Speech by Gauteng Premier Mbhazima Shilowa at the Premier's Service Excellence Awards

Programme Director
Members of the Executive
Members of the Legislature
Heads of departments
Senior managers
Our service excellence awards nominees
Invited guests
Ladies and gentlemen

On an evening where we celebrate service excellence, I think it is appropriate to start by congratulating the Veterinary Public Health Directorate of the Gauteng Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Environment for the award they have received from the International Standards Organisation. This is the first certificate to be handed to a province in the country and the continent.

The award, which recognises the high standards maintained by this unit in ensuring abattoirs in Gauteng adhere to the highest safety standards in handling meat, will go a long way in building the good image of Gauteng internationally. It will also assist in assuring tourists to our province and those planning to come for the 2010 Fifa World Cup, that our food meets the highest standards in the world.

We agree with Vince Lombardi when he says: "it is time for us all to stand and cheer for the doer, the achiever, the one who recognises the challenges and does something about it."

Indeed the Premier Service Excellence Awards (PSEA) is an ongoing exercise of recognising and acknowledging government employees who rise to the challenges of their work and excel in service delivery.

We meet here tonight, to pay tribute to teams that have displayed dedication, commitment and enthusiasm in the execution of their duties. When we introduced the Premier's Service Excellence Awards five years ago, we were concerned about the prevailing dominant work ethic in the public sector.

We had realised that the orientation of government employees was neither civil nor service oriented. They were functioning as old bureaucrats who would look for reasons why things could not be done instead of trying to find solutions to problems and better ways in which things could be done to achieve results.

To change this mindset and to introduce the kind of public service that would ensure government became more effective, accountable and responsive, more efficient, more user-friendly and more focussed on spearheading development and service delivery we adopted the Batho Pele principles. To entrench these principles in the culture of the public service we then introduced the Premier's Service Excellence Awards. We said then that the awards will reward those who truly live by the Batho Pele principles and entrants will be judged according to how well they performed and maintained the following:

* a high standard of professional ethics,
* provision of services impartially, fairly and equitably,
* utilise resources efficiently, economically and effectively,
* respond to people's needs,
* encourage the public to participate in policy-making.

This was about getting the basics right. It was about getting the government employees to do ordinary things in an extraordinary manner. Public recognition of those who achieved the desired levels of excellence was seen as a catalyst for others to emulate their best practices.

Our record shows that we have succeeded in laying the foundations for building the public service that can be relied upon to direct and implement our strategic programme of action in a co-ordinated and integrated manner across all departments and within departments.

We now have hard working, dedicated, creative and innovative women and men in the employ in the Gauteng Provincial Government. We have true public servants who understand that the primary purpose of public servants is to serve the public.

Last year we launched the Gauteng Global City Region perspective. We need to look at whether there is a need to further refine the PSEA to take account of this added expectations of our employees to coordinate and integrate beyond the department and the province.

A globally competitive city region requires the development of a dedicated, productive and people centred public service that has effective service delivery mechanisms. A motivated and easy to adapt workforce will be a determining factor in the performance of our province in the global economy.

Innovation is also of critical importance if we are to achieve our goals. The PSEA must now be aligned to place emphasis on this so as to help us achieve our goals. The Extended Executive lekgotla in September this year agreed to the establishment of the Global City Region (GCR) Academy as a matter of priority to build innovation capacity in the public sector. The academy will assist in the development of the necessary skills and capacity within local and provincial governments in Gauteng to drive service delivery and in building the capacity for research and development.

We have also agreed on the development of standards of service and service charters across departments and in future these would have to be taken into consideration in determining whether service excellence has been achieved.

There is growing impatience on the part of the general public towards poor service delivery. Despite adherence to the Batho Pele principle, we have seen service delivery protests, entrepreneurs continue to complain about delays in payment and big business is unhappy about the length of time it takes to finalise environmental impact studies and investors say it is not easy to gain access to government information in our province.

Another decision we have taken as the executive, is to institute measures to reduce the cost and ease of doing business in Gauteng, including the development of a one-stop service for businesses interested in investing in Gauteng. This would include addressing red tape, streamlining approval processes and upgrading a one-stop business portal. Attention will also be paid to the current complex legal framework for land use management as well as accelerating skills development and attracting scarce skills to the province.

We are mindful of the fact that government actions can positively influence active private sector participation in the economy, in particular through creating macro-economic stability, an environment of openness and transparency, ensuring effective governance and institutions and through investing in infrastructure.

Your role as government employees and managers is therefore crucial in helping us achieve the goals of growing the economy and reducing unemployment, poverty and underdevelopment. We are conscious of the fact that, due to the strategic role of the public service, the future of our province and our country lies in our hands. We have the ability to work together to make Gauteng a better place, that is able to compete with the top city regions in the world and meet the needs of all its people.

The prevention of fraud and corruption is going to be critical in building an image of a competitive city region. Rewarding behaviour that ensures that we achieve this on a sustainable basis will be important in improving the performance of the state, building confidence in our province and achieving growth.

Ladies and gentlemen I challenge you to create a culture of continuous service improvement. Let us recognise, support and encourage service excellence by adopting the quality of work demonstrated by the teams we are rewarding tonight and replicating it other areas.

2009 marks the end of term of the current government. We all need to go back and look at the commitment we made in 2004, to ensure that those that are supposed to be completed by 2009 are completed and that a foundation for achieving the 2014 objectives is laid. It is in this regard next year's PSEA will focus on departments that are on course to ensuring that we complete our five year mandate and lay the foundation for achieving our 2014 objectives.

I would like to congratulate all the teams that were nominated for this year's awards. I also urge the achievers to sustain their excellent work. We are indeed inspired by the dedication and commitment you have display in serving our people and in achieve excellence in your work.

Let us remember the attainment of excellence is not an event. It comes from continuously striving for improvements in all aspects of our lives. Let us make it a habit in the public sector. To quote Vince Lombardi once more: "The achievements of an organisation are the results of the combined effort of each individual."

I thank you

Issued by: Office of the Premier, Gauteng Provincial Government
22 November 2007