GOOD Statement by Brett Herron,
GOOD Secretary-General
04 September 2026
According to the government, adult South Africans need R868 a month (or about R29 a day) to buy enough food to meet an adult’s required daily energy intake. But the government grant for unemployed adults is just R370 a month (about R12 a day).
What that means is that the so-called Social Relief of Distress Grant, introduced during the Covid pandemic for unemployed adults without the means to feed themselves, is sufficient to nourish the average adult for less than 13 days a month.
Section 27(1)(c) of the South African Constitution states that everyone has the right of access to “social security, including, if they are unable to support themselves and their dependants, appropriate social assistance.”
Each year, StatsSA calculates three poverty lines: This year the Upper-Bound Poverty Line, “below which people cannot afford the basic lifestyle that most South Africans consider necessary” has been calculated at R2962 per month, and the Lower-Bound Poverty Line “that forces difficult trade-offs between food and other necessities” is pegged at R1457 per month.
These figures tell us that the R370 SRD Grant is wholly inadequate, and that the State is not meeting its constitutional obligations to provide for its poorest citizens who are unable to provide for themselves. The SRD grant is presently distributed to between 8.5 and 10 million citizens.
For the past five years, since the introduction of the SRD Grant, the GOOD Party has advocated for its conversion to a Basic Income Grant of a higher quantum.
In 2024 the Party conducted economic research that indicated the country could afford a BIG of around R1000 per month through prudent financial management – without the necessity for new taxes or borrowing.
That figure should now be pushed closer to the R1457 Lower-Bound Poverty Line because, besides the necessity to eat, people need to clothe themselves, pay for electricity, cleaning materials, medical supplies such as painkillers and plasters, and public transport…
Paying the measly R370 a month is to condemn citizens to indignity and perpetual financial crisis – and re-affirm the radically unequal structure of a society engineered under apartheid and never undone.
Until South Africa experiences meaningful and sustainable economic growth, on the level that creates masses of jobs, a Basic Income Grant is a critical necessity. The more the economy grows the less the requirement for social relief.
The alternative is to leave things as they are which, besides the injustice of re-victimising apartheid’s victims, will continue deepening inequality with all its anti-social outcomes.
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