up the verges of roads - all those things eliminate the build-up of water on the surface and beneath the surface of roads. Road-surface cracks must be sealed timeously so that a crack doesn't become a pothole, a trench, or anything else.

Finally, we need to help provinces and municipalities to prioritise preventive maintenance as much as possible. When budget is actually spent on roads, the tendency is to go for either a big, new "vanity" road project or to fix the very worst roads. For the same budget you can mend 1km of seriously deteriorated road or fix 18km of a road that hasn't deteriorated completely. We need to assist with all of those things.

I am trying to work out what this clock is saying. It's going up. It's very difficult to figure out. I need Sanral to assist me with some capacity-building!

I've said that as the national government and national entities we need to work very closely with municipalities to assist with capacity to rescue the road network. We also need to do so in regard to public transport. Working closely with metros and municipalities is absolutely central to transforming the public transport reality in South Africa.

Minister Ndebele has already spoken eloquently about the priority that public transport enjoys in the Department's strategic plan, notwithstanding what the hon Mbhele had to say. It's central. It's the critical thing in terms of our planning. We've got to get public transport right.

We are not going to be able to achieve sustainable, reliable and affordable public transport without, at the same time, beginning to transform the persisting apartheid geography of low-density, sprawling suburbs that are reliant on cars and freeways on the one hand and, on the other hand, the distant, marginalised dormitory townships, which often we unwittingly recreated with Reconstruction and Development Programme, RDP, housing over the last 15 years.

As long as that reality is there, public transport will be for those who are condemned to it - those who can't afford a car. The rest of us who live in suburbs with freeway access will use cars. Public transport needs to become the first choice for all of us, rich and poor. That's how great cities and towns work where public transport is the key mode. You use a car occasionally when there's no alternative, but fundamentally your daily life revolves around public transport.

Public transport is not just about moving people. It is about democratising space; it is about de-racialising the spatial geography that is still so deeply entrenched in the South African reality.

This means that planning of public transport needs to devolve to the local level – and that's why when we ring-fence road maintenance, for instance, the question is: do we hold it as a national fund? It might be tempting because we think we can do it better, but we've got to make municipalities... [Interjections.]

The TEMPORARY CHAIRPERSON: Hon member, your time has expired.

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: ...municipalities responsible for their space because they are the ones that need to help change and transformation, and that's...

The TEMPORARY CHAIRPERSON: "Expired" means your time has ended. [Applause.]

The DEPUTY MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: Thank you very much. [Time expired.]

Mr S N SWART


The DEPUTY MINISTER OF TRANSPORT

Mr S N SWART: Chairperson, we are on the verge of hosting what we as the ACDP believe will be a very successful Soccer World Cup. While we had a relatively successful dry run with the Confederations Cup, deficiencies in the public transport system were highlighted. We trust that the single transport command and control centre will enhance integration among various departments to ensure that we have an efficient and reliable transport system for the World Cup.

However, the ACDP noticed that concerns have been expressed about the regulations for public transport for the World Cup, particularly relating to delays in issuing licences and possible tensions with existing operators. While the decision to licence courtesy services seems commendable, it may create further tensions with the taxi industry. The question is, to what degree has the hon Minister consulted with the taxi industry on these new regulations?

The promotion of infrastructure investment as an instrument of growth and employment remains an important driver, and the Gautrain and the Bus Rapid Transit, BRT, systems are key components of the department's network plan. They will also be real showpieces when the world focuses on South Africa in two month's time. This, of course, depends on the co-operation of taxi operators, some of whom have threatened to disrupt the World Cup. This clearly cannot be tolerated and we wish the Minister well in his ongoing negotiations with them.

The ACDP shares the concerns about the unacceptably high number of fatalities on our roads, and we sympathise particularly with the family of the deceased Deputy Minister of Health, Dr Sefularo. The leading causes of road accidents are human error and poor road conditions. It is, however, positive and heartening to see that the number of fatalities on our roads this past Easter holiday has been reduced, and we commend the department and law enforcement officers in this regard.

