I move—

I think this gives expression to the idea expressed by the hon. member for Pinetown (Mr. Hopewell)—in another paragraph, but it is the same idea.

Agreed to.

Amendment in Clause 9, new Clause 15 and amendment in Clause 16 put and agreed to and the Bill, as amended, adopted.

I move—

I understand that at an earlier stage in this Bill in reference to a clause dealing with the duties of the auditor to satisfy himself as to the valuation of a property, the hon. the Minister expressed the opinion that he would have to rely on the valuation of a sworn appraiser. Sir, in many cases the institutions concerned have highly qualified people on their staff who are well able to value and I take it that the auditor could accept any certificate from a competent person with whose ability he is satisfied.

The idea is that the original valuation may be that of a sworn appraiser, but I am well aware of the fact that many of the bigger financial institutions have their own sworn valuators whose valuation would in all probability be accepted by the auditor.

Motion put and agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

May I ask the hon. the Minister whether he will make an alteration in line four by deleting “1959” and substituting “1957”?

I am informed that it has been rectified already.

Clause put and agreed to.

On Clause 2,

I promised during the second-reading debate that I would see to it that an alteration was made to maintain the present position, namely that one member of the commission must be a woman. To this end I move—

Agreed to.

I would like to ask the hon. the Minister whether he has any particular reason for reducing the number of members of the new commission from 13 to 10, as in sub-section (a)?

For years the position has been that all the members have not been appointed. Because of the reorganization that has taken place we have a member of the commission at every regional office. We think it is redundant to have so many members. In practice the full number of 13 is no longer appointed. We are only following here what is already being done in practice to-day.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 4,

I move the amendment standing in my name—

Sir, I think we on this side of the House have made it clear, in the course of the second-reading debate, that we were anxious to protect to the greatest possible and practical extent the rights and the powers and the functions of the local authorities in South Africa. I think we have debated this very matter with the hon. the Minister, under various other headings, last year and again this year. I would like the hon. the Minister, in this case, to consider whether there is any value—from his point of view—in taking the powers which he does in this particular clause, powers which will enable him to do exactly what he may wish to do “after consultation with the Administrator, and with or without the consent of the local authority concerned …” The local authority is obviously very vitally concerned with the housing in its own municipality. The hon. the Minister himself has said from time to time—he said so again last Friday—that by and large the local authorities have carried out their duties satisfactorily. In one or two cases, he said, they had done so extremely well. I certainly do not want to involve myself in a discussion with the Minister as to which local authorities have not carried out their duties properly, those which had motivated him to take these very wide powers. In the first place this question of consultation with the Administrator, while it may indicate a certain measure of desire on the Minister’s part not to carry out his duty as Minister without some reference to some authority outside his Department, has very little practical value, as the Minister himself will admit—because “consultation” in this content, as we know, does not mean the consent of the Administrator. In other words, as far as the Administrator and his executive committee are concerned, the Minister need not in any sense at any time pay any heed to their views. Consultation, we know, can and sometimes does take the form of an intimation to the local authority, in this case the Administrator, that it is intended that certain things shall be done by the Government through the Minister concerned. I suppose the only difference between “consultation” in this sense and the information or advice to be given to the Administrator, is that the hon. the Minister will await the reply of the particular Administrator, as a matter of courtesy. He is in no way bound to take any steps to carry out the policy of the Provincial Administration or the Administrator, or to give any real heed to their views.

That being the case, I think the hon. the Minister may agree, in view of the fact that he himself has said what we have always argued from this side and what has been supported from time to time from that side of the House, that the local authority system in South Africa is the cornerstone of the democratic system of government in this country. Having regard to that, and having regard to the further fact that if he does find one or two recalcitrant and uncooperative local authorities, he, as well as the Administrator and executive committee of the province concerned, has ample other powers to deal with such a recalcitrant or unreasonable local authority. This particular clause need not be part of the Bill at all, in so far as it eliminates completely the question of consent by the local authorities. At this stage, I do not think it is necessary for me to develop this argument. But I hope the hon. the Minister, apart from the reason he has already given that he must be armed with these powers in the face of the possibility that a local authority will not carry out its duty and which can be made, as I have said, to do so by other means, will say that he can well afford to delete these words “or without”, at least to make the local authorities feel that they do have some initiative and standing and function in the eyes of the Minister, in the provision of housing in their particular municipalities.

I am sorry but I cannot accept the hon. member’s amendment. I want to assure him, however, that he should not, as I have already said in the second-reading debate, read into this clause an attempt simply to ignore completely either the Administrator or the local authorities and to carry on in a self-righteous manner. As a matter of fact when this clause was drafted the Administrators, amongst others, were consulted. I think as it is worded here it is much more calculated to give the most effective results. I do not think it is right that the body responsible for the provision of housing, like the Department of Housing which incidentally also falls under the Central Government, should be placed in a helpless position in respect of this all-important service which has to be rendered from time to time to communities and to the State. As the provisions read in the past the Department of Housing was in a helpless position. I think we are now rectifying that position.

In the second place I wish to say to the hon. member that as the clause is now worded it is clear that there will be full consultation. There will continue to be consultation with the Administrator and there will be consultation with the Minister of Finance. That being the case it obviously follows that there will also be consultation with the local authorities.

I want to assure the hon. member that it is not the intention of this clause to enable us to go over the heads of local authorities without taking their objections into consideration. There will be proper consultation. I think this power must vest in the Department of Housing and in the commission so as to assure that the necessary housing is provided where it is at all possible.

I am sorry I cannot agree entirely with the hon. the Minister’s explanation. He has specifically chosen to insert the words “with or without the consent of the local authority concerned”. If the hon. the Minister wants to proceed with any matter such as this, namely, the amendment of the conditions of a loan, and if he wants to use the opinion of the Administrator as his yardstick whether to vary those conditions or not, totally disregarding the local authority, then he should say that clearly. I think he should then say “with the consent of the Administrator” and leave out all reference to the local authority. Because that is really what he is trying to tell us in this clause and that is why he will not accept the amendment. He wants to do it with or without the consent of the local authority. He says so quite clearly. I believe this clause which is almost in the nature of an insult to the local authorities should be left out. If he were to leave it out he would be far better advised. He can then say “with the consent of the Administrator” who in turn, from his level, could have consulted with the local authority and thus be in a better position to advise the hon. the Minister. I do not like this clause a bit and I am surprised that the hon. the Minister inserted it at all.

I want to repeat, Sir, if he wants to consult the Administrator only he must not put in this little kick at the local authority. He must leave it out entirely. Say “with the consent of the Administrator concerned” and then I think the Minister will be achieving his objective without insulting the local authorities.

Perhaps I did not express myself clearly. The position remains that the Minister of Finance will be consulted. That control remains. In the second place the Administrator has to be consulted. You may have the position that a high reserve fund has been built up over the years and that, after thorough investigation, you are convinced that that reserve fund must be used for other purposes in order to improve the housing there and to make it more convenient. Hon. members hold it against me because I intend going over the head of the local authority if they are unwilling. I do not want to attack local authorities to-day and it must not be interpreted as such. But there will be cases—I know what I am talking about—where a local authority will simply not be prepared to provide the necessary services or to utilize the funds they have built up for other purposes. I think the fact that the Administrator of the province concerned and the Minister of Finance have to be consulted is sufficient guarantee. As hon. members know local authorities change from year to year; every few years there is a newly constituted local authority. Hon. members also know what petty local squabbles you get in local authorities. I really do not think hon. members should see any harm in this. They must be satisfied, with the guarantee in the form of the Administrator and the Minister of Finance, that the best interests of those accommodated under the scheme will be served. I regret, therefore, that I cannot accept the amendment.

Before I deal with another aspect of the same clause, I should like to remind the hon. the Minister that a local authority is in any case completely under the control of the Administrator of that province. A local authority may not spend a cent of its ratepayers’ money without the authority of the Administrator.

That is why we are still going to consult the Administrator.

In other words, what the hon. member for Umlazi (Mr. Lewis) has said is really true, namely, that if the Minister wishes to exercise that very final control over the recalcitrant local authority, he can do so by saying “with the consent of the Administrator” rather than “with or without the consent of the local authority”. He can achieve exactly the same object without this, as I regard it, affront to the local authorities. Is there any reason why the hon. the Minister cannot accept that suggestion?

It is a much better approach.

But the Administrators were consulted.

I want to put this to the hon. the Minister that since the Government appoints the Administrators, they are less likely to find anything iniquitous about this clause than the several hundred local authorities throughout the country. I can well understand a local authority taking the view we said they would take, while at the same time I realize that when the Minister discussed this with the Administrators, who are more or less colleagues of his, they were more prone to say: If that is the way you want it, all right, you can have it that way. We are pleading even for the consent of the Administrator, particularly for the sake of the status of the local authority as well as for the sake of the status and dignity of the Administrator, before certain things are done. However, I do not want to push the Minister on this point. If he thinks about it, I think he will realize that he can improve this clause, without sacrificing any powers, by shifting the emphasis of consent on to the Administrator and taking it off the local authority.

The other point I should like the hon. the Minister to consider is the question of retrospectivity. This is most important. Not only can certain things be done with or without the consent of the local authority, if the Minister so desires, but he can “amend or substitute new conditions for the conditions of any advance which it approved (i.e. the local authority and the commission) under the provisions of Section 11 …”. And after he has consulted, etc., and if he has any reason to do so, he can even take into account the state of any reserve fund established with the approval of the commission. I want to put it to the hon. the Minister that quite apart from the undesirability of his total failure to obtain the consent of the local authority, the local authority which must at all times be his instrument in any municipality to carry out any scheme for the provision of housing, he goes even further and says, as I understand the clause, that even after negotiation and agreement about a particular housing scheme between the local authority, the Administrator, the Minister, the commission and the Department of Housing, the Minister can come along and say, after the event: “I am going to substitute new conditions or amend the conditions relating to the advance.” This seems to me to be extremely unfair. In effect, the Minister can take it upon himself to nullify all the negotiations which were conducted before a particular housing scheme was embarked upon, and say quite whimsically: “I want to impose a new condition; I do not ca.e whether you like it or not-—I do not need your consent.” Surely this is an even worse affront to the local authority than to say to it very plainly: “I am going to be in a position to initiate a housing scheme with or without your consent.” The Minister does not even leave it there; he says: “I can come, after the event, and present amended or substitute conditions and you will have no voice in the matter.” I should like the hon. the Minister to explain to this Committee why it is necessary to go to those extreme lengths when he has said that by and large, the local authorities throughout the Republic had co-operated and were co-operating very well with regard to the provision of housing. According to the hon. the Minister the greatest sinner of them all has sometimes been Johannesburg. But the hon. the Minister stood up here the other day and said Johannesburg was co-operating very well. Well, Sir, once Johannesburg is cooperating very well with the Minister, according to him, that is practically the millennium! Why does he now come with this kind of legislation when everything is going so beautifully and moving in the direction of Heaven? I should like him to tell the Committee.

I want to make an appeal to hon. members to accept this clause. I think it is wrong to say that we are limiting the powers of city councils. The question of what a city council may do or may not do is not at issue here at all. We are only dealing here with the conditions attaching to an advance. The conditions laid down in this clause can just as well be contained in a private contract between the Housing Commission and a city council. The Housing Commission may say: I shall lend you this money on these provisional conditions but I reserve to myself the right to alter the conditions, one-sidely, in future. If we rejected this clause, for instance, that would be done in all future cases; then this would only refer to existing cases.

I want to emphasize this point that to have such a condition imposed by the money lender, which is the National Housing Commission in this case, is nothing new. All the city councils at one time or another operate on an overdraft. Every banker reserves to himself the right which is reserved here, he only has a much wider discretion. We must bear in mind that the circumstances under which the Minister may act are restricted here. The position of the local authority must have changed; there must have been a change in the position of the local authority. Or, alternatively, the state of the reserve fund, which has been established with the approval of the commission, must have guided the Minister in making the change. The Minister, therefore, has not the absolute discretion which a commercial bank has in the case of a loan it has granted. The Minister must be able to show that a special circumstance in respect of the local authority as such exists or a special circumstance in respect of the reserve fund. Only then can he exercise his power. It is wrong to suggest that the Administrator must give his approval. The approval of the administration may be sought when you are curtailing the powers of a local authority because in that case he steps in as the guardian of that local authority. In this case it is after consultation with the Administrator so that the Administrator who exercises a central control over the borrowing powers of local authorities may be kept informed of how exactly the terms attaching to this specific obligation of his local authorities have been changed. It must be remembered that the Administrator has approved of the original loan granted by the Housing Commission to the local authority. If those conditions are changed the Administrator, the authority who approved of it, must know about it. In this respect I can again give the bank as an example. The borrower has to tell the banker what his other obligations are and if those other obligations undergo a change the banker must again be informed. Similarly the Administrator, in his supervisory capacity, must be informed. I think if hon. members opposite would regard this more as a commercial transaction where the lender is entitled, in certain limited circumstances, to change the conditions, the existing clause will be more acceptable to them. The powers of local authorities are in fact not being restricted.

The hon. member says the Minister must be able to “show” that circumstances have changed. But to whom must he show? That is exactly our complaint—the hon. the Minister must not show anybody, as far as our interpretation is concerned. Nor must the commission. The commission may consult the Administrator but the commission does not require his consent. The commission may consult the Minister and the Minister of Finance …

It is subject to the Act.

I appreciate that. The hon. member for Kempton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn) tried to assure us on this side of the House that what we have read into this clause is nothing but a bogy. That was the essence of his argument, I think, Sir. We read what we see in this clause and we read some very explicit phrases in this clause. I suggest with great respect to the hon. the Minister and to the hon. member for Kempton Park that there is nothing in this clause which requires the Minister to get the consent of the Administrator and/or the local authority even as to the variation, after the event, of any of the terms and conditions on which a loan was made. This is the simple fact. It would be another matter if the Minister were to say: That is true, and that is the way it is going to be. Then we would know where we stand. But the moment he says we are reading something thing into lit which is not there, and when the hon. member for Kempton Park amplifies that and says we are merely taking fright at something we need not have any fears about, I say they should look at the wording—and the wording is very clear. I hope we have said enough to give the hon. the Minister some reason to amend this clause in one way or another. He must either say “with the consent of the Administrator” or at least to agree that this rescission cannot be made retrospective. In other words, that after this Bill has become an Act and a housing scheme is initiated, he will be entitled to do certain things in regard to the reserve fund of a local authority. But to make this retrospective and to visit upon an otherwise innocent local authority any sort of penalty or hardship or variation or substitution of conditions is not the essence of fair play, and I doubt whether it is the essence of good government, or of good control. I hope the Minister will deal with this in a factual way—as we have done with this clause, by reading the words in it.

I do not want to keep the Committee much longer. Let us get down to the basic facts. The hon. the Minister said the intention of this clause was to deal with local authorities who were building up big reserve funds but were nevertheless using the money of the commission for the purpose of establishing various schemes. He wants them to employ those big reserve funds when they become too big and unmanageable. We accept that. I do not think anybody grumbles at that. Our only complaint is that he makes it clear in this clause that he can do so with or without the consent of the local authority. I think this is the point the hon. member for Kempton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn) has overlooked. This clause says it is going to be done with or without the consent of the local authority. That means in effect that the local authority is going to have no say in whether the terms of an agreement are to be varied or not. That is the position as I see it. If the Minister accepts my suggestion and says “with the consent of the Administrator” and cuts out “with or without the consent of the local authority” he will achieve exactly the same object and remove our complaint. I would appeal to him to accept that suggestion. I think it is reasonable and good.

