FRIDAY, 14 JUNE 2002 __

          PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF PROVINCES
                                ____

The Council met at 09:36.

The Chairperson of Committees took the Chair and requested members to observe a moment of silence for prayers or meditation.

ANNOUNCEMENTS, TABLINGS AND COMMITTEE REPORTS - see col 000.

                ACT OF HEROISM BY MEMBER OF THE SAPS

                         (Draft Resolution)

Dr E A CONROY: Voorsitter, ek stel voor sonder kennisgewing:

Dat die Raad -

(1) kennis neem van die heldedaad deur konstabel Willem van Niekerk van die SAPD op Bethlehem wat sy lewe gewaag het om kop onderstebo in ‘n puttoilet af te sak ten einde ‘n pasgebore baba uit die toilet te red nadat dié na bewering deur sy moeder daarin gegooi is;

(2) konstabel Van Niekerk gelukwens met dié heldedaad wat hy sonder huiwering en sonder inagneming van sy eie veiligheid verrig het; en

(3) baba “Miracle”, soos hy toepaslik deur die hospitaalpersoneel gedoop is, sterkte en ‘n goeie huis vol warm liefde toewens. (Translation of Afrikaans motion without notice follows.)

[Dr E A CONROY: Chairperson, I move without notice:

That the Council -

(1) notes the act of heroism by Constable Willem van Niekerk of the SAPS at Bethlehem, who risked his life by being lowered upside down into a drop toilet to save a newborn baby after he had allegedly been thrown into the toilet by his mother;

(2) congratulates Constable Van Niekerk for undertaking this heroic deed without hesitation and without due allowance for his own safety; and

(3) wishes baby ``Miracle’’, as he was aptly named by the hospital staff, well and a good home filled with warm love.]

Motion agreed to in accordance with section 65 of the Constitution.

CONGRATULATIONS TO SELECT COMMITTEES ON SECURITY AND CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS AND ON LOCAL GOVERNMENT AND ADMINISTRATION

                         (Draft Resolution)

Kgoshi M L MOKOENA: Chairperson, I move without notice:

That the Council congratulates the Select Committee on Security and Constitutional Affairs and that of Local Government and Administration for being so dedicated to their work, because today, immediately after adjournment, or at 12:00, they are going to meet again to consider negotiating mandates from provinces, and to look into other issues relating to the crossing-of-the-floor legislation.

Motion agreed to in accordance with section 65 of the Constitution.

            DECISION BY M-WEB TO COMBAT CHILD PORNOGRAPHY

                         (Draft Resolution)

Me E C GOUWS: Voorsitter, ek stel voor sonder kennisgewing:

Dat die Raad -

(1) kennis neem -

   (a)  van  die  voorneme  van  M-Web,  die  Suid-Afrikaanse  Internet-
       diensverskaffersvereniging,  om  kykers  en   verspreiders   van
       kinderpornografie hok te slaan;


   (b)  dat mnr Richard Heath, reguleringsraadgewer by M-Web, voorstelle
       om hierdie oortreders te vervolg aan die Film- en Publikasieraad
       voorgelê het; en


   (c)  dat die nuwe prosedure M-Web in staat sal  stel  om  sonder  die
       tussentrede van 'n hof materiaal te blokkeer wat hy  vermoed  as
       kinderpornografie kan kwalifiseer; en

(2) hierdie besluit van M-Web om kinderpornografie in Suid-Afrika uit te wis, baie hoog op prys stel. (Translation of Afrikaans notice of motion follows.)

[Ms E C GOUWS: Chairperson, I move without notice:

That the Council -

(1) notes -

   (a)  the intentions of M-Web,  the  South  African  Internet  service
       providers' association to curb the viewers and  distributors  of
       child pornography;


   (b)  that Mr Richard Heath, regulation board  adviser  at  M-Web  has
       submitted  proposals  to  the  Film  and  Publication  Board  to
       prosecute these trespassers; and


   (c)  that the new procedures enabling M-Web to block  material  which
       it suspects of qualifying as child  pornography,  without  court
       intervention; and

(2) greatly appreciates the decision by M-Web to wipe out child pornography in South Africa.]

The CHAIRPERSON OF COMMITTEES: Is there any objection to the motion? There is an objection. The motion without notice will therefore become notice of a motion.

                         APPROPRIATION BILL

                           (Policy debate)

Vote No 15 - Education:

The MINISTER OF EDUCATION: Chairperson, hon members, it is tempting to repeat the speech I delivered in the National Assembly last week. Similarly it is tempting to identify the problems and pathologies in different provinces and each school. But my duty today is to concentrate on the relationship between the national and provincial departments of education and to examine how the provinces carry out their constitutional mandate. Also, rather than looking at micro specific issues, I will provide an overview of what has been achieved in the past year and identify some of the challenges the provinces face in the implementation of our transformation agenda.

Let me start off, however, by drawing on the experience of a country far way but relevant to us, Japan, in their efforts to spur on and, indeed, accelerate their own development, which I believe is instructive for our context. In 1872, Japan issued its fundamental code of education through which it sought to catch up with the West. Their central strategy as an underdeveloped country revolved around the commitment to ensure that there would be ``no community with an illiterate family nor a family with an illiterate person’’. Their success is today regarded as one of the most spectacular in global history.

By 1910, although Japan was still poorer than Britain and the United States, almost all its young people were fully literate and Japan was publishing more books than Britain and more than twice as many as the United States. So Japan’s phenomenal economic and social progress is largely ascribed to their success in education.

There are two important lessons to be drawn from the Japanese experience. First, it took Japan a little under 40 years to achieve this much praised level of success. We in South Africa have only had about eight years to build the system we have today. Our characteristically harsh evaluation of our own achievements - often it is very noble to be so self-critical, and harshly so - must be mediated by and understood in relation to the experience in other parts of the world.

Our achievements in the last eight years, from the abysmal baseline fashioned through years of apartheid, objectively compare very well with some of the most important success stories in global history. The second lesson to be drawn from the Japanese experience is that education is one of the most potent instruments for achieving sustainable national development. This is internationally recognised and also recognised in the preparatory work done at the Bali conference on sustainable development. So we now have the benefit of extensive empirical studies that provide compelling evidence of the critical role of education in economic and social development in developed and developing countries.

The Japanese experience was also important in another respect. Although it was an authoritarian society then, there was absolute unity of purpose across all the regions and provinces and in national government. It was centrally driven to ensure success.

This country’s commitment to education is reflected, therefore, in the proportion of national public expenditure devoted to education. Following the rapid increases in education spending in 1996-97, education spending declined between 1996-97 and 1999-2000. These declines were necessary to stabilise education spending because there was a vast amount of profligacy and inefficiency up to then, and spending which was unsustainable and limited in its impact on education quality and equity.

Last year I said in this House that the success of spending stabilisation was extremely commendable and I expressed my appreciation to the education MECs for their role and achievement. I regret to see so few MECs here this morning. I say today that the added significance of the stabilisation is that it was achieved without a lowering of education quality.

During this time the education system achieved greater financial equity through a number of measures, including the improvement of financial management capacity, the educator rationalisation and redeployment process, the improvement of our management of personnel expenditure and the implementation of the national norms and standards for school funding, with the poorer schools getting seven times as much in school funding as the richer schools. We managed also to achieve significant improvements through the introduction of new policies and laws, while maintaining an unstinting focus on performance.

I am extremely pleased, therefore, that we are now harvesting the benefit of successful spending stabilisation. Education spending has been rising in real terms since 2000-01 when aggregate spending grew in real terms by 1,4%. Notably KwaZulu-Natal increased spending by 4,7% in real terms in 2000-01, although from a very low baseline, with the Eastern Cape and Northern Province also achieving strong growth at 1,5% and 1,6% in real terms respectively.

Therefore it is reassuring that this growth is being maintained in the new MTEF period, 2001-02 to 2003-04, when education spending is projected to rise by 1,7% in real terms. Real growth is projected for KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga, the Eastern Cape and Gauteng, while the North West and the Northern Cape are projected to grow at slightly lower than inflation.

After adjusting for once-off payments such as severance packages, all provinces project real growth higher than 2,5%, with KwaZulu-Natal projecting a growth of over 6% per year. This is a phenomenal change in orientation.

These impressive growth figures are accompanied by equally impressive improvements in spending patterns. The figures show a significant increase in capital expenditure, which bears testimony to the commitment of provincial governments to tackle classroom backlogs, the lack of water, sanitation and electricity and the shortage of furniture, media and specialist teaching facilities at schools. Later I will show hon members, in my summing up, the extent of the involvement - the 400% increase in capital expenditure in the next three or four years. Non-personnel expenditure is set to rise by 10% per year in real terms. So we are turning the ship in the right direction, allowing for improved provision of textbooks and other learning support materials.

This overall picture is therefore very promising. However, one province, that of the Western Cape, under the previous administration, has consistently stood out as a province where education accounts for the lowest percentage of provincial expenditure. The actual expenditure on education as a percentage of provincial expenditure for 2000-01 in the Western Cape was 34,9%, compared to a national average of 39,3%. The national average in provincial expenditure in eight provinces was 39,3%. The estimated education expenditure in the Western Cape over the MTEF is 34,7% for 2001-02, 34,5% for 2002-03 and 34,3% for 2003-04, compared to the national averages of 39% for 2001-02, 38,6% for 2002-03 and 38,3% for 2003- 04.

These figures, therefore, and particularly the lack of the kind of commitment that we wanted from the previous administration, raise questions about the previous administration’s commitment to education. They also convey an even more damning indictment with respect to commitment to the poor, to equity and to poverty eradication. It is the poor who bear the brunt of this lack of commitment. It is the poor who happen to be black and resident in the Western Cape who have to bear the burden of lost opportunities and reduced education quality. I am hopeful that under the new administration, this scenario will change for the next MTEF cycle.

A country’s economic competitiveness is now, more than ever before, dependent on the existence of vibrant institutions to promote high-level human resource development and engage in research and development. Without these, some countries will continue to operate outside the knowledge economy and therefore continue to occupy unfavourable and uncompetitive positions in the global economy. The defining line for economic competitiveness for nations today is drawn between those nations that are knowledge rich and those that are knowledge poor.

Furthermore, the context of knowledge production is extremely significant for reflecting and nurturing indigenous knowledge systems. It is something that we have learned in a democracy: that we just cannot continue the old colonial system of education to provide the same kind of education for all our children. The enormous contribution of, for example, African indigenous knowledge systems will be lost to the world, unless we have credible and vibrant higher education institutions on the continent to help knowledge production in context and to sustain the emergence and nurturing of a cadre of African intellectuals which would otherwise fail to reach critical mass.

My Ministry’s efforts to transform higher education are relevant to the NCOP, although higher education is a national function. We seek to establish a trajectory which will result in a system that can optimally contribute to the country’s reconstruction and development. The new system, therefore, will comprise 21 higher education institutions, each of which will contribute to national as well as regional development. In addition - and I am very proud to announce this - the system will include two new bodies, the National Institutes for Higher Education in both the Northern Cape and Mpumalanga. This exciting innovation will extend the reach of higher education to provinces that do not currently have such institutions. I must pay special tribute to the MECs for education and the premiers of the Northern Cape and Mpumalanga for their total support for the development of the National Institutes for Higher Education.

As I mentioned earlier, education is critical to a nation’s economic development. In this regard, the further education and training system has a central role to play. To this end, the Ministry has also made enormous strides in transforming our further education and training system, so that millions of our young people and adults who have not been part of the vocational stream of education will now have access to quality learning opportunities.

Towards the end of last year, I launched my programme for a new institution landscape for public further education and training colleges. In the short time since then, with the enormous co-operation of the provinces, we have succeeded in reducing the total number of technical colleges from 152 racially fragmented and largely unresponsive institutions to 50. All further education and training colleges will now operate within a single legal and policy framework. Through new systems of quality assurance, curriculum development, funding and governance - and I hope some of the hon members will play a part in the governance of these technical colleges - we hope to ensure that these colleges are better equipped to meet the needs of the community.

