Statement to provide clarity on housing provision comments by Minister Kubayi during Newzroom Afrika interview
Human Settlements Minister Mmamoloko Kubayi conducted an interview with broadcast news channel Newzroom Afrika on Tuesday evening to highlight key proposals of the Draft White Paper on Human Settlements, that aims to replace the current policy which is almost three decades old.
The subsequent public comments on social media platforms necessitate that Minister Kubayi provide public clarification in the spirit of frankness and open debate that enhances the draft policy under consideration. Access to adequate housing is enshrined in the Constitution in Section 26, that provides:
- Everyone has the right to have access to adequate housing.
- The state must take reasonable legislative and other measures, within its available resources, to achieve the progressive realisation of this right.”
Where Section 26 speaks about everyone, it does not specify the income levels of the different segments of the South African population, yet we know that our population is segmented into different income levels from low to high income. Within its available
resources, government has created housing programmes that are aimed at helping the poor, the elderly, the child-headed households, and people living with disabilities to achieve the progressive realization of the right to access to adequate housing. This
is with the understanding that households earning above R 30 000 have access to bond financing through established financial institutions such as banks and therefore can access adequate housing with indirect assistance from government.
The current housing policy dictates that government should provide free housing for households with income levels of between 0 and R3500, including designated groups and military veterans. Furthermore, government provides assistance through grants and subsidies to what is called the gap market or the missing middle - those who cannot access bond financing from financial institutions and yet they do not qualify to receive free houses for government. These are families earning between R3501 and R22 000 per month. Social housing which includes low-cost rental and rent to own and affordable housing, which includes the First Home Finance programme, are some of the programmes designed to support the missing middle to access housing opportunities. It is important to emphasize that the missing middle programmes are private sector driven and government only creates a conducive environment, through grants and subsidies, for the private to develop and build housing units.
The Minister in her interview with Newsroom Africa said amongst other things "When the Constitution says people have a right to shelter it's not because it says it must be done by the government, we must create a conducive environment for people to (also) access shelter in the private space." You will realise that what has been circulated on social media was a truncated quotation of the Minister’s comment.
The context of the interview discussion was the Draft White Paper, with new housing policy proposals, which has been published for public comment in December 2023.
The Minister’s comments were referring to the importance of placing emphasis on the segmentation of the housing market, as part of the policy proposals in the Draft Human Settlements White Paper. Her reference to the creation of the conducive environment
was precisely to make the point that there are other indirect ways that government will assist South Africans to access adequate shelter, such as social housing, first home finance subsidies and service sites to the qualifying beneficiaries. Simply put, government cannot and will not build a house for everyone except for the most vulnerable. However, where necessary, it will provide a conducive environment within its available resources for the private sector to create housing stock for other income groups.
The new White Paper does not propose the discontinuation of the current housing programmes but it makes proposals on the improvement on the housing delivery systems, tools and technologies and funding mechanisms.
The draft policy is accessible here https://bit.ly/3vwvOF9 following its publishing for public comments in December 2023. Members of the public are encouraged to make their written inputs ahead of the extended deadline on 28 February 2024.
For media enquiries and confirmations, contact:
Hlengiwe Nhlabathi-Mokota - Spokesperson to Minister of Human Settlements
Cell: 064 7548426
Email: Hlengiwe.Nhlabathi@dhs.gov.za
