It falls to me on this occasion to open the debate as far as this side of the House is concerned on the motion which is now before the House. The hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), as hon. members know, has decided not to seek re-election, and I know it is the feeling on this side of the House, and I am sure it is the feeling of the House, in every one of its sections, that this involves a very great, I might say, an irreparable, loss to the House and to the public generally. In dealing with the statement made by the Minister of Finance in moving the second reading of this Bill, I propose, and I think I may say, we on this side of the House propose, to approach that statement as critics, but as responsible critics. We are faced with the prospect in a very short time of a general election, and I have no doubt on the platforms throughout the country there will be found by candidates of every party ammunition wherewith to forward their views drawn from the statement which we listened to the other day, but before that time arrives and while there is still a calmer atmosphere abroad, we propose to deal with the statement and figures put before the House in an attitude of criticism, but of responsible criticism—criticism on the part of men who have in their time had to undertake responsibility for the administration of the affairs of this country and who probably, before very long, will again be called upon to undertake that responsibility. I hope hon. members over there do not think they have an eternal lease of their position. I said that as illustrating the spirit in which we approach this very important statement and therefore I want to say in the first instance, that I regard the Minister of Finance as having handled the surpluses and funds which have come into his hands in a sane and statesmanlike manner. Finance Ministers, on the eve of a general election, have many temptations before them with a surplus in their hands, and I think it is fair to say that the Finance Minister has resisted many of those temptations. He has had a few flutters, of course: he has had a little flutter with Doornkop, and other gilt-edged securities of that kind, but he has kept the disposal of the surplus that is in his hands and all the funds that have come into his care from the disposal of diamonds, he has kept these funds for the next Parliament to deal with. We do not know what the loan programme will be. That will be a matter for the next Parliament to decide, and therefore I give him credit for having reserved the disposal of these—shall I say, vast sums, which fortune has put in his hands—for the decision of a future Parliament. We have to consider not only what the Minister proposes to do with these surpluses of his, but we have also to consider how he came to be in possession of them and whether it is better for the country as a whole that these funds should be in his hands for the Government to dispose of, or whether they should have been left in the hands of the taxpayer to dispose of as he thought best. I think it cannot be denied that whatever wisdom may actuate the Government in disposing of the large sums which are being placed into loan funds, however wisely those funds may be expended—and we have no guarantee that they will not be expended wisely—I think it is open to argument and it may be contended, and we do contend, that if these funds had been left as they might have been left and should have been left, largely in the hands of the taxpayers from whom they were extorted, a better state of things might have existed in the country. Industries might have been encouraged; poverty in some respects might have been relieved, and there would have been a greater check than there is now on ill-advised expenditure. I want to lay stress on the fact that these surpluses of which the Minister has told us, which have been heaped up every year since the Government took office, have been obtained not by a reduction of expenditure and by economy of administration, but by the maintenance of a scale of taxation which was appropriate to the war and the time of depression following on the war. That scale has been maintained when the country has come to an easier and more prosperous time. That is the point we have to consider to-day, whether this system of finance has been justified—[interruption]— We have had remissions of taxation—that is quite true—but they have been small, and have come too late. They are out of all proportion to what could have been given if a more cautious policy of taxation had been followed. In the five years during which this Government has had control of our finances, we have had surpluses amounting to something like £7,500,000. I think that hon. members on the other side who say “hear, hear” have what I might call the “surplus complex,” and they like the mere presence of a surplus, but I do not think the taxpayer likes it. I think his obligations have been fulfilled when he has met the cost of the public services of the country, and there is no reason why he should be called upon to put into the Treasury vast sums over and above what is required for the public services. That is my view; if hon. members take other views, they are quite entitled to them. I am not regarding what the state has got out of the diamond mines—that I consider as a fairy godmother, and I congratulate the Government; I wish we had had an equally beneficent fairy godmother; I am not dealing with that, but with the surpluses which the Minister of Finance and the myrmidons of his department have extracted from the taxpayer over and above what is required for the services of the country.

It is put back.

It is not put back. It is spent by the Government on matters which may be good or may be bad. After all, the individual taxpayer is better able to use the money which comes to him than the Government. If his money is left for him to dispose of, some of it may be spent wastefully, but, on the whole, when he has money to spend it will help to promote industry in the country. The Government may do that or not. It is a sound maxim of finance that the Government should not take from the taxpayer a sum far in excess of that which is necessary to meet the services of the country for the time being. I find there has been a very large and rapid increase in the revenue derived from taxation. According to the Auditor-General’s report, there was an increase in taxation revenue in 1923-’24 over 1913-’14, which I take as the starting year, of 97 per cent. If you take 1927-’28 and compare it with 1913-’14, you find an increase of 153 per cent. I say that is an enormous increase, and that in these last years, when we have got through the troubles occasioned by the war, and the aftermath of the stress and depression that followed after the war, the taxpayer of the country might reasonably have looked for some relief—far more than he has got—from taxation. If you look at the increase of taxation and compare it with the increase that has taken place in the industrial, agricultural and mining development of the country, you will find there has not been that growth which sufficiently justifies this enormous increase in the expenditure of the country. With regard to industry and manufactures, there has been a very large and notable increase since 1913-’14, but if you look at the mining increase it has been nothing like that percentage, and in agriculture it has been still less. I quote this as a further indication that we have been overtaxed, and that we should have had some marked remissions of taxation.

What taxes would you remit?

I will deal with that when I am in a position to do so. I propose to indicate one or two ways in which remissions should take place; but let me again enforce what is the effect of a financial policy that exacts from the country a high level of taxation in excess of what is required. One effect is that the cost of living is kept high. That is undoubtedly the effect of a customs tariff such as we have, and which now in 1927-’28 brings in three-sevenths of the taxable revenue of the country. That is bound in my opinion to cause an increase in the cost of living; if it does not cause an actual increase in cost, it does not so in substance by preventing a diminution of the cost.

Are you advocating free trade?

I am not doing so, and the hon. member knows that. In one respect our customs taxation is unjustified, and that is on cotton blankets—things used by the poorest section of the community. What is the reason? —that in time someone might come here and start making these blankets, and that this will afford some relief to these unfortunate people. But do not let us build up industries, I might almost say, out of the blood of the poorer classes. Then take the duty on printing and stationery, which is another palpable tax on industry, and which is neither legitimate nor necessary.

I shall be very pleased to hear of another example.

What I say is that this is one of the results of a policy of high taxation: it keeps up the cost of living. Let us see how it affects another great industry, namely, the gold mining industry. There are in this country enormous deposits of comparatively low grade ore which cannot be worked unless the cost of production can be considerably reduced below what it is now. We all know that if these low grade propositions could be worked, they would enormously prolong the life of one of our greatest industries. We do not need to go outside to look for industries; we have one at our feet if the cost of production can be kept down, I know my Labour friends will say that I want to reduce the wages of the miners. I do not want to do anything of the kind, because they are quite low enough, but there are railway rates and other costs of working this industry which, I think, could be largely reduced. Another result of this high taxation is that it discourages accumulation. People are discouraged from accumulating and investing by the fact that so much is taken from them in the form of taxation, and I think the income tax could be reduced more than it is now. The income tax now benefits the man at the lower end, but I think the time has come to consider whether we should not do something for the man at the other end, the man who pays the super tax, and who does not get much sympathy as a rule. We have to look at this from the public point of view, and I think that the high rate of super tax, especially when we have more money than we need, could be very well reduced. I think something should be done to give relief in respect of income derived from personal exertion. The professional man has no income except his own brains and ability, but his income is taxed up to the hilt in the same way as if it were derived from investments. Incomes derived from personal exertion should be taxed upon a different scale. The third result of our heavy and very high scale of taxation is that it removes one of the checks upon wasteful expenditure. It is very difficult to control public expenditure, but the most effective way of checking it is that the Minister of Finance should be placed in the position of saying “I have not got the money, and if you want this particular expenditure you must put on more taxation.” I maintain, and I submit it to this House, that we have built up and are maintaining a scale of expenditure which may be quite appropriate in these days of rolling wealth, but which will not be appropriate when the other side of the picture has to be faced. When that day comes, and we are threatened with a deficit, we shall have to retrench and send people out of the service. That is one of the evils attendant upon our having such a high scale of expenditure.

Then you want retrenchment?

No, I want a check on extravagance. My point is that you have not a proper check upon expenditure by having too much money available for the service of the country.

What is your argument?

My argument is that the Minister is maintaining a higher rate of expenditure than he would if he did not have these rolling surpluses. These points constitute the gist of my criticism of the Minister’s statement, and I say again that these surpluses have resulted from an unduly high scale of taxation being maintained. If we had got larger and earlier remissions of taxation, if the finances had been governed by a closer approximation to the actual needs of the service of the country, it would have had the effect of stimulating industry, of relieving some of the poorer classes of the country, and of acting as a check on extravagant expenditure. I want to say something with regard to loan funds. The Minister told us that the debt of South Africa at the end of this financial year would be about £243,000,000. It is not so very long ago that hon. members on the other side of the House were causing the flesh of the unfortunate taxpayer of South Africa to creep by telling him of the enormous debt of this country. The debt has not been diminished; it has gone on increasing. It has not been diminished because an increasing debt is necessary in a young and expanding country. The change that has taken place is that hon. members on the other side have learnt that an increasing debt is necessary. The question is not whether your debt is growing or not, but whether it is used for proper and productive purposes. The Minister has told us that while he has been in office, he has been able to use over £10,000,000 for purposes of capital expenditure which has not had to be raised by loan, but which has come out of mining revenue and other assets of the country. I admit that the revenue has grown, because the mining industry has grown and a considerable increased revenue has been obtained from mineral leases and other sources. For one or two years this revenue might have been used for purposes of ordinary expenditure in order to tide over a temporary bad time, but improved times have enabled the Minister to utilize this revenue in the manner he has stated. But now we come to the matter of this unproductive debt. I did not follow very clearly the statement of the Minister when he said that the unproductive debt had been reduced, not only in proportion but in amount, since the present Government took office. I am not aware that any particular repayment of unproductive debt has taken place. It is true that about £2,000,000 was taken from loan account to finance deficits, but to that extent that amount of Unproductive debt has been got off our books. But the greater part of our capital expenditure of recent years has been spent on undertakings which provide interest on the debt and therefore the proportion of Unproductive debt has been reduced. We have heard in the past that the late Government piled up a large amount of unproductive debt which the present Government has reduced, but there is no evidence whatever of anything of that sort having happened. What does this distinction mean between Unproductive and productive debt? It is largely founded on a fallacy. Hon. members talk of unproductive debt as if it meant debt spent Upon a wasteful object. Productive debt is a term applied by the Treasury to certain classes of loan expenditure which are spent on objects which return the interest payable on the borrowed money. The fact that the object on which capital expenditure has been used does not return interest direct does not mean that the money has been wasted. Has the money spent on schools or Government buildings or bridges or all the other means of developing the country been wasted because it does not provide interest? Take this money we voted the other day for bringing the Angola Boers back from South-West. That is unproductive debt. A large amount of our so-called unproductive debt comes from the time of the war and the expenditure that was caused in connection with the war. Are hon. members going to say that that was wasted because no interest is being paid on it? The whole distinction between productive and unproductive debt, in my opinion, is entirely fallacious. I do not deny that money has been spent wastefully both by the preceding Government and the present Government, but I do say that this distinction between productive and unproductive debt is entirely fallacious without considering whether the money has been spent usefully. We have spent a vast amount of money from loan funds in this country which is unproductive, but which is absolutely necessary for the purposes of the state. It is foolish to go about the country and talk about vast sums of unproductive debt when all that is meant is that loan money has been spent on something or other which does not produce interest.

I agree with you, but it is a very valuable distinction.

For accounting purposes. I think the Minister agrees that unproductive debt does not mean wasteful expenditure.

Not necessarily in every case.

It may be as necessary to spend money on building bridges, or even on wars, as it is to spend money on railways and other utilitarian objects. The Minister refers to the result of his last local loan, and said it had not been altogether successful as the public had taken up only £800,000 as compared with £5,000,000 subscribed by the Public Debt Commission. He seemed to think that, notwithstanding that, the loan had been a success. I think, however, that it was a failure, as it induced the public to take up such a negligible amount of it; at the same time I would be sorry if people in South Africa had subscribed a large proportion of the loan, for it would have been an indication that they had no better investment for their capital than a loan at something under 5 per cent.; it would have been a bad augury for our industries and for the development of the country if South Africans had no better investment for their money than a Government loan. It is possible that people overseas may find these interest rates attractive, but it would be a pity if South Africans did. I do not agree with the Minister’s views that it is a matter for congratulation if we raise all our loans here rather than overseas. I do not see why we should not get as much capital from overseas as we can, so long as we obtain it at reasonable rates. We should encourage overseas capital to come in and take up our loans. I have touched on the growth of expenditure and the fact that having this large surplus destroys checks on expenditure. There are one or two things I would like to touch upon concerning checks upon public expenditure which are losing their effect. The first check on the expenditure is the Treasury; it is for the Treasury to decide, in the first instance, whether a particular expenditure asked for is, or is not, justified. The strength of that check would depend to a large extent on the Minister and the permanent officials of the Treasury, but outside that check there are some others, but, unfortunately, we are not giving the full effect to them that we should. One check on public expenditure is the Auditor-General’s report, but I regret to say that he does not obtain the respect and support that he ought to receive from the Government and the party in power. It seems to me that hon. members, and even Ministers, are apt to regard the Auditor-General’s criticisms as having something behind them. [Time limit extended.] I am not on the Public Accounts Committee, but from what I have heard of its proceedings, it seems to me that the committee is not exercising that influence on public expenditure which it should exercise. That and other committees have got too much on party lines. We are apt to regard these select committees as little replicas of this House, where the actions of the Government must be defended. That attitude, however, destroys a great deal of the efficacy of committees. Neither this House, nor a select committee, can do much in the way of checking expenditure so long as we maintain the tradition that public expenditure is a matter of confidence in the Government. That may be a consequence of our present party system, but surely we should not carry that spirit into a select committee. The Government should not regard the resolution of a committee adverse to some of their actions as a vote of want of confidence. A committee should be a critic, and not merely sit to carry through the resolutions of the Government. The Public Accounts Committee has suffered in that direction, and something should be done to make it not merely a replica of this House dividing on the same party lines, but it should be established more as a critical body, and its resolutions should be accepted by the Government in that spirit. As my time is short, I will say in conclusion that, apart from the financial aspect of the Minister’s statement, we welcome his announcement in regard to the support given by the Government to the air route from Europe to South Africa. I think that is a step entirely to be commended, and I hope it may be taken as an indication that this Government realizes the necessity for us in South Africa to keep the ways of communication open—not to draw fences around us, and to trust our own capacities alone. We have a national culture, quite strong enough to absorb all those visitors from the outside world if they are prepared to come here and to dwell with us. If people are prepared to come to this country and make their homes in South Africa, we have a strong enough national spirit to absorb them, to make them one of us, and we need not be afraid.

You rather locked the door?

No. It is quite a good thing, and we rejoice to see it, that the youth of South Africa are able to take up appointments which, a few years ago, they were not so well-fitted to do. The worst service we can do them is to build a wall around them to keep competition from them. The worst possible kind of protectionist policy is to put an embargo on the importation of brains and capital. That is why I like this idea of a new air-line from Europe to South Africa. We should throw open our doors and should encourage the best abilities and the best capital that exists outside South Africa to come here to help us carry our burden and to further the welfare of South Africa. We have nothing to fear, but everything to gain by following on those, lines.