We will also ensure that each institution has the required capacity for management effectiveness and teaching effectiveness, and real curriculum development that will take into account the needs of the local business and social communities and improve responsiveness to the world of work, while creating better citizens and a better life for all. And I hope that the older generation of people, who have been neglected up to now, will be part of this further education and training system.

Our programme to transform further education and training goes beyond colleges to include schools. My department is working on the development of a national curriculum statement for further education training Grades 10 to 12 in schools. This process will build on the principles and designs of the national curriculum statement for Grades R to 9 and will be completed by March 2003. The incremental phasing in of outcomes-based education into Grade 10 will begin in 2004, heralding the final phase of curriculum transformation in the schooling system, which has taken nearly a decade.

In reforming the curriculum from Grade 10 to 12, we have drawn on our rich experience of transforming the curriculum at lower levels of the schooling system. We have now standardised the content of education through the laying down of a national curriculum statement for general education. This has recently been revised to deal with some of the problems that were encountered in its earlier form, especially in regard to its complexity and difficulties. The new statement has been streamlined, and there are clear guidelines for teachers regarding the development of learning programmes and the assessment of learner achievement. If the programmes are not in the library, I will make sure next week that they are put there. English versions of the statement have been given to all members, but copies, for the first time, are available in all 11 languages as well as in Braille, and members can be sent these on request.

Our successes in the schooling system go beyond education. I am sure that hon members will agree that without doubt, one of our most significant achievements has been the matric results in 2001. From a starting point of below 50%, only four years ago, we have improved the national pass rate to above 60% for the first time, creating a sense of accomplishment by teachers, parents and students, all of whom play their part.

This success was not ours alone to claim. It was the result of targeted interventions in conjunction with the provinces. Some provinces showed wonderful improvements, others less so, and we will all work together with them to maintain the upward trend. I am especially glad that we have managed to reduce the number of schools which recorded a 0% to 20% pass rate from 1 000 schools out of 7 000 to under 500, in the space of one year. This year, hopefully, we will have none, which would be appropriate since a school that gets 0 to 20% cannot really qualify to be called a school. A school should signify pride and dignity. We cannot educate in a climate of shame and worthlessness. Of course, this year, we have an enormous programme worth R15 million, simply to improve maths and science under the guidance of the Deputy Minister.

One of our greatest achievements, which I am particularly proud of, is the extent to which we have developed and advanced those areas of the educational system which have traditionally existed at the margins. Most significant is the provision of a preschool year for all children, which is being introduced in more than 2 800 community-based sites this year, all located in areas identified by the President for urgent intervention. We are therefore fulfilling the promise, for the first time anywhere in history, of more than eight years of a universal 10-year education programme. We are fulfilling the promise that we made more than 10 years ago. So much for the political claims that we do not carry out our promises.

Another area is the inclusion of children with special educational needs, whether emotional, intellectual or physical. These children will no longer be isolated in special schools, and will be mainstreamed into specially prepared schools. We have rolled out the programme to bring in the thousands of young people who suffer some form of handicap and will bring them into the mainstream system.

We have also increased resources to literacy and adult education. Adult education centres have become institutionalised and their programmes focus on relevant issues. So as to eliminate doubt, particularly on the part of those who ascribe an F plus to the department and Ministry, let me give them the figures. In 2000, the provinces spent R248 million on Abet. Last year it was R822 million and by 2004 it will be R1,2 billion. In addition, the Government has allocated R110 million to the Ikhwelo Poverty Relief Project, over three years, for the establishment of 60 more adult education centres nationwide. We are on the way. We only began two or three years ago.

Chairperson, you will no doubt appreciate the budget that we are voting on today. It is insignificant in relation to the national spending on education, which I referred to earlier. The bulk of spending, of course, occurs in the provinces. My own budget, outside salaries, is only R150 million. The provinces, of course, take the vast bulk of more than R50 billion of expenditure on education. Furthermore, given the complex constitutional arrangements that we have agreed upon for the management and governance of education, much of our ability to turn the education system around is dependent on the provinces, which are responsible for the actual implementation. At a formal level, my primary level of intervention in regard to schools and colleges is the development of norms and standards. I cannot implement them until I get the consensus of all the provincial MECs. One of the criteria for approval is always that the new norms and standards should not cost more, so the possibilities are limited. But let me assure the House that we do agree on most things, and we have taken a giant leap forward in ensuring that we achieve our mission of providing high-quality learning opportunities to all South Africans.

I do not, however, consider myself to be a eunuch or, as described this morning in a journal, a tea lady. I have nothing against tea ladies. I think that was very insulting, tea ladies are vitally important for our sustenance. On the contrary, having reached an agreement on particular programmes and responsibilities, I am charged with the responsibility for monitoring and evaluating the provision of education with regard to constitutional and legislative requirements and in terms of agreed upon standards.

The Ministry has developed some useful instruments for discharging this mandate, including the School Register of Needs, whole school evaluation and systemic evaluation, in which a large sample of learners across Grades 3, 6 and 9 will be assessed for the first time. My monitoring role is therefore critical in ensuring that our constitutional provisions become a reality for all our people, and it is a role that I therefore take very seriously. To this end, together with my officials, I undertake regular visits to the provinces, and meetings are held with education MECs and heads of department every six weeks.

Quarterly reports to the President on the state of education, which are available here, are also prepared in our efforts to monitor the extent to which the provinces are meeting their constitutional obligations in the implementation of national policy. These reports to the President are published widely and include information about selected indicators, including spending levels. This is not done in a finger-pointing way, or with a view to shaming anyone. Rather they are compiled in a collaborative and transparent way in order to identify the problems, like the filling of posts, for example - headmasters’, special teaching and advisors posts - and to find mutual solutions to those.

The next report will be a special one, timed as a mid-term review of progress by the national and provincial departments. Independent evaluators will prepare the report for me, so members can be assured that there will be no spin doctoring. For those who have not become regular readers of these reports to the President, I urge them to at least to get a copy of this report, which is due out in August.

I also reminded all provincial MECs at our meeting earlier this week that in terms of the National Education Policy Act they are required to report to me if at any stage they believe that they are not capable of meeting the socioeconomic requirements in the Constitution, including the right to basic education. I can also remind members that if I am unable to deal with such a situation with the provinces, I am obliged under the Act to report this to Parliament, which will advise me on the matter. I intend to carry out my functions in this area.

Our intervention is therefore an indirect one. We try to influence the provision and quality of education. We do so by prescription in terms of access, funding, post provisioning and so on, so as to try to ensure equitable access to education across the country. We also do so by persuasion, by encouraging and assisting provinces to reflect on and improve the quality of education.

While there are clearly a number of enormous challenges that confront us in our efforts to build a completely new education system, I am pleased to report to this House that we have made significant progress in moving from apartheid education to a just and democratic order. However, much of our success stems from the hard work performed by all those who work hand in hand with us on this daunting but necessary journey.

In this regard I wish to pay special tribute to the MECs and heads of departments for education together with other officials. Our achievements are theirs. The Select Committee on Education, under the leadership of Comrade Kgware, must also be singled out for the assistance and guidance it has provided and continues to provide. I must also express my sincerest gratitude to the Deputy Minister, Musibudi Mangena, for his wise counsel and dedication and for the vital role that he plays in the Ministry.

I have no doubt that we will all build our education system into one that serves the needs of our society and economy, and those wonderful little children up there in the public gallery to whom I dedicate my speech. They are our children. The future generations of South Africa deserve no less. [Applause.]

This is a monumental task which requires members’ support and their painstaking and purposeful effort. We have experienced many setbacks, some of which have already been resolved while others demand more of our attention. Overall we are winning for the sake of the children. We are delivering on the charge to invoke education as the key driver of social development. We will continue with our efforts, with members’ assistance, until we have succeeded - one step at a time and one child at a time. [Applause.]

The CHAIRPERSON OF COMMITTEES: Order! Let me take the time to recognise our future leaders. They have come at an appropriate time in this debate about them. [Applause.]

Mr D M KGWARE: Madam Chairperson, hon Minister, MECs, hon colleagues from the provinces and hon colleagues of the Council, let me start with a quote: Far better it is to dare mighty things to win glorious triumphs, even though chequered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the grey twilight that knows not victory or defeat.

After 100 years of oppression and a mere three since our second democratic elections we have managed to transform institutions, establish new ones and make them work. During our first term of governance in developing a new democratic society, we laid the framework for the future, identified the possible limits and the undesirable and defined the values and ethos by which we seek to live and grow. As a result we have done two things simultaneously: maintained stability and order, and changed and promoted the wellbeing of the least advantaged within a rights-based constitutional framework.

Almost two decades ago our educational system under the apartheid regime was in jeopardy. It was when our very own people started to mobilise against the then Bantu education department, when they started to introduce Afrikaans on an equal basis with English as a medium of instruction in secondary schools. The issue, however, was not so much the introduction of Afrikaans as the whole system of Bantu education, which was characterised by separate schools and universities, poor facilities, overcrowded classrooms and inadequately trained teachers. Over this coming weekend we are celebrating this remarkable struggle that was led by our own children and even by some of us. We salute those who offered their lives to the liberation struggle in all spheres.

Today we can proudly account for the major shift which has unfolded since

1. One of the Department of Education’s main objectives is to restore values in our education system. Last year this department started a process of addressing the restoration of values, education and democracy. This process was launched with a very important conference which our members attended. Its mandate was to seek solutions and strategies for the promotion of equity, tolerance, multilingualism, openness, accountability and social honour in our schools. It suggested a range of ways in which schools could begin to promote these values.

Once we have succeeded in restoring the moral fibre of our society, beginning with our learners, we will be able to say with pride that one of our country’s milestones has been reached through our education system.

Restoring values in our schools will be a useless exercise if the department should fail to provide accessibility to institutions. I want to commend the Department of Education on the strategy that it has adopted, under the leadership of the Minister, in the restructuring and development of a co-ordinated further education and training system.

Through this we will be able to provide high-quality, accessible, flexible and responsive programmes and equitable opportunities for learners which will support both the current economic activities of the different provinces and the new development initiatives planned.

This strategy will also assist the future further education and training Colleges in the development of their institutional plans, which will contribute to the growth of the further education and training sector and also improve the quality of life of citizens by improving their employability.

The establishment of the further education and training institutions in provinces makes them accessible for our youth to improve their skills for entry into the employment market. The acquiring of skills should be one of our society’s major objectives. I want to motivate our youth to grab the opportunities given to them and qualify themselves with the necessary skills. It is only through effective education that we can build a better South Africa.

Redressing the inequalities of the past during a transition period is, for some of us, a painful yet very vital exercise in a new democracy. In this regard Minister Kader Asmal’s department has correctly handled the restructuring of higher education in South Africa.

In conclusion, I want to applaud the hon the Minister, the director-general and the rest of the department for the remarkable work done in addressing the imbalances and the overall successful transition of our education system.

If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavours to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. [Applause.]

Mr N M RAJU: Chairperson, hon Minister, hon MECs and hon colleagues, no one should dare underestimate the gargantuan task of transformation in education that the hon the Minister has undertaken.

It is in the terrain of education that meaningful and real transformation has to occur. Education had been trapped for decades in a divisive anachronistic and ideological mode. It is therefore a tragic commentary to note that when the hon the Minister decided to merge higher education institutions with specific goals and strategic objectives, he met with intransigence and obstinate objections from certain elements who, let it be said quite bluntly from this side, are placing impediments against the transformation, not on some scholarly, well-researched grounds, but for selfish reasons of institutional preservation.

