THE DA OFFERS REAL VALUE FOR YOUR VOTE

The ANC continues to increase rates and tariffs. The DA has proposed a workable zero increase budget which promised more delivery for our capital city. Why pay more when you can pay less for better government? No matter where you live or for whom you voted, residents across our city are unhappy with the lack of delivery of the current ANC government. I am tired of hearing people complain but then shortly thereafter they claim that their business or their home owners association is “A”political. The “A” standing for Apathetic .The time has come for residents to take an active stand and draw a line in the sand. It is time for residents of our City to say no to increases in property rates in exchange for continued terrible or no service. The inefficiencies in the current administration cannot be allowed to continue. The ANC has managed to ensure that all social economic groups are getting poorer. Only a few select connected persons seem to be making any progress thanks to their administration. Yet despite unhappy residents, little capital expansion and growing failure of service delivery, no change is made by the ANC to their incompetent administrators.

“A”political. The “A” standing for Apathetic” You need to stop complaining and stand up and be counted. Ensure that you are correctly registered and if not go to the IEC and make sure that you can vote in the 2011 elections. Call the DA to assist you and volunteer to help Pretoria prepare for these important life changing elections. Where the DA have been provided with the opportunity to govern we have shown superior service delivery with happy residents living in clean working municipalities. Residents complain but do not do anything.

Politics is not something which a few individuals in any country do. Politics is a process which requires all residents to play an active part. When it comes to election time these same unhappy residents choose not to vote or complain about being bothered by a political party asking them to go and vote. These associations choose to make election campaigning more difficult than necessary by hampering access to residents quoting security and privacy rights. Shopping centres deny political parties access to their public areas quoting the need to be “A” political.

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” (Edmund Burke). This 18th century quotation remains applicable in politics and in all areas of life today. In modern politics voter turnout has a dramatic impact on the outcome of elections.

Make sure that you can vote next year. Politics in our city is a two horse race. The choice is yours. Continue to complain or do something about it and support the correct horse.

We can no longer tolerate intolerance

Strikes hold South Africa in poverty. For our country to develop we must ensure that the new generation of South Africans receive a top quality education. The new generation of South Africans must be able to claim that they received an education as opposed to a schooling. An education will help our people to reason and think for themselves. They will need to express themselves and communicate better than those who are now charged with their education.

Strikers want everyone to agree and act as one. The mentality of consensus can not continue to exist on this continent. Our constitution allows all the right to disagree. Unfortunately our educators and care providers who have the responsibility to teach these rights will fail as they themselves do not subscribe to the right to disagree. Violence is the result of people failing to communicate and resolve differences and when a stale mate occurs our continent reverts to violence as violence is the language of the unsophisticated cave man and woman. Continued strikes will keep our country unsophisticated and will keep the new generations at the same level as their parents who were not provided with the same opportunities. Are the old who are intolerant of others also jealous of the future generations prospects to live in a true democracy? How can any person turn away young children seeking knowledge and wisdom? How can we as a country tolerate the violent behavior of intolerant persons whose actions are and will continue to keep South Africa ransom to poverty?

The time has come for all to step forward and do there share, remembering at all times our right to disagree. In the end the compromise is what takes a community, relationships, business and a country forward. Our democracy will only be proved a success once the right to disagree is understood and people are protected from the actions of intolerant people. We need to understand that you can not always win but a win-win position must be found even in the most dire of situations.

The living conditions of too many South Africans is a dire situation which will not be turned around by the current approach of government nor by the obstinate stance of key role players. We need to accept that in no "good" business deal does any party really fee that he won. So too in life and politics no one group in a true democracy will ever feel they won. Our rights balance out and this is what must be striven for. A balance which takes positive steps forward to eradicate poverty in society by all parties gaining small steps at a time. Newtons law of every action having an equal and opposite reaction can be applied in society as well. Thus for change to occur which does not have a violent and opposite reaction we will need to make small consistent progress forward in order to manage the reaction which the change will bring about.

DA Tshwane Metropolitan Council Proposed Budget 2010-2011

Metro

The DA rejects the budget proposed by the ANC for the 2010-2011 year. We feel that the ongoing lack to deliver efficient services and the continued practice of doing the same incorrect things over and over with the same failing results does not result in the residents of Tshwane having to carry the cost of the ANC’s mistakes.

A budget must be balanced and must address the primary issues facing the metropolitan council. The following are our main differences in slashing the operational budget and the cost to residents by R479 million and increasing our capital budget by R804 million. If we do not increase capital expenditure vital development will continue to not be delivered and the residents will continue rioting.

