“Where they are going we don’t know,” says the minister of education about the kids in grades 10, 11 and 12 missing from school. She lost them? Seriously?
She should have a chat with the minister of finance. He knows why those kids are not in school.
Many 14- to 17-year-olds are not school-goers precisely because they are denied access to the child-support grant. The minister of finance argues in an upcoming court case around the grant that kids over 15 should not get the grant, and that they should look to other types of poverty relief programmes, particularly those that stimulate economic growth and create employment.
He refused to extend the grant to kids older than 15 in his budget speech last week, even though the Department of Social Development said in its budget briefing that the child-support grant was going to be rolled out to kids up to the age of 18. Surprise, surprise, school enrolment takes a dive right after kids can’t access the grant.
Maybe the minister of finance and the minister of education have seats very far away from each other in Cabinet meetings. Maybe they don’t talk to each other. Maybe she thought that when the minister of social development said that the grant was going to be rolled out to children to 18, he meant, you know, now.
The minister may not know that the child-support grant is uniquely effective in meeting the needs of poor children. Her own government-commissioned research shows that primary caregivers spend the grant on the nutritional, educational and health requirements of children. For the vast majority of primary caregivers, these grants are their only source of income.
She may also not know that in the absence of the grant, children take work, pick over rubbish dumps, trade sex for food, and generally scrounge a living wherever they can. She may also not know that staying in school stops being a priority, or even possible, when you can’t pay for food or transport, or soap, or a toothbrush.
Talk to Trevor, Naledi. He knows where those kids are.
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