By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
The Social Relief of Distress Grant will be raised by R20 to R370 from April 1, finance minister Enoch Godongwana announced in the National Assembly on Wednesday evening.
About 9-million people receive the grant, which the ANC uses as a strong point in its favour in its electioneering in the run-up to the May 29 general elections.
Godongwana said that the minister of Social Development would soon be publishing a “comprehensive social security programme” for public comment.
This plan would include regulation changes, among which will be changes to the “new grant” – referring to the R350 SRD grant – and how much it will increase.
“I am pleased to say that, subject to the finalisation of the comprehensive social security plan, we will increase the R350 to R370 by 1 April this year,” he said.
In the Budget Speech delivered in February, Godongwana had announced that social grants across the board are set to increase over the course of 2024.
The increases to be implemented during this year are as follows:
- An increase of R100 to the old age, war veterans, disability and care dependency grants. This amount will be divided into R90 effective from April, and R10 effective October;
- A R50 increase to the foster care grant; and
- A R20 increase to the child support grant.
“We are sensitive to the increase in the cost of living for the nearly 19 million South Africans who rely on these grants to make ends meet. In this regard, we have done as much as the fiscal envelope allows,” Godongwana said at the time.
Technically, the SRD grant has not been officially extended beyond March 2025 – however, the National Treasury has provisionally allocated funding for the SRD through March 2027.
The SRD grant is allocated R33.6 billion in 2024/25 with provisional allocations of R35.2 billion and R36.8 billion for the 2025/26 and 2026/27 financial years.
The grant is widely expected to eventually become South Africa’s basic income grant.
President Cyril Ramaphosa previously said that the SRD Grant will be extended and amended to form part of the Basic Income Grant (BIG).