SALGA annual report 2016/17 SALGA ANNUAL REPORT 201617 PRINTED FINAL | Page 192

South African Local Government Association Schedule 3A public entity i.t.o. the Public Finance Management Act, 1999 and recognised i.t.o. the Organised Local Government Act, 1997 Annual Financial Statements for the year ended 31 March 2017 Accounting Policies 1.22 Related parties (continued) Senior management of SALGA comprises of the Chief Executive Officer; Chief Financial Officer; Executive Manager in the Office of the Chief Executive; and other senior managers including their close family members have been identified as Related Parties of SALGA due to the significant influence that senior / key management exert over SALGA’s operating and finance policies. The governing body members of SALGA, being the NEC, audit committee, and performance and remuneration committee members and their close families have been identified as related parties, due to the significant influence these structures exert over SALGA’s operating and finance policies. SALGA does not provide loans whether at market rates/prices or non-market related rates/prices to either senior management, NEC members, audit committee, and performance and remuneration committee members. Only transactions with related parties not at arm’s length or not in the ordinary course of business are disclosed. Compensation paid to key management personnel including their family members, where relevant is included in the disclosure notes 1.23 Commitments Commitments are recorded at cost in the notes to the financial statements when there is a contractual arrangement or an approval by management in a manner that raises a valid expectation that SALGA will discharge its responsibilities thereby incurring future expenditure that will result in the outflow of cash. Items are classified as commitments when an entity has committed itself to future transactions that will normally result in the outflow of cash. 1.24 Segment reporting SALGA has considered the implementation of GRAP 18 – segment reporting. The organisation 192 is unable to implement the Standard, however, because it does not satisfy all the requirements of the Standard. GRAP 18.05(b) requires regular review of the potential segment financial information at its management meetings for the purpose of making decisions about resources allocations. Section 51(1)(a)(i) of the PFMA requires that public entities must ensure and maintain an effective, efficient and transparent systems of financial and risk management. In ensuring a transparent system for resource allocation, the SALGA budgeting process includes “budget panel hearings”. The budget panel is a formal established forum where all business units are granted an equal opportunity to present their respective programmes, in detail or summary, depending on the process for each year. The SALGA budget process requires all business units to populate their budget, in a prescribed format, on an annual basis based on their annual priorities in line with the approved annual plan. The respective budgets are presented to the Budget Panel which is chaired by a member of SALGA’s NEC. Members of the Budget Panel also include the Chief Finance Officer (CFO), Executive Manager (EM) and the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) (alternate chairperson), who assist the panel in dealing with various inputs from the directorates and provinces. The budget panel is a structure that decides and recommends the budget allocation after deliberations and requests presentation from all cost centres, based on the organisational strategic imperatives and advice of the CFO. Financial management reports for business units are only presented at management meetings for budget implementation and cost monitoring purposes. There are no comprehensive segment financial reports that serve at management meetings for purposes of making decisions about resources allocations as defined in the Standard. In view of the above mentioned SALGA cannot comply with all the requirements of GRAP 18 and thus the Standard is not applicable to the organisation.