WATCH: Government and labour still poles apart ahead of key MTBPS

For every R10 of government expenditure, more than R3 is spent on transfers, about R3 on public servant salaries and R1 on debt. The remaining R3 is supposed to cover goods, services and infrastructure. Transferring money from the wage bill to infrastructure is what the president’s economic advisory council suggests, but will this be politically feasible ahead of the municipal elections in 2021?

Michael Avery speaks to Dr Miriam Altman, director of Altman Advisory, and National Planning Commissioner; Martin Kingston, chair of the steering committee of Business for SA (B4SA); Matthew Parks, parliamentary co-ordinator for union federation Cosatu; and Peter Attard Montalto, head of capital markets research at Intellidex, ahead of Wednesday’s medium-term budget policy statement.