I travel widely and I would encourage MPs to make use of the main roads. Wherever one travels, one sees major construction on the roads, and there is a lot of improvement. While this may irritate a number of motorists, we are greatly encouraged to see this network system being improved. Even the notorious road between Kimberley and Johannesburg is being rebuilt and improved. Our concern does lie with secondary roads. As we have learnt and the Deputy Minister has pointed out, if we do not maintain our roads properly, the costs obviously increase dramatically.

The ACDP also notes the Deputy Minister's glee regarding Acting Judge Fabricius's judgement. We participated in the whole process of that Amendment Bill, and, to a certain degree, you have been vindicated, which I think is correct. However, I think it is, to a degree, unfair to place the full blame for the costs with the lawyers. Being a lawyer myself, I might of course not be that objective, but I do believe that one can contest those figures. Clearly the issue of the attorney-client cost does seem exorbitant, and I'm sure that it will be raised in further litigation. Let's see where that process goes further.

As far as the no-fault policy is concerned, we would clearly like to engage further with it. Thank you. [Time Expired.] [Laughter.]

Ms N J NGELE


Mnu S N SWART

IsiXhosa:

Nksz N J NGELE: Sihlalo wethutyana...[Kwahlekwa.],... Mphathiswa wezoThutho neSekela lakho, Mhlalingaphambili weKomiti yezoThutho, Malungu ePalamente nonke, zindwendwe zethu ezibekekileyo, namkelekile nonke.

Mandimbulele urhulumente ngezinto asenzela zona, ngoba into esiyaziyo kukumgxeka, sithi akukho nto asenzele yona. Asenzele yona asikwazi ukuma phambili sithi usenzele. Ndithetha ndingumntu wasemaphandleni, emakhaya. Ndithetha ngabantwana abahamba umgama othatha ixesha elingangeyure nangaphezulu besuka emakheyeni abo besiya ezikolweni. Ndithetha ngaloo nto ke.

Makhe sibe nomfanekiso-zingqondweni simbone lo mntwana ephuma emzini ongenanto; emzini ekumnyama kuwo, apho kude kuthiwe "ikati ilal' eziko"; enxibe ibhatyi kaTata wakhe kukuphela kwento ayombetheyo. Inkulu le bhatyi, iyidyasi esindayo kuye. Uyabaleka uya esikolweni.

English:

The TEMPORARY CHAIRPRSON (Mr T S Farisani): Hon member, I think there are some interpreting gadgets that are on, but not in the ear. Is that fine? Thank you.

IsiXhosa:

Uza kulibhatala ke ixesha lam. Ahambe ke lo mntwana ebaleka de ayekufika esikolweni, sele ediniwe. Uhlala imini yonke noku kudinwa kwakhe, efunda. Ukuphuma kwesikolo kufuneke abuyele ekhaya. Uyabona ke ukuba ungumntwana oyinkwenkwe, kufuneka agqithe ezinkomeni phambi kokuba abuyele ekhaya, ngoku anqanda ezi nkomo libe litshona ke lona ilanga. Udiniwe, kodwa kukho umsebenzi wesikolo ebewunikwe esikolweni ekufuneka ewenzile. Uwenza ngeliphi ixesha, ewenziswa ngubani? Ziingxaki esinazo ezi. Kungoko simbulela urhulumente ngokucinga kwakhe, ecingela aba bantwana basemakhaya ngokuthi abafunele iibhayisekile ekuthiwa ngooShova Kalula. [Kwaqhwatywa.]

