National Assembly Cape Town: 11 March 2008
 

The IFP is very concerned at the uncertainty surrounding the implementation of the Property Rates Act.  

It is clear from daily reports in the media that there are simply too many instances of poor valuations. We therefore urge anyone who believes their property is wrongly valued to take advantage of the objections process to have their property re-valued.  

In light of widespread public concerns, we also call on the Minister of Provincial and Local Government to reassure this house that he is satisfied that the valuations process has been properly implemented in all the municipalities that have completed or are presently busy with, a valuations process. 

Madam Speaker, the reason people are concerned is a fear that their rates bill will rocket. People accept increases but they do not accept unreasonable increases, and people may have sound reasons to fear the latter since there are cases where rates revenue collected has increased by more than 350%.    

We therefore further call for urgent finalisation and implementation of an existing draft regulation seeking to cap the extent to which rates income may be increased year on year, and call on the Minister to ensure it applies to rates raised during the current implementation phase of the Rates Act.