When one is comfortably ensconced in a particular position, with all the accoutrements of meretricious splendour, one is impervious to change. The nobler aspects of why change is necessary recede into insignificance. But we welcome the Cabinet support that the hon the Minister has elicited from the executive. From our side, every strength to the Minister’s elbow in this exercise.

In his fifth report to the President, the hon the Minister has stated that the performance of provincial departments of education in the utilisation of conditional grants has not been good. In my province, for instance, overcrowding in schools is still a big bugbear.

More than 29 000 schools are currently overcrowded. There is no doubt that the infrastructure scenario is bleak. We ask the hon the Minister to wield the big stick in ensuring that provinces play their parts in providing additional classrooms, ablution facilities, electrification, potable water, etc. Schools that go without these necessities can never produce good results. So when the hon the Minister tells the President that poor performance and the use of conditional grants are unacceptable, we concur.

I wish to dwell for a moment on the parlous situation in which the school feeding schemes find themselves in KwaZulu-Natal. In the Pietermaritzburg region, some 365 schools are using the programme and 160 are not. In the Durban area those schools that have been approved are still not being attended to. In Empangeni feeding only started on 1 June 2002 - that is, this month. In Newcastle only one-third of the schools are being fed. In Ladysmith half the schools are being fed.

My information is that there is no proper cohesive arrangement in this area. There is inconsistency as some schools are being paid at a rate of R1 per child, others at 90 cents and yet others at 80 cents. Do we see the seeds of corruption? I think we do.

I have just been faxed a newspaper article that appeared in The Natal Witness only yesterday. It says, ``Parents sack school head in fraud case’’. I am not going to read the article in full but in substance it reports that a school principal has been diverting not only school funds, but also the funds for the feeding schemes, into her own personal bank account. She had arranged for her brother to be one of the suppliers.

We say that this is just the tip of the iceberg, it would seem, because my information is - and recently I have getting a lot of calls on the nutrition programme - that there is a lot of dissatisfaction about the payments and disparities between payments and about people who are being collaborated with as far as the supplying is concerned. When there is a case brought to the attention of the authorities, it would seem that they are a bit slow to react. It says here, that pleas for official action were allegedly ignored.

Another point that I want to comment upon is the issue of discipline in our schools and universities. It is with utter consternation and despair that one sees how reprehensible and thoroughly offensive is the behaviour of some students and learners who trash university campuses, defy management measures, flout authority and engage in looting and theft. Some Cosas members, I believe, are up in arms simply because some schools keep the gates locked. What is this new phenomenon that learners must be free to walk off school premises during school hours should they so fancy?

Surely anarchy and mayhem are not part of the new democracy? In that respect, I will show hon members an article that an eminent South African journalist has written about this very subject. His heading is, ``Student anarchy a disgrace’’. I would appeal to the Minister also to address this aspect, because all the noble efforts to bring quality education can be sabotaged by the very people who are supposed to be the beneficiaries.

I am not going to talk about the terrible impact of Aids on our schools, but let me quickly read a paragraph from The Teacher magazine:

The 1999 Progress of Nations Report noted that South Africa is one of seven countries where the number of children orphaned by HIV/Aids between 1994 and 1997 increased by more than 400%.

[Time expired.] [Applause.]

Ms Z P DLUNGWANA (Free State): Chairperson, hon Minister and hon members, it is a fact that whenever people discuss the ills of society they often also suggest education as a solution. Even those stakeholders who fail to be actively involved in the affairs of their institutions acknowledge that education is a key to a brighter future for our country.

We have, in the Free State, recently seen an improvement in the matric results and overall culture of teaching and learning in our institutions. Where there are still problems, we are addressing them and are confident that we will succeed. The Free State was able to realise an improvement of 6% in the matric results in 2001. This might not appear much of an improvement, but it is nevertheless an achievement.

We have started with a holistic intervention strategy to help turn poorly performing schools around. These are schools that have achieved a below 40% pass rate over a period of three to six years. This strategy involves appointing people who will be called administrators, selected from our best schools, for a period of nine months. Their role will be to support the principals of these nonperforming schools in improving their work and turning the performance of their schools around.

The main intention of the whole school intervention programme is to enhance service delivery in schools in terms of Batho Pele principles. We will need sustainability of performance and capacity-building in order to turn around the situation in nonperforming schools and poorly managed institutions and offices of the department.

Having said that, I would like to highlight a few issues. On HIV/Aids, I would like to thank the Minister for calling the coalition conference that was recently held in Midrand. The message sent out at the conference was that there is an urgent need for us to work together in the fight against HIV/Aids and poverty.

A clear call was made to the Departments of Social Development and Health, and other stakeholders, to assist in supporting children infected and affected by HIV/Aids, and in particular orphans of this dreadful disease. These children are really destitute. They leave home in the morning without breakfast and often do not have lunchboxes. They cannot afford to buy school uniforms or pay school fees and are therefore often ridiculed by their peers at school.

We hope that the joint committees that have been established between the Departments of Education and Social Development to address the problems of these children will be able to help in this regard and also enable these children to access child support grants and foster care grants.

It is the responsibility of Government to protect the rights of children and ensure that these rights are upheld by all. The department has therefore committed itself to ensuring that children who cannot afford to pay for school fees or buy school uniforms are not excluded from education. We are also doing everything in our province to ensure that all schools adhere to this commitment.

Secondly, two years ago Minister Asmal launched the South African National Literacy initiative. At that time statistics were bandied about to showcase the poor state of literacy in the country. Since then, there have been no updates in this regard. It needs to be made clear where we are today in relation to the resources allocated to this initiative. We need to know the extent to which this initiative has helped to improve the quality of life of our people so as to motivate those involved in the programme to carry it forward with even more commitment and determination.

Furthermore, the relationship between adult basic education and training and the literacy initiative needs to be clarified. Otherwise it will be difficult for provinces to take this initiative forward convincingly and to monitor its impact.

Finally, we all agree that higher education in our country should be restructured. Our main concern, however, is that only previously black institutions seem to be expected to sacrifice their culture and everything they hold dear while the previously white institutions get to lose nothing.

There is a concern in this regard about the proposed merger of the University of the Free State and the University of the North’s Qwaqwa campus in particular. It is believed that UFS is demanding that some staff members of the Qwaqwa campus be retrenched while there is no similar move on the part of UFS. This gives the impression that there is no merger between the two institutions, but rather that the Qwaqwa campus is being incorporated into or swallowed by UFS.

While we accept that the merging of institutions is essential to the restructuring of higher education and that nothing should be allowed to stand in the way of this restructuring, we should, however, be cautious that we do not make black institutions feel that they are the only ones expected to make a sacrifice in this regard.

In this example of staff retrenchments, it would be proper and just for the two institutions to first merge and thereafter for an assessment of the collective staff of the two institutions to be made in terms of qualifications, capacity, skills, experience and so on. Based on this assessment, a selection could then be made of those staff members which the merged institution would wish to retain. In that way no one would feel unfairly marginalised. Surely there will be people from both institutions that the new institution would wish to retain?

In the name of patriotism and loyalty to our country and its democratic values, all merging institutions have to compromise certain parts of their culture, embrace some parts of their merging partners and move forward as true South African institutions of higher learning.

In conclusion, I have no doubts that our education system has taken big strides forward in comparison to the systems of the past. It is now up to all of us stakeholders in education to put our shoulders to the wheel and ensure that our education system keeps improving and compares favourably with the best education systems internationally. [Applause.]

Mr J O TLHAGALE: Chairperson, hon Minister, special delegates and hon members of this House, education is one of the most important long-term investments a country can make in its citizens. When one considers that this Budget Vote is among the top five, one begins to realise how much value is placed on this department.

Under Programme 3 - General Education it is noted with appreciation that the conditional grants for HIV and Aids have increased from R64 million in 2001-02 to R142 million in the current financial year. The funding for early childhood development has also increased from R21 million in the previous financial year to R52 million in 2002-03.

It is hoped that the provinces will not only reciprocate this good gesture, but will, more importantly, see to it that the funds are spent for the purposes for which they were allocated, and that there is no underspending of the funds when the need for delivery of services is so acute. This applies particularly to my province, which is lagging behind in a number of issues.

It is noted that technical colleges are to be reduced from 152 to 50 further education and training colleges by April 2003. However, it would be interesting to know which areas will be affected and what measures have been put in place to ensure that access to tertiary education in those areas is not hampered by the arrangements. The issue of merging universities and technikons with other universities was a hot issue which I did not expect the Minister to tackle unscathed, but the Minister stood his ground, to the satisfaction of all who love him.

‘n Afrikaanse gedigskrywer sê in so ‘n geval [In such an instance an Afrikaans poet says]:Ek hou van 'n man wat sy man kan staan.'' [I like a man who can stand his ground.’’]

However, given the current problems with these mergers, how much does the department expect to spend on legal fees relating to them?

It is also noted with appreciation that the allocation for higher education has been increased from R7,5 billion in 2001-02 to R7,9 billion in the financial year ending March 2003. Since the National Student Financial Aid Scheme does not cover the registration costs of students, and many disadvantaged young people with the potential to further their studies cannot afford to pay registration, has the department considered a way of assisting students to cover registration costs?

Notwithstanding these few issues that I have raised, the UCDP supports this Budget Vote. [Applause.]

Ms M P THEMBA: Chairperson, hon Minister, hon members, I am reading this speech on behalf of the MEC for education, Mr Padayachee, who is unable to be here. I should commence by indicating the various steps that the Mpumalanga department of education is taking to improve access to books and services for our learners. The target has been reached for the reduction of the personnel: nonpersonnel expenditure ratio from 85:150. This implies that 15% of R555 million of the budgeted R3,654 billion will be directed to service delivery, compared to 11% of R371 million in 2001-02. The budget for stationery and textbooks has increased by 100%, that is R136 million allocated for the 2003 school year as compared to R68 million for the previous year.

Last year R83 million was spent on building 386 classrooms, 42 specialist rooms, 32 administration blocks, 873 toilets; and 67 schools were renovated, 19 schools fenced, 17 schools provided with water and 13 schools electrified. In addition, renovations and repairs to flood-damaged schools were conducted at a cost of R3 million. From the conditional grant of R24 million allocated to the previous year, various renovations were made; fencing, water and electricity were provided; and toilets were built.

In 2003 the budget for school infrastructure increases by 48%, that is from R83 million to R123 million. This will enable us to build an additional 401 classrooms, 12 administration blocks, 28 specialist rooms and 722 toilets. This allocation will also cater for the renovation of 184 schools and for the provision of water and electricity to 83 schools.

With regard to easing the burden on learners from rural and farm areas who have to contend with walking long distance to access schools, we have increased the scholar transport subsidy by 120%. This is an increase from R8 million to R18 million, with the number of routes increased from 48 to 102 to the benefit of 11 299 learners.

Regarding the stable management of schools, 552 promotional posts have already been filled. In addition, a landmark agreement was reached at the Education Labour Relations Council Chamber to translate into permanent posts the temporary teachers with two or more years of service.

Through private-public partnerships and international assistance R6 million was donated in the past financial year. The programmes supported by the donors included technology, inclusive education and OBE, as well as teacher- training restructuring.

The Mpumalanga Education Development Trust donated R2,66 for both capital and education development projects. The Mpumalanga Secondary Science Initiative, MSSI, a joint undertaking by the Mpumalanga education department and Japan, which includes various other initiatives, is contributing significantly to improved performance in mathematics and science education.

Through the assistance of the Japanese government, 20 fully fledged schools are in the process of being built. In addition, this collaboration provides administrative and management support to school principals and heads of departments, as well as providing of effective school governance training to school governing bodies. With regard to LSEN learners - learners with special educational needs - the principle of mainstreaming, crystallised through the inclusive education pilot programme, has already commenced at ten schools.

