Higher school rates hurt SA kids

One often wonders if logic ever makes appearances at the ANC’s policy conferences. The latest piece of illogical action has surfaced in a central government decision which will see municipal rates on schools soaring. In the case of Johannesburg, the charges to schools increase by six times their current levels for state schools and 10 times their current levels for private schools.

According to Christo Bokhorst, director at Rates Watch, an earlier change in the Local Government Municipal Property Rates Act, aimed at standardising categories over all municipalities countrywide, provided for a period during which municipalities had to do away with all but a limited number of categories. “Education” is not on the prescribed list.

Granted, there are discounts which can be applied to the rates bills for schools … but still, government schools will be charged 1.5 times what residential rate payers are, while in the case of private schools, the amount is 2.5 times what ordinary homeowners pay.

According to member of the mayoral committee (MMC) for finance Julie Suddaby, Joburg’s application to the minister of cooperative governance to retain the category, which the Act provides for, has not been approved.

This in a country where no one will argue against the proposition that education is one of the main ways in which South Africa can help reverse its ongoing slide into failed state status.

Every extra rand removed from schools to pay for municipal rates is one less which can be spent on providing a better learning environment for pupils. And, given that many government schools are heavily subsidised by parents through school fees and by donations and work for school governing bodies, this is yet another example of the government’s policy of double taxation. Ultimately it is our children – our future – who will suffer. This unjust and illogical law must be immediately revised or repealed.