Honourable Chairperson;
Honourable Premier and Members of the Executive Council;
Chair and; Members of the Portfolio Committee;
Honourable Members;
Amakhosi;
Distinguished ladies and gentlemen;
Comrades and friends.
Introduction
Honourable Chairperson, the National Development Plan boldly affirms our commitment to eliminate poverty and sharply reduce inequality by 2030. All our energies and efforts should be directed at ensuring that we implement programmes to achieve this goal.
To effectively implement these we need to recognize the key challenges identified by the Planning Commission’s Diagnostic Report. Amongst others are the following: “infrastructure is poorly located, under-maintained and insufficient to foster higher economic growth, spatial patterns exclude the poor from the fruits of development, public services are uneven and often of poor quality, corruption is widespread, South Africa remains a divided society.”
In 2012 to 2013 we acknowledged that we are in the main an implementing agent on behalf of our sister departments. We undertook to become the implementing agent of choice for them. We believe that we have made significant progress in this regard. We have consciously and diligently located ourselves within the new service delivery model.
We are also pleased that increasingly to the larger public we have also been associated with innovative programmes of poverty alleviation and work opportunities. In pursuit of the effective implementation of the government agenda, the National Minister of Public Works in his 2013 budget speech said that, “The Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) remains an effective part of the government’s response to the triple challenge of poverty, unemployment and inequality.”
In 2012/13 I committed the department to delivering on job creation and poverty alleviation. I am pleased to report that the department has made great strides in achieving this target through Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) related programmes such as Izandla Ziyagezana (IZ), the Community Maintenance Programme as well as the KZN Integrated Greening Programme. I will expand on these when I speak specifically to them.
Contractor Development Policy and Implementation Strategy
The Construction Industry Development Board (CIDB) in conjunction with National Public Works developed the NCDP – National Contractor Development Policy in 2012.
The KZN Department of Public Works used the provisions of the NCDP to develop a KZN Contractor Development Policy.
The aims of this policy are to:
- enhance job creation and alleviate poverty through infrastructure development
- stimulate wealth creation among the historically marginalized
- strengthen and develop Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises (SMMEs) that will be able to participate in the mainstream economy
- enhance a database of KZN contractors over the range of CIDB gradings able to undertake and deliver construction, maintenance and refurbishment works on time and to specification.
The policy has the following broad objectives:
- To grow South Africa’s contracting capacity, moving smaller contractors into mainstream construction and to higher CIDB levels;
- To target empowerment gaps revealed by the CIDB contractor register which categorizes contractors according to capability;
- To raise the performance and quality of contractors, delivering quality goods;
- To create an enabling contracting environment that will allow access to financial support, information, knowledge systems, training and mentorship;
- To create a pool of capable contractors that will be able to compete in an open market.
The Provincial policy has been aligned to the Infrastructure Delivery Management System (IDMS), Draft Treasury Regulations, CIDB Prescripts and the Broad Based Black Empowerment Act and Codes of Practice.
The KZN Contractor Development Policy enjoys buy-in and support from client departments in formulating a procurement strategy that advances the departments’ mandates to achieve both social and economic goals.
The broad strategy in terms of how the Province would realise the objectives are contained in the Implementation Strategy. The strategy focuses on sustainability, empowerment, capacitation, up-skilling and a transformed pool of black contractors.
One area of emphasis is compelling large contractors to “adopt”, coach, mentor and guide smaller contractors in the province. A graduated approach is also taken to ensure that there is emphasis on under-represented categories of historically disadvantaged individuals.
Larger contractors will be required to draw sub-contractors from a database compiled by the Department of Public Works on a roster and a competitive bidding system.
Contractors in CIDB Grades 7-9 will also have to ensure that accredited learnerships are in place within the construction sector, thereby increasing the pool of professionals and artisans as well as the recognition of prior learning (RPL).
It is useful to point out that KwaZulu-Natal has among the highest number of contractors registered on the CIDB database in the country. Significantly, we have the highest number of grade 9 contractors of all provinces. One of our concerns is the number of grade 7-9 contractors decreasing over the years mainly on account of the 1% training levy payable to the training SETA. We are concerned that the Province has 25027 contractors registered on CIDB Grade 1 while there are only 1207 contractors on Grade 2. We are putting in place necessary interventions to change this scenario.
The department also established a Contractor Development Forum to address issues within the Provincial mandate which hamper the development of emerging contractors.
