Madam Chair and hon members, I rise as usual to thank the members of the House for the work that they have done in the committee and for the report which has been submitted here by the Chair of the committee. I thank you very much for all the proposals and suggestions you have made which indeed if they are internally consistent with what we are trying to do, we will take them into account.
In this regard, the debate about the Wage Bill is a serious one and we must handle it in a manner that does not seek to discourage civil servants because there are too many hard working civil servants. We must show our appreciation to them because it is these hard working South Africans who are going to take us forward. We must be careful as the Chair of the committee was saying not to conflate the size of the Wage Bill with the number of civil servants. The two are not the same and we must be careful about how we handle that matter.
I indicated where the problem about Wage Bill started. I do not want to repeat it here in case I get into trouble again. The fact of the matter is that we have some serious conversations to be had very soon going forward in order to resolve this problem.
The second issue is about the state-owned enterprises and I do not want us as well to confuse an ideological posture with what is a difficult financial situation. Indeed I am tempted to quote August Bebel, the German social democrat who said:
When the enemies of the working class clap hands when you speak, you must stop to reconsider what you have just said.
So, I am afraid that I may say something which the DA might just about agree with. So I will be very careful on how I go about articulating the issues around the state- owned enterprises. You know, it seems like what I say gets recooked and uncooked and presented in a wrong way. Nevertheless we should continue our work on the
structural changes which are required in the state-owned enterprises.
I appreciate the EFF's view on the neoliberal drivel which I do not quite understand what it means but nevertheless thank you for that. I hope to debate the matter with you but we have to proceed with our programmes of structural reforms. If we do not focus on structural reforms we would not be able to get the economy going in the direction that it should. Indeed I welcome the contribution to the drivel.
The final point I wanted to make colleagues is that in the manner in which we articulate certain things here, we also have to bear in mind that there is audience outside. We should be seen to be working together in resolving the country's problems. Last week, Standard and Poors was here and having a conversation with us because they are looking into our rating again and so was an IMF article for consultation machinery. So, the way we articulate certain, the way we agree or disagree has a bearing on what people think about us as a country. We therefore have to be very careful. In short Madam Chair, I came to
the podium to thank members for their contributions which I very much appreciate. Thank you very much. [Applause.]