At this stage, I wish to say to Minister Asmal that we greatly appreciate his announcement on higher education reconfiguration, particularly in relation to Mpumalanga. This new development will certainly optimise and enhance further career possibilities in diverse fields for the majority of learners from the formerly marginalised sections of our society.

I take pride in the establishment of a hotel school as the Mpumalanga Tourism Academy. The full tourism potential of Mpumalanga will be greatly enhanced. Students at this academy will receive accredited training in hospitality, namely in accommodation, front desk, food and beverage services, food preparation services, hotel management and hotel maintenance.

This will also include the training of tour and field guides, receptionists, travel agents and tour operators, and training in ecotourism and a whole range of other forms of expertise. At an initial cost of R9,2 million, this holds immense and unlimited potential for the development and growth of our human resource base. I can assure the House that this will be the first tourism academy of its kind in the country.

Our commitment to combating the spread of the HIV/Aids pandemic remains unwavering. Awareness programmes are targeting both learners and educators in lifeskills education at a cost of R10,3 million. [Applause.]

Mr H T SOGONI: Chairperson, hon Minister and members, the UDM supports the Budget Vote. Today I want to confine myself to a matter which is quite disturbing to me as a parent and a teacher, a matter which is vitally important for the department whose mandate it is to provide our children, regardless of race, colour or social background, with equal opportunities to quality education, while guaranteeing their right to safe learning, freedom of the person and human dignity.

The Select Committee on Education, in partnership with the provinces, initiated public hearings in 2001 on sexual violence in schools. Media reports and feedback from our constituencies confirm that sexual molestation of schoolchildren is still continuing, if not getting worse.

Recently reported incidents of two male teachers who sexually assaulted two schoolboys, of seven female teachers who forced a 15-year-old schoolgirl to use a banana to perform a sexual act, and of a high school girl who was found raped and murdered, allegedly by fellow schoolboys, are clear examples of such deplorable conduct that the hon Minister correctly described recently as a kind of sickness in society where the most vulnerable of young people were in peril.

If this rot is not swiftly rooted out, history will judge us harshly as a nation that does not care and as a nation with no pride, because our young people will carry into adulthood both the emotional and the physical scars of humiliation and a permanently bitter feeling of dishonour. We seek effective remedies to this scourge. I am happy that the recommendations by the select committee are partly contained in the initiative by the department to address the matter. The pledge by educators, their unions and student bodies is an important step in the right direction. But we would like to have the involvement of parents and school governing bodies clearly defined in the campaign, and have them also pledging a commitment that they will actively take the lead in the struggle and not just bury their heads in the sand while children suffer irreparable harm.

Undonakele omkhulu singawukhomba apha ebazalini nakumaqumrhu elilawulayo ezikolweni. Ixhomisa amehlo imeko yokuxhatshazwa kwabafundi. Onke amandla olawulo lwezikolo namakhaya lusezandleni zabazali nala maqumrhu koko abawasebenzisi ngempumelelo. (Translation of a Xhosa paragraph follows.)

[The problem is with parents and the school governing bodies. The rate of sexual abuse of learners at schools is appalling. Parents and school governing bodies have power in their hands but they are unable to use it successfully.]

As in the case of HIV/Aids awareness programmes, counselling and capacitating parents on how to tackle the challenges of sexual abuse should be vigorously embarked upon, alongside the intervention strategies already contemplated by the department to help children protect themselves against sexual harassment.

The select committee, in its recommendations, also emphasised the need for co-ordinated efforts within departments, such as Safety and Security, Education, Social Development, Health, and Justice and Constitutional Development, with strong committee forums all participating in combating sexual abuse of children.

Perhaps to illustrate how severe other nations are in dealing with sexual offenders, a school teacher in Hanoi, Vietnam, has been executed for raping six pupils, despite an appeal for clemency by parents of his victims. While taking the law into one’s hands cannot be advocated, may I indicate that the public hearings on sexual violence revealed that certain communities are losing patience with sexual criminals.

However, as responsible leaders and citizens, we have a responsibility to save our children and to assure them of a bright future. We encourage the department, therefore, to champion the crusade against the moral decay of the nation. [Applause.]

Mrs L N JAJULA (Eastern Cape): Chairperson, hon Minister, hon members, education is the cornerstone of any nation. We believe, as the Eastern Cape, that in order to succeed in transforming, in actually achieving the objectives of and in realising what the Freedom Charter stands for, we need to make sure that in the budget process education gets the biggest slice.

That is why the amount allocated to education in the province is the highest amount, namely R8,9 billion. In that sense, we are looking forward to addressing the following issues. Firstly, the call by the President of the country that for the next three years no child should be taught under a tree must be addressed.

Therefore, 250 schools will be built within this financial year. The next point we have realised is that in order to succeed in school effectiveness and education professionalism, the educators themselves must be educators with capacity and effectiveness.

Statistics have revealed that in the Eastern Cape 18 700 educators are underqualified. That reflects the downfall in effectiveness and in the achievement of better results. The Eastern Cape has rendered a programme to upgrade teachers at the University of the Transkei. As many as 2 894 teachers have registered for higher education and diplomas to improve their level of education.

Besides that, we have engaged in a programme for training principals and their deputies, heads of departments. The training programme is to make sure that the principals and heads of departments have the following skills. They must have skills in financial management, human and material resource management, change management, communication and time management. They must also have skill in aspects of conflict resolution, which is always a challenge at certain levels and particularly at certain schools in our province.

The scourge of HIV is being addressed by some hon members. We address this with a clustered approach involving the Departments of Health, Social Development and Safety and Security. We would like to make sure that whoever wants to fiddle and deliberately does so with our schoolchildren knowing that he or she is HIV-positive must account to the justice system. We believe that we need to move towards having legislation to get these people punished.

This cannot go on as if nothing is happening. We involve the NGOs and SGBs in the programme to ensure that the HIV/Aids programme is actually discussed at home. People must realise that it is not a school programme, but something that should be discussed around the table by every person and all their relatives because, most unfortunately, the victims are affected and victimised by their own relatives and friends, those they trust.

At the level of special schools and special needs education, we realise that there is policy shift, but we believe, as the Eastern Cape, that we need to look at the different disabilities that are there instead of shifting everyone towards the mainstream, because some of them will not succeed. Instead, we should look at a mechanism that will actually assist those who cannot go into the academic stream, but who can use their own physical hands to produce certain items and be qualified under the further education and training programme. That is our wish as a province.

On adult basic education, or Abet, we realise that last year we had 7 604 females and 2 222 males who registered in this programme, which reflects a good number. In spite of the results that were not pleasing in Grade 12, the adult basic education results, as the Minister knows, reflected very well. This year we have a total of 11 000 that have registered for adult education, which we believe is a good move to improve the quality of life and reduce poverty in South Africa - and not only in the Eastern Cape, because some of these people are actually from across the borders of our province, as most of us know.

If we look at further education and training, the department in its report has reflected a partnership with the private sector involving mechanics for the motor industry in the Eastern Cape, which we need to turn around. We do not need to produce academics as technocrats, but we need to produce a motor mechanic that has practised producing a car before receiving the qualification of a certificate. That partnership has been forged between Volkswagen, DaimlerChrysler and further education and training institutions that are training these learners for technology as well as with Telkom for telephones and communications. That is a success which the department is achieving this year.

But we still have to train most of our people and managers at all levels in technology and we need to make sure that each manager is able to run an institution with a clear sense of effectiveness and efficiency and cost- effectiveness regarding the amount of money that is allocated to that institution. We have secured a close relationship with the churches. Most of our people go out to the churches, and education is for us all. What is it that the church is preaching towards the restoration of the morality and dignity of our society? We have got to turn it around and preach the gospel which says that one should go back to human dignity and realise that as a human one cannot destroy someone’s else rights and be proud at the end of the day.

The shift to promote the level of Grade R is a wonderful one. The budget for the Eastern Cape recognises that in order to get the best results in life, Grade R must have a good foundation, and there is an increase of 16% in that budget. We believe that if Grade R moves, then the rest of the classes will succeed, because that is where we have the career guidance that identifies where the child is going to move and guides the child from Grade R onwards.

I do believe that the situation at the farm schools will improve. We are trying to cluster those farm schools together with transport that will give access those schools, but it is not going to be a fast programme. It started this year in partnership with the Department of Transport, because the farms are far apart from each other but the school needs to be central. It need not be a round hut, but has to be a building that is conducive to learning and teaching.

We need to improve the science and mathematics awards. We need to make sure that those who achieve the best are recognised. We believe that at the same time we must go back to what we used to call winter schools. This does not take anybody’s time but encourages a programme, everybody needs to be scientific today. We need, in the future, to reach out there and compete in the world as scientists. But unless we boost and award those who are achieving the best we will not succeed. The nation will prosper with better education. [Applause.]

Mr R STADTHOUER (Northern Cape): Chairperson, hon Minister, hon MECs and hon members, we live in a world where the three richest individuals own more wealth than the 48 poorest countries, where a quarter of the world’s population consumes three quarters of the world’s energy and minerals and eats more than half of the world’s food. The huge gap between rich and poor, between weak and powerful, is growing bigger. Sustainable development is simply not possible while millions live in poverty.

This world reality is our South African reality and also our Northern Cape reality. Our life and work in the Northern Cape are therefore shaped by this reality too. It is within the context of Nepad, with this huge divide between the rich and the poor and these gross inequalities, that we execute our mandate of educating our children.

As we approach the end of our first decade of freedom, we pause to reflect on whether the programmes that we as Government have put in place in education have given hope to the poor. A review must be made to establish whether we have succeeded in the contributions that we have made to alleviate poverty, effect equity and reduce illiteracy, develop skills, deracialise our schools, combat HIV and Aids and fight crime, and in our quest to provide a better life for all.

As we started our journey to transform the education landscape in 1994, children were in need of decent and basic school accommodation. The education landscape revealed no coherent programme for early childhood development and adult literacy. No idea of higher education institutions existed and the challenges were enormous.

We are proud to report that we have, since 1994, amalgamated and integrated more than 24 previously separated schools into 12 integrated schools. However, we could not conclude our work in this regard. Racism is still rife and many schools exist without justification as a cost-efficient entity. We now declare our resolve to continue with the amalgamation of schools with renewed verve.

We are not satisfied that staff and school governing bodies are reflecting the interests and the aspirations of the broader learner population at some of our schools in the province. We are fully aware of schools still abusing legislation to maintain the vast disparities in learner demographics and staff compositions. We therefore support the proposed amendments to the Employment of Educators Act that go some way in ensuring the realisation of more equitable employment practices at our schools and to ensure that the balance between staff and learner compositions are equalised.

We do not intend to stand idle and watch the misappropriation of policy by those who refuse to recognise the legitimacy of our consensus. We wish to sound a stern warning to those who continue to undermine our transformation that we are adamant in our resolve to conclude the transformation process.

Our greatest challenge was the task of radically reducing the number of learners of compulsory schoolgoing age that were out of school and roaming the streets or at the mercy of unscrupulous exploiters of child labour. Our current data analysis points to a radical improvement in this regard. Every child must be in school. The doors of learning must be open to every child. Our focus for the next two years is to accelerate change, to speed up transformation in our schools, to eradicate the last vestiges of racism in education and to fully realise the call of the Freedom Charter, and that is to open the doors of learning to our children. Our budget in the Northern Cape will indicate a distinct awareness of the provision of quality education as the first and foremost weapon in the arsenal launched against poverty.

As part of our commitment to fulfilling our role as a province in the alleviation of poverty and redress of past imbalances, we are constantly refining our resource allocation modules to narrow the gap between the rich and the poor schools towards achieving equity. Due to the high turnover in the membership of school governing bodies, continuous training is needed. In our attempts to assist schools, the department is embarking on a comprehensive training and capacity-building drive to assist schools to improve financial management and to finalise the development of financial tracking systems in all our districts.