I have listened to all the arguments and I have also had an opportunity of considering the suggestions made by the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Gorshel). In any case these are conditions which were originally laid down by the Housing Commission. As the hon. member for Kempton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn) rightly said the powers of local authorities are not at issue here at all. The funds which have been built up were built up as a result of the loans granted to them on the conditions laid down by the commission. The position may be that there is an old scheme in respect of which the rentals have been determined. Adjacent to it there may be a precisely similar scheme but in respect of which the rentals are much higher. You may have the position that a local authority simply refuses to view the matter on the broad basis on which the commission views it and where the commission may feel obliged to remedy the feeling of those who live in the new scheme that they are being treated unjustly. In other words, we are not in the least encroaching on the rights of the local authority. They operated in most cases with money granted to them at a very low rate of interest. The reserve fund they have built up they have built up with Government money. In other words, the commission remains the body that has enabled them to build up that reserve fund. In view of that I do not think we shall be doing the right thing to deny the commission this right.

Amendment put and negatived.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 5,

I move the amendment standing in my name—

1. (a) by the deletion in sub-section (1) of the words “subject to the prior written approval of the Minister, given in consultation with the Minister of Finance”;
2. (b) by the insertion in paragraph (a) of the said sub-section before the word “purchase” of the words “subject to the prior written approval of the Minister, given in consultation with the Minister of Finance,”;
3. (c) by the substitution in paragraph (b) of the said sub-section for the words “of Community Development” of the words “made in consultation with the Minister of Finance,”; and.

During the second-reading debate I explained the purpose of this amendment already. It is purely of a technical nature and it should be included as a result of the decision to transfer the Group Areas Development Board to the Administration of the Department of Housing.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 6,

I wish to move the following amendment—

In terms of the existing provisions the commission may lay down the conditions in respect of individual borrowers, for example, and the category of people to whom loans may be granted. But it appears that the commission itself is not bound by the conditions it lays down for others. The object of this amendment is simply also to bind the commission to the conditions it lays down for others.

I want to move the amendment standing in the name of the hon. member for Florida (Mr. Miller)—

The object of the amendment is to provide that the Minister can transfer any scheme which he has started to a local authority with the consent of the Administrator concerned, and not only after consultation. It is obvious to us all that the Administrator is surely the best authority to determine if such local authority is able to undertake this responsibility.

I am sorry but I cannot accept the amendment. I dealt very thoroughly with this whole matter when I introduced the Bill. I think we must simply accept that the obligation to see that proper housing is provided throughout the country rests on the shoulders of the National Housing Commission and that the final authority must vest in the Department. The State is continuing to undertake greater and greater responsibility for making funds available; the Department and the National Housing Commission are coming more and more into the forefront in regard to the provision of housing and, as I rightly said, a large majority of the local authorities co-operate with us in the provision of housing. Up to this stage, however, it has been difficult in some cases to get 100 per cent co-operation and we often did not get that co-operation in respect of the very areas and towns and urban areas where it was extremely necessary to provide the necessary housing. I repeat that I do not wish to lay a general charge at the door of local authorities. As far as most of them are concerned we have succeeded in getting their co-operation. But for various reasons some local authorities do not always cooperate. Sometimes the local authority is to blame, sometimes officials in the employ of the local authority are to blame, but the fact remains that it is lacking. I want to give one example, without mentioning the name. In that case, ever since I became Deputy Minister, I have gone out of my way to see to it that housing was provided for both Whites and Coloureds. In spite of the fact that attempts were made for five years and that the Chairman of the National Housing Commission and the Secretary of my Department repeatedly visited that place nothing was done; we could not move them. I personally have complained to the Provincial Administration about the attitude of those people. I can mention other cases. A few weeks ago a case came to our notice where officials from my Department had gone to the local authority and asked them what their housing position was. They said they had no housing problem. When our officials went into the matter they found that in the case of housing for Whites alone there was a shortage of at least 70 units. When they started to argue and ask the people please to tackle a scheme, they were told: “No, in any case we do not care for your standards, you cannot build those houses in this area and we do not intend carrying it out.” It is only in exceptional cases where this attitude is adopted, but they are important exceptions. You also get the case, to which I erroneously referred a moment ago, where the borrowing powers of a local authority are of such a nature that the Administrator may perhaps hesitate to give his consent, based purely on those borrowing powers, but where, with the funds at our disposal, we can make arrangements to see to it that the housing is provided. I think the Department of Housing and the Housing Commission must have the power simply to brush all difficulties and opposition aside and see to it that the people are properly housed there.

I would say that in a case like the one cited by the hon. the Minister where a local authority says “We do not want your scheme …”

Sheer laziness!

In such a case the Administrator would perhaps not take the same attitude as the hon. the Minister. Certainly in the case of an Administrator, we presume that he has a sense of responsibility; he is selected by the Government, not by anybody else, and in such a case surely the Administrator would be the first to take action, as he so readily can, against such a local authority which refuses to bestir itself to provide housing for its citizens, and which uses any sort of excuse to do nothing. Surely the Administrator would be the first one, because he is, as it were, the man on the spot, and he is responsible for the management of the province and responsible for the progress and development of his province, and surely he would be the first to rap such a local authority over the knuckles and see that in one way or another they would bestir themselves …

He has no powers to make them do it.

Then I would ask the hon. the Minister to give the Administrators those powers.

No, I am taking those powers myself.

Now we have it, Sir.

When the hon. the Minister is confronted with a choice between achieving something by giving the Administrator the power to do something or taking unto himself the power to do it, then he says “I take the powers myself”. Obviously I cannot pursue this any further. I wish him well with this power. I think it is wrong as far as co-operation between the Minister and his Department on the one hand and the local authorities and the Administrators on the other hand is concerned, but that is his attitude and I do not think the hon. Minister can expect us to carry the matter any further.

There are one or two minor matters in this clause which require some change. For example, in line 66, sub-section (3), the first word “On” clearly should be “An”, and then in sub-section (5), whereas the Afrikaans is perfectly clear, the English version is not. In this sub-section, surely, there is a word missing after “shall be”. I take it the word “undertaken” is missing. This has no verb in it.

We will see to that.

Amendment proposed by Mr. Dodds put and negatived.

Amendment proposed by the Minister of Housing put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 7,

I move the amendment standing in my name—

This is in line with the agreement I came to with the four Administrators of the provinces, and I have already explained the position during the second-reading debate.

I move the amendment standing in my name—

This clause deals with the composition of the regional committees which the hon. the Minister has in mind to appoint. The reason for the first amendment is that the commission is appointed by the Minister and he will lay down the rules and regulations under which the regional committees will work. I think that the appointment of the regional committees is a job that should be within the purview and responsibility of the commission itself. I think the original Act was like that and perhaps the hon. Minister could tell us why he has changed it.

The reason for the other amendment to insert “and any other persons” is that the Minister may appoint as a regional committee a committee consisting of one or more members of the commission and one who would be from the Department, that is to say, an official. I put it to the hon. Minister that he could with advantage employ other people, because further down he makes provision for the payment to people who are not servants of the State. I would like to ask the hon. Minister to accept this amendment, because it will be in the interest of decentralization and make the regional committees work faster. I think in that way he will get better results in housing.

I move the amendment standing in my name—

Provided that where the commission rescinds or alters any decision of a regional committee, such rescission or alteration shall not affect—

1. (a) anything duly done or suffered or any right, privilege, obligation or liability acquired, accrued or incurred under or pursuant to the decision so rescinded or altered; or
2. (b) any investigation, legal proceeding or remedy in respect of such right, privilege, obligation or liability referred to in this sub-section,

My amendment is based partly on legal considerations, but mainly on practical considerations. It is a practical matter because whatever a regional committee may do in terms of subsection (3) must in the ordinary course of events affect a local authority or someone else. It is equally obvious that between the time when a regional committee exercises its powers or makes a decision in terms of subsection (3) and the time when a decision is altered or rescinded in terms of sub-section (4), various rights and privileges may have arisen and various obligations and liabilities may have been incurred. The status quo of such rights, privileges, obligations or liabilities must therefore be maintained. Now much the same sort of thing can and does happen when Parliament or a provincial council alters or rescinds a law or an ordinance. In those cases the status quo as regards whatever may have taken place under the old law is preserved in terms of the Interpretation Act, No. 33 of 1957, which in Section 12 gives all the safeguarding provisions that are needed. But those safeguarding provisions of the Interpretation Act will not apply in a case such as this, and my amendment is therefore designed to give the safeguarding protections which are necessary in order that the scheme of things can function, and that everybody who acts under the Act can do so with complete safety. As I said, practical considerations are involved and it is to safeguard the practical aspect of the matter that I move my amendment.

I just want to put one question to the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (South) (Mr. Plewman). Is he suggesting to this House that if the Housing Commission as such is entitled to vary a decision of the committee, any legal contract the committee has entered into with a third person will be affected by that variation? That is what the amendment of the hon. member amounts to. He wants any contract the committee may have entered into with a third person to remain in force in spite of the fact that the decision has been altered by the commission. Obviously there is nothing to suggest that the obligations towards a third party may be varied or affected because the commission has upset the decision of the committee. Surely the fact that the commission can amend or repeal a decision of the committee does not affect the rights of third parties. Why, then, does the hon. member represent it in that light?

He is a stupid person!

I hope that at some stage this afternoon the hon. member for Cradock (Mr. G. F. H. Bekker) will enter this discussion and tell us exactly how these clauses should be interpreted. Up to now he has been of no help whatsoever. However, I want to say in defence of the attitude adopted by the hon. gentleman, to whom the hon. member for Cradock referred as “’n dom amptenaar”, that I have never been an “amptenaar”, but to my mind this clause has exactly the impact as outlined by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (South). The point is that here again you have an element of retrospectivity. Surely the hon. member for Kempton Park will not deny that. I put it to him this way: Supposing a local authority has already acted bona fide on the decision of the regional committee, what is the position? Take one of the best local authorities in the country—take Pretoria, where they are never at variance with the hon. Minister. Somebody will come along after the event and say in effect: Whatever you fellows have done here, with the authority of the regional committee, the Housing Commission, the Minister, the Administrator, your own city council, I am about to rescind this—and not a word can be said by the local authority! I fail to understand how the hon. member for Kempton Park can deny that this can happen.

If Pretoria acquires rights, those rights of Pretoria cannot be varied.

This Bill does not say it. You know, Mr. Chairman, I hope that one of these days we will be given a glossary of terms by hon. Ministers which will indicate exactly what they mean when they use certain words or phrases, as compared with what anyone outside means when using those words or phrases. Then you would know that what you read in this particular clause is not in fact what it means. But we as the Opposition are not entirely in the confidence of the Government or the hon. Minister, or even in the confidence of the hon. member for Kempton Park. We are reduced to the position in which we have to believe What we read in the Bill. So we read the Bill and we say: Ordinarily this word means whatever it means, and this phrase means whatever it means. We have nobody to help us to understand it differently. And I think that when it comes to a legal interpretation, the hon. member for Kempton Park will be the first to agree that a court would say: What does the Act say? Not, what did the hon. Minister say; not, what did the hon. member for Kempton Park say, one fine Monday afternoon—but what does the Act say? And the Act says what we say it says, and so I say again that the minimum we can ask in the form of consideration is that the hon. Minister should stand up and say exactly what he intends to do. [Quorum.] What I have been trying to say is that we are entitled to ask at least this little consideration from the hon. the Minister—that he should say: Yes, you are quite right, this is what the Bill says and this is exactly what I intend to do—and not rely on a rather involved legalistic argument by the hon. member for Kempton Park to cast any doubts over the clause and to lead us to believe that it means something quite different. We say, as the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (South) has already stated, and as I now wish to confirm as a sea-lawyer, that this clause says that the commission may in consultation with the Secretary rescind or alter any decision of the regional committee. It contains no qualifications whatsoever as to what may not happen. Does the hon. member for Kempton Park agree with that?

It does not affect any obligations which the committee might have entered into lawfully.

Then the hon. member must ask the hon. Minister to accept the amendment, because this is exactly what my colleague here has asked the hon. Minister to accept.

It is totally superfluous.

Why superfluous? On the one hand the amendment, phrased perhaps differently by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (South) but just uttered in a few words by the hon. member for Kempton Park, is superfluous, but on the other hand, as the clause reads there is no shadow of doubt that we have interpreted the powers of the Minister correctly. The hon. Minister will not deny that we have interpreted him correctly. So he should at least say: You are quite right, I am going to take these powers and you can take it or leave it. I like it that way. That we would understand. Speaking for myself, I always understand plain language, but when it becomes involved like that of the hon. member for Kempton Park, admittedly with the authority of his legal degrees behind him, it still does not make sense to us.

When the amendment was brought to notice I sought advice, and the information I received was the same as that given by the hon. member for Kempton Park, namely, that it is not necessary. However, in order to avoid any misunderstanding, I shall not accept the amendment of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (South), but I shall accept it if it is worded as follows. I therefore move—

If the hon. member would withdraw his amendment in favour of this one, I think the position will be much clearer and we shall be writing into the law precisely what the actual position is.

May I also point out that when I replied to the second-reading debate I pointed out what procedure would be followed. We have these committees and the commission, in consultation with the Minister, will decide beforehand what functions will be handed over to these regional committees, and the framework within which they will be allowed to operate. If there are border-line cases we shall expect the regional committees first to consult before they come to any decision. The position is not that the commission and its regional committees will clash. That happens in the case of other departments and it works satisfactorily. I think the fears of hon. members are unfounded, but in order to remove those fears completely I am prepared to move an amendment in this form.

As far as the amendment moved by the hon. member for Karoo (Mr. Eden) is concerned I regret but I cannot accept it. I have considered it very thoroughly. I have agreed with the Administrators to appoint members of the Provincial Administration they select on the regional committees. In that way the regional committees will be representative of three interests. In the first place a member of the National Housing Commission will serve on it. Secondly, a representative from the Department will be in that office. He will probably be the regional representative who is a reasonably senior official. And in the third place a representative of the Provincial Administration will serve on it. If I were to accede to the request of the hon. member for Karoo it would mean that I would be subjecting myself to all sort of pressure groups in those local authorities, groups that will ask me to appoint this one or that one. How am I to choose between all the groups? I think we should rather act wisely. The provinces are now represented and I regard it as a major step forward that there will be this consultation between the provinces and the Department. It will contribute greatly to facilitating the work of both but I do not see my way clear to accede to the request of the hon. member because I think that will only land me in a labyrinth of pressure groups and difficulties. The regional committees have to function. They are not there to clash with one another.

I think the hon. member for Kempton Park has tried to over-simplify a legislative problem. I indicated that it was a practical problem, because I have here a letter from a local authority that was very concerned about this aspect of the matter and it felt that it would be very ill-advised to act on any decision taken by a regional committee so long as this power to rescind could have retrospective effect and would be a retrospective rescission as the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Gorshel) has indicated. But the hon. Minister’s proposal which I accept is tantamount to the safeguard for which I have pleaded.

With leave of the Committee, the amendment proposed by Mr. Plewman was with drawn.

