Issued by: SA Communication Service
Madame Speaker Honourable members Comrades
In rising to introduce my budget speech on the Housing Vote, I would like to begin by asking my colleagues on both sides of the House to ensure a constructive debate in the interests of the homeless. I therefore appeal that this debate reflects the need to unite in the search for workable and sustainable solutions.
Madame Speaker, in designing and implementing a national housing programme of the scale and magnitude currently being undertaken by me and my Department, two of the most important ingredients are planning, and time. My Department recently completed the implementation of a national framework in terms of which, for the first time, mass housing delivery finally becomes a tangible possibility.
This is the most comprehensive housing framework ever attempted in South Africa. It addresses the normalisation of the housing market, the facilitation of new lending, the provision of consumer protection, mechanisms to enhance bridging finance and working capital; and wholesale fund mobilisation on an unprecedented scale.
My Department is not in the business of merely creating companies. A more careful investigation will reveal that these interventions are market mechanisms to manage risk. They have been located to strike the appropriate balance between the needs of the government and sensitivities of the wider environment.
Madame speaker, at times the detail is baffling to the ordinary citizen. This is a problem that needs to be overcome, but without prejudice to the scale and complexity of what we are seeking to achieve.
The outcomes should, of course, be somewhat more simple. We are trying to create the conditions necessary for the delivery of housing at a rate and of a scale never before attempted in this country. And we are attempting to do so, not only in terms of the new framework and new policy, but also in terms of a new Constitution.
The impact of the merging Constitutional dispensation on housing needs to be better understood by us all, especially in regard to the division of responsibilities among the three spheres of government. This is the main reason that my Department has been at such pains to complete the implementation of the national framework. This framework consists of those initiatives that are necessary to be managed at the national level. The implementation and articulation of housing policy is increasingly going to assume a provincial and local flavour within the national policy framework. Madame Speaker, there is already evidence of different approaches and different priorities emerging within the nine Provinces - this is to be welcomed and supported.
Of course, Provinces must increasingly take the blame or the credit for their respective failures and successes. As this House is aware, housing legislation was amended this year to empower the Executive Councillors to take direct control over their respective Provincial Housing Boards and the allocation of funds in their Provinces.
Equally significantly, our legislation also provided for the accreditation of local authorities to manage directly our subsidy scheme. Madame speaker, this budget gives us the opportunity to properly involve all three tiers of government in the management of the nation's housing programme. With next week's community elections taking place in KwaZulu-Natal, the stage will be set for increased delivery.
Madame Speaker, over the past two years we have not only put the framework in place, but we have also put into the market some two hundred and ninety thousand capital subsidies, which are being spent at an ever-increasing rate. With the support of the Provincial Governments, I am in a position to announce the granting of a further two hundred thousand subsidies nationally.
The Provinces will shortly be receiving authorisation from my Department on the following basis:
FREE STATE 13 800 EASTERN CAPE 30 400 NORTH WEST 14 000 NORTHERN PROVINCE 17 200 MPUMALANGA 10 600 NORTHERN CAPE 3 600 GAUTENG 48 600 KWAZULU/NATAL 39 000 WESTERN CAPE 22 800 TOTAL 200 000
I am concerned to ensure that our housing funds play a direct and active role in contributing to the integration of our urban areas, both in economic and in racial terms. One of the ways in which we will be able to achieve this will be through the insistence of higher densities in the application of these funds. Such guidelines will accompany these subsidy allocations.
Madame Speaker, as part of the process of integrating our cities, we have to address those issues and those people that were separated through the policies and effects of apartheid. Our policy approach must be one that removes both the physical and psychological barriers between hostel dwellers and their surrounding communities. Madame Speaker, tonight I wish to announce that, after due consideration, I have decided to allocate the R200m RDP funds under the Special Presidential Urban Renewal Programme for this purpose. A small proportion of the funds should be allocated to the capacity building that will be specifically required in this regard.
However, Madame Speaker, in addition I believe we are now in a position to provide even further and more direct impetus to the housing programme. I wish to make an initial announcement in this regard:
Following one of the recommendations of the Task Team appointed by me in August 1995, my department has managed to secure an amount of R525m from the RDP fund. This money will be used for scale delivery of housing in joint ventures with the private sector. Detailed proposals on the application of these funds are currently being finalised, and I will be in a position to release these shortly. A flexible approach is being adopted to allow a variety of approaches and mechanisms, many of which have been encapsulated in numerous proposals to my Department.
The programme will be structured to maximise private sector gearing and investment, and will focus on increasing delivery at scale in the crucial R17,500 to R45,000 house price range. This is precisely where the bulk of the affordability lies, but where very little delivery is currently taking place.
However, Madame speaker, let me be quite clear on one of the main purposes of this programme - it will be to ensure mass delivery at much higher densities than are being achieved by the one-person- one plot approach, which has the potential to destroy our cities. We will be looking for medium rise construction, shared wet core and walls - in short we will be looking for the achievement of densities that will allow us to use housing as part of the programme of integrating our cities. I may add that my Department will also be aligning itself, in this regard, with the Department of Transport in implementing the metropolitan corridor approach.
The funds that I am announcing today will aim to involve all three tiers of government, with a particular emphasis on metropolitan government. This programme will aim to:
In making this announcement, I would like to underline a simple housing fact. These programmes of high levels of delivery at lower margins for developers will rest on the fundamental principle that people who enter into legal contracts must adhere to such agree- ments, otherwise they will not be able to remain in their properties.
I would also wish to stress that the private sector must meet its responsibilities by ensuring good building, prudent lending and providing consumer education.
Combined, these announcements imply a cash injection of six and a half billion rand of public and private sector investment into housing over the next three years, over and above the existing programmes. For its part, the Government cannot be expected to announce, as we have tonight, a direct injection of R3,2bn into housing without there being an appropriate response from our social partners.
For mass housing delivery to take place, conditions conducive to investment must be created and maintained, and this rest - fundamentally - on the honouring of legal contract, of services being provided, and of goods being paid for.
I would like to stress that those organisations that create doubt in the minds of ordinary people in this regard are acting directly against the interests of the poor and the homeless. The priority of my Department, and the priority of this Government, is and must remain those that do not have houses at all and not those who have houses but would prefer not to pay. For them, the law will take its course.
NO PAYMENT EQUALS NO HOUSES - THIS IS AS TRUE FOR THE NATION AS IT IS FOR THE INDIVIDUAL.
Madame Speaker, the message of this Government is clear. Let us move forward to delivery at scale, and move away from the tired and self-serving populist rhetoric of yesterday. The announcements I have made today will bring a message of hope to all those with an interest in speeding up development in this country. Let us all see how we can increase our roles and our responsibilities, rather than run away from them. Governments' commitment in this regard must not be underestimated.
LET THIS BE A PROMISE, RATHER THAN A WARNING.
20 JUNE 1996