Full Bench of High Court Trips Cape Town up in Tariff Lies

GOOD Statement by Brett Herron, GOOD Secretary-General:

The GOOD Party calls on the City to stop pretending that it gives a damn about redistributive and social justice, and actually do something real to narrow inequality.

The call follows today’s Cape Town High Court judgement declaring the City’s fixed cleaning, water and sanitation charges unlawful.

Rather than waste more ratepayers’ money on misleading PR or lodging an appeal to the Appeal Court, the City must prepare a new budget without delay and get it out for public comment.

THE GOOD Party was granted leave by the court to intervene in the application brought against the City ‘s unlawful tariffs by the South African Property Owners’ Association (SAPOA).

Now the City must actually do something to narrow inequality. It must stop its fixed tariff nonsense and develop a system that charges more to those who can truly afford to pay – most of whom live in areas that receive a superior basket of servicers from the City, anyway.

The GOOD Party sought leave to intervene in the case as a party because the City’s scheme linking tariffs to property values is illegal. The Local Government Municipal Systems Act dictates that a municipality’s tariff policies must reflect the principle of usage. In other words, you pay for the services you receive.

The City’s scheme furthermore unfairly targeted groups of people who simply cannot afford to pay, including those who have inherited property or whose property values have escalated exponentially due to gentrification or development.

Worst of all, the scheme was underwritten by lies because the only real pro-poor elements in the entire Cape Town budget, including free basic services and expanded sanitation provision, are not funded by cross-subsidisation from wealthy residents but through conditional grants from the National Treasury.

Of the R4.7 billion the City received from Treasury last year in the form of its local government equitable share, the City budgeted just R2.7 billion toward free basic services. The poorest residents are thus clearly not supported by the City’s generosity or any sort of progressive thinking.

The High Court accepted the GOOD Party’s submissions that, first, the fixed charges are unlawful and imposed in violation of the Systems Act in that they are not linked to

Consumption and, second, that the City’s contend that the cleaning charge is cheaper than charging rates for the provision of this service was factually incorrect.

The court’s judgement is an opportunity for the City to do something pro-poor in an election year. Wise people won’t put their money on it doing so.

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