Thank you, Chairperson. These are some of government's programmes that are directly focused on our children. Clearly this shows that the ANC government is a caring government that has placed the plight of our children high on its agenda.
South Africa is on track to achieve the Millennium Development Goal of universal access to primary education and gender equality. Disadvantaged children benefit from free education through the government's no-fee schools and its school fee exemption policy. In 2008-09, 98,6% of children of schoolgoing age attended school, which is up from 86,7% in 1996. Most promising is also the steadily increasing matric pass rate.
Allow me also to wish the matric class of 2011 the very best for this year's matric examination, which started last week. We hope they will be very successful.
What is very promising is the dramatic rise in access to early childhood development programmes for young children, which is up from 16% in 2001 to 43% in 2009. The plight of the three orphans from Qwaqwa, as mentioned, is not an isolated one. It calls on all of us to tackle the issues concerning children as a collective. In the spirit of ubuntu, our communities should work together to take care of our children. No child should be left to go hungry or neglected. If enough people were touched by the spirit of ubuntu, it would, in time, change the whole landscape of how children are treated in this country.
I conclude with the words of Graa Machel:
We must do anything and everything to protect children, to give them priority and a better future. This is a call to action and a call to embrace the new morality that puts children where they belong - at the heart of all agendas.