Our seriousness is amply displayed by the fact that we have increased our allocation for adult basic education and training by 40% from R5 million last year to R9 million this year. We are confidently targeting a 10% reduction in illiteracy through our National Literacy Initiative programme and we will further increase our number of Abet centres by 10% as from this year. The enactment of the Adult Basic Education Act has given further coherence to our adult literacy programmes.

One of our direct interventions specifically targeted to alleviate poverty among the target groups is the primary school nutrition programme, which is led by the Department of Health. Well over 90 000 of our learners, of whom 73 800 are to be fed in rural areas, have benefited from this programme. This resonates in the President’s call to ``rise and to do it yourself’’. That is why we intend to bring our communities on board to assist in this regard. The Letsema campaign has given momentum to this programme in different towns in our province.

We are aware of the fact that basic infrastructure in providing learning spaces should go hand in hand with the creation of a learning environment that is safe and secure and where quality education programmes are offered. Our province is committed to stamping out gangsterism, drug abuse and violence in our schools. To this end, the department is conducting searches and raids in our schools, and these have resulted in a significant reduction in crime at our schools. These interventions have enabled us to contribute to the provincial efforts to combat crime and violence.

We further wish to reiterate our position that we are implementing a zero tolerance attitude towards educators who sexually abuse our learners.

Allow me also to make an input regarding the HIV and Aids programmes. Our programme focuses on HIV/Aids and life-skills education, and we are targeting the training of 1 500 educators during this financial year. We believe that our messages of prevention and empowerment and the raising of awareness are correct. We must, however, do more and more in this regard.

At this point, let me also refer to the establishment of the institute of higher education in our province. We would like to thank the Minister and to acknowledge his involvement in this. We thank the national department under the leadership of our Minister for the establishment of this institution in our province. We, however, as a province, have put the necessary mechanisms in place to proceed with the implementation thereof.

In conclusion, we are constantly reminded that we have to fulfil our mandate of basic education within an environment characterised by technological advances taking place at high speed. On this note I would like to thank the hon the Minister for the excellent national leadership that he provides, and the Select Committee on Education for fulfilling their team role in providing the province with the necessary national information, and the excellent relationship that can only go from strength to strength. [Applause.]

Mr A E VAN NIEKERK: Chairperson, thank you very much. I would like to inform the hon the Minister that I have just returned from the Northern Cape, from Upington - that is why I was a bit late, and I apologise for that - where I addressed a group of businessmen last night. They asked me to convey to the hon the Minister their thanks for what he envisages at tertiary level for the Northern Cape. They also asked me to tell him that the community of Upington is ready to host the tertiary facility for the Northern Cape in the heart of the natural growth area of that province.

The New NP in the Northern Cape, but also nationally, is committed to supporting all efforts to promote quality education for all our people in South Africa. But when we have concerns we need the Minister to listen to this and to hear our concerns. At this very moment the New NP still needs to decide on whether we are going to support hon Minister Asmal’s Budget Vote next week in the National Assembly.

To us it is a very serious matter, for we understand and agree with the importance of good education in the development of our beloved country, South Africa, and we also understand that the injustices of the past must be put right. We also understand the necessity of the leading role we have to play in South Africa in this regard for the whole of Africa, and especially to assist with Nepad.

We want to support the hon the Minister, but we also represent a fair portion of the approximately 3 million white and just over 3 million brown members of the Afrikaans community in South Africa. Coming from the Northern Cape, where we are 85% Afrikaans-speaking, I am sure that the hon the Minister can understand my passion for this specific topic. Especially after the hon the Minister’s announcement on the merger, he was labelled on the Internet, in the press, on the radio, on the streets, as enemy number one of Afrikaans. They even call him ``Lord Asmal’’, who has take the place of the historical enemy of Afrikaans, Lord Milner.

This perception is a serious allegation, and this negativity does not bode at all well for what we are busy with in education at the moment. I hope the hon the Minister takes this opportunity to tell us whether he is enemy number one or not.

The MINISTER OF EDUCATION: Why am I enemy number one?

Mr A E VAN NIEKERK: I am telling the hon the Minister what the people say. If he is not, let him please spell it out, so that we can be strengthened in getting rid of this negative perception. We are prepared to help him with that, and we are prepared to support the Budget Vote as well.

We only need an answer. Does the hon the Minister still agree with what he said on the 27 February 2002 in the question time in the other House? I handed a copy of that Hansard to his officials a bit earlier today, and I would like him to respond to that. I also want to share with the hon the Minister the sentiments of some Afrikaans academics and opinion-formers on the hon the Minister’s answers to the questions here earlier this week. I will have to read this in Afrikaans, so the hon the Minister must prepare himself. I hope you add some time to my allocation, Chairperson. They say:

Ons is bekommerd daaroor dat die Minister se versekering dat hy teen geen taal diskrimineer nie, en dat sy departement mettertyd ‘n bevredigende taalbeleid sal ontwikkel, nie gerealiseer kan, of gaan, word nie.

Die tekens dat die Minister ander middels soos finansiering, diversiteit, arbeidsbeleid, ens, wil gebruik om inrigtings vir hoër onderwys in ‘n onomkeerbare taalbeleid in te dwing wat eventuele gelykberegtiging van alle tale onmoontlik sal maak, blyk uit die antwoorde wat die agb Minister gegee het.

Hulle sê verder: [They go on to say:]

Aan Afrikaanse inrigtings geld dieselfde beginsel as aan Engelse universiteite, en aan alle universiteite dwarsoor die wêreld, naamlik dat hulle daar is om bepaalde gemeenskappe te dien. Die feit dat Suid-Afrika ‘n land van vele tale is, hef daar die beginsel nie op nie. Enige Suid- Afrikaner wat in Engeland, Nederland, Duitsland, of in enige ander land in die wêreld, gaan studeer, moet eers ‘n taalbevoegdheidstoets in daardie tale slaag.

Afrikaanse universiteite het uit hulle pad gegaan om sodanige taalkursusse in te stel. In die buiteland word dit selfs vereis van buitelandse studente alvorens hulle tot kursusse toegelaat word. Aan Suid- Afrikaanse universiteite word dit vir gespesialiseerde nagraadse onderrig nie vereis nie, maar word dit net sterk aanbeveel. Afrikaanse universiteite is dus veel meer tegemoetkomend as wat die internasionale norm is.

Taal aan universiteite dien nie bloot net ‘n nuttigheidsfunksie nie. Taal druk ook identiteit uit. Enige diskriminasie teen Afrikaans as onderrigtaal is dus diskriminasie teen die Afrikaanse identiteit. Die agb Minister het dit aangespreek in die vrae anderkant, en daarop wil ek nou ook die antwoorde hê.

Die Grondwet beklemtoon die erkenning van kulturele diversiteit, en dit moet ook in hoër onderwys tot uitdrukking kom. Dit is dus nie bloot net ‘n kwessie van aangesien Afrikaanse studente ook Engels ken, daarom teen Afrikaans gediskrimineer mag word nie.

As die agb Minister praat van dubbelmediumonderwys verval sy argument oor studente wat oor geen taalvaardigheid in Afrikaans beskik nie. Dubbelmedium veronderstel dat die tale gelyktydig in die klas gebruik word, en vereis dus meerdere taalvaardighede van die studente. (Translation of Afrikaans paragraphs follows.)

[The hon Minister addressed this in the questions on the other side, and I would also like the answers to that now.

The Constitution emphasizes the recognition of cultural diversity, and this must also be realised in higher education. It is therefore not simply a question that, seeing as Afrikaans students also know English, Afrikaans can therefore be discriminated against. When the hon Minister talks about dual-medium education, his argument about students who have no language proficiency in Afrikaans lapses. Dual-medium presumes that the languages are used simultaneously in the classroom, and therefore requires superior language skills of the students.]

The CHAIRPERSON OF COMMITTEES: Hon member, your time is up.

Mr A E VAN NIEKERK: You are unfair, Chairperson, but I accept your ruling. [Laughter.] [Applause.]

Mr R Z NOGUMLA: Madam Chair, hon Minister and hon members, it is a great honour for me to debate this Budget Vote here today. Some of the answers are going to come from the Minister, because the speaker before me directed those questions to him. The one that I can also try to shed light on is the question of identifying the enemy. It is worrying to me that at this stage as a nation we do not know what our enemy is. In education we do not know that the ignorance and illiteracy in this country are our enemy. We do not know that the poverty that is in this country is our enemy. It raises a lot of questions if we do not know that yet. Let me come to my speech now. All nations by now should realise that education is central and imperative to any country’s development, and that should be embraced by our nation too. Any nation should understand that a learning nation is a winning nation. We should take a lesson from a developing country like Cuba, for example, whose economy was devastated and also knocked by Cold War stereotypes. In the midst of those pressures, this particular country managed to produce many doctors, enough for herself and also for the benefit of other developing countries, like ours.

There is no doubt that, in the times that we are living in, when developing nations are not exactly reaping the fruits of globalisation, education is of the essence. It is a key to innovation, mental emancipation and liberation from ignorance, poverty and underdevelopment. It is the essential key to making this century an African century, a key to the success of an African Union and a key for us as a continent to meet the objectives of Nepad.

In the hon the Minister’s words, education is a vaccine that has proven to work, and the one we should capitalise on and make work even better by the content and type of education we offer and the way we manage it. It is that education that the youth of June 16 fought and died for. To our youth today we are saying that that education is available, so they must make use of it. We have come a long way as a nation, hence at this particular point I would like to congratulate the department on its visible commitment to reform in the education sector.

I would like to commend the department for its dedication to the success and prosperity of this country and to an education that builds democracy, human dignity, equality and social justice, an education system that responds to the enormous economic and social challenges of the 21st century. As in any young democracy, change does not come without challenges. In some of the provinces that we visited, in particular the rurally concentrated provinces, more work needs to be done, especially where education is concerned. Progress is much slower in those provinces compared to the powerhouses like Gauteng and the Western Cape.

What was more visible, particularly in my province, the Eastern Cape, was the low levels of infrastructure, the lack of libraries and computers, irregularities in terms of delivering books, sanitation and access to toilets. I have met quite a number of students who, once they complete matric, either stay at home or go and look for jobs in the big cities, simply because they have no access to financial assistance or do not even know how to access it. The role of efficient teachers and resources to make sure that this information is available becomes more crucial. I believe that this is not an issue that should be taken lightly.

It is a reality of our democracy that the majority of our youth is concentrated in the rural sector. We are talking about the youth that is part and parcel of what will happen to the future of this country. If we go far enough as a nation in investing in the education of this youth, out of them will come scientists, economists and the wisest leaders the world has ever seen. If we do not, they might take another route that is one not of prosperity, but of survival, of lost innocence, of ignorance and moral degeneration and of loss of hope.

I am positive that in our various walks of life we have come across the eyes of an innocent child in the streets of our cities, gazing at us with no sign of hope. We have seen innocent young girls turning to prostitution because that is the only way they know how to survive. What kind of adults will these children become?

Hence we are forever questioning the morality of the times we are living in, and yet that immorality is a direct consequence of the realities of the challenges we face as a nation. Not so long ago, in his state of the nation speech, the hon the President stressed the importance of moral regeneration, which should be a responsibility that all of us take upon ourselves for life. This arises from the understanding that, just as we were our own liberators in our resistance to apartheid, so too should we today act as our own liberators in dealing with this legacy.

We as a nation, regardless of which political parties we represent, should embrace and support the betterment of the future and the restoration of the moral order of this country.

To conclude, I would like to stress the fact that education is a cross- cutting sector, it is where all departments intersect. Therefore it is important that various departments join hands, like Trade and Industry and Water Affairs and Forestry, and contribute to the best possible education for all. To quote Iran Booth in his paper South Africa: Reasons to stay:

… to the nation that won its place in history

…. the nation with the brightest future

… the nation that fights and wins …

Let us be that nation, and fight and win the battle for the prosperity of the future of our children and for access to the best education for all. As the ANC we support this Vote. [Applause.]

