GOOD Speech by Patricia de Lille,
GOOD Leader
14 June 2023
GOOD morning sisters and brothers, and members representing the 4th estate…
Thank you for braving the cold and wet winter weather to join us this afternoon.
About six months ago, we began working on a feasibility exercise for the introduction of a Basic Income Grant, with a view to launching a public campaign for its implementation.
With the preparatory work done, we are now ready to launch the campaign.
About 2500 years ago, Confucius remarked: “In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of.”
What would the ancient philosopher have made of South Africa, today? A country that is characterised by extreme poverty, inequality, and corrupt self-enrichment, where the few who are wealthy have no qualms about flaunting it?
Ladies and gentlemen…
GOOD is a young party that was established a few months before the 2019 election.
The South Africa of our vision is one of justice – social, economic, environmental and spatial justice – for all of our people.
We created an alternative platform because we know that effective opposition politics demands more than just opposing everything in sight.
The fact that we’re in opposition does not diminish our duty to serve our people.
When I first entered organised politics, as a young firebrand unionist, our struggles were for similar principles of justice to those we strive for today.
We didn’t know much about the environment, then, but we knew all about the social, economic and spatial injustice around which our lives had been forcibly structured.
The quality of life of millions of South Africans today, nearly three decades after we negotiated a new Constitution speaking to an entirely new landscape of fairness, is shameful.
Millions of young people, with and without qualifications, and millions of mothers and fathers, people in the most productive phase of their lives, cannot be productive because they don’t have jobs. They don’t have any income.
Millions of people can’t contribute at home. They don’t have the means to put a loaf of bread on the table; don’t have money for a unit of electricity, a pair of shoes that keeps the feet dry, or bus fare to look for work in town.
The State is already providing grants to children and pensioners, and the disabled, among others. But it is excluding those who are excluded by the economy?
This isn’t justice or fairness, and nor is it sustainable.
My friends…
My colleague, Brett Herron, will later address you on issues of affordability, mechanisms and finance.
We are very conscious of the present state of the economy, and the cost to the fiscus of introducing another grant. But we are equally conscious of the unaffordability of not introducing it.
The devastating impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on our already embattled economy, which has been struggling to regain vigour since the global recession 15 years ago, are well-documented.
Covid-19 exposed fault-lines in our society of poverty and inequality in our country.
When the Social Distress of Relief Grant was introduced, the number of people who qualified to receive it was staggering
Since then the value of the grant has been reduced, and thresholds tightened. That 7.5 million South Africans qualify for the pitiful R350 SDR grant today, because they effectively have no other sources of income. This is inhumane.
That’s 7.5 million South Africans who survive on a monthly budget equivalent to the cost of a decent steak or bottle of wine in a restaurant in the suburbs.
It was heart-breaking to see the number of young graduates who applied for the SDR grant – more than 700 000. Not all of them would have qualified for the grant, but the number illustrates the extent of the youth’s struggles.
Programme director…
South Africa needs to create space at the table for all our citizens.
We, of all countries, have a particular responsibility to do so because the vast majority of our people who are marginalised and impoverished today were deliberately marginalised and impoverished by our past.
There’s a phrase we’ve become used to in South Africa: The missing middle. It’s most commonly applied to the category of tertiary students who don’t qualify for a State bursary, but also lack the means at home to fund their education.
Our young and middle-aged people who can’t get a job and don’t qualify for a government grant are our societal missing middle.
It’s not that they deserve an act of charity. It is their right.
That’s why we’re calling on South Africans to support our campaign for a GOOD Deal. We’re pegging the deal at R999 a month, and we believe, if we put our minds to it, it’s a GOOD and affordable deal for all of us.
The GOOD Deal doesn’t leave anyone out.
R999 is not an arbitrary amount. It’s the minimum amount.
It falls squarely between the State-pegged food poverty line of R624, the minimum South Africans need to afford to eat, and the upper-bound poverty line of R1 417 per person per month, which is the minimum needed for essential food and non-food household items.
The concept of a basic income grant, or universal income grant, is taking root around the world.
The website, worldpopulationreview.com, features a world map with colour coded countries, from Finland to Canada and Brazil, to Namibia, Kenya, Iran and India, which are in various stages of discussion or implementation of such a grant.
It’s time to bring it home.
To conclude, this is what we’re going to do.
We are a young party with modest means, but considerable reach. We are going to war for a basic income grant.
Paying people R350 a month temporarily is neither enough money, nor do we know how long the State will allow it to last.
GOOD demands that government implements the BIG because it’s had enough time to complete its research, panderings and discussions.
We will use whatever influence we have, from our communities to civil society and parliament, to push for the GOOD Deal. To explain why it’s necessary and how we can afford it.
The media wields considerable power in matters of framing political issues and advocacy. It’s why you’re called the Fourth Estate. The people you serve includes all classes, colours and personal circumstances.
We’re hoping to convince you to create space for the excluded.
It’s a matter of principle.
Media Enquiries:
Janke Tolmay, GOOD Media Manager
Cell: 073 367 1223
Email: janke@forgood.org.za