I am sorry that the hon. the Minister is not prepared to accept my amendment, and I want to make three points in the light of his refusal. The hon. Minister says that he would be subjected to pressure groups and that a municipality would say: You should appoint X, Y or Z. We all know the basis on which these nominations are made. I think the hon. Minister is doing the local authorities an injustice by suggesting that they might form pressure groups. What they really would like to have is a man with some practical knowledge. He may be an engineer, a retired man or even an active one. There may be people in the area who have particular knowledge of the local circumstances, and the choice would lie in the hands of the commission. Where provincial officials are a long way from, e.g., Cape Town, how can they possibly put a man on a regional committee? He can have no knowledge of local conditions or of housing, unless he is attached to the housing and town-planning section of the Provincial Administration. It can happen in the particular city I have in mind as happened in the old days when there was a regional committee stationed in Bloemfontein. These people had no knowledge of the conditions in the place where they were required. I put it to the Minister that there are many people who would like to see housing accelerated, and he should not close the door, but should accept “or any other person”. It is then within the jurisdiction of the commission to decide whether or not they want any other person. It may happen that there is a man with specialized knowledge. Now you close the door to him and restrict yourself to members of the commission and to members of the Department. I have no objection to that, but in the case of the province it is unlikely that there will be a provincial official in a place like, e.g., Port Elizabeth with any knowledge of the subject. We do not want numbers, but quality, people who know what they are doing. I ask the Minister to reconsider the matter.

I am sorry the hon. member for Kempton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn) has left the Chamber. Had he been here I would have asked whether, with the acceptance by the Minister of his own amendment, that should not have been the cue for the hon. member to tell the Minister that no amendment to this clause was needed!

But I told you it was not really necessary.

I believe we have now made some progress, and so I put this point of view to the Minister in regard to the regional committees. The essence of the regional committee is the local committee, the committee that is on the spot, in the region.

No, there are seven regional committees.

Yes, but the regional committee for Region A will be concerned only with what goes on in Region A, and not in any other region. That must be so. So in that sense it is in effect the Minister’s local committee, spread over perhaps 12 municipalities. Surely in that case the Minister can and should utilize to the maximum the services and the abilities of the people in that region, some of whom may be experts. Yet he deprives himself of any such possibility, as was pointed out by the hon. member for Karoo, and at the same time he does not give the regional committee the true character of a regional committee, because it consists purely of people who are officials but who really have nothing to do with the local affairs of that area. I have already given the example of the Local Road Transportation Board. There the local authority puts forward a panel of names to the Minister of Transport, and from that list the Minister chooses the person who will serve on that local board, and the Minister has a completely free hand because he need not necessarily choose any of these people. Take the case of Johannesburg. Often Johannesburg has put forward the names of Councillors A and B but the Minister of Transport has chosen Councillors C and D, because they happen to be supporters of his political point of view. I am only telling the Minister that we are not concerned with politics here, but we feel strongly, on this side, that a regional committee should incorporate a local and specialized interest in housing in that regional area, and the Minister can lose exactly nothing by agreeing that the local authorities concerned can nominate certain people who shall serve with the approval of the Minister, or he can go further and say that such persons must be approved first by the Administrator, in order to make sure that he, the Minister, will not be under pressure. In some way the Minister should find it possible to agree to the basic desire of this side of the House, and give some representation to people in the region other than the officials concerned.

I do not want to repeat what I have already said but I just want to explain this one aspect. I want to tell hon. members that the whole idea is to have seven regions with regional offices to serve the Department. That regional office will be in charge of the member concerned of the National Housing Commission, and will not be attached to any local authority. It is there to serve the whole area and it must do so objectively. I think the mistake we made in the past was to think you could appoint a member of the National Housing Commission to represent a definite area on the commission. That is not the idea here. Our very object is to have these regions represented and that is achieved as the commission is constituted at the moment. In appointing the members of the commission we also want to try to appoint people who are experts in one or other sphere in regard to this matter, either in the financial sphere or the sociological sphere, or an engineer or a town planner—people who can make a contribution in that direction. He is appointed chairman of the regional committee. What we are doing further is to appoint a departmental representative on this regional committee and to ask the Provincial Administration to appoint somebody. He will now probably have a committee consisting of three or four persons which has to serve the whole area. But if I acceded to the request of the hon. member for Karoo, an area the size of the Free State will have an office. Why must I just take somebody from Bloemfontein and not from Kroonstad or Bethlehem? You will appreciate, Sir, in what an impassible position I shall find myself, because it will not be long before I shall be accused of having taken somebody from Kroonstad and not from Bethlehem. That is precisely what I want to avoid. I want the regional committees to be above this sort of thing. That is why we are constituting them in this way. I really hope hon. members will not insist on this. We shall only be dragging local matters into the regional committees and that is not the intention. The intention is that they should be objective and serve the cause of housing, no matter which town it is.

Amendments proposed by Mr. Eden put and negatived and amendments proposed by the Minister of Housing put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 10,

I move—

This gives effect to a further part of the agreements entered into with the four Administrators, namely, that the same rights which the Housing Commission will have to embark upon a scheme without being subject to the existing building regulations will, in given circumstances, to be agreed upon by the Administrator and the Minister, be enjoyed by local authorities and that the building regulations will also be lifted in those cases where a scheme, financed by the State, is being carried out under the supervision of a local authority. This does not only refer to wooden houses but also to other prefabricated material which may be used in future.

I am a little concerned about this question of allowing local authorities to be exempted from their own by-laws and regulations. The object of the Minister in introducing this authority is quite a good one, but what I want to know is this. Did he put it to the Administrators that they should recommend to local authorities to change their by-laws and make it possible for persons who are prepared to build houses of different types to do so? They should be able to do so, because I think private enterprise can and wants to tackle the problem of providing houses in the economic class for large numbers of people. It will also give many people employment. What I cannot understand is why the alternative types of houses are restricted to funds coming from the Housing Commission. I will give some examples. Most authorities provide for a nine-inch brick wall and damp courses, etc. Now people have come along in good faith and offered to build single walls of concrete blocks and/or small bricks. Others have come along and offered to build single brick walls reinforced with steel mesh. These people are in business and they could cater for a large number of people in the R180 a month class. I put it to the Minister that it would be to the advantage of the country as a whole if he did not approach this problem from the angle of breaking rules and regulations or by exempting local authorities from applying their own regulations. We are living in a modern age and modern methods should apply. If an individual produces plans for building a number of houses for resale, it is the best that can be done under present circumstances. Unless the sizes of the rooms are reduced considerably as well as the height from the floor to the ceiling, the cost works out at a price which the tenant cannot pay. We also herd them together in housing schemes where there is row upon row of houses which are all alike. By doing that we are not achieving what we set out to do. The whole thing hangs on the question of regulations and by-laws. There are local authorities who say: These are our by-laws and we will not do it any other way. I believe that the Minister, in dealing with the different types of houses, should set up certain standards and say that these are acceptable. Then if a private individual wished to build to those standards he should be entitled to build, but under the present circumstances he cannot. I concede that there are councils that are obstinate and will not allow departures from their regulations. Here is an opening, because I am quite convinced that modern materials and systems should be used. I will give an example. Whole walls can be cast in one piece, put up, and bolted together. I have seen houses with very thin cavity walls with paper used as insulation. I have seen all sorts of things like that. I do not know why the Minister is only asking that the local authorities should be exempted from their own by-laws. That gives the idea that the bylaws are somewhat onerous. If we are living in a modern age, we should apply modern methods, and I should like the Minister to consider that.

I gave the reply on Friday but I shall repeat it. In the first place it is a tedious process to have all building regulations which hamper modern techniques changed and that is not the task of this Department. At the moment the S.A. Bureau of Standards, the Building Research Institute, the Department of Housing, the provincial administrations and the Department of Economic Affairs are having discussions to see whether a set of standard regulations cannot be drawn up, a set of regulations that will be worthy of emulation, and which can be adapted to local conditions, but it is of necessity a long process. I hope that will be possible and all the signs are there that it will. Various organizations are to-day insisting that that should be done. A person like Dr. van Eck has already expressed himself publicly on this subject and I think there was a congress of engineers in Durban where they adopted the same attitude, namely, that there should be standard regulations. I have no doubt but that it will come about, but what we are doing here cannot wait until we have those standard regulations one day. The State has to deal with the question of housing and you have the anomaly that the Department of Housing can carry out a scheme which it finances itself without paying any attention to existing building regulations, but if the Department of Housing makes money available to the Municipality of Kimberley, Kimberley is tied to its building regulations, and it is difficult to get them changed. That is why we take this power to say to a local authority: Here are the standards we lay down. Because the National Housing Commission does lay down standards. What we have in mind is more particularly economic housing and not sub-economic housing, but two aspects have arisen. The first is the use of wood in respect of which there is a great deal of prejudice and where we must effect a break through. There is a committee under the chairmanship of Professor Louw and this committee will, it is hoped, submit its report towards the end of May on the use of other prefabricated materials such as heavy concrete, Iton and Supporex and various other materials which is to-day being used on a large scale overseas. A firm recently started a factory in the Transvaal where they manufacture prefabricated houses, something quite new compared with what we have had in the past. I know of another big firm which will probably also come to South Africa shortly and which builds on a large scale overseas. They can construct between 1,000 and 1,500 houses in a year in their factory. In that way we shall not only be able to meet the shortage but we shall be able to catch up with it. It is clear throughout the Western world that we lack the necessary manpower to continue to employ the conventional methods. I agree that the regulations must be changed but we cannot wait for that. In the meantime we have to act speedily but I want to add this that the National Housing Commission will be on its guard to see to it that inferior standards are not applied. We shall also guard against the danger of monotony. I hold very strong views in this regard, even as far as sub-economic schemes are concerned, namely, that we must guard against monotony. I think we have sinned somewhat in this respect in the past; I think we must get away from that. That is why hon. members will see that we refer in this clause to the type of dwelling, its value and the material to be used, so that when we want to erect a prefabricated house made of Iton, or heavy concrete, the position will not be that it is only the National Housing Commission who can construct those and not a local authority. I shall, however, bear the hon. member’s suggestions in mind.

The point I wish to raise with the Minister is, why does he confine this experimental stage to the local authority? He has already explained that he wants to extend the right of the commission to experiment with new materials.

The commission has that right. I wish to extend it to the local authority.

In the Bill the Minister makes provision for the activities of utility companies. Should not the same right be granted to the utility company which can then contribute to a far greater extent in the provision of housing?

They function through the local authority.

Yes, but the point is that I have read the Minister’s amendment in such a way that the utility company is not covered—it refers to “any local authority which is constructing an approved dwelling or is carrying out an approved scheme”. Therefore, as I read the clause, it is only when the local authority itself is carrying out an approved scheme that there can be a deviation from its by-laws, and I can foresee a situation arising that whereas the first body which can utilize improved and modern methods of construction is the utility company, it is precluded from doing so by the wording of the Minister’s own amendment.

I will go into that.

Then I will not press the point.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 12,

I move the amendment standing in my name—

The reason is self-evident. Assuming a local authority has held to land which was originally acquired out of moneys advanced by the fund to eliminate slums, and has not bestirred itself for five years, I do not think such a local authority should be dealt with as summarily as is provided for in this clause, because in sub-section (2) it says that they must do something within a period fixed by the Minister. This is a little bald. The local authority may have held the land for five years without being able to build on it for all sorts of reasons. I want to give the example of Jeppe. This has gone on for many years, and for reasons which were always beyond the control of the City Council of Johannesburg, and to this day Jeppe is still what it was 25 years ago, although everyone agrees that something should be done. In that case, the last person or body to be blamed is that local authority. But let us assume that the Minister is entitled to say: You have had the land for five years, and now you must get a move on. Then I think he should still give the local authority a reasonable period of notice so that it can then make a last attempt to overcome its own difficulties as well as those raised by outside authorities, and if during this period of notice the local authority fails to make use of the land, then it can be sold. If the Minister thinks a year is too long, I will not argue with him, but I think the Minister should agree in principle to a period during which that local authority will have the opportunity of carrying out a scheme on that land.

Further, I want to deal with sub-section (3). The Minister may direct that if the land is sold for more than the price paid for it, the local authority must pay over to the fund as much of the profit as he may consider reasonable. This clause is very significant for what it does not say. It does not say that if there is a loss, the Minister will share in the loss! We have heard various forms of partnership discussed in this House, but this is a very peculiar partnership. The Minister enters into a business partnership with a local authority, and if the land is sold at a profit he says that he is entitled to as much of it as he may determine, which may even be the whole profit. But he is discreetly silent as to what happens if the local authority sells the land at a loss. Where is the money to cover the loss to come from? What part of it will come from the Government? I should like the Minister to deal with that, because if this is a partnership between the local authority and the Government, it should be on a fairer basis. This kind of partnership does not even comply with the principle of the horse for you and the rabbit for me, because the Minister may only give them the rabbit and stick to the rest of the profit, he may confiscate the whole profit, and yet he does not contribute anything towards a loss! I should like the Minister to explain this.

I am certainly not prepared to accept the hon. member’s amendment and it ought to be clear to the hon. member why I cannot accept it. Just imagine, Sir, a local authority receives money from the National Housing Commission to clear up a slum area. It does nothing about it for five years but the hon. member wants to give that local authority another years’ grace. For what other reason did it get the money from the National Housing Commission?

To lend it out on interest.

In fact the principal Housing Act provides that where a local authority acquires land and pays for it out of the Housing Fund, for the purposes of the Housing Act, it must act within six months; in that case we only give local authorities six months’ time. But here local authorities may borrow money to clear up slum areas, and where they have already failed to do so for five years the hon. member wants to give them a further year’s grace. I can find no excuse for that.

Or six months.

No, not even six months. They must simply get on with the job of clearing up the slums; we cannot have slums in this country; we cannot afford to have them. Apparently the hon. member is satisfied, if a profit is made, that we should get some of that profit, but he wants to know what the position will be if there is a loss. Sir, I have never known it to happen that a loss is suffered on land where a slum has been cleared up. I have always been under the impression that the land appreciates in value when you clear up the slum conditions. I do not know of any case where a loss has been suffered where a slum has been cleared up. That is my reply to the hon. member. If there are to be cases like that we shall have to deal with them in the light of the circumstances and, if necessary, ask this House for the necessary powers but I honestly do not think the hon. member has made out any case.

I do not want to press the point in regard to the period of notice, because it may well be that after five years the local authority, having had the opportunity of doing its duty under the Housing Act, need not be given any further opportunity. But there are certain hard luck cases, as the Minister knows. In a certain part of Johannesburg, for instance, there was a doubtful situation for years because of Group Areas influences, and because it was very difficult, if not impossible, to redevelop or redesign it. I refer to the areas of Burgershoop, for example, and part of Fordsburg in Johannesburg, where the matter is bound up with the question of Indian occupation and business rights, etc. I do not say that that is the position to-day, but I am trying to see this matter from the point of view of the Minister during a period when such difficulties have arisen, as far as the local authority is concerned, and it has in all good faith found itself unable to go in for the clearance of the slum and for the construction of new dwellings. I want to put this to the hon. the Minister: It does not follow that a local authority which acquired the land in, say 1953 for slum clearance purposes has kept that particular slum going, as it were, with all the buildings on the site; it may have cleared the land immediately, but then found its building schemes could not be advanced. Coming to the question of value, I assure the hon. the Minister that up to now, at any rate, it has been possible for a local authority to show a loss on land. I can speak from experience. Land bought in 1953, for example, when there was a boom in the property market, fetched nothing like what it cost when sold in 1958. Since then, the position has changed again. Land bought in 1953 is worth more in 1964 than it was in 1958. The position may change again. A local authority buys land to-day for slum clearance, with the consent of the commission, and by the time it gets around to doing something about it there are difficulties; it may find in 1965 or 1967 that it cannot build; the Minister then says: “You have no right to hold this land; you must sell it,” and in Johannesburg this may mean a sale which runs into hundreds of thousands of rand, if it is a fairly sizeable area of land. In a case of that kind it is easy enough to show a loss if there has been a certain change in the property market. The same thing may happen where the council has been badly advised, for example, with regard to the price it paid for the ground. Surely the Minister concedes that a loss is possible. He is discreetly silent as to what he is going to do about such a loss. He should at least say that where there is a loss, although he believes it is unlikely or even impossible …

We will cross that bridge when we come to it.

