Land Court Bill: deliberations; with Deputy Minister

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Justice and Correctional Services

13 September 2022
Chairperson: Mr G Magwanishe (ANC)
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Meeting Summary

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The Portfolio Committee Justice and Correctional Services met to deliberate on the Land Court Bill.

The Department of Justice and Constitutional Development presented a working document that was amended in light of the Portfolio Committee discussions that took place the previous week. The Department had inserted the new amendments as per the direction of the Committee. The previous week, the Committee dealt with the issue of the Bill taking away the jurisdiction of the Magistrate's Court. The Committee directed the Department to attend to the amendment of the provisions on the jurisdiction of the Magistrate's Court so that those courts could have concurrent jurisdiction with the Land Court concerning land matters.

A Member asked about matters where the Land Court would have exclusive jurisdiction, and if the current version of the Bill addressed that aspect.

The Chairperson asked the Department to create a document that set out the various pieces of legislation and then the specific provision that gives the exclusive jurisdiction of the Land Court and those provisions that give concurrent jurisdiction with the Magistrate’s Court.

A Member also asked about the “knock-on effect” of all of the amendments on appeals. Ordinarily, any judgement or order from the Magistrates Court was appealable to the High Court. The Land Court had the status of a High Court but it was determined that there was concurrent jurisdiction. Had the Department reflected on the impact of whether it would then mean that while there was concurrent jurisdiction, a litigant may still choose to appeal to the Land Court? This was in the context of the Land Court being a specialised High Court in respect of matters where the Magistrates Court had issued an order in respect of concurrent jurisdiction. Would the advice be that it was something that must be regulated through the Bill? If it was an appeal to the Land Court, then was the appeal to a full bench or a single bench?

A Member asked about the impediments that people who are the claimants might have with the property laws of South Africa.

Members also raised questions on whether judges appointed to the Land Court would also be able to move over to an ordinary High Court, or whether such people would have to apply again for High Court positions. A related issue was: When the Committee was initially briefed on the Land Court Bill, the idea was put forth that land law specialists could in that way be appointed to be judges of the Land Court. The ultimate argument was that for such judges to then move over to other divisions, a further process would have to be followed. The Committee needed to guard against a phrasing that would enable such judges to say that they are simultaneously appointed as members of the bench of ordinary high courts.

The Committee planned to approve the A-list of the Land Court Bill on Wednesday, 14 September. The following week, the Committee would vote on the Bill, incorporating the amendments, that will be submitted to the House.
 

Meeting report

The Chairperson said that the Committee would be dealing with two issues, namely the Land Court Bill and a progress report on the project plan on how the Committee would be processing the Prevention and Combating of Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill (referred to hereafter as the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill). It was very difficult to compile a long-term programme, so the Committee would compile weekly programmes. Its programme was significantly changed since it had to accommodate some of the new issues. Such issues included the Traditional Courts Bill, and accommodating the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill (the latter was raised the previous week). Members would be informed each week as to how the programme would look. He suggested starting with Mr Du Preez, who would take the Committee through the project plan for the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill, since the Committee was not expecting him to report on the contents of the Bill. The Committee just wanted to know the timeframe so that it would be able to rework the programme to accommodate the processing of the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill.

Programme to process the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill
Mr Henk du Preez, Senior State Law Advisor, Department of Justice and Constitutional Development (DoJ&CD), said that with regards to the outstanding comments on the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill, the Department decided not to “clutter” the existing summary with further summaries. The Department was preparing a supplementary summary, so the Committee would then have two summaries on the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill. The supplementary summary would provide additional information. The Department undertook to have the finalised supplementary summary available by Monday or Tuesday next week at the latest. He estimated that he was halfway through the additional information provided to the Department. The Committee Secretary sent him two folders of the sum total of the comments received by the Committee. It took some time to process the submissions because some were substantive; for example, there were submissions in excess of 40 pages.

Mr John Jeffery, Deputy Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development (DoJ&CD), said that the Department could have a summary of the additional submissions missed by Monday morning. The Committee could look at continuing with the Bill from Tuesday of next week.

Adv S Swart (ACDP) noted that he needed to leave early. He expressed gratitude to the Department, the Committee Members, and the Secretariat, who worked very hard over the weekend to arrange the meeting. He understood that the Committee would have two documents on the public submissions, namely the initial summary, and a second one which the Members would have to read together with the first document. The Committee appreciated the time constraints it had to deal with that legislation.

