A piece of Paper Stands in the Way of Children Accessing Grants
"We dare not allow the children to starve while something can be done by government to alleviate their plight” These are the words of the Director-General of the Department of Social Development, Mr. Vusi Madonsela spoken in July last year. The government is not keeping its word.
The Regulations to the Social assistance Act prescribe that to access any of the social assistance grants for children, the caregiver must produce his or her Bar coded Identity Document and the Birth Certificate of the child in his or her care. Many children don’t have these documents and are therefore prevented from accessing the grants that they are entitled to. A Special Assignment programme screened in August 2001 highlighted this problem, which translated into extreme starvation for many children in the Mt. Frere area.
The Government has been aware of this problem since that date. They expressed a commitment to address the problem immediately. Since then ACESS has engaged in protracted negotiations with the Department of Social Development to try and address this problem. Formerly, the Director General was vested with a discetion to award a grant in the absence of these documents, but this discretion was subsequently removed, without any evidence of why. ACESS aimed to amend the regulations to the Social Assistance Act in order to reinstate this discretion on the Director General.
Such an amendment would allow for caregivers to provide alternative proof of identity which would be specifically listed so as to address concerns of fraud.
It was only when we threatened litigation that we met with cooperation some 2 years after bringing the problem to light. A fruitful meeting between ACESS and the Department took place, where it was agreed that the Department would enter into a process to amend the regulations. At a further meeting with the various provincial Heads of Departments it was again agreed to take this process further. Amended regulations were eventually published for public comment in the Government Gazette in January 2004. After a waste of taxpayers’ money and a tremendous waste of time, the Heads of Department have now decided that the regulations are not a good idea.
ACESS has been strung along in this critical election period. It is now, almost 4 years later and there is still no solution and children continue to starve. ACESS now has to reconsider litigation against the state to ensure that the government keeps its word. There most certainly is something government can do to alleviate the plight of starving children, they simply are not doing it.
National Co-ordinator: Patricia Martin
Tel: 021 – 761 0117 / 761 1468
Fax: 021 – 761 4938
Address: Office 1,
Website:
www.acess.org.za
E-mail:
info@acess.org.za
Task Team: Children's Institute (UCT), Children's
Rights Centre
Reference Team:
Prevention of Child abuse and Neglect