Mr S B NGIDI (KwaZulu-Natal): Chairperson, I come from a province which has allocated close to R10 billion to education, which makes it the biggest provincial department of education in the country. I was listening with interest to what the hon the Minister was saying earlier, and I actually commend the contributions made by the hon the Minister in whatever endeavours he has to go through to realise increased funding, in real terms, for education in the country. We actually support the Minister’s efforts with regard to that. I also listened with interest to the analogy he used of Japan and the fact that we have some foundations in place also to be able to move along with Japan into the next 40 years. We have actually spent the first eight years and the prognosis in terms of what the hon the Minister said, is that we are actually doing the right things now. I sincerely hope that the next 32 years will actually see us being on course rather than being off course, for whatever reason.

May I also assure the hon the Minister right up front that we from the province of KwaZulu-Natal do not regard him as an enemy, whether we say it in jest or in all seriousness. We actually do not look at him as enemy number one.

There are quite a number of things that we can actually regard as enemies of education as it progresses through its transformation process. First of all I want to start with HIV/Aids as an enemy. The KwaZulu-Natal department of education recognises the gravity and enormity of the HIV/Aids pandemic. It is, for us, the number one scourge that is threatening the very survival of the education function in the province. Therefore the province has made HIV/Aids the number one priority, in keeping with Tirisano, as well as with our own provincial plans. The immediate response has been to further boost the human and budget resource allocation for HIV/AIDS, so that the province has not only scaled up on current interventions which are already in place but also prioritises and has indicated other delivery structures.

In the previous year, we grouped death among educators, for instance, in terms of illness, accidents, violence and suicide. Out of a total of 557 educators who died, 508 of those died from various different kinds of illnesses, and these 508 were between the ages of 25 and 49 years. Even though that there is no direct linkage between their deaths and the possibility that they might have died of HIV/Aids, we are aware that almost 22% of the people in the province are actually affected by the pandemic. It is a real problem when it actually begins to eat away at the educator corps.

Somebody said once that one of the challenges this country is facing is that if HIV/Aids is not checked it is going to eat away our security forces, and when it does that we will actually begin to see the implications of how serious that particular pandemic is - when it actually eats away at the people who are supposed to protect the very education system which we are talking of.

There are a number of things which the province is trying to do in order to face this particular challenge. We know that the ECG grant allocation for HIV/Aids, which is a project on life-skills, increased to R31 million from the previous R18 million. I would concur with and support the hon the Minister when he says that it is not acceptable if provinces get these conditional grants and do not use them to the full in the face of the dire need and dire straits in which our people - the children as well as the educators and the communities in general - find themselves.

From 2000 to 2002 the province successfully trained the required 40% of educators from Grade 6 to 9 in life-skills and HIV/Aids education. Apparently some regions exceeded this 40% and trained up to 70%, and consequently the province has trained more than 8 300 educators in life- skills and HIV/Aids education, which is commendable. There have also been a number of advocacy workshops for school governing bodies, communities and parents, and these have had the desired positive outcomes. In some regions parents have formed themselves into committees which are involved in programme advocacy for life-skills and HIV education.

One of the most popular programmes in the province addressing HIV and Aids and also providing edutainment is the extracurricular programme for youth, sports, arts and culture, where the youth perform in various participatory programmes which have HIV/Aids themes. These are quite popular in the province.

May I also say a little about the restructuring of the further education and training colleges. The directorate for FET colleges in our province is responsible for the implementation of FET in the college sector. This is done in accordance with the Further Education and Training Act, Act 98 of

1. In terms of this Act, provinces, under the guidance of the national Department of Education, have developed policy frameworks for the changing of the college landscape. As a result of this change in the college landscape we collated 24 different colleges in the province, and reduced them into nine mega FET institutions to facilitate this, and it was done in terms of the Act.

We now have nine FET mega colleges which are spread throughout the province in the areas of Nongoma-Vryheid, Richards Bay-Eshowe, Newcastle, Ladysmith, Pinetown-KwaMashu, Durban South, Central Durban, Pietermaritzburg and Port Shepstone. This was done in line with guidance from the national department.

May I also state, with regard to school effectiveness, that there are a few things which we would like to bring to the attention of the hon the Minister. I know that there are policy guidelines in place with regard to the question of school fees and how school wish to handle this particular matter. But one thing which is becoming evident in the areas we stay in is the fact that school fees are being used as a means of exclusion, both for people who want to enter the institutions and for people who are already in the institutions. For those who are inside the institutions it is even more of an ordeal because children are told that they are not going to be part of any extracurricular programme. They cannot participate in sport or even use the swimming pool, and they cannot go on tours like other kids because their parents have not paid their school fees.

The schools know that this is not supposed to happen. It goes further. If a child has been admitted to a particular school, a sibling of that child cannot go to the same school if the parents have not paid the fees for the first child in full. So one has these particular tensions developing.

They have also gone to the extent, because they want to move away from that, of beginning to talk about the geographical areas that children come from. In some places the geographical areas are set up in such a way that they favour some people as against others. This is being used now as a means of exclusion.

Maybe our language policies, more especially with regard to promoting the indigenous languages, need to be looked into. I do not want to sound sectorial by saying that my language needs to be promoted, but I know that the Constitution provides for 11 different languages, plus sign language, that have equal status. What is gradually happening is the system in which we find ourselves is providing more for the development and protection of English, and perhaps Afrikaans as well in some areas, and is not really allowing room for the development of other indigenous languages. This has to be looked into somehow. In areas like KwaZulu-Natal, for instance, where 80% of the people speak Zulu … [Time expired.]

Adv A H GAUM: Madam Chair, Prof Asmal is correct when he stresses, as the major theme of his budget speech in the NA, the need to ensure both access to quality education and the success of learners once they have gained access to our schools. The Western Cape government is fully committed to ensuring both the access and the success of our learners. Our vision for education in the Western Cape is effective education for all. Our mission is to create vibrant, self-reliant, well-managed, effective learning institutions. Our call is to put education first, so that more and more of our learners can break through to a better future.

We are determined to remove all obstacles that prevent access of learners to our education system and to walk the extra mile to actively seek new ways to improve access. No child should be forced to settle for second-rate education.

There are many critical challenges we must address. They include effective teaching and learning, good management and governance, and safe, secure school environments that are conducive to effective teaching and learning. Many factors play a role in ensuring effective teaching and learning. Key factors include the curriculum, the supply of textbooks and teacher training and recruitment. Equally important are the media of instruction, the language of instruction and the technology used in teaching and learning. The human factor is vital. Education will not happen without the commitment, motivation and discipline of all concerned.

The curriculum lies at the heart of everything we do in education. The revised curriculum will play a massive role in improving the quality of education in this country, by providing clear objectives on what we must achieve, for each learning area, grade by grade. While I was a critic of the original Curriculum 2005, as the Minister knows, I gladly give my support to the much improved version.

The first draft of the revised curriculum raised concerns when it was released late last year, especially around the issues of religion and religious education and sexuality education. We are satisfied that the national Department of Education has ensured that statements in respect of sexuality and religious education which were interpreted as being offensive have been removed. Although I shall continue to engage Prof Asmal on our view that a child’s awareness of other religions through education in different religions is best developed later in his or her life, the national curriculum statement does not encourage religious indoctrination.

I also wish to allay parents’ fears that learners will not observe and practise their religion at schools. The South African Schools Act gives school governing bodies the right to provide for religious observances and religious practices as long as learner choice in relation to these practices is respected. Schools may also offer extracurricular religious instruction, if this is approved by the school governing body. I am grateful for Prof Asmal’s undertaking to us not to amend the South African Schools Act in this regard.

We have to accept that religious practices are part and parcel of the daily activities of many schools. As long as every learner’s religion is respected, we should never attempt to superficially remove religion from schools. That would be a social experiment that we could ill afford.

Teachers obviously play an absolutely fundamental role in ensuring the success of education. This week I announced that my department would launch a major research programme this year, to determine exactly how many teachers we need, in what grades and for what learning areas, to ensure detailed forward planning on our teaching requirements in the Western Cape. We are concerned about the looming imbalance between teacher supply and demand.

We will focus on the following areas in our research: the number of unemployed teachers in the province and the country; the number and profile of trainee teachers currently engaged in preservice training; the number and profile of teachers needed in the Western Cape for particular learning areas and grades; and the likely impact of HIV/Aids on teaching. In addition to informing forward planning, this research will enable us to launch a well-informed recruitment campaign for teachers in this province.

A major initiative this year will be the launch of our new institute for in- service teacher development based at the Western Cape College of Education. My department found that in-service training involving short courses and workshops had not been as successful as we would have liked and decided to launch the institute, which will provide intensive training over longer periods. The first course for 50 teachers will start in August this year. My department has budgeted for substitute teachers to enable teachers to attend these part-time courses.

Terwyl ek by die onderwerp van opleiding is, wil ek graag byvoeg dat ons die nasionale Kabinet se goedkeuring van die herstrukturering van hoër onderwysinstellings verwelkom. Ons is bly dat universiteite, die Universiteite van die Wes-Kaap en Fort Hare, hulle aparte identiteite sal kan behou. Daar moet in ons hoër onderwysomgewing ruimte wees vir universiteite met spesiale karaktereienskappe.

Die behoeftes en samestelling van elke provinsie moet ‘n rol speel, net soos daar aan die versugtinge van die Noord-Kaap en Limpopo om eie hoër onderwysinstellings te kry, gehoor gegee is. Ek stem saam dat universiteite vir almal toeganklik moet wees, en dat iets soos taal, of enigiets anders, nie as buffer gebruik mag word teen toeganklikheid en voortgesette hervorming nie. Dit blyk egter dat bepaalde Afrikaanssprekende universiteite, in die jongste voorstelle vir hoër onderwys, uitgesonder word vir spesiale aandag deurdat vereis word dat hulle parallel- en dubbelmediumklasse moet aanbied ten einde meer nie-Afrikaanssprekende studente te akkommodeer.

Suid-Afrika is nie ‘n eentalige land nie. Ons het verskeie provinsies met verskeie taalwerklikhede wat geakkommodeer moet word. Die jongste voorstelle oor universiteite se voertale getuig nie van konsekwentheid nie. Ek glo dat universiteite soos Stellenbosch en Potchefstroom toegelaat moet word om hul regmatige plek in die hoër onderwyslandskap as hoofsaaklik Afrikaanssprekende universiteite te handhaaf.

Daar behoort nie ‘n vereiste van parallel- en dubbelmediumklasse op voorgraadse vlak te wees nie, anders moet dieselfde vereiste beslis ook in die Wes-Kaap by universiteite soos UCT en UWK gestel word. Die klem moet veel eerder daarop val om meer amptelike tale van ons land tot akademiese tale te verhef, en om taaloorbruggingsprogramme by die Afrikaanse universiteite te versterk.

Prof Asmal behoort te sorg dat finansiering hiervoor verskaf word. Dit sal ‘n absolute onding wees as iemand sou probeer om al ons universiteite volledig te verengels of by verstek te verengels. Dit sou ‘n belediging vir alle ander tale wees, en ‘n daad van taalimperialisme. Dit sal die dood in die pot wees vir taalverskeidenheid. Dit kan nie toegelaat word nie. Ek wil graag verskerings van Minister Asmal in hierdie verband hê. (Translation of Afrikaans paragraphs follows.)

[Whilst on the subject of training, I would like to add that we welcome the approval by the national Cabinet of the restructuring of institutions of higher education. We are pleased that universities, the universities of the Western Cape and Fort Hare, will be able to retain their individual identities. There must be scope in our higher education environment for universities with special characteristics.