The Chairperson appreciated the hard work of Mr du Preez and his team. The Committee appreciated that the Department worked throughout the weekend to ensure that the Committee had the document by the following week. If anything happened and it was not possible, the Department needed to inform the Committee by Sunday, so that it could plan accordingly. As it stood, the Committee would reserve the following week for the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill. On Tuesday, it would deal with outstanding responses. He thanked Mr du Preez, his team, and the Deputy Minister for his leadership.

Mr du Preez said it would have been better to have a supplementary summary. If he wanted to insert the additional comments in the existing summary, he would have to highlight them to the Committee so they could be easily identified. He would be guided by the Chairperson whether it was better to have the original summary or the original summary with the supplementary summary. He added that the Department wanted to highlight the proposed amendments in the schedule to the Bill.

The Chairperson said that Mr du Preez was dealing with the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill, and combining it with the Land Court Bill. The expectation is that Mr Mokulubete is dealing with the Land Court Bill, while Mr du Preez is dealing with the summaries on the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill. Mr du Preez’s request for Mr Mokulubete to present the changes made to the Land Court Bill was in order.

On Mr du Preez’s first request: It was a matter of style and preference. He would be happier with the approach of a supplementary document because he felt like a lot of highlighting could look quite untidy.

Dr W Newhoudt-Druchen (ANC) agreed with the Chairperson to keep the two summaries separate. If the summaries were combined into one document, they would become untidy.

The Chairperson agreed with Mr du Preez’s approach. He should proceed with the supplementary document on Tuesday. Once done, the Committee would link the documents, especially if there were contrary views. Once the Committee was done with the responses, it would move to the clause-by-clause processing of the Bill. Because of the delays that had happened, and since the Committee would be adjourning at the end of the month, the Bill might have to be finalised next term. It would have to finalise the Land Court Bill and the Drugs and Drug Trafficking Bill this term. If there was the possibility of finalising the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill, then that would be a good thing.

Deliberations on the Land Court Bill
Mr Makhubela Mokulubete, State Law Advisor, DoJ&CD, presented. The working document was amended in light of the discussions that took place last Tuesday. This working document was a continuation of the previously-used working document. The Department had inserted the new amendments as per the direction of the Committee. The previous week, the Committee dealt with the issue of the Bill taking away the jurisdiction of the Magistrate's Court. The Committee directed the Department to attend to the “reinstatement” of the jurisdiction of the Magistrate's Court so that those courts could have concurrent jurisdiction with the Land Court concerning land matters. He focused on the highlights in pink, which were the new amendments resulting from the directions from the Committee. (The clauses on which Members raised questions for discussion are noted below, as well as the references to various pieces of legislation.)

[See the document for details.]

Clause 7: Jurisdiction of Court

The new clause 7(1) read as follows: 
7. (1)    Subject to the Constitution, and except where this Act provides otherwise, the Court and the Magistrates Court within whose area of jurisdiction the land forming the subject matter before that court is situated, have concurrent jurisdiction in respect of all matters that in terms of this Act or in terms of any other law are to be determined by the Court.

Mr Mokulubete added that the Department had intended to delete the word “elsewhere”.

Schedule

Under item 1, paragraph 3,  Mr Mokulubete noted that while the words “magistrate’s court” were deleted, the word “Court” was defined earlier as including both the Land Court and the Magistrate’s Court.

Mr Mokulubete explained that while the Committee had been taken through the Schedule, the changes relating to the Land Reform (Labour Tenants) Act, 1996 had not been addressed to the Committee. Those changes were brought about by the deletion in the Bill of the provision relating to arbitration. Initially, the Bill made provision for arbitration, in which the Judge President of the court was given the discretion whether to refer the matter to mediation, arbitration, or the court for adjudication. However, because the Department had deleted the provision relating to arbitration, it had to effect the changes to those clauses under paragraph 6 of the Schedule (see item 5, page 70). It was substituting section 18 of the Labour Tenants Act, in which subsections 7, 8 and 9 were substituted with the following provision: The Department was inserting the provision that would see to the referral of the application for arbitration, or the court for adjudication. Initially, this provision empowered the Director-General to refer the application under this Act to the court and inform the parties that the Director-General had done so. Arbitration was initially dealt with in the Land Court, so the Department had to provide for arbitration in that section of the Labour Tenants Act, to empower the Director-General of the Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development (DALRRD) to refer the application or arbitration, or to the court for adjudication.

