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ActionSA’s call for additional funding for the South African Revenue Service (SARS), rather than taxing ordinary South Africans through a Value Added Tax (VAT) hike, has been vindicated. 

After being allocated an additional R4 billion, a cause championed and placed firmly on the national agenda by ActionSA, SARS is now expected to collect R19.7 billion more in revenue for the 2025/26 financial year than was projected in the 2025 Budget, according to the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement (MTBPS) tabled in Parliament today.

From day one, ActionSA has been the leading voice in Parliament demanding that SARS be properly resourced to rebuild capacity and close the R800 billion tax gap created by years of underfunding. It was ActionSA that first fought to ensure that SARS received more funding. SARS’s improved revenue collection is therefore not only a victory for ActionSA, but for all South Africans who deserve a government that manages their money efficiently before reaching for higher taxes.

Despite this positive development, ActionSA remains deeply concerned about South Africa’s dismal growth outlook, revised down to just 1.2% for the year. By contrast, emerging and developing economies are growing at 4.2%, and Sub-Saharan Africa at 4.1%. External factors like global tariffs affect all countries, but South Africa’s stagnation is homegrown, the product of a GNU government without a credible plan to kickstart growth, and one too often responsible for its own economic own goals.

This is evident across key industries: construction contracted by 3.9% over the first half of the year, manufacturing by 1.7%, utilities by 1.6%, and transport and communications by 1.3%.

ActionSA welcomes the Minister of Finance’s renewed commitment to tackling illicit trade, an issue ActionSA has consistently driven across several portfolios. The illicit alcohol and cigarette industries alone deny the fiscus an estimated R30 billion annually, while the broader illicit economy costs around R100 billion in lost revenue. To combat this effectively, ActionSA calls on National Treasury to ensure that SARS, SAPS and the Border Management Authority (BMA) are properly capacitated to root out illicit trade and the criminal networks that thrive on it.

We also welcome Treasury’s commitment to implementing spending reviews to bolster efficiency, protect frontline services, and create space for investment in growth-enhancing infrastructure, expected to save R6.7 billion over the medium term. However, the GNU executive should lead the way by adopting ActionSA’s Cabinet Reform Package, which proposes cutting deputy ministers and curbing ministerial perks to save an additional R4.5 billion over the same period.

From the outset, ActionSA has ensured that our presence is felt in Parliament. As the unofficial opposition, we are holding those in power accountable while offering constructive, evidence-based solutions to the challenges that affect all South Africans. These solutions are finding expression in positive developments included in the Budget.

Issued by ActionSA Member of Parliament Alan Beesley