The needs and composition of each province should play a role, just as the wishes of the Northern Cape and Limpopo to have their own institutions of higher education were granted. I agree that universities should be accessible to all, and that something such as language, or anything else, may not be used as a barrier against accessibility and continued reform. However, it seems that certain Afrikaans universities, in the latest suggestions for higher education, are singled out for special attention in that it is demanded that they must present parallel and dual-medium classes in order to accommodate more non-Afrikaans-speaking students.

South Africa is not a unilingual country. We have various provinces with various language realities which should be accommodated. The latest suggestions on the language of instruction of universities do not bear witness to consistency. I believe that universities such as Stellenbosch and Potchefstroom should be allowed to maintain their rightful place in the higher education landscape as predominantly Afrikaans universities.

There should not be a requirement of parallel and dual-medium classes at undergraduate level, otherwise the same requirement should be set in the Western Cape at universities such as UCT and UWC. The emphasis should much rather be placed on elevating more official languages of our country to the status of academic languages, and on strengthening language-bridging programmes at the Afrikaans universities.

Prof Asmal should see to it that financing is provided for this. It would be an absolute absurdity if someone were to try to completely Anglicise all our universities or to Anglicise by default. It would be an insult to all the other languages, and an act of language imperialism. This would be the end of language diversity. This cannot be allowed. I would like to have assurances from Minister Asmal in this regard.]

This brings me to the issue of languages of instruction in schools. The language of instruction plays a huge role in ensuring effective teaching and learning. Research has shown that home language instruction is vital for the cognitive development of young learners. I also believe that we will only develop healthy relationships among our various population groups if we can speak each other’s languages.

For these reasons, I appointed a ministerial task team earlier this year with the following brief: to develop a strategy and plan for implementing home language instruction in Grades 1 to 7 in all primary schools in the Western Cape and to develop a strategy for introducing third language instruction in primary schools in the Western Cape. We will shortly launch a video on multilingualism in the classroom which will contribute significantly to raising awareness on this issue.

Another medium of instruction is, of course, the technology used for teaching and learning, which ranges from chalk and talk to the very latest in information and communication technology. We are implementing massive projects to bring ICT into schools. These include the telecommunications project, which will complete an initiative this year to link almost every school in the Western Cape to the Internet. Our Khanya and Dassie projects are forging ahead in their efforts to develop innovative ways of using ICT to enhance curriculum delivery in our public schools and further education and training institutions.

Since e-learning is clearly the most important development in education in decades, we are determined to take the introduction of technology in education to new levels. We hope that Microsoft’s magnanimous donation will encourage other sponsors to become involved as well. I would like to pose a direct challenge to our huge multinational companies to jump into action and to plough similar major investments into our future. We have identified good management and governance as crucial for the success of education. Our key strategy is to decentralise education management to education management and development centres in each of seven new education districts. The aim of the education management and development centres is to bring development support much closer to schools and to assist them in their efforts to become vibrant, effective centres of teaching and learning.

Other new initiatives this year include launching a Partnerships for Progress programme, to bring together clusters of schools to learn from one another, and the launch of a Mentors and Curators programme, to assist principals and school management in their efforts to improve the quality of school management. I will soon make more detailed announcements in this regard. Our new institute for in-service training development will also play a key role in providing management training to principals and aspiring principals.

We should also recognise that evaluation forms an essential part of any management process, including education management. Our evaluation tools include ongoing contact by EMDC staff and my department’s annual schools survey. The survey is a self-assessment by schools, using a wide variety of indicators, covering all aspects of school management and governance, including a whole school index.

We now plan to complement these measures by introducing whole school evaluation as developed by the national Department of Education. Prof Asmal has my full support as he seeks to implement the whole school evaluation policy approved by the Council of Education Ministers. [Time expired.] [Applause.]

Mrs C NKUNA: Chairperson, hon Minister, hon members we have heard a lot of good points about education. I think what is left now, or for the educators and lecturers, is for them to engage in what is called introspection and for each to ask himself or herself: Am I really adhering to the educational values that have been put in place? Am I being loyal? Am I advocating the principles of democracy? I will come to that as I continue with my speech.

One of the most crucial issues in our society is the effectivess of schools and institutions of higher learning. That effectiveness is central to the development and economic growth of any democracy. It is this effectiveness that will enlighten our learners about the scourge and deadliness of HIV/Aids, promote moral values and human rights, discourage discrimination and racism and motivate learners to study and realise that the key to success is education and not demolishing and destroying the structures of these institutions.

Central to this are educators. They are an absolutely integral part of the education system and play an important part in the lives of our learners. They are the ones who become parents to our children in our absence and therefore play a critical role in their mental development. How they conduct themselves and treat our children and the kind of image they portray are of the essence.

President Mandela said, and I quote:

One of the most powerful ways of children and young adults acquiring values is to see individuals they admire and respect exemplify those values in their own being and conduct. The question of leadership, generally, and in the educational sphere particularly, is therefore of vital importance. Hence the launch of the network on values in education by the Minister a few days back.

It becomes rather disturbing when the educators themselves do not live up to their professions and do what their professions require of them. That poses a challenge to us as a nation and, in particular, as leaders. What can each and every one of us do to deal with this challenge, because it is our problem? The President named this year Vukuzenzele. In the spirit of Vukuzenzele we must rise, act in partnership across the nation and ensure proper teaching and learning in our schools.

We have to act in partnership to help educators conform to the code of conduct. This code specifically commits educators to the noble calling of their profession to educate and train their learners. It also acknowledges that the attitude, dedication, self-discipline, ideals, training and conduct of the teaching profession determine the quality of education.

What also raises concern is the racial condition of the former white institutions. As we all know, racism is still very rife in some of these institutions. What are the implications of this situation? What consequences will that have in the future of this country? Transformation has to start with the educators themselves, or else they will contribute to the psychological, mental and emotional degeneration of the fibre of our society.

Surely we do not want to cultivate young people who are resentful, bitter or racist? If one has to elaborate on this one, let me talk about two students. There is student A, who takes time to do her homework and submit assignments on time, and student B, who only does the assignment a day before the due date. Student B, in the end, obtains 80% whilst student A obtains 30%.

In the hon the Minister’s own words, we need teachers who model democratic teaching styles. It has been shown that young people are more likely to respect themselves and others if they grow up in an environment of support and acknowledgement.

At this juncture, allow me to extend my congratulations to the department with its enormous contribution to the transformation of this country in ensuring that we have a very efficient education sector that is accessible to all. While I am still articulating this, allow me to quote a writer in the Sunday Times who once said, ``The fact that birds eat together does not mean that they mix’’. The hon the Minister once mentioned in this Chamber that when one visits these institutions, one sees the racial groupings in different corners.

We are very much aware that this has been and remains a challenging task. It is through the establishment of programmes like the Values in Education programme of action that our country will go forward. Again, I would like to say to the hon the Minister that time is going to be part of the solution. This programme addresses precisely the challenges that I have highlighted. The hon the Minister has stated that the department cannot transform education on its own and that it should look to its social partners, the educated people and professionals, for help.

I would like to take this opportunity to make an appeal to the NCOP, whose constitutional obligation it is to make our provinces respond to the hon the Minister’s call. I propose that, given all the mechanisms put in place, we visit the schools and tertiary institutions to get the learners and students talking, and in that way, through our own findings and understanding of the situation, formulate a way to assist the department in realising the objectives of this programme and possibly try to come up with mechanisms that can assist in its successful implementation.

To conclude, the culture of educating and learning has taken its course. Though here and there there are some hurdles that we hope to overcome, let us join hands and commit ourselves to the future of this country by making our education sector a success. [Applause.]

The MINISTER OF EDUCATION: Chairperson, I am now resolved that next year, if I am still here, I will not speak to introduce the Vote. I will say two sentences and devote all the time to summing up and replying to the points.

I tried to say that today we must look at the relationship between education and the provinces - the policy implications and implementation - which is a function of the NCOP. The vast majority of people here did that. I got very valuable reports from the provinces: the Eastern Cape, the Northern Cape and Mpumalanga in particular. We missed Gauteng for some odd reason. What we got from them was the richness of what they are doing and the real problems that they face.

I now have the information, which I cannot give hon members, that implementation on HIV/Aids, contrary to what is said by the newspapers, which are not here today, has been implemented in a remarkable way. I have the statistics here. In one province they spent the provisional grant to the tune of 102%. They found their own money. I only have 15 minutes, so we cannot look at much of this. KwaZulu-Natal spent 89% of provisional aid for HIV/Aids and Mpumalanga spent 123%. In other words, they put in their own money. The Northern Cape spent 150%. They put their own money in. Of course, the Western Cape spent 27% of their conditional grant on HIV/Aids. The Eastern Cape spent 62%. Now, I hope the press will take this on board. In addition, as we learnt, nearly every province has supplemented it by between R10 million and R15 million. These are conditional grants that I negotiate, or my department negotiates, with central Government.

Let us look at the remarkable change this year in relation to infrastructure development. I have answered many questions about providing sanitation, water and additional classrooms. This year, by 31 March, according to official Treasury figures, the Eastern Cape had spent 78% of the infrastructure grant, the Free State 59%, Gauteng 42%, KwaZulu-Natal 99%, Limpopo - or the Northern Province - 108%, Mpumalanga 96%, the Northern Cape 73%, the North West 60% and the Western Cape 97%. We must keep this momentum going. These are basic. Let me announce the figures. Unless there is implementation, the provinces will not get the additional money. This year, there is R500 million for infrastructure; in 2001-02 there will be R1,1 billion; in 2002-03, R1,8 billion; and in 2003-04, R2,1 billion. That is a 400% increase for infrastructure.

I do not want to be distracted by those who, like the Bourbons, have learnt nothing and forgotten everything. I am not going to be distracted by them. My enemy, our collective enemy, is poverty. Our collective enemy is the disparity in the expenditure between formerly white institutions and black institutions. Our enemy is inequality in the education system. Our enemy is the refused rejection of the apartheid principle that blacks should not, as Verwoerd said, increase their capacity beyond a certain kind of labour. That is my enemy, because there was no mathematics and science in the rural schools and township schools. We had to do it in eight years, to correct something that colonialism and racism took 150 years to perpetuate. That is our enemy.

Our enemy is maladministration. Our enemy is corruption. Two hon members dressed up their own prejudices as other people’s perceptions. That is a classic way of doing it, by saying that this is how other people perceive a situation. The hon member from the Western Cape must learn a little bit of modesty as to how he presents things, by the way. The time is past for him to make demands on democratic Ministers. He has lost the capacity to say that he wants an assurance from a democratic Minister. He is not going to get that assurance, because he refuses to learn that we are committed, because we drafted the provisions for diversity and multiculturalism in this country, not those hon members. We drafted the provisions of our mother-tongue instruction. I am not going to give any assurances to that hon member, because we are practising it.

As for those who ask why English is being favoured, it is the governing body and the principal, whom the hon member supports so much, that decide - I address this to my friend from KwaZulu-Natal - the language of instruction in schools. The governing body says, for its own reasons, as they do in Gauteng very often, that the school’s children want to learn English. We oppose that in the national department. In the foundation year, one to three - it is not one to seven; that is wrong - there should and must be mother-tongue instruction. That is the basic development. From mother-tongue instruction and proficiency one can move on to other things.

I am not going to be distracted. I want to talk about HIV/Aids. I want to be doing about HIV/Aids nationally. How much money are we devoting to it? UNAids says that our social protection programme on HIV/Aids, the vaccine of education, is the most advanced in the world. We are going to develop it further. We hope that we will spend - that is, Health, Social Development and Education together - R1 billion in two years’ time on the whole prevention approach.

