Chairperson, let me start by mentioning that I can't recall having seen the hon Bhoola at any of the committee meetings for the past three years. It was a powerful presentation, but unfortunately, there was no substance to it. [Interjections.] The Customs and Excise Amendment Bill replaces the Customs and Excise Act, Act 91 of 1964. It also allows government to monitor and control the movement of goods and people into and out of South Africa.
The most controversial aspect of this Bill is that it revokes the current acceptance of a carrier manifest as a declaration to customs for the inbound seamless movement of containerised cargo. This will give Sars more powers to fight illegal imports by requiring a ship's manifest to terminate at an ocean port to prevent fraud on the rail and road routes to Johannesburg. However, there are very real concerns that this could have a detrimental effect on the inland container terminals, such as at City Deep in Gauteng.
Our policy position in the DA is very clear. We are in favour of free trade and economic growth. While we believe we need to be able to police effectively for customs fraud, we need to balance this power - as my colleague has indicated - with the interests of the economy and trade, and it is not clear that this Bill does exactly that.
During deliberations Sars did not demonstrate that they would prevent more fraud by clearing goods at the first port of entry. We understand that Sars wants to implement measures to prevent fraud, but we think it is too high a risk to impede the logistic flow when it is uncertain whether these measures will make any real difference. We cannot support the fact that goods might no longer be able to pass directly through to Johannesburg to be cleared. We believe the need for more information to assist Sars to make a risk assessment can be prescribed in the rules and regulations.
In a presentation to the committee, the Johannesburg Chamber of Commerce and Industry, through Mr Corbin, said the following:
While ... other comments and suggestions relating to the Bill were adequately dealt with, this remains the one disagreement that has not been ... resolved.
They continued:
The implementation of the new Bill would directly impact the City Deep container terminal, which has been operating as an inland port for the past 35 years, alleviating pressure from the already-constrained coastal ports.
In our finance committee meeting this morning we heard a presentation from the Manufacturing Circle that indicated that congestion at the ports is still problematic. We therefore support the inclusion of a fall-back clause. I think that is a step in the right direction. That should practically alleviate some of the problems at the ports.
However, it is unfortunate that Sars' written response to the presentation and to our amendments was very late. A verbal apology was made to me on the morning of the very last day, when the 99 amendments were presented. They were presented only on the last day, which was very unfortunate, as it is just impossible to deal with that amount of legislation at the last minute before we deal with it line by line. I think the chairperson of the committee will remember that incident very vividly.
The committee needs a culture of tolerance, I believe, to see to it that we at least present the best meaningful legislation on this important matter and not compress timeframes for members who would really like to make a meaningful input at that point in time.
I must say, Mr Van Rooyen's statement with regard to Luthuli House is a rather unfortunate and misplaced one. Mr Van Rooyen is a good politician, but I certainly think he missed the point completely in this regard.
We as the DA tabled eight amendments to the Bill to try to retain the concept of an inland port in this legislation. Each of them was voted down by the committee. So, there was no real feeling of co-operative governance or attitude of "let's present the best legislation that we can". Simply put, when there is a DA proposal, made by the hon Harris, it is voted down.
We were supported in drafting these amendments by Business Unity South Africa. They were concerned about the potential negative effect on the economy and perhaps changing the status of the inland port, City Deep.
The DA therefore cannot support this Bill. I thank you, Chair.