Madam Speaker,
infrastructure development is one of the most important drivers of economic growth, of inclusion, and of service delivery. In the time I have available, I would like to highlight a few areas of progress.
Firstly, more than R1,3 trillion has been invested in infrastructure over the past five years. That is equal to about R1 billion per working day, to improve the backbone of the economy, to enable government to provide services to millions of citizens - to do the things that all of us, in Parliament, in the community, and in society, rely on.
This investment has helped to grow the economy by almost R300 billion per year. Our research shows that it helped South Africa from going into a recession, in 2015. That infrastructure programme has created many new jobs. It has helped to bring young people into employment. That R1 billion per working day that we invested sustains the country's quarter-of-a- million jobs in construction and in other sectors. Hon members may be interested to know