Hon Speaker, let me begin by thanking you and the House for allowing me to postpone Question Time last week so that I could attend the Zimbabwean peace process on 17 and 18 March 2010 in Harare, Zimbabwe, as facilitator.
The time was well spent. The leaders and parties agreed to a package of measures to be implemented concurrently, as per the decision of the Southern African Development Community Troika in Maputo. The implementation of this package will certainly take the process forward. The leaders have instructed their negotiating teams to attend to all questions and outstanding matters during their deliberations on 25, 26 and 29 March, and to report back to the facilitator by 31 March.
I used the opportunity of attending the inauguration of the President of Namibia over the weekend to brief the SADC Troika Chairperson, President Armando Guebuza of Mozambique, as well as the SADC Chairperson, President Joseph Kabila of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
We certainly look forward to a speedy resolution of the impasse to ensure the full implementation of the Global Political Agreement. Hon Speaker, I thought I should thank you for that understanding, together with the House. [Applause.]
With regard to the question of our visit to the United Kingdom, the most important outcome was the consolidation and further strengthening of the excellent relations that already exist between our two countries. There was specific emphasis on co-operation on our priorities, such as education, health, the fight against crime and creating decent jobs.
The visit expressed, unequivocally, our readiness to host the 2010 Fifa World Cup and allayed fears regarding security around the World Cup event. In this regard South Africa and the United Kingdom signed a memorandum of understanding with the police and other co-operation partners during the World Cup.
We took more than 200 businesspeople along with us in order to strengthen economic ties and we underlined the importance of this relationship. They met with British companies to discuss opportunities in various sectors. The value of the total trade between the two countries in 2008 was R74 billion, and the United Kingdom is South Africa's largest foreign investor.
The meeting with the South Africa-United Kingdom Business Forum and other public engagements provided an opportunity to reiterate government's position on nationalisation. We reiterated that South Africa remains an attractive destination for investment.
On education, the two countries will develop links between further education and training colleges. This will help South Africa to tackle unemployment through skills development. We are also going to establish a South Africa-United Kingdom Next Generation Forum to deepen links between young people.
We resolved to work with Fifa and the Global Campaign for Education in their 1Goal campaign, aimed at harnessing the power of the 2010 Fifa World Cup for the benefit of education for all. This should be one of the greatest spin-offs of the World Cup on African soil. I urge members of this House to support this worthwhile campaign.
The UK reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the fight against HIV and Aids in South Africa, and is supporting our public health system in a new 25 million programme. This is to enable the achievement of key targets, such as cutting the rate of mother-to-child transmission and halving the number of new infections.
With regard to multilateral relations, we concurred that the UK and South Africa would work together towards the reform of international financial institutions to make them more effective, accountable and legitimate. We also welcomed the UK's support for permanent African representation on the United Nations Security Council. This will enable the UN Security Council to better address issues of peace and security across the world. The United Kingdom and South Africa agreed to work together through the G20 and the United Nations to make 2010 the year of action in combating poverty. This will include agreement on a global action plan on the Millennium Development Goals at the UN Summit in September 2010. Both the UK and South Africa welcomed the new High Level Advisory Group on Climate Finance and called for developed countries to provide finance from 2013.
The state visit has shown that ties between South Africa and the UK are getting stronger, and we will continue to explore areas of co-operation that will help us achieve our developmental goals. I thank you, hon Speaker. [Applause.]