In the first place, I think the Minister is to be congratulated on his budget, and I think the country is to be congratulated on the sound financial position for the near future. For a young country like this that needs development and needs capital, I think the taxation is excessive. It is very high indeed. It is in some degree because of the high taxation that there is so much unemployment. There is no shadow of doubt in my mind that we should have less unemployment if we had lower taxation. I agree entirely with what the Minister of Finance himself said: “Reduction of taxation means more income in the hands of the people.” Of course it does. Has my hon. friend just discovered that? He also said: “And it helps to provide funds for building up the capital of the country and also to increase its productive capacity.” I agree with every word, but I want to ask why has the Minister not practised this in the last few years? He has been in office five years. Has he just discovered these extremely sound principles? Why did he not put these sound principles into practice two or three years ago? My hon. friend has been too keen about showing big surpluses every year. He has not worried so much about the taxpayer. The taxpayer is just about the last man he has thought of. Take the present position. He shows a surplus of £3,000,000. My hon. friend has taken that out of the pockets of the people. It is not required to carry on the government of the country. Does my hon. friend not know that it could have been more usefully employed if it had been left in the pockets of the people? Of course he knows it. His own remarks that I have quoted show that he does. £3,000,000 is a very large sum. It is an axiom in the taxation of a well-governed country that you should never take out of the pockets of the people more than is required to carry on the business of the country, but, as far as I can see, this elementary axiom has never been discovered by my hon. friend.

No country ever carries it out.

Do they not? I do not think there is any country in proportion to its financial position where it is carried out less than by this Government. Taking more than is necessary from the pockets of the people means extravagant administration. It hampers development, and it prevents the building up of capital, and it leads in some degree to unemployment. I cannot too strongly emphasize what my hon. friend himself said, that reduction of taxation means more income in the hands of the people, and it provides funds for the building up of capital.

It has been my policy for five years.

Then I wish we could have seen more evidence of it. My hon. friend also said that it increases productive capacity. Of course it does. Ever since he has been in office, it has been a matter of accumulating surpluses. He has done that by the very simple process of under-estimating his revenue. In the first year he was in office, he under-estimated the revenue by £1,440,000. In the next year £891,000, in the next year £1,763.000, then £2,661,000 and £3,000,000. The total for the five years has been £9,755,000. What it really means is this—that my hon. friend has over-taxed the people of this country to the extent of £9,755,000. or almost £2,000,000 a year. Is that a satisfactory state of affairs? I think hon. members should reflect on this. With all your brag about surpluses, you have taken out of the pockets of the people £9,755,000, which is so much less available for building up capital in this country, and in many cases has meant unemployment.

Is the taxpayer not in a much better position to-day?

No, of course he is not. How could he be? There is no question about it. The people are over taxed.

What did your Government do with them?

Notwithstanding this immense amount taken unnecessarily from the pockets of the people, the total remission of taxation in the five years is £1,903,000.

For the five years?

For the five years, exactly. One result of this policy has been to keep up expenditure. The expenditure is increasing to a very large extent. In 1924-’25, the expenditure was £24,527,000, and in 1928-’29 it was £28,790,000, giving an increase in five years of £4,263,000.

What did you do?

You cannot go to the country and say that the South African party Government is responsible for this; you are responsible for this. There has been an increase of 17 per cent, in the five years, and the increase of population does not exceed 10 per cent, in the same period. There has been a reduction, at the same time, of taxation of only two millions. The Minister should refer to his own memorandum which he issued last year. I am not taking last year; I am taking his own figures to the end of 1927-’28. These show that the expenditure has steadily grown.

And the country grows with it.

If you take the population the growth has not been the same. In 1929-’30, according to the estimate, the expenditure will be £29,900,000, an increase again of £1,150.000 on last year. The increase in six years has been £5,423,000, or 22 per cent.

It is not a rich country; it is a small country.

Exactly, and we ought to spend less money. There is another point about which I want to speak, and that is that, as far as I can see, the Minister has made no adequate provision for times of depression. I have mentioned it before, but it will stand saying again. We largely depend on two industries in this country which are not permanent, and those are gold and diamonds. We depend on them not only for the upkeep of trade, but for taxation in some degree. We got £2,000,000 in direct taxation from gold, apart from loan fund moneys. Anybody who knows anything about the gold mining industry will tell you that in ten years from now, and that is not such a very long time, there will be a vast change, and, naturally, the output of those mines must decrease. As far as I can see, no adequate provision has been made for that time when it comes along. As to diamonds, the output fluctuates, and then there are times of trade depression. I have known three bad trade depressions—in 1880-’85, in 1904 ’08 and in 1920-’24. In all these cases we had to put on increased taxation in the Cape Province, and revenue fell to a very great extent. I would like to ask my hon. friend, the Minister, what is he doing to meet such times. I would like to warn him what he should do, and that is to make provision for a rainy day by keeping his taxation to the lowest possible point, so that you have other taxation to fall back upon if necessary, and so that when the revenue from these industries which I have mentioned falls off, he has something to fall back upon.

In the first place, I should like to associate myself with what the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) said about the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger). Notwithstanding our differences with him politically, and we sometimes differ very strongly, we shall all miss him in this House when he is no longer here; we shall miss him as a personality, and his yearly criticism of the budget, and I personally feel sorry that we shall not see him here again after the next election. I can assure him that we on this side of the House will long very much for him when he is no longer here. I should like to make a few remarks on what the hon. member for Yeoville said about this budget. While he was speaking, somebody close to me remarked that he was speaking uphill. I think that exactly describes the position with regard to his criticism, because to attack such a good budget, to find faults in it is not so easy. We all realize that he was in a very difficult position in criticizing this thoroughly sound financial position, and the full purse. The hon. member for Yeoville promised us that in future we should get responsible criticisms. What we got in the past was not always exactly responsible criticism. He said something which astonished me very much, but also pleased me a little. When he was speaking about the surpluses and funds of the Minister of Finance, he frankly said that the Minister had dealt with the surpluses and funds he had in a sound and statesmanlike way. It is really gratifying to hear that as the honest opinion of a man of the standing of the hon. member for Yeoville. We well remember what the hon. member for Standerton (Gen. Smuts) said last year. He said that the Minister, to use his own words, was frittering away the surpluses. That is quite a different view from the one held by the hon. member for Yeoville, who has nothing against the way in which the funds have been applied. That shows us the value to be attached to the words of the hon. member for Standerton. The hon. member for Yeoville wanted again to persuade us that the surplus complex which the Minister of Finance is suffering from is one about which the taxpayer won’t hear. I am certain of it that the taxpayer much prefers the surplus complex to the deficit complex of which the country and the taxpayer have had considerable experience in the past. Ex-Minister Burton had that deficit complex, and the result was that loan funds were used for current expenditure and taxation was increased. He was the high priest of the deficit faith, and I think that the country; prefers the surplus complex of the present Minister. That statement by the hon. member is a little imaginative, and the country is very pleased that, after the years of deficits, years of surpluses have now arrived. The hon. member speaks of the fairy godmother who has suddenly come to visit us, and given us diamonds. What I want to know is whether she would have come if the party opposite had been in power when the diamonds were discovered? This Government tackled the matter and established a State diggings. The State diggings were certainly not supported by the Opposition; they fought it tooth and nail. Where Would the £6,500,000 have been if this Government had not taken action? Where would the money have been if the late Government had been in power? To-day we get no criticism on the State diggings. The hon. member for Yeoville did not criticize it, either in principle, or administratively, but he welcomes the little present which the fairy godmother has brought us, though he forgets to add that if this Government and this Minister of Finance had not been sitting under the chimney, the fairy godmother would certainly not have come down it. Then he criticized the customs duties. It is very easy to say that they are too high, and that the cost of living is going up. Hon. members on this side could also easily arise and say: “Reduce here and reduce there, because certain things will then possibly become cheaper,” but that is a contradiction of our whole protection policy. The hon. member for Yeoville himself admitted that he did not want to put an end to the protection policy. He said that he was no advocate of free trade. When, however, he criticizes he should give concrete examples. The only thing he could mention was cotton blankets. That was the only thing he could criticize with regard to customs duties. It is clear that when the hon. member is criticizing such an important matter he ought also to give concrete instances, and point out where we should, and could, curtail the protection policy without injuring our own industries. The hon. member did not give them. We know quite well that the party opposite was always composed in the past of very lukewarm supporters of the policy. They say constantly indeed that we must have protection, but when that is given they say at once that it is increasing our costs of living. The hon. member for Yeoville also spoke about income tax, and in this connection said something very interesting. His argument practically was that our Government had now done quite enough for the poor man, and that something ought now to be done for the rich man. When hon. members opposite, however, come to the countryside they say that the increase of the exemptions from income tax are of no use to the poor man, and now they will once more say that the increase for children will also not benefit the poor man at all, because his income is below £400. The hon. member for Yeoville, however, says to-day that we are doing quite enough for the poor man on the low scale, and that we ought to do something now for the rich man, with super-taxes, because, according to him, the tax prevents the rich man from accumulating money. He wants people to be encouraged to make more money. I hope that hon. members opposite will report on the countryside that the hon. member for Yeoville thinks that enough is now being done for the poor man, and that something must now be done for the wealthy. He also criticized the increase in expenditure. It is the same hardy annual. Every year, however, the Minister of Finance has also risen and challenged hon. members opposite to mention a concrete case where retrenchment could be effected. No case is ever mentioned. Oh the contrary, members on both sides of the House rise every year and ask for more money for various purposes. It is very easy for hon. members to shout about increase in expenditure, while they constantly introduce motions necessitating more expenditure, and hon. members, as representing divisions, are constantly demanding facilities from Ministers and heads of departments which all mean additional expenditure. Let me, however, point out to hon. members who speak and criticize so easily what is written in the election manifesto of the South African party of 1920 about increase in expenditure. In that year the increase was 26 per cent., and the excuse in the manifesto then was: “That the current expenditure should increase every year is quite natural, because we are a young country which asks for more help day by day, as, for instance, more officials, police, justices of the peace, magistrates, postmasters, postal facilities, etc.; and that costs money. But the material prosperity of the country is also increasing year after year, and the increase in expenses is such that we can meet the future with equanimity.” That was said in the year when the expenditure increased by 26 per cent, over the previous year. This year the increase is not quite 4 per cent., but now hon. members opposite say that we are going too far. I want to refer them to their own words in the year when the increase was 26 per cent. Let them say so in their election manifesto. That they certainly will not do. If we go into the increases in expenditure during the last Government we find that after the world war the increases were on the average 7 per cent, per year, while the average increase under the present Government was 3.5 per cent. The increase under the previous Government was, therefore, just double of that under this Government. What right have my hon. friends then to talk about increase in expenditure? Notwithstanding all that, our increase is only half as great as that under the previous Government. After the world war the increase under the South African party Government was 7 per cent, on the average, before, 6.2 per cent, on the average, while our average is 3½ per cent. Much has been said also about the increase in our public debt. I hope the hon. member for Yeoville will investigate the figures for the last three years of the previous Government. In 1921-’22 the increase was £13.000,000. 1922-’23 £8.000,000, 1923-’24 £9,000,000. This year, under this Government, it is about £4,000,000, and for the four previous years of this Government it was about £6,000,000, £7,000,000, £7,000,000, £7,000,000. We never got near the figure of £13,000,000. There is no point in their criticism. They criticize, but they themselves run more deeply into debt. The hon. member for Yeoville also said that we must not put an embargo on brains from abroad. He made a covert defence of what we experienced with the Durban grain elevator where imported engineers cost the country thousands and thousands of pounds. He advocated what we experienced in connection with electrification when the imported engineers caused great expense to the country, and yet in the end the advice of our own engineers had to be followed. When necessary we shall get men from abroad, but when we have our own men in the country who can do the work, it is not necessary to get meh from overseas. We know how very many English-speaking and Afrikaans-speaking young South Africans who have completed their studies have gone to look for work in other countries, and that some of them to-day have achieved fame there. They had to go there simply because they could not find work in their own country, but in the meanwhile people from overseas came here and obtained work. I think that we ought to be thankful to the Government for giving our Own sons an opportunity, and, where possible, using our own resources. The hon. members for Yeoville and Cape Town (Central) have really made no criticism worth mentioning. Nor did they thank the Government for what it has done. I certainly speak for this side of the House when I express my deep gratitude for the concessions in the income tax which the Government is going to grant. Apart from the reduction of income tax by 20 per cent., the public Will be very glad at the raising of the exemption for children, and especially for the raising of the age from 18 to 21 years. There is great expense on children of 18, 19 and 20 years who go to the universities, and parents are only allowed to deduct for children under 18 years. Another matter for which the Government will be much thanked is the abolition of the customs duty on fuel for farm purposes, and the further concession in the reduction of the railway rate for this fuel. In my own constituency motor tractors are being used more every year, and this will much assist the farmers. We are particularly grateful for the amount of £1,000,000 which is to be given the provincial administration for roads. The improvement of roads is absolutely necessary.

Is that also an exemption from tax?

It is of very great importance, and I hope you do not object to it. The road motor services are constantly extending, and this amount will help a great deal to put the roads on the countryside into better order. There has always been a lack of money to improve the roads. I want to say here that I think that the Free State has worked out a very good scheme for the upkeep of roads. The Free State Provincial Council thinks that it will be a good thing when a road is made for a ganger to be appointed, just as on the railways, to see that the road is kept in good order. In this way the capital expenditure will not be lost, and provision is made for the road being permanently kept in order. This £1,000,000 which the Government is giving the provincial councils without interest, and without its having to be repaid, will assist very much on the countryside. I do not want to say any more. Good wine needs no bush. That is the case with this budget. It is not necessary to paint the beautifully. The financial position is first class, and no wonder the hon. member for Yeoville said that their mouths wittered to see the position of the country so satisfactory. It is not all due to the Government. I admit it, but the particularly sound policy of this Government to put the finances on a proper basis in the first place, and to separate the underground wealth from the land itself, for the country, has contributed a great deal to the satisfactory position. As for the mineral riches, I hope the Government will keep before it in future the example of the State diggings in Namaqualand. We notice that Mr. Solly Joel said that apparently all kinds of minerals were found in South Africa. What is required is research work, not only by private individuals and syndicates, but also by the Government to ascertain the great wealth in minerals, both precious and base, under the ground. Let us keep them for the people, and let them be a blessing to the country. I hope the country will see how valuable a Government is which follows a sensible statesmanlike policy, and disposes in a states-manlike way of funds committed to its charge.

