I move as an unopposed motion—

Hon. members are aware of the fact that if the period of office of the State President expires normally, i.e. if he has completed the period of seven years provided for in the Constitution, the electoral college may elect a State President before the due date. But our Constitution provides, naturally, that in the event of death no election can take place before the due date. Our Constitution also provides, however, that if the State President retires as a result of resignation before the expiration of his normal period of office, we shall also not be able to elect his successor before the due date. It is the position that the State President has intimated that he will resign his office on 31st May, and if we did not amend the Act it would mean that we could not put the necessary machinery into operation before 31st May, in order to appoint a successor. The Government has considered the matter and has deemed it desirable—and I make bold to say that hon. members on both sides of the House will also deem it desirable—for various reasons to elect the State President before 31st May. One of the reasons to which I just want to refer in passing is the fact that all of us attach great value to the historic day of 31st May, and in view of the fact that, as a result of resignation, the period of office of the present State President will now terminate on 31st May, one would like to induct the successor of the State President on that day. All of us attach great significance to that day, and consequently I think hon. members will welcome it if we do it on that day. In passing I may also just tell hon. members that we would do well to put the necessary machinery into operation as soon as possible, and I want to thank hon. members for their co-operation and their willingness to take all stages of the Bill now. If all goes well, we should like to make representations and put the machinery into operation in order that the election may take place on 28th February.

Mr. Speaker, that is the reason for the introduction of this Bill. Then there is a second amendment, namely in the Afrikaans wording of the oath of office. Authorities on language have pointed out to me that notwithstanding the great care we devoted to these matters in the Select Committee, we made a small error. They told me that it is not good Afrikaans to speak of “na die beste van my vermoë”, but that one should rather use “na my beste vermoë”. I promised them at the time that at the very first opportunity when we amended the Constitution we would do justice to the Afrikaans text, and that is in fact being done now. I want to thank hon. members once again for their co-operation in this matter.

We on this side of the House support this Bill. There is clearly a deficiency in the Constitution Act. It is quite clear that it is not desirable that there should ever be a period during which no State President holds office. An elected State President is not someone acting as a deputy. Consequently this Bill enjoys our support, and there is no objection to taking all the stages.

Motion put and agreed to.

Bill read a Second Time.

Committee Stage.

Bill read a Third Time.

When the debate was adjourned, I had indicated that I believed that unless there was a little clear thinking in regard to sport in South Africa and our approach to international sport, sport would die, and I believed that with it would die a part of South Africa. I think that part of the soul of South Africa would die with it. I say that for reasons which I think are apparent to everyone in this House. Sir, we are a sporting nation. [Interjections.]

Order! It is not sporting to interrupt the hon. member so.

I doubt whether there is one member in this House who at some time or other in his life has not hoped that he would attain Springbok colours, the green and gold of South Africa, in the particular branch of sport in which he was interested. But what both these hon. Ministers must remember that if there is no international sport, if there are no tours, our sport in South Africa will die. They should both know, and the hon. the Minister of Sport and Recreation should know better than anybody else in this House, that sport in South Africa is financed by tours of overseas countries here and our sportsmen going overseas. The finance derived from that is what has brought sport in South Africa to the level we have reached, where our status in the world is a source of envy to many nations. This Minister knows also that this is the means whereby we constantly improve the standard of our sport and enable other countries of the world to improve their standards by competing with us. In my opinion my two colleagues have stated a case which is not only unanswerable but one which has not been answered, despite the fact that we have had two Ministers participating in the debate.

Let us have a look at the line taken by these two hon. Ministers. The Minister of the Interior, who unfortunately is not here now, pinned the bulk of his argument to the case of a gentleman called Van der Walt, who happens to be the South African welterweight boxing champion at the moment. This is a very bad example, in my opinion, because Mr. Van der Walt is a victim of the Population Register and not of sport. His problem is that he has been reclassified as a Coloured person.

Oh no.

There is no problem attached to the sport of boxing. The very case made out by the hon. the Minister proves the absurdity of his contention, because on the Minister’s own admission this man has been participating in White boxing for six or seven years and nothing has happened. In fact, he became the welterweight champion. These are facts, not fiction. He might still be boxing today had he not applied for re-classification on the Population Register.

He has never been reclassified.

I accept that. I am not arguing that point. [Interjections.] If hon. members opposite would just listen they would hear what my point is. The Minister said this man was classified in 1961 and he has now applied for reclassification, some six or seven years later. This man has been boxing for six or seven years as a White man, and he has become our champion. I should not be surprised if this Minister has not been to watch him.

May I put a question? If you had been classified as White and you had accepted your race classification, and for reasons of your own you had wished to associate with Coloureds or Blacks, have you then become Coloured or Black because of your wishes?

This is another type of hypothetical question of the sort which has got this Minister into a lot of trouble, but I will deal with it in a moment. The question he has put to me has nothing at all to do with the point I am making. I am just stating the facts presented by the Minister. I am not questioning the facts. The Minister told the House that this man was classified as Coloured in 1961 and it is only now that he has applied for reclassification. But the fact is that for six or seven years he has been fighting as a White man. I said also that he might still be the South African champion had he not applied for reclassification, and this proves the statement I made, that first of all he is the victim of the Population Register, and it also shows the absurdity of the whole position in regard to the Government’s attitude towards sport. I would like to ask the Minister who stopped him from boxing? I believe he either did it voluntarily or else the Board of Control stopped him, but it was not the Minister. All the Minister did was to reclassify him, but who in fact stopped him from boxing? Why has he quit now? Not because the Minister issued a directive, but because the responsible body did something about it. The Minister is now making my point for me and he is making our amendment for us.

The Board still has control.

The Minister has had an opportunity of presenting his case. The other point the Minister made was that this was just a try-on on our part because there is a new Prime Minister in office. Sir, I rather resent that, because I think it is to some extent, at any rate, a reflection on the hon. the Prime Minister. It is quite untrue, and I sincerely hope that the Prime Minister will have a more intelligent view and approach towards sport than the two Ministers who participated in the debate.

Now, let us come to the hon. the Minister of Sport. Before I go on to deal with the point he tried to make, I want to say that in listening to him I wondered whether his job is to foster sport or to hinder it in South Africa. That is the impression he gave me.

That is your job. You are advocating mixed sport.

This Minister opened the debate by referring to the D’Oliveira case. That was the main plank in his platform, but what was the attitude of this Minister and of his colleague, the Minister of the Interior, in regard to this very case of D’Oliveira? Let us come to the facts. This Minister was reported in the newspaper on 31st January as having made a statement a week before which had three South African cricketers excluded from the world team which was to have played against Barbados. This is what the report said—

I am not referring to the statement the Minister made in this House yesterday. I will come to that in a minute—

So that must have been between the 23rd and the 28th January—

Yesterday, after we had raised the issue here, the Minister made a statement in the nature of an excuse. He excused himself and blamed a Press reporter. That is fine. I accept the Minister’s word. I accept every word he said. I am not arguing about that. But why did the Minister not make a statement before the 8th February? Why did he have to wait until we raised this issue?

Because the Minister of Sport was replying to a question put to him in the House. [Interjections.]

Now we have got them on the run. In the same way as they both bobbed up at the same time yesterday to take part in the debate, they are now passing the buck. This is quite interesting. I am now going to ask the hon. the Minister of Sport the same question that this hon. Minister was going to ask him. Why did he not make a statement? He is the hon. the Minister of Sport. Why did he sit on it all this time? I venture to predict that if the hon. member for Yeoville had not raised this matter in the debate yesterday, we would not yet have had a statement from either of these Ministers. [Interjections.]

I want to come to another point. The hon. the Minister of Sport prompted me to come to this particular point. He said that the Afro-Asians were to blame. We were right and the rest of the world was wrong. Let us accept that he is right for the purposes of argument. If somebody asked me what are the two factors that could do more damage to our good name overseas and give the Afro-Asian group the ammunition to fire at us, do you know what I would say, Sir? I would say first of all petty apartheid.

What is that?

I shall give you an example. A recent one is in a report dated the 1st February, 1967. The heading is: “Moon watcher used the wrong subway.” Do I need to go any further? A man walked through the wrong subway and he was brought to the courts of this country. This Government must not blame the Press for this. They must blame their own petty attitude and approach. This is their law. It is not our law. When you get this type of headline, which goes throughout the world and damages our good name, then one must accept, as I do, that South Africa’s enemy number one is probably petty apartheid as applied by this Government.

I should now like to mention the second factor. Number two is the petty attitude of this Government to sport and sportsmen. I add sportsmen for a specific reason. Here I should like to mention D’Oliveira, a man who has played the game. He has not participated in this argument. He has carefully refrained from doing so. [Interjections.] I am here to present his case.

Purely political exploitation.

Do you see the attitude, Sir? Basil D’Oliveira is to-day more in the public mind and in the newspapers than this Minister, yet he seeks to attack this public figure, this man who has become famous and is well-known throughout the world.

Who attacked him?

Why can’t you learn to leave him alone?

Why can’t you learn to tell the truth?

This Minister has done far more harm in this one fell swoop or with this lackadaisical approach, to the name of South Africa and to its sport, which he is supposed to foster, than he could possibly have done in any other way. He must not blame us. I have heard members here refer to this policy as a stupid one, and that is the only word I can think of which adequately sums it up.

The other thing this Minister said to us was that we wanted mixed sport. Amongst his possessions he probably has a copy of our policy. [Interjections.] It shows him quite distinctly that this party’s policy is against mixed sport. [Interjections.] I want to repeat that, Sir, because his supporters are making quite a noise and they obviously cannot hear at the same time. The policy of this party is against mixed sport. It always has been. In this amendment we do not ask for mixed sport.

What are you asking for?

Sir, either this Minister cannot read or else he has not taken the trouble to read our amendment. When I read the first part of this amendment, I want to accuse this hon. Minister of something, because the first part of our amendment reads as follows:

I am reading this for the Minister’s benefit but that is perhaps a waste of time. I think it is quite clear. This position has obtained in the past. We have had no trouble. If there has been any trouble it has been caused by outside influences. If you go to a sports meeting on the Continent, precautions are taken. They accept this as the spirit which is stirred up by sport. It is not made into a crisis, such as this Government makes of it, which is quite nonsensical. The second part of our amendment is actually the part which I particularly want the Minister to read, learn and inwardly digest. It reads as follows:

When the Minister says that we want mixed sport, he is in fact accusing the sporting bodies of South Africa. We do not ask the Government to give us the control of sport. We ask the Government to put it where it belongs, under the sporting bodies of South Africa. There is nothing wrong with these people. Men like Dr. Craven, Frank Braun and the hon. member for Johannesburg (North) have fought our case overseas time and time again. Does he not trust them to fight it in the future? Are those the people whom he is accusing of wanting mixed sport in South Africa? We do not want it. [Interjections.] The third paragraph of our amendment reads as follows:

This is what we ask. Is that unreasonable? Is there anything wrong with it? It has pertained in the past and we have not had tragedy visit South Africa. It is only because these people build things up in their minds and they do not trust their fellow-South Africans.

Fourthly, “recognizing in the case of both national and international professional sport, acceptable boards of control representative of the sport concerned”. I want to ask this hon. Minister and the hon. Minister of the Interior where we ask for mixed sport. Where do we ask for the United Party, sitting on this side of the House, to determine whether our sport should be mixed or not. You see, Sir, to begin with, the hon. Minister of Sport does not know what he is arguing about and he speaks, as did the hon. Minister of the Interior, about something which was completely wrong. We did not ask for it, and we don’t want it.

Let us make our point of view quite clear; we did not ask for it, and we don’t want it. Can I be clearer and more specific than that. Let me say it for the fourth time; we did not ask for it, and we don’t want it. What I do want is to ask this Government to remove the embarrassment which is hindering those people who are trying, unlike these two Ministers, to uphold the cause of South African sport in the world bodies which control them.

By conceding to what?

That might well include removing the two Ministers, but I am not going to suggest that. I am thinking of men like Dr. Craven, whom I have quoted before, and Mr. Frank Braun, who looks after our athletics and our representation at the Olympic Games. [Interjections.] Are they trying to say that they do not trust those men? Are you accusing those men of being untrustworthy in dealing with South Africa’s sport?

Yet you are.

No, on the contrary…

Order! I am going to stop all interjections from now on.

I am asking this Government to give a chance to those men who are good South Africans, who of their own free will and accord are devoting their time and efforts and lives to try to improve sport in South Africa and to try to get us representation and maintain that representation on world bodies. As fast as they do it, this Government is embarrassing them in everything they do and in every direction in which they go. We know what happens. Everybody in this House will remember the newspaper duel between the then Minister of the Interior and Dr. Danie Craven which in my opinion was degrading for a man who is known as Mr. Rugby in South Africa. I think that that is the sort of thing which must stop forthwith if we want to retain our position in the world of sport. These are quite simple things and I do not think that we are asking much when we ask this Government to review the situation.

[Inaudible.]

Yes, I can name the things. I will read the amendment again.

Order! The hon. Minister has had his chance.

I will read the amendment once again:

1. (i) Allowing all race groups to watch all organized sport, provided adequate facilities are available for Whites and non-Whites;

Why bother to read the amendment again?

I have forbidden all interjections. That applies to both sides of the House.

Mr. Speaker, I could not hear.

I can hear from here. Why cannot the hon. member, who sits nearly half as close to the hon. member making his speech, hear? The hon. member’s attention is elsewhere.

1. (ii) Entrusting the control and administration of sport in the Republic to the recognized sporting bodies;
2. (iii)Accepting the principle of non-interference in the realm of international sport and leaving the issuing of invitations and the selection of teams to the controlling bodies concerned;

Is that a lot to ask? When we want to sell our pig-iron, this line of thinking works perfectly.