Property Rates (0% increase as opposed to 10% of the ANC)

We propose that the residents of Tshwane should pay no increase in rates and taxes during the forthcoming budget year. The financial crisis faced by most residents requires government at all levels to step in and assist in aiding the transformation of the economy. By providing this relief to residents and by the city tightening its belt the long term financial stability of the region will be positively influenced. The DA acknowledges that this zero increase can not be maintained but out of necessity for the economy of the metropolitan area and as a way to apologise for the failed service delivery of the past, this token action for the forthcoming year will go a long way to re-storing confidence in the city in the eyes of residents. The effect of this zero increase is to reduce the cities revenue budget by R275 million.

Electricity (Increase of 15% as opposed to the 19% of the ANC)

The local government has little control of the ridiculous high tariff increases imposed from Eskom due to the inefficiencies in this parastatal who has failed to follow best business practice, efficient administration and management. The consequences of which are now reflected in the high tariff rates. The DA believes that the current 4% inclusive levy set in the prior budget to facilitate infrastructure development should as recommended by officials in the metro be funded in an alternate manner other than through rate increases to residents. There has traditionally been a large mark up on electricity and this has been an important revenue source to the metro. There are large quantities of unbilled power, poor maintenance of infra-structure and lack of control over the electricity and water has resulted in large wastage. The traditional high mark up of electricity in the past has allowed for the metro to carry these in-efficiencies. The time to tighten up control of this loss has come.

Our proposed 15% is in line with the increase as recommended by NERSA. We have also substantially increased the electricity infrastructure capital budget to ensure that this long term asset be paid for over a longer period of time. A basic business principle is to finance long term assets with long term finance and short term with short term cash flows. We have increased the capital budget for public works & infrastructure by R450 million.

Solid waste – Refuse removal (Increase of 5% as opposed to the 9% of the ANC)

The strikes of the last year have left a bad taste not to mention smell in the minds of residents. We are pleased that the ANC have at last realised the importance of controlling an important service centre such as service delivery and have taken action (even if arms may have been twisted by strikers) to employ workers engaged in this area of service delivery. We feel that the inefficiencies prevalent in this department leave much room for improvement and believe that a lower rate increase can be offset by reducing expenditure. Failure to sub-contract should result in savings to offset our lower revenue of R15.8 million as a result of the 4% lower increase.

Increase in revenue from Fines, licences and permits

We have increased the capital budget of the Community safety by 150 million more than the ANC. This is a necessity due to the large numbers of current metro police employees who do not have the assets to do their jobs. Large numbers of police vehicles, motor bikes and equipment is required to move a currently almost un-operative department to an efficient and important one. Under DA control we will utilise the metro police to better enforce by-laws and to assist in the important task of protecting employees of the metro when enforcing credit control in no-go and other areas. In addition we will utilise metro police to assist with debt collection and service of notices in order to recover the debtors which will in part finance the dramatically increased capital expenditure budget proposed.

A city can not grow and the economy can not stabilised if business are not able to operate efficiently. We are proposing a monthly business licence which will be automatically billed to all business accounts in the region of R100 per month. These increased funds will be utilised to fund the special customer service lines for business’s and to finance the expanded economic development expenditure which we have budgeted for. We believe that spending money on economic development in the form of entrepreneurial hubs and other projects aimed at helping the unemployed be self sufficient will assist the city grow in the medium term. A vital macro-economic development role which every local government should take seriously. An additional R20 million has been set aside in our budget for this purpose.

The total increased revenue from these interventions is budgeted at R16.5 million.

Balance

We have budgeted to keep the surplus at the same level set by the ANC, being R1.5 billion. This is important as the surplus is used in main to fund the capital budget. The shortfall must be financed by external loan’s. The ANC have budgeted for a R1billion external loan. We believe that if more is required then a larger loan can be justified taking the debt/ revenue ratio into account We do not believe that it will be necessary as the total council funding requirement of our capital budget amounts to R2.6 billion. This is covered by the R1 billion loan and the R1.5 billion surplus. Our additional spending on the finance department and collection mechanisms will result in the debtors collection of arrears increasing which will ensure that our cash position will improve over the 12 month period without having to take up additional external loans.

Our operational budget was slashed on account of the large wastage prevalent in many departments and the over reliance on expensive external consultants. Cost cutting exercise will result in the savings budgeted for with the largest saving coming from the improved control of the bulk services which are currently un-billed and lost due to theft and incorrect billing. We have increased the finance department employee remuneration budget by R10 million to ensure that suitably qualified persons are employed in the finance department. Terminating the outsourcing of debt collection at the high costs currently paid with poor results will result in a more efficient metro. The decrease in our operational budget results in a decrease across all departments in expenditure of a mere 3.23%. The result is zero percent increase in property rates and a relief to residents for a 12 month period. Inflationary increases will be however need to be levied in the future years.