I agree that the financial position as outlined by the Minister of Finance is, on the whole, satisfactory. Obviously the financial position of the country is very sound, and I congratulate the Minister on having shown that very clearly. I agree, also, with the criticism that we have in past years taken too much money out of the tax-payers’ pockets and that some of the Minister’s receipts have come in rather fortuitously. I share the opinion of the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) that the Minister has done wisely in refusing to be tempted to purchase votes with this money, but instead has decided to put it into capital expenditure. As for the exact nature of the expenditure, we must remember that we are still in the dark, but in the next Parliament there will be opportunities of expressing opinions as to the advisability or otherwise of the proposed expenditure. I am comforted to find that the money is not to be frittered away in unnecessary expenditure, but is to be devoted either to reduction of debt, or for purposes of capital expenditure. There is also cause for the criticism of the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) that perhaps insufficient allowance has been made for the fact that a great deal of our revenue is dependent on mining. It is quite true that this country is highly mineralized, and there may be an expansion of mining, but at the same time we have to face the fact that as far as is known at present, there may be within a reasonable number of years a considerable number of mines on the Witwatersrand approaching the termination of their lives. If their lives are to be prolonged, it will be necessary for them to carry on operations at a cheaper rate than they are able to do to-day. It is not so much a question of profits, because, except for direct taxation purposes, the country benefits almost as much from a mine working at a small profit as it does from a mine producing a large profit. But in order to keep the mines going on the present scale, it will be necessary to work a great deal more of lower grade ore, than is possible with the present working costs. When the time comes to do that, there will be very considerable difficulty in reducing the costs of working. A reduction of wages would be difficult, and the cost of native labour is more likely to go up than to come down. We are now embarking on a policy of somewhat high protection, and that is bound to lead to some extent to an increase in the cost of living. I know the Minister of Finance realizes that to some extent, and some of the proposed alterations in the customs tariff have taken that into account. Judging by the experience of other countries, the cost of living is bound to go up and be reflected in the wages and the cost of production in primary industries, and the Minister should take into account the fact that there is coming a difficult time so that the best thing to do would be to keep the general taxation down as low as possible, so that if it is necessary to make a special effort, it may be made with as little damage as possible to the ordinary taxpayer. There are two other points to which I should like to refer. At the end of a Parliament one naturally thinks there may be changes in the system of administration, and there may be an opportunity of making such changes when the new Parliament meets. I suggest one change which would really be of benefit to Parliament and the country. At the present time it seems to me that the care of native affairs is bound inevitably to suffer a certain amount of neglect; I am not blaming the Minister of Native Affairs or the officials of his department. As far as I can see the officials are efficient and do their best, but the system seems to me to lend itself to neglect of native affairs. The Minister of Native Affairs to-day is the Prime Minister. That has been the system for many years. It was the system in the Cape before Union, and at that time the system had much to recommend it. It was a good thing that the natives should look to the head of the Government as their great chief, so to speak. But it seems to me that time has gone by. As things are to-day, with the pressure of work on the shoulders of the Prime Minister, it is absolutely impossible, in my view, for the Prime Minister, whoever he may be, to devote the attention to native affairs which that very important subject demands. I think, therefore, that the time has come when a Minister, one of the eleven Ministers, other than the Prime Minister, should be appointed Minister of Native Affairs, that that should be his particular work, that he should be head of that department, and head of the Native Affairs Committee in this House, and that it should be a real live committee. To-day a great deal of its work is done in a very perfunctory way, not because of any fault on the part of the members, but because things of importance are not referred to it to be thrashed out. I believe if we had had such a committee as I suggest, we could have avoided some of the difficulties we have to-day in connection with natives’ land and so forth, difficulties many of which have been caused by the fact that Parliament has really not had the time to devote to them. Then there is another (matter which more especially affects me in a local way, and affects very materially one section of the constituency which I represent. That is the matter of the payment of rates in municipalities by the Government, or advances in lieu of rates. There is a good deal of discrepancy as between the provinces, and I believe it is the intention of the Minister of Finance, if he is there again, that consolidating legislation should be introduced. That, I think, would be a good thing. To-day some municipalities appear to get not enough assistance and others too much, and that question could be gone into thoroughly. What I have particularly in my mind is the petition which has been referred to the Government from the municipality of Simonstown. There are special circumstances into which I cannot go now, but I would commend this petition to the notice of the Government. The petition shows the special circumstances of the port of Simonstown and the difficulties with which the municipality have to contend. In view of the services which it renders both to the Admiralty and to the local defence forces, the municipality feels it is hardly treated. I am aware there has been an investigation and the result is the Treasury has decided that no change should be made, and the municipality was informed that consolidating legislation is to be introduced in the future. I hope that legislation will act in a fair manner and that there will be investigation and full justice will be done. I confidently recommend to the notice of my hon. friend over there, or over here, wherever he may be, that question, and that he will look into the peculiar position in which the municipality of Simonstown is placed, and see that proper justice is done when the question comes up for decision.

Hon. members may have seen a well-known sporting print which shows a very small boy behind a very large cricket bat, the title of which is “The hope of his side.” The Government have gone from blunder to blunder in this session. They have committed every possible futility and every possible ineptitude and their prestige has so steadily been lowered that at last they have been forced to rely on “the hope of the side,” and they are going to the country and are going to fight this election, on “Klaasie and his surplus.” I will admit straight away the Minister is playing quite a good innings for his side, but I would suggest to the Minister, if he plays bridge, it is easy to play a good game with a hand full of trumps, but the man who plays the best game is the man who can play a defensive game when he has a bad hand to play with.

I have seen a good hand spoilt.

The difference is this, that while Mr. Burton in the last three or four years of his office, had to face a time of unprecedented difficulty, the Minister is swimming with the stream, sailing with a fair wind. I do not think this House yet realizes—certainly the country does not—what a debt the country owes to Mr. Burton.

We do. We recognize that!

But if you asked the Minister of Finance he would be the first to agree that we owe a great debt of gratitude to what Mr. Burton did. Take one instance alone. You remember the Burton cut in civil service salaries in 1923, which was to produce progressively a reduction in civil service increments reaching a maximum of £800,000. He did that when times were bad, but the Minister of Finance, when times are good, has still retained the advantage, of the cut and he has not proposed to go back on it. He is reaping the benefit of the odium which Mr. Burton incurred.

The odium will be mine now, because I am not restoring it.

I should say so, and personally I agree with the Minister. I think he is doing the right thing, and I do not care who knows it. I think the whole country, whatever party they belong to, rejoice with the Minister and the Government on the soundness of the financial position. We welcome the use which the Minister has made of his surplus; we welcome the judicious amendments made in the income tax, and we rejoice with him in this nest egg from Namaqualand and the manner in which he proposes to spend it. I think the Minister is to be congratulated on the restraint which he has shown in his budget speech. Judging by the incidents which took place in Potchefstroom some three months ago, many of us on this side were wondering if the Potchefstroom shilling-a-day was to be repeated on a large scale in this budget, if presents were not to be handed down from the Christmas tree to all sections of the population in order to purchase votes at the next election for a Government whose popularity is obviously on the wane. I will say that there is nothing in the Minister’s financial proposals which lends colour to that, and he is fairly to be congratulated on the restraint he has shown. No one can take exception to his proposal to pass the whole of the Namaqualand revenue and the surplus to loan account. That is the Minister’s good point, and he has many good points as Minister of Finance. Probably his worst point is the one which has been already alluded to by the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) and others on this side—the Minister’s bad budgeting. The Minister started off and in his first year underestimated by £1,000,000, and this year underestimates by £3,000,000, which means, in plain language, that the taxpayers of this country have been called upon to pay in taxation £3,000,000 more than they needed to do. Speakers on the other side have said, “Is not a surplus better than a deficit, and would not the country sooner have an era of surpluses than an era of deficits?” Of course I would sooner have an era of surpluses than of deficits, but I would rather see a balanced budget than either, and I maintain that the Minister of Finance should ask for just as much moneys as he reasonably needs for the expenditure of the country, rather than these surpluses year after year which grow like a snowball. They are a rake’s progress. If we give him another term of office I suppose the surpluses will grow in geometrical progression.

made a remark [inaudible].

I shudder at the prospect of a Minister of Finance who may announce at the end of his next term a £7,000,000 surplus. The Minister gave his whole case away in his speech on Thursday last, when he said that when framing his estimate of £27,500,000 for the coming year, he was influenced by three factors—drought, probable reduction in the yield of the alluvial diggings, and uncertainty in the diamond market. Well, there was a drought, and he had to admit that his yield from alluvial diamonds did fall, and that the position of the diamond market was hardened by legislation brought in about the same time that the Minister made his estimates; and yet in spite of that we find an under-estimate of £3,000,000.

All these factors would mean decreased importations, but they went up.

The Minister went on to speak in similarly apologetic strain of the growth of expenditure and said he had always done his best to check wasteful expenditure, and without adopting a cheeseparing policy, not withholding money from public needs. I think we can acquit the Minister of “adopting a cheeseparing policy” and “withholding money from public needs.” When he took over the expenditure was £24,000,000, and now at the end of his term it is £30,000,000, an average growth at the rate of £1,000,000 per annum. What better evidence can the country require than those figures themselves that he has been entirely unable to impose an effective check on the growth of expenditure? Certainly there is an “upward and forward movement”—in public expenditure. These surpluses about which we have heard so much are not due to economy and to reduced expenditure; if they were I would take off my hat and acclaim the Minister as a financial genius. They are due to the fact that although expenditure has gone up, revenue has gone up more still. The taxpayer last year paid £6,000,000 more than in those days when Mr. C. G. Fichardt told this hon. House, on behalf of the Minister of Finance and his colleagues, that the country was groaning under a burden of taxation which it could not bear. I will be asked if I can put my finger on any specific instance of extravagance. If I had the time and there was no time limit, I could give detailed instances at length. I will mention only the heads of a few: firstly, there is the inflation of the public service. The Auditor-General gives a list of 694 new posts, costing £100,000 a year, which were created in the year under review, and to give one instance of high-grade posts which have been graded up still further—he mentions all these high-grade posts graded up—there is that of the Government attorney, who had a salary of £950—£1,100, who was re-graded to a maximum of £1,200, and if that were not enough, was recently re-graded to £1,300—£1,450. I could multiply such instances by the score. We are to-day reaping the full benefit of the Burton cut, and we are spending £800,000 a year less than you would have done if that cut had not been made; in spite of that, we are to-day, according to this year’s estimates, going to spend £9,500,000 on our public service, and in the last year of the South African party regime we spent a little over £8,500,000, so that there has been a rise in the cost of nearly £1,000,000 under the Minister’s aegis, in spite of the benefit of the Burton cut, The number of officials has gone up nearly 5,000 in that time, of all sorts, and inside and outside of the public service—not the railways and harbours, with which I have nothing to do in this speech—all sorts of new posts have been created. The Government told us that if they get hack to power they are going to create ambassadorial posts in various parts of the world. We know what that means; each ambassador will cost the country an ambassadorial amount, and the expense will be enormous. Our Pensions Bill has gone up by nearly half a million for pensions for officials alone, largely as a result of getting rid of officials who are not personae gratae with the Government. The Auditor-General has drawn attention to the fact that many an official has been got rid of prematurely and that we have in consequence an added burden on the pensions vote. In all four years, as I have said, our pensions bill in regard to officials rose by nearly half a million sterling. I will give another example. Without any enquiry by the Treasury, this House was stampeded in giving extra pensions to ex-republican officials. At the same time the House had no idea of what the cost would be, but it cost nearly £340,000, and added an extra expenditure of nearly £18,000 a year to our pensions vote. Dr. Leyds got a grant of nearly £9,000, and the Minister of Lands got £2,500. Dr. Leyds, not satisfied with that, decided to fight (and fought successfully), against paying income tax on that money. I could go on multiplying these cases of extravagance of this sort, but I have not the time. The Minister had a word to say about our own unproductive debt, and gave us certain revised figures. In that regard we had “Philip sober,” but I remember “Philip drunk.” I remember the Minister of Finance a couple of years ago claiming that in one year he had reduced the unproductive debt by thirteen millions. I am glad that he has abandoned that fantastic claim and has now given us the true figures. He now tells us that on the 31st March, 1924, the debt was 58½ million and that this year it will be £44,000,000—a reduction of 14½ millions in five years—why, loans receipts from mining leases account for eight and a half millions of that total. There was one purple patch in the Minister’s statement when he referred to the re-receipts from mining revenue. He said—

All very true, but who has he got to thank for this ten millions? Who initiated this policy and handed over these properties on terms which brought in a substantial return to the Government? It is something which the Minister has to thank his predecessor for, and for which he also has to thank the South African party administration, and one would have expected that when he took the credit to himself for these very large receipts he would at least have mentioned that all that he had done was to step in and draw the profits which his predecessors ear-marked for him. With the exception of the Sub-Nigel lease, every other lease and every receipt from the bewaarplaats was simply increment coming from the policy adopted by his predecessor.

I only took the credit of applying those proceeds, not diverting them.

That reply is unworthy of the Minister. He knows that in the years 1921-’24 the revenue from taxation shrank by £4,000,000, and it is unfair and unworthy of the Minister to now sneer at his predecessor because, under very grievous financial pressure for two years, these monies were temporarily diverted to revenue.

There was another explanation.

We did not hear it at the time.

If I am short I will take the consequences and impose taxation.

When the Minister has to go through what Mr. Burton went through he will know. The policy I have referred to was the policy of the South African party, and all the Minister is doing is to draw revenue which was provided for him by his predecessor. I now want to say a word or two about the four-and-a-half per cent, loan, which the Minister seems to regard as an extraordinary achievement. But where did the money come from? Only some £800,000 was subscribed by the public; the balance came from the Public Debt Commissioners, the chairman of whom is the Minister of Finance. The Minister issues a loan, subscribes to nearly all of it as I have said, and then points to its success as that of a loan which had been issued entirely in South Africa. The Minister has announced certain reductions of taxation. He is going to take a quarter of a million off the customs dues, and a million off the income tax. As to the customs dues, he is taking something off silk piece goods, underclothing and carpets, but the things that really matter, the bread and butter and food of the people, are left untouched. The yield from customs and excise in the last financial year was £11,500,000, taken from the pockets of the importers, who in turn will probably make the purchasing public pay double. That is why the cost of living is so high. I am glad that he has managed to give certain concessions with regard to income tax, but I do not suppose it will benefit in the aggregate more than 10,000 payers of income tax. If he had reversed the process, and given a reduction of £1,000,000 in customs rates, and only a quarter of a million reduction of income tax, he would have benefited the many and not the few. No married man with a family pays income tax unless he has an income of over £600 per year, and I am more concerned with the people who have small incomes, the clerk and the working people. What is a little reduction in underclothing and silk piece goods to these people? For these reductions I say, thank you for nothing. I say that income tax has ceased to be the concern of the ordinary middle-class man. It is the concern of the rich man. I agree with the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) that even the rich man could benefit by a reduction of income tax, but the man that I am concerned with is the poor man. I would like to begin with the native, and reduce the customs duty on blankets and ready-made clothing. Then I would go on with the breakfast table. In any case this surplus of £3,000,000 comes very largely out of the pockets of the people who buy the goods from the shops and who pay the £11,500,000. I am glad the Minister of Finance has announced this new arrangement with Britain with regard to air lines, and when he made it I could not help thinking what a misfortune it was for the country and for his own party that he did not have the handling of the German treaty, because I do not believe he would ever have been a party to that treaty, and I am certain that if he had negotiated such a treaty he would not have abolished future preference to Great Britain.

The hon. member must not discuss the German treaty.

What I chiefly admired about the Minister when he made his speech was his courage, the courage that he showed, not only in the statement he made in regard to finance, but the claims which he made in the course of his statement. Before coming to instances of his courage, I would like to say that one could not fail to be gratified by the very sound position of the country both with regard to revenue and loan that lie was able to put before the House. One of the most satisfactory things was the Minister’s announcement of our ability to finance our capital expenditure without borrowing. Whether it would be wise to do too much financing of our loans in our own country is another thing. It is not a bad thing to get capital from overseas, but still, it is well that the people out of their savings are able to finance our loans. There is one thing upon which the Minister is to be congratulated, and that is when once he has a surplus, he makes good use of that surplus. I do not like, the way he gets the money, but he makes a prudent use of it. It seems unnecessary to comment upon his intentions with regard to the 1929-’30 surplus, because I hope that someone else from the South African party will be in a position to make a more beneficial use of that surplus than the Minister intends to make of it. I have nothing but approval, however, for the prudent way in which the Minister deals with his surpluses, but I would join in deprecating the unnecessary amount of money he has raised from the public. I spoke of the Minister’s courage, and I would say that it needs considerable courage for the Minister to make the speeches and to give the figures he has submitted on several occasions, and then a year later to come before us with the information that, the revenue is largely in excess of his estimates. On the 4th April, 1927, he told us that be expected to have a deficit of £7,000. A year later he comes before us and tells us that he has a surplus of £1,700,000, when he expected equilibrium. More than that, the Minister went on to tell us how he intended to deal with the previous year’s surplus, leaving him with a deficit of £185,000, which he could make up out of savings. Less than a year later he tells us that all the benefits he expected to give us from the surplus he was able to make up out of ordinary revenue, and that he has a surplus of £3,000,000. For any Minister to come forward within that short space of time showing how wrong he has been in his estimate, needs very considerable courage. Of course, it requires more courage if on the wrong side. The only fly in the ointment is the failure of that experiment of issuing a 4½ per cent. loan. One thing that is puzzling me is this—seeing that the Minister has all these surpluses, what is the need for issuing Treasury bills, that is, promissory notes? I should now like to refer to the claims the Minister has made. A great deal of the reductions in customs duties were made on items required by manufacturers, and these reductions mean nothing to the consumer. They enable the manufacturer to buy his materials more cheaply, but it is still the case that the price of the South African article is not governed by the cost of production but by the figure at which they can be imported. The Minister is right in not taking notice of the general level of the customs duty. He claimed that the general position of the poorer consumer has been considerably improved since 1924, and that alterations have been made in the customs duties so as to shift the burden from the poor to the rich I can find no warrant for that assertion. According to the Hansard reports of the 1925 session the Minister made no such claim when he introduced the revised customs tariff, but he gave five principles which he said were embodied in the changes: Development and promotion of industries, admission of raw materials free of duty, the adjustment of the preferential tariff, the provision of maximum and minimum rates and a system of suspended duties. No claim was made by the Minister at that time that he intended to help the consumer. When did he find out that that was the case?

