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27 October 2004

INTRODUCTION

The intention of reporting to the Cabinet was to give a progress report based on the Social Sector Cluster’s Programme of Action. The report covered the following areas:

* Disability
* Social Health Insurance
* South African Social Security Agency
* Macro Social Analysis
* ISRDP and URP
* And Integrated Food Security

DISABILITY

Following the last report to Cabinet the cluster was requested to:
i) finalise the definition of disability;
ii) Finalise the tool for assessment following an agreed upon definition;
iii) Focus on the clean up processes to ensure that beneficiaries that did not qualify for disability were taken off the system.

On the question of the definition of disability the cluster proposed the following working definition:

“A disability is moderate to severe limitation in functioning (activity) or participation restriction that is permanent. Disabilities are normally classified as physical, sensory, communication, intellectual and mental. The activity/functional limitation or participation restriction needs to exist after correction or control of impairment.”

This definition is based on the extensive work that has been done by government to ensure correct inclusion of people with disabilities whilst enabling the system to be freed of those who do not qualify.

The Cabinet recognises that this definition raises the need to carefully work through the implications for the assessment of disability and for the granting of temporary disability benefits. Further work will therefore be undertaken in this regard. The Cluster will also look into the matter of the implications of the concept of “maximum correction” on the health system. There is also a need to be more specific on the description of “functional activity”.

Cabinet decided that the definition should be aligned to various Acts which relate to disabilities such as the Employment Equity Act.

The cluster also reported on the development of an assessment tool for disability in line with the definition proposed above, which harmonises the assessment tools of the Departments of Health and Social Development. It is anticipated that a new assessment tool can be costed and piloted by the end of this year and can therefore be implemented by 1 April 2005.

REVIEW OF GROWTH IN DISABILITY GRANT NUMBERS

A study on the causes of the rapid increase in the number of disability recipients has been commissioned under the guidance of the Department of Social Development and the National Treasury. The target date for completion is the end of November due to time-consuming processes involved in generating Social Pension data prior to an analysis of actual records in provincial offices.

SOCIAL HEALTH INSURANCE

The Cluster reported on progress to date with regard to social Health Insurance and presented the three components of SHI. The three components are:

* Risk related subsidy
* Income Related Cross subsidy
* Mandatory Membership

Cabinet noted the report and resolved that more work should be done around various components and that the Cluster should do further work with regard to the financial implications of SHI.

SOUTH AFRICAN SOCIAL SECURITY AGENCY

1. The Cluster reported progress in the implementation of the Social Security Agency. In this report the cluster dealt with the actual process of implementation and showed that there are three distinct periods, within which the Agency will be established.

THE IMPLEMENTATION STRATEGY OF THE SASSA:

2. The process of establishing the Agency will occur over the following three phases:

(a) Phase one:

The following processes will have been finalised:
* Establishment of the Agency Head Office: the development of policies, procedures and processes, establishment of funding mechanisms and human resource ring fencing and separation.
* Increased ongoing support to the provinces to contain the escalation in grant beneficiary numbers and to prevent fraud.
* Finalisation of interim service delivery improvement strategy and implementation.

(b) Phase two:

This phase will consolidate and finalise all the processes necessary for the complete transfer of this function to the Agency, the key issues include:
* Finalising the readiness of provinces to be incorporated at National level and progressively incorporating provinces during the year.
* Continuing with short-term service delivery improvements.

(c) Phase three:

This phase optimises and builds the capacity of the Agency to deal with grant administration and payment.

MACRO-SOCIAL ANALYSIS OF SOUTH AFRICAN SOCIETY

3. The Cluster is working on a macro-social analysis of the South African society. This work is about to be finalised giving a comprehensive analysis of the data obtained around a number of social. This work will be presented to Cabinet in November.

COMPREHENSIVE SOCIAL SECURITY

4. Previously, the Cluster through the Department of Provincial and Local Government provided a report on the work around the provision of basic services in municipalities. The Cluster also instituted a study on an analysis of the services provided by government to citizens in kind - what is known as the social wage. This study is due to be finished at the end of November and will provide a comprehensive understanding of the total package of services provided by government.

5. Cabinet resolved that this matter forms part of a detailed presentation on the Comprehensive Social Security System of the country to the January Lekgotla. This will include the finalization of policy proposals around the indigent policies and the provision of a total package of basic services to citizens including matters related to progressive realisation of certain key socio-economic rights.

EXPANDED PUBLIC WORKS PROGRAMME

6. The intention of the EPWP programme in the Social Sector Cluster is to provide a model that promotes community participation in the delivery of services, while creating job opportunities. The Cluster had identified the problem of different stipends that are paid by different Departments to volunteers and workers that have similar jobs. These issues have since been discussed and Cabinet recommended that further work need to be done to review other categories of workers which have not been included.

EARLY CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENT

7. With regards to Early Childhood Development (ECD), the Cluster was tasked with developing an integrated plan for comprehensive ECD services with detailed plans and resources required. The aim of the ECD programme is to skill a number of practitioners over 5 years, thereby increasing their capacity to generate an income and at the same time improve the care and learning environment of our children. The target workers are the unemployed and/or under-employed parents and caregivers in all ECD programmes.

8. The ECD Interdepartmental Committee, consisting of Office on the Rights of the Child, Departments of Education, Health and Social Development, has been established and has already developed an integrated plan for comprehensive ECD services, Tshwaragano le Bana.

9. The plan provides an integrated approach for converging basic services for improved childcare, early stimulation and learning, health and nutrition, water and sanitation – targeting young children (birth to five years of age), expectant and nursing mothers and community groups.

10. The primary components of the plan centre around services to the child including:

* integrated management of childhood diseases;
* immunisation and nutrition;
* referral services for health and social security grants;
* and implementation of psychosocial programmes.

The next step for the Cluster is to cost all the specific services in the programme.

EXPANDED PUBLIC WORKS PROGRAMME

11. The Department of Public Works and the National Housing Forum Consortium (NHFC) have agreed on the principles of how the EPWP will be incorporated into the piloting of rental housing stock for the poor. The use of the EPWP Guidelines for the implementation of labour intensive infrastructure projects will be made a requirement for all proposals submitted to the NHFC by Municipalities and consortia that will be involved in the Presidential Job Summit Pilot Projects.

12. Furthermore Department of Public Works, CETA and the NHFC will sign a Memorandum of Understanding that will allocate learnerships to these projects so that they can provide the practical training component for the learners.

ISRDP and URP

13. The Cluster is finalising an audit of Departmental activities in the nodes. The Cluster has also analysed all the IDPs, existing programmes and the input from various Departments and came to a conclusion that it is possible to identify key programmes for each Cluster in all the nodes. Areas of work for all will be finalised soon together with financing protocols.

INTEGRATED FOOD SECURITY

14. The Cluster was previously directed to focus more attention on other measures that could be used to deal with families with food shortages, including the use of food stamps and the implementation of the Agricultural Starter Pack Programme. The Department of Social Development and Treasury are discussing mechanisms to use the current allocated funds for this purpose.

Issued by: Department of Health
27 October 2004