(iv) Recognizing in the case of both national and international professional sport, acceptable boards of control representative of the sport concerned.

That is what I ask of this Government.

Mr. Speaker, through the years South Africans have won many fine and glorious victories on many playing fields in the world, but they have also suffered their setbacks and defeats. Now it is true, of course, that victory and defeat play a most important part in the concept of sport. The sportsmen of South Africa enjoyed many fine and memorable days. Because we have unshakable confidence in the dynamic strength of the youth of South Africa I am convinced that in years to come they will gain achievements quite as fine as those of the past. Seen against that background, it will be appreciated that yesterday was a very black and ugly day for the sportsmen of South Africa, because yesterday it pleased the hon. member for Yeoville to bring sport directly into the political arena under cover of a paltry motive, i.e. to catch a few votes for the dying United Party by doing so. I have to admit, however, that there was also a slight touch of humour in the elaborate arguments advanced by the hon. member. To use a true sporting term, he caught the few conservative votes in that patch of the House with a very loose line. Under the cover of being the champion of the sportsman of South Africa he advocated nothing less than mixed sport and social integration. It is only natural that he should be smiling now. The hon. member is simply doing what the United Party is accustomed to do. They are usually foot-up before the ball is put in. If that had not been so, would the hon. members not have understood that to grant permission for mixed teams from overseas to come to South Africa would have the direct effect of promoting mixed sport locally? If the hon. member is honoured as the sportsman of the year, he should at least know that the game on the playing field is only a small portion of sport itself. Surely the social functions, the social intercourse and the pleasant conviviality—ask the hon. member for Pinelands —also form an integral and most important part of sport. If we were to do what the hon. members on the opposite side seek to do, we would create a position that would give rise to impossible situations. Are we to give up everything without more ado? Are the traditions that have been built up through the years by these sportsmen of South Africa valid for South Africans only if they go overseas? Are we to allow the sporting traditions established over many generations to be destroyed suddenly and totally by world liberalism? Of course, if we were to do that we would perhaps be acting in accordance with the policy of the United Party and the Progressive Party, because then we would be promoting mixed sport and, by implication, social integration. Am I to accept that through the years the hon. member and the United Party have allowed their political vision to become so clouded that they can no longer appreciate the fine traditional way of life of the sportsmen of South Africa?

Now I want to ask the hon. member most urgently, if he wishes to encourage social integration by implication, to do so on some other occasion and in another field, but to leave South African sport, as we knew it and should like to keep it, as it is. It is something fine that we have built up here in South Africa through the years. Or do the hon. members on the opposite side not know that through the years sport has been one of the strongest factors in bringing about unity between the two great White groups here in South Africa? Are we to allow it to be meddled with now, and the tradition built up through the years to be destroyed now? The hon. member for Johannesburg (North) followed the example of his deputy leader, and from what I gathered by implication I came to two conclusions. In the first place it was his attitude that this Government is responsible for the fact that problems have now arisen as regards visits by overseas teams to South Africa. But does the hon. member not know that that simply means following the pattern fixed by tradition? Cannot the hon. member, even if only for the sake of sport, put up some small show of patriotism and lay the cause of this problem at the door of world liberalism? If the hon. member had based his conclusion on the fact that this Government was not prepared to allow mixed sport and social integration, in contrast with the policy of the Progressive Party and of the United Party, we could at least have credited him with having the courage of his convictions.

Yesterday the hon. the Minister of the Interior and the hon. the Minister of Sport set out very clearly and firmly the broad principles concerning overseas touring teams. I now want to ask hon. members on the opposite side this one question. If they as a party are prepared to allow non-White South Africans who are living abroad and who succeed in becoming members of an international touring team to come and play here, are they also prepared to include the top non-White sportsmen in South Africa in teams playing for South Africa against those international teams?

Are you also prepared to call Mr. Dirk Richard unpatriotic because he suggested that a few Maoris in a team would not make much difference?

The person to whom the hon. member refers is an individual and has nothing to do with the matter, but if the hon. member really wanted to attach importance to that, he should note what ensued in that newspaper. But there is a further question. Are hon. members on the opposite side prepared to include those South African non-White sportsmen in the White touring teams of South Africa if they come back to South Africa after having succeeded in making an international touring team while they were overseas? Someone on the opposite side said “No”—in other words, when they play against South Africa they are welcome, but when they are called upon to defend the sporting banner of their own fatherland they must not be allowed to do so.

The hon. member for Umlazi spoke of some “rethinking”. But what is this rethinking to which he referred? By implication it is nothing but the acceptance of mixed sport and social integration. What else can it be? The hon. member also made a second point—also only by implication, because they are not prepared to say unequivocally what they think, and we are therefore forced to deduce what they actually want. They allege that the Government has either done nothing for international sport or nothing for sport in South Africa. What happened yesterday in this hon. House is so typical of the United Party. You know, Mr. Speaker, Senator Paul Sauer said on one occasion that the National Party is forging ahead constantly while the United Party is static; the National Party is vital, dynamic, whereas the United Party is dying. Now it so happens that the National Party can grow because we have a Government which always keeps a finger on the pulse of the needs of our people and of our country. Therefore it was a great day for every South African when the late Dr. Verwoerd announced that we would get an independent Department of Sport and Recreation. On 1st July, 1966, that announcement was ratified in the Gazette. It was aimed at the advancement of sport and recreation in our fatherland in order that the physical and spiritual strength of the South African nation might be reinforced. But what was the reaction of the United Party to that? In this debate the hon. member for Umlazi and the hon. member for Johannesburg (North) tried to create the impression that this Government is actually insensitive to the needs of our youth and of our sportsmen in South Africa. Here something fine was being created, and what was the reaction of hon. members on the opposite side? The words had hardly left the lips of the late Dr. Verwoerd when the hon. member for Wynberg got up and said: “The Nazis also had a department of sport.” If we are reviled as Nazis before the world the moment a small department of sport is established, what would happen if we were to follow the instruction of the hon. member for Johannesburg (North), that our Government should make representations to sports bodies overseas? I wonder what the United Party would say then. But the attitude of the hon. member for Wynberg was amplified by the hon. member for Karoo. I must say, I do not actually blame him for that, because he does not know any better. He said that countries where departments of sport were created and where money was voted by the State for the advancement of sport were mostly fascist or communistic. But that was by no means all. Another hon. member, who is a senior member in this House, the hon. member for Constantia, said in his argument against the establishment of that Department to the late Dr. Verwoerd: “I think it was unpatriotic. I think the Prime Minister ought to be ashamed of himself.” These are the people who pretend to be patriots, and who pretend to have the interests of South Africa at heart, who pretend that they are good South Africans. But when such an important step is taken for the benefit of the youth of South Africa it is received in that spirit and described in those terms. Can the youth of South Africa and the sportsmen of South Africa have any faith in the United Party if that is its attitude? The hon. the Leader of the Opposition has had enough time and adequate opportunities to repudiate those things. But that was never done.

Let me mention a single fact to prove how wrong those allegations were. Let us consider what a few civilized Western nations are doing in this regard. Let us first take France. Last year France spent more than R63 million on the advancement of sport and youth affairs. France also has a separate department headed by a minister. In a lengthy brochure he addressed the youth of France as follows: “France, whither your youth?” It is therefore apparent that France is concerned about her youth and her sportsmen. May not this Government, a Government which always tries to keep a finger on the pulse of the needs of its country and its people, also be concerned about its youth and its sportsmen? The same applied to West Germany. Last year R35 million was spent there. Even Great Britain spent R6,600,000 in that regard, in only a portion of last year. No, no government worth its salt may withhold its hand from the interests of its sportsmen and its youth.

Hear, hear!

I am pleased to hear that hon. member say, “Hear, hear!” but that does not mean that one should destroy what has been built up through the years by means of traditions and by means of national customs to secure the survival of civilization in this country, because then one would achieve nothing. I want to appeal once again to hon. members on that side. If hon. members would propagate such alien notions, can they not do so somewhere else and on some other occasion, rather than when we are discussing sport? In that spirit and in that spirit only I would then use this opportunity to-day to pay tribute to those two great young South Africans from the Eastern Cape, namely Peter and Graeme Pollock, who after they had been thrown out of the international cricket team accepted that setback like true sportsmen. Their names will be immortal in the history of sport in South Africa. I think the sportsmen and the youth of this country salute those two young South Africans.

The hon. member who has just sat down, like the two hon. Ministers yesterday, has completely ignored the amendment moved by the hon. member for Yeoville. He has not only ignored it but he did not even get close to it. The hon. member avoided every argument, every charge and every challenge put to the Government in regard to its decision. Yesterday the hon. the Minister of Sport, in a moment of blinding truth, said to this House and to this country: “Now swallow your poison.” Sir, I think the Afrikaans expression put it best: “Wat die hart van vol is loop die mond van oor.” No truer words could have been spoken by the hon. the Minister of Sport because what was pouring from him was poison—lethal and fatal, to the sport of this country. This Government has avoided, carefully and, I believe, by design, the simple issues that we have put to it in this debate. We have said firstly that all sport should be available to spectators of all races provided separate and adequate facilities are available. I challenge the hon. the Minister of Finance, the only remaining speaker on the other side, to state on behalf of the Government that the Government does not believe that sport should be available to spectators of all races provided separate and adequate facilities are available. Not one of these Ministers has referred to this matter; the Minister of Sport has said no word; the Minister of the Interior has said no word. They have avoided the simple, clear statement of policy which is contained in our amendment. Our amendment is a statement of policy, and not a single member on that side of the House has even referred to the question of spectator participation. I challenge the Government to state where it stands regarding spectator participation.

The second point of our amendment asks that the control of sport domestically should be entrusted to the sporting bodies. I challenge the Government to say, clearly and unequivocally, as it has done by implication in this debate, that it has no confidence in the sporting bodies of South Africa. The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) who spoke before me pleaded that we should follow the time-honoured traditions of sport in South Africa. That is exactly what we ask. We ask that the present meddling finger of interference should be kept out of the control of sport in this country of ours, because we have complete confidence in the South Africanism and in the traditional approach of those who control our national sports in South Africa. Sir, by rejecting and opposing this amendment, every single member on the Government side who votes against it will be casting a vote of no confidence in the sports administrators of this country. I want to have it clearly on record that every member of this House who votes against the words “to entrust the control and administration of sport in the Republic to recognized sporting bodies” is indicating his lack of confidence in our sports administrators. They cannot evade that inference; the implication of lack of confidence in our sports administrators cannot be evaded. We on the other hand have every confidence that if this problem were left to our sports administrators, they would follow the traditional pattern of South African life; they would follow it because they are South Africans and because they want to retain the support and backing of the sporting public of this country. If they were to go against the traditional pattern of our life, then they would themselves destroy public following for the sport which they administer. We therefore have no doubt whatsoever that that is a danger which South Africa need not fear at all. But instead of that we get the Government poking its finger into sport.

Now I want to ask the hon. the Minister of the Interior how he knows who is a White man in a team coming to South Africa from, say, England or Australia or New Zealand. They do not carry identity cards with Ws and Bs and Ms and Is and goodness knows what other letters on them. They come here as representatives of their country. Is the hon. the Minister of the Interior now going to set up a race classification board in every country against which we want to play any form of sport? Is he going to ask that every member of an overseas team, before it comes to South Africa, must go through the sieve of his foreign race classification board? The hon. the Minister of Sport said that countries overseas have not sent non-Whites to South Africa as members of their teams. How does he know? Do they have identity cards? There have been non-White swimmers who have swum in our swimming baths. Sir, let me ask the Government this: Did white civilization topple round our ears some years ago when that happened? I have not noticed any change in the colour of hon. members representing Pretoria because they may have swum in water in which Japanese swimmers swam. I have not noticed any change in the civilization on which they pride themselves.

I have.

The only change in colour that I saw was yesterday and here I refer to the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs. He did not turn dark because Japanese swimmers had swum in our swimming baths; he turned pale when he heard the Minister of Sport and the Minister of the Interior talking, and he turned pale with good reason, because the whole of Government foreign policy has been designed and has been hailed during this Session as a step towards closer co-operation with the non-white countries of Africa. We were told with pride how South Africa was building up contacts; how over 50 non-white diplomats and statesmen had been in South Africa and treated as white men and given the facilities, the privileges and the respect due to a diplomat. And now, Sir, because a person with a little colour in his blood may possibly play rugby or cricket for a foreign team against South Africa, the whole of our civilization is going to collapse. The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) spoke of social intercourse. What is social intercourse if it is not having meals together, talking together and having sundowners together? What is social intercourse but Kaiser Matanzima having tea with the Minister of Bantu Administration and other Ministers, as any player does after a match? Has white civilization died in South Africa because a white man had a cup of tea with a black man? Those are part of the accepted exceptions which the Government finds it necessary to make in order to carry out its own policies. The hon. the Minister of the Interior has a test of race, and the courts have held that the most important of the tests are those of association and acceptance. With whom does a person associate? Does he associate with white people? Is he accepted by white people? I put it to him that every sportsman who comes to this country from another country associates with white people and is accepted by them.