Sir, the Bill has no provision for that bridge to be crossed; the Bill merely says that the Minister is a partner of the local authority as far as profits are concerned, to the extent that he will determine; in other words, he can take all the profits. The Bill says nothing, however, about contributing to a loss. Sir, this is a very curious situation. The local authorities have already been deprived of certain rights and powers and functions. They also find a difficulty in Clause 10, which is a very restrictive clause in connection with building schemes—that several advances may have been obtained for one scheme and then the Minister says that he wants the cost sub-divided; that he wants a separate accounting for each scheme. Sir, this will create a great deal of difficulty, especially with regard to the revenue account of the local authority. We have now reached Clause 12 of this Bill and the Minister has made a couple of minor concessions—but not a single major one. He should at least reassure the local authorities who are disturbed about this partnership clause, sub-clause (3); he should at least say to them, “For better or for worse, I am with you; if there is a profit I have the right to share—and if there is a loss, you have the right to look to me to share that loss”.

Nothing in the Bill prohibits that. We can deal with the position should it arise.

Deal with it fairly, I take it?

Yes.

I accept that.

Amendment put and negatived.

Clause, as printed, put and agreed to.

On Clause 13,

I move the amendment as printed in my name—

I need not say much about it. I have already thoroughly explained the position in the second-reading debate. This is a further part of the agreement with the Administrators.

I wish to move the amendment standing in my name …

Order! The hon. member cannot move to omit the whole clause. He can speak against the clause and he can vote against it.

Sir, I want to speak to the amendment standing in my name. In doing so I would like to make it clear at the outset that it does not indicate that I do not support the Minister in his scheme to build houses for the less privileged. I commend him for that and I think all of us, on both sides of the House, are with him there. Our difficulty, however, is the way in which the Minister now seeks authority to call upon the local bodies, the divisional councils and the local authorities, to supply services such as lights, sewage, water, etc. in townships which, I take it, are principally situated in close proximity to established local authorities. Sir, we realize that these services are necessary. What I would like to ask the Minister at this stage is this: Has the Minister ever had a refusal from authorities of this kind to assist in this particular development? The very object of the scheme, that is, to provide housing for the less privileged, is already sufficient to move every council to give its assistance voluntarily, and it is regrettable that under the circumstances the Minister should seek this power. The Minister has told us that practically all the authorities have been prepared to cooperate with him, and I feel in all sincerity that he should allow these bodies to continue to carry out these undertakings after consultation and with co-operation. The Minister is providing that the finances required may be recovered by introducing rates, etc. over these schemes. This only further emphasizes the necessity for consultation and co-operation with the local authorities. I think in this way the Minister will maintain all the goodwill which has thus far been given to him by all the local authorities. It is for this reason that I appeal to the Minister not to take this power but to rely upon the goodwill of the local authorities. After all, we realize that our local authorities have been pioneers in housing; they have in many instances led the way with the support of the Government and even on their own, and I would like to feel that the Minister recognizes the support that they have given him in the past and that he will continue to rely on their co-operation and goodwill.

Order! Before I call upon the next speaker, I want to point out that the principle which was approved at the second reading is that the Minister may under certain circumstances require one local authority to perform certain services. I have allowed the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Mr. Dodds) to state his objection but I am not going to allow a second-reading debate on this clause.

I accept that, Mr. Chairman. The one question I would like to ask the Minister is this: He takes the power to direct a local authority to provide services in the area of another local authority when he is satisfied that the local authority in which the scheme is undertaken cannot supply these services at reasonable tariffs. Sir, that is a very wide term, and whilst I accept the principle I feel that we should try to nail down what “reasonable tariffs” mean. Sir, there are “usual tariffs”. Let us take an example. I just want to get a picture of what the hon. the Minister has in mind. If the Minister decides to initiate a scheme for any particular population group within the area of a small local authority, whose ability to generate electric power or to supply water, because its water scheme is not a big one, is doubted by him and if the Minister thinks that the tariff of that authority may not be reasonable for that scheme, he then directs another local authority to provide the services. Would it not perhaps be better to say, “Let us expand the ability of the small local authority in whose area this scheme is going to be established, to enable them to supply these services at reasonable rates?” I do not quite understand what the final situation is going to be. If we are going to direct one local authority to enter into the area of another and vice versa, you might get one service from one local authority and you might end up with a service from the original local authority to the second local authority. It can lead to a great mix-up, and it is all based on the question of “reasonable tariffs”. I think it should rather be based on the ability or otherwise to supply the service, and I should like to hear the hon. the Minister’s views in this connection.

This clause is not directed against any local authority. What is contemplated here is this: In the Cape, for example, you have divisional councils and municipalities and in some cases you will find that a municipality is in a better position to provide the services than a divisional council, and in that case you may be compelled to provide a housing scheme in the area of a divisional council with the necessary services where the divisional council is not in a position to do so. It is in those cases that this power is going to be used.

*Hon. members want to know whether I have encountered cases where municipalities have refused. No, we have not had such cases yet, and that is why I said in the beginning that this clause is not directed at any local authority. But we have had cases where much difficulty was encountered, where a local authority was so weak financially that in any case, even had one lent it the money, it would not have been able to provide the necessary services. One may have cases where the Peri-Urban Areas Board in the Transvaal is faced with the position that it cannot provide the necessary services for an essential large housing scheme, but where a neighbouring local authority is in fact able to provide those services. It is in view of that that we are taking these powers. I want to give the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Mr. Dodds) the assurance that this power is not being taken in order to threaten local authorities, but that it is rather intended to promote housing and to assist local authorities which are not able to provide the necessary services.

The hon. member also referred to the provision of services at a reasonable tariff. Well, these things are never done by simply issuing an order from the head office of the Department of Housing. What happens is that consultation takes place. In the first place there is consultation by the regional office of the Department with the two local authorities concerned, and the hon. member for Port Elizabeth will be able to confirm that this recently happened in his city, where very hearty discussions took place between the city council and the Divisional Council of Port Elizabeth, and where we have now reached the position that we are going to erect a large housing scheme within the area of jurisdiction of the Divisional Council of Port Elizabeth. We also have engineers available there to give the necessary guidance. These things are worked out jointly with the experts of the various bodies, and it is only after this consultation that one reaches the stage where one determines what a reasonable price will be. This clause is not intended to be used as a whip or as a Government measure; it is intended to assist in providing housing where it cannot be provided under normal circumstances.

I just want to make one point in connection with the word “reasonable”. I accept the explanation of the hon. the Minister that this relates to municipalities and divisional councils which are close to each other, but I am afraid he is going to walk into a lot of difficulties over this word “reasonable”. The point is, who is going to interpret what is “reasonable”. The correct method, if I may make a suggestion, is that it should be the normal tariff, a tariff approved by the Administrators, or you might have the cheapest or the lowest tariff, or the domestic tariff. There are 101 ways of defining it, but the term “reasonable tariff” throws the door wide open to arguments and disputes. It is a potential seed of discord which may result in holding up the scheme. Sir, it works both ways: It is not only a one-way traffic; it is a two-way traffic. There is the one who supplies the service and there is the one who gets the service. They both come into the picture. If they are on a tariff which is laid down and approved by the Administrator they will in the first place know the tariff of the supplying authority. That is straightforward. Then there is the person who accepts the service. He must have the ability to pay and therefore the Administrator must come into the picture because the Administrator knows the financial position of these people better than anybody else.

I think that is obvious.

Well, I have made my point and I hope the Minister will see to it that the term “reasonable tariff” is amended. The last point I want to make is in connection with the Minister’s own amendment. The Minister is giving himself the power to approve a scheme within three months of the submission of the application, provided he and the Administrator are satisfied that the scheme is a satisfactory one. I think that is a good thing, but the problem lies with the Departments of State themselves.

I know.

I do not know how the Minister is going to accelerate the decisions of Government Departments.

I have already taken steps.

I think it will be a great thing if the authority developing the township and the local authority can have the assurance that the scheme will be approved within three months because there is a tremendous amount of dilly-dallying going on and nobody is able to get anywhere. We find that the people who are really responsible for the delays are the various Government Departments.

Sir, while we recognize that the principle has been accepted and that it is the Minister’s object to provide housing, I want to ask the Minister whether he can tell the Committee under what circumstances he will determine that the construction of an approved dwelling is being delayed. What is a “delay” in this context? In a previous clause the Minister refers to a period of five years as being the period which proves delay has clearly taken place. I put it to him with all deference that this is one of the words about which there is no clarity. Only the Minister must be satisfied that the scheme has been delayed. What is a “delay”? Is it three months or six months or five years? There should be some indication as to what is regarded as a delay, in exactly the same way that he gives an indication as to what he considers to be an unreasonable delay on the part of a local authority in getting a move on with a scheme. That is my first point. Secondly, in the same line the Bill refers to the “bona fide” inability of the local authority …

You must read the clause.

I have read the clause. “Where the Minister is satisfied that the carrying out of the approved scheme or the construction of the approved dwelling is being delayed by the bona fide inability of the local authority …” This is the salient point in subclause (1) which leads to all sorts of other actions. I want to ask the hon. the Minister to give some indication how he is going to determine “bona fide”. He says that only he must be satisfied that it is mala fide, and yet it can be bona fide in the mind of everybody who has dealt with the scheme. Surely the Minister must not merely put words in here and then say, “Well, I will see what I mean when I have to cross that bridge”; he must give an indication as to what a “delay” is; under what circumstances there will be good faith or bad faith, in his view—otherwise he is merely taking unto himself tremendous powers to intervene in the affairs of local authorities and, what is even worse, to allow the one local authority to intrude in the area of jurisdiction of another local authority. I say that because whereas, where there is no local authority on the spot to provide the services referred to here, it may be reasonable to say to any neighbouring local authority, “You must provide the services, and let us now negotiate about it”, the clause does not say that only in those circumstances can the Minister invoke this power. He can say, for example, that in the case of Roodepoort where there is a proposed housing scheme, he is not satisfied that Roodepoort can provide the services at reasonable tariffs. Sir, he can say (I do not say that he will say it) go to Roodepoort—“The housing scheme which is in your municipality has to be provided with services; I am satisfied that you cannot provide them at reasonable tariffs or within a certain period of time, and I am getting Krugersdorp to provide the services in your municipality.”

Go back to Hospital.

Sir, some service should be provided for the constituency of Cradock, and that is a new M.P.—but that is only my opinion!

The Bill provides for a reasonable tariff.

Sir, this is not nearly as absurd as the hon. the Minister would like the Committee to believe. He knows very well that in the case of Meadowlands, which was set up under an Act which made of Meadow-lands an authority with the same powers as a local authority, the Johannesburg City Council provided the services there for some years, and at a time when it showed any signs of unwillingness to do so certain sanctions were referred to which were used subsequently—to make that local authority provide the services. Surely here is a case in point. Within the area of Johannesburg the Government, for reasons of its own—and I am not dealing with the pros and cons of that—has set up another local authority and has told the existing local authority, “You have to provide these services”. Why does the Minister think it is so absurd, in terms of this clause of the Bill, for him to be in a position to say …

I have already explained what our intention is.

I do not know what the Minister’s intention is, since I am only concerned with what the Bill says. We are always at cross purposes because the Minister talks about “intentions” and “purposes”, and I, unfortunately, am reduced to reading the Bill and trying to understand what it means. Sir, this is no way to deal with it. The purpose of this Bill is one thing, apparently, and the way that purpose is expressed in words is a completely different matter. I maintain that in regard to “delay”, in regard to the question of bona fide, in regard to the question of “reasonable tariffs”, raised by the hon. member for Karoo (Mr. Eden) and in regard to the question of retrospectivity, this is by no means as innocent a clause as the Minister would have the Committee believe. Let me put this to you, Sir: In sub-section (3) the Minister says—

It may be a scheme that was completed years before this Bill came into effect …

Here again a local authority, which has completed a scheme years before this clause was contemplated, can be told by the Minister—after the event—that it had no business to make provision for the payment of any capital costs in regard to the rates or fees. Does the Minister deny that? He has that power. This is certainly retrospective legislation in regard to any scheme that was undertaken or any approved scheme paid for out of an advance. It does not deal merely, as the Minister would have the Committee believe, with the present and the future of the housing programme in this country. As this wording stands, it deals with things already done and completed, and the Minister, if he so desires, or any of his successors, could cause considerable difficulties to any local authority if it had any reason to upset that local authority. Sir, I also wonder why there is any objection to a local authority making some provision for the payment of capital costs in regard to the rates and fees it may charge. Providing, to use the Minister’s own expression, the tariffs are reasonable, what is wrong with applying part of the capital costs in calculating that reasonable tariff? Only if the tariff should be unreasonable, should the Minister say to the local authority that it cannot take into account any of its capital costs—but it may be that the local authority can in fact provide those services at a reasonable tariff, even when it has permit itself to charge part of the capital costs. The Minister says that it may not do it. I promise you, Sir, that this will create the greatest difficulties for the local authorities if anybody in a position of authority in the National Housing Commission or the Government desires to apply any one or more of these very irksome provisions of this particular clause. I would like the hon. the Minister to give us some indication as to how he will define, if and when such cases arise, as they must, what is meant by “delay” and bona fide, “reasonable tariffs” and “retrospectively.”

Proposed new Section 60bis, put and agreed to (Official Opposition dissenting).

Proposed new Section 60ter put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 14,

I move the amendment printed in my name—

Power is now being granted in sub-sec. (1) of this new section for the bondholder to agree to the sale of properties which have been attached, if the bondholder is of the opinion that his interests will not be deleteriously affected by it. It appears that the clause, as it was drafted, did not properly take all the circumstances into consideration.

The hon. the Minister says that this clause had to be reconsidered; the matter was put to the Department and I just want to say that I am very glad that it was found possible to meet our difficulty. The clause is much better now.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 16,

Up to now the position has been that “fees charged by local authorities in respect of properties of which the Commission is the owner shall not be subject to penalties”. Why does the Minister wish to extend this provision by bringing in taxes as well? I ask the Minister this, because if anybody should set an example in the prompt payment of its taxes and fees to a local authority, it is the Government and a Government agency like the National Housing Commission.

Order! That is not under discussion now.

May I not discuss the addition of taxes?

No. The payment of taxes by local authorities and the Government is not under discussion.

This clause provides the addition of the words “taxes levied and fees charged”.

I have explained that fully and I am not prepared to consider any changes.

Clause put and agreed to.

On Clause 17,

This clause governs the power of delegation and it falls into two parts. I am only concerned with the first part which reads—

1. (a) to the Secretary the power conferred upon him by Section 30 and sub-section (1) of Section 59 to approve of the acquisition by the Commission or a local authority of any land.

