Hon Chairperson, hon Acting Minister, hon Deputy Minister, hon members, guests and friends, one of the major challenges facing this Parliament is the lack of commitment by all government departments when it comes to meeting the Cabinet targets around women and people living with disabilities working within government. One would think that when it comes to meeting Cabinet targets, government departments would strive very hard to meet them. Sadly, this is not the case.
Everyone in government knows that the percentage target for people living with disabilities is 2% of total staff. Everyone knows this and yet, according to the Public Service Commission, the figure sits at around 0,2%. This is one-tenth of what it should be.
The Cabinet target for women in senior management service, SMS, positions is 50%, but currently the actual percentage is around 35%. Every year the Portfolio Committee on the Public Service and Administration raises these issues in the Budget Vote speeches. So, the question is: Are the directors- general of all government departments wilfully undermining Cabinet targets or is this an indication of incompetence?
This Parliament will no longer tolerate this lack of will to meet Cabinet targets and, more importantly, the ANC, the oldest liberation movement in Africa, will not tolerate it. There will be consequences if these targets are not met.
One of the resources that directors-general could use to meet Cabinet targets is the Centre for Public Service Innovation. This Public Service subprogramme exists to come up with and to assist departments with innovative ways to solve problems within the Public Service by unlocking innovation and creating an enabling environment for improved and innovative service delivery through capacity development activities.
The Centre for Public Service Innovation, CPSI, has successfully piloted and tested an assistive device for visually impaired teachers. It has also successfully replicated a permaculture model at the Helen Joseph Hospital, where it improves food waste management, patient therapy and the nutritional value of food served at the hospital. This model has also been shared with all Gauteng hospital chief executive officers.
It is innovations like these that need to be recognised, and more innovations within the Public Service need to be explored. For instance, innovations need to be found on how to make Thusong Service Centres more efficient and accessible to the community.
Government's vision for Thusong Service Centres is to provide every South African citizen with access to information and services within their place of residence and in each local municipality by 2014, with the purpose of improving the quality of their lives through integrated service delivery.
The Public Service Commission, PSC, found that Thusong Service Centres have increased access to services, but only for the people who live near the centres. The PSC went on to say, in their state of the Public Service report, that within Thusong Service Centres departments continue to operate in silos. They just operate in a common space without really being integrated. Departments do not even share resources or link information systems. This cannot and must not continue.
The Department for the Public Service and Administration, DPSA, needs to seriously look into ways to integrate departments that operate within Thusong Service Centres. The ANC slogan, Working together we can do more, must be implemented within this ANC government.
In my Public Service and Administration Budget Vote speech on 26 May 2011 I said:
The department needs to take a serious look at these centres and see how they can be improved in order to bring more government services to the people.
Chairperson, an attitude of decadent indifference is emerging within government administration. The ANC tolerated the inclusion of apartheid collaborators within our democratic government, but it will not tolerate decadent indifference within the management of this government.
Effective and efficient Thusong Service Centres are of more strategic importance to a developmental state than this parliament is. We are all here to serve the needs of the South African people who need access to information and services through a fully integrated public service. Chairperson, the real heroes in public service are the community development workers. These heroes are out there in the community, trying their best to bring services to the people. They have enormous challenges with regard to accessing services in a disintegrated Public Service. These heroes are on the ground dealing with people's problems face to face. This government needs to assist community development workers, CDWs, in every way we can. We need to provide office space, laptops and, if need be, transport so that they can go to where the people live, which is in rural South Africa. The finalisation of the CDW policy must be achieved as soon as possible. Community development workers need assistance and we must all render that assistance.
At last year's Budget Vote, I raised the issue of the performance of the State Information Technology Agency, Sita, not being up to scratch and the slow implementation of their turnaround strategy. I am very pleased to state here that that is no longer the case. The State Information Technology Agency has made large leaps and bounds to implement their turnaround strategy. It has filled eight out of nine executive positions; completed a major organisational redesign to align Sita structures with Sita strategies; the board approved the new structure and the engagement and placement of staff will commence; human resource policies have been overhauled; a performance management system established; and the organisation is currently standardising Sita processes for effective and consistent service. Overall, I am confident that the State Information Technology Agency will achieve its constitutional mandate.
One thing that does concern this portfolio committee is the slow implementation of the Integrated Financial Management System, IFMS. To date, R559 million has been spent. This is an astounding amount. The reasons given for the delay in implementation are: complexity of the IFMS programme; longer than planned procurement and contract negotiation processes; the lack of full capacity in the Sita IFMS team; readiness and change management issues of lead sites; misalignment of product procurement and product development; and lack of functional skills in some departments.
The IFMS team has come up with the following steps to deal with these problems: A revised memorandum will be submitted to Cabinet which includes more realistic timelines; Sita's capacity problems have been addressed with the Sita turnaround strategy; contract negotiations will be comprehensive and streamlined; and the IFMS architecture is being institutionalised, which will result in less complexities being experienced in developing the outstanding modules.
However, Chairperson, the portfolio committee is concerned about the fact that it has taken such a long time and at a cost of R559 million to this country to get to this point. The National Treasury, the Department of Public Service and Administration and the State Information Technology Agency need to take this process very seriously. This process needs to be prioritised and dealt with as soon as humanly possible. I thank you. [Applause.]