Mr Chairperson, I would like to thank all the members who have participated in this debate, but in particular Mr Sogoni and Mr Mufamadi and their respective teams from all political parties for their excellent work.
I know reading is not a popular sport, perhaps, in this House sometimes, but if you read these reports they are extremely valuable. They demonstrate that the portfolio committees have gone into far greater detail than ever before. They have tried to command the facts and the figures; they have asked the right sorts of questions; and certainly they are beginning to discover both the good things that are happening in government and departments and the not so good things that are happening in government and departments. I think the House needs to compliment all the portfolio committees for the excellent work that they have done. Could you applaud them, please? [Applause.]
In the course of their work they have looked at the roles and mandates of departments; they have assessed the strategic priorities of departments and their measurable objectives; they've examined the operational plans and the extent to which they are being delivered. There is a powerful relationship between the executive, the administration, the Appropriations committee, the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, Scopa, and indeed all of the other committees as well.
Now, one of the things that has come through in this debate is the necessity to reinforce what the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement is. The MTBPS is not the Budget. The MTBPS is here to update you on the economy to undertake certain adjustment appropriations and to give an indication of the fiscal framework which will guide the Budget for the next year and indeed the two years that follow. In doing so, it sets out, as many of you have pointed out, the revenue picture, the debt picture, and the expenditure picture.
What is interesting about the debate and the contributions of the various members and indeed the reports as well is the vast areas of agreement that we seem to have amongst us. We have agreement that the global economy is an unsteady picture; that there are still uncertainties in this environment in which we operate which we need to be extremely vigilant about. We agree that the South African economy is recovering, but clearly the growth isn't reaching the levels that it should reach. We also agree that the current levels of growth or the past levels of growth, and our capacity to create jobs and our ability to reduce poverty are not good enough for the future.
At least we seem to agree that corruption is a problem that all of us need to tackle. We seem to have some doubts in certain quarters about the will or political will of government. Let me, on behalf of government and indeed the ANC, emphasise very clearly that we have no shortage of political will. There is enough demonstration of that in terms of the number of investigations and so on going on in our country - you can clap louder for that one. [Applause.]
We also seem to agree that value for money is a concern for all political parties in this House. All I can say is that through the vehicle of the portfolio committees, can we start interrogating value for money in respect of all the departments and all they are doing on a much more rigorous basis than we do.
We also agree that infrastructure projects are key, whether they are operated at the national or provincial level through municipalities or state-owned entities. We also agree that skills development is a crucial project for our country and, as the hon Ngcobo pointed out, even in areas such as nurses' training colleges, we need to do a lot more to reopen them, re-establish them, and widen their capacity.
Interestingly, in much of what I have heard in the debate, there is also agreement that in a country like ours where poverty is a serious challenge and where development is a serious challenge, the state must be much more active than in other economies where this problem does not exist to the same extent. So, perhaps this is another area of consensus amongst us, and it should not become an ideological debate as it often does. The state must do much more. It must do it with a greater sense of urgency and a lot more efficiently than it does currently.
There is also agreement amongst us that monetary and fiscal policies on their own don't really solve our problems. As we approach the challenges of the growth path, the challenges of creating more jobs in South Africa, and the challenges of meeting the target of five million jobs we need a combination of policies, actions, institutions, and indeed the participation of all our people and actors if we are to deliver. So, more and more we should talk about not which single instrument is going to get us to where we want to get to, but what this package is that we need to put together; and that is what the growth path attempts to do.
In that particular context, the hon Mufamadi and the hon Koornhof made very important comments about the so-called currency wars, about where the world stands at the moment; about how national interests and global interests don't always align in a particular way. We also need to keep a very watchful eye on how South Africa's interests are affected by the actions of other, far more powerful countries than us.
It's a risky business to raise our voices, as I've learnt recently, but nonetheless we've got to speak truth to power and we have to say to those who take policy choices which impact on other countries - or have what the International Monetary Fund and others call a spill-over effect on other countries - what those impacts are and why we should continue to search for alternative ways of doing things which will give us a different set of answers.
With regard to areas that, clearly, you were expecting answers to and in regard to which you didn't receive as detailed answers as some of you would have liked, I want to repeat the message that this is not the Budget and this is not where all our answers and questions will be spelt out. So, on the growth path more details will indeed follow. There is a lot of intensive work being done by the whole Cabinet, and in time those details will become clearer.
Some of you have raised questions about our debt being high. The hon Singh even went to a dramatic extent, I thought - or the melodramatic extent - to say that debt was skyrocketing. We are nowhere near the skyrocketing range in the world, hon Singh, so please do not lose any sleep over this. You know we are really worried about your health in this regard.
The debt is under control. We have a credible fiscal path; we have a credible exit plan; we know exactly where we are going; we are not underspending nor are we overspending; we are underspending to an extent - as the committees have pointed out - in that in certain areas we don't spend the money we allocate to various departments and provinces, and that certainly is an area of concern.
