... to understand how reckless you are in government. That's why! [Applause.]
Today, Eskom produces less electricity than it did a decade ago. Yet, this ANC wants to raid pension funds because they paid its management bonuses in this time and bloated its staff structure. The next time I see an ANC MP canvassing a school teacher for a vote, please tell that school teacher that you're taking their pension fund because you bankrupted Eskom.
Today, SA Airways, SAA, runs fewer routes and flights than ever before, including profitable routes like Johannesburg to London and Johannesburg to Cape Town, but it is in need of a bailout. The next time you canvas a police officer for a vote, admit that you're taking his or her pension because you appointed Zuma's friend, Dudu Myeni, to destroy the SAA. [Applause.]
The SA Broadcasting Corporation, SABC, generates less revenue than ever before because you allowed Hlaudi Motsoeneng - well, looking at his testimony at the Zondo commission ... Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs - to destroy it. The next time an ANC MP canvasses a nurse for a vote, please admit to him or her that you are raiding their pension fund because you let Hlaudi destroy the SABC.
Hon Hill-Lewis made the point that many of these ANC MPs before us grew up in the trade union movement and now that they have their parliamentary pension funds and top-up guarantees they don't need to worry about the impact of prescribed assets, unlike ordinary South Africans for whom lower returns will
determine if they can afford bread or not in their retirement. For shame, you have forgotten where you have come from!
Legalising the theft of pension funds shouldn't be on the table and even if comfortable millionaire managers go onto Twitter and say prescribed assets, just because they are millionaires who run asset management companies it doesn't mean they are interested in ordinary people.
So, I say to my fellow South Africans today, if your fund manager says prescribed assets are okay, run for the hills. Move your funds to a manager who cares about whether or not you can retire with dignity. [Applause.]
However, there is an alternative to all of this. It's called growth. Some ANC MPs will be familiar with the term growth. You put it on your posters and billboards. Let's grow South Africa together. Remember that? It was a few months ago. Maybe you remember it. That was your promise.
Growth will lead to more tax revenue that will quench the ANC's insatiable thirst for spending other people's money. Growth will allow enough revenue to sort out the SOEs and government debt. Most importantly, growth will pull millions of people out of poverty and reduce the burden on government services.
However, legalising the theft of pension funds is not the way out of the mess the ANC has created. The National Treasury has proposed a growth- orientated economic strategy document that not a single ANC MP has stood up for or defended in this House. With a handful of tweets, this document is a blueprint to do what the ANC promised - grow South Africa. It's a pity that these ANC benches, and back at Luthuli House, are filled and populated with enemies of growth. You'd think after a lost decade that the pursuit of growth would sit at the core of solving our problems in this country. Growth can restore people's dignity through jobs. Growth can restore the health of our fiscus and help our ailing SOEs.
So, I say to the ANC, stop trying to steal pension funds. Just do what you promised. Grow South Africa. We'll help you do it.
We'll join you. We'll grow South Africa together but follow through on your core promise. [Applause.]