Paragraph 7 stated that section 19 would be substituted for the following section: 19. (1) On referral of an application by the Director-General, the President of the Court or a judge of the Court nominated by him or her may give such directions as he or she considers appropriate as to the procedure to be followed for the application to be heard by the Court.

The Department noted that the “President of the Court or the judge nominated by him or her” would be substituted for Director-General as the official who may appoint an arbitrator in relation to the disputes that are arbitrable that emanate from the provision of the Labour Tenants Act.

Paragraph 8 noted that section 20 would be reinstated, except for the deletion of subsections (1) and (2) of section 20 of the Labour Tenants Act, since it related to what the Judge President was required to do concerning the arbitration that emanated from the disputes emanating from the Labour Tenants Act.

Mr Mokulubete referred to the following:
- Paragraph 11, page 71
- Paragraph 16, page 73.

Mr Mokulubete referred to the Communal Property Associations Act, 1996. He referred to the following:
- Paragraph 1, page 74
- Paragraph 3, page 74.

Mr Mokulubete referred to the Extension of Security of Tenure (ESTA) Act, 1997. He referred to the following:
- Paragraph 1, page 75.

He then referred to the Prevention of Illegal Eviction from and Unlawful Occupation of Land (PIE) Act, 1998. He referred to the following:
- Paragraph 1, page 81
- Paragraph 2, page 81.

[See the document for details.]

Discussion
Mr W Horn (DA) said that the Department restored those powers to the Magistrates Court meticulously. The way he read clause 7 as it now stood, it said clearly that there was concurrent jurisdiction unless otherwise indicated by the Act. His understanding was that by way of the decision of the Committee and as given effect by that draft, that would then mean that the only matters in which the court would now have exclusive jurisdiction, would then be restitution matters in terms of restitution and land rights. He could not find where that specific aspect was addressed in the current version of the Bill.

The Chairperson asked if the Committee could deal with Mr Horn’s first question, and then move on to the second question.

Mr Mokulubete replied that with clause 7 as amended, the Department was deleting the word “exclusive” and replacing that with “concurrent jurisdiction”. However, in the Schedule, the various pieces of legislation were the ones that were going to give the exclusive jurisdiction in certain instances or concurrent jurisdiction of the Land Court and the Magistrates Court in certain instances. For instance, in the Upgrading of Land Tenure Rights Act, there was concurrent jurisdiction. With the Provision of Land and Assistance Act, one would see from the insertion of the new clause 12(a) that that Act had given the Land Court exclusive jurisdiction. The Land Court, established in section 3 of the Land Court Act 2022, has jurisdiction to resolve any dispute arising from the application of this Act. In terms of that provision, the Land Court is exclusively given the jurisdiction to deal with matters emanating from that Act. The same was the case with other pieces of legislation; for instance, the KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) Ingonyama Trust Act, which talked to the Land Court as being given the jurisdiction to resolve disputes emanating from that Act. It was also the case with various others. Those that would have concurrent jurisdiction would be specified. The ESTA Act and the PIE Act would also have concurrent jurisdiction. However, certain pieces of legislation would give exclusive jurisdiction to the Land Court. In clause 7 itself, the phrase “exclusive jurisdiction” would have to be deleted, because the Schedule would no longer say exclusive jurisdiction; it would be concurrent jurisdiction and exclusive jurisdiction in certain instances.

The Chairperson said that for the purposes of communication, it would be helpful, whether it was from Parliamentary Legal Services (PLS) or the Department, for it to have a page that would be able to say which areas have exclusive jurisdiction, and which have concurrent jurisdiction. But to communicate, especially if one goes to local radio stations, Members of Parliament (MPs) who might not even be Members of the Portfolio Committee, would be asked questions, especially on areas of exclusive jurisdiction and concurrent jurisdiction. If MPs could have notes on talking points on how that would work, that would be helpful.

