A petition is doing the rounds in the Langeberg area requesting a local office for those who need to claim from the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF).
The nearest offices are in Worcester and Swellendam, and residents have to spend many hours travelling and queueing at a high cost.
The petition, addressed to the Department of Labour, the head of the UIF and the Premier of the Western Cape, comes from residents of Montagu, Ashton, Robertson, Bonnievale, McGregor and surrounding areas.
It reads: “Residents of the Langeberg region urgently appeal to the Department of Labour to establish a full-time UIF office in our region. The current lack of access to UIF services deprives our communities of constitutional rights and causes unnecessary suffering.”
The petition states that inadequate service delivery is a concern as officials visit the region only once or twice a month, which is insufficient for the more than 80 000 residents of the area.
Unfair access is another point of concern as residents must often queue from midnight before the office opens with no guarantee that they will be helped. This causes job losses, health risks and much uncertainty.
The nearest UIF office is 70 to 100 km away in Worcester or Swellendam, a journey the poor and elderly can ill-afford.
Moreover, the petition says, they receive poor-quality service due to time pressure. The officials cannot assist more than 40 to 60 people per day and hundreds of residents in the queues are regularly turned away.
The residents demand from the department that a full-time UIF office be opened in the Langeberg region within six months, preferably in the central area of Robertson or Ashton. They also ask for sufficient staff to handle around 200 cases a day and a guarantee that no resident will wait longer than seven days for an appointment. They also ask that a time-framed implementation plan be shared with the community.
“Our community deserves access to basic services without humiliation,” their petition says. “We are willing to collaborate with the department to expedite the establishment of this office.”
Councillor Danny September of Robertson said this has been an issue since the UIF was implemented in 2001.
“We are collecting signatures and residents are eager to support us as it is an issue that affects many in the community. We will hand over the petition when we have 10 000 signatures.”
He said people start queueing on a Sunday to be early in the queue on Monday mornings, only to hear that they won’t be helped. This even happens during cold winter nights as they are desperate.
“It is their own money that they’ve contributed over the years, that they have such difficulty getting access to. These people are already unemployed and now have to spend a lot of money on transport fees.
“We also get support from employers whose employees are affected by this. Mothers with young babies have to queue for hours away from their children in the cold, only to return home without being helped.”
Standard & Breederivier Gazette has reached out to the Department of Labour, but had not received any feedback at the time of going to print.