As an amendment I wish to move—

I think the delegation of power to the Secretary in the case of the Commission is understandable. The Commission is a Government-controlled statutory body and the delegation of power to acquire land in that case seems to be satisfactory and may be of benefit to good administration. But I think local authorities fall into an entirely different category of statutory bodies or subordinate authorities. They are established to carry out functions of local government and as such they are representative of a community and of community interests. In actual fact it is the whole community in such a case which becomes the legal persona and not the few persons who from time to time may carry out the executive functions on behalf of that body of persons. We know that all local authorities cannot be grouped together without distinction. You have small local authorities and big ones; you have important local authorities and less important ones. In terms of this provision however they are all grouped together in regard to their right to acquire land, which after all is an important function and may be an intricate one, can be delegated to the Secretary. I think local authorities of importance are entitled to regard the hon. the Minister as the fons et origo in regard to matters of this importance. This is a power which should not be delegated to the Secretary of the Department. We are not against the delegation of power, Sir; that has to be done. But I think where all local authorities are grouped together as is to happen here the delegation, if made, will have to be made in respect of all local authorities. Some local authorities can not be excluded. I am trying to indicate that the larger and the more important local authorities, representing as they do important communities, should be entitled in their dealings to have the Minister as the person to whom to look for authority or direction in regard to this important matter of the acquisition of land.

I regret that the hon. member did not notify me of his amendment. The implications of his amendment are not quite clear to me at the moment. In the circumstances I do not want summarily either to accept or reject it. I shall go into the matter and if I agree with the hon. member I will remedy it in the Other Place, but I cannot just accept it now.

With leave, amendment withdrawn.

Clause, as printed, put and agreed to.

Remaining Clause and Title of the Bill put and agreed to.

House Resumed:

Bill reported with amendments.

I move—

The effect of the amendment I am moving is to ensure in the first place that an officer of the rank of major, or higher rank, of the South African Defence Force may also act as a presiding officer for absent voters. The reason why we propose this is that one may easily find the position where a military camp is situated far distant from any official, i.e. any official for whom provision is made in this Bill. One may easily find a camp which is 30 or 50 miles from the nearest town, with 1,000 men in it. One cannot expect the police station or post office in that vicinity to make provision for that number of persons. In view of the fact that the principle in this clause is that the presiding officer for postal votes should only be a State official, and a responsible one, we feel that this principle will not be harmed by asking that an officer of senior rank in the Permanent Force should also be appointed.

It is for the same reason that in the second portion of this amendment we propose to omit justices of the peace and station masters as officials who can act as presiding officers for absent voters. The Minister emphasized in his second-reading speech, and we strongly supported him, that in regard to postal votes the most important principle in this Bill is the one that the postal vote will be taken out of the hands of the political parties and be handled on the same basis as the vote of a voter who casts his vote on polling day in the ordinary way. That is a principle on which both sides of the House are agreed. We believe it is a sound principle. It is a principle which will ensure there being no suspicion in the mind of any voter in regard to the safety and the secrecy of his vote. All the officials mentioned here as presiding officers, except these two, are persons who are in the permanent full-time employ of the State and who are also prohibited from participating in politics. The two exceptions are a justice of the peace who is not a State official and a station master who is entitled, in terms of the railway regulations, to take an active part in politics. A station master is even entitled to stand as a candidate in an election. Not only is he entitled to do so, but in practice one finds many railway officials on both sides of the political dividing line who actively participate in politics. One finds railway officials who are the chairmen of branches or the secretaries of branches, and who openly and quite legitimately support one or other of the political parties. These are the only two exceptions in the new principle we accepted in the second reading and which we want now to apply in the Committee Stage. Both sides accepted the principle of having only State officials as presiding officers. We now propose that this principle be implemented by moving that justices of the peace and station masters may not serve as presiding officers, and that only full-time State officials and persons who are quite divorced from politics will have the postal vote in their physical possession.

As the hon. the Minister surely knows, there are justices of the peace in Johannesburg, for example, who take an active part in politics. One of the Senators in the Other Place is a justice of the peace. A few of the Provincial Councillors are justices of the peace. These are persons who are openly and daily concerned with political activities and support one or other of the political parties. If we allow a postal vote through them it can still get into the hands of a political party, we would be violating the principle and a new ideal we are trying to achieve here. I realize the difficulties referred to by the hon. the Minister in regard to distant places, but I hope that the Minister will accept that the principle he adopted here is more important than a little inconvenience. I do not think we should grant greater advantages to the persons who vote by post than to those who vote personally on polling day. If there are distant places where it is difficult for a person to reach an official, then it is just as difficult for the ordinary voter who goes to vote on polling day. In view of the fact that the voter is expected to find his own way to the polling station, or that the party takes him there in order to cast his vote, we feel that the person who votes by post should take the same trouble to cast his vote. Why should he be in a better position than the man who votes personally on polling day? If the parties can transport a man to vote, they can also transport him to cast his postal vote. Even though it is a little inconvenient, we believe that the principle is so important that we trust the Minister will accept this amendment so that we can all unanimously maintain this important new spirit in regard to our postal vote administration.

I should have liked the hon. member to move that Clause 1 stand over until the other clauses have been disposed of, because then I would have been able to be very conciliatory and I would not have had to say no in regard to the very first clause. I hope hon. members will accept this in the right spirit.

I have serious objections to the first part of the amendment moved by the hon. member for Durban (Point) (Mr. Raw) that officers of the Defence Force should also be nominated as presiding officers. Perhaps the hon. member for North-East Rand (Brig. Bronkhorst) will understand my objections. As our electoral laws read now, any voter can choose to which presiding officer he wants his postal vote to be sent. In other words, if we now say that officers of the Defence Force may also act as presiding officers, it will mean that people who are not members of the Defence Force my choose such a presiding officer. Take, e.g. Voortrekkerhoogte. It would mean that Voortrekkerhoogte will have to be thrown open to the general public, people who have nothing to do with that place, but who can then say: I want to cast my vote with Officer A or B.

Another great problem which I see in this matter is this: Now an ordinary soldier may select an officer of high rank, because the amendment refers to a major or somebody of superior rank. Then this major or officer of superior rank must serve this private soldier in this way. What may happen as the law reads now is that these officers may be appointed as electoral officers, or they may be used as witnesses. As electoral officers they can assist in the casting of these votes. In the case of a distant camp such as the hon. member for Durban (Point) referred to, the presiding officer, who may be a magistrate or some other official, can go and sit there and take the votes of these people. They may, for example, sit there for a certain number of hours a day. In the case of an officer, however, he will have to be at the disposal of these people the whole day, because he is subject to discipline and cannot say that he is not available. If the magistrate goes and sits there as the presiding officer, then these officers may be used as polling officers and as witnesses.

If these people cannot cast their votes in the usual manner, they may be declared to be immobile, and as immobile voters the officials can go to them in order to allow them to vote. There are therefore all kinds of possibilities which make this unnecessary. I think we are going a little too far if we now say that we want to do this in the camps themselves. I think the hon. member will agree with my explanation. My object, like that of the Committee, is to enable every person to cast his vote. Having created these facilities, I do not think it is necessary for us to make further provision, even though the camp is far distant.

The hon. member, who is also a member of the commission, said that they felt that the political parties should be excluded. With all respect I want to say that I did so, but that the commission of inquiry did not do so. The commission went very far in their report. On page 29 they mention a number of officials. In addition they mention Senators, Members of Parliament and members of the provincial council who are not themselves candidates in the election concerned. That was their recommendation to us. Then they also recommended a maximum number of 12 persons nominated by every candidate and appointed by the electoral officer as such. They say further that the persons mentioned under (b) (i.e. the persons to whom I have referred) may only act as presiding officers if they have complied with all the formalities accompanying these appointments. I am just mentioning that. Our object in drafting this clause was to exclude the political parties. I do not think it is fair of the hon. member for Durban (Point) to reproach me by saying that by including station masters and justices of the peace I am really bringing in the political parties. I am excluding the political parties completely. The worst that the hon. member can say of these people is that they are allowed to belong to a political party and take an active part in politics.

Why have they now been added? We set out from the standpoint that every person should be given the opportunity to vote either by post or on polling day. It is a fact that the long list of people mentioned here who can be appointed as presiding officers may simply not be available in those far distant districts. If we now consider against whom the hon. member has objections, whom he wants removed, we see that in the first place it is the justices of the peace. I looked up the Justices of the Peace Act. The Justices of the Peace and Commissioners of Oath Act reads as follows—

1. (a) within the magisterial district within which the ward for which he is appointed, is situated possess all such powers and perform all such duties as, by any law in force in such district, are conferred or imposed upon justices of the peace and upon field-cornets, and assistant field-cornets, whose powers could be exercised and whose duties could be performed by justices of the peace in terms of any law repealed by this Act.

And then follows the important part—

1. (b) carry out such instructions for the preservation of the peace and good order in such ward as he may receive from the magistrate of the district in which such ward is situated; and
2. (c) render all assistance possible in suppressing disorder or disturbance in such ward.

A commissioner of oaths is described in one short sentence—

The reason why I read this out is the following. The Minister of Justice, who has to appoint the justices of the peace, is here now, and I am glad of it. A justice of the peace is not just any person whom one can suspect of abusing the high confidence placed in him and of making himself guilty of any malpractices when he is used to take up votes in those widely spread areas or to allow people to vote. The hon. member should not forget that the same applies to station masters. There are station masters in small places and there are station masters in large places. The political parties is not being excluded when these votes are cast. A political party can always act as a watchdog and watch the position by means of its representatives. Will a man with the title “J.P.” jeopardize the high regard in which he is held in the district for the sake of a postal vote? Will a station master, although he may take part in politics, dare to throw away his whole future and his livelihood?

I now want to plead with those hon. members. I think there is such a long list of these people that we cannot be accused in this House of having amended the Act in such a way that there will be too few officials to handle the work. Let us rather retain this clause as it stands and see what happens at the first election, which will be a provincial election. When this election is over my Department can very easily have a survey made among the various electoral officers to ascertain to what extent this or that category of persons was used. My prediction is that the people who will be used most will be the magistrates and assistant magistrates. We are also including postmasters. It may be that we then decide to exclude postmasters if their services are not utilized. Let us see what happens. Our motives are honestly to eliminate malpractices and abuse. I therefore plead that we should offer this opportunity particularly to the far distant and sparsely populated areas. I therefore ask that the clause remain as it is; I cannot accept the amendment.

In regard to Permanent Force officers the Minister has advanced an argument one must accept—namely that you cannot open military installations to the public and that once a person has been appointed as an official for postal vote purposes that could happen. Provided that the Minister gives us the assurance, as he has done, that in the case of a camp where the people cannot get to an ordinary presiding officer suitable arrangements will be made then perhaps that position can be accepted. I am not going to press the point. We felt this was a group of people who should be catered for but it is not a matter which is of that magnitude that we need argue too strongly about it.

Now let me deal with the Minister’s statement about the commission’s recommendation. The commission, as the Minister stated, recommended that in respect of one of the types of postal votes within a constituency the various officers the Minister mentioned could be presiding officers. But in the section of the report which introduced the new concept of postal votes, the section which in fact went further with the blank ballot idea, it was strictly limited to officials. However, that is an academic argument. This is not a high school debate where we are trying to score points. We are trying to get a law with which both sides can agree and in which the public can have confidence. Our reason for moving the deletion of these two categories, namely, justices of the peace and stationmaster, is simply the fact that both those categories are active in politics, and if a person is for instance a railway employee and he is approached by his foreman and told: You must apply for a postal vote and ask for that vote to be sent to your stationmaster, you put that person in a very difficult position indeed, particular if the stationmaster is active in politics. I do not question the bona fides of the stationmaster. I accept that there may be no intimidation whatsoever, but the point is that the opportunity is there, and we are trying to avoid even an implication, even the slightest possibility of anyone pointing a finger at this Act and saying: That could happen, or this could happen. It does not necessarily mean that it would happen, but it could. As the Bill stands now it is possible for any person to claim that he has been victimized—that he has been intimidated—because as a junior employee he was brought before his own senior to cast his vote. He may think so in his own mind. It may be quite unjust, but that man has a suspicion and a grudge. That is why that particular category is to us one that requires reconsideration. In regard to justices of the peace you do not have any state discipline exerted over a justice of the peace. He is appointed but he is not subject to the discipline of the State and not subject to regulations. He is a free agent and in practice is often an active politician. I said that we have a Senator, who happens to belong to this side of the House, a member of the United Party, who is a justice of the peace in Johannesburg. There are two or three members of the provincial council, active politicians who are justices of peace. I would say that 80 per cent of the persons appointed as justices of the peace are appointed because of their association, directly or indirectly, with the ruling Government of the day. It is natural. The Government is going to appoint people in whom it has confidence, and therefore it will seek people known to them. Now the hon. Minister has said that he is not thinking of the cities, he is thinking of the distant rural areas. But what about the cities? Once you put this in, all we need to do is to channel every one of our postal votes in Johannesburg through a few J.P.s known to be active supporters of our party, and all the Government has to do is to channel its postal votes through J.P.s who are supporters of that party, and the whole objective of this Bill falls away. Then we might as well not pass this clause, because then you can have all your postal votes going through that one channel and all the other channels not being used at all. If the hon. Minister is thinking only of the rural areas then I put this to him: Let us make a deal; I accept that there are places far distant from any of the other officers named here as presiding officers. Is the Minister prepared to restrict justices of the peace to areas outside the jurisdiction of a municipality or local authority?

No. Why?

You see, Mr. Chairman, immediately you get “No”. In other words, the intention of this clause is not to have justices of the peace in the distant rural areas for the convenience of people who must travel; the intention of this clause is to have them in the cities where they can be used to evade, where required, the state officials which are here laid down and to whom we wish to restrict this provision. As soon as you object to urban justices of the peace being excluded, then in fact you are saying that this is not a clause to deal with rural areas and distances, but that you want to use justices of the peace because it will be convenient in the cities.

What about divisional councils?

I am asking the hon. Minister to reconsider the position, and if he is prepared to do so, I have an amendment drafted which would meet the case, limiting justices of the peace to rural areas. This is the amendment I have drafted—

If the Minister would accept that, then I think we can get a 100 per cent agreement, because then he will be doing what he has just stated in his reply to me, is his objective. He will be ensuring that in the distant rural areas the justices of the peace can play their part, but he will also be ensuring that in the municipal areas where you have got magistrates, police stations and post offices, and often Native Commissioners’ offices, you will use the channel of the State rather than the channel of the politician. Where these other officers are available, let us use them, but where they are not available, let us use the justice of the peace. There is no need to use J.P.s in Johannesburg or Cape Town where you have got dozens of the other presiding officers available. If you are not prepared to exclude those, then why have the other offices at all, because in point of fact you can then go on exactly as you used to do and use party officials, M.P.s, Senators, M.P.C.s, anybody who happens to be a justice of the peace by using them as the only channel for your postal votes.

The hon. member for Durban (Point) (Mr. Raw) adopts an attitude which I find rather strange. The hon. member says the principle has been accepted by both sides of the House that only Government officials should be presiding officers. When was this principle accepted? What right has the hon. member to say that this principle has been accepted? It is true that the principle has been accepted that stationmasters and justices of the peace shall be included, and not only public officials. But I find the attitude of the hon. member for Durban (Point) extremely strange. He also signed the report of the commission of inquiry, together with the other members, and in paragraph 140 it says very clearly—

The existing system!