Mr Mokulubete believed that the Department would be in a position to prepare a document that would deal with that specific issue. Perhaps by way of a table, the Department could set out the various pieces of legislation and then the specific provision that gives the exclusive jurisdiction of the Land Court and those provisions that give concurrent jurisdiction with the Magistrate’s Court. The Department could liaise with PLS for assistance. The document could be made for the purpose of the Committee and MPs at large.

Mr Horn asked about the “knock-on effect” of all of the amendments on appeals. Ordinarily, any judgement or order from the Magistrates Court was appealable to the High Court. The Land Court had the status of a High Court but it was determined that there was concurrent jurisdiction. Had the Department reflected on the impact of whether it would then mean that while there was concurrent jurisdiction, a litigant may still choose to appeal to the Land Court? This was in the context of the Land Court being a specialised High Court in matters where the Magistrates Court had issued an order in respect of concurrent jurisdiction. Would the advice be that it was something that must be regulated through the Bill? If it was an appeal to the Land Court, then was the appeal to a full bench or a single bench?

Mr Mokulubete observed that the Schedule gave the Land Court and the Magistrate Court concurrent jurisdiction. Only those pieces of legislation included in the Schedule would have the jurisdiction of the Land Court exclusively in one instance, and concurrent jurisdiction of the Land Court and the Magistrates Court in certain instances. For the appeal, matters that were appealable where the Magistrates Court had jurisdiction in terms of those pieces of legislation were going to go directly to the Land Court. Those pieces of legislation that were not listed would have the appeal directed to the High Court. He reminded the Chairperson that the Department intended to confine all those pieces of legislation to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Land Court. Through engagement with the various departments, the Department isolated which specific pieces of legislation were going to be immediately placed under the exclusive jurisdiction of the Land Court. All of those specified pieces of legislation would have exclusive jurisdiction of the Land Court, and with instances where the Magistrates Court had dealt with the matter, the matter would be appealable to the Land Court.

Mr du Preez said that the Department would go through those pieces of legislation just to ensure that if there were any appeal provisions, those provisions fell in line with the Bill itself.

Mr Horn understood that the Department would look into appeals provisions. Given that the Committee was creating a “creature of statute”, it would have to be stated specifically that in the Bill, in matters where the Magistrates Court concurrently dealt with the matter, the appeal lay with the Land Court, and not to another High Court. He would appreciate it if the Department considered further feedback on that issue.

Mr Mokulubete replied that Mr Horn’s suggestion was noted. The Department would look into the entire Bill and then see where it could slot in the specific provision that would clarify that issue beyond doubt as to the appealability of Magistrate Court matters directly to the High Court concerning the matters listed in the Schedule to the Land Court Bill.

Mr Horn asked about section 8(4). The Chairperson’s guidance was that Members needed to reflect some more on that. He proposed that the latter part of the first subsection rather be added to the previous section in order not to create the perception that through an appointment or a dedicated appointment to the Land Court, a judge appointed in such a way would be entitled to argue that they are also (in a concurrent way) appointed to other sections of the High Court. The Chairperson’s guidance was that Members needed to reflect on that and express an opinion in the next meeting as to whether they had an objection. He was still very much in favour of that proposal. He recalled that the Chairperson’s guidance was that other Members must consider the matter, and then the Committee must make a resolution on it at the next meeting.

Ms N Maseko-Jele (ANC) asked about the impediments that people who are claimants might have concerning the property laws of South Africa. When the Committee was dealing with the Bill, were those issues considered? There were a lot of issues with property law. For example, one would find that people were coming to claim the land, and there was a contradiction. Maybe the property law would say that people cannot claim such land because there were already laws in existence regarding land issues.

Mr Mokulubete confirmed that several pieces of legislation regulated land. He reminded the Committee that during the Department’s initial briefing to the Committee, it identified about 33 pieces of legislation that were land-related. Those pieces of legislation provided for the court that would adjudicate disputes emanating from those pieces of legislation. The High Court or the Magistrates Court would still proceed to hear matters emanating from those pieces of legislation. The Land Court, now the Magistrates Court, was going to deal with disputes emanating from pieces of legislation listed in the Schedule to the Land Court Bill. The Department made a provision that the jurisdiction of the Land Court could be extended so that certain pieces of legislation can be adjudicated upon in the Land Court itself, thereby removing the jurisdiction of the High Court, and dedicating it to the Land Court. Similarly, with the Magistrates Court, if a certain piece of legislation would take away the jurisdiction of the Magistrates Court, and then give it to the Land Court, then that would be the case. However, the point of the Land Court Bill was to restrict only those pieces of legislation that were in the Schedule to the jurisdiction of the Land Court and the Magistrates Court.

