MEC De Lille's Speech Notes: First Task for City and Province Must Be Registration of Day Care Centres

• The value of this Implementation Protocol Agreement cannot be underestimated
• This is a first for the provincial department and the City of Cape Town and I am sure that in the future other departments and municipalities will follow our example
• Mayor Plato, this is long overdue for our two arms of Government, WHICH must work together ever more closely to ensure the delivery of services to the most vulnerable in our city and province
• There is always the danger that even the slightest miscommunication between the City and Province, which share interdependent Strategic Objectives and the same political ideology and goals, can result in an uncomfortable hiccup for the community at large
• I would like to quote from Section 35 (1) of the Intergovernmental Relations Framework Act 13 of 2005, which says:
  "The organs of State must coordinate their actions in such a manner as may be appropriate or required in the circumstances and may do so by entering into an implementation protocol."
• So "coordinating" our actions is a must and in future we will do joint planning to avoid duplication and working with a silo mentality when it comes to the following crucial issues
  Street people
  Substance abuse
  Youth development
  Poverty alleviation
  Disability
  Gender
  Early childhood development
  Social crime prevention
• Our very first task must be to work together to register the hundreds of Partial Care Facilities that remain unregistered
• We rely on each other to complete different parts of the registration process
• People apply to the provincial Department of Social Development, but even once we have helped them complete the forms they then rely on the City to check their sites based on safety, health and fire requisites
• I think we must also not forget that our guiding light here is the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, which places different obligations on all arms of Government
• However, sometimes our responsibilities overlap and especially in the case of the delivery of social services, it is imperative that our combined efforts translate into more than double the delivery outcome
• This agreement also formalises many large social delivery tasks the City has in any case been doing over the years
• Considering what we have in common, identifying the policy requirements to address social challenges should be easy
• Already in Provincial Government there is a keen understanding that Social Development cuts across every single department, in turn feeding each one of our Strategic Objectives
• The City also has a wealth of institutional knowledge that must be tapped into
• There are so many areas in which we need to increase our already significant efforts
• We must improve the lives of our children and youth, strengthen our dual response to the abuse of alcohol and other drugs, continue to chip away at poverty, ensure that the elderly are appreciated by a caring, compassionate Government and tackle women empowerment with renewed vigour
• Disability is another area in which the City can continue to contribute
• In conclusion I would like to once again repeat something that has been on my lips all week, since our Emergency Summit on Monday:
  what we need is implementation, implementation and more implementation, and more and stronger partnerships, not only with each other, but also with business, the NGO sector and civil society in general.
• I know we will intensify our cooperation still more in the weeks and months to come in the interests of the people of Cape Town and the Western Cape

Thank you.