House Chairperson, colleagues, hon members of the House, at least during this discussion the temperature will go down a bit. It won't be the same as during the previous discussion that we had on the SABC board.
The ANC conference that took place in Polokwane in December 2007 reiterated, amongst other things, that we must place people at the centre of development. Key amongst those needs that must be taken up is the issue of service delivery that promotes sustainable livelihoods. Our view as a Ministry and a people's government is that in everything we do we need to ensure that local government becomes everybody's business.
This means that with regard to every piece of legislation we bring before this House and every policy intervention we make, we should be able to answer the following questions. How do we ensure that service delivery is enhanced when we do those things? The second question that we must be asking is: To what extent is what we are doing improving the capacity and the capability of municipalities to be able to deliver a quality service to our people?
The Bill we are presenting today, the Local Government: Municipal Property Rates Amendment Bill, is aimed at ensuring that we improve the capability of municipalities in collecting revenue, and ensure that they move forward in whatever they do. One of the major tasks that this Bill is dealing with is to extend the period within which municipalities must be able to get into the net of the valuation roll. Another task is to ensure that municipalities are able to raise revenue that belongs to them, using the old apartheid legislation, until 2011. This means we are extending the life of the apartheid legislation, to be used when we present this Bill here today.
If we don't pass this Bill, the implication is that municipalities will lose an amount of over R400 million. Two thirds of this amount is taken by only two secondary cities. The municipality in Polokwane, the capital of Limpopo, will lose R163 million; and the municipality of Matjhabeng in the Free State will lose R172 million, if we are unable to pass this law.
You will agree with me that property rates and taxes are the second most important revenue generator for municipalities. The first is electricity with surcharges. Therefore, in light of this economic meltdown, every rand and every cent counts towards service delivery. The issue of passing this Bill is at the heart of service delivery, because we are building the capacity of those municipalities so that they can be able to offer services to our people. Therefore it is in our interests, all of us here, to ensure that we pass this law in order to rescue these municipalities. Together we must make sure that these municipalities are able to live up to their challenges, are able to pass their laws, and are able to ensure that they are brought into the net by June 2011.
Parliament is an important instrument. It must make sure that these municipalities, provinces and the department are able to account for managing to get their voters' rolls in place. This will ensure that when July comes there is no other requirement for the extension to take place. As a department we are going to spare no effort. We are going to make sure that these municipalities are able to do what is right and are in the net in terms of the voters' roll.
In that spirit, we want to thank everyone who contributed to the Bill, particularly the chairperson of the committee who led this process diligently, the members of the committee who made contributions and various parties, because this Bill is a Bill on which everybody agrees. It has been agreed to unanimously. That tells us that when we work in this committee, this committee is a committee of consensus. It really implements co- operative governance. We see it in action. In that respect, we are saying, "Le ka moso." [Keep it that way.] Thank you very much, House Chairperson. [Applause.]