Yes, and paragraph 139 reads as follows—

Is that hon. member prepared to place this enormous burden on his political party? It seems to me this hon. member does not wish to give all persons an opportunity to vote. What objection has the hon. member to members of the House of Assembly and members of the provincial council and members of the Senate acting as presiding officers? As the hon. the Minister has indicated, he recommended here that these people should be able to act as presiding officers.

Under the existing system.

No, Mr. Chairman, it did not change the position like that. The fact of the matter is that that hon. member supported a recommendation of the Postal Vote Commission that M.P.s and Senators and M.P.C.s should still be able to act as presiding officers for absent voters, and if the hon. member had had such strong objections, why did he not mention them during the second-reading debate? At that time he did not say a word about justices of the peace, or about stationmasters.

That is detail.

No, you said just now that it was a matter of principle, and you said it was so important, but now you talk about detail. The hon. the Minister rightly pointed out to the hon. member that this is the position under the circumstances, as the Bill reads now, and the Minister pointed out, moreover, that we should try out the law at the next election; the Minister also told the hon. member that it would be a difficult task for public officials alone to perform the duties relative to postal votes. You know postal votes have to be dealt with within a period of 21 days, and in view of the numerous duties of public officials, I cannot imagine that they will be able to do this work, but if justices of the peace and stationmasters are to be taken away also as presiding officers, I should like to say that they will most certainly not be able to do the work. Does the hon. member want people to be deprived of their vote because they are not given an opportunity to cast their votes? That is what it will mean in effect. I really do think the hon. member adopts a very strange attitude, an attitude which cannot be reconciled with the point of view he adopted when we were engaged on the work of the commission, and which is not reconcilable either with the point of view he adopted during the second-reading debate.

One understands and appreciates the difficulty of the hon. the Minister if he feels that there are remote places, and that other exceptional circumstances may exist where the burden on the public officials mentioned here would be too great, but I wonder whether he should not have regard to the fact that he can overcome this difficulty administratively under the clause as it stands to-day. The clause mentions a large number of officials who can act as presiding officers for absent voters. I see here—

This last phrase makes the field very wide. What we like in this clause is that the people will act under the direction of a senior and responsible officer of the State. I think the Committee should be reminded that the Minister and everybody who participated in this debate at the second reading emphasized that the Minister was trying to prevent a ballot paper from ever falling under the control of a person actively associated with politics. That was the ideal. For on both sides of the House we have had the experience that as soon as the ballot paper falls into the hands of politicians, there is, to put it mildly, a tremendous temptation to commit an abuse. The Minister sought to eliminate this temptation, and to avoid giving people interested in the success of a particular political party, who have an active interest, an opportunity to control ballot papers, and I still hope that the hon. the Minister will in any event still accept the amended proposal of the hon. member for Durban (Point).

The hon. member for Bloemfontein (East) referred to the fact that the Commission proposed two systems, and that the one is the system which will be difficult to apply if it is limited to public servants only. I should like to remind the hon. member that it was the object of the commission to have the two systems, the old system and in addition the new system aimed at keeping control away from political parties, operating together as an experiment. I do not think it is fair to bring up admissions that may have been made in the commission in connection with the old system, where we are now dealing with a new system. If one had wished to try out the two systems together, one should have left the old system as it was in most respects; otherwise it would not be a fair test. The majority of the members of the commission had complete confidence that the new system in the course of time would prove to be so superior and so much more acceptable to people who wish to ensure honesty in our political life, that it would prevail and that the old system would die out. Although the Bill of the hon. the Minister is not on all fours with the proposals of the commission, he has nevertheless come forward here with a brilliant idea in the Bill, and we wish to congratulate him on that. At the same time we feel that the inclusion of stationmasters and justices of the peace infringe the principle the Minister, to our joy, wishes to introduce in this legislation. Therefore I should like to urge the hon. the Minister earnestly to consider meeting the representations of this side of the House in regard to this matter.

While I have the floor, I should like to move the amendment to Clause 1 standing in my name, namely—

This amendment is quite simple. The Minister will concede that the aim of the postal vote system is to give every citizen of South Africa who is entitled to vote an opportunity to cast his vote. In the past there have been exceptions to the rule, among others as regards people who were overseas during an election. They were unable to vote. This was so because it was difficult to extend the operation of our laws to foreign countries. Since we have now adopted this new system almost fully, namely that the ballot paper will remain under the control of the State or its representatives, we feel that the objections to the casting of their votes by people who are overseas fall away. Therefore we feel that people who are overseas temporarily during elections should be permitted, in the same way as public servants, to appear before representatives of the South African State, such as ambassadors, consuls-general, etc. to cast their votes provided of course they act timeously. It should be remembered that South Africans travel around in the world much more than any other nation. Apart from that, things being what they are to-day, it is necessary for citizens of the country to be overseas to promote the cause of South Africa. Therefore it is not only Government officials who go overseas in the interests of South Africa. Frequently these people are prominent businessmen and industrialists who go overseas to do work, and good work at that, in the interests of South Africa. Why should they now be disfranchised while we have accepted the principle that every citizen should be given an opportunity to cast his vote?

Then I should like also to draw the Minister’s attention to the fact that not only people with business interests proceed overseas. There are people who go overseas as tourists and among them you find some of the best ambassadors for the good name of South Africa. Therefore we should do nothing here to restrict or to affect the rights of those people as citizens. I do not think one party will derive more benefit from this than another. Supporters of the National Party surely travel as much as supporters of the Opposition. So I do not think any political ulterior motive can be seen in this proposal. Actually it is only an attempt I am making to make it possible for South African citizens who are absent from the country temporarily during elections, to have an opportunity to cast their votes under the supervision of important and responsible representatives of the State. I therefore very strongly commend this proposal to the hon. the Minister.

I should like to dispose of the matter of justices of the peace. As far as I am concerned, there is no other alternative than that justices of the peace should either remain or go. But to say that certain justices of the peace may be used and others not is in my view a wholly wrong principle. If we were to do that, we would immediately be making these people suspect and create the impression that there is something wrong somewhere because they are being used to achieve a certain object. That I think is very wrong. But hon. members opposite who are now urging that justices of the peace and stationmasters should be deleted have lost sight of one thing, namely that there will be very few justices of the peace who will make themselves available for this type of work. What will this entail for them? In the first place a justice of the peace, if he is a presiding officer, will have to be available full-time. That means he will have to have a public office and that means that the political parties, his watchdogs, will be able to be present in that office all day long, that is to say from 8 a.m. until 6 p.m. If the justice of the peace is a private person, he will have to make his lounge or his study available for that purpose, or otherwise an office will have to be hired for him, even if such an office were to be situated next to the party office. However it may be, a political representative of a political party will be able to be there from 8 a.m. until 6 p.m.

And that while there is a shortage of manpower in the country!

So I cannot see any danger. However, the reasons why I am so adamant on this point are those mentioned by the hon. member for Bloemfontein (East), and these are that while the Commission has enumerated a whole number of other persons who may be used in case public servants are not available, we cannot in this Bill limit ourselves to public servants only. A tremendous responsibility rests upon me here. Hon. members opposite will be the first to blame me if things go wrong, because I did not accept the recommendations of the commission that M.P.’s, Senators and others recommended by the Commission be included. For that reason we have made wide provision in this Bill. In addition there are so many safety valves that I am not afraid in the slightest degree—even if a United Party Senator were to be a justice of the peace—that something will go wrong. If such a person were to do something in order to benefit his party, then I would say the watch-dog system of the other party was too weak to watch him.

This could not be done before. You walked around with the postal votes in your pocket, and all these postal votes went to one address. Now the polling officer has to go to the homes of the voters and political parties will be entitled to be present. Let me repeat that if it appears later on that public servants will be able to handle all the postal votes, then only will it be the time for us to say that we shall cut out some of these various people because we shall not be needing all of them. I do not see my way clear to doing so at the present time, in view of the responsibility I have to shoulder.

As regards the amendment of the hon. member for Yeoville, I should like to say that the first objection I have to it is this, that the hon. member’s proposal will not give certain people an opportunity to vote, namely those people who travel in countries where South Africa has no representatives. In those countries there will not be the prescribed people before whom they can cast their votes. That being so, a consequence of the hon. member’s proposal will be that only certain tourists from our country will be benefited because South Africa does not have representatives in all countries before whom they could cast their votes. That is my first objection to this proposal. A second objection is that such a proposal could open the door to great malpractices. As hon. members know, the identity card has not yet been made operative for electoral purposes. Even if it had been, such a proposal would still open the door to great malpractices. Suppose we were to accept this proposal, an overseas traveller could come along and pretend to be a person other than himself.

What about his passport?

His passport is there, but there are hundreds of other ways of introducing abuses if such a proposal were accepted. As soon as a person is outside the Republic, the control over his vote disappears. Our object here is to put into operation the watch-dog system of the parties so that voters may be looked after. For that reason this Government has always said that only those officials who are obliged to serve overseas can vote overseas because they are known. It has always been so. Others who are merely travellers are free of our control and therefore I am sorry but I cannot permit them to cast their votes.

I want to return to the Minister’s reply in regard to the limitation of justices of the peace to rural areas. The hon. the Minister, when introducing this measure at its second reading, clearly told the House that the principle which was embodied in the Bill was that only persons under the control of the State should have control of a ballot paper but that because of the long distances in rural areas he had to make one exception in regard to justices of the peace. The Minister made it clear that it was an exception which he was introducing in conflict with the principle which the Bill contained in order to cover distant parts of the country. Consequently we are only supporting the hon. the Minister’s own point of view, because it was his in the first instance and not ours. As far as we are concerned, we would prefer to see justices of the peace eliminated. But if the Minister’s point of view is such as he has indicated, then we are prepared to meet him and agree to an amendment that justices of the peace be used in those areas which the Minister had in mind. That is not insulting people or telling them that they cannot be trusted. You will only be saying that justices of the peace, as non-State officials, will only be used where other officials are not available. Where however there are sufficient public servants available, then these must do the job. It is simple enough. No insult is meant to anyone, nor is there a reflection on anyone. It will only mean that in cities and towns where there are public servants, these only will be used and where that is not the case, justices of the peace can be used. If this is not accepted, then we will be opening the door to a completely new field. We do not want to see anybody being prevented from casting his vote. Obviously not. But let us be frank about this and not beat about the bush. This Government has not appointed one justice of the peace, as far as I know, for the last 15 years who is a supporter of the United Party. Not a single one. [Interruptions.] Let us face facts. We are prepared to accept justices of the peace where they are necessary. But where they are not necessary, why use provincial councillors, for instance, who are active in politics, in cities where they are not necessary? They will not be necessary. The same thing will, no doubt, happen, when we become the Government. Any party that is in power will do it. Any party appoints people of its own political persuasion to boards and offices. [Interruptions.] There may be an odd exception. But I have studied the list of people appointed in Johannesburg. It makes interesting reading. We too have supporters who have been justices of the peace for many years and we do not want them to come under suspicion any more than we would like to see active office bearers of the Nationalist Party come under suspicion. Why then not exclude them in cities where they are not needed? There is no reason on earth why they should be used. And if the hon. the Minister does not want to exclude them, there must be a reason for insisting on having them there. During his second-reading speech the Minister said he only wanted them in the platteland. Now he wants them elsewhere too. And yet the position has not in the meantime changed. We agree that justices of the peace could be needed in the country districts. But let the Minister then meet us in regard to towns and cities where we say there is no necessity for them.

I really do hope that the Minister is not going to allow this one back door to remain open. Let us rather close it. It is a suspected back door, although it might quite unjustifiably be regarded as such. It nevertheless remains a back door because of the political activities and the political views of those people holding these offices. Furthermore, they are not subject to the control and discipline of the State. Even the hon. member for Bloemfontein (East) who spoke just now agreed on the Commission when we were dealing with blank ballot papers that the presiding officers should be State officials only. They were the people who were regarded as being the ideal people before whom a vote should be cast, because then you were voting under the control of the State, and we were going to test the two systems. The one system was not accepted, but we were going to test the two, and when we came to a new system we said that this new system should be entirely under the control of the State. That is all we are aiming at, to maintain the State control over the ballot paper at all times, and never to let it get out of the control of a person whose career and livelihood are based on rules and regulations and who will not consider jeopardizing his whole future for the sake of a little political advantage. But justices of the peace and stationmasters may be active politicians, and merely the fact of their activities, without them doing anything, can be an implied influence on the voters—not necessarily an actual influence, but a latent influence, and we want to eliminate that.

You are just afraid.

The hon. member says we are afraid, but we have seen what some of their organizers have done in the past.

Order!

I do not like that sort of interjection when we are dealing with a serious issue and trying to eliminate the very fear which the hon. member for Cradock talks about. Of course we are afraid of abuse and we do not want it. It is that sort of thing that we want to make impossible in our electoral machinery. We do not want a back door to be left open for it. We want every possible loophole closed. I hope the Minister will look upon this not from the angle of where advantage can be gained, but from the angle of whether it is a possible loophole which should be closed so that no suspicion may be possible.

I do not know why the hon. member for Durban (Point) (Mr. Raw) is becoming so nervous now. What surprises me is that the hon. member now wishes to differentiate between who may handle a postal vote in the rural areas and who may do so in the cities. If we begin to differentiate in that way, where will it end?—because what is a country area to-day may to-morrow be a city. Your own constituency, Sir, was, not so long ago, a small rural town and now it is a city with almost two constituencies already. How do you distinguish between the country districts and the cities? It is unrealistic.

But I should like to bring the hon. member back to the recommendation of the commission. The commission recommended that under the old system, to which modifications are being proposed which are mainly accepted in this legislation, excluding the blank ballot paper, every candidate should have the right to go and introduce 12 persons to the returning officer who can be appointed by him as polling officers for local absent votes. What is a justice of the peace if not a local person, save that he may have a much higher status? What danger is there of a person in Johannesburg naming a justice of the peace in Cape Town to come and do his postal vote for him? He knows no justices of the peace in Cape Town. In Cape Town he does know the electoral officer and the magistrates and the police stations, and they are going to be the people who will be handling most of the postal votes for other places, and a justice of the peace will only permit himself to be used for local postal votes, and that fits in with the idea of the commission that a person who is not a public servant should only handle postal votes for and in his own neighbourhood where he is known, so that he can be under the direct control of the returning officer concerned. I say that in practice this proposal included in the Bill will comply with the recommendations of the commission, because a justice of the peace will only be used for local votes.

Now I should like to point out to the hon. member, further, that when a justice of the peace allows himself to be used for this purpose of handling postal votes, he must do so for both political parties, and secondly, every political party will have the right to have a representative with him day and night in his office or in his home.

Not at night.

From 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. If that justice of the peace wants to go and handle postal votes outside, he has to notify me and my opponent and then we may travel with him, or we may send our representatives with him. I say that if any justice of the peace agrees to handle postal votes in Pretoria, I shall always see to it that there is a representative of the National Party with him, and I expect the United Party to do the same. Why is there any fear then? That person will have to act strictly within the regulations, as a magistrate acts during an election, and if he does not do that we have the necessary remedy and we can see to it that he is punished. I should like to appeal to the hon. member not to see bogeys, for this thing really does not contain those dangers of which he is afraid. He is now merely giving the necessary play so that wherever there may be too few officials—and in certain parts of the country there are very few civil servants—these people may be used, but the political party still has the right to watch him and if they do not do so, it is their own fault.