English

The Shova Kalula Bicycle Project introduced in 2001 is a government-sponsored initiative providing subsidised bicycles to rural and peri-urban beneficiaries with mobility constraints. This project is part of the department's non-motorised transport, NMT, strategy initiative that aims to meet the target of delivering one million bicycles throughout South Africa by 2015, in line with the resolutions and action plan agreed to during the African Transport Ministers' Summit held in Addis Ababa in 2006. It is a partnership between the national Department of Transport and provincial and local governments intended to promote the use of bicycles as an alternative mode of transport. It also promotes the establishment of microbusinesses which support the maintenance and repair of the bicycles.

Shova Kalula is a phased project that started with second-hand bicycles donated from Europe and England. Microbusinesses – where these bicycles were sold and serviced to sustain the project – were then set up. After an evaluation of phase one of the project, the Department of Transport resolved to distribute new bicycles only, owing to the fact that spares for some of the second-hand bicycles were unavailable.

During phases one, two and three, the department transferred funds directly to provinces to implement the project. However, realising that many provinces did not have the required capacity to manage the project, it decided to procure services centrally.

Up to the end of phase three, a total of 33 000 bicycles were distributed and 22 microbusinesses were established in seven provinces. [Applause.] As at 23 April 2009, the Department of Transport had distributed a total of 59 000 bicycles, nationally. In addition, it reported that it intended to distribute 15 000 bicycles by the end of April 2010. [Applause.]

IsiXhosa

Iingxaki esidibana nazo apha kulo Shova Kalula kukuba thina sisemakhaya, nangona sibulela, kodwa siyibona ikukuza kukaNxele, ngoba okokuqala, sinemilambo nemilanjana ekufuneka aba bantwana batshove besenyuka besehla kuyo xa besuka emakhayeni abo. Abakwazi ukungena endleleni yeemoto, ngoba iza kuba neengozi. Ingxaki yesibini esiza kuba nayo -masithethe ngomntwana oyinkwenkwe - kukuba xa efika esikolweni uza kunikwa le bhayisekile ze afike kowabo kukho umkhuluwa ongaphangeliyo, ekudala ehleli. Umbuzo wakhe uza kuthi: "Ye kwedini, uyithathaphi le bhayisekile?" [Kwahlekwa.] Athi ke yena: "Hayi, bhuti, siziphiwe ezi bhayisekile esikolweni. Kuthiwa masihambe ngazo." Athi ubhuti: "Yho, inkwenkwe enebhayisekie ndingekabi nayo mna!" [Kwahlekwa.] Ayithathe le bhayisekile. Aye ngayo phi? Etywaleni. [Kwahlekwa.] [Kwaqhwatywa.] Xa ebuya etywaleni, akaboni andithi kuba kusebusuku kwaye uqhub 'ibhayisekile? Ayokuwa, folokohlo nebhayisekile yomntwana.

Into esiyicelayo kurhulumente kukuba makubekho ulongamelo lweziShova Kalula. Athi umntwana xa eyifumene kubekho into eyenziwayo ukujonga ukuba isekhona na kule nyanga kwaye ibikhona na kule veki iphelileyo; kubuzwe ukuba: "Kwedini ibhayisekile yakho iyephi?" Ze ke urhulumente abone ukuba ubanika ezibhayisekile ebaxekela ntoni. Umbono wona wamkelekile kakhulu kuthi thina sisemakhaya.

English

We recommend, then, that Shova Kalula be viewed within the context of the South African transport history that has neglected the role of the so-called "slow modes" of transport, namely, walking and cycling. This is because, even though the country arguably has world-class urban roads, it does not have adequate facilities and infrastructure for pedestrians and cyclists.

South Africa's transport planners have historically provided high-speed car use for the rich, very basic transport for the poor and totally inadequate facilities for the millions of urban and rural people with no option but to walk or cycle.

IsiXhosa:

Into yesibini endiyicelayo kurhulumente nendiyithandayo ngabantwana basezidolophini abahamba ngeekhumbi. Emakhaya, apho mhlawumbi kukho umnyinyivana wemadlana, aba bantwana bakhwela iiveni. Evenini ke ngumaqala ngakhwela. Ukuba ukhwele kuqala, ndikholelwa, uza kusingatha abantwana abathathu phezu kwakho; andimazi ke oza kulala ngecala ukuba ke yena uza kumthini olandelayo. Ingxaki yeveni kukuba ilayisha kakhulu. Kuthi ukuba kukho ingozi ibe mbi kakhulu kuba ilayisha ngaphezu komthamo wayo.