Therefore, according to the Government’s own test and their own law, they should accept those people. But because one or two players come here to represent a foreign country, the Minister suddenly sets a new test, a test of sportsmen which he is now going to apply as Minister of the Interior. We say that we believe that when our Boards of Control, the Rugby Board and the Cricket Board and the other administrators of our sports issue an invitation to a team to come to this country they act responsibly and in the spirit of South African tradition; and when they issue that invitation, we, the people of South Africa, should have the confidence in them that they will not abuse their authority as the elected administrators of the sport they represent. I believe, and I believe that South Africa believes, that everyone in South Africa except those with narrow, closed minds who are politically obsessed with race and colour believe that this is an issue which should be left to those who know how to deal with it, the administrators of our sports. If it should be that those boards in their wisdom should invite a team from any country, and the selectors of that team should include in it perhaps someone who would not be regarded here as entirely “lily white”, it is not our business to tell them that they cannot pick him, any more than it is their business to tell us that we must pick people of colour in our teams.

We in the United Party have made no bones about where we stand. We believe that domestic sport in South Africa has been built up on the tradition of racially separate players, White and non-White, with their own separate organizations and playing separately for their own teams. That is our tradition in South Africa, and that is how our sport has grown up. The Minister of the Interior has spoken of blowing a whistle in a non-White rugby match. I am sure there are many men here who in their time tried to give some help and encouragement to non-White sport. They have done it within a traditional pattern where the White man has played his games and the non-White has played his, and they have done it without the Government or the law telling them to do so. They have done it because it is the way the South Africans like to play. When you participate in a sport, you pick the people with whom you want to play. You belong to a club because the members of that club are people with whom you would like to associate. So, by tradition in South Africa, we have played our sport among those with whom we are accustomed to associate. We have picked the team-mates with whom we play according to the groups in which we mix. What has suddenly changed in South Africa that that should no longer apply? Do those hon. members believe that the youth of South Africa will no longer abide by that tradition? Do they believe that the sportsmen of South Africa are now going to abandon that tradition because there happens to be one Maori in a New Zealand rugby team? We believe that sport should be played separately, but that it should be free to be watched by all races. We believe it should be left to the administrators of the sport to control it, and we believe that we should not try to interfere in the selection of other teams which come to play here. If it were left on that basis, we would not be cutting our throats—cutting ourselves off from all international sporting competition—as will be the case if the Government persists in this policy.

In the dying moments of this debate we are faced with the reality of what is now before us. We face the reality of a Government statement of policy which sounds the death-knell of international sport in this country, and with it we sound the death-knell of those major attractions which draw the crowds which produce the money upon which our major sporting unions exist. They do not make their money from internal games. The money with which to build sportsfields and to assist promising players comes from the spectator appeal of international sport. If the Government is determined to destroy international sport, then it must accept that at the same time it is undermining and destroying the economics, the plain rands and cents of sports administration in this country; and if international sport is closed to us, sport in this country will ultimately deteriorate. So we plead that no matter what should happen in the way of political extremist pressure, there may be just that little flash of light which enables the Government to treat international sport in the same way that it treats international diplomacy—on the basis that it is something which South Africa needs and wants and which the Government is prepared to face when it comes to dealing with non-White diplomats. We should also be big enough to accept it in the field of international sport. I believe that this amendment before the House is one which the Government must consider again and it must not take hot-headed or stubborn decisions, because it is something which will affect the future of every child who has ever kicked a football, or who has ever hit a cricket ball, or who has ever run on a racetrack—it will destroy that great tradition upon which South Africa has built her sporting reputation throughout the civilized world.

If one should ask any sportsman in South Africa whether the United Party has rendered a service to sport in this country by this amendment and by the discussion it has held in this debate the reply will be in the negative throughout, because it is as clear as daylight that the motive here was not the welfare of sport, but seeking political gain for the United Party. I deplore the fact, as does everyone in our country who is interested in sport, that the hon. member for Yeoville made use of the same opportunity as did certain newspaper concerns that do not seek the welfare of sport in South Africa but want to further other interests, and that is why they have seized the same opportunity to raise this matter. Just listen to the language used by the hon. member for Durban (Point). He conjured up visions of this Government wanting to kill international sport as far as South Africa is concerned. Now you can just imagine, Sir, how that will be interpreted to the outside world by those selfsame papers. He asked the Ministers of Sport and the Interior whether they now wanted to appoint a race classification board abroad to decide who is White and who is non-White. Just look at the way in which those things are going to be interpreted to the outside world in connection with interference which we are allegedly wanting to perpetrate in connection with sport abroad. Let us take the case of the Maoris in New Zealand. Is it not a recognized fact that the Maoris classify themselves as a group apart from the ordinary New Zealanders, and also as rugby players? Is it not a fact that the Maoris have organized themselves into a Maori rugby union and have their own Maori governing body? Therefore we have no doubt as to what this matter is really about. It has been raised here for the sake of politics.

Business interrupted in accordance with Standing Order No. 99.

Mr. Speaker, a Minister of Finance is expected to reply at the end of a second-reading debate on a Part Appropriation Bill. I rise because I do not want to be disloyal to that tradition. At the outset, however, I want to set the minds of my friends on the opposite side of the House at rest: I shall not reply to the numerous problems raised and attacks launched by them from that side of the House. There is no need for that. Sir, to use with your permission a poetic phrase which you yourself coined, I say that the attacks that the hon. members tried to launch during the past three days “have all been washed out by the assaults from this side of the House”. Like the Australian cricket team, I think the hon. members on the opposite side of the House feel that the rain has saved them from certain defeat. If it had not been for the time restriction on this debate, one could imagine what would have become of the members on the opposite side of the House, if they had been exposed to the replies they received from this side of the House.

To use another sporting term—the hon. member for North Rand will understand it—I think the hon. members on that side have been saved by the gong. I do not want to be too hard on those members to-day. They behaved themselves very decently towards me. In all the years of my parliamentary experience I think this is the first time a Part Appropriation Bill—I say Appropriation Bill—was involved and not a word said about finance. I regard that as a wonderful accolade, not for myself, because I have just accepted this office, but for my predecessor and for the economic financial policy of the Government. In three days of talking about a budget not a word was said about finance. But, Sir, I also think the hon. members have some sense. After the sad experience they had with their excursions into the field of finance during the No-Confidence debate, they considered it advisable rather to talk about other matters during a budget debate. Since hon. members on that side have deviated from the normal tradition of the House, they will pardon me if in my reply I also deviate slightly from the normal tradition of the House. Because I have nothing substantial to reply to in the field of financial policy or financial administration, I want to avail myself of this opportunity to raise a few brief points about certain fundamental financial concepts, about certain basic matters in the finance and economy of a country. I do so because I may not have the opportunity later to deal with those principles in detail. I also do so in order that there may be no need for me to discuss them in detail on a later occasion. I also do so because in the course of this debate certain ideas were expressed and certain statements made which touched obliquely on certain fundamental principles, and to which I want to reply.

The first point I want to discuss is an accusation which was frequently levelled against me in previous debates and also in this debate. I was alleged to have said that I was prepared to bend and break economic laws. As the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg (District) said yesterday, I was supposed to be prepared to break the economy of the country. That shows how far some members of that party can go in order to make political gain. What is the meaning of that phrase, “to bend or break economic laws”? In the first place economics are concerned with the material prosperity and the material progress of a country and of a nation. There is nothing wrong with those things. Achieving material strength and material wealth is an important item and an important factor in the life of a nation. This Government of the National Party will be second to no government this country has ever had, nor to any government in the world, in its endeavour to promote the material prosperity and the wealth of our country. Our record through the years proves that. The object of economics is the promotion of the material prosperity of a country. It is necessary. We regard it as necessary because economic strength lends a country prestige abroad, because it brings contentment to the population, because it strengthens the resistance of the nation. I myself have been attacked on that score. I would not have devoted so many years of my life to economic matters if I did not believe in the importance and the essentiality of the economic strength and the economic power of a nation. But that is not all. A nation is not merely a bunch of businessmen on the look-out for riches and profits and dividends, nor is a government there to see how its people can become as rich as possible as quickly as possible. Apart from the economy a nation, a government and a state have a further duty. Politics have another task, which is much higher and much nobler and much more lasting. It is to stand and to strive and to work for the enduring survival of the nation and of its liberty. I now tell hon. members on the opposite side: In future, as in the past, we on this side of the House will endeavour to obey and employ economic laws for the economic strengthening of our people. But if we have to choose between economic strength, financial riches or financial gain, on the one hand, and the survival of our nation on the other, we choose the survival of our nation, and we shall use the financial gain and the economic laws for the advancement of the liberty and survival of our people.

The economy is not an end in itself. The economy is a means in a nation’s struggle for its liberty and for its survival. We have been doing that for many years. Do we not spend thousands and millions on the defence of our nation every year? Can we not use that money much more profitably to lighten our lives in the economic sense? We do not do that because that is the premium we pay to insure the security of a nation. Is it not true that a country like America pays billions every year, experiences chronic balance-of-payments difficulties and spends millions in Vietnam and elsewhere because she believes that those economic laws must bow to the security and the survival of her country? During the last war, did not states use their peoples’ economy and bring their populations to the utmost hardship because they stood up for their liberty and for their survival?

Therefore I say that hon. members should not tell me that it is an eternal sin to use economic laws. If it becomes necessary in future, for the security and the survival of our people, we shall subject and use the economy of our country, because it is not an end but a means in the service of the nation.

There is a second point I wish to raise. While listening to the debate from the other side of the House and the criticism levelled by hon. members on that side against certain measures taken by the Government, namely the influx and the efflux policy, and the establishment of industries in the border areas or in the large urban areas, and while they were pleading that it was to the economic advantage of the country to do this rather than that, the question occurred to me whether my hon. friends on the other side had asked themselves whether their views were to the temporary advantage or to the lasting advantage of our country. Because there is a difference, and that concerns an attitude which may bring money and riches and profits and dividends and prosperity for the moment and for the immediate future, but for which one will have to pay in years to come. Perhaps hon. members on the opposite side can prove that it is to our economic advantage to allow more and more non-Whites to stream to the urban areas and to the white areas rather than to implement an efflux policy. Perhaps they can prove to us that in the economic sense it is not profitable at present to establish border area industries, and that it is more profitable, as the hon. member for Hillbrow said, to persist with the large industrial concentrations in the major urbarr areas. It is possible, perhaps, to prove that for the present moment those things wjll pay dividends, but the Government does not consider only to-day and to-morrow. The Government has to consider the long-term advantages and the survival of a nation. A Government has to look far over the rise, and even if it must pay to-day and even if we must bring sacrifices to-day, even if something is not profitable to-day, we should ask ourselves whether it is not a long-term investment which will pay dividends in future. We are not investors from abroad who invest money here and who want to get out as quickly as possible with the largest dividends possible. We came here to stay. We have to work for the generations that will follow us. I therefore want to ask the hon. members, in their economic and financial criticism of the actions of this Government, not only to consider what will pay us the best profits and the best dividends to-morrow and the next day, but to consider the measures which will secure the greatest advantage for South Africa’s economy in generations ahead.

The hon. members on the opposite side accused us of not approaching our economic problems from an economic point of view but from an ideological point of view. They have frequently brought the accusation against us that something was not an economic consideration but an ideological consideration. But, Mr. Speaker, that is not an accusation. One need not be ashamed of having an ideology. One should be ashamed not to have an ideology, for having an ideology means that one has an idea and that one has ideals and visions, that one has principles, that one has a plan, that one has a criterion by which one acts.

Having an ideology means that one thinks, and that one does not proceed from day to day in an ad hoc fashion. I would not be overly concerned if the hon. members accused us of having ideologies. I shall feel bad the day they tell us that we have no more ideologies, for then they would be accusing me of not thinking any more, of having no plans or principles or policies any more. A party that prides itself on having no ideology prides itself on having no policy. If it is a matter of ideology when we stand for the separation of the races—which is the ideology to which they are always referring, namely apartheid, separate development—if that is an ideology, is it not also an ideology to stand for the mingling and the integration of the races? Have they not also the ideology—although they refuse to acknowledge it and although their ideologies are frequently at variance—of a belief in the diversity of races and nations? Is it not also an ideology to believe, as the hon. member for Houghton does, in the basic equality of races and of nations? That is also an ideology. If it is an ideology to believe that border industries should be encouraged although initially they may not be economic, because the social costs of the establishment of industries in cities like Johannesburg are too severe and too great, and that we have to pay an economic price for that, if that is an ideology, is it not also an ideology on the part of the hon. member for Hillbrow to say that he believes the economic factors should be placed first and highest, despite the social costs?

Finally I want to repeat that the National Party is a party with an ideology in the sense of having ideals, principles and visions, and that it has a policy in accordance with which it does things and continues doing things as it did in the past and will also do in future. The day the hon. members accuse us of having no ideology, that day we shall be worried because then we shall be in the position of the hon. members who have no ideology and therefore no policy. Because we have an ideology, also in economics and in finance, and because we have ideals and principles, we grew from strength to strength in the past, and that is why we shall also grow from strength to strength in years to come.

Question put: That all the words after

“That” stand part of the motion.