Mr du Preez referred to chapter 3 of the Bill, which dealt with the appointment of judges. He pointed out subsection 4 of subclause 4 please. Paragraph (a) of subclause 4 was the relevant paragraph. The proposal was that the last part of that paragraph should be added to subclause 3 to clarify that judges be appointed in a dedicated capacity to the Land Court. That issue was still on the table for consideration by the Committee.

The Chairperson recalled that the words “as far as is practicable” should be deleted.

Mr du Preez confirmed that that was correct. If the Committee instructed the Department to include paragraph (a) towards the end of subclause 3, then the wording would change. His concern about the drafting itself at that stage was the word “must” – to use that with “as far as is practicable” would not make sense.

The Chairperson’s understanding was that if he was appointed through that dedicated court as a judge and halfway through his life, he was “bored” with Land Court issues, and wanted to work on other issues, then would he not claim that since he was appointed to be a judge, he was therefore entitled to go to an ordinary High Court? What was the practical effect of the clause as it was? As it was now, would that clause impede someone moving from that dedicated court (the Land Court) to other courts, or would they just be a judge for the Land Court and not any other court?

The Chairperson asked Mr Horn if he understood the point correctly.

Mr Horn confirmed that the Chairperson was correct. He recalled when the Committee was initially briefed on the Bill, the idea was put forth that land law specialists could, in that way, be appointed to be judges of the Land Court. The ultimate argument was that for such judges to then move over to other divisions, a further process would have to be followed. The Committee needed to guard against a phrasing that would enable such judges to say that they are simultaneously appointed as members of the bench of ordinary high courts.

The Chairperson had experience at the Judicial Service Commission (JSC), which might assist the Committee. He gave an example: A person was appointed to be a judge of the High Court in the Free State. The same person then wanted to go back home to Gauteng. The person would still have to apply again via the JSC and be interviewed and recommended to the President for the appointment. A person could not just write a letter and say that they wanted to jump from one division to the next division. A person would have to be appointed via the JSC, and if there is a vacancy; the person would then have to be interviewed and recommended. Judges must be appointed as judges of the Land Court and also be a specialist in land law; then if a person at any point changes his or her mind and wants to do something else, then he or she will have to be interviewed by the JSC for the position that would be available at that time, whether it is in the High Court or elsewhere. That was how the JSC rules were.

Mr du Preez asked Mr Mokulubete to show the Committee subclause 3 and 4(a). After the word “court” at the end of subclause 3, the Department inserted a comma. It was not an easy thing to draft in the Committee itself. But Mr du Preez thought the Members’ concerns might be addressed by saying “the President acting on the advice of the JSC and the Judge President of the court may, subject to subsection 4, appoint as many judges as is necessary as judges of the court, who may have been judges at the time they were appointed to the court.” He also suggested the wording “who may have been judges of the High Court”. Subclause 4(a) would then be deleted, and the rest of it would be renumbered.

Mr Horn said that the amendment addressed his concern.

Mr du Preez’s concern about paragraph (a) was that it was clearly stated that “at least half of the judges appointed to the court must have been judges of the High Court”. Referring to the proposed amendment of subclause 3, would the Committee still want the principle of at least 50% of individuals being appointed as judges to the court having been judges of the High Court?

Mr Horn wanted to reflect on the initial substantiation for the proposal on the wording about judges of the Land Court. He recalled that substantiation ultimately enabled subject experts to be appointed in addition to High Court judges. The relevant question was whether that brought into question the idea behind the initial proposal. That brought it more into the authority of the JSC to ultimately reflect on the needs of the court. Such needs were always expressed by the sitting Judge President of the court who would form part of the JSC in such instances. More of the obligation to look after the court would rest with JSC, rather than the Committee prescribing that. That would not necessarily be a bad thing.

The Chairperson asked if people who were not judges of the High Court at the time of their appointment would be remunerated as judges.