We increased the duties on articles of luxury and reduced them on a number of other articles.

The Minister is absolutely unwarranted in saying that he has transferred the burden from the poor to the rich. If you put a duty on the rich man’s jewellery, how does that help the poor man? The Minister increased the duty on some articles, such as condensed milk, butterine, margerine, sugar, blankets, rugs, clothing, hats, chairs and so on. Is that helping the poor man?

What about the reductions?

A reduction has been made on tea. Does the poor man use more tea than the rich? These reductions apply equally to the rich man as to the poor man. There is no warrant for the assertion that the Government has shifted the burden from the poor to the rich, because they have not done anything of the sort. The same thing applies to income tax. Reductions were made in the duty on piece goods made of silk. Who is going to benefit by that—the rich or the poor? Reductions have also been effected in the duty on underclothing, but the poor man does not wear underclothing. Then there are reductions on gas and electrical cooking stoves and so on. I welcome the reductions, but when the Minister claims that he is shifting the burden from the poor man to the rich, he is making a statement without foundation. The same thing applies to the income tax concessions. Who are going to reap the benefit from exemptions of income tax on payments made for the erection of dipping tanks, fences, and the eradication of prickly pear? The farmer who has the money to spend on these things will be the man who will reap the benefit, and it is the rich farmer who has the money to spend on these things. I am afraid the Minister’s courage is greater than his discretion. The Minister certainly made some very sound remarks on the cost of living, pointing out that we have not only been over-importing, but that a large proportion of the population is living beyond its means. The Minister is absolutely right. Largely owing to the method of purchasing on the instalment system, especially where motorcars are concerned, people have got into the habit of buying things before they can afford them. It is exceedingly courageous for the Minister to bring that forward when we think of the example he is showing in going beyond what the country can afford in normal times. We have reached a basis of expenditure which is unsafe. I think the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) went a little beyond what is correct when he said that the Public Accounts Committee was rather apt to be a party committee. But I will inform the Minister that he would find the Public Accounts Committee does not hold the same opinion that he does in regard to public expenditure. Look at the third report which the Select Committee on Public Accounts presented last session. He will see the report refers to “the laxity of Treasury practice, and the committee hopes that there will be a drastic reform.” That was signed by Mr. Pienaar, who is the chief whip of his party, and if the Minister will look at the report which has been presented this year but not yet printed, he will find some very interesting things there. That is the unanimous report of a committee on which there is a majority of Government members. That does not look like effective control of expenditure. To all sitting on that committee it has been a matter of extreme anxiety that there has not been the control of expenditure we would look for from the Treasury. It is almost inevitable that when the Minister has his pocket unnecessarily full of money there cannot be a proper control of expenditure. The Minister also showed considerable courage when he made this statement: “There is a general spirit of contentment and optimism prevailing.” Where does he find that general spirit of contentment and optimism? Is it shown in the feelings of the country in regard to these half-baked measures dealing with the native question? Is it shown by the flag controversy? Is it shown in the feeling aroused by this ill-starred German treaty? Has it been aroused by the declaration of the Government that political favour will be shown in the civil service? Where does the Minister find this spirit of contentment and optimism? Then finally the Minister referred to “the undisputed fact of a wise Government policy being predominant …. the satisfactory position of the country and the sound position of its finances are sufficient answer and proof.” Does the Minister have the hardihood to say that the voters of this country are going to be influenced by the fact of a sound financial position and that those things I have spoken of do not count? Two thousand years ago it was said. “Man shall not live by bread alone” and it is just as true to-day as it was then. In my opinion, the voters will say that, notwithstanding these benefits, which the Minister proposes to confer upon them—and which, incidentally might equally be conferred by this side—they would be prepared to renounce the whole of those benefits in exchange for once again being able to breathe the free air of equal opportunity for constitutional government and for the feeling that they can look in the eyes unashamed the other members of the British empire.

I can quite understand the Opposition finding a great deal of difficulty in criticizing the budget before them, and I can quite understand the criticism of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (South) (Sir William Macintosh) and the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell). The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (South) has been trying to show us that the Minister has heaped most of his benefits on the rich man and not the poor man, and the hon. member for Bezuidenhout has tried very hard to show that he is now coming forward as the champion of the poor man. There is no doubt that the Minister, through his careful budgetting, has been able, at the end of the Government’s lease of life, to produce a budget such as the Opposition cannot criticize. So far, no serious criticism has been levelled. There is nothing we on this side have to answer. What have we to reply to? We have to reply to the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) in his statement that the Public Accounts Committee does not do its duty, and here we have the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (South) telling him what the committee really has been doing, that the committee, with its instrument—the Auditor-General—has for the last four years been exercising careful control over the Minister of Finance, and I do not think that as many as six times the committee has taken sides one way or the other. The criticism levelled by the committee has been honest criticism and very thorough. Owing to the presence of the old watch-dog, the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), whom I also regret is leaving the committee, I do not think there has been any opportunity of the proverbial camel slipping through the eye of a needle. He has been much too careful. The one charge that has been levelled against this Government has been the steady increase of the public debt. We have been told this Government, through continual borrowing, has been very lavish. I think first of all the hon. member for Bezuidenhout dwelt upon it.

I never mentioned the public debt from start to finish of my speech.

It has been the one cry that this Government has been responsible for the growth of the public debt up to the present amount of £243,000,000. The hon. member for Yeoville also brought it up.

I think you must be dreaming.

The position is that for the four years preceding the period of this Government in office, the public debt increased by £34,000,000, and for the four years which we have been in office, the public debt has increased by £30,000,000. What the Auditor-General has drawn attention to is the ever-increasing interest that has to be paid on this public debt, and the previous Government simply kept pace with the progress of the country exactly as we are doing. The Auditor-General, in his last report, says the debt extinguished by this Government has been £3,800,000, while by the previous Government, it was £4,000,000, and there is still a year to go, as far as this Government is concerned. The Government has gone out of its way to see that this debt is not expanded any faster than it should be. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) told us he was very much concerned with the over-estimation, and thought that if there was a change of Government, he would rather see a Government which dealt in an overdraft than a bank balance—that was what it amounted to.

I said: “Under estimate”, I said precisely the opposite, and you know it.

If they think that is a sound financial position they are entitled to think it, and the Minister of Finance was quite right in saying that that is all the more reason for returning this Government to power. The hon. member for Ladybrand (Mr. Swart) voiced it somewhat, and the other side have been playing a bit with the “fairy godmother of Namaqualand,” but there was a fairy godmother also on the other side, shortly after the great war, when South-West Africa came to us as mandated territory. The Government had 80 per cent, of the receipts of the diamond mines there, but the then Government told us that they were not prepared to go into private enterprise, and would give it out to contract by lease, which they did. The right hon. leader of the Opposition (Gen. Smuts) has stated that the position in regard to Namaqualand is to be reviewed. I take it, from his actions of the past, and to which they committed themselves when they were in power, if they come into power again they will hand over Namaqualand to some individual, or group of individuals, and have a lease or some other contract. Notwithstanding the fact that the Minister has used only a small portion of the money that the fairy godmother has brought us, there is still a fairly large amount of money to be dealt with on that basis. The Minister of Mines and Industries told us that on an expenditure of £105,000 he has recovered six and a half millions worth of diamonds which belongs to the State to-day, and it has provided a certain amount towards the development of the country. There will be a difference between our budget and the budget from the Minister of Finance on that side. I suppose the hon. member for Kimberley (Sir Ernest Oppenheimer), who is the authority on finance on that side, will frame the budget and tell us what they will do with the surplus from Namaqualand. He is a successful man of business, and deals in globular millions, and no doubt he will deal with these millions in an impartial manner. He has already dealt with it as far as South-West Africa is concerned. We have heard very little of the amounts of money put into the development of key industries and the other industries of which the previous Government set us an example, and we had to foot the bill. You will find the Electricity Supply Commission credited with a capital amount for State services of something like seven millions, and the payment made out of public revenue. I think that the record, as far as the Government is concerned, is very healthy. We have the Minister of Mines and Industries telling us he is coming forward with regard to gold enterprises in the future, and it is for the Opposition to tell us where the Government has gone wrong in these matters. Consideration has not been given to the question in the criticisms which have been made whether, if the Opposition had been in power, these questions would have been put right. The hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), in his usual thorough manner, dealt with some figures, but I do not think I will go into them now, and I will leave it at that. The hon. member stated he has handed over to the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan). The budget is a good one, and shows careful thought and budgetting. The finances of the country are in a healthy and prosperous state, for the Government to take over when they are returned to power.

I listened with a great deal of pleasure to the budget speech of the Minister of Finance, but I notice that there is one thing that applies to all his budget speeches—he deals almost exclusively with getting other people’s money into his pocket, and he never deals with the necessity which makes him become such an expert in extracting that money. I hope that either he or a future Minister of Finance will devote more time to thinking about cutting down expenditure rather than of methods by which he can increase taxation. The Minister spoke retrospectively of the last five years, but instead of a retrospect of the enormous amount of taxation he has been able to squeeze out of the public, he should make a retrospect of the expenditure which the Government has incurred; and if he were on this side of the House, his criticism of that would be very strong, and correct. I find that if you take the budget of 1924-’25, which was the Minister’s first one, and this budget, the increase in the amount is £5,350,000. When you come to the details I can imagine what the Minister’s criticism would be. The Minister’s own department has to deal with an increased expenditure of £3,358,000. He would probably say: “I do not suggest for the moment that that was necessary. For instance, the item £900,000, which is due to old age pensions is a very necessary and very important addition to our statute book.” But the Minister would also say that the amount also includes a very considerable item of expenditure in regard to pensions for old republican officials. The House voted these sums under an entire misapprehension, and I think the Minister would criticize such expenditure very seriously indeed as totally unwarranted and much of which is paid to people who to-day do not live in the country. Another considerably increased item of expenditure is in regard to the national debt, but if I remember rightly, one of the chief planks of the Nationalist platform was that there should be little or no increase in the national debt, but they never explained to the country how they were to carry on without increasing that debt. Another large item is the increased expenditure in connection with the provincial councils, which to a very considerable extent was spent upon education. I can understand a Minister saying in this regard: “We have already got an educational system which costs us more per head than any system in any other country similarly situated to ourselves, and it is very doubtful whether our system is better or even as good as the systems in other countries, and yet we go on increasing the money spent upon education. I have no quarrel with money spent on education, provided we get increased value for it, but if we spend more than any other country upon our education, then our education should be the best.” Then there is an increase on the education vote, caused by having taken off certain categories from the provincial councils. Then we have an increase of £500,000 in the cost of running the post and telegraph service. This is caused by an extraordinary increase in the personnel. The previous Minister seemed to consider that the principal reason for running a post office was to employ a huge staff. Even during the last 12 months the increase in the staff of the post office amounted to 376. The result of all this is that we are spending £5,300,000 more than we spent three years ago, and yet the Minister prides himself upon the fact that he has extracted more money from the taxpayer than was necessary, and, much to my surprise, his statement is hailed with applause by all the members on the Government side of the House. I can quite understand that applause coming from many of the members opposite, but surely there were some of them who were not dazzled by the Minister’s diamond figures and by the method by which he got money out of their pockets. I am quite certain that the country will not be pleased, because the burden of extra taxation is a very great burden. I hope there will be some method by which we shall be able to control expenditure, and I would like to ask the Minister to look at the method adopted by New Zealand, where a profit and loss account is prepared annually in connection with every department of State. By this means each department is brought into the limelight once a year, and it can be seen exactly where it stands. Until we get to some form of account similar to that adopted in New Zealand, there will be a continued recurrence of increased expenditure. I recognize that the Minister spends the whole year in keeping costs down, but unless he knows what the various departments are spending, it is impossible for him to check them. The Minister has dazzled the House with his description of the Alexander Bay diamonds. It is quite true that we have made a very good gamble. I very much doubt whether, in the long run, it is going to benefit this country if we gamble in mining properties. The Minister may say: “Well, we have come out all right. What have you got to complain about?” I would point out to hint that before long members of his party and of the Labour party will be asking him to extend his mining ventures, and that they will ask him, if he can mine diamonds in Alexandra Bay, what objection he can raise to starting mining adventures in the Transvaal? There will be a very presistent demand for the extension of State mining, and I think it will be a very serious thing for this country, having made £7,000,000 on a gamble, if we are in consequence led into a course which will result in the loss of very much more than £7,000,000. I am sorry that the Minister of Posts and Telegraphs is not here, because I would like him to give us a statement during the course of this debate as to the position with regard to automatic telephones. We on this side of the House have been pleased to see him take up a modern position with regard to telephones. We know that the other day we had to vote a considerable extra sum of money for the salaries of telephone operators because we were told that the work of a telephone operator might almost be termed a noxious calling or trade, and that their hours had to be shortened. I would like the Minister to explain whether the increased cost of these telephone operators has not made the necessity for going on with automatic telephones more urgent than before. Previously the reports from our own officials showed that it was financially advantageous to put down automatic telephones, but we were told then that it would do away with the telephone girls. Now we are told that the work of a telephone operator is very unsatisfactory, and for medical reasons they must have a decrease in the number of their hours. Therefore it seems to me that it is still more urgently necessary to go on with automatic telephones. I would also like the Minister to tell us what he is going to do with the Cape Town annexe. The top floor of this annexe was built in order to put in automatic telephones. It was specially built to make it possible to run a perfect system of automatic telephones. Are we going to waste the money put into that building, or are we going to get advantage from it? When are we going to get that advantage, and when is the Government going to start installing automatic telephones? I do not suggest that you are going to spend many thousands of pounds immediately on automatic telephones, but what I do suggest that no more manual telephones should be installed, because the manual telephone is out of date. It is not modern. Last year I was in Europe, and I do not think I came across any country in my travels where they were putting in any more manual telephones. I think the Minister of Posts and Telegraphs should take this opportunity of telling the House what the position is. What I feel is that the constant increase of expenditure which is taking place is caused by the various socialistic tendencies of this Government, tendencies forced upon them by their left wing. There is a tendency to say that a good thing is being done if more people are employed by the Government, even if there is no more work to be done. The idea is that you have done something if you have given more employment. It would be better to pension people rather than employ them unnecessarily. The other day I came across an extract from a letter by Mr. Disraeli in 1873, which, I think, really covers the criticisms legitimately made with regard to the present Government. In this letter Mr. Disraeli said—

I have been asked to make a statement to the House with regard to automatic telephones. The hon. member will know that my predecessor laid down the policy that he would not instal automatic telephones in the various exchanges throughout the country, and furthermore laid it down that he would not allow any further private installations of automatic telephones. I felt that this was a policy that could not be sustained in the interests of the public, and very early I reversed that policy and allowed the automatic telephone to be installed in private offices. I may say that there were hundreds of applications for them. With regard to installing automatic telephones in post offices and exchanges throughout the country, our policy in the future will be one of a gradual replacement of the manual system by the automatic system. It would be useless to scrap a good manual system, but in future all new post offices will be built with a view to the installing of automatic telephones. The new post office annexe in Cape Town is built for the automatic system, and as we have to replace any of the existing plant, so the automatic apparatus will be installed in the new building, and so we shall gradually build up an automatic exchange. An order for an automatic exchange at East London was cancelled in favour of one on the manual system, but I in turn got the latter order cancelled so that East London will have an automatic exchange. Of course it will involve delay, but I think the people of East London would sooner wait a little bit longer and have an up-to-date service. I have inquired very fully into the point which the hon. member for Benoni (Mr. Madeley) said had influenced his policy on this matter—that the adoption of automatic telephones would involve the dismissal of a large number of girls. I am assured by the post office officials, however, that by not filling vacancies automatic telephones can be installed with a minimum of hardship to the staff. In the case of Port Elizabeth, the change was effected without a single girl suffering, and I am sure that in the long run there will be no complaint on that score. The replacement is very gradual—sometimes the replacement occupies some years, and as the average working life of a telephone girl is only about five years, the automatic system can be installed without involving any great hardship.

