Deputy Speaker, with regard to the Pebble Bed Modular Reactor Programme, PBMRP, as the IFP we would like to know whether the Minister has taken into account the human capital invested into this programme and the amount of unemployment that will be created by the project's sudden termination or not. At its inception it was projected that 57 000 people would be employed in this programme. The Ministry of Energy, the state and the country for that matter, can ill afford such turnarounds in policy decisions, especially when we are already so far down the road.
Besides the unemployment that is going to be created by this decision, the loss of money, taxpayers' money - yours and mine - is going to be enormous. As recently as October 2007 the then Minister of Finance hon Trevor Manuel brought before this House a Special Adjustments Appropriation Bill which was approved. Herein an additional amount of R1,8 billion was transferred to the PBMR project for operational expenses, bringing the total to R8,8 billion being spent on this project by government since 1999. Notwithstanding these calamities, we are further burdened by the prospect of no direction now in terms of our future energy sources.
We urge the Minister and her department to be absolutely certain before they commit to the next energy route that this country is going to follow, lest we have a similar situation on our hands in the future. Finally, Madam Deputy Speaker, this House deserves a full report on government's direction in this regard. I thank you. [Applause.]