Mr du Preez replied that there was a clause providing for the remuneration of judges of the Land Court. He agreed with Mr Horn that there was a fail-safe, which was the process in the JSC itself. The question at that stage was whether it served any useful purpose to include that obligation of at least 50% of people appointed to the court need to have already been judges of the High Court. It was not necessary to include that. The fail-safe mechanism then lay with the JSC and the needs of the court.

The Chairperson said that criteria (of the 50% judges from the High Court) would assist the JSC with the appointment process. If it was not there, then the JSC might refer to its default position of just appointing people who were judges.

Mr Mokulubete replied that the intention was to ensure that when the JSC appointed judges to the High Court, it would have those with expertise in land matters. For example, if the JSC intended to appoint ten people to be the judges of the court, the intention was to say that all of those people were from practice (such as advocates, attorneys, etc.), then it would not have to take everyone from that group of ten. Others needed to be taken from the existing judges so that the JSC did not have people who were placed in the court not having had the experience of being on the bench. If 50% of the ten judges were already judges of the various courts, then five would be taken from the advocates and attorneys. The intention was along those lines. Hence, the provision “as far as practicable”, because it may be the case that few judges who were already sitting judges applied for the post of judges of the Land Court.

The Chairperson said that if that was the case, then both Mr Horn and Mr du Preez had a point because the JSC would take that into account when interviewing regarding the required skills (whether it was interviewing a person who was a judge or not a judge). Perhaps the 50% was superficial, because the JSC, at any rate, would know it was appointing a person serving on the Land Court. The expectation would be that that person was au fait, if not an expert, on land matters.

Mr Horn agreed with the Chairperson.

Mr du Preez said that during the previous round of interviews by the JSC, two or three people were interviewed with specific reference to being appointed to the Land Claims Court. If one applied for an appointment, or was nominated for an appointment, the JSC should say that it considered five or six candidates for appointment to the Land Court as “permanent judges”.

The Chairperson said he wanted the Committee to conclude the Land Court Bill the following day (Wednesday). As far as he could tell, Members agreed on all the matters that had been discussed, except for the Issue of appeal, which needed to be reflected on. He asked if Mr Mokulubete and Mr du Preez could make the amendments that day, so that the following day, the Committee resolved that matter and moved toward adopting the Bill.

Members agreed that that was in order.

The Chairperson asked Mr du Preez and Mr Mokulubete to deal with the issue of appeals. That would be the first issue that the Committee dealt with the next day, and thereafter it would move towards adopting the Bill. It would be good if the Bill was adopted so that it could reflect on the Programming Committee meeting on Thursday.

Committee business

Mr Vhonani Ramaano, Committee Secretary, said that the Committee was also supposed to be dealing with the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill, so it would only have that Bill besides the Land Court Bill.

The Chairperson said that the Committee might have a problem going forward. He asked the Committee Secretariat to get a date to start processing the oversight reports. He suggested looking for a date to process the oversight reports in preparation for adoption in the House. The Committee had corrections, but it still had to work on the reports. It then had a meeting with the DoJ&CD ministers, and then the reports would go to the House. Since the Committee had that challenge with the programme, it might need to bring that matter forward urgently. After receiving the supplementary document on the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill from Mr du Preez, the Committee would still need to give the Department time to synthesise what the Committee would have agreed on into a working document. The Committee would deal with the Drugs and Drug Trafficking Bill the following week. The Committee needed to process the supplementary document just before it adjourned.

Members assigned to provinces needed to make follow-up visits to those provinces. Mr Horn had already been to Mpumalanga with Mr Ramaano, and the Committee had his report. The Committee did not have other Members' reports. The Chairperson appealed to the Members that those visits not be seen as one-day events. Members had to go back and ensure that what was promised was done. Thus, when Members gave reports to the House, those reports encompassed the follow-up work that the Members would have done and showed progress or lack thereof. He requested Members to contact the Committee Secretariat to facilitate Members going to provinces to finalise oversight reports.

The Chairperson reminded Members that they received an invitation to a workshop on women-related issues. He received an apology from Ms Maseko-Jele. He assumed that other Members were able to go to that workshop. He asked Members to inform the Committee Secretariat about their availability for that workshop by Friday so that the Committee could send names to the Speaker of Parliament as soon as possible.