Siyamcela ke urhulumente ukuba akhe asikhangelele ezi veni zithutha abantwana. Sifuna nokwazi ke ukuba urhulumente unomnyinyivana weekhumbi zasezidolophini na, ukuba unawo, makawenze kuyo yonke indawo. Nasezivenini mawube khona. Ukuba iiveni ziyahamaba endleleni nazo mazibe nento eziyifumanayo, zingahambi mahala. Kodwa ke ubungozi bufika apha...

English

In February 2009, three children died.

IsiXhosa

Uyabona ke ukubhubha komntwana omnye kuyinto enkulu kakhulu, xa sele bebathathu baninzi gqitha.

English:

Three children died and four were seriously injured when the bakkie taking them to school crashed through bridge railings onto another road in Centurion. The children were thrown from the vehicle as it plummeted eight meters from the R55 onto the N14.

Again, in February 2009, six pre-school and primary-school children died in a crash which occurred when an off-duty Pretoria police officer allegedly raced through an intersection and collided with the bakkie taking the children to school.

In March 2010, a bakkie carrying 27 school children overturned on the R617, in Kokstad.

IsiXhosa

Yiyo ke loo nto sisithi iiveni makube ngathi kuyaqiniselwa ukuthintelwa kokufumana kwazo lo msebenzi wokuthutha abantwana. Ewe, abantu balambile, kodwa mabangavunyelwa, ngoba kukho obu bungozi bokuba ithi yakufumana ingozi kulimale abantu abaninizi; kulimala abantwana abaninzi nyhani.

English

I support the budget. [Applause.]

Mr M S F DE FREITAS


Ms N J NGELE

Mr M S F DE FREITAS: Chairperson, much media attention has rightly been given to the recent Arrive Alive campaign during this Easter period, and the Department of Transport reported last week:

This year's 105 road fatalities were a significant drop compared to the 197 lives lost last year during the same period.

I disagree with some of the speakers who previously said there is an improvement. Interrogating this statement tells us this is actually incorrect. The 197 quoted was the final figure for 2009 but this year's 105 deaths is a preliminary figure and thus can't be compared until the final figure is out. The Road Traffic Management Corporation, RTMC, is not comparing apples with apples, which is a tendency of theirs.

They have a knack for playing with figures and misleading the public. Since 1999, we have not had full statistics. From 2001 till the present, there are only incomplete details on fatal crashes. The most important statistical measure is fatalities per 100 million vehicles per km. This is an overall expression of the risk of road deaths, taking into account all sorts of different factors. This figure has not been released by government since 2006.

In 2007 to 2008, the "new" measure introduced by government was changed to fatalities per 10 000 vehicles. This is incorrect. Without proper comparisons and statistics, how can one strategise and plan? At present, our stats are in shambles. We need to adhere to the international ratio of 100 million vehicles per kilometer.

I'm glad the Minister paid attention to road safety. Certainly, I see no ubuntu that the Minister speaks about regarding our roads. Our roads continue to be a haven for carnage and death. Speed control has not yet yielded any improved results. Since 1998, road deaths and fatalities have more than doubled. Speed prosecution creates the illusion of enforcement without actually adding anything to safety. The high numbers of speeding fines has been offered as proof that the authorities are doing everything in their power to reduce road deaths, but the motorist does not co-operate. The problem is that the offences, which are the most direct causes of crashes, are not being addressed.