Upon which the House divided:

AYES—103: Bezuidenhout, G. P. C.; Bodenstein, P.; Botha, H. J.; Botha, M. C.;

Botha, M. W.; Botha, P. W.; Botha, S. P.; Carr, D. M.; Coetzee, B.; Coetzee, J. A.; Cruywagen, W. A.; De Jager, P. R.; Delport, W. H.; De Wet, J. M.; De Wet, M. W.; Diederichs, N.; Du Plessis, H. R. H.; Du Toit, J. P.; Engelbrecht, J. J.; Erasmus, A. S. D.; Erasmus, J. J. P.; Frank, S.; Greyling, J. C.; Grobler, M. S. F.; Haak, J. F. W.; Havemann, W. W. B.; Henning, J. M.; Hertzog, A.; Heystek, J.; Jurgens, J. C.; Knobel, G. J.; Koornhof, P. G. J.; Kotzé, S. F.; Kruger, J. T.; Langley, T.; Le Grange, L.; Le Roux, F. J.; Le Roux, J. P. C.; Le Roux, P. M. K.; Loots, J. J.; Malan, G. F.; Malan, J. J.; Malan, W. C.; Marais, J. A.; Marais, W. T.; Maree, G. de K.; Maree, W. A.; McLachlan, R.; Meyer, P. H.; Morrison, G. de V.; Mulder, C. P.; Muller, H.; Muller, S. L.; Otto, J. C.; Pansegrouw, J. S.; Pelser, P. C.; Pienaar, B.; Potgieter, J. E.; Potgieter, S. P.; Rall, J. J.; Rall, J. W.; Rall, M. J.; Raubenheimer, A. J.; Raubenheimer, A. L.; Reinecke, C. J.; Reyneke, J. P. A.; Rossouw, W. J. C.; Roux, P. C.; Schlebusch, A. L.; Schlebusch, J. A.; Schoeman, B. J.; Schoeman, H.; Schoeman, J. C. B.; Smit, H. H.; Smith, j; D.; Swanepoel, J. W. F.; Swiegers, J. G.; Torlage, P. H.; Treurnicht, N. F.; Van den Berg, G. P.; Van den Berg. M. J.; Van den Heever, D. J. G.; Van der Merwe, C. V.; Van der Merwe, H. D. K.; Van der Merwe, S. W.; Van der Spuy, J. P.; Van der Wath, J. G. H.; Van Rensburg, M. C. G. J.; Van Tonder, J. A.; Van Wyk, H. J.; Venter, W. L. D. M.; Viljoen, M.; Visse, J. H.; Visser, A. J.; Volker, V. A.; Vorster, B. J.; Vorster, L. P. J.; Vosloo, A. H.; Vosloo, W. L.; Waring, F. W.; Wentzel, J. J.

Tellers: P. S. van der Merwe and B. J. van der Walt.

Noes—37: Barnett, C.; Basson, J. A. L.; Basson, J. D. du P.; Bennett, C.; Connan, J. M.; Eden, G. S.; Emdin, S.; Graaff, De V.; Hourquebie, R. G. L.; Hughes, T. G.; Jacobs, G. F.; Kingwill, W. G.; Lewis, H.; Lindsay, J. E.; Malan, E. G.; Marais, D. J.; Mitchell, D. E.; Mitchell, M. LZ; Moolman, J. H.; Moore, P. A.; Murray, L. G.; Oldfield, G. N.; Raw, W. ‘V; Smith, W. J. B.; Steyn, S. J. M.; Streicher, D. M.; Sutton, W. M.; Suzman; H.; Thompson, J. O. N.; Timoney, H. M.; Wainwright, C. J. S.; Waterson, S. F.; Webber, W. T.; Wiley, J. W. E,; Winchester. L. E. D.

Tellers: H. J. Bronkhorst and A. Hopewell.

Question affirmed and amendments dropped.

Motion accordingly agreed to and Bill read a Second Time.

Committee Stage.

I move—

The destiny of the technical colleges of our country has received a great deal of official attention over the past decade or two, and there were motives which gave rise to the Cabinet’s decision, taken in November, 1954, that all technical colleges should be taken oyer by the State. As background to the legislation under discussion it would perhaps be informative to examine the most important motives briefly.

In addition to the more important arguments advanced at that time for the gradual takeover of semi-autonomous colleges as full-fledged State institutions, steadily increasing pressure was brought to bear upon the Department of Education, Arts and Science to make full-time technical education up to matriculation level free of charge, as is the case with academic secondary education at provincial schools. It was argued that there were no grounds for pupils at technical colleges, who were mainly children from the lower income groups, having to pay class fees, while academic secondary education under the provinces and secondary technical education at Government schools under this Department were free of charge.

The colleges were almost exclusively dependent upon class fees for a Government subsidy, calculated on income from other sources; they could therefore not do away with class fees. The authorities felt that, if the State had to pay the class fees, it would be bearing more than 50 per cent of the cost of the colleges and should therefoie have full control.

Another motive for the take-over of the technical colleges was the fact that from Std. V onwards children and adults alike were grouped together in one institution; consequently proper discipline could not be maintained and the children could not be provided with formative education. At that time the entire school programme of the colleges was sharply focused on training in technical skills, while other extremely formative cultural subjects, such as singing, music and physical culture, were grossly neglected. It was clear that the training of the pupil had to suffer under these ci’cumstances. Character formation, which is based on a broad programme of development, did not receive its rightful share of attention.

It was also known that the equipment in the colleges was obsolete and unserviceable, so that justice could not be done to technical training. It was extremely difficult to put matters right, since the control over the colleges could only be exercised indirectly at that stage.

To put matters right in the colleges, there was apparently only one solution at that time, namely full State control, and in the years which followed good progress was made in regard to the take-over of the technical colleges.

As is known, Mr. Speaker, with the exception of four main colleges, all technical colleges and their branches have already been taken over by the State in terms of the Vocational Education Act, 1955. The four main colleges which were not taken over, are the Pretoria Technical College, the Witwatersrand Technical College, the Durban Technical College and the Cape Technical College, but virtually all of the full-time secondary vocational schools (technical, commercial and domestic science) under these four main colleges have either been taken over or are about to be taken over within the foreseeable future.

However, the question which subsequently arose on several levels was whether it was still necessary and desirable at present, in the light of newer developments, to take over those remaining four colleges as well. I can state here categorically that most of the above reasons for the take-over of technical colleges have to a large extent lapsed in the meantime, because at present full-time education in the technical colleges on the secondary level up to Std. X, is free of charge and under full State control; justice is being done to the other cultural subjects; with full-time secondary schools being detached from the technical colleges and developed as separate independent schools, the remaining functions of the colleges were mainly advanced work and part-time education; the argument that children in Std. V and adults were grouped together, has therefore virtually disappeared as a result of the fact that all full-time secondary vocational schools have already been taken over. It is clear therefore that the ideal of satisfying all educational requirements, has for the most part been achieved. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, there were well-found reasons for reconsidering the necessity of the take-over of the remaining four colleges.

At present the four main technical colleges provide principally, and to an increasing extent, advanced training courses such as training for technicians, teacher training, training in pharmacy, art, and so forth. It will be more advantageous to make semi-autonomous institutions do such work as does not fall within the subject range of a high school, yet neither belongs at a university. In this regard we are thinking of the large variety of short courses, the various types of courses for technicians, from St. X onwards, and adult education which are to be introduced as local circumstances and needs may require.

The phenomenal development in the field of technology and the consequent shortage of manpower require specific institutions to concentrate on advanced technical training which does not belong at a university. The remaining four technical colleges are the obvious institutions for fulfilling these functions, since they already move mainly within this framework. In the eyes of the public they have already earned status and prestige for themselves in this field through the advanced training they have been providing.

The interests of both commerce and industry as well as the scientific and technical needs of the country require virile institutions which can cater for education between the secondary and university levels. Municipalities, industrial organizations and other bodies will generallyspeaking be more willing to give donations and make other assistance available to such institutions. There are great possibilities for the four technical colleges to supplement their income to a reasonable extent from donations once it becomes known that they will no longer be taken over as State institutions. Leaders in the field of industry and commerce will be more enthusiastic to serve on the councils of these technical colleges once they hear that they may display a greater measure of initiative and need not merely have to act in an advisory capacity.

Taking into consideration all the arguments against the take-over, it was necessary to reconsider the take-over of the four main semiautonomous technical colleges. That point of view was also held by Dr. Mönnig in his “Report on a Study of the Organization of Science”, in which he recommended that consideration should be given to the four most advanced technical colleges—in Pretoria, Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town—being raised to the level of institutions which could provide education on a level between that of the ordinary technical college and the university.

The question was what the implications of such a point of view would be. If it were to be agreed to that the remaining four colleges were not to be taken over, it would be necessary to re-enact the provisions of the Higher Education Act, 1923 (Act No. 30 of 1923) in Afrikaans instead of in Dutch and to incorporate into it the provisions of the Higher Education Financial Provisions Act, 1931 (Act No. 27 of 1931), thus forming a new measure making provision for State-aided institutions which could provide advanced technical instruction. In such institutions provision would have to be made for stricter control in order that the State might have a hold on these semi-autonomous colleges for advanced technical education to prevent their falling into their old ways again.

Owing to the Cabinet decision at that time to take over all technical colleges as State institutions, the financial grant to technical colleges was not revised, as was the case with universities. Hon. members will recall that in the past few years I have had to obtain additional amounts in the Estimates every now and again, and periodically I have also had to make ad hoc provision until such time as the colleges could be taken over.

If those colleges were to have been set aside as semi-autonomous institutions for advanced work from Std. X onwards, it would have entailed revision of the formula according to which financial grants were made at that stage. As an interim measure it then became necessary to determine a subsidy basis in terms of which the colleges would be enabled to meet their running expenses from the usual subsidy granted according to the formulas. As regards capital expenditure, application had meanwhile been made beforehand so that provision to that effect might be made in the Estimates.

Having regard to the above, the Government gave careful consideration to, and eventually decided to accept certain recommendations made in 1964. One of these recommendations was that the four main technical colleges of Pretoria, the Witwatersrand, Durban and Cape Town should not be taken over as State-controlled institutions, but survive as State-aided institutions on the explicit conditions, firstly, that they should mainly confine themselves to advanced technical and teacher training extending from more or less the Std. X level to a level somewhat lower than the university level in that particular field, providing that such training is of a more practical nature than the corresponding university training; secondly, that they should also provide such part-time training on the secondary level, chiefly for adults from the age of 18 years and older, as the Department of Education, Arts and Science may from time to time approve, but no full-time secondary education under any circumstances, and, thirdly, that suitable legislation should be adopted to invest the Minister of Education, Arts and Science with the necessary powers to ensure that these colleges will operate in a manner which is in the interests of the country.

Another recommendation which was approved, was that as from 1st January, 1965, State-aided technical colleges should be subsidized by the State on a new basis, but I shall leave this matter at that since it is not relevant here. Mr. Speaker, now I just want to give you a brief survey of the provisions of this Bill.

The usual definitions are to be found in clause 1, and in terms of clause 2 a college may, by proclamation, be established for advanced technical education and training and such part-time secondary and other education for adults as the Minister may determine. Such an institution which has been providing fulltime pupils with other vocational education may, upon proclamation, continue to do so for such period as the Minister may direct; this provision is necessary so that the colleges may continue with their full-time secondary sections until they can be taken over by the State. At present only two such sections are left, namely the technical High School of the Pretoria Technical College and the Commercial High School of the Cape Technical College. These are the only two in which fulltime vocational education is still being provided.

When the provisions of this Bill come into operation, the four main colleges will, in terms of clause 4, automatically become colleges for advanced technical education; in terms of clause 3 such colleges will bo corporate bodies with the usual powers. Provision is also being made in clause 5 to declare institutions under the Vocational Education Act, 1955, to be colleges for advanced technical education. To put it more clearly, these four will now automatically become technical colleges for advanced education, and any of the other existing or new technical colleges yet to be established, may, in terms of this provision, also be promoted to the status of institutions for advanced technical education.

In terms of clause 6 such a college will consist of its principal, a council, a board of studies, and its staff and students. In terms of clause 7 the principal will be appointed by the Council, subejct to the approval of the Minister. They themselves appoint him. The principal is a member of the Council, which will consist of not fewer than 15 and not more than 30 members, and on which representation will be granted to local authorities and persons by virtue of donations made by them to the college, the local authorities nominated by the Minister for that purpose, and the past students of that college. In addition, the members appointed by the Minister may not be fewer in number than the said other members of the council. They will hold office for a period of four years. Now we come to a new concept. In terms of clause 9 a Board of Studies will consist of the principal, who will be the chairman, two other members of the council and such members of the teaching staff as the council may determine. The council will assign powers of organization of and control over the instruction and discipline of the students to the board of studies, which will advise the council and make recommendation on academic matters. It is a type of small senate, such as the senates found at universities. We are calling it a board of studies here.

In terms of clause 10 the establishment at any college will be determined by the Minister, and the staff will be appointed by its council, but in certain cases this will subject to the Minister’s approval and previous service will always be taken into account. In clause 11 provision is being made for pension rights and retirement benefits. In terms of clause 12 the qualification entitling a person to being registered as a student is roughly-speaking the attainment of Std. 10 level. In clause 13 the Minister’s prior approval in writing is being required when a new department or course of study is instituted, just as in the case of universities. This is done for the purpose of obviating irregularities and providing control. In clause 14 provision is being made for Afrikaans and English to be used on an equal basis, as far as is possible; in clause 15 the right of inspection is being laid down. The provision relating to the recognition and registration of certificates and diplomas is being laid down in clause 16 and disciplinary provisions are contained in clause 17.

These four colleges and any other colleges which may be established in terms of this Act, will concentrate on advanced education ranging from the secondary to the university level. I cannot place enough emphasis on this. As hon. members might already have inferred from the above, this will lend them a much higher status than that of the present technical college. I have now more or less dealt with the important points in this Bill, and the remaining provisions relate to financial matters only. They are to be found in clauses 18 up to and including 27, and based on the Universities Act, 1955, as amended from time to time. If hon. members examine those clauses, they will see that all of the financial provisions are exactly or, except for a few adaptations only, as nearly as possible the same as the provisions for the Universities Act. The aid provisions relate to guarantees in respect of private loans, the purposes for which State loans may be granted, applications for such loans, the conditions and repayment of such loans, as well as the expropriation of land, grants of land, money or other movable property made by local authorities, subsidies, the records to be kept and information to be furnished by a council and the action to be taken on failure of a council to comply with any conditions subject to which a subsidy has been granted. These provisions require no further comment. They are quite clear because they are familiar to us. For the rest there is provision in clause 28 for delegating some of the Minister’s powers to the Secretary or to any other senior officer. Clause 29 makes provision for the making of regulations. Clause 30 makes provision for vacancies to be filled. I think that I have now completed my brief survey of the contents of this Bill.