I should like to come back to the amendment moved by the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. S. J. M. Steyn) and plead with the Minister to reconsider it. I think the principle has been accepted that a person who happens to be outside South Africa should be able to vote. [Interjection.] I just want to point out that the Minister has rejected quite a number of the commission’s recommendations, and in many cases he did the right thing in doing so. The principle has already been accepted that a person who happens to be outside South Africa may vote, and public servants serving outside South Africa are allowed to vote. We should like to have that principle extended to include people who travel overseas. In many cases they are rendering a very great service to South Africa, and I do not think they should be prevented from voting. The Minister has two objections. He says in the first place that a person may be travelling in a country in which South Africa has no office and that he will not be able to vote then under the supervision of an office of ours, whereas a person who travels in England will be able to vote. But I do not think that is a sound argument. The fact that a person who travels in Tahiti is unable to vote whereas a person travelling in England is able to vote because South Africa is represented there—that is no valid argument. We should try as far as possible to enable people to vote. As long as a person can vote secretly, we should not make it difficult for him to vote, and the fact that one person is travelling in a country in which we have no office ought not to prevent another person travelling in a country in which we do have an office from voting.

The Minister has a second objection. He says that it is difficult to identify such a person. But the best way to identify such a person is by means of his passport, and a person who wishes to travel overseas is not going to get very far without a passport.

Wolpe and Goldreich have no passports.

As a good South African a person travelling overseas ought to be able to cast his vote, and the Minister ought to allow that person to vote.

Then I should like to come back to the other proposal. The fact of the matter is that the greatest objection in the case of postal votes is this question of suspicion and I for one was very grateful that the Minister has placed this whole matter under the control of public servants. The commission felt that Members of Parliament should also have this right, but I think the Minister did a very good thing in refusing to accept that recommendation. The fact of the matter is that however high a status a justice of the peace may occupy and however high the calibre of a stationmaster may be, both are members of the public, members of the public with political loyalties who were enabled to take an active part in politics. And even if these people had the purest motives in helping a member of the public to vote through the post, the fact that they assist him may very easily give rise to suspicion. I think the Minister did an excellent thing in placing this matter under the control of public servants and removing all grounds for suspicion and I do not think he should leave the slightest room for suspicion. These persons may very easily become suspicious. As the hon. member for Durban (Point) has said, even if the man did nothing wrong, a person who votes under his supervision may nevertheless think he may do something wrong because he happens to be the chairman of a party branch, and I think that suspicion should be removed.

The party which is most suspicious is the United Party. The United Party, because of the fact that at every election more and more votes are cast for the National Party, has a suspicion that the National Party fabricates postal votes. Whatever system of postal votes we introduce, or even if there are no postal votes, the results of the next election will disillusion the hon. member even more.

Do not boast; advance arguments.

The hon. member adopts the same attitude as the hon. member for Yeoville and that is that people who travel overseas should be able to vote there. Let me ask him this: What about the saboteurs and the political refugees? Does he want to make the same exception here which he made in the case of justices of the peace? He mentions the example of Tahiti. Because the man who travels in Tahiti is unable to vote, the Minister must not allow the man who travels in England to vote! I would rather say that the man travelling in Tahiti should be able to vote because he is not likely to be a political refugee; he is likely to be a genuine traveller, but in England to-day there are numbers of political refugees and saboteurs.

The hon. member for Durban (Point) (Mr. Raw) made a sweeping statement here. I wonder whether he realizes what he said. He says that in the past 16 years while this party has been in power not a single justice of the peace who supports the United Party has been appointed. That is utter nonsense.

I can give him the names of United Party supporters who have been appointed.

Sir, I want to state a fact here which the hon. member cannot deny, and that is that when this party came into power there was practically no such thing as a Nationalist justice of the peace, because during that party’s regime a Nationalist did not have the privilege of being appointed as a justice of the peace. The statement that this Government has never appointed a United Party justice of the peace is untrue.

I said that few had been appointed.

No, the hon. member said that none had been appointed. I want to state another fact here. When this Government came into power 95 per cent of the justices of the peace in this country were United Party supporters.

Where do you get that figure from?

It is based on our experience of postal votes. Since this party has been in power, not a single justice of the peace has been relieved of his post. Many have died, of course, and others have become Nationalists. I honestly cannot follow hon. members opposite. They want to make the position of the political parties completely impossible. We argued about this a great deal on the commission and we agreed that we would not like to do this because we all recognized the role which the political parties play and have played in the past, and it was mainly because we recognized that fact that we tightened up the existing postal vote system. We did not want to emasculate or exclude the political parties, but we tightened up the system. Moreover, we were all agreed that the stories about malpractices were grossly exaggerated; that was why we tightened up the system and tried to eliminate all malpractices and we did so unanimously. On this aspect the commission brought out a unanimous report. Another system was then put forward, the so-called blank ballot paper, which was to be under the control of public servants only, but as far as that system is concerned there was no unanimity on the commission. Sir, I have nothing against public servants. They are fine people, and if they could do it I would fully agree that it should be confined to public servants. But the members of the commission, particularly hon. members on the other side who have no experience of election campaigns in the rural areas, were faced with this problem: In the days when the United Party used to contest rural seats the present secretary of the United Party in the Cape, the hon. member for Maitland (Mr. Hickman), was still a baby; he cannot remember so far back with the result that he, the person who has to advise his party, has no knowledge at all of the handling of votes in the rural areas. I say that we were faced with that problem, and I think the Minister has come forward with an excellent solution. Until the 1938 election the position was virtually that only public servants were in control of elections. With the increase in the number of postal votes, that system proved to be impossible. The number of postal votes increased not just because they were postal votes but because the numbers of voters in the various constituencies increased. Even the United Party Government found in 1943 that with the increase in the number of postal votes, they could no longer be handled by public servants and justices of the peace. It was under United Party rule, not under our regime, that the system was extended to include commissioners of oaths and political agents. It was done in terms of the Electoral Law of 1946. Hon. members opposite have no idea to-day what goes on in the rural areas and they just want to make the position difficult for the National Party which represents vast rural constituencies. There are areas in which there is not a single public servant within 50 square miles. In such an area there may be a station master, however, but hon. members opposite want to exclude him as well. The hon. member for Durban (Point) comes here with the proposal that privates should be allowed to vote before their officer, but an officer is not a public servant either. They want to make fish of one and fowl of the other. I say again that this whole hullabaloo is quite unnecessary. This is not the spirit in which we acted on the commission. Hon. members opposite are revealing an entirely different spirit here. It looks as though the party opposite has brought pressure to bear on United Party members who were members of the commission. That is the only conclusion to which I can come.

Order! I want to draw attention to the fact that the amendment of the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. S. J. M. Steyn) is not acceptable. The reason is that it proposes to extend certain provisions of the original Act beyond the borders of South Africa, South West Africa, Marion Island, etc., an extension which was not contemplated at the second reading.

I had not intended taking part in this discussion but having listened attentively to the debate and having listened to what the hon. members for Durban (Point) (Mr. Raw) and Malmesbury (Mr. van Staden) had to say, I have come to the conclusion that whatever good there may be in this legislation, it will nevertheless lead to a position in which my hon. friends in this House who were political organizers for many years will look back with nostalgia in the future to all the stunts they pulled and the experience which they gained over the years and which they will now no longer be able to use. I think much of the discussion which is taking place here is due to the fact that they are sorry that they will no longer have to make use of that experience.

First amendment put and the Committee divided:

Ayes—41: Barnett, C.; Basson, J. A. L.; Basson, J. D. du P.; Cadman, R. M.; Connan, J. M.; Cronje, F. J. C.; Dodds, P. R.; Durrant, R. B.; Eden, G. S.; Emdin, S.; Fisher, E. L.; Gorshel, A.; Graaff, de V.; Henwood, B. H.; Hickman, T.; Higgerty, J. W.; Hourquebie, R. G. L.; Lewis, H.; Luttig, H. G.; Malan, E. G.; Mitchell, M. L.; Moore, P. A.; Oldfield, G. N.; Plewman, R. P.; Radford, A.; Raw, W. V.; Ross, D. G.; Steyn, S. J. M.; Streicher, D. M.; Taurog, L. B.; Taylor, C. D.; Thompson, J. O. N.; Timoney, H. M.; Tucker, H.; van der Byl, P.; van Niekerk, S. M.; Warren, C. M.; Waterson, S. F.; Wood, L. F.

Tellers: H. J. Bronkhorst and N. G. Eaton.

Noes—75: Badenhorst, F. H.; Bekker, G. F. H.; Bekker, M. J. H.; Botha, H. J.; Botha, P. W.; Cloete, J. H.; Coetzee, B.; Cruywagen, W. A.; de Villiers, J. D.; Diederichs, N.; Dönges, T. E.; du Plessis, H. R. H.; Fouché, J. J. (Sr.); Frank, S.; Grobler, M. S. F.; Haak, J. F. W.; Heystek, J.; Hiemstra, E. C. A.; Jonker, A. H.; Keyter, H. C. A.; Knobel, G. J.; Kotze, G. P.; Kotzé, S. F.; le Roux, P. M. K.; Loots, J. J.; Malan, A. I.; Malan, W. C.; Marais, J. A.; Marais, P. S.; Maree, G. de K.; Maree, W. A.; Martins, H. E.; Meyer, T.; Mostert, D. J. J.; Mulder, C. P.; Muller, H.; Niemand, F. J.; Odell, H. G. O.; Potgieter, J. E.; Rall, J. J.; Rall, J. W.; Sadie, N. C. van R.; Sauer, P. O.; Schlebusch, A. L.; Schlebusch, J. A.; Schoeman, B. J.; Schoonbee, J. F.; Smit, H. H.; Steyn, F. S.; Steyn, J. H.; Uys, D. C. H.; van den Berg, G. P.; van den Berg, M. J.; van den Heever, D. J. G.; van der Ahee, H. H.; van der Merwe, P. S.; van der Spuy, J. P.; van der Walt, B. J.; van der Wath, J. G. H.; van Eeden, F. J.; van Niekerk, M. C.; van Nierop, P. J.; van Rensburg, M. C. G. J.; van Staden, J. W.; van Wyk, H. J.; van Zyl, J. J. B.; Venter, M. J. de la R.; Verwoerd, H. F.; Visse, J. H.; Vorster, B. J.; Vosloo. A. H.; Waring, F. W.; Wentzel, J. J.

Tellers: W. H. Faurie and J. J. Fouché.

Amendment accordingly negatived.

Question put: That the words in lines 38 and 39, proposed to be omitted, stand part of the clause,

Upon which the Committee divided:

Ayes —73: Badenhorst, F. H.; Bekker, G. F. H.; Bekker, M. J. H.; Botha, H. J.; Botha, P. W.; Coetzee, B.; Cruywagen, W. A.; de Villiers, J. D.; Diederichs, N.; Dönges, T. E.; du Plessis, H. R. H.; Fouché, J. J. (Sr.); Frank, S.; Grobler, M. S. F.; Haak, J. F. W.; Heystek, J.; Hiemstra, E. C. A.; Jonker, A. H.; H. C. A.; Knobel, G. J.; Kotze, G. P.; Kotzé, S. F.; le Roux, P. M. K.; Loots, J. J.; Malan, A. I.; Malan, W. C.; Marais, J. A.; Marais, P. S.; Maree, G. de K.; Maree, W. A.; Martins, H. E.; Meyer, T.; Mostert, D. J. J.; Mulder, C. P.; Muller, H.; Niemand, F. J.; Odell, H. G. O.; Potgieter, J. E.; Rall, J. J.; Rall, J. W.; Sadie, N. C. van R.; Sauer, P. O.; Schlebusch, A. L.; Schlebusch, J. A.; Schoeman, B. J.; Schoonbee, J. F.; Smit, H. H.; Steyn, F. S.; Steyn, J. H.; Uys, D. C. H.; van den Berg, G. P.; van den Berg, M. J.; van den Heever, D. J. G.; van der Ahee, H. H.; van der Merwe, P. S.; van der Spuy, J. P.; van der Walt, B. J.; van der Wath, J. G. H.; van Niekerk, M. C.; van Nierop. P. J.; van Rensburg, M. C. G. J.; van Staden, J. W.; van Wyk, H. J.; van Zyl, J. J. B.; Venter, M. J. de la R.; Verwoerd, H. F.; Visser, J. H.; Vorster, B. J.; Vosloos, A. H.; Waring, F. W.; Wentzel, J. J.

Tellers: W. H. Faurie and J. J. Fouché.

Noes —40: Barnett, C.; Basson, J. A. L.; Basson, J. D. du P.; Cadman, R. M.; Connan, J. M.; Cronje, F. J. C.; Dodds, P. R.; Durrant, R. B.; Eden, G. S.; Emdin, S.; Fisher, E. L.; Gorshel, A.; Graaff, de V.; Henwood, B. H.; Hickman, T.; Higgerty, J. W.; Hourquebie, R. G. L.; Lewis, H.; Malan, E. G.; Mitchell, M. L.; Moore, P. A.; Oldfield, G. N.; Plewman, R. P.; Radford, A.; Raw, W. V.; Ross, D. G.; Steyn, S. J. M.; Streicher, D. M.; Taurog, L. B.; Taylor, C. D.; Thompson, J. O. N.; Timoney, H. M.; Tucker, H.; van der Byl, P.; van Niekerk, S. M.; Warren, C. M.; Waterson, S. F; Wood, L. F.

Tellers: H. J. Bronkhorst and N. G. Eaton.

Question affirmed and second amendment negatived.

Clause, as printed, put and agreed to.

On Clause 4,

I just want to ask the hon. the Minister whether it is not necessary, in the modern times in which we are living, to insert the words “by air mail” in Clause 4, where reference is made to notices which have to be sent to the voter. At every election one has to argue about this matter with the various electoral officers. There are some of them who are prepared to forward all documents to the voters by air mail but there are others who say that there is no provision for that or that it is not necessary to do so. We have not placed an amendment on the Order Paper because possibly it is unnecessary, but I want to ask the hon. the Minister to consider the question of either instructing all electoral officers to forward all documents in connection with postal votes by air mail to the voters or alternatively to insert such a provision in the Bill itself so that the time wasted at present because these documents are not forwarded by air mail can be eliminated. I do not know whether the hon. the Minister feels that it is necessary to insert such a provision in the Bill. If so, we are prepared to move such an amendment.

I can assure the hon. member that at every election instructions are issued that where it is at all possible to do so and where air transport is available, these documents must be forwarded by air mail.

That instruction is not being carried out.

Well, we can lay it down in the regulations. I do not think it is desirable to incorporate such a provision in the Act because there are certain places to which there is no regular air service and where it would be faster to forward these documents by ordinary post. I can give the hon. member the assurance that we will make use of the quickest form of transport, and such an instruction can be incorporated in the regulations.

In view of what the hon. the Minister has said I want to ask him whether he will not consider inserting the words “over the fastest route” or “by means of the fastest method” after the word “post” because at every election there are arguments over this matter. It is true that these documents are forwarded by air mail during the last few days but that is not done at the beginning. The postal service, with all due respect, is not what it ought to be, and it may take a week or longer for documents in connection with postal votes to reach their destination when they are forwarded by ordinary post, whereas it would only take a day if they were forwarded by air mail.

I shall go into it and insert such an amendment if it appears to be necessary.

Clause put and agreed to.

