Hope For Better Policy Making

From The Government Of National Unity?

An article published by Ian Kilbride on 1 July 2024.

Buried within the small print of the Final – Final – Final GNU Statement of Intent is a short, bland, technical clause that commits the Government of National Unity to uphold the principle of evidence-based policy decision-making. Procedural, prosaic and barely noticeable, if applied to the letter, this clause is potentially the most revolutionary and meaningful for future governance in South Africa.

While acknowledging the Constitution’s founding provisions, of equality, restorative justice, and the imperative of transformation, much government policy and decision-making has been shaped by ideology and captured by secular political interests, rather than informed by evidence. Of course, every government has an ideological bias and a self-interest to develop policy and make decisions favourable to its electoral constituency, but this need not be at variance with the best available evidence when formulating policy, or decision-making.

While lacking any legal basis, clause 8.8 of the Statement of Intent binds all parties to the GNU to elevate evidence above ideology, or at the very least, ensuring that the facts are to be considered in policy and decision making.

This is not a new principle internationally and, for example, is foundational to sound governance frameworks developed by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development Policy Framework on Sound Public Governance. It’s also not new to South Africa. The requirement for Regulatory Impact Assessments (RIAs) to be completed before the completion of significant policy, legislation and regulation dates back to the second Mbeki administration. RIAs were replaced by Socio-Economic Impact Assessments (SEIAS) in 2015 and have been applied highly unevenly since then.

Indeed, a raft of political and ideologically informed policy, legislation and regulation continues to be churned out of Pretoria that simply lacks sufficient evidence to warrant its adoption. Worse still, policy lacking evidence risks becoming a costly and un-implementable white elephant the country can ill afford.

The most obvious recent example is that of the National Health Insurance (NHI). While the principle of universal access to health care is socially desirable and consistent with the provisions of the constitution, both the policy and legislation lack the most basic economic and financial supportive evidence of detailed funding and affordability calculations and modelling. Notably, costing and financial modelling is also entirely absent from the NHIs SEIAS. The result is that we are confronted with a piece of legislation, the intentions of which are progressive and laudable, but whose cost is unknown, but potentially unaffordable. Academics, consultants and private sector players who have ‘run the numbers’ calculate the total cost of NHI to be between R450billion to R800 billion annually, which contrasts markedly from the Department of Health’s ‘estimates’ of the need for an extra R200 billion to fund the programme. In toher words, even at the lowest end, NHI would require an almost doubling of the current Department of Health budget is some R259 billion. Nor has the funding model for the NHI been determined by Treasury and yet the President signed the Bill into law at the eleventh hour before the May 29^th elections.

So why should things be different in the GNU? Firstly, all parties to the GNU, not just the ANC, have signed a commitment to evidence-based policy and decision-making. Thus, an element of mutual accountability should be embedded within the new executive and parliament. This latter point is particularly important as the principles adopted by the Statement of Intent are to be extended and embedded within the legislative branch, thereby strengthening accountability.

The second reason for optimism is the commitment to an all-inclusive National Dialogue process that, together with parties to the GNU, includes civil society, labour and business. This precursor to the establishment of the promised and long delayed national social compact should give voice to constituencies concerned about the poor quality of public policy and decision-making and how to improve it.

The third reason for cautious optimism lies in the parties’ commitment to a professional, merit-based, non-partisan, developmental public service. Thus, if adopted the principle of evidence based policy-making should be embraced, supported and practiced by a new, non-captured, non-cadre based civil service that puts people first.  

Finally, the Statement of Intent commits to integrity, good governance and accountable leadership. This is precisely the political, philosophical, political and ethical basis required for evidence-based policy and decision-making.

Numerous critical policy and legislative choices await the Government of National Unity, whatever its composition, but if adhered to, the principles signed by all parties to the GNU provide hope for better, evidence based, public policy and decision-making.