After this Act has been passed, the colleges, i.e. the existing ones, those which are about to be established and those which will be established in the distant future, will therefore concentrate to an increasing extent on offering training courses, such as the training of technicians, training in pharmacy, art, teacher training, and so forth. This will to a large extent meet the shortage of technicians in particular. I may add that in passing this Bill we shall once again enter upon a new era in our edcuation by actually filling up a gap which has existed between secondary education and university training, a gap for which no adequate provision has been made in the past. We must make no mistake; the technical colleges have gradually been developing towards becoming institutions providing more advanced and superior training for technicians, but they have not yet been given full scope and appreciation because the necessary legislation did not exist. This will enable us now, in this increasingly technical age in which we are living, to make provison for trained manpower to do the work which is mainly being done by professional people at present, which in many cases is very expensive labour. Mr. Speaker, I move.

Mr. Speaker, we on this side of the House recognized on reading this Bill that it represented a new and important development in the organization of our education. For that reason we felt that there were certain clauses to which we should like to devote more attention and especially hear the hon. the Minister’s explanation of those clauses. We wish to thank him for giving us the opportunity, as we understand he has done, to give further consideration after hearing his speech. In those circumstances I should like to move the adjournment of the debate.

Debate adjourned.

Mr. Speaker, throughout the centuries that our courts and the operation of law have existed in his country, the power to determine who is and who is not a fit and proper person to practise the legal profession has always lain with our courts. In terms of the amendment which is now before the House, and I refer particularly to clause 2 of the Bill, this power is to be removed from the courts in two respects.

In certain respects the courts are now being told who they must not admit and the two categories are persons listed under section 8 and persons who have been convicted of certain crimes under sections mentioned in the amendment. We have been told by hon. members opposite that the object of these amendments is to ensure that communists shall not practise in the legal profession. We are told that it is a principle of the Government that they shall not do so. With those sentiments, as I said during the previous debate on this Bill, we agree entirely. We agree that a proved or an avowed communist is not a fit and proper person to practise the legal profession. But the extraordinary aspect of this matter is that although we are told that this is the reason behind the Bill, there is not a word in this amendment about Communism except that the convictions which are referred to have to do with convictions under the Suppression of Communism Act. But as I pointed out previously the amendment relates also to persons who are listed under section 8.

Those persons can be persons who cannot be referred to, no matter how widely the definition is stretched, as communists. In fact, Sir, it has been conceded by the previous Minister of Justice, the present Prime Minister, that the category is so wide that it can and does in fact include persons who are not communists. This is the aspect of the matter which worries us. It worries us because the power to decide in terms of the law as it stands at the moment who is and who is not a communist or who is or is not a person who should be listed, lies not with the courts, as should be the case, but either with the Minister or with the person who happens to be the liquidator of the particular organization concerned. We on this side of the House think that it is quite wrong and contrary to all the principles of Western justice as we know it that a Minister of the State, or an official of the State, namely a liquidator, should have that sole power to determine the fate of an individual. We on this side of the House believe that that is a power which should rest with the court.

What about those cases where the persons are found guilty?

We have made our attitude very clear in regard to such persons. We have said that we concede that these are serious crimes and that the court— the judges—should have the right to take into account those convictions in determining whether the person who has been convicted of these crimes is a fit and proper person. But we have maintained even in regard to such persons that the discretion should be left with the court because the conviction may in certain circumstances be of a somewhat technical nature. There may be genuine reformation. Therefore the court should be enabled to decide whether even such persons continue to be fit and proper to practise the law or not.

We on this side of the House have always shown the highest regard for and the greatest trust in our judges. I believe that the members on that side of the House share these sentiments in regard to our judges. For that reason we cannot understand why it is that the Government is not prepared to accept our amendment, which makes it quite clear that in deciding who is and who is not a fit and proper person to practise the profession, the court and the judges shall have regard to whether or not this person is a listed person and to whether or not he is a convicted person. [Time expired.]

Mr. Speaker, when I think back on the part of this debate which took place last week, I ask myself which of the Opposition’s contributions actually made the most lasting impression on me. In actual fact there are only three things. The first is their astonishing naivety about the approach to the communist problem in South Africa, with the result, secondly, their absolute inability to safeguard South Africa against such a threat. The third is their incredible ignorance of communist ideology, of its methods and strategy in the Western world. If I err in coming to this conclusion, the Opposition themselves are to blame. That is the only impression they left in this debate, except if they want me to choose an alternative. That is, namely, that they have become the advocates of the communists and their henchmen.

Clause 2 of the amending bill, section 5quat of the principal Act, pursues only two objects. The first is placing a prohibition on the admission of certain persons. Secondly, in subsection (2), provision is made for the removal of certain persons. These “certain persons” whom we have in mind are persons who are communists and, shall we call them, imitators of the communists. Last week, during the debate on this matter, the hon. member for Transkei alleged that the Transvaal Bar Council had expressed its opposition to this amendment. I should therefore very much like to place on record in this House what the Bar Council of the Transvaal Provincial Division of the Supreme Court of South Africa said last year. They issued a Press statement which I now want to read. It so happens, and perhaps fortunately as far as the official Opposition is concerned, to be in English. It reads as follows—

[Interjections.] The hon. member for Transkei said that the Transvaal Bar Council had expressed its opposition to this amendment.

You have read the resolution of the Pretoria Bar Council.

The Pretoria Bar Council is known as the Transvaal Provincial Division of the Bar Council. Perhaps the hon. member had the Witwatersrand local division in mind, but that is certainly not the Transvaal Bar Council.

At this stage I think it is apt that we should consider the requirements laid down for advocates by their profession and by the law in this country. We find the best summary of those requirements in the work of Ulrik Huber writer on Roman-Dutch Law, who set out his requirements for a good advocate some centuries ago, i.e. integrity, loyalty, decency and intelligence. Those are his main requirements, but Huber’s book is not the only source for the requirements laid down for advocates. Upon the admission of an advocate, and also of an attorney, notary and a conveyancer, each one of them has to take an oath. The oath for all such people has the same wording and reads as follows—

For the purposes of this debate we may therefore say that the main requirements for an advocate are the following: Integrity, loyalty, decency, intelligence and faithfulness to the Republic of South Africa. How does the communist ideology measure up to these requirements? In this regard I should like to read what Lenin said in his book Left Wing Communism—

Later in that book he says—

In another of Lenin’s works he says the following:

In other words, not our generally accepted values and standards, not things like integrity, honesty, etc., but the criterion is whether or not the communist revolution is promoted. If the revolution is promoted, lies and deceit, disloyalty and perjury are of no account. In fact, these are essential requirements as long as they promote the revolution in any way whatsoever. What has experience taught us here in South Africa? Where do the communists stand, in the light of our experience of them here in South Africa, when it comes to those requirements laid down for an advocate? Here we have the example of two advocates. The first is Abram Fischer. While he was defending his lieutenants in the Supreme Court of South Africa he was breaking and violating every conceivable element of faithfulness in the oath. In fact, he was getting his lieutenants released in order that they might be available for the communist onslaught and the subjugation of the State to which he had sworn to be faithful. But not only that. He also estreated bail. An advocate of the Supreme Court of South Africa estreated bail! And when? Only after he had found out that his game was up. Only after Ludi had produced information which Abram Fischer had not expected. Prior to that he had gone to England on bail and had returned. But then that information was not known. We have another example in Bob Hepple. He was also an advocate in the Supreme Court of South Africa. and in addition a lecturer in law at the University of the Witwatersrand. During the day he lectured in law to his students, perhaps even referred them to our fine values, probably with his tongue in his cheek; at night and during the week-ends he planned high treason in Rivonia. That is what experience has taught us in South Africa about communists, as far as the general requirements for an advocate are concerned.

I have already said that the naivety of the Opposition was exposed in this debate. The communist ideology is alien to the entire system we know in South Africa. For example, it does not subscribe to the same religious principles as those to which the Government and the Opposition subscribe. Nor is it merely a different political attitude or line of thinking. Communistic values are not our values. The criteria of Communism are not those of the Western Christian civilization. The only criterion that Communism dictates to its adherents is whether or not a specific line of action will promote the world revolution. As long as the revolution is promoted, there is no thought of integrity, honesty, decency, loyalty and intelligence, not to mention an oath of faithfulness to a State. For these reasons a communist cannot be cornered by means of a definition in an act. That is what the Opposition is asking. One cannot pin him down by those means —wherever he may be hiding, in whichever front organization he may be, and whether he pretends to be a member of the Government or of the official Opposition or of the Suz-manites, it is of no importance. He is by no means easy to deal with. And if the official Opposition has not come to realize that by now, they are really naïve. But here we are saddled with a poor official hon. Opposition. They want to define. I want to tell them that they may define until the cows come home. They may try to include every conceivable splinter group in a definition, but they will never succeed in pinning down a communist statutorily. I challenge any of my hon. learned friends on the opposite side to produce a definition which would in fact be able to pin down a communist. If the people of South Africa had not rejected the United Party Government in 1948, we would not have been able to sit in a democratic parliament to-day. There may perhaps have been a people’s democracy. I am not sure whether that is not perhaps what the hon. member for Transkei had in mind last week when he proclaimtd his loyalty to democracy so clamorously.

It is for that reason—that subtlety, that slickness of the communist, which is part of their strategy—that there has been a resolution by the Assembly and House of Delegates of the American Bar Association, and they did not speak of a definable communist in their resolution. They spoke of “any lawyer who, publicly or secretly, aids, supports or assists the world communist movement to accomplish its objectives in the United States by participating in its programme, whether he be an avowed party member or not”. This resolution also includes undeclared communists.

Another point mentioned by the Opposition is the question of the rule of law, and to that they added their customary complaint that too much power is being vested in the hands of the Minister or of the State.

Who said that?

It was not said in this debate, nor does it matter. By implication the hon. member for Durban-Musgrave referred to it when he said that too much power was being vested in a Minister of State. But the Opposition is always combining the question of the rule of law and the powers vested in Ministers. Mr. Speaker, this Opposition uses the term “rule of law” for one thing only, and that is as a slogan. They do not know the meaning of rule of law. [Interjection.] I have no time now to teach the Opposition the meaning of rule of law, they can go and read it up in Dicey’s book, which deals with it. But I just want to say the following as far as the rule of law is concerned: In the first place it is not a principle of Roman-Dutch Law; it is a principle of English Law. Secondly, I just want to say that what I find most extraordinary is that the Opposition advocates the rule of law for communists who know no rule of law whatsoever; everything they do is arbitrary.

The next point raised by the Opposition during this debate is that too many powers are placed in the hands of Ministers of State. I just want to remind them that our Ministers of State have to come to this Parliament every year to render account to the representatives of the people for their actions. Apart from that they have to account directly to the people for their actions every five years. Does that not satisfy them?

Mr. Speaker, I believe that the listing of communists is necessary for the reasons I have mentioned. I also want to say that it is right, but I want to add that any person who considers himself aggrieved by such listing may submit proof to the Minister, who may then remove his name from the list, and once his name has been removed I see nothing in the Bill to prevent him from applying for admission as an advocate of the Supreme Court of South Africa. In the course of his speech in this debate the hon. member for Green Point said that no advocate in this House should vote for this Bill. Sir, I am a member of the advocate profession and I just want to say that I was ashamed that communists like Abram Fischer and Bob Hepple and others could have infiltrated so deeply into such a profession of such high standing. I may tell you that I spoke to members of all language groups in this country after Abram Fischer’s treason had been revealed, and everywhere it had the effect that the status of advocacy in South Africa was besmirched and made suspect. I want to say that I am grateful that communists are now being barred from the profession in such an efficient manner.

The hon. member for Durban-Musgrave said that it was a matter of concern to the Opposition that a person who is not a communist might be affected by this Act. This Act has been on the Statute Book since 1950. wonder why he failed to mention one example of an innocent person affected by this Act.

He cannot.

He also said that i* was completely in conflict with the accepted legal principles in the Western World that a minister or an official should have so much power. With due respect, I disagree with the hon. member.

He did not say that.

In the Anglo-Saxon world it may be an unknown principle; in European law it is not entirely unknown.

I should like to refer to the contribution made by the hon. member for Houghton, but I do not want to spend too much time on that. I want to tell her that it was clear to me that her speech was not meant for this House or for South Africa but, as usual, for overseas consumption. The tenor of her entire speech was to make the judicature and the administration of justice in South Africa suspect before the world, and I want to tell her that it is a disgrace …

Why not say something new?

The hon. member asked why I did not say something new. I am relatively new here. To me it was a new experience to hear such things said in the Parliament of South Africa about our judicature and administration of justice. I want to deal with specific points raised by the hon. member for Houghton, She said that in course of time persons accused of offences with a political background would no longer have advocates to defend them, because the advocates would be scared or intimidated.

It has already happened at the Side Bar.

I ask the hon. member to give me one example of intimidation.

It happens at the Side Bar all the time.