Some colleagues and hon members have raised questions about where the details are of the National Health Insurance. The hon Minister of Health is not here, but I'm the Acting Minister of Health, so let me say on his behalf and mine that this is an area which is being worked on intensely and as soon as the numbers are available, we will certainly make them openly available to all of you.
Similarly, on the five million jobs, many of you have said that it is not clear how these jobs would be created. True, it is not absolutely clear, but I think we are beginning to choose a path that is fairly clear, and a set of strategic choices which are actually saying: firstly, if we continue like this, we won't succeed in creating the jobs - I think we all agree on this. Secondly, we have to do something different - I think we all agree on this as well. Thirdly, we need to put this package together under the title of the growth path and say what it is that we are going to do differently; how we are going to commit our resources; and what other concrete things - not just policy papers - we are going to do which will give hope to the millions of unemployed youth and other unemployed people amongst us.
You mentioned some areas - several colleagues and hon members have done this as well - of concern. There is absolutely no doubt, as the hon Koornhof, the hon Swart and others were saying, that what is happening in the euro zone is certainly an issue of concern. You would have heard us saying from this platform and others that there is no environment at the moment where you can say you can sleep in peace for longer than three days. Because as soon as you think that one set of problems seems to be resolved, another set of problems arises. That is the story of the last two years: that every couple of days there is something new happening - new fault lines, if you like, are being exposed, new imbalances come into play, and different trajectories are being followed in trying to sort out some of these problems.
From a South African point of view, we've got to watch all these developments and keep asking questions as some of you have correctly done: What is the impact of this for us; what are the implications for us; and what proactive or defensive measures do we take in order to ensure South Africans that we are doing the right things and not allowing these things to have a negative impact on us?
We agree with you on the value-for-money question. But, again, as Parliament you have a powerful role to play both as the ANC and as the opposition parties to ensure that our interrogation is far more detailed, the questions that we ask far more probing, and the demands that we put upon departments and officials to deliver value for money far more strident than we've had until now.
The issue of corruption keeps coming up, and whether we have the political will or not and whether we are going to be able to deliver or not. But let me repeat what I've said many times before on this platform: This is not a problem where one brush will eliminate all of the problems that we have.
We have to make this a matter of national conscience and national consciousness where every citizen understands that, whoever the public official might be in a political office or in a bureaucratic office that engages in this kind of activity, it is the public of South Africa that is short-changed at the end of the day. When the masses of our people begin to understand how they are being short-changed a lot more cutely than they do currently, well, those who are engaging in this type of activity had better be careful because that anger is going to come out in quite a ferocious way.
There was a concern raised about rural areas, and I'm sure Minister Nkwinti, if he had an opportunity to address you, would reassure you that we are doing extremely good work in this particular area. The Appropriations committee has also raised other concerns in that, for example, a number of departments have been neglecting section 43 of the Public Finance Management Act, and engaging in virements or shifting of funds outside of the provisions of the PFMA. About 11 departments have been engaged in authorising such shifts of greater than 8%. Again, I hope that Parliament will follow this up as much as Treasury will and ensure that the right things are done.
The other concern raised by the Appropriations committee and the standing committee is improved management of capital spending in government - and some colleagues have also mentioned this. There are areas where we have given money and it has not been spent; there are grants that have been allocated to either provinces or municipalities which have not been spent; and there were hospital revitalisation grants given to provinces, and almost one billion rand may have to be recouped in this regard. In certain provinces, though, excellent work is being done. These are areas which Parliament and the National Treasury as well as all Ministers need to take a lot more seriously.
The committee has also raised concerns about the plethora of funds, agencies and entities that departments seem intent upon creating. We are living in a period in which we need to be a lot more careful about the extent to which we expand our fiscal envelope, but I don't think that consciousness is going through sufficiently. Parliament can help a great deal by exposing some of these things - those departments and entities that want to multiply these, if you like, money-absorbing activities - and try to restrain them in some way.
There has also been some criticism and observations about the MTBPS - if the size of the deficit is too small or too large, whether there are enough details about the growth path, whether the department or financial institutions are active enough or not, and whether the revenue picture is correct or not.
All I want to do in concluding is to commit from the Treasury point of view that we would like to engage with all stakeholders; listen to the views even if we disagree with them; and allow both ourselves and others to put facts on the table and let the facts begin to persuade us as to whether we are pursuing the right track or not.
I want to conclude by echoing what the hon Ngcobo had to say - that development is not about figures, but about how we change peoples' lives. The hon Sibhida made a similar point. The assurance that we need to give the South African public is that we are passionate about making changes which will affect people's lives positively and doing this in such a way that we spend our money wisely and make real differences to people and the conditions in which they live. Thank you very much. [Applause.]
Debate concluded.
Bill read a first time.