Gauteng built only half of planned housing

Gauteng and North West are among provinces that are underspending on human settlements grant.

Parliament's Select Committee on Appropriations was briefed by the National Treasury‚ the Department of Human Settlements (DHS)‚ the Western Cape‚ Limpopo and Gauteng provinces on the human settlements development grant for 2017/18.

The committee was told by the Department of Human Settlements that the human settlement development grant allocation for the 2017/18 financial year is R19.9-billion‚ while in 2017/16 the allocation was R18.3-billion.

“It said that North West and Gauteng are among those provinces that are underperforming on spending the grant.

“Gauteng province set a target of 49,029 sites and units‚ but only delivered 25 468. Overall‚ the national shortfall is 41,444 sites and units for the 2017/18 financial year‚” the committee said.

The National Treasury also informed the committee that provinces were underperforming on planned programmes‚ but are spending on unplanned programmes. "This suggests a planning deficiency."

“The committee expressed its concern with the underperformance in some provinces and also with the findings of the Treasury. It believes that the finding on programme spending speaks to the capacity of the grant’s implementing agents.”

Acting committee chairperson Charel de Beer said the provincial underperformance on the spending of government grants had a significant impact on the people and could ultimately lead to service delivery protests.