On Clause 6,

I wish to move the amendment as printed in my name—

The effect of this amendment will be that we shall keep the original Act, as it reads at the moment, and that the amendments moved by the hon. the Minister will not be inserted. As you know, Sir, the present position is that anybody who lives more than ten miles away from the nearest polling station in a certain constituency may vote through the post … This amendment will make it impossible for anybody living within a municipal area, of which the nearest boundary line is within ten miles from the nearest polling station, to vote through the post. I admit that arguments can be advanced against a suggestion such as this; it is a ticklish problem and there have been many changes along these lines in the past, particularly in respect of urban voters and how far they have to live from the nearest polling station in order to qualify for a postal vote. I wish to suggest to the hon. the Minister that we are perhaps discriminating to some extent against the urban voters in comparison with the voter on the platteland. When I refer to “urban voters”, I naturally mean the urban voters of all parties. In effect it makes it more difficult in future for the urban voter to vote through the post than it will be for the voter on the platteland. I do not think there is any justification for that.

I think of the cases which may arise under the amendment moved by the hon. the Minister. The case has been mentioned to me of somebody who is registered in Zululand, for example, but who lives in Durban (Umlazi) on election day. In terms of this new amendment he will have to travel that distance, which is much longer than ten miles, whereas it was possible for him to vote by post under the old system. Take the case of somebody who is registered at Halfway House, near Pretoria, but who finds himself in Wonderboom on election day. He will be much more than ten miles away from the polling station but he is not allowed to vote through the post simply because the municipality, in which the Wonderboom constituency is partly situated, is less than 10 miles from Halfway House. Take the case of somebody who is registered in Muizenberg but lives in Bellville on election day. He too will have to travel that long distance. Somebody who is registered in Lawley near Johannesburg, outside the municipal border and who lives in Craighall Park on election day, will have to travel a long distance in order to vote, simply because he is in an urban area, near a municipality, whereas had he been on the platteland he would have been able to vote through the post.

Did you not listen to the reply of the Minister to the second reading debate?

It is definitely much more difficult for anybody in these circumstances to vote on election day. He may have to travel a long distance as I have already indicated. Very often the traffic in an urban area is much more difficult for such a voter than for the voter in a platteland area. It is very easy in a platteland area to travel 10 or 15 miles; it is much more difficult for the voter in an urban area to travel that distance particularly early in the morning or late in the afternoon when the traffic is heavy. In many cases of this nature we are not dealing with people who are on holiday; they are people who changed their jobs a month or two before the election and who work somewhere else near the urban area. Very often the wife of such a voter also works; particularly under the new set-up which is envisaged here she may not have a servant to look after the house. In these circumstances one realizes how difficult it will be for such a person to travel 10 or 12 or 15 miles in order to vote. It would be so much easier if you could tell such a person he can vote through the post, because in an urban area the voter is usually very near to a presiding officer.

I hope the Minister will bear in mind what I have said here, particularly in view of the fact that I understand declaration votes will no longer be allowed in urban constituencies; in other words that makes it even more difficult for the voter to bring out his vote in those particular circumstances. I know arguments can be advanced against this amendment as well, but in view of the objections that can be made against his amendment, I hope the hon. the Minister will consider accepting my amendment.

The hon. member for Orange Grove (Mr. E. G. Malan) was apparently not here when in my reply to the second reading debate the other day I told the hon. member for Parow (Mr. S. F. Kotzé), who had put forward a brilliant plea here, that he had made out a very good case for such an amendment and that if such an amendment was proposed I would be willing to accept it. I am prepared to accept the hon. member’s amendment and also a similar amendment in Clause 7.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 7,

I move the amendment as printed in my name—

The hon. member for Orange Grove (Mr. E. G. Malan) has formally proposed his amendment and the hon. the Minister has indicated that he will accept it, and therefore I proceed to deal with the two amendments standing in my name. I do not think it will be necessary for me to move the second amendment because in practice there is a form for people who are infirm etc., and the purpose of this amendment is just to ensure that that practice will continue. I do not think there can be much doubt that it will continue but I shall be glad to have the hon. the Minister’s assurance that in fact there will be a special form in these cases; in fact the Act is so worded that there must be a special form.

I want to refer now to the first amendment standing in my name and to say that I do not propose to move it either, but that I propose to move the amendment which I handed to the hon. the Minister about an hour ago and which deals with the same topic. I would like to read out the amendment which I do propose to move to this clause—

If that amendment is accepted, then in line 69, instead of the present words sub-section (c) will read as follows—

I think an amendment of that kind is essential in view of the provisions of Clause 12 which introduces a new Section 53 (3), because in lines 17 and 18 of the new Section 53 (3) one finds the following words—

In other words, there is an obligation on the returning officer to advise the absent voter of the fact that his ballot paper has been posted, and it is clearly a waste of time to address it to the residential address reflected in the Voters’ Roll because he almost certainly will not be there. The need is to advise the voter where he is going to get the advice and where he will in fact be. At this stage I formally move this amendment—

As I say, unless an amendment of this kind is introduced I cannot see how the absent voter will get notification that a ballot paper has been issued for him. It is clearly in the interests of the smooth operation of this Act that he should get notification; indeed that is the clear intention of the Bill, and I should have thought therefore that this can only be an improvement. It is possible that it may be desired to have both the residential address of the applicant as it appears on the Voters’ Roll and to have an extra column in which you put the residential or postal address at which the applicant may be reached at the time when the ballot paper will be issued. If it is desired to maintain the present paragraph (c) as it stands in line 69 one could simply add something along the lines which I have in mind in a different sub-clause. But I want to make it plain that in the normal case where a voter tells one that he will not be in the constituency of, say, Pinelands on election day but that he will be in Durban, then it is necessary to insert an address in Durban to which this ballot paper can be sent in due course. If the wording is “residential or postal address” then one is on the safe side because the voter may not immediately know exactly where he will be in Durban, but he will be able to give a postal address at which he can be reached. At the very worst he could perhaps give the address of the party concerned; that may be what will happen in practice. I cannot see what harm that can do because the notification that the ballot paper has been issued will reach the address of the party who will then tell the voter and, of course, the actual voting will still take place before the presiding officer as contemplated in the Act. Sir, I hope I have adequately motivated my amendment.

Sir, I wonder whether the hon. member for Pinelands (Mr. Thompson) is not on the right track here. I think the idea here is that a person should give the address at which he is going to be on the day in question, but that address need not necessarily be his residential address. A person goes on holiday for a week or for two months or he is temporarily transferred to a certain place, but that is not his permanent residential address. I think the idea here is clearly that it must be the address at which he will be on the day in question. I think the amendment of the hon. member for Pine-lands gives effect to the idea that it must not be his residential address but the address at which he happens to be that particular day. I therefore support the amendment of the hon. member for Pinelands. As far as the second leg of his amendment is concerned, that is, that there should be a special application form, I do not think it is necessary to incorporate that in the Act.

He said so.

In that case I shall say nothing more about it.

I move the amendment standing in my name—

“and that the contents have been explained to the applicant”.

I do so in order to close the door to a possible abuse which has occurred and that is that persons who are themselves unable to understand what they are doing have had applications submitted in their name, in the form of an E.F. 33A purporting to state that they have authorized somebody to vote for them. In fact after the last election we handed two affidavits to the police; we laid two charges with the police in regard to this practice. It happened in the case of an official of the Progressive Party. A person had been in a coma for some five months but an application form was submitted stating that X had been authorized by this voter to apply for a vote on her behalf. Now if the person must certify on the application form, form E.F. 33A, that he has explained the contents of the form to the applicant he cannot make that statement if the person is unconscious, for instance, or round the bend and unable to understand what he or she is doing. By certifying that he has explained the contents; he is in fact implying that the form was understood, because if that were not so, the person could not swear under oath that he had explained the contents. I move the amendment merely with the object of closing a possible loophole.

I think at this stage I should deal with a few of these amendments. For the same reasons that I mentioned in connection with the previous amendment, I accept the amendment of the hon. member for Orange Grove (Mr. E. G. Malan). I want to say to the hon. member for Pinelands (Mr. Thompson) that I have a different solution. I think there is only one thing that we have to do to put an end to this lengthy struggle and that is in line 69 of the English text to delete the word “residential”; it will then read, “shall state the address of the applicant”. We shall then be achieving the same purpose. It will then be either a residential address or a postal address. It boils down to the very same thing that the hon. member has in mind.

I accept the amendment of the hon. member for Durban (Point) (Mr. Raw) to the effect that the contents must have been explained to the applicant, because it will help to ensure that the voter is properly informed. Our intention is to ensure that there is no uncertainty in the mind of the voter.

The Minister’s suggestion may perhaps meet the case. Under the present regulations it says on form E.F. 33 that the address must be the address appearing on the voters’ list. Of course, I am referring to the regulations and it may be possible to alter this administratively. In the particular column on form E.F. 33A and form E. F. 33 itself, where residence is dealt with, they have it in this form: “Residence and postal address (as appearing on voters’ list).” In other words, it may be that a proper legal construction of the wording of the Act as it stands at the moment, will be that that is a reference to the address on the Voters’ Roll. I am just rising to express doubt as to whether, if one leaves the language of the present Bill in the identical wording, a similar construction must not be placed on it. I have not considered the point. But if I may just elaborate somewhat. Sub-section (2) of Section 43 states this …

We can adapt the regulations …

Yes.

I should like to ask the hon. the Minister whether the amendment of the hon. member is not clearer?

It may be clearer, Mr. Chairman. There might, I submit, be confusion in regard to (c) as suggested by the hon. the Minister because it might be interpreted that that refers to the address of the applicant on the Voters’ Roll.

No, it cannot.

That could very well be the address appearing on the Voters’ Roll. This is the case at present. It is true that the meaning of the word “addresss” must be interpreted in the light of the amendments to the Act, including the amendment being proposed by Clause 12 of this Bill. There reference is made to the address of the absent voter stated in his application.

Surely you shall have to have both addresses on the application form?

We shall have to amend Clause 12 as well.

What the hon. member for Pretoria (Central) said is probably the answer to our problem. In fact, that was the alternative suggestion I put forward, i.e., that paragraph (c) be left as it is and introduce a new sub-section dealing with the address to which it should actually be sent. Since the Minister clearly wishes to clarify the matter, I shall give him an opportunity of doing so now.

I think the hon. member is adopting a very sensible attitude. On both sides of the House we know exactly what we want; it is simply a question of stating what we want in clear language. I undertake therefore, when the Bill is discussed in the Other Place and after having gone into this point thoroughly, to move the necessary amendment there so that we can have absolute clarity.

Amendment proposed by Mr. Thompson withdrawn with leave of the Committee.

Remaining amendments put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 8,

This clause deals with the actual issue of the ballot paper. If one refers to Clause 43 of the principal Act one will see that an applicant for a ballot paper can apply for it on four grounds. In addition he must state the reasons why such grounds are applicable to his case. In Clause 8, which amends Section 46 of the principal Act, provision is made that the returning officer must issue a ballot paper if the conditions laid down in Clause 43 are complied with. It is further provided that he shall issue a ballot paper—

That is fine, but only as far as it goes. I should like to move that the following words be added—

untrue”.

I do this because one can imagine the returning officer being placed in great difficulties when it may be proved by the candidates or by their agents that the applicant is telling an untruth. As we all know, there are people who can lie very circumspectly, and an untruth can be stated in very precise terms. However, as the law now reads, the returning officer will have to accept it because it is not vague, although untrue.

Knowing that the hon. the Minister is in a mood to accept reasonable amendments, I move my amendment confident that the Minister will accept it.

I accept the principle underlying the amendment moved by the hon. member. However, after having discussed the matter with the law advisers I suggest the insertion of the following words instead of those suggested by the hon. member—

If the hon. member is prepared to accept my form of the amendment I shall be prepared to accept the amendment.

In the circumstances, I withdraw my amendment in favour of that of the hon. the Minister.

Amendment proposed by Mr. S. J. M. Steyn, with leave, withdrawn and amendment proposed by the Minister of the Interior put and agreed to.

There is one thing that I have noticed while this discussion has been going on. In terms of the amendment which has now been moved, the electoral officer has to consult with the candidate or the agent of every candidate. You may find in an election that you have two candidates representing the two main parties and that in addition to those two candidates there is a third candidate who is one of these cranks whom one comes across occasionally, who is never present when ballot papers are issued to vote through the post and who has no organization. As this clause is worded at present, if one of the candidates is not there himself or is not represented by an agent, then the powers which we are granting here to the electoral officer fall away because he will not have consulted with every candidate. One may find that such a candidate thwarts this whole provision. I wonder whether this is not a point which should be investigated and, if necessary, rectified in the Other Place.

We shall do so.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 9,

I move the amendment as printed in my name—

I think it is well known that in the normal course of events when ballot papers are issued to enable people to vote through the post, the candidates or their agents are present when the ballot papers are issued. When I talk about ballot papers issued in the normal course of events, I refer to ballot papers issued in respect of applications received the previous day. But then you get the case where a person comes to the office of a political party on a certain day and says that he has to leave that same day, that it will not be possible for him to be present on election day and that he would like to have a ballot paper to enable him to vote through the post. The normal procedure then is for the party office to telephone the returning officer and to ask whether he would be prepared to issue a ballot paper at a particular time of the day. Normally the returning officer co-operates and such a ballot paper is then issued the same day; the person concerned votes through the post and the matter is disposed of. All we are asking here is that in such a case the normal practice should also be applicable and that where an appointment is made with the returning officer for a particular time he should, if possible, telephone the parties and tell them that he will issue the ballot paper at such and such a time that particular day and that they may also be present.

I accept the spirit of this proposal. There is nothing wrong with it, but I want to say to the hon. member that I cannot accept it in the form in which it is drafted. I have again consulted with the law advisers. The amendment should really be framed in the negative in order to fit into the sub-section where it properly belongs. I want to propose—and I hope the hon. member will move this—that in line 22 up to and including line 24 the underlined words be deleted and replaced by “except where in the case of an issue in terms of the proviso to sub-section (1), the returning officer does not consider it practicable to give such notice.” If the hon. member wants to move it in that form, I shall give him the opportunity to do so.

With leave, amendment withdrawn.

I now move—

Agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 10,

I move the amendment as printed in my name—

1. (4) The returning officer shall supply to each candidate or his agent a daily list of ballot papers issued containing the voter’s number and name and the name or office and address of the presiding officer for absent votes to whom each ballot paper has been despatched or handed.

I do not know whether it is necessary to argue this. Usually the returning officer, when he issues postal votes, makes a list of such postal votes. He makes it in any case for the post office because the vast majority of them have to be posted, and he usually gives that list to the candidates. But there are cases where returning officers refuse to do so and where they require you to write down every name. If the Minister is prepared to accept that, then I leave it at that.

Here too I am prepared to accept the intention underlying the amendment, provided the hon. member is prepared to move it in the following words: “To add the following sub-section at the end of the proposed new Section 51: (4) The returning officer shall on demand hand to any candidate or his agent a list of the ballot papers issued on any day indicating in each case the voter’s number and name and the name or office and address of the presiding officer for absent votes to whom each ballot paper has been despatched or handed.” I think the language is more elegant and it states the position more clearly.

With leave, amendment withdrawn.

I then move—

1. (4) The returning officer shall on demand hand to any candidate or his agent a list of the ballot papers issued on any day indicating in each case the voter’s number and name and the name or office and address of the presiding officerfor absent votes to whom each ballot paper has been despatched or handed.

Agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 12,

Here I want to move the amendment standing in my name—

Clause 19 contains provisions in terms of which duplicate votes can be replaced and offenders who have voted twice can be charged. It is not necessary for me to say anything more about this amendment and I hope it will be accepted as it stands.

Agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to. Business interrupted to report progress.

House Resumed:

Progress reported.