
EDITOR – Clinic committees are voluntary, advisory bodies.
As such, any adult member of the local community, regardless of age, is eligible to volunteer his or her time as a member. Nowhere is it prescribed that the composition of a clinic committee has to reflect gender, race, religion or disability (see section 42 of Act 61 of 2003). Nowhere is it specified that affinity is required for a particular area of concern such as sexual orientation, diabetic, cardiac or paediatric issues.
Cllr Prinsloo’s call for youth volunteers within a specified age range to service LGBT interests is therefore completely out of order and contrary to the parameters of clinic committee membership. It is also at odds with the political party he represents which claims to promote “an open society” and which is opposed to social profiling, discrimination and quotas.
Terms and conditions do not apply to volunteerism. Cllr Prinsloo should be grateful, as I was when I chaired the Bluff Clinic committee, for anyone who volunteers their time and concern. As such, beyond producing an ID card and proof of residence, Cllr Prinsloo’s prescription that membership application should include a CV is unnecessary and ridiculous. Research on clinic committee membership elsewhere in the country shows that in some cases communities nominate prospective members or that they are selected merely by a show of hands at a community meeting.
A clinic committee is purely a civic conduit for liaison between clinic patients and the clinic’s professional staff. It has no jurisdiction and, like a councillor, may only make representation on behalf of complainants. It may make suggestions but it may not prescribe policy. Accordingly, in the interests of an open, non-discriminatory Bluff community, I ask that Cllr Prinsloo adheres to the parameters pertaining to clinic committee membership and withdraws the notice he filed in the 28 September issue of the SUN concerning membership.
DR DUNCAN DU BOIS
Former ward 66 councillor