Secondly, about violence and sexual abuse, I want hon members to take into account that the only way to deal with sexual abuse is to have proper sexual education programmes at our schools. It is not an ideological thing. I understand why some people and fundamentalists of some degree would say that we want to encourage sexual promiscuity. Some politicians do not know what happens on the ground. They really do not know. I think being strident and dressing up prejudices as other people’s perceptions is not good enough. There is an enormous amount of sexually precocious activity in schools. I believe, as a grandfather and former parent of schoolchildren, that children must develop in their own way, in their own time in their age groups. Precocity is harmful to them. But our society, of course, with instant gratification largely demanded by adults - sexual and material gratification - gives the wrong example to our children, and we do not give them the comfort and the love that they often find in the sexual experiences that children have.

Our slogan is, ``Protect the right to innocence of our children.’’ We are doing an enormous amount of work on this, and that is the way to deal with HIV/Aids too. It is the right of women to say no. That is fundamental. Once one understands that no culture or background allows one to exploit women - often men use this idea of culture and of the right of first refusal, I think it is called - then one can accept this, but women must have the right to say no. That is what we are proposing in our school system, as part of the built-in learning areas of the national curriculum statement about sexuality in education. I would rather not go into the idea that we will now be going into oral sex or masturbation, as we have been accused of. I ask hon members to read our learning area statements. That is very important.

About school effectiveness and school fees, it is a disgraceful, appalling indictment of both formerly white schools and formerly black schools that a school can reject a child because of an inability to pay fees. It is legally laid down that if one earns less than 10 times the school fees, then one does not have to pay any fees at all. Then, of course, there is a graduation there for all parents, and there should be no punishment of any kind.

As for uniforms, I have always believed - and I have got into trouble for saying so - that uniforms are part of the colonial heritage of subordination and militarisation of our schools. What happens when children are very poor? What happens to the Aids orphans that we spoke to, 16 of them in our conference, who stay at home in their hovels because they cannot afford uniforms? What happens to them? An extraordinarily noble principle is invoked. It is wonderful to see all these kids at a funeral with expensive lined, colourful jackets, but there, in a way, is the real enemy: the enemy of the exclusion of the Aids orphans in their hovels.

I, as a humanitarian democrat, would support the right of that person to go to school without a uniform, and I do not want any action taken against her. I would believe that the MECs and the heads of departments are failing in their function if they do not take action against the headmaster or teachers there. This is vital.

Regarding the school feeding scheme, I compliment Mr Raju and ask him to give me the information. I know that there are defects in the school feeding scheme, but it is the biggest antipoverty thing that we have. We must look at where things are breaking down and we must be introspective, as some of the provinces have been. But two of the hon members who spoke here refused to be introspective about the values in their educational system. We are trying to do this. Exclusion and racism are the real enemies in our schools and universities. I do not want to be strident about this. I want to stay very calm. But we must all join together to create a South African culture. I opposed Lord Milner. I called him a troglodyte. I presume hon members know what a troglodyte is. We do not want to have that language here.

On Monday morning, on my public holiday, I am speaking to the FF. I think the FF is more entitled to say that they are speaking for 6 million Afrikaners than the hon Mr Van Niekerk is. [Interjections.]

Mr A E VAN NIEKERK: Why are they more entitled?

The MINISTER: I am speaking to the FF because they want me to speak about education, language and all those issues. They are not accusing me of trying to rape Afrikaans. Let me start with this. No vice chancellor of a former Afrikaans university has said they want Afrikaans to be a single medium of instruction. No one said that when they met the President. Politicians, for their own populist and irredentist reasons, inflame opinion and make those extraordinary statements. I give an assurance that we will carry out the language policy, which is consistent with South Africa and our needs.

Secondly, it is a much more fluid situation, if hon members were in the House when I answered that question about language in higher education. There are in Stellenbosch undergraduate courses taught in English because they want to attract foreign students. They are pragmatic about it. Otherwise they would not get any students in forestry. Let us not exaggerate this idea. Then, of course, in other places like Pretoria, they have chosen their own approach to keep numbers in order to get the subsidy from the national Government.

Thirdly, having said that, no vice chancellor says, ``We want to keep exclusively Afrikaans.’’ Let us not confuse the matter with English. We say in the White Paper on our national plan that we want to develop indigenous languages and we will give money for chairs, for example, in the national institute, if we can, to develop African languages, indigenous languages. That is very important.

I say in the national plan, which nobody else said, that we will get the textbooks and dictionaries. There is no reason why there should not be instruction in one of the indigenous languages at different universities. I have said publicly here that very few people are studying Afrikaans as a language. Very few people are studying our indigenous languages. So where are the teachers going to come from? Where are the professors going to come from if very few people are studying these languages? That is what the hon member should be talking about. He should be giving leadership rather than retrogressing to the Bourbons and to the time before 1994. I care about Afrikaans, and that is why I care about foreign languages. I care about indigenous languages. I want more of them in our universities and institutions instead of that hon member’s twaddle about my being the enemy of Afrikaans. Leaders must give leadership, not run behind a prejudiced and bigoted flock.

That is why it is very important that we should talk about values in our higher education system. We should talk about things like those the members have spoken about. I must reassure my sister from the Free State that no one wants to ensure that black institutions suffer. There is no question of a merger between Qwaqwa and Bloemfontein. This was announced 15 months ago by the Cabinet. It is the incorporation of a small college 500 km away from Turfloop. That is what the architects of apartheid did. We are now bringing it together. The natural home is Bloemfontein.

We say in our National Plan for Higher Education and Cabinet decision that the transformation of higher education must affect every institution in South Africa. If the hon member wants the details, we will provide them. Therefore it is not about black institutions. We are going to merge RAU with Wits Technikon. We are going to merge them. Natal University is going to merge with Durban-Westville. We are going to have dentistry move to the University of the Western Cape. We are going to build up Fort Hare, the Western Cape and Limpopo as three centres of excellence where we can develop black intellectuals. Every institution has to change its values and attitudes.

Let me say very categorically that I will publish my policy on language in higher education. I have two documents. We are talking about access. Medicine and engineering are about the most expensive subjects in South Africa. Why should 40 students, at great cost, have to go to Cuba to become doctors? We are saying, therefore, that in the expensive areas, like medicine and engineering, there must be either parallel language or dual language. If an hon member wants that demand to be made of UCT, if there is an opportunity for that demand, I will agree to it, but most Africans are comfortable in English, or have learnt it for five or six or ten years. If Afrikaans is used as an exclusive method of teaching medicine, that will exclude Africans.

Again I refer to our national plan, which the new vice chancellor of Stellenbosch, who is much more understanding of South Africa than those who have lived here all their lives, agrees with, as we have said. Poor Afrikaners from the Northern Cape, whom the hon member tends to speak about, are not attracted by Stellenbosch. They do not make any special attempt to get the poor Afrikaners, who are coloured, from the Northern Cape. My view is also that nobody cares for the poor Afrikaners from the southern suburbs of Johannesburg, so I have instructed the National Financial Aid Scheme to say that poor Afrikaners must now be assisted there. Of that money, 94% goes to Africans, and we have 232 000 African and 4 000 or 5 000 Afrikaners. But now we must emphasise this, because we are, in the end, trying to achieve one community approach. The poor Afrikaners from the southern suburbs of Johannesburg must now be incorporated, and we must make a way to get them there.

For example, only 12% of coloureds in the 18-24 age group, like 12% of Africans, go on to higher education. We must attract coloureds to go there. The universities, particularly the Afrikaans-speaking or former Afrikaans- speaking universities, must go out of their way to say, ``There are the catchment areas for universities,’’ but not the catchment areas of the vineyards and Gauteng and Zebediela; they must go for the poor.

I am sorry that I have been deflected. I will try to answer all the other questions later, particularly the questions on FET are very important. There is real development in FET. I have given the answers about Abet development. I think these are the real areas. The provinces are working very well, but they will have to get more money.

Also very important, of course, are some issues that fall between the cracks. My friend Comrade Nogumla, who spoke about integrating education, raised a very important matter. I want pressure from the public and from Parliament to say that all Government departments must work together where the functions are overarching. We are doing that now with Aids, involving Social Development, Health and ourselves. Elsewhere we have to come together and particularly ensure - I am someone who is not strident about this - that the money given to education should be used effectively. The Treasury has taken rationally into account the need for more money for early childhood education and other areas. It is my officials who, in fact, negotiate these matters with them. They have taken into account that we cannot transform higher education without more money. We cannot get more money if students are destructive. But we must remember that the overwhelming majority of kids at primary and secondary school want education, want to be integrated into the system and want to develop their own capacities.

When we started off five or six years ago, there was violence and trouble at every university, including the Vaal Triangle and Potchefstroom. There is no trouble now, because we have begun to deal with them. The overwhelming majority of young people in higher education want to succeed. We want to push them also into science and technology and into history, because hardly anyone learns history any more in higher education. By that method, in fact, we will ensure that we get our growth in our economy and in human resources.

So we must salute the overwhelming majority of young people and schoolkids, particularly the primary schoolkids, the kids we saw here. We could see the self-assurance when they came in. It was not there five or six years ago. Whether they are white or black kids, the great hope is the primary school system, because that is where the first postapartheid cohorts are coming out. In two or three years’ time they will be the full cohorts going into the secondary schools. I promise hon members that what they saw here this morning is what I will see when I go to a Soweto primary school, to Hector Petersen primary school on Youth Day on Sunday morning, where I will see 1 500 kids, largely from the informal dwellings, and they are the great inspiration for what we are doing. I hope that all hon members will be inspired to say that this is the kind of value system we want to create in South Africa.

People like us have been ghosts outside - excluded. We want to be in the house now, but not exclusively, as happened until 1994. We want to work with others, but they must be sensitive to our needs and aspirations and to the development of our languages. My own language is dead, through apartheid, so I speak one language only. Apartheid killed my language. It did not kill it for other people because they had the national strength to keep it alive. But we want the members over there to join with us and understand, but please not to use out-of-date approaches because they feel they are being excluded. They must not feel that the Government, which in fact undertook the rights in this constitutional order, is against them. I represent the vast majority of people in South Africa who want to ask those members to make the adjustment, to reach us, to work with us, and hope that in that process, the kind of protection they need will be enhanced.

They believed in group rights in negotiations up to 1994, but I believe that group rights are destructive, that communities in South Africa like the blacks, the Jews and the Indians never had group rights protection, but they protected their cultures and their languages and their inheritance. One does not need the protection of the law to keep those dear and to keep them with oneself.

The legalistic approach could be the bane of our society. We want social co- operation, whether in religion or anywhere else. Religion should never be the basis of exclusion in our schools or of a lack of comfort and development in our schools. Our test is that every child and every young person at school or university should feel comfortable. I think that the developments we are involved in will increase the comfort zone. I ask hon members to join me in increasing that comfort zone. [Applause.]

Debate concluded.

The Council adjourned at 12:13. ____

            ANNOUNCEMENTS, TABLINGS AND COMMITTEE REPORTS

TABLINGS:

National Assembly and National Council of Provinces:

Papers:

1. The Speaker and the Chairperson:

 (1)    Report of the Auditor-General on the Financial Statements of the
     Ingonyama Trust Board for 1 April 1994 to 31  March  1999  [RP  17-
     2002].
 (2)    Report of the Auditor-General on the Financial Statements of the
     South African Wool Board for 1999-2000 [RP 74-2002].


 (3)    Report of the Auditor-General on the Reinsurance Fund for Export
     Credit and Foreign Investments for the period 1 April  2001  to  30
     June 2001 [RP 64-2002].

1. The Minister of Finance:

 (1)    Government Notice No R 740 published in  Government  Gazette  No
     23463 dated 25 May  2002:  Amendment  of  Treasury  Regulations  in
     terms of section 76 of the  Public  Finance  Management  Act,  1999
     (Act No. 1 of 1999).


 (2)    Government Notice No 741  published  in  Government  Gazette  No
     23450 dated 31 May 2002: Borrowing powers of Water  Boards  Limited
     under Schedule 3, Part B of  the  Public  Finance  Management  Act,
     1999 (Act No. 1 of 1999).