Introduction
The purpose of the Unauthorised Expenditure Authorisation Bill 2011 is to enable the Provincial Legislature to authorise expenditure recorded as unauthorised in the provincial accounts.
This Bill deals with the unauthorised expenditure for the financial years 2008/09 and 2009/10. It should be remembered that the house passed two Unauthorised Expenditure Authorisation Acts in 2009 and 2010, dealing with the unauthorised expenditure dating back to 2000/01 up to and including 2008/09.
The KwaZulu-Natal Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) had, however, at that time, not considered the unauthorised expenditure for 2008/09 for the Department of Social Development due to insufficient motivation provided by the department.
SCOPA met again from October 2010 to consider the remaining unauthorised expenditure amounts, as well as the unauthorised expenditure incurred by five departments during 2009/10, in light of the explanations offered by the departments and the availability of funds in the Provincial Revenue Fund.
The provincial Exchequer Account has a provision to fund the unauthorised expenditure as reflected in the Schedule to the Bill and which appears in the provincial accounts of the relevant provincial department (vote) referred to in Column 4 of the Schedule. The amount of unauthorised expenditure being authorised by means of this Bill is
R1 815 056 281.12
Conclusion
The KwaZulu-Natal Unauthorised Expenditure Authorisation Bill, 2011 gives effect to the Resolutions of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, to authorise some of the unauthorised expenditure reported by the Auditor-General on the 2009/10 Annual Financial Statements of departments, as well as authorising specific expenditure recoreded as unauthorised in the provincial accounts.
The amounts not approved by SCOPA become first charges against departments’ votes in terms of Section 34(2) of the PFMA.
In conclusion, I wish to say that the resolutions of SCOPA and this Bill will, if passed, have dealt with all outstanding unauthorised expenditure cases. This will give the Provincial Treasury an opportunity to clear the remaining anomalies in the accounts of departments and the Revenue Fund. We can now proclaim that we are, as a province, up to date with both our revenue account reconciliation and the annual Consolidated Financial Statements.
It is now my privilege to formally table the KwaZulu-Natal Unauthorised Expenditure Authorisation Bill, 2011 for consideration of the House, and I am looking forward to the debate on this Bill.
Thank you.
Source: KwaZulu-Natal Treasury