She cannot give one example. After the Defence and Aid Fund had been banned, the Department of Justice made special provision for the pro Deo defence of persons accused of offences with a political background, and advocates are appointed by order of the State Attorney to defend such accused persons. Why does she not broadcast that to South Africa and to the world? Is there any other country where so much leniency will be shown? I have not yet had the opportunity, but some of my colleagues have appeared for such persons. There are several instances of advocates who appeared for such persons. I know of no advocate in South Africa who need fear intimidation because he defends a person, no matter what the charge against him may be. I have defended many persons accused of murder—also the murder of Whites —and it has never been held against me, nor have I ever felt that there was any danger of intimidation. I know of no advocate in this country who has acted professionally correctly and who need fear intimidation.

In how many political cases have you defended the accused?

No, I have never defended persons accused of political crimes, but I challenge the hon. member for Houghton to give me one example of intimidation. I challenge her to give me the name of one advocate who is afraid of defending a person accused of an offence under the Suppression of Communism Act. But that is not all that the hon. member said in this debate. Last week, during this same debate, I asked her by way of an interjection which was unfortunately not recorded to ‘give me the name of one person who is listed and who is not a communist, and she replied: “What about Ian Robertson?” He is not a listed communist. Why would the hon. member say such things in this House unless she says them with a view to overseas consumption, in order to bring dishonour on the South African judicature?

But he was banned under the Suppression of Communism Act.

He was restricted. Mr. Speaker, in conclusion I just want to say that I welcome this Bill. I think this measure will enable the State to bar undesirable peop1 from the legal professions in South Africa and also to weed them out from the legal professions where they have already infiltrated. This legislation will also contribute towards restoring the esteem of the legal profession in South Africa, which was adversely affected and prejudiced by communists like Hepple, Fischer and others.

I think there exists in the Magistrate’s Courts Act and other Acts what we call a pre-trial arrangement where certain facts are admitted by both sides before the actual trial.

In civil actions.

Yes, in civil actions. I think we in this House should come to an agreement when there are certain facts which are admitted by both sides and that it is unnecessary, as happened in this debate when Government members took part, constantly to talk about certain views which we do not hold. In the first place, I think it is common knowledge and common cause that everyone in this House denounce Communism and communists. Speaking for the Coloured people, I am proud to say that there are very few, if any, communists amongst them, and that they certainly do not try to foster what we call Communism in this country. I am proud to say that the Coloured people have been a law-abiding section of this community, as lawful as any other section, and that they have been free from the scourge of Communism about which we hear so much. I do not want to start a legal argument with the hon. member for Water-kloof who indicated that the Bar Council of Pretoria had said that they do not want anybody in the profession who is a communist. I do believe that the hon. the Minister of Justice has quite a task in defining who is a communist or what Communism is. I say that deliberately because of what happened in the Treason trial. The accused in that case were charged under the Suppression of Communism Act, and despite the fact that the State brought in experts from overseas and other places to define Communism and endeavoured to show that the activities of the accused persons came within the compass and the meaning of the definition, our courts rejected that evidence and the accused were found not guilty. In other words, Communism as envisaged by the Act was completely destroyed by that trial. But that is not really important at this stage. We all know that a man who is banned and is not really a communist can be dealt with under this Act, and unfortunately we have to accept that. But I cannot say that the hon. the Minister has made a great point, nor did the hon. member for Waterkloof, who supported him in regard to the American Bar Association, make a point at all, because whilst the American Bar Association passed a resolution amongst themselves that any man who is a communist could be disbarred, it is a nebulous decision; it is of no value because Communism is allowed in America. The Communist Party is a legal party in America. I was very surprised to hear that when I was there and I had something to say to the Americans about it, but the fact is that the Communist Party is a recognized party. If a man is a member of a recognized party in a country, surely he is entitled to talk about his party and to espouse the cause of his party, so what force and effect has this resolution of the Bar Council got? In my opinion, the Minister did not make a point at all, because I do not think he thought about the fact that the Communist Party is in fact a recognized and legal party in America. So it is no use saying that a group of people in America say that such a man should be disbarred when he does something that the law says he can do. The Minister must really think of something more powerful than that as an argument.

I want to come back to the Coloured people. Under this Act it seems that any man who has been a member of an organization which the Government does not like or which was banned can be dealt with under this Act. There was what was called a Coloured Convention at one time. I think the Minister knows about it. That Convention was to have been held, but the late Mr. Erasmus, who was then Minister of Justice, banned that Convention. They escaped the ban by moving to Malmesbury, which was not an area included in the ban, but I think the organization as such was banned. I want to tell the Minister that I think there were certain lawyers who went to that Convention honestly believing that they could go there and that they could talk on matters affecting the Coloured people. I would therefore like to ask the Minister for a little elucidation. As I understand it, the Minister does not have much trouble about this Bill from the point of view of the Opposition. There is a very clear-cut difference in the approach as to how these people should be dealt with. The difference is that the Government Party wishes to give the power to the Minister or the Department of Justice to act against any man who has been taken off the roll. The Opposition has pleaded that if that man has to go off the roll it must be done through the Law Societies or the Bar Council. Before dealing with that, I should like to mention the case of Bram Fischer, about which hon. members make so much. [Interjection.] I am not defending this man, but nobody knew about him. Even the Government thought he was a wonderful man.

Never.

The Government thought he was an honoured, wonderful man, and they allowed him, after he was arrested, to go to London to argue a case there. They gave him a passport. They thought he was an honourabe man. Now they come with these stories that he was a bad man.

We knew that he did not know what we knew.

But despite what you knew about him, you allowed him to go to London, and he was honest enough to come back. [Interjections.] It is no use hon. members opposite trying to bolster up the case and running down this man, when nobody knew, until the Government acted, that he was so deeply steeped in Communism. Now everybody denounces him for it. Nobody gauged him correctly and nobody in this House will defend Fischer for what he has done. The Government, in denouncing communists, makes friends with them when it suits them and uses them when it suits them. Take this man Baleveldt. A more vicious communist never existed in this country. He was banned and later he was arrested, I think, and then he came creeping to the Government and they used him, and to-day he is a free man. That is his reward for ratting on his old friends. But we do not want to go into these matters in this House, and I will come back to the Bill. May I ask the Minister this. Will he give me the assurance that before he acts under this Bill he will give every man who is listed the opportunity of applying to be taken off? Will he give me the assurance that every man listed in terms of this clause will be given another opportunity of applying to be taken off the roll? There is nothing in this Bill which indicates that an opportunity will be given to anybody who is now on the list to apply before the action contemplated by this Bill is taken. It says here that no person shall be admitted by the court unless he is satisfied that his name does not appear on the list, and then it goes on to say that the court shall remove him. The point is this, that before this man applies he will write to the Department and ask whether he is still on the list, and the Department may write back and say yes, he is still on the list. Will he then have the opportunity to apply to the Minister, or is this list now closed and all applications for removal closed?

No, it is not closed. We will always hear representations.

I am happy to hear that. He can make representations. The hon. member for Waterkloof raised the point which I wanted to raise, because the Bill is silent on that point. Can any barrister or any attorney who has been removed from the roll in terms of this Bill automatically re-apply, or will the Department of Justice advise the court that the reason for his removal no longer exits and that he may be re-admitted without making an application? Because, after all, it would make it much easier. I merely want the Minister to tell us, in clarification of this point, whether the courts will be advised by the Law Society that this man’s name no longer appears on the list. Does this prohibition against practising remain a permanent bar if the man is on the list?

It is a temporary bar

Then it is not a perpetual bar but it exists only as long as his name is on the list. I am glad to have that assurance. Those are the two points which have been worrying me and I have now had satisfactory answers, as far as I am concerned, although I will not vote for the Bill as it is now, because I do believe that the Minister as a legal man should consider very seriously whether the modus operandi,the means of removal, should not be initiated by the various bar councils or law societies, in the same way that the Minister depended on the American Bar Association. I cannot see any reason, when the Bar Association is satisfied that any man is guilty of unprofessional conduct—and if he is on the list after this he will be guilty of unprofessional conduct. Why cannot it be left to the Bar Council to make that application? I feel that is a very reasonable request and it is in conformity with our tradition. We have spoken so much about tradition to-day. Let us carry on with that tradition of using the law societies or the bar councils as the vehicle for acting in terms of the Bill. I think the Minister will be happier if he does that. I think he can place reliance on these people. I hope the Minister will have a change of heart and accept this suggestion.

What the hon. member who spoke just prior to me was really doing was to put direct questions to the Minister and I should prefer not to go into that, but while the hon. member was talking I thought that when it comes to this juridical legislation it would be better to stick to one’s own trade. I am saying this with all respect and in a favourable sense.

But I am also a lawyer.

I had merely assumed that the hon. member was the representative of the Boland constituency. I should prefer to confine myself to a few other aspects which emerged from the debate. In the first place the United Party concentrated mainly on clause 2 of the Bill only, namely whether an advocate or an attorney should, under certain circumstances, be struck from the roll. But the hon. member representing the Progressive Party made very serious statements of principle in her speech. These are statements of principle which are and have been bruited abroad and which I cannot allow to remain unanswered. What struck me as the most important aspect of her standpoint on this legislation was, firstly, that the legislation will have retrospective effect; secondly, that this legislation will be used to take action against people simply because they object to the racial policy of this Government; thirdly, that people who are listed in terms of this legislation will have no opportunity of preparing their defence; and fourthly, that this intended legislation intimidates jurists. Mr. Speaker, if one considers the first point, i.e. the question of this Bill having retrospective effect, then the clause is very clear. The intended new section reads—

(a) being or becoming officer-bearers, officers or members,

That is the existing section and to it is now being added—

In other words everything is aimed at the present state of affairs and to any future circumstances which might crop up. That is very clearly also the intention of this Bill and the interpretation which must be attached to our laws is also very clear. I am quoting a brief extract from the manual by Judge L. C. Steyn, i.e. Die Uitleg van Wette, where he states the following on page 84 in regard to the case Mohammed, N.O. VS. Union Government, 1911 (A.D.)—

Appeal Judge De Villiers refers to another case in the following way—

There is no indication in the phrasing of this clause, or in the interpretation which must be attached to it, that it is to operate with retrospective effect. But now, perhaps with another purpose in mind, the hon. member says the following—

In addition the hon. member refers in her speech to the following extremely important principle in regard to retrospective effect—

That is what this hon. member said in regard to the retrospective effect of this clause. But one must go further and see why this was said. It was said merely so as to link it up with Defence and Aid and to comment on that. The hon. member then said that Defence and Aid was a totally innocent organization and that everyone who played a part in it was completely blameless. I do not want to cast aspersions on all those people but what is at stake here are the principles attached to it. The hon. member then mentioned the following—

But, what are these people’s real aims? They are the following—

Those are the important ones, i.e. “to assist in the development of a non-racial society” and. “to keep the conscience of the world alive to the issues at stake”. Those are the aims of these people who are presented in so innocent a light here in various parts of the speech which is then broadcast to the world. But what did these people do who were presented in so innocent a light and in regard to whom it was averred that this principle of retrospective effect in the Bill would prove so onerous and which cannot be the case according to the intention of the Bill? Are they not the people who provided thousands of pounds and subsequently rand for the trials of people like Luthuli, Matthews, Mandela, Slovo and others? Are they not the people who persuaded the Dutch Government to donate £20,000 to them for use in South Africa while those people were given the impression that the Defence and Aid were doing welfare work in South Africa? That was done until they discovered what Canon Collins in England actually meant by welfare work in South Africa. Were these people at any stage interested in the murders being committed in the Congo? Did they render assistance there? Did they render any assistance when mass murders were committed in Zanzibar? Did they render any assistance when 600 tribesmen, members of Alice Leushina’s Lumpa Church in Zambia were shot dead for revolting? But the moment someone in South Africa raises his voice and he is dealt with according to the laws of the country, then thousands of rands are sent into the country in order to assist him here. This same principle of retrospective effect which is supposedly so unfair in respect of those people and in respect of the Defence and Aid would also implicate a number of their other friends, such as the Africa Defence and Aid Fund of the American Committee on Africa in New York, which is probably the most virulent critic South Africa has ever had. But what is striking about this argument developed here in this debate by the hon. member is that the principle was stated in almost identical fashion in 1960 when a Second Reading debate on communist legislation took place. At that time the hon. member herself said, in Hansard (Col. 6468), that she also opposed this same principle in respect of members who might have been members of the A.N.C. and P.A.C. In 1962 in the Committee Stage of the General Laws Amendment Bill, practically the identical arguments which were raised here in respect of Defence and Aid were also raised by the hon. member (in Col. 7168) in respect of members of the A.N.C. and P.A.C.

Apart from the fact that clause 1 of this Bill is not with retrospective effect it contains another very important principle to the effect that the Government is making every attempt to ensure that nobody who is cunningly working against South Africa is allowed to continue to do so. That is why sub-clauses (b) and (c) are now being specifically inserted in order to fill the existing deficiencies in the present Act. Now, what kind of assistance is the South African nation receiving from this hon. member in these attempts which are being made to fill all these deficiencies? The type of assistance which is being rendered in this respect is reflected in a speech which the hon. member made in Johannesburg. There she stated—

That is the Government of this country—

That is what, according to the Rand Daily Mail of 18th May, 1966, was said in Johannesburg last year. She went on to say—

In other words, she was associating herself with it—

She associated herself with this kind of propaganda. While this Parliament is earnestly seeking to fill all the deficiencies which can cause cunning people to contribute to the downfall of the white civilization in South Africa, that is the assistance which has been rendered by the hon. member. In the same edition of the Rand Daily Mail the hon. member also said—

Those are the kind of people, Mr. Speaker,, who through their Chairman …

[Inaudible.]