I wish to bring a matter of very great importance before the attention of the House. Statistics show an enormous increase in native crime, and, as a result, we have a clamour for more police. This is a wrong perspective; it would be more profitable and more statesmanlike to examine the causes of increased crime. At present the police are maintained not so much for the prevention of native crime as for the detection and punishment of native crime. The alarming increases in native crime are shown by the following figures of convictions obtained for three years: 1924, £369,535 convictions; 1925, 375,031 convictions; and 1926, 405,918 convictions; the last figure representing 61 convictions per thousand of the total population of the Union as compared with 53 convictions per thousand in 1923. Three-quarters of the convictions secured in 1926 were in respect of statutory and municipal offences, so approximately 300,000 natives were found guilty of minor offences. On the Rand 265 out of every thousand natives were prosecuted in 1926; On the other hand, in the Transkei territories, which has a population of over 1,000,000, the laws can be enforced by only a handful of police. These native convictions are chiefly in respect of minor offences such as non-payment of taxes and contravention of the pass regulations, none of which would be offences if the law did not discriminate in respect of our laws. The number of natives convicted throughout the Union on serious and properly criminal charges was 44 per thousand of the population, a fact which indicates the law-abiding nature of the native population, notwithstanding the many disabilities which surround their lives. That figure is as against 265 for minor offences, and which shows a great disparity. The injustice and the crass stupidity in the administration of justice is that no discrimination is shown between those convicted of serious crimes and those convicted of mere offences against pass laws and municipal regulations. The native in arrear with his taxes is put in the same prison as the thief and the murderer. Under this system the prison becomes an instrument of ruin and not reform. Who further can estimate the annual damage to native morale of wholesale imprisonment of guiltless natives’ The law, rightly, is very careful and very discriminating in regard to the imprisonment of the European, but the incarceration of natives is resorted to on the flimsiest grounds. This indiscriminate herding together of guiltless and of those guilty of slight offences with hardened criminals makes and breeds criminals. Under that system the police force will not bring about a reduction of crime, and no prisons under such a system will serve as a deterrent. The era and methods of our ancestors to control and govern the native by means of the rifle and shambok—at one time perhaps intelligible—is good for ever. Unhappily there are in the country many still who do not realize this. The abusive and humiliating discrimination in our spoken Vocabulary which designates a European a “mensch,” that is a human being, and the native as a “schepsel,” that is a created thing, is still significant of the attitude of many Europeans towards their fellow humans of the native race; The result of all this want of discrimination and injustice is that the natives are sullen, disaffected and hostile to the white man. I maintain, and I submit to the consideration of those responsible for the government of the country—it applies to all Governments—that a great deal more could be achieved by good will and kindness than by harshness. More humane treatment is required, and not the rough and sometimes brutal police methods one frequently sees practised. I don’t wholly blame the police, they are merely carrying out a system which the country tolerates and allows. Our country owes a great deal for its development to the native population. They are the real workers of this country as much as, if not more so than the aristocracy of white labour, entrenched and privileged as the latter is by clean legislation, legislation which retards and prevents native uplift. We are all dependent upon the native for his labour; he is a great asset, and on this ground alone, I contend, he is entitled to proper and humane treatment. The native, like any other being, responds, and will respond, to humane treatment. He is amenable and has good instincts. He is not vicious, and all of us have known natives who have been examples of honesty, fidelity and loyalty. I venture to assert that the native population is, on the whole, as law-abiding as the European population, if not more so. Give the native fair treatment, and it should be accorded on higher grounds. The Prime Minister, in a recent speech to the Zulus, addressed them as his children; he said he was their father. The Minister of the Interior praised them for their patriotism. I am in hearty accord with these sentiments, but do we practise them? Do we treat them as we should treat our wards and our children? You must recognize in the native a fellow-labourer on a lower scale of civilization. It is your interest as well as his interest that you should raise and advance him. How often if ever do you find that humane provision, a suspended sentence, imposed on a native? If ever there was an opportunity for imposing a suspended sentence, it should be imposed in cases of contravention of minor offences; against the pass laws and taxes. The punishment, the sentence is invariably fine or imprisonment. Imprisonment, I repeat, with hardened criminals leads to corruption. The suspended sentence should be the rule in the case of a native for a slight offence. A wise man has rightly observed that the greatness of a country consists not so much in the number of its inhabitants, or in the extent of its territory, but in the extent of its justice and compassion. The budget, on which I congratulate the Minister, holds out to many a promise of remission of taxation. I am glad to see that a concession has been made to farmers which is very important—the removal of the tax and lower transport charges on power paraffin—which is long overdue. The result of this will be you will find increased efficiency and greater production. But I see nothing for the natives in this budget. Other speakers have referred to his clothing and blankets. At a recent meeting held here some of the leaders of the native people said that many natives find it most difficult to pay their taxes. By reason of their exogenous earnings this is what might be expected. Many of these people are living on the borderland of starvation. Malnutrition accounts for the appalling infant mortality amongst them. The native question does not now present so much a political problem as an economic problem. A frank recognition of the native’s value to the community by increased wages, fair and humane treatment, as an inhabitant of the country. These are of more importance than a shadowy representation in the councils of the nation. When a native, by his uplift, fits himself to occupy a position in this country, an opportunity should be given to him to occupy that position. We have seen a manifesto in the paper this morning signed by several very influential citizens of Cape Town. That manifasto reminds me of what I submitted to this House last session, in a speech for which I incurred the strong censure of the Prime Minister. The colour of a man’s skin does not necessarily connote inferiority or superiority. There is no doubt that the Government of the country is, to a large extent, in the hands of men who have no asset in the country, who have no education, are unfitted to exercise or even to have the vote, but who have acquired the right merely owing to their being Europeans. I hold strongly that unless a man has proved his fitness to have the vote, he should not have it. In this matter I am an out-and-out aristocrat —that is government by the best. The government of a country should be vested in those who are most fitted to govern it. If there is a very high franchise qualification the government of a country will be in the hands of the most fitted, irrespective of the colour of the skin. This prejudice against a man because of the colour of his skin must go, and if we give the best of the native population, those who have the knowledge and show themselves fitted, the franchise, it will be a comparatively easy matter to govern the rest of the native population. I am glad to see the Minister of Agriculture in his place, as I want to claim his attention for a few moments. I wish to say that I admire his frank and fearless speeches to the farmers. One of the last I read was his address to the South African Agricultural Congress, and in the course of which, he inculcated the value of self-reliance in the farming population. The Minister is to be commended for that. The Minister also expatiated upon the fact that farmers should endeavour to improve their stock, not over-stock, and that they should also discontinue the pernicious habit of trekking. Some few weeks ago I put a question to the Minister as the result of an address given by an officer of his department in regard to over-stocking. After referring to some of the evils of over-stocking, the officer spoke of the moral standpoint in regard to keeping many animals, and not producing for those kept, and that frequently, as a result, many died from starvation, whilst it was in the power of the owners of these animals to prevent it. Then I proceeded to ask the Minister whether he was aware that the treatment described showed negligence and ill-treatment, which made the people who practised this liable to punishment under the Cruelty to Animals Act, 1914, and whether he would bring this to the notice of delinquents. The Minister’s reply was that whether there was any contravention of the law which I mentioned was a matter of opinion, and that cruelty through over-stocking should be brought to the notice of the police. I want to direct the Minister’s attention to the fact that the starving of animals in the towns is an offence punishable under the Act. You cannot successfully put up a plea in the towns that you have suffered from drought, or that you have no fodder for your animals. There is a class of farmer who neglects his stock where it is possible for him to make provision for them. We know that in the Free State and the Transvaal, although there may not be sufficient rain to ripen the grain crop, yet there is no excuse for a man keeping a number of cattle dependent wholly upon nature, because there is always enough rain to enable him to make use of his silo. An appeal to Christian duty as made by the officer referred to may make some recognize their duty to dumb animals. There are, however, some in whom only the terror or dread of punishment will arouse a sense of responsibility. Let the Minister warn and prosecute such. This more than anything else will improve the class of cattle in the Union. Some farmers must be taught that keeping starving stock will not be tolerated. It is time this national disgrace was ended.

Before dealing with the budget, I want to deal with sentences which are being passed in this country for stock theft.

It may be a platitude to say so but nevertheless it is a fact that a hundred years ago, stock theft was considered so serious a crime that it was punishable by death. It is still one of the most serious crimes, at any rate, in the agricultural world, and one of the biggest menaces which the sheep farmers have to face. Stock are being stolen every day, it is most difficult to catch the thieves, and there is not one conviction out of 50 cases or more. The only protection the farmers have is the police, and they are inadequate to cope with the trouble. It is not altogether their fault, they are often recruited from young men bred in the towns, with very little knowledge or experience of country conditions, and after a few months’ training at headquarters they are drafted to some outstation in the platteland where they are expected to take their part in the suppression of stock theft. They are often quite ignorant of the native languages and are accompanied on their rounds by a native constable who acts as interpreter. How can they be successful under such conditions? It is the same with the C.I.D. Take my own district. You have men sent there without the slightest local knowledge of the area they are to work in; often as soon as acquire such knowledge they are transferred to some other district. Even these men often have to work through an interpreter. Native detectives are employed who are supposed to approach the farmer as labourers seeking work and to take employment on the farm and remain incognito. They are instantly recognized. They wear every sign of military training about them, and everyone on the farm immediately knows them as detectives. We want a thorough re-organization of the whole of the police methods in this country so far as stock theft is concerned. We are never going to get efficient protection for the eradication of this evil until then. I have known stock theft to be so bad that men have been driven right out of sheep breeding. Also sentences on conviction of a thief are utterly inadequate. Every farmer knows how difficult it is to get a conviction, how it is only once in a hundred cases that you do get a conviction. And then what happens? I saw a circular a few years ago in which, the commissioner of police instructed the public prosecutors not to press for more than nine months, because judges had intimated they would not confirm sentences of over nine months. I asked the Minister for figures relating to the convictions and sentences imposed for stock theft and for I.D.B. I regret that I have not yet got those figures, but we all know the difference. A man convicted for I.D.B. gets three or five years, sometimes ten years, and there are no bones about it, but for stock theft a man gets six or nine months. A farmer’s sheep are as much value to him as diamonds are to the mining magnate. And the crime of theft is the same in both cases. Why this great disparity of sentences? If our city merchants had their stores broken into every night, goods stolen and no arrests made, I can imagine that the outcry would be such that the Government would be compelled to take action. This Government which professes to represent the farmers should take this matter in hand. I know the Minister will say we cannot interfere with the judges’ sentences in other hands, but we are here to make the law and it is up to the Government to introduce legislation which will ensure that sentences which will really have a deterrent effect shall be imposed for stock theft. I hope the Minister will see that we of the farming community get the same protection for our stock as the gold and diamond magnates get. To turn to the budget generally, I am not going into deep waters, but there are one or two outstanding facts that should be made clear to the country. You can very safely gauge the prosperity of a country by its income, and I want to apply that test to the prosperity of this country and to the finance of the present Government. We have heard a lot about prosperity, and about increased production in trade and business. It is granted that production and output has increased. There has been a big increase, but the profit—as indicated by the country’s income—has actually decreased in the last two or three years. The national income of this country is actually less than it was three years ago. I have here the report of the Commissioner of Inland Revenue. I do not say this is the whole national income, because it does not deal with wage-earners getting under £300 or £400, but it is a very fair reflex of the financial position. The taxable income in the year ending March, 1925. was £83.900,000. In’ 1926 it was £85,849,000. In 1927 the income dropped to £80,729,000, and last year. 1928, it was £81,431,000. The hon. member for Vredefort (Mr. Munnik) said they had nothing to answer, but I would point out that while we find the national income is decreasing, the Government has increased its administrative expenses by £4,000.000. Is that sound budgeting? I defy anyone to justify that. The main plank in the political platform of the Government was economy, and that is the economy that is being effected. Again we have been told this is a farmers’ Government, and I dare say 95 per cent, of members opposite do represent agricultural districts. We know what the trend of legislation has been. We know that Labour have practically kicked the ball in the direction they wanted it to go. The price of their support has been the Wages Act, high protection duties to stimulate industry, and these have become the policy of the present Government. Do not the farming representatives on the benches opposite realize that this means inevitably higher living costs? It means increasing costs of production. These increased costs are inevitably passed on to the primary producer who has to bear them, as he has to sell in the open markets of the world and cannot pass his increased costs on. We have said over and over again that the increased cost of production is coming back on the farmer every time. The income of the farmers in South Africa is only 7.3 of the total national income. The taxable income of the South African farmers in 1925 was £5,300,000. In 1926, before the Pact policy had taken effect, it grew to £6,000,000. In 1927, after the wage determinations had taken effect, and after the high protective duty had taken effect, it dropped to £4,400,000. That is the agricultural prosperity we hear so much about. In 1928 it dropped to £3,800,000. Can farmers sitting opposite deliberately lend themselves to a policy like this? Trade shows an increased income. The wage earner is getting more money but the farmer is paying: His income is steadily decreasing under a policy of the Government, forced on it by labour pressure, paying the price labour demands, and the farmers are doing the paying. Is that what you have been sent for here by your constituents? You have sold your birthright for a mess of political pottage.

The hon. member must address the Chair.

I ask you, sir, what you think; should they sell their birthright for a mess of pottage? The effect of this policy is re-acting on the farming population of this country whose income is going down year by year. You cannot get away from that; you will find all the figures in the reports.

The trouble is you do not understand them.

I understand them well enough, but the Minister does not want to understand them. Those sitting behind the Minister do not want to understand them. I will make it my business and those on this side of the House representing the farming community will make it their business to see that the country understands them. The country has to understand these figures. When we go to the country are farmers going to see a Government returned which whittles away the prosperity of the farmers and increases the prosperity of those who sit on the cross benches? Then there is this question of wage determination. Its results are becoming evident. Take the case of the recent wagte determinations at Bloemfontein. You have a thousand natives flocking into Bloemfontein every month attracted by the wage offer. They are overcrowded in the location and are embarrassing the municipality. There is not work for them and they starve or become criminals. There still is a great scarcity of labour in the surrounding farming districts.

Not a thousand a week.

We know what the remarks of my hon. friend are worth. We know that he made the country ring as to what he was going to do with the Government, He was going to cross the floor against the Government and turn it out, but what a change when he came here. It had the pitiable spectacle of him crawling on his hands and knees across the floor of the House to support the Government on every division. The Minister of Finance spoke of the flourishing condition of agriculture, that the Government was closely watching the cattle and dairy industry, instancing that the Minister of Agriculture sent a commission to the Argentine, what is the use of doing that? Every farmer who knows his job knows what conditions in the Argentine are. We want something done here. As to what this close attention and sympathy really means let me give you one instance. The South African party gave a bounty of a farthing per lb. on beef exported; the first year this amounted to £1,225; the second year £5,596, and the third year £12,440, clearly showing there was increased export fostered by this bounty. It was a very valuable help to the farmers in building up an overseas export trade. The Minister or this Government in their wisdom took that bounty off, and the result was that the export was discontinued, and the surplus cattle position was rendered more acute. When the Minister for Doornkop, I was going to say—the Minister of Labour—wants money for labour he gets it; he got £350,000 in one vote for his department, and he can get £140,000 for Doornkop without blinking an eyelid. When we farmers want £12,000 a year to foster and increase our exports of beef, we cannot get it. I am not afraid to go to the country on this budget, for which I give the Minister what credit he can get. When you take enough money out of the pockets of the taxpayers you can always show a surplus, but I do not think that the taxpayer will appreciate having his pockets unnecessarily picked in this fashion. It is an uneconomic budget as far as the farmers of the country are concerned. We have not had the economies that were promised by the Government, and we are spending more and more and the man who pays is the farmer all the time.