Conclusion

Whilst much more should be possible with time and better operational efficiencies being possible as new assets are deployed in the field, the current budget remains tight but the practice of passing on ineffectiveness to the residents must stop. This budget is an example of what is possible if an attitude of taking the resident best interest into account is adopted. A budget must serve the people and its needs. We believe that this budget will force more efficient departments, provide more effective crime prevention and will ensure that our infra-structure is developed to cater for a growing city’s needs.

REVENUE BY SOURCE	ANC 2010-2011	DA 2010-2011	Change
Property rates	3,021,874,644	2,747,154,644	0%
Electricity	6,010,000,000	5,807,984,000	15%
Water	1,618,399,760	1,618,399,760	10%
Sanitation	392,543,113	389,007,113	10%
Refuse removal	429,884,000	414,108,000	5%
Rental of facilities & equipment	105,502,844	105,502,844
Interest earned - Investments	120,080,230	120,080,230
Interest earned - Debtors	351,148,098	351,148,098
Fines	65,687,066	67,000,000
Licences & permits	34,783,170	50,000,000	Business licence
Other revenue	920,893,790	921,000,000
Transfers recognised - operational	1,976,514,000	1,976,514,000
Gains on disposals of PPE	4,950,000	4,950,000
Transfer from government grant reserve	1,325,026,000	1,325,026,000
	16,377,286,715	15,897,874,689	479,412,026
Expenditure	(14,831,720,270)	(14,352,308,244)
Surplus	1,545,566,445	1,545,566,445
Distributed as follows - Reserves
Transfer to other reserves	(107,200,935)	(107,200,935)
Depreciation off-sets	326,345,480	326,345,480
Transfer to CRR	(439,684,990)	(439,684,990)
Trf to government grant reserves	(1,325,026,000)	(1,325,026,000)

Expenditure by vote
Agriculture & Environmental management	1,355,263,569	1,335,263,569	(20,000,000)
City planning & economic development	313,270,632	333,270,632	20,000,000
Community safety	1,036,377,731	999,377,731	(37,000,000)
Corporate & shared services	1,032,200,085	932,200,085	(100,000,000)
Financial services	801,453,829	811,453,829	10,000,000
General & assessment rates	504,279,314	493,279,314	(11,000,000)
Health & Social development	368,142,233	378,142,233	10,000,000
Housing & sustainable human settlement development	345,325,319	365,325,319	20,000,000
Office of executive mayor, Chief whip, Speaker & City Manager	336,207,356	300,000,000	(36,207,356)
Public works & infrastructure development	7,236,667,196	6,908,462,526	(328,204,670)
Sports & recreation	247,752,798	240,752,798	(7,000,000)
Transport & roads	1,254,780,208	1,254,780,208	-
	14,831,720,270	14,352,308,244	(479,412,026)

Capital Budget
	ANC Budget	DA Budget	Change
	2010-2011	2010-2011
Council funding	1,831,909,907	2,628,689,947
Provincial Transport Infrastructure Systems Grant	804,180,000	804,180,000
Government Housing grant - Not yet finalised for 2011
Grants & subsidies	46,878,000	46,878,000
Government Housing (Social infrastructure)	5,400,000	5,400,000
Municipal Infrastructure Grant	380,568,000	380,568,000
National electrification programme & DSM	88,000,000	88,000,000
Capital replacement reserve fund	38,039,040	45,000,000
	3,194,974,947	3,998,715,947
Per strategic unit		-
Agriculture & Environmental Management	63,964,640	83,964,640	20,000,000
City planning & Economic development	70,454,000	70,454,000	-
Community safety	38,610,900	188,610,900	150,000,000
Corporate & Shared services	101,717,000	101,717,000	-
Financial services	16,259,000	20,000,000	3,741,000
Health & Social development	30,216,000	40,216,000	10,000,000
Housing & Sustainable Human settlements	144,958,500	164,958,500	20,000,000
Mayor, Chief Whip, Speaker, City Manager	286,000	286,000	-
Transport & Roads	1,295,950,667	1,445,950,667	150,000,000
Public works & infrastructure	1,394,558,240	1,844,558,240	450,000,000
Sport, recreation, Arts & Culture	38,000,000	38,000,000	-
	3,194,974,947	3,998,715,947	803,741,000