Order! The hon. member for Houghton has not got a licence to speak continually in this House.

Those are the people whom she is now taking under her wing. I shall specifically mention Jonty Driver, who said the following in 1964 in an official circular—

Therefore it is not always legal to call these people, whom she is taking under her wing, communistic. As for these people, were there not amongst them a Neville Rubins, an Adrian Leftwich, a Hugh Lewin, a David de Keller, an Alan Brookes and others, including John Harris, who were acknowledged communists? That is the position, but, contrary to what that hon. member has stated, there is no reason for concern about this situation. Did the hon. the Prime Minister, when he was the former Minister of Justice, not time and again invite and even challenge any and all members of the Opposition to mention one example of where the Government was exceeding or abusing the powers included in this Act? According to the information I have been able to glean, not one single case was mentioned to the Minister in which he had supposedly exceeded his authority.

Who would ever have known?

You could have given the information to the hon. Minister. Why was that not done? Mr. Speaker, arising from this there was another objection on the part of the Progressive Party to the principles of the Bill, i.e. that that Act would be used to take action against people because they objected to the racial policy of the Government. Surely, this part of the hon. member’s speech can only be, as one of the former speakers, the hon. member for Waterkloof, said, for overseas consumption, for why else should the hon. member say—

Surely these kind of things are only said for overseas consumption? But why does the hon. member not come forward with proof of where these powers had been abused in this way, where these powers had been used against people who only criticized the Government as far as the colour policy was concerned? I think the best reply to this is the presence of the member herself in this House. Surely that is proof of the right which every person in South Africa has to criticize the Government? The hon. member is welcome to criticize the Government in this House. We are not prepared, and the Government has never stated anything to that effect, to interfere with that right, nor will anyone interfere as far as the hon. member’s interpretation is concerned, not by means of this legislation, in its present form and as it has been interpreted from time to time. But the voters of South Africa do not allow themselves to be taken in by this kind of nonsense. Between 1959 and 1961 there were 11 members of this persuasion present in this House who revealed this line of thought. The Government did absolutely nothing to silence them, but the voters of South Africa did. If this hon. member does not return in 1971, she must not blame the Government, i.e. that is the interpretation which must be attached to this Bill.

She also alleged that members who had previously been members of the Defence and Aid Fund and similar organizations would never again have the right to criticize the Government. It has been stated repeatedly in the House by hon: Ministers and the present hon. the Prime Ministér has given the assurance that the intentions of the legislation, in its present form, is solely so as to be able to take steps against people who in one way or another are engaging in subversive activities That is not this absurd interpretation which this hon. member is attaching thereto. Neither is it thé position in our law. Surely that is very clear? In the words of Forster: An inter pretation which creates an absurdity must not be allowed. That is another quotation from the work Die Uitleg van Wette.According to him a restrictive interpretation is justified if the wider meaning leads to an absurdity. This presumption has been applied on numerous occasions in our courts.

Another important allegation which has been bruited abroad and which is not true, i that people who are listed in terms of the Act have no opportunity of preparing their défence. In that regard, too, the following is announced for world publication—

But there are various sections in the Act which make provision for this. There are various procedures which have to be followed. A person receives notice to the effect that he has been listed. He can object to that. A person may make representations to the Minister. A person may even go to court, and there are cases of persons who have made representations to the Minister and whose representations have been accepted. The Minister may even of his own accord raise such a restriction order if it should come to his attention from other sources that that action is justified. There is no more striking example of how sympathetically this intention in the legislation is being applied, and this can be linked with the foregoing, than the actions of the former Minister of Justice, the present hon. Prime Minister, who even allowed a number of these prisoners to be released from gaol a year or two, or even three, before they were due to be released, after they themselves and their parents had given him the assurance, and he himself was convinced, that they would in future not fall into their old ways again. That, and not as the hon. member has revealed, is the spirit in which this legislation should be read.

The hon. member even went so far as to say that jurists would also be intimidated by this legislation and that the wider powers made it more difficult for advocates to take charge of defence proceedings. Because jurists have previously in their private capacity contributed to the Defence and Aid Fund, they are afraid that they can be listed and do not want to accept any brief for this kind of case. “Now these people could be listed,” but then she also adds the following: “I admit that they have one protection. It must be at the instigation of the Minister and they must be given an opportunity to explain why their names should not be on the list.” This is just mentioned in passing. But what are the actual facts? As far as this question of alleged intimidation is concerned, I was present in cases in which members of the A.N.C. and P.A.C. were charged. I never accepted any brief and I had no doubt in my mind that I would never accept one for those cases, because I am not there to lend a hand or assist in the defence of people who want to destroy White civilization in South Africa. But that is beside the point now. In these cases it became very apparent that the Security Branch police had even gone out of their way to be very polite, decent and civilized to these people. In these cases they even went out of their way to help them and their lawyers. Intimidation by the Security Police was also dragged into the speeches a few times.

As has already been mentioned the Government, in certain circumstances where people could not afford or arrange to do so, even went so far as to appoint lawyers and advocates for them. This is known to have happened, particularly in the Eastern Province region. But what has the hon. the Minister of Justice done up to now in regard to this question of intimidation? Is it intimidation if the hon. the Minister of Justice afforded lawyers and advocates who had already been listed the scecial opportunity of making representation« to him to have their names removed from the list and if a large number of them paid no heed to the notice they received from the hon. the Minister? Suppose he gave them another chance to do so and they still did not avail themselves of the opportunity? I am referring in this connection to an interview which the then Minister of Justice, the present Prime Minister, had with the chairman of the Bar Council, Advocate Coleman, and other advocates who accompanied him. On that occasion the hon. the Minister told this senior advocate that he was prepared to give one of his colleagues another chance if he would only give his word of honour that he would not participate in subversive activities. This request was conveyed to that advocate, but he rejected it.

During this interview, one other senior advocate. Advocate De Kock, said that the standpoint of the Bar Council was that a man was either honourable or dishonourable. If he engaged in subversive activities he was dishonourable and should for that reason be struck from the roll and not because he was a communist. If that should be the case, i.e. that he should only be struck from the roll under those circumstances, it would be fitting if we were to consider the reverse situation, i.e. at what the standpoint of the communists would be, communists who may be concerned in the profession. They are people who receive instructions from their higher authorities. They are people who receive instructions in the official documents of their leader in South Africa, Abram Fischer. This instruction was to the effect that they must not try and persuade people to become communists, but rather to take sides against the State and the State policies. That was their duty. With this purpose in mind they were, by means of patient persuasion and explanation, to make use of all the means at their disposal to penetrate to the higher levels of the population, particularly to the professional levels such as lawyers, medical men, academicians and others. Those are the people who must not be punished because they are communists, but who must be punished only when they are guilty of conduct unworthy of an advocate. After a man has had every opportunity of making representations at three different stages why is it then still necessary to bring him before the court again? That is what the Bar Council wants and that is also how I understand the amendment of the hon. Opposition. We are acquainted with the activities and points of departure of a communist. Why is it therefore necessary for him to be given another chance after he has already had so many opportunities of making representations? If these bodies do not want to take action then it is quite right that the State should do so, which is also what is being envisaged in this Bill.

Mr. Speaker, at the end of this debate (which has gone on intermittently over three days) it is perhaps not surprising that the hon. member who just sat down should indicate exactly what the difference is between the attitude of mind of this side of the House and the attitude of mind of that side of the House in so far as the principles of this Bill are concerned. The hon. member said something which, I must say, came to me as a great surprise, he being a member of the legal profession. He said that as far as he was concerned he would not accept a brief or instructions to defend anyone charged with an offence relating to subversion. That typifies the attitude of that side of the House, because according to that hon. member that person is guilty of subversion. That is why he won’t defend him. According to him that person already is guilty of subversion when the Police have charged him or when a member of the State Service has drawn up an indictment against him. If that is the attitude of hon. members on the other side of the House I can assure this House that that is not the attitude of the legal profession in South Africa. The hon. member for Waterkloof who also spoke here this afternoon avoided the question and said, when asked, that he had not been offered such a brief. However, he did not say whether he would accept such a brief or not. Well, if that is the attitude of the hon. member who has just sat down—and I hope the hon. the Minister will denounce that attitude—then it really strengthens our case, namely that in these matters the discretion of the court should be left exactly where it lies now.

I want to tell the hon. the Minister very frankly that when he introduced this Bill he did not assist us by indicating what his attitude was to the principles contained in it. That is something we still have to learn. The hon. the Minister neither justified nor dealt with the question as to why this matter was to be taken out of the hands of the courts and placed in his hands. One wants to know why the hon. the Minister wants to do this. We want to know whether the hon. the Minister will give us his views as to the difference which exists in this Bill between those persons who are listed and those persons who are convicted, because when he introduced the Bill he did not speak about those persons on the list. So we should like to know what the attitude of the hon. the Minister is.

The hon. the Minister should tell this House whether he agreed with the speeches of certain hon. members opposite. They all put up their own skittles and then proceeded to bowl them down. They all lectured us about Communism. But there is no question about Communism and its dangers because we are all agreed on that. The question is how, in so far as clause 2 is concerned, are you going to control this question of whether a communist or a person convicted of communist activities is a fit and proper person to practise? Is that to be determined by the Minister, i.e. that a person may not practise either for a period or at all? Or are the courts to be allowed to continue to do what they have done over the years? Are we going to leave it to the courts to decide whether such a person is a fit and proper person to practise? As I have said, the hon. the Minister has not as yet given us any indication why he does not like the courts deciding these matters and why he thinks the courts are not fit and proper to determine the issue. This is a factor which he himself must weigh. When a request is made to the hon. the Minister by a person for his name to be taken off the list—for instance, because he has had a change of heart—presumably the hon. the Minister will apply his mind to it and in applying his mind to it he must have regard to all the facts available. As he should know, he would be greatly helped if, in having to weigh those facts, he had the benefit of argument from both sides and if he had the benefit of having the facts or information put before him tested according to the rules of evidence which have stood the test of centuries and upon which our entire system of justice is founded. In the determination of these facts virtually life and death is involved for the person concerned. So why should the Minister want to remove these instruments which have been used through the centuries in our search for truth? We should like to know. The sort of speech one has heard from the other side of the House does not give any credit to our institutions, to our democratic institutions. They talk about Communism; they talk about this being a Bill which will protect the country from Communism. Surely we are dealing here with the very institution which makes us different from a communist country, the very institution which makes us a democratic country. Sir, what has been said about our Judges? We have the most impartial Judges. One hears people say, quite correctly, that we in South Africa have a Bench without peer, and I do not think the hon. the Minister will disagree with that. Why do we have a Bench without peer? Has anybody asked himself that question? Why is it that we have the magnificent Bench that we have in this country? The Bench is not unrelated to the legal profession. Hon. members must realize that the Judges are chosen from amongst the senior advocates, the silks, the Q.C.s of old and the S.C.s of to-day. The cream of the profession is put on the Bench. But how this system works, why it is so good, is not the point to-day. The fact of the matter is that since we have had a Supreme Court in South Africa and in the colonies prior to that, we have had a Bench without peer. Sir, that system has produced it, and that system is now being interfered with by this Bill.

Many hon. members opposite have a lot to say to the hon. member for Houghton when she said that this Bill could have an intimidating effect upon members of the profession. I want to say, especially to the hon. member for Waterkloof who spoke particularly in this regard, that the Pretoria Bar is not the Bar of the Transvaal. The Pretoria Bar and the Johannesburg Bar make up the Bar of the Transvaal and the Johannesburg Bar is far bigger than the Pretoria Bar.

And far better too.

The hon. member has produced a statement of the Pretoria Bar. I want to say in this regard that the Natal Bar, the Cape Bar, which represents the whole of the Cape Province excluding the E.D.L., and the Johannesburg Bar issued a statement on the 9th June, 1965, in this regard. The hon. the Minister smiled when this question of possible intimidation was mentioned. Let me read out to him what those Bar Councils had to say—

Sir, these are not the words of a politician; these are not the words of a group of people devoted to furthering the objects or aims of Communism; these are the views of the three major bodies comprising the Bar of South Africa, and this is what they think the effect of this Bill will be. And what they think is not too far-fetched. If you know that in the conduct of your profession and in the performance of your duties, it is a court which will decide whether or not you can be deprived of the opportunity of making your livelihood at the Bar or the Side-Bar or as a conveyancer then you can fearlessly conduct your affairs, and that is why over the years and the centuries, the South African legal profession has fearlessly conducted its affairs, and that is why it has produced what it has produced in the way of its senior members, and that is why we have the Bench we do have to-day. The hon. the Minister, with this Bill, is interfering directly, and indirectly, with members of the legal profession in the proper performance of their duties. Sir, this is not helping anyone; this is not going to help to fight Communism. I want to ask the hon. the Minister to tell us how many members of the legal profession are affected by this measure, how many practising advocates are affected by it, and I want to ask him whether the price that we will pay for this measure so far as our legal system is concerned, is worth it in relation to those persons whom he might tell us about? Sir, I want the hon. the Minister to answer this and to tell us whether he does not believe that any undue interference with the members of the legal profession will in fact affect the Bench? It must affect the Bench! It must affect their ability to sit in judgment if they have not before them persons who are steeped in those traditions which have made our system work as well as it has. This is of interest to the people of this country. The courts to-day stand between any form of authoritarianism and the people. This is the way the system was devised; this is the way it is and this is the way it always has been. The hon. the Minister must be very careful when he deals with this and when hon. members opposite talk about striking a blow against Communism, they must be very careful too, because the courts are the very heart of our democratic process. The courts in this country are what stand between any country becoming a totalitarian or a communist country on the one hand or remaining a democratic country. It is not only the position of the advocates and attorneys which is at issue. As witness to my statement I would like to call the hon. the Prime Minister, who told a meeting of the General Council of the Bar held in Grahamstown some two years ago that there were two things which distinguished a democracy, and those were free and regular elections (which we have in this country) and a free and independent judiciary. I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether he is helping in creating a free and independent judiciary and whether he can say that our judiciary is free and independent and then say on the other hand, as he does in this Bill, “I am not going to give the judiciary the power to determine the question of fact as to whether a person is a fit and proper person to practise the legal profession; you, the courts, shall not choose your own officers; I am going to do it for you.”Do not forget,Sir, that “I”inthiscase is apolitician, notan independentimpartial court. I give the hon. the Minister all the credit in the world for applying as impartial a mind as he can; the fact of the matter is that he sits in the position where he sits because he is a politician and he must be motivated by political thoughts when he sits there. Sir, that is an inescapable fact. If it were really necessary to pass this Bill then perhaps there would be some case, but no case at all has been madeout for this Bill.