I want to support the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) with regard to the leniency of the sentences passed for stock theft. I have had complaints from my own district, and in the last case to which my attention was drawn a native received three months’ imprisonment for the theft of a sheep. If that is going to be regarded as an adequate sentence, it is no deterrent, and instead of suppressing this form of crime, the evil will increase. I do think it is time that attention was drawn to these inadequate sentences for stock theft, I also have had complaints that districts are understaffed with European police, and that particularly applies to my constituency. I have had numerous complaints with regard to that. I have no complaints with regard to the force being inefficient, except for the fact that there is a dearth of police with the necessary knowledge of the Zulu language and of Zulu customs which is so essential in Natal. The consequences is you do not in that respect get that degree of efficiency which is desired. This complaint has been made on previous occasions, and apparently nothing has been done to remedy it so far. I hope the Minister will pay attention to these complaints which are well founded. On the Asiatic question I would like to say a few words. I had a wire a short time back when the native Bills were being discussed here from the Ladysmith and District Chamber of Commerce stating—

It is common knowledge that when this side of the House introduced the Class Areas Bill, the main ground of criticism by those who now occupy the Government benches was that it did not go far enough, the contention being that something more drastic and efficacious was required to deal with the problem. During the last general election, the country was led to believe the present Government would take drastic measures to deal with the question. What happened, the Minister introduced the Areas Reservation Bill, which appeared to be a step in the right direction. When he introduced the Bill, he gave an assurance that the Bill would not go to a select committee because he had no intention of receding one jot from it. He said his Bill was the last word on the subject. Subsequently we had the delegation from India, following by a conference, when the Minister proceeded to run away from his Bill. Then the Minister entered into what is known as the Cape Town agreement. Prior to that agreement being entered into, no less than £250,000 worth of immovable property had been purchased by Indians in Natal within 18 months. Indian competition in commerce had become most acute and has since become more and more acute. At present, as far as commerce in Natal is concerned, it is in the bands of Asiatics in all the country districts outside the large centres. After the agreement has been in operation nearly two years, complaints are made that it is not solving the question in any shape or form, but that on the contrary, it has aggravated the position, which to-day is more acute than ever. It is complained that this agreement is no solution. I want to ask the Minister of the Interior whether, under this voluntary repatriation scheme, any of the Indian trading classes, or the classes which perform skilled work, have taken advantage of that scheme. The Minister has had that question put to him on several occasions, but as yet he has not been able to give the House an assurance that one Indian trader in Natal has availed himself of the Minister’s voluntary repatriation scheme. If this agreement is not going to touch those classes who are an economic menace to European civilization then it is no solution of the Asiatic problem. I should like the Minister to tell the House what class of Asiatic has availed himself of this voluntary repatriation scheme. We have had nearly two years’ trial of this agreement, and as far as Natal is concerned, I can give the Minister the assurance that we are no nearer a solution of the problem than we were before. I should also like to know whether any of those who did avail themselves of this repatriation scheme have elected to return to the Union and resume domicile therein. I say again that this scheme has been given a trial, and it is clear that it does not touch those who are undermining the position of the white man in this country. The sooner the Minister gets away from this agreement and makes a serious attempt more on the lines of the Areas Reservation Bill, the better it will be for the country as a whole.

This budget is a very glittering one, and the Government is a very lucky Government. They were lucky in succeeding a Government whose wise legislation made it possible to reap such a harvest from mining. They are lucky in finding this £6,500,000 of diamonds in nine months. It is one of the world’s romances, and the life of these State mines may go on for years. But there is one sad note which appeals to me very much indeed, and that is that not a word has been mentioned in regard to a problem which is a reproach to South Africa, and in connection with which South Africa can never progress as it should so long as it remains unsolved. This problem has faced South Africa for many years, but nothing has been done, mainly because of lack of funds. But here Providence has given us £6,500,000, and yet we are still faced with this problem. I refer to the poor white problem. Hon. members opposite may laugh. If they have ever been to the Cookhouse district, which is only one of many, they would have seen the conditions. In the northern districts of the Transvaal the same conditions obtain. These people are our own flesh and blood. I have seen the children there running about like wild animals; no education, ill-fed, living on a small ration of mealie meal and the prickly pear. The poor white exists everywhere, and I say that a man is a poor white who cannot feed and clothe himself and his children. At Cookhouse I have seen undersized children, literally underfed And what hovels they live in! Those who have not seen the conditions under which they live cannot realize the depths in which some of our Europeans are living. They are worse off than our natives. Our semi-civilized Zulus are well off compared with these people. I was amazed that such a state of affairs should exist in South Africa. The evils of inter-marriage are to be seen there also, and these people are breeding children who are mentally deficient. This problem can be solved. I know that the Carnegie Commission is at the present time roving South Africa, and that its members are highly qualified in the different branches which they represent; but they will probably take years before they report, and they will no doubt give a scientific solution of the problem. In the meantime, however, the problem is growing My suggestion is that we act upon our experience with regard to afforestation. Each government which has tackled afforestation has found that it is the best avenue of employment for these people. It is remarkable how some of these people who come from the sun-baked Karroo, where a tree is unknown, when they are in some of these forest areas, look upon a tree as something supernatural. The transportation of these people to these areas will mean that you will get them into communities, and they and their children will be properly fed. Further, the children will be taught, and the parents will be engaged in congenial work. We have a duty to posterity. Surely posterity is going to share in the good luck of the Government in finding this Aladin’s cave. We can serve posterity by spending £2,000,000 upon afforestation. This work could be regarded as a probationary measure in regard to observation of these people. The better ones could be removed to the irrigation works which the Government proposes to establish with this diamond money. That should be our ultimate aim; back to the land with these people. If we establish these people in communities there will be a chance of new blood being introduced, and we shall do away with inter-marriage and incest. Let me warn the Government that land companies are at work buying land suitable for afforestation, and that one of these companies has a big capital. We know that there will be a world shortage of timber, and that in the last ten years the price of some of our best timber has doubled, such as stinkwood and sneezewood. Why? Because the forests have been cut down, and replanting has not taken place. What is posterity going to do for its stinkwood in 50 years’ time if we do not do our duty? There is another South African timber called sneezewood—it is unfortunate that the best timber in South Africa should have such unmusical names—but this timber has all the qualities of lignum vitae. These timbers are disease-resisting; they are different from imported timbers. It is lamentable to see the forest lands to-day where these giants of the forest have been cut out and scrub growing. The Government has an opportunity of taking the unfortunate people I have referred to from their present surroundings, and of placing them on the land. They should take the best of them, even if only 30 per cent, of them are good. Another avenue which the Government may utilize in the solving of this poor white question—[Laughter.]

They are laughing.

If they are laughing they are heartless monsters. They should go to Cookhouse and see what I have seen. If they have any sense or feeling in them they will weep and not laugh. Another avenue open to the Government is road-making. We have to follow the advance of time and progress. When I introduced mechanical traction 20 years ago I prophesied that in future South Africa would do its ploughing mechanically. That prophesy has come true. Now our roads are going to compete with our railways, and many a branch line which is running to-day will have to be pulled up because of the competition of road transport. Some districts can be cheaper and better developed by road transport than by rail. Why should not the Government take on its shoulders the main trunk roads. I heard the Minister of Finance say the other day that out of this budget £1,000,000 is to be given to the provinces for roads, but he said nothing about the conditions under which the money is to be spent. The central Government should take over the trunk roads and put them in a condition to stand the traffic for years. European labour only should be employed on the work, and it should be paid a decent wage—not less than 10s. a day. It is a mistake to employ poor whites on the railways in towns where they are in the wrong atmosphere and absorb the vices of civilization with none of its virtues. The concentration of these poor whites in large towns has brought demoralization and ruination to hundreds of them. I do not blame these unfortunate people, but I do blame the Government. Some of them do not even receive a house allowance, and what I have heard in the outskirts of Durban as to the conditions under which they are forced to live is a reproach to us. Many of these men have families, and is it reasonable to expect them to bring up their families on 5s. a day? The minimum wage for a European labourer should be 10s. a day. What sort of nation are we going to have, if we treat working people in this way? The Minister has a windfall of £6,500,000 in diamonds and more to come. How is it that under those circumstances the Government has not allocated at least a couple of millions to solving, or, at any rate, alleviating the poor white problem? Its solution would be cheap at £10,000,000. It is a reproach to the Government and to South Africa that the problem exists without a real effort being made to solve it on the lines I have indicated.

It was really interesting to listen to the hon. member for Umvoti (Mr. Deane). We have now discovered that the Opposition, and especially the hon. member for Umvoti, have got a lot of sympathy for the poor whites. In one breath the hon. member pities the poor whites in the Cookhouse district, and immediately’ afterwards disparages them as people whom the Minister of Railways has sent to Natal, and who have demoralized it. I thought that the Opposition after their experience in the first week of this session would have learned not to throw stones if they live in glass houses. If we look back a few years when the Opposition were in power what was the position of those people then? During the fourteen years the present Opposition were in power the poor whites increased from a few thousand to approximately 150,000. In vain did we as an Opposition call upon the Government to solve the poor white question. They did indeed every now and then vote a few hundred thousand for emergency relief work, but we urged the Government to find a permanent relief. It was however always in vain. What happened when this Government came into power? We took them—

And brought them all to the towns.

Of course the hon. member for Stellenbosch (Mr. J. P. Louw) was asleep again when the Minister of Railways introduced his budget on Friday last, and told the House how thousands and thousands of people had got permanent work on the railways.

The hon. member may not now deal with the railway budget.

I am only referring to it. We have listened this afternoon to the debate and heard the arguments of the Opposition.

And you all remained silent.

Yes, because we are quite satisfied. The contrast is very great. When the Minister of Finance introduced his magnificent budget this side of the House cheered the Minister because the finances of the country were in such a favourable position. What did the Opposition say then? They remained perfectly silent. Not one of them gave a sign of gratitude. One of the chief members of the Opposition did at any rate subsequently in his speech have the honesty to congratulate the Minister, but then they immediately thereafter referred to “the pity about their being so large a surplus.” In other words they would rather have had a deficit. Now we have the hon. member for Umvoti telling the Minister how he ought actually to tackle the poor white question. He said the Minister should plant stinkwood trees. The hon. member probably does not know that a stinkwood tree has to be 800 years old before it is of any use. Hon. members opposite are disappointed that the Minister of Finance got £6,500,000 from the State diggings. Why are they disappointed about it? Because they themselves, as hon. members will remember, fought tooth and nail when the Government, through the Minister of Mines, introduced the Diamond Act last year and pointed out that it was absolutely necessary for the Government to have the control of the diggings, They opposed the matter so strongly that it was necessary to have a joint sitting.

We are still opposed to it to-day.

They prophesied what a great failure the State diggings would be, and now there is a yield of over £6,000.000.

And £4,000,000 stolen.

If the Minister of Mines and Industries and the Government had not been firm in putting that Act through, or if hon. members opposite had been in power then that £6,500,000 would not to-day have been in the people’s possession but in the hands of a few large capitalists opposite. Their argument was that the Government should lease the diggings, as was done during their period of office. Then only a few friends of the Opposition would have filled their pockets with the millions. And what would the taxpayer then have had? Let me tell the hon. member for Umvoti that he must not come and try to tell the Government what ought to be done with the £6,500,000. I can assure him that the revenue from the State diggings will be used for the development of the country—not merely to make a few financiers richer still, but for the benefit of the population as a whole. I shall yet see the time come when the Opposition together with us will erect a monument to the Minister of Mines and Industries for preserving these treasures for the State. I want to heartily congratulate the Minister of Finance on his splendid budget. It is more than the S.A. party could ever do with its Ministers of Finance, and they are ashamed at having carried on with deficits year after year. They talk about the burden of taxation on the people, and the hon. member for Yeoville said that the surpluses should rather have remained in the pockets of the taxpayers. He says the people are taxed too heavily, but let him remember that the taxes the people have to pay to-day were all imposed by the Opposition. I want to go further and say that the present Government has reduced taxation, but, notwithstanding this, the Minister of Finance has been able to show a surplus every year. Instead of the Opposition being grateful with the people that we have surpluses instead of deficits, they are shedding crocodile tears at the Government having put the country on such a sound financial footing.

There are one or two points I would like to bring to the notice of the Minister. It has been stated that while the Mozambique treaty was under the consideration of the Government, the commercial and mining community practically accepted the terms laid down by the Portuguese authorities without protest. My recollection is that the commercial and mining community protested against the treaty in so far as Clause 45 was concerned dealing with customs matters. Under the old convention a sum of 8s. 6d. per head was debited to each native crossing the border. Under this treaty that 8s. 6d. is waived with the result that the Mozambique Government are entitled to charge customs duty on all goods entering their territory. I have a letter from the Johannesburg Chamber of Commerce showing that the Portuguese Government are charging a very high duty on goods coming in from the Transvaal. An actual case has been reported that a native was charged £2 8s. 6d., equal to 47 per cent, on goods value £4 12s. 6d. The natives find they cannot pay this duty, and their boxes are being piled up at Ressano Garcia. It was pointed out at the time that the loss to the Witwatersrand trading community would amount to between a quarter and a half million a year, owing to this loss of trade, as the natives eventually would refuse to purchase on the reef. I do not know whether it is possible to amend the treaty to-day, but I think it should be pointed out by the Minister that the Mozambique authorities are taking an undue advantage of the natives in this respect. As representing a civil service constituency I should like to say that the civil servants are profoundly disappointed that they have not received consideration at the hands of the Government. They had hoped that as a result of these huge surpluses they would have been considered. The reductions in their increments were made at a time of dire necessity, and it was hoped that when better times arrived the Minister would favourably review their position. I pointed out previously that the civil servants were very much upset at the way in which the plums of the service were being handled to people outside the service. In response to my request a report was laid on the Table in which 584 names were given of officials appointed from outside the service. In many cases the appointments were very high ones and the men in the service thought they were entitled to these positions rather than people outside. I made a statement at the time that there was a preponderance of Dutch names and this is borne out by the list. When the list is analysed you find that 246 officials with English names were appointed with an average grade of £534 per annum, a total of £131,400 per annum.; and 338 officials with Dutch names were appointed, with an average grade of £606 per annum, a total of £204,900 per annum. Amongst these are: Dr. N. Pirow, £1,800 per annum; Dr. Hoogenhout, £1,400—£1,600; J. P. van der Heever, £1,350—£1,500: S. N. Pellissier, £1,150 —£1,300; A. J. van der Spuy, £1,050—£1,200; J. J. Kruger, £1,050—£1,200; Dr. J. E. Holloway. £950—£1,100; J. F. J. van Rensburg, £950—£1,100; Dr. J. Daneel, £900—£1,100; Dr. Gie, £950—£1,100; Dr. H. D. F. Bodenstein, £1,400—£1,600; Dr. Geldenhuys, £800— £950, and Ivan Walker, £850—£1,000. When you really get down to bedrock, you find that the English-speaking men get positions which are worth only half of those of the Dutch-speaking men. The Minister suggested I was rather a racialist when I brought this matter before the House, but I did so because the matter was brought to my attention by my constituents, and I thought it was my duty to bring the facts to the notice of the House.

