The Democratic Alliance has called for the disbanding of several government departments and doing away with district municipalities.
The official opposition was presenting its budget wish-list ahead of this week's tabling of the national budget by Finance Minister, Pravin Gordhan.
DA spokesperson on Finance, Tim Harris, says there is a lot of inefficiency and fat in government which he says should be trimmed.
He says they're calling for the disbandment of the departments of economic
development, women and children, public works and sports and recreation.
To this effect, key policy priorities in the DA's Alternative Budget include:
"Setting out to reduce government debt to levels close 35% of GDP in the long term by kicking off an aggressive process of fiscal consolidation. This priority is demonstrated in our commitment to running a budget deficit of 4.3% of GDP in 2013/14, an improvement on general projections of a deficit of between 4.5% and 4.7% for the upcoming year;
"Recovering nearly R30bn in revenue by streamlining government and curbing public sector corruption;
"Boosting the job-creating potential of small businesses through a proposed stimulus package including R9.4bn in tax cuts and R3.7bn in additional support programmes;
"Fully implementing the Youth Wage Subsidy and additional investment of almost R3bn in programmes fostering job creation;
"Rolling out new investments of R4.6bn in education and skills development, including R200m for an in-the-classroom training programme for teachers and funding for roving master teachers;
"Appropriating more than R1bn to promote empowerment and capitalise poor South Africans;
"Keeping South Africans safer with an additional R3.4bn to secure our communities;
"Eliminating broken promises on infrastructure expenditure with interventions to increase actual investment on infrastructure to 10% of GDP.
Meanwhile, civil society organisations will be holding a night vigil tomorrow ahead of the budget speech this week.
The 2013 Call for Budget Justice demands a budget that will give adequate scope to the state to address structural inequality and poverty and create an environment for ecological development.
The organisations say government should fund this budget through a just redistribution strategy that increases taxes for rich individuals and corporations, clamps down on tax-dodgers and broadens the tax base by addressing inequality.
"The 2013 Call for Budget Justice demands a budget that will give adequate scope to the state to address structural inequality and poverty and create an environment for ecological development."
"This would entail abandoning the 25% tax to GDP ratio and deficit hawkishness that have been the standard since democracy. Government must fund this budget through a just redistribution strategy that increases taxes for rich individuals and corporations, clamps down on tax-dodgers and broadens the tax base by addressing inequality."
"We call for an open and accountable budget that recognizes the right to know, gives meaning to participatory democracy and prioritizes the realization of the promises of the constitution." the civil society organisation said.