The many traffic offences on the court roll, which the Minister mentioned, are overwhelmingly speed related. Road deaths will not be reduced until the focus of law enforcement shifts to moving violations instead of speeding. For example, someone who habitually changes lanes without checking or signalling, who is intoxicated or drugged, or whose following distance is too close on the road, is a danger. We need to catch these culprits, and we won't catch them from behind a bush with a laser gun. Controlled visible policing is the internationally proven solution.

I'm glad the Deputy Minister touched on the state of our roads. Replies to questions that I posed recently to the Minister indicated that only 8% of the entire South African road network is in an optimal state. This represents a staggering fall of 75% since 1988. Within a few years, there will not be a single road in the country in good condition, unless something is done immediately.

The most immediate consequence of this is that poor road conditions endanger the lives of all commuters. The RTMC recently revealed that poor road maintenance caused 1 694 deaths and a staggering cost of R10 billion annually in the last four years.

In the longer term, poor road infrastructure has devastating consequences for our country's economic growth. A recent study by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research revealed that bad roads have a negative impact on logistics costs, especially as trucks have to travel great distances from the economic hub of Gauteng to our ports. The study indicates that logistics costs in South Africa have already reached R317 billion, or 15,9% of gross domestic product, in 2007. That was a 1% increase from 2006.

Furthermore, without an efficient road network, South Africans are constrained in their ability to move across the country and create economic opportunities. In tandem with this, we require an enhanced rail network that will move people out of their cars and onto our trains. This is difficult, considering the continued alleged corruption, cash-flow trouble and mismanagement that I keep uncovering within Passenger Rail Authority of South Africa.

The solution to the deterioration on South African roads is the establishment of a dedicated fund especially for road maintenance - as mentioned by my colleague, hon Stuart Farrow. This is a move that the DA has been calling for for many years. Minister Ndebele has been quoted in the media supporting this and we eagerly await action to match the words.

Other measures that the Minister can implement will be included in our safety plan, entitled "A simple six-point plan, making our roads safer", which we'd like to present for consideration when we initiate and launch a road safety indaba, as mentioned by my colleague, hon Farrow.

The Minister can immediately implement certain measures with minimal effort. These include: firstly, investigate a new, updated K53 licence test. Secondly, re-implement driving instructors' permit tests, ensuring that instructors are of the highest standard. Thirdly, implement a licencing inspectorate so that driving examiners are assessed at least annually. Fourthly, implement a provisional licensing system for new drivers, incorporating a five-year retest, which keeps drivers up-to-date with new developments in driving. Fifthly, replace speed-orientated traffic enforcement with moving violations and drink-driving orientated enforcement, as has been implemented in the Western Cape with their Safely Home campaign.

Lastly, no new laws need to be introduced to bring in simple and cost-effective existing innovations that can save lives. Innovative technologies, such as this child-retainer harness, is such an example. Such a harness can easily be slipped onto a seat belt, ensuring that children and pre-teens are safely strapped without being hurt by safety belt-related injuries, which are in fact considerable.

Implementing such basic measures and undergoing a paradigm shift in the department can go a long way to improving the unacceptable situation that we currently have on our roads. Thank you, Chair.

Mr J J MAAKE


Mr M S F DE FREITAS

Mr J J MAAKE: Chairperson, Ministers, Deputy Ministers who are here, and colleagues, a country's level of development is usually identified by the type and level of infrastructure that it prides itself on. The lower the level of infrastructural development, the lesser the level of economic development of a country and this is an obvious yardstick of underdevelopment.

For the last week our portfolio committee and a number of other portfolio committees have been doing oversight on the state of readiness of Fifa host cities. They were checking roads infrastructure, transport, health, tourism, home affairs, immigration, etc.

Although there is still a lot of construction going on, we were assured that the time frames will be met and we could clearly see for ourselves that this was true. A report on the oversight will definitely be tabled before Parliament in the near future.

When we check the vision of the national Department of Transport, it reads: "Transport, the heartbeat of South Africa's economic growth and social development". Its mission statement says that it ...

