Chairperson, in fact, one must start by saying that this is very disappointing. Thanks go to your and the Speaker's leadership for having captured the key essence of the role of Parliament, for having raised the challenges Parliament is faced with, and for having provided what alternatives needed to be brought about in order to ensure that we have an effective people's Parliament.
I find it extremely disingenuous and misleading on the part of the DA to even question the outreach programme of Parliament and, at the same time, they want to purport or position themselves as people who support the notion of a people's Parliament. This is because the notion is primarily centred and anchored by our outreach programmes - by ensuring that we reach out to our people, by ensuring that we strengthen our oversight role, by ensuring that we listen to our people, by ensuring that we become a responsive Parliament.
We cannot, therefore, be seated here and listen to an hon member not supporting a Budget Vote of Parliament and even questioning the credibility of the outreach programme of Parliament. I think that is very misleading.
We have said this, and you have said this also regarding the Budget Vote: One of the things we will be doing in this financial year is to strengthen the capacity of the committees in order to make the committees of Parliament very effective and to ensure that they are resourced in such a manner that they are able to respond to the needs of our people.
Therefore, not to support a Budget Vote that seeks to do exactly that makes one question why they are Members of Parliament. Why is your party represented in this Parliament? That is misleading. That shows that this organisation or party called the DA does not care about our people and, therefore, would not even support the notion of a people's Parliament during its outreach programme. I rise to say that as the ANC, we support you, we support the Speaker and we support this Budget Vote wholeheartedly. And we will ensure that we work with you to ensure that this Parliament is an effective Parliament that will address the issues of the poor and the marginalised in particular. Thank you very much. [Applause.]
Vote agreed to (Democratic Alliance and Independent Democrats dissenting). Vote No 3 - Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs - put: (
Declarations of vote: