'Stop starving the poor': State told

The Free State department of social development has less than 90 days to come up with a "fair, equitable and transparent" funding policy for non-profit organisations providing social services.

The ultimatum was issued by the Free State High Court, which had declared the current funding policy unconstitutional just days before 12 elderly women were burnt to death at Struisbult Care Centre in Springs, Gauteng.

The provincial department was also ordered to rectify an "illogical and irrational" policy on the funding of non-profit organisations.

The move comes in the wake of a court decision last year in which the National Association of Welfare Organisations and Non-Governmental Organisations and NG Social Services Free State took the department to court to force it to pay subsidies owed to care centres run by non-profit organisations.

They also asked the court to declare the department's policy on payment of subsidies - which states that the final award of funding is the prerogative of the department - to be declared unconstitutional.

The judge found that the policy did not recognise that the bodies "that provide care to children, older persons and vulnerable persons in need ... fulfil constitutional and statutory obligations of the department".

He also found that the policy was not reasonable because it lacked a "fair, equitable and transparent method" of determining how much money these bodies should come up with to sustain themselves.

When the department returned with a new policy, including a model for determining funding, the judge found that it did not comply with the earlier judgment because it still allowed the department to reduce subsidies.

The non-profiting organisations are now waiting for a final judgment and planning to approach the Constitutional Court for a nationally applicable order.

Willem Botha, the association's deputy chairman, said this was because the under-funding of non-profit organisations was a "massive problem".

Paula Proudlock, manager of the Child's Rights Programme at Children's Institute of the University of Cape Town, said provinces allocated between R6000 and R7000 a child a month at its own institutions, while non-profit organisations only received between R1700 and R2500 a child a month.

Lumka Oliphant, spokesman for the national Department of Social Development, said a new policy was approved in March.

"(It) will abolish the current disparity between government-run and (NGO)-run facilities ... by creating a set of national norms and standards," said Oliphant.

Dr Sello Mokoena, spokesman for the Gauteng Department of Health and Social Development, said the fire at the Struisbult Care Centre was still being investigated.