I wish very briefly to touch on one or two points which have so far escaped attention. There is the wage question and our high protective tariff, which are responsible for the very high cost of living in this country. I think it is a perfectly sound axiom which says that high wages mean dear production, and dear production means high cost of living. My hon. friends on the cross benches dispute that. With regard to the wage board, no fewer than eight out of the twenty-four determinations have been declared ultra vires. You would have thought that these gentlemen, being all lawyers, would at least have avoided that mistake, but we cannot wonder at their having blundered in many other respects. They have committed blunder after blunder, and it is only natural, seeing that not one of these members have a commercial or an industrial training, which one would have expected of members of boards of such a responsible character. One of their worst blunders was to try and bring within the operation of the board large blocks of districts, not only in the Cape and in the Karroo, but right up to Kuraman. The effects of their determinations improves the position of the skilled man, but the unskilled man is going to be in a worse position; it spells unemployment to a very large section of our population. The country is very pleased to hear from the Minister that the conditions generally are as prosperous as they are, and that there is going to be a very considerable remission of taxation. The income tax and many other taxes are to be remitted, but I do not observe that the native is going to be relieved in the smallest degree. They are the poorest section of our community, and have to bear heavy taxation; and while other sections are benefited, I cannot find that the native is benefited to the slightest degree. I do think that the Minister is wise in allowing an abatement for improvements made on farms, such are wire fencing, the cost of dealing with erosion, and the building of dams. I think that is very useful, fair and necessary, and the country will be very thankful for that. Some mention has been made of our inadequate police protection. I would like to know from the acting Minister of Justice to what he attributes the tremendous increase in crime, for while the Government has been increasing their police vote year after year, and very handsomely too, we find that capital crimes have more than doubled themselves during the period of office of the present Government. What can be the cause of it? It is no good our increasing our police force if crime is going to increase at a greater ratio. I think the remedy lies in some other direction, and I conclude that one of the reasons is that the punishment is not adequate and not sufficiently deterrent to prevent this increase of crime. I asked the Minister of Justice what his explanation was, but he failed hopelessly to give any explanation of that tremendous increase of crime. I have a few figures showing what is the position of our pastoralists at the present time. In 1923 the number of woolled sheen in the Union was nearly 26,000,000, and in 1927 it had grown to 36,000,000. The value of the wool sold in 1923 was just over £12.000,000, and in 1927 it had grown to £17,000,000. Now the Minister of Agriculture took the great credit for this increase in the number of our stock and the value received for our wool. I do not know if he has read attentively the report of the drought commission of 1922, which maintained that with jackal proof fencing of our land, this country could run at least 52 per cent, more sheep than is done at present. I endeavoured about three years ago to show in a similar way what the ravagas of the jackals were in this country. I maintain that the jackals cause a loss of at least £5,000,000 per annum in the Cape Province alone. The Drought Commission estimated the damage at £13,000,000 per annum for the Union. The remedy for that is verminproof fencing. What happened in 1923, when the previous government endeavoured to bring the Fencing Act up to meet present requirements? With the exception of one farmer on the other side, everyone, including the Minister of Agriculture, voted against it, and since then the Minister has consistently refused to amend the old Fencing Act. They have gone back on the assistance which the Government previously gave to farmers in regard to the erection and maintenance of certain fences, yet the Minister now claims that the large increase of stock is due to the present government. It is due to nothing of the kind. Another point I wish to raise, and one which probably will not be very popular on either side of the House, is the policy of protection to which this country is committing itself. Both sides seem to have gone wild on the question. Protection is a good thing up to a certain point, but if it is pushed too far it must have very injurious effects. What of the wool farmer who has to sell his wool in the world’s market, he gets absolutely nothing from our protection policy, excepting a heavier burden. He has to pay more for everything he requires, and receives nothing in return. This is a very important point, and one which I think the farmers should bear in mind. While reducing rates on the railways in respect of other commodities, since 1913 the railway rate on wool has gradually gone up until at present it stands at 84 per cent, above what it was 15 years ago. While he has to pay a heavy rate to get his wool to the coast, and while lie has to pay higher costs of living as a result of protection, the wool-grower does not stand to benefit a farthing by our protective policy. What I have said in regard to wool also applies largely to maize. The maize farmer in the Free State sells his crop overseas; he has no protection, but what he does have to bear with the wool grower is the increased cost of living, the increased cost of his machinery and other commodities, for which he gets nothing by way of a quid pro quo. I do think it is time our farmers realised this. Our protection policy is going too far, and unless something is done to arrest it, the farmers will find that they will be obliged to leave their farms and get to the towns, where living may be a little more attractive to them.

I was very pleased with the budget speech delivered by the Minister. I hope and trust that the Opposition will not succeed in diverting him from the road upon which he is travelling, also that he will not be persuaded to alter the present tariff system. If there is one thing more than any other for which the Government deserves credit it is its fiscal policy, for not only has it developed our industries. But it has also resulted in initiating a policy which means that in a very few years South Africa will be able to produce practically all it requires. I was very interested indeed to hear the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) criticizing the tariff and talking about the high cost of living. Does the hon. member ever realize the fact that were it not for the tariff policy of the Government, this country would be producing very little foodstuffs? For instance, if it were not for the protection which the Government give, in a short space of time we should have very little wheat grown, because both the Argentine and Canada repeatedly have surplus crops, as a result of which they dump wheat in South Africa. The result of that is, if it were not for the protection they ep joy, the wheat farmers would be crushed out of existence; therefore, in a time of famine, or in a time of worldwide turmoil, there would be no foodstuffs in South Africa. For those and similar reasons, I believe this country is on a sound foundation in creating a protectionist policy. Since this Government has been in office more than £60,000,000 a year has been circulated, not directly, in the form of wages, but through the circulation of money which the extra wages paid has caused. Not only has the Government initiated that policy, but it has also initiated a policy of protection on raw commodities. I am very pleased to know that agriculture in South Africa is so sound. While I was visiting the Transvaal, I visited the settlements there, and I give the Government credit for trying to turn out efficient farmers. You cannot expect a townsman or a man without experience of farming to become a farmer. The settlements are doing excellent work. Agriculture is the foundation of any country’s prosperity. But for agriculture, nothing else would prosper. You could not have industries; you could not have exports. This Government has initiated schemes for agricultural development. I hope it will not utilize the money it gets from diamonds at Alexander Bay for big irrigation schemes; it should rather advance the small farmers 20 or 25 per cent, of their expenditure in irrigation, supervized, of course, by Government officials. We should then see small irrigation schemes in ever part of the country, which would be far better for development than large schemes, which it would be impossible for the farmers to use economically on account of the great expenditure they entail. This Government has been called a lucky Government. True it has been a lucky Government, but it has also been a wise Government in its industrial and economic, policy. There is no doubt that this Government has built its policy on a firm foundation. It started by attending to the children. Within its first year it allocated one million pounds more towards the provinces for education. It also allocated large sums for the technical education of boys. Then it encouraged industries, in the railway workshops along with other industries, thousands of apprentices are employed where there were previously tens. The hon. member for Uitenhage (Mr. Bates) laughs. He has got a short memory. When the Government took office there were only 340 odd apprentices registered. Now there are approximately 6,000. It is very interesting for hon. gentlemen to discuss the question of apprentices, but it means an opportunity to the working-class people when their boys are able to learn the arts, crafts and sciences. The Government has initiated a sound policy, not like the previous Government, giving bursaries only for scholastic subjects and leaving out the working men. I think this country has got an undue proportion of its youth educated to become B.A.’s and M.A.’s and other university degrees, but we have got too few men trained to use their hands in harmony with their brains to manufacture and produce commodities which are needed in South Africa. I realize not only that the industrial policy of the Government has been sound, and that its educational policy has been sound; also the commercial policy of the Government has been sound. Previous to the Government taking office, there were many bankruptcies. Now there are very few in proportion. Not only has commerce prospered, but we find that although it was anticipated when the Government took office that there would be no confidence in the Government, therefore no development in building, yet during this Government’s term of office, almost every building in the main streets of our principal cities have been re-built. There has been building activity previously unheard of in South Africa. I think the Government is also to be commended because it has kept Alexander Bay for the people, instead of giving it to De Beers.

Five and sixpence a day.

I would rather see men earning 5s. 6d. a day than see them begging in the streets. Though 5s. 6d. a day is not enough, it is better than nothing, but I think the Government could very well increase the amount by one shilling. Still, giving the people work is far better than living in poverty like previous Governments have allowed. In conclusion, I again would like to press upon the Government the necessity of not neglecting the boys of the country. I know the Government has done good work during the last five years, but South Africa can only be developed when the youth of the country develop on sound lines. I would like to see the men and women of the teaching profession, who have a direct responsibility for the moulding of the character of the children, have a higher salary than the rest of the community. If we consider the number of teachers and the amount they receive in salary in bulk we find that they are only receiving the same as a carpenter or an engineer. In France, Germany, Denmark, Sweden and America teachers’ salaries vary 52 per cent, to 103 per cent, more than the wages, of ordinary mechanics, showing that when you need the best, you must pay a little more. The teaching profession in South Africa has not only to teach the three “r’s” but has also to build up the character of the future generation, and the teachers should have more attention than they have had, particularly those in the different technical institutions, who should receive the same salaries as those who are teaching scholastic subjects. It is acknowledged in other countries that a professor who gives instruction at a technical institution needs a greater amount of training than in the case of a professor who imparts learning at an ordinary university. The Government should carry on and play the game to young South Africa, so that when it becomes old South Africa it will be a prosperous and a grand country.

I would not have spoken on the Budget, but now that the hon. member for Umvoti (Mr. Deane) has spoken this evening, I just want to say a few words. As in every year the Budget has been laid before the House. The speeches on it have usually lasted five days, but this time it seems that it has so taken the wind out of the Opposition’s sails they can say nothing about it. In the first place I must congratulate the Minister of Finance on the splendid condition in which our finances are. I believe that all the people, if they are not wilfully blind, will, together with me, congratulate the Minister. If we think back five years, in what condition our country, and especially our finances, then were, it cannot be otherwise than that the people to-day are full of gratitude because in the five years the Government has ruled the country so wisely that a larger surplus is shown every year, because surpluses mean progress of the country.

Not always.

Yes, always. Deficits signify retrogression; the Opposition cannot deny that. During the last years of their administration they took £500,000 out of their loan fund to cover their current expenses. When things go so far then the country is on the verge of bankruptcy. In the five years the present Government has again built up the finances of the country. I acknowledge that matters are not yet just as they ought to be, but what has astonished me most is that the hon. member for Umvoti has become a champion of the poor whites. I think it is nothing else but vote catching. Since this Government came into power at least half a million pounds has been spent every year on the poor whites. Although in 1924 we took over thousands of poor whites from the former Government, a considerable portion of them has already been given work to-day. We find that not less than 15,000 of them have got work on the railways. Others again have got work on afforestation or irrigation works, and have been put back on the land. Now hon. members, especially the hon. member for Umvoti, come and want to tell the Government what they ought to do with the proceeds of the State diggings. But the Government has already declared that they are going to use the money for those people by establishing irrigation and other works. It is too amazing to me that the hon. member for Umvoti acts here to-day for the poor whites, but he may as well leave it to us on this side. We shall not rest until every white person in the country has a proper livelihood. They do not to-day get the wages which they ought to get, but that is because there are so many thousands, so that everything cannot be done at once. What has happened in the past however*? Then Mr. Burton was Minister of Railways. For election purposes, I believe, he gave the people on the railways the eight-hour working day. The result was that he had a deficit of £4,000,000, so that another Minister had to take it over from him. A further result was that the same people, for whom the hon. member for Umvoti is now talking, were thrown on the streets. Now I ask the hon. member for Umvoti whether the Government ought to deal with the matter in the same way, for example by giving the people higher wages, and, after they have worked for nine months, again throwing them out on to the streets Then the distress of the people will be much greater. I still remember that in 1923 £750,000 was voted for relief works. After twelve months the money was all gone, and the people were in a more miserable condition than before. This Government tries to give them permanent work, but the other side throws mud at the Government. The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (South) (Sir William Macintosh) said not long ago that the people whom the Government was employing were “civilized loafers.” The present Government, however, is anxious to solve the poor white question, and if we come into, power again it will be completely solved. The Opposition also fought the Government in connection with the State diggings. Their idea was to let them, and that would have meant nothing else but giving them to a few diamond kings from whom the Government would then get a little rent. The present Government, however, has received 6½ million pounds from the State diggings, and hon. members opposite can safely leave it to us, we shall use it for the poor people.

How much has been stolen?

Could one perhaps be so careful that nothing is stolen? Why did you not go and look after them? The Government would pay you well. Whatever the Opposition may say the Government will, in the next five years of its power, solve the poor white question further, to the benefit of the country.

I just want to say a few words, more especially on the cattle question. I am surprised to hear the Minister of Agriculture saying the cattle farmer is getting good prices for cattle. Last year, 1928, the Chamber of Mines contract was taken at 2⅛d., and the Government tender was 2⅛d. That is £3 10s. 10d. for 400 lbs. of beef. On that price it is very difficult to see how you are coming out. In 1924-25 and 1926 the number of tractors imported was slightly over 300. In 1927 it rose to 381, and in 1928 one firm in Durban alone sold 500 tractors. That same firm has indented for over 1,000 this year. I have asked farmers who are using tractors how many oxen each tractor displaces, and they put it down at 60. There are thousands of oxen exposed on the markets every year. Where are you going to find a market for them? Since the Minister stopped the bounty on the export of beef, the export has gone down to nothing, that is export from the Union, and although the Union had ten and a half millions of cattle, according to the returns, at 31st August, 1927, we can take it that 400,000 at the outside are all that are required in this country in the way of slaughter cattle. In the year ending August 31, 1927, 687,000 head of cattle died of starvation. Taking them at only £4 a head, that is over two million pounds. It would be far better to pay the £2,000 required to encourage the export of beef from this country. No country can flourish agriculturally unless it has cattle. The land is being blown away by the wind every day. What is going to come of it? We are all going to be poor whites in a very short time. I have kept a register of the rainfall on my own farm for over thirty years. In the last six years, there has been a shortage in the rainfall of 5 inches a year, compared with the previous twenty years average. The country is drying up very fast. The Minister of Agriculture ought to encourage the growing of forest trees near farms. I would even go so far as to give a bounty. It would stop erosion and protect the soil from the tremendous winds we have in this country. If that afforestation was carried out for a considerable time, it would have a great effect on the future of this country. Otherwise, there is very little prospect for agriculture, because the springs are drying up every year. This country wants an afforestation scheme on a large scale, and that would be a better outlet for the employment of poor whites than trying to build roads even at 3s. 6d. a day. You would be doing something for the future of this country and not allowing it to go down and down until it is down and out.

The hon. member for Liesbeek (Mr. Pearce) and I are generally in opposition, and the reason why I am in opposition to him on this occasion is because he gives the Government all the kudos for the large increase in apprenticeship in this country. I want to show the hon. member why this apprenticeship has taken place. In Johannesburg, they are employing apprentices in practically every department of the municipality, and why the hon. member should say it is entirely owing to the good offices of this Government, I fail to understand. I believe the principle applies very largely to all the mines on the Witwatersrand, and there again I fail to see where the Government can claim any credit whatever. I want to deal with the question of employment from the juvenile affairs point of view. I think the Government have done good work in forming and assisting juvenile affairs boards, but after that it is the public who have come along and found employment. I was a member of the Juvenile Affairs Board in Johannesburg before the present Government came into power, and if there is any credit due, it is to the previous Government. After all, a Government only follows in the steps of its predecessor in connection with these matters. If the hon. member for Liesbeek could get these figures of what the Juvenile Affairs Board is dealing with he would be surprised at the large number of South Africans asking for employment, which shows the large amount of unemployment existing in the Union to-day. I was rather surprised that there was no increase held out in the way of old age pensions when the Minister introduced his budget. Many of these pensioners are in very sore straits, and many urgent cases have been brought to my notice. Some cases are very pitiable. I have no doubt a good many more will be disappointed when they know they are not likely to get much relief. The hon. member for Liesbeek also made much of the policy of the Government in regard to industries, but in spite of what has been said the importation of railway trucks has been large—

The hon. member can discuss that on the Railways Bill.

I was only replying to what the hon. member was saying. I would like also to have seen some relief of taxation as far as the mining industry is concerned, which has to find close on a £1,000,000 for phthisis relief. Finding such a large sum of money has a tendency to retard mining development. If the taxation could be reduced and encouragement given to people, the Minister would do something to start operations on mines which are not so payable at present, which would have a tendency to increase employment, When I go back to the Rand I expect 10 to 20 people will come to me every night seeking employment, which shows how largely unemployment exists there. If mining operations could be started because of reduced taxation there would also be more opportunities for trades people and artisans. If the Minister has three millions to spend, one of the greatest industrial concerns in the Union should receive some relief.

