Published: May 2004 – ESR Review, CLC, UWC
Lerato Kgamphe

The much-anticipated budget speech of 2004 broadly spoke to the duty of the State to meet the basic needs of all South Africans.

When presenting this speech in Parliament, the Minister of Finance, Trevor Manuel, spoke about the need to progressively extend the social security system, "with a focus particularly on the needs of children who cannot be expected to provide for themselves".

While South Africa celebrates ten years of democracy, poverty remains one of the biggest challenges for the government. The need to provide social assistance to poor children, who are a most vulnerable group in our society, is highlighted by the extent and depth of child poverty in South Africa. It is estimated that by 2000 there were 13.3 million children under 17 years old who had a per capita income of below R430/month. These children need social assistance, without which they are not able to access the minimum income that facilitates access to other basic rights.

Section 27(1)(c) affords everyone, including children, "the right of access to social security, including, if they are unable to support themselves and their dependents, to appropriate social assistance".

As held in the landmark case, Government of the Republic of South Africa and others v Grootboom and others 2000 (11) BCLR 1169 (CC) (Grootboom), this right primarily binds the parents or primary caregivers of children. Only in the absence of parental or familial care does it bind the State.

However, the State still has the duty to assist parents in fulfilling their obligations towards their children. Among other things, the State must provide the legal and administrative infrastructure to enable parents and child caregivers to access social assistance on a progressive and coordinated basis.

As noted by the Constitutional Court in Grootboom, legislative measures alone are not enough to give effect to socio-economic rights. The State is obliged to take other measures by conceptualising and implementing programmes geared towards realising these rights.

When determining whether measures taken by the State comply with the constitutional obligations implicit in socio-economic rights, the court will ask whether the measure is reasonable.

An important element of this test is whether the measure or programme gives priority to meeting the needs of the most vulnerable members of our society.

The reasonableness test is relevant to analyses of the State's budget insofar as the latter impacts on the realisation of socio-economic rights.

Social assistance programmes in South Africa
There are three child-specific programmes through which the government intends to fulfil its obligations relating to children's right to social assistance. They are the child support grant (CSG), the care dependency grant (CDG) and the foster care grant (FCG).

At present, the CSG takes the form of a monthly payment of R170. It is claimable by the caregiver on behalf of children under the age of 11 years. This age limit will be extended to 14 years in April 2005. A means test applies to the grant. This means that a person must demonstrate, through a set test, that they are in need of this grant in order to be able to claim it.

The CSG is critical to poverty alleviation efforts.
The CDG is targeted at poor children who have severe mental or physical disabilities and are in need of full-time care. It takes the form of a monthly payment of R740. It can be claimed for any child under 18 whom a medical assessment proves has a severe disability. If the child is still in secondary school, he/she must be under 21.

The FCG targets children who are placed in foster care by a social worker on behalf of the Children's Court. The monthly payment of the grant is R530. Any caregiver with a court order indicating foster care status can claim it.

These grants are financed and administered by provincial government departments through the equitable share allocation and the conditional grant allocation. The equitable share allocation comes from the National Revenue Account to which all provinces are constitutionally entitled. The conditional grant is an allocation of money from national government to the provinces for rendering a specific service. Thus, provincial governments do not have the discretion to spend the conditional grant allocation on any other item than that for which it was intended.

The following discussion evaluates the current budgetary allocations for these grants and the projected spending by the government over the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF).

Grant allocations - nominal vs. real amounts
Evaluating the nominal amount (the actual allocation) and the real amount (the allocation after taking inflation into account) per grant from 1999 to 2004 helps assess what growth there has been in the purchasing power of grant allocations in that time. It is commendable that the government has increased the real value of the CSG from its 1999 value. As a result, CSG beneficiaries' money has more purchasing power now than it did then.
However, the CDG and FCG allocations are now much lower in real value than they were in 1999, although the nominal allocations have increased each year since then. This means that CDG and FCG beneficiaries' money does not have the same purchasing power now as it did in 1999.

The government should ensure that, at a minimum, the real value of the money beneficiaries receive over time is constant.

Provincial budgets for children's social grants

A review of the provincial budget allocations to the three social grants and the government's planned spending over the next three years provides a useful understanding of whether there is growth in nominal budget allocations and whether such growth keeps up with inflation.

The CSG budget allocation to provinces since 2002/03 increased progressively to cater for the extension of the CSG to children up to 14 years old. The Eastern Cape and KwaZulu/Natal have had the largest nominal allocations of all provinces over the MTEF, while the Northern Cape and the Free State have had the lowest. The Eastern Cape and Mpumalanga have had the largest average real growth rate over the MTEF (35.6% and 34.4% respectively). Over the same period, the Free State had the lowest average real growth of only 8%.

The real growth of allocations slows down over the MTEF, with Gauteng and the Northern Cape having a small to negative overall growth to allocation in 2006/07 (2.8% and -1.32% respectively).

In essence, it seems that over the MTEF the government has allocated more to provinces with higher poverty rates, namely the Eastern Cape (85.69%) and KwaZulu/Natal (78.98%).

The Eastern Cape and KwaZulu/Natal have the largest nominal budget allocation for the CSG for the period between 2002/03 and 2006/07, while the Northern Cape and the Free State have the lowest. However, the latter provinces have the highest average real growth allocation over the MTEF (33.7% and 22.6% respectively). Gauteng has the lowest average real growth (-0.46%).

In 2004/05, the real allocation to Gauteng and Mpumalanga for the CDG decreased dramatically, by 16.8% and 11% respectively.

The allocation increases or decreases for the CDG seem to follow no logical pattern over the MTEF. It would be logical to assume that the provincial allocations are based on the number of potential grant beneficiaries over the medium term, over and above those already benefiting from the grant. This would ensure that every beneficiary is catered for in the budget and would allow room for the inclusion of more beneficiaries over the medium term. If this approach were adopted, real growth would show higher provincial allocations than the inflation rate. At present, real growth for all provinces shows no such trend.

Nominal allocations for the FCG to provinces show that Gauteng and the North-West have the highest average growth over the MTEF (50% and 35.6% respectively). Gauteng and KwaZulu/Natal have received the highest nominal allocations over the MTEF.

Concluding remarks
However commendable this step to realise the child's right to social assistance is, there are still children who, though vulnerable, are not catered for in the current system of social assistance programmes. For instance, children over 14 are still excluded, despite the fact that the Constitution defines a child as a person under the age of 18. The current system also remains largely inaccessible to children living on the streets and those made vulnerable by HIV and Aids. As such it is vulnerable to constitutional challenge.

Although the government's nominal allocations are increasing, it is still difficult to ascertain whether the allocations are sufficient to support the grants. This is due to the lack of accurate eligibility data for, and actual costing of, all grants.

The budget allocations to the CDG currently show no consistency regarding the number of beneficiaries to be budgeted for or any possible increases in such numbers over time. Unless accurate eligibility data are maintained, the budgetary allocations will be made haphazardly.

Considering that the State's duty is to ensure the progressive realisation of the right to social assistance, it is submitted that the government should ensure that the real grant values of the CDG and FCG keep up with inflation. This would ensure that the actual grants received retain the purchasing power they had when the grants were introduced.

Lerato Kgamphe is a Researcher in the Children's Budget Unit, Institute for Democracy in South Africa (Idasa).

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