Thank you very much, Deputy Speaker. I was just showing hon Ellis that I have two speeches. Luckily he is sitting up there today, so he can't comment on them. [Laughter.]
Deputy Speaker, we are dealing with the Finance Bill. The Finance Bill is not a Bill that is normally tabled every year. It is tabled once to achieve a certain purpose. This year's Finance Bill has three schedules. Schedule 1 relates to section 34(1)(a), which empowers Parliament to appropriate money as a direct charge against the National Revenue Fund, as an additional amount for a particular Vote. In this instance we are dealing with Defence and Military Veterans. To cover the overspending, the amount that we are requesting Parliament to condone is R40 292 419,92. The overexpenditure occurred in the 2003-04 financial year.
The second schedule deals with the amount of R20 625 352,33, which was previously surrendered by the same department to the National Revenue Fund as unauthorised expenditure. That expenditure occurred during the 1998-99 and 2003-04 financial years. Today, this Bill proposes that we refund this money to the same department. The refund is provided for in terms of section 34(1)(b) of the Public Finance Management Act, Act No 1 of 1999.
The last schedule proposes the approval of unauthorised expenditure of R481 821 478,78. This proposal is made in terms of section 34(2), where the amount is charged against the Budget Vote of the Department of Correctional Services. In other words, the difference between this schedule and the other two that have been mentioned before is that this amount will be recovered from the department's own savings and must be paid in full by the department by 1 April 2015. The Standing Committee on Appropriation recommends that the House approves this Finance Bill. [Applause.]
There was no debate.
Bill read a first time.