May I appeal to the Minister to allow me to move the adjournment of the debate? I am sorry he moves his head the wrong way, because I may remind him of the aphorism that “one hour in bed before midnight is worth two hours in bed after.” In kindness to us he might have acquiesced. However, we have to put up with his gentle tyranny. I think when the Minister of Finance was born a bevy of good fairies gathered round his cradle and gave him good gifts; one was a perpetual smile, that we have rather worn away; another fairy gave him the inextinguishable luck which has pursued him. Amongst the many good gifts he got, including that of personal bravery and courage, and many other fine qualities, I regret there was one fairy absent who might have tickled his feet with its magic wand and got him Io wander a bit to see what the world was like. If only he had a knowledge of what the outside world was doing and what he might have done with his wonderful opportunities, he would also regret the absence of that good fairy. It is a thing one constantly deplores that in this narrow boundary of South Africa men spend all their energies, and instead of finding what other countries are doing, they are content to be in the backwater, and to multiply and enlarge on the difficulties of this country. Other countries have difficulties greater than those of South Africa, and if those who have the good fortune to be directing our steps and decide our destinies only moved about in younger and not so much in the older countries, we should be at least 20 years ahead of where we are to-day; have double the population and be more generally prosperous, and our country would take a larger place in the enterprises of the progressive world. We have a Minister in this year of grace who can talk in millions. I remember when ministers used to be very-proud when they could talk in hundreds, and then in thousands. Now millions are glibly reeled off. We are not so much interested in these wonderful figures and these gorgeous millions; what interests us is not the millions themselves, but their productive power. It is not the Ford millions, or the Rockefeller millions, or even the Solly Joel millions that matter in themselves, but what, is being done with these riches. The hon. the Minister must have heard in the nursery the old proverb about a penny saved being a penny earned. But there is a better proverb and truer —that a penny spent may bring in 3d. That is the best criticism one can offer to the hon. gentleman. Wealth has fallen into his lap, and I ask what he proposes to do with these millions. Does he think that all he has to do is to sit on the chest and keep these millions there, and merely let us know that he has them? What we want is not only’ a cautious Minister of Finance, but a Minister with imagination, a Minister who knows the use of money, and the value of velocity in the use of it. The hon. gentleman has always been obsessed with the one idea that he must have a large surplus, taken out of the pockets of the people, sit on it, and do nothing practical with it, That suits a great many people, but it does not suit the spirit of the age, which is to believe in one’s country and help it to expand. To merely have these millions and work up these surpluses is really very poor finance. If you believe in your country, experiment with its surpluses and see if it is not possible to bring about still greater production. If a Minister of Finance cramps all his colleagues, prevents expansion and does not make the utmost use of their energies, the financiers of the world may proclaim him a very great Minister, but he is really a failure. Fortune has favoured us, we have a very rich country, and the Minister has done the same thing year after year—taken from the people all that it is possible to take, and then boasted, “Look at the great surplus I have got. It is pitiable. I could have forgiven him if he had not enjoyed that gorgeous luck. His predecessor left him a windfall of £3,500,000 in the Treasury, and it may be that there will be a poetic justices that this £5,000,000 of which he talks may not be in his possession or at his disposition, and he may not have the very great pleasure of disposing of it, therefore I am sorry he did not take action and say, “here is my opportunity; I will show the country that I believe in it, and that I am not afraid to spend the money which conies to me in this fortunate way.” But his first idea is to pay off debt; he borrowing with the right hand and paying off with the left. If I were a broker, I would be delighted if he carried on his business on that principle with me, so that I could have double brokerage. I would like to see this country expanding, so that criticisms as to how big our debt is growing would be answered not by the mere fact of the bigness of our debt. The real test is whether we have created compensating assets. The hon. gentleman is very proud of the fact that he raised £5,500,000 locally while he was paying off stock he purchased elsewhere, mostly overseas. The net result is that while he is buying stock in London and raising money here, he is really sending money out of this country. By using this very five-and-a-half millions in that way, he is sending that amount out of the country and so impoverishing it. That is what has been going on. I am not enamoured of the attempt to pay off what we owe; what I am concerned about is how we can make this country one of the foremost countries. If we want prosperous conditions we should borrow every penny we possibly can get for the purposes of expanding the country. Let me point out what the effect of repaying debt not yet due is. The Minister told us that he had succeeded in getting five-and-a-half millions in connection with a local loan. He got a net sum of £5,155,000, so that he had to pay £345,000 for getting it, and on that amount we never received we have to pay 4½ per cent, for 25 years. Well, the Minister has made a reputation as a very great and successful financier, and I do not wonder at it. It is being understood more and more that the real secret of good finance is to use the credit of the people for the people. I would remind him of his actions in regard to the ordinary finance of his department. He has declared himself against a State bank, and would not listen to anyone who declaims upon the advantages of such an institution. I think the hon. the Prime Minister said at the elections that he himself was in favour of a state bank, and I know that the hon. the Minister of Defence was an advocate of a state bank until he fell under the baleful influence of the conservatives whom he serves. We have the example in front of us of a successful land bank, and all that we ask that we should have a state bank on the same principle. There are those who complain that the millions advanced by it are ever growing. I wish we had doubled the amount, so that farmers could be assisted to the utmost in such things as windmill pumps and irrigation. It is said that the reserve bank should be looked upon as a state bank, but what is the position of the reserve bank? First of all, it is a shareholders’ bank, and the bulk of the profits go to the shareholders. Out of the profits of the reserve bank, after £250,000 had been put to reesrve, £131,000 came to the Government, and the shareholders got £514,000 No wonder that it is costing £195 nearly cent, per cent, to buy a share in the reserve bank. The shareholders put up a million for their reserve bank, and the Government gave the bank the right to issue nine millions of paper currency. No wonder that Mr. Clegg, the Governor, from the Bank of England, is quite satisfied with the position. When I asked what the remuneration of that gentleman was, I was told that it was such as was decided on from time to time by the board of directors. The average Government deposits in the reserve bank amounted last year to £1,749,000. The information is given me that the bank pays no interest whatever on deposits. In addition to letting them have the currency of nine millions the Treasury leaves them £1,749,000 in the bank on which no interest is paid. But the Treasury wants money, and have a system by which they issue Treasury bills when they want money. The Treasury bills which the bank held from the Government in 1928 averaged £272,308, and the rate of interest on them averaged four per cent. Therefore the Government were lenders to the Reserve Bank of vast sums on deposit, received no interest, but paid the bank on Treasury bills an average of four per cent, and in effect borrowing their own money from the Reserve Bank. I am very glad the Minister of Defence has come in. He used to be so eloquent on using the people’s money for the people. I would ask what the Minister of Defence must think of the present position, when at the last election he was so much in favour of a state bank. There is no doubt that the popularity the Minister of Finance has gained he has gained by carrying out the system of high finance which pours profits into the pockets of the big financiers. He has had an opportunity of using the credit of the people for the people. I ask him to consider whether it is good business when he controls the issue of paper currency which is legal tender, to hand unlimited millions of legal tender controlled by the Government to the Reserve Bank. People are becoming more educated, and more alive to this system by which taxation is placed upon them, and by which what could be used in their interests is simply handed over to the big financiers. Under the old system banks paid one per cent, on legal currency, so that when a customer came in and had good security the bank manager had only to consider the question of security, but now he has to go to Mr. Clegg, and say “what are your terms,” and Mr. Clegg says “my terms are that you must pay forty per cent, in gold and sixty per cent, in approved paper before we can let you have it.” This great man comes along to teach us banking in this country. He says: “I have got control of all your legal tender. Now you pay me forty per cent, in gold and sixty per cent, in approved paper.” But Mr. Clegg says “I am tired of your renewable bills—I want short dated bills like they have in England, paid at due date,” so he nearly burst the whole trade of this country which has been built up on extended credit, because we are dealing with Europe and require a much longer period of credit. He very nearly ruined our whole system of trade. He has complete control of our resources and, financially, carries the Government in his pocket. I think this is deplorable, and I have dealt with it because many people think it must be all right, but they forget that the history of banking is strewn with wreckage. If four years ago the Government had said it would buy out the Reserve Bank and had adopted the system of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, the immense amount of riches that would have been developed would have been astonishing. It is another case of lost opportunities. There is no limit to what the Minister of Finance could have done under such a system. For instance, he could have had trawlers built at a cost of £9,000 or £10,000 each, and sold them to the fishermen on the instalment plan. Then we could have built up one of the greatest fishing industries in the world, but nothing has been done to help the fishermen except to get elaborate reports. Alas, we have no mental vision to see the opportunities that we are losing. Fishing should be taken out of the “ring” which keeps up the price of fish and dumps tons and tons of fish into the sea. We look to the Minister—our Mussolini—to stop all this “ring,” but to-day all kinds of “rings” exist in South Africa. Take again the cattle industry. If we had a Minister of Finance with vision, he would have said to the energetic Minister of Agriculture “We have 9,000,000 scrub cattle: here is sufficient money with which to buy bulls.” Then by this time, the grade of our cattle would have been on the up grade. Unfortunately, however, the position is far worse than when we started. He has not let his fellow Ministers have any more money than he could squeeze them down to, and the consequence is he has broken their hearts. At last we have a miserably insufficient old-age pension, adapted mainly because the Government is going out of office, and it will pay only one-quarter’s pensions. As a supporter of the Government, pledged to support, and with a written Pact that we should carry out whole-heartedly domestic legislation in the interests of the people. I am ashamed to tell people that all we of the Labour party could get out of our wonderful Minister of Finance was this miserable old age pension. With all the advantages this country has, with its enormous resources, we hand out this paltry pension, and that only in consequence of members on the cross-benches having made ourselves infernally nasty. Then there is unemployment insurance. Surely the hon. gentleman with all his ability and the time at his disposal, could have brought unemployment insurance in three years ago. It is no new thing. It exists in other countries much poorer than this. To-day the fear that hangs over the worker is the prospect of unemployment. Anyone who has seen an artisan at the top of his business tramp for three months, with starving wife and child, tools in hand and unable to get work, appreciates the real meaning of unemployment insurance. But you will never get a lawyer to appreciate it. It is only the worker in touch with workers who understands this terrible dread over-hanging even a good workman. With five years’ surpluses we have not got it yet. Then there is immigration. We should have immigration of the right class of people. I know it frightens the Government, of whom I am such an unworthy supporter. At the mention of immigration they shudder. If Nationalists only knew, as other countries know, that the more people got in the better for the people of the country! I do not know how the Minister can hold up his head when he goes down the street and sees the hospitals starved, crowded to the last beds and with beds even on the open verandah. It that economy? The hospitals now are thrown back on the charity of the people to a large extent instead of being supported by the State. The Minister could have afforded to say to the provincial councils long ago: “ here is two millions of money, get busy, get modern hospitals and see that every sick person is properly theated.” That is practical economics. We will have to learn that economy does not consist in merely saving money. Economy consists in having the highest intelligence, the highest degree of ability and the highest results it is possible to get from every human being. I wish the Minister had time to look at our crowded hospitals and then be proud of his treasured millions. He says “ I have five millions which I could use for the people but I am not going to. I am going to pay off debt, to send it out of the country to people who have lent us money. That is what I am going to do.” There is another thing I cannot allow to pass without comment. Providence has blessed us with a wonderful production of diamonds, a luxury which has no limitation in value except what people will pay for it. And yet, what good use do we make of them? We have the Namaqualand riches pouring into our land. For 60 years we have had this rich diamond production; fortunately for us, those who took an interest in this, marvellously and miraculously, got a 10 per cent, export duty put on, although we had the lamentable Mr. Burton who did not collect it when he could have done so. The figure of £9,000,000 has been given as the total amount from this source; we could have had £30,000,000. It would not have hurt anybody; the rich people who would have paid it would not have felt it. In Canada, I came in contact with the biggest diamond operator there, who has an enormous business, and is credited with £3,000,000 a year turnover in cut diamonds. I asked him to come to South Africa some time to buy diamonds, and I told him we had a 10 per cent, export duty on rough stones. He said, “ Tell your Government to put on 20 per cent, and I will have my buyers permanently there.” Diamond dealers would be very glad if that were done, because they would put on another 5 per cent. A good deal has been done during the period of office of the hon. gentleman and his colleague, but I feel sorry as I have always done for the poor digger. He does not go to the diggings because he is rolling in riches and likes the life, but because of his necessity. For some time, digging has been stopped completely, but fortunately, for the exigencies of the election, more ground has been found for diggers, and the Minister of Justice has regained his popularity. More could have been done by him. We have thousands of diggers, and 4,000 are out of work. If the hon. gentleman—the Minister of Finance—had a little vision and said, “ We are going to have Government valuators on the diggings and protect the digger so that he could get the highest possible price for his product,” a digger could go to that official, have the stones valued and get an advance of 75 per cent, and not be squeezed by the buyer. The Minister might have assisted schools, proper hospital accommodation and other things, but has anything of that kind been done? [Time limit.]

In connection with the Budget which has been laid before the House, I should like to offer some criticism on the administration of some of the departments of State under the regime of the present Government. Firstly, I should like to deal with the department controlled by the Minister of Labour. The Minister of Labour, as you well know, is a Minister whom I have severely criticised, and whom I shall continue to criticise as long as there is that incompetence which has characterized the department, under the portfolio which he holds. He has shown the grossest incompetence—

I do not think the hon. member should say that.

I was going to proceed to show it, but in deference to your ruling I shall do so without describing his incompetence by that objective. I wish to show that in connection with the wage determinations the administration of that side of his department has been characterized by an entire neglect of the interests which are committed to his charge. As a matter of fact, dealing with such an important centre as Johannesburg, I am in a position to say that the Minister brought his ministrations to bear on the bakery industry, but with such a disastrous result that a journeyman baker who was able to get £6 13s. 6d. per week before the Wage Board came on the scene, as a result of the Minister’s ministrations now finds his wage reduced to £4 10s. 0d. in the faith that white men should have preference in the bake-house, but it has simply resulted in a large number of white men losing employment, and natives being taken on in their stead. The wage which was formerly paid to a journeyman baker was £6 13s. 6d. per week, but it is now only paid by one firm, and this firm is entitled to the credit that it employed white bakers only. For the rest, in spite of the Minister of Labour and his compulsory wage legislation. I should like to quote from a letter from one of the men who has been thrown out of employment on account of the absurd wage determinations that have followed one upon another with such frequency that the Department of Labour has been absolutely powerless to bring about any relief. This man says “What is the matter with the baking industry in Johannesburg? For the past two and a half years the Wage Board has been juggling with this trade, making determinations as to wages to be paid. They have made three determinations already, and they have all been declared ultra vires. That seems to be something of an achievement. The Wage Board has made a possible,—full marks—100 per cent, ultra vires. The letter continues: “The last determination was published, I believe, about the second week in January of this year. Up to the present time there has been nothing done to make the employers pay the wage laid down by the wage board.” He goes on to say that these facts are well known to the Minister of Labour, but all appeals to him by the men who are suffering are made in vain. The wage laid down is £4 10s. 0d. per week for white and black. We find, however, that there are about 16 master bakers in the city who have defied Mr. Boydeil and his Wage Act since its inception, and have not paid any native such a wage. The wage a white man had before this Act came out was £6 13s. 6d. per week. Mr. Lucas had it reduced to £4 10s. 0d. so that the white man should have preference in the bakehouse. It was thought that later on the wage would be restored to its previous standard. But no. This class of master baker in the city has defied the Wage Act and Mr. Boydell in every shape and form imaginable. This man also says in his letter that when these defiant master bakers were prosecuted on previous occasions, it took as long as three months to bring them to court. They were taken before the magistrate, who, by reason of the uncertainty of the wage determinations did not know what to do, and fined them 1s. on each count. That was the last case in Johannesburg—