{"id":360846,"date":"2019-12-09T14:28:16","date_gmt":"2019-12-09T12:28:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=360846"},"modified":"2019-12-09T14:33:59","modified_gmt":"2019-12-09T12:33:59","slug":"massive-cuts-to-minister-perks-in-south-africa-including-no-cars-over-r700000","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/360846\/massive-cuts-to-minister-perks-in-south-africa-including-no-cars-over-r700000\/","title":{"rendered":"Massive cuts to minister perks in South Africa &#8211; including no cars over R700,000"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Department of Services and Administration (DPSA) has launched a new ministerial handbook for members of the executive, slashing some of the major perks offered to government ministers.<\/p>\n<p>In a media briefing on Monday (9 December), DPSA minister Senzo Mchunu said that the changes have been approved by president Cyril Ramaphosa and reflect government&#8217;s &#8216;fiscal prudence&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Some of the most notable changes to the handbook include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>On the procurement of official vehicles, the cost of the vehicles is limited to R700,000 (including VAT), maintenance plans and security extras;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Members and their partners must travel in economy class for all official domestic travel as well as international travel where the travel time is less than two hours;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Travel by a spouse is limited to six domestic economy trips per year;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Additional travel tickets for private use has been reduced from 30 to 20 tickets a year;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>The state will not bear any costs in respect of security upgrades done at the minister&#8217;s private residences;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>The rental of cellphones and the cost of official calls is limited to R60,000 an annum;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>The ministerial support staff has been drastically reduced;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>The state will limit its contribution towards water and lights at R5,000 a month for state-owned residences;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>The continued benefits for members upon relinquishing office is one calendar month;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>A member is allowed to occupy one state-owned resident free of charge but may rental for other properties they plan to use.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Mchunu said that similar restrictions are set to be placed in other areas of the public service &#8211; including mayors and managers.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are in a period that requires us to make difficult and complex decisions above our own national interest,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Government is operating in an ever more complex and demanding environment, more so with regards to the fiscus.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Our approach to addressing the national budget and deficit has to be collective in nature, whilst adopting a holistic approach that yields substantial and coherent gains that are sustainable over time.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pay freeze<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In his October medium-term budget policy statement, Finance minister Tito Mboweni said\u00a0government has to significantly reduce expenditure in goods and services as well as transfers if it is to stabilise debt by 2022\/23.<\/p>\n<p>In the review accompanying the MTBPS statement, the National Treasury sets out a detailed analysis of spending on public\u2010sector wages.<\/p>\n<p>It reveals that 29,000 public servants, plus members of the national executive, Members of Parliament, members of the provincial executive, among others, each earned more than R1 million last year.<\/p>\n<p>After adjusting for inflation, the average government wage has risen by 66% in the last ten years, Mboweni said.<\/p>\n<p>In his speech, Mboweni also called for a reduction in Board and Executive Management compensation and benefits.<\/p>\n<p>He said President Cyril Ramaphosa has agreed to guidelines which will apply to members of the Cabinet and members of provincial executives.<\/p>\n<p>These include that, in the foreseeable future, Cabinet, Premiers and MECs\u2019 salaries will be frozen at current levels, with the likelihood of an adjustment downwards.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/320254\/heres-how-much-ramaphosas-new-cabinet-will-earn-and-the-perks-they-get\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Here\u2019s how much Ramaphosa\u2019s new cabinet will earn \u2013 and the perks they get<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Department of Services and Administration (DPSA) has launched a new ministerial handbook for members of the executive, slashing some of the major perks offered to government ministers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":180983,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-360846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=360846"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360846\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":360864,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360846\/revisions\/360864"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/180983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=360846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=360846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=360846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}