... needs to lead the development of integrated efficient transport systems by creating a framework of sustainable policies, regulations and implementable models to support government strategies for economic, social and international development.

As the Minister and the chairperson stated earlier on, the department's priorities for 2010-11 are reducing transport costs; contributing to environmental sustainability by decreasing carbon emissions; eradicating backlogs in road, rail, aviation and maritime infrastructure; improving access to transport through greater spatial integration; reducing freight transit times; and developing the regulatory capacity required to enforce the safety standards and reduce accidents in all modes of transport.

It is necessary for me to mention all these because very few people go in to the system to check what the priorities are. These are the areas on which we as the Portfolio Committee on Transport will be doing oversight over the department.

The main areas that we as a transport committee were looking at during the 2010 readiness oversight were road construction projects; roads to stadiums; taxi industry associations; parking at stadiums; and checking clear signage to the host cities and stadiums.

It must be taken into account that this Budget Vote happens at a time when only 58 days are left before the biggest event ever to happen on the African continent commences. We were even advising some municipalities and government structures that if they wanted to succeed in their request for funding, at this point all they had to do was label every request as falling under 2010 projects and their request would be approved as soon as possible. I'm not sure whether it's legal what we were doing. This is the situation with this budget also; maybe we can try that.

Everyone knows that the success of this event hinges on the ability of the country to provide up-to-standard infrastructure and systems. Therefore, government has identified the transport sector as one of the necessary conditions for the event. South Africa promised Fifa that we will deliver a successful World Cup and that is exactly what we are going to do. This year has been declared the year of action by the President of this country.

We should instead request much more than what is before us today because if we wave the Fifa card, no one will ever reject our proposals. You never know with the opposition because they are like a chameleon. They change colours according to what suits them. All they do is oppose anything the ANC says. Those who don't know and easily forget, the ANC, by the way, is the ruling party in this country. I'm happy that the ANC is my organisation. [Applause.]

Seventy percent of the South African roads, according to the Automobile Association of South Africa, needs urgent repairs that will cost approximately R65 billion. As my colleague the hon Ngwenya-Mabila has already mentioned, overloading is said to be contributing to the destruction of the roads and is costing R650 million a year. As a result road safety is compromised by potholes, rutted and slippery surfaces and the lack of general road maintenance.

Avoiding references to the past would not be fair to us, because the reasons for the state of affairs lie exactly in the past policies of apartheid. During apartheid there were fewer tarred roads and they would, of course, be concentrated in the white areas. Nobody at this time would be worried about potholes. Now tarred roads have been extended to those areas that never even imagined they could ever have this "white privilege". [Applause.]

Therefore, it is hypocritical for the opposition to complain about potholes. They are in a roundabout way getting a taste of their own medicine. One can imagine an ambulance carrying a critically injured or ill person rushing to a hospital on a gravel road with no bridges. By this I am not trying to justify anything; I'm trying to put things into perspective. I am trying to teach the opposition to stop mourning, whining and howling and to start coming up with possible solutions to the problem faced by our country, which we all love. [Applause.]

The solution according to them, which might not be very clever, is for the ANC to relinquish power and give it to them. The question is: is Cape Town better - or any other municipality run by the opposition?

If there are good things that used to happen previously, we must name them. For instance, the rail system worked better during those times than now. It stands to reason that that eased the pressure on the trucking of goods, which in turn helped save our roads.

The revitalisation of the rail system needs to be looked into by the department in order to reduce spending on road maintenance. The clever and caring ANC government is already doing something about this. In the state of the nation address, the President committed government to maintaining and expanding the road network as well as ensuring that the rail network is reliable and better integrated with sea ports.

Hon Mbhele asked the question on what the Minister is doing in terms of rail. In trying to solve some of these problems, the department is in the process of developing an integrated transport infrastructure plan, the National Transport Master Plan, NATMAP. That is where the ANC always comes in. The main reason for developing NATMAP is to examine, determine and crystallise relationships between various land uses in the country and their consequential multimodal transport requirements.