Land Court Bill Processing

Mr du Preez said the Department had prepared a working document and an A-list of the Land Court Bill. He asked if the Committee would approve the working document on Wednesday or the A-list. The Department would have to adapt the A-list according to the information it had at that stage.

The Chairperson understood that the Department would have to work on the A-list to accommodate what was raised on the appeal issues, and then the Committee would deal with the A-list on Wednesday. It would have to approve the A-list, since Wednesday’s meeting would be the Committee’s last meeting on the Land Court Bill if things went according to plan.

Mr du Preez observed that the A-list needed to be approved. There would be a slight knock-on effect regarding the supplementary summary for the Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill. He apologised in advance, as he did not think the Department would be able to provide the Committee with the A-list on that day; it might have to present the A-list on Wednesday morning.

Mr Ramaano said that the Committee needed to adopt the A-list. There were also processes that the Committee had to do in formatting the Bill so that it could be presented to the House in the correct format. Sometimes, that took time, because after the Secretariat received the A-list, it sent the A-list to an external service provider to format. After that, there might be some changes that need to be made. The time factor meant the Land Court Bill might not be before the House the following week.

The Chairperson said that the Committee was not talking about the Bill being before the House the following week. It was talking about the procedures of passing the Bill in the Committee. The decision to schedule the Bill would be the decision of the Programming Committee. His understanding was that after the Committee had voted on the A-list, the Bill would be formatted accordingly so it could be debated in the House. The House would have to observe the three-day rule, unless the rule was waived through a resolution by the House itself. After the Committee had approved the A-list and the Bill, the formatting would have to be done. On Thursday, the Bill would be taken to the Programming Committee, which would decide when the Bill was debated. The Bill might not be debated the following week.

Mr Ramaano agreed with the Chairperson. The Committee should be guided by rule 286(4)(n). The Committee needed to ensure that the final version of the Bill to be presented to the National Assembly was before it the following day.

Dr Newhoudt-Druchen asked if the Committee would approve the A-list on Wednesday. Then after the A-list was approved, the Committee would still go through the Bill clause-by-clause.

The Chairperson observed that the Committee had dealt with the various issues related to the Bill. An issue that was still outstanding was that of the appeals, as raised by Mr Horn. The Committee would focus on the appeal on Wednesday. Once the appeal issue was clarified, the Department would work on the Bill overnight. The Committee would then go through the A-list. Once it was happy with the A-list, the Committee would then vote on the Bill. If the Bill passed, Mr Ramaano would take over the formatting of the Bill. The Secretariat would take the Bill to an external service provider. The Bill would then be ready to be debated in the House. On Thursday, the Bill would go to the Programming Committee. The Programming Committee would then receive a report that the Committee had processed the Land Court Bill, and it was ready to be debated in the House. The Programming Committee would give a date when the Bill would be debated in the House.

The Chairperson said that Mr du Preez would not be able to circulate the A-list that day; the Department was going to work on the A-list overnight. The Committee would interact with the A-list on Wednesday. The Committee had been taken through the Bill on a number of occasions, and it had made its views known on the clauses it thought needed “panel beating”. He asked if Members were fine with going through the A-list together on Wednesday, and then voting on the Bill. The Bill would not be circulated that night.

Members agreed that that was in order.

Mr Ramaano said that in terms of the rule he highlighted, the Committee must formally adopt the final version of the Bill as it was to be presented to the House. Focusing on the A-list might not be sufficient. Members might need to look at the Bill as amended so that they see how the proposed amendments sat in the Bill as amended, which would be the B-version of the Bill.

The Chairperson clarified that after the Committee had gone through the A-list, then the Secretariat would put together the B-version, after which the Committee would vote on it.

Mr Ramaano replied that once the Committee agreed on the amendments, those amendments were put into the B-version as tabled. Members would then be able to see the final product, which would be adopted. The Committee would vote on the Bill during the following week.

The Chairperson confirmed that Wednesday was only about going through the A-list, and then the following week, the Committee would vote on the Bill. That was how the procedure needed to be, because if the Committee did not follow it, it ran the risk of undermining the good work done. On Wednesday, the Committee would deal with the A-list, and then deal with the B-version the following week. Once the formatting was done, then the Committee would vote on the Bill, which meant that the Land Court Bill would go to the House either late the following week, or during the week before Parliament adjourned.

The Members agreed on that procedure.

The meeting was adjourned.

 

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