The Department of Human Settlements appeared before the Portfolio Committee on Human Settlements today to present the first quarter (April to June 2018) performance and expenditure report.

The committee has noticed pockets of remarkable achievements in most key strategic areas and commended the department for such achievements in meeting its quarterly targets.

The committee has expressed its concern on the department’s under-performance on some key areas.

The committee has expressed its serious reservation with the department’s constant moving target of Military Veterans housing programme. The committee has called upon the department to take appropriate steps to finalise the set target for military veterans houses programme and to work with the Department of Military Veterans in addressing any bottle necks that are hampering progress.

The failure of provinces to utilise one billion of the allocated funding for housing also received strong condemnation from committee members and instructed the department to act decisively in ensuring that the allocated funds are utilised as per the set time frames.

Although there is a remarkable progress made in paying service providers with the 30-day period, the failure to pay 23 out of 1571 invoices on time by the department was condemned by the committee due to its potential negative impact on services providers, especially SMMES.

The Chairperson of the committee Ms Nocawe Mafu advised the department to pay a closer look at the Free State Provincial Government’s underperformance in the actual housing delivery while the expenditure patterns are on the rise. Ms Mafu said there is no correction between expenditure and Housing Service delivery in the Free State Provincial Government. 

The committee demanded details on why the department is under-performing on critical area of issuing houses to beneficiaries with title deeds and the plan going forward to address urgently the under-performance.  

The committee plans to invite all underperforming metropolitan municipalities to appear before the committee to provide detailed explanation regarding their poor performance.