The opposition will always be unreasonable. They will always contradict themselves. They will always be hypocrites, always moan and howl as long as the ANC is in power. The reason is not that the ANC is doing anything wrong, but because they want our power, which they will never get. I think that they know this pretty well.

The way they contradict themselves all the time is as if the ladies of the night, which you may call a prostitute, were to say that the goods they trade in are out of stock [Laughter.] What a contradiction; it is very hard to fathom. That is the way the opposition thinks and behaves and it is surely not very clever.

They sometimes make me think of asking the President of the country to do an exchange with President Mugabe to rule this country for at least three months and then we'll see what the opposition will do. Maybe he might whip them into understanding this country's problems, especially if his deputy were my comrade whom I like, Comrade Malema.

Hon Farrow, I am very happy today and I would like to commend the DA at least for once. Hon Farrow, you didn't only moan and howl but came up with recommendations and suggestions, which must be commended.

Hon Mbhele of Cope talked about the congestion in major cities. To him I would say that the engineering of these cities was not made for you and me. You cannot extend them and you cannot do anything. If you are in Cape Town you will either be staying in a hostel, Gugulethu, KwaLanga, or you will be in the Eastern Cape. The engineering was not for us to be here. That is why you cannot do anything about it - unless you start using helicopters. That is apartheid-era planning which you cannot blame on this government.

Hon Lucas of the IFP talked about bridges being washed away in Limpopo. He never told us whether it was because of natural disasters, which we cannot do anything about as the ANC.

Mr E J LUCAS: Hon member, would you like to take a question?

Mr J J MAAKE: No, I would not. Something was said about encouraging walking. I would like to commend the City of eThekwini. They have started doing something about it and they are developing walkways that encourage exactly what we want. The ANC supports the budget.

The MINISTER OF TRANSPORT


Mr J J MAAKE

The MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: Madam Chairperson, I would like to thank the members for the constructive contribution that has been made to this debate. Thank you to all.

Let me start by announcing that the Cross-Border Road Transport Agency now has a chief executive officer, Mr Khumalo, who was appointed a few weeks ago. [Applause.] The lack of leadership at that agency has been a serious one and quite a number of things went awry. But, of course, in terms of our own borders, we know that there are many agencies there, for example, the army, the police, and Home Affairs, that deal with traffic overloading, roadworthiness and so forth. We now have that in place.

Secondly, the issue of the Road Traffic Management Corporation, RTMC, has been in the media, and we took action. Of course, action that is taken by us will always be founded on the basis of law. It might very well be admirable to have the strength and power of a lion, but it is terrible to use it like a lion. So, you follow procedures, and that takes time. We will be finishing a year next month. That takes time and a task team has been set up to do the investigation while the chief executive officer is on extended leave. We have an acting chief executive officer now, the director-general in our department, and things are moving. So, it is not as if we don't see and don't hear and so forth, but then we've got to follow procedures and see whether there is wrongdoing, guilt, and efficiency or inefficiency, and that is what is happening now. Those things are worth noting.

I must also take this opportunity to thank in particular the partnerships that we have with the agencies, all of them. It is an excellent working relationship, and we are all trying to create opportunities, job opportunities, and greater efficiency. Right now we are discussing with the chief executive officer of the South African National Road Agency Limited, Sanral, to ask whether there is a way in which some contribution can be made. Even though it is not within the mandate of Sanral, some contribution can be made in terms of provincial and, particularly, rural roads. The chief executive officer was happy to say: Where do we start? Do we start with a billion rand? I am sure we start with the billion rand and then move forward. I think that is good, because it opens up our country, so that the divide between the developed urban areas and undeveloped rural areas is actually breached. We need to do extra things in that regard.

Let me just say that the development of a system for school transport is also in our plans, to ensure that when we say we have an equality clause in our Constitution, it applies equally to a kid who is going to school in the city here, the one who is in Gugulethu, and the one who is far out in rural Transkei and has to walk three, four, five kilometres – what do we do with that situation? So, the question of school transportation must be addressed, so that we can say that all seven-year-olds are equal. We might have grown up during a period of inequality, but we can't revisit that inequality on our children. Our children must have equal opportunity, even the equal opportunity to be unequal. It now depends on your own energies; on applying yourself to the opportunities that are there. You have that; it's not as if you are denied those opportunities.

The proposal for a road safety indaba is most welcome. It is something that we actually need to do very urgently, as a country. I hear the question about the statistics: how many corpses were there the past Easter? How many were there last Christmas? How many were there compared to other Christmases? That's not where the dog is buried. The actual fact of the matter is that as South Africans, we are atrocious drivers. The democracy that we have achieved has not yet translated into a mindset that is also democratic on the road. We are rude; we are everything but democratic. Therefore, what you will find when driving the roads and streets of London, Paris, Moscow, the United States of America, or even China, where it is quite congested, there is a lot considerateness towards other people. You see a bicycle passing there, and they let it pass. Here there would be swearing; there would be pointing of middle fingers and all those sorts of things. [Applause.] The behaviour when you are in the streets of New York or Beijing actually show that it is a different type of driving culture. This is what we must discuss, as South Africans. When we move a step further, democracy is not something that was declared on 27 April 1994 and then was simply there. Democratic behaviour is something you develop over time. However, let's start on our roads. It's really quite important.

Let me not pass this matter by, else it will arise again. I've been in the executive, albeit in the province – this is my sixteenth year in the executive – and I don't have much, except my name. It is something that I do want to protect. For over 16 years, for four days I had the gift of a car, received on a Saturday. Without any prodding by anybody, by Tuesday morning at 11:00 that car was returned. Right? It was returned and we didn't even wait for the President to say that we should keep it or not keep it. I discussed the matter with my wife, Zama, and that was enough. We decided we didn't need the thing. That's all. It was given in good faith. There was no stolen property to be found with Sbu Ndebele. [Applause.]

So, we can't have this thing hanging, as if I was found to have stolen property or something. [Applause.] It was on a Tuesday. On Monday, I flew from Durban to Cape Town, and I couldn't do anything about it. Tuesday was the first working day that I was able to do anything about the issue. Why does the matter arise, as f some stolen property was found and so forth? I am sure I am still going to commit sins. Deal with me on those sins that I do commit, not on one that I didn't commit. [Applause.]

On the issue of road maintenance, I've been looking at the speeches of my predecessors, and I was surprised. If you look at what former Minister Mac Maharaj was saying about the budget for new roads and the budget for maintenance, what the late Minister Dullah Omar was saying, what the former Minister Jeff Radebe was saying - there were similar arguments in this House that we needed to marry the question of maintenance and new roads. We need a bigger budget for this. That case has been made over and over again. Unfortunately for me, what was predicted 16 years ago is catching up, that if we don't do this thing in the next seven to 10 years, the road infrastructure will collapse. Unfortunately, it collapses. That is what they were predicting, and it is catching up with us now.

What do we do? We don't fold. As the Deputy Minister was saying now, we need renewed energy, and all of us need to refocus and say that we cannot, because that is what defines us as a developed country. A developed country has water, roads and electricity; those three things. If we are not there, we should forget about other things.

Therefore, we need to refocus and ask ourselves how we will make up lost time on this matter. We must actually move on it so that although we have lost out, all is not lost. We have excellent engineers under chief executive officer Nazir Alli and in the provinces as well. We have them, and let's use them. As the Deputy Minister said, we can also use road maintenance for job creation, in order to say that we will now provide manpower for the maintenance of our roads and bring them up to standard.

Thank you very much, members. I want to thank the director-general, as well as the portfolio committee, and I want to thank you all for a good budget. Thank you. [Applause.]

END OF TAKE


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