A great deal has been saidin the course ofthis debate about Abram Fischer. I wonder how many hon. members appreciated what they were dealing with. The case of Abram Fischer was quoted as justification for passing this Bill.

But he was not theonly one.

Abram Fischer was removed from the roll by the Supreme Court in Johannesburg at the instance and on the application of the Bar Council of Johannesburg.

For other reasons.

[Interjection.] You see, Sir what you get. The hon. member for Waterkloof says it was done very reluctantly. He should be ashamed of himself. Does he know why it took so long? I think he should go back and ask his colleagues of the Johannesburg Bar why it took so long. He might find that the record in the criminal proceedings got lost, for example. But he might at least checkup before making wild statements. One expects them from the hon. member for Heilbron, but one does not expect them from this hon. member, who is a practising member of the Pretoria Bar. [Interjection.] We are talking about a serious matter to which this hon. member is supposed to be applying his mind.

The hon. the Minister indicated to the hon. member for Boland that so far as persons on the list were concerned, he would treat all applications for removal on their merit, and he obviously will. As he pointed out, if the person was removed from the list, he could practise again, because the cause for his removal had been removed. In other words, what the Minister said was that if he had a change of heart he would take him off the list. If in the Minister’s opinion he had had this change of heart the Minister would consider him to be a fit and proper person to practise in our courts, the Minister being the arbiter in the matter.

But there is another matter. The question is not why the courts should not do this, but whether the courts could not do it very much better.

Why? The courts do not have all the information that the Minister has.

I will tell the hon. member why. The answer is very simple. The Judge looks at the facts. The Judge has been trained throughout his life to examine and sift facts. He knows the laws of evidence, and he knows what is a fact and what is not a fact, and he has the benefit of argument on both sides, and he also has the inestimable benefit of being an impartial person with no interest whatsoever in the matter. He is not the Minister of Justice who sits there on a hot political issue, and who is making the decision because he is a politican. That is my reply to the hon. member for Heilbron. But what I want to point out to the hon. the Minister is this, that so far as a convicted person is concerned, the same position does not apply. He can never practice in his life again. If a person is convicted of some offence, he, too, can have a change of heart, and he, too, should be given this other chance.

The hon. member for Transkei has already made that point.

I am glad the Minister is going to reply to it. The case of Krause was mentioned. He was convicted and he later became a Judge of the Appellate Division. He was convicted during the conflict between the Republics andGreatBritain.Hewas convicted of an attempt to solicit a person to commit the crime of murder, but in present-day circumstances it would probably be called a political offence. It could easily have been one of the offences mentioned in this Bill. But despite that conviction, the court felt that he had expiated his guilt and that he was a fit and proper person to practise, having regard to all the circumstancesexisting.So again the question arises as to who decides on these issues. I am orry the Minister did not give us his reason for excluding the courts. I think he must go further and tell us why he has what the hon. member for Pinelands described as, not contempt for the courts, but somethingwhich amountsto avote ofnoconfidencein ourcourts.We would like to know what the Minister’s attitude to this is. An amendment to clause 2 may or may not be possible in the Committee Stage, but at any rate the opportunity will be there, in answer to the hon. member for Waterkloof’s challenge to present a better alternative. I hope it will be on the Order Paper to-morrow, and we hope that the Minister will apply his mind to this. Or perhaps he will now tell us why he cannot accept an amendment to the effect that the Attorney-General or the Secretary for Justice, or anyone else he likes to name, can apply to any court for the removal of any practitioner on the ground that he is not a fit and proper person, because either of the conviction or because of any other information relating to his activities which he may have.

Then you have to disclose that information and it may not be in the public interest to do so.

In addition, notice should obviously be given to all the parties concerned, including the Law Society and the Bar Council; and, thirdly, anyone who wishes to apply to be admitted as a practitioner shall be obliged to serve the Attorney-General or the Secretary for Justice with a copy of his application, and the Attorney-General or the Secretary shall be entitled to appear at the hearing of the application and to produce such information or evidence to persuade the court that this is not a fit and proper person; and the court should be expressly told that it may take that into consideration in order to avoid the conflict which has arisen between the Cape and the Transvaal courts in regard to the decision in Mandela’s case. That, I think, is a fair proposition. I think it will meet the Minister’s difficulty and it will meet every speech that was made from that side of the House. We hope that the Minister will give this his serious consideration because I do not believe that the price we are going to pay for this is worth it. Many of the hon. members opposite who spoke were under the delusion that it was the courts who were going to decide the issue. [Interjection.] There is one hon. member who spends his time interjecting instead of reading the Bill, but if he reads it he will see that it is not there.

The courts have no say whatsoever in this regard. The opportunity will be there when we reach the Committee Stage and we hope that the hon. members will read our amendment and that they will apply their minds to it. It will at least give the opportunity to these persons to give some substance to the thoughts that were mentioned in this debate. It will give, we believe, South Africa a far better image and will give our legal system and the foundations of our democracy a far better basis upon which we can continue in South Africa to fight Communism, always aware of the dictum of President Truman that he was not prepared to destroy his own institutions, he was not prepared to turn America into a right-wing totalitarian country in order to fight a left-wing totalitarian threat. I believe that we can do this through the courts as effectively as through the provisions of this Bill. In fact, I would say we could do it even more effectively because with the Judges deciding, we will ensure that the right persons are excluded and the right persons included according to the facts.

Mr. Speaker, first of all I want to thank all the hon. members for the fine spirit in which this debate has been conducted. I say this even of the Opposition members, who made their contributions under very difficult circumstances, as I shall show presently. In particular I want to thank hon. members on the Government side who have spoken, for the effective way in which they replied to the arguments advanced by hon. members opposite. In the whole of the debate there was one slightly discordant note which I did not like. The hon. member knows what I am referring to. This discordant note came from the hon. member for Houghton, when she referred to this measure as “this miserable little Bill in the tradition of other miserable pieces of legislation affecting the freedom of the people”. I do not mind the hon. member calling this measure “this miserable little Bill”, but when she says “in the tradition of other miserable pieces of legislation affecting the freedom of the people”, she is reflecting on the legislation of this House. I feel—I do not think you were in the Chair, Mr. Speaker—that she should either withdraw those words or apologize. I have her speech in front of me. But apparently what has been allowed through cannot be undone.

The hon. member for Houghton objected to clause 1 in particular. Hon. members have replied to her objections effectively, but allow me to say a few words also. She was particularly concerned about the fact that this clause, as it is being amended now, would be retrospective. Now, what are we doing in this clause? We are not giving it retrospective effect. All we say is that I, as the Minister, may in future prohibit office-bearers of prohibited organizations, restricted persons or persons whose names appear on the list, from receiving or making any contributions in respect of particular organizations named by me or certain organizations which have already been named. I now ask the hon. member how she knows to which organizations I am going to apply this amendment. I may apply it to an organization that is yet to be established. It is not necessarily retrospective in nature. I readily concede the hon. member’s point that it may in fact happen that the members, office-bearers and officers of an organization which was a lawful organization initially but which was declared an unlawful organization later may fall within the scope of this Bill. I readily concede that. But now the hon. member has ouoted the Defence and Aid Fund as an example.

I do not want to deal in detail with the Defence and Aid Fund, because it is in fact still sub judice.We are not really allowed to discuss it. But why did the hon. member not rather mention Poqo or the P.A.C., which want to cut the throats of all the Whites in this country and chase the rest of them into the sea? Why did she mention the Defence and Aid? Why does she not rather mention the P.A.C. and the Poqo? If I am doing officebearer of the P.A.C. or of Poqo an injustice by effecting this amendment and by making it applicable to its office-bearers, my conscience will be eased by the fact that I sincerely believe that this is in the best interests not only of the Whites in this country, but also of the black and the brown people. The hon. member referred—and I do not want to refer to everything she raised—to the lawyers. Once again, it was a case of the lawyers who would be intimidated and who would become afraid. The hon. member for Durban (North) also referred to that. I agree with the hon. member for Waterkloof that that is not the case at all. The fact of the matter is that the type of person who has to be defended does not want the decent lawyer. He wants a certain type of lawyer and if he cannot get that type of lawyer, he prefers to be tried without legal aid. If the Defence and Aid Fund had not been sub judiceI would have quoted to the hon. member for Houghton some of the best examples of what had happened in Grahams-town in this connection.

I leave the hon. member at that, and I want to deal very briefly with the official Opposition. The official Opposition found itself in a very difficult position. As they are obliged to do so often, they tried to sit on two chairs on this occasion. They cannot oppose the Bill out and out, because if they do they run the risk of its being said that they are pleading for the communists. That they could not do. Neither could they reject the Bill out and out. as the hon. member for Houghton did. That they dare not do. If they do reject the Bill out and out, they run the risk of being accused that they are pleading for the communist cause and that communists should be allowed to practise in the courts. Conversely, if they accept the legislation they run the risk of offending their liberal leftist supporters. [Interjections.] That is the point. What are they to do now? I now want to pay them the compliment that I think they have made out the best case they could under the circumstances. I do not know who the tactician was, but they are now trying to shelter behind the courts, behind the Side Bar, the Bar and, if that is not enough, they even bring in the Attorney-General. All of a sudden it has to be the court and nobody else that should decide whether a person may practise. It has to be the court and nobody else.

Not “all of a sudden”.

Very well, I shall omit the words “all of a sudden”. It has to be the court and nothing but the court. It has to be the court at the request of the Side Bar or the Bar or the Attorney-General. I now want to put a question to hon. members opposite. We stipulate to the court what a person’s qualifications should be before he may practise. What is wrong with it if we can also stipulate those things which will disqualify him? If we may stipulate his qualifications, and the court takes no exception to it, why cannot we stipulate his disqualifications as well? I told the House right at the outset that it was a matter of principle with the Government to eradicate Communism entirely. It is a matter of principle with the Government to clear our courts of practitioners of this type, namely communists or listed persons.

It all depends how you want to do it.

I shall come to that. What is most interesting is that one speaker after another on that side got up and told us how they were also opposed to Communism and how they also wanted to fight it. But let us take this amendment introduced by the hon. member for Transkei. In this amendment I see no reference whatsoever to the fact that they want to eliminate communists from the courts.

Read it.

I have read it very thoroughly. The amendment refers only to offences mentioned in it. No mention is made of communists or of listed persons at all.

But the law is against Communism.

There is nothing in the amendment against communists or listed persons. It refers to offences only. I now want to tell the Opposition that they should not blame speakers on this side of the House if they go to the rural areas and to the towns and to meetings when this measure appears on the Statute Book one day and accuse the Opposition of having been in favour of allowing listed communists to practise as legal practitioners in our courts.

Is the Minister aware of the fact that the following is stated in our amendment: “That this House, while agreeing that convictions by the courts for offences involving communist activities or the security of the State …”?

Yes, only “convictions” are mentioned and nothing else. Clause 2 refers to two groups of people, namely listed persons, amongst whom communists are included, and people who have been convicted. The Opposition’s amendment refers purely to convicted persons only. No mention whatsoever is made of listed persons or listed communists. I say they must not blame this side of the House if we say on public platforms that the official Opposition—they always know what the attitude of the Progressive Party is —we’e in favour of having listed communists practise in our courts. Then they may explain until they are blue in the face but the public will simply not accept their explanations.

I have been asked repeatedly how many people will be affected. I now want to furnish hon. members with the reply. There are exactly 16 people who may possibly be affected. I shall read out their names. Hon. members will find it rather interesting to know for whom they have been Dleadingso much. The list is headed by Nelson Mandela. He is under arrest at the moment. The next one is Nokwe. He is in Dar-es-Salaam. Then there is Joseph Slovo. He is overseas at present. Then there is Harold Wolpe, that great hero. He is also overseas. [Interjections.] Then there is Adv. Berrange. He is in Swaziland. There is O’Dawd. He is overseas somewhere, I do not know where. There is Sam Kahn. He is in England. There is Roley Arenstein. He was in Durban until recently. I think he is in Pretoria Central now. but I am not quite sure. There is Fehler, his partner. There is Meer, the Indian attorney of Verulam. Then there is Singh, a Durban attorney. Then there is Baker of Brakpan. He is in gaol in Pretoria. Then there is a certain J. Cohen, also of Springs. It is peculiar that Springs should produce these people. Then there is Basner, who is also overseas. These are the only listed communists. [Interjection.] Then there is one other man, whose name appears on another list. That is the list drawn up in respect of the Congress of Democrats. There are 35 people who are listed. Only one of them, namely Hepple, is an advocate or attorney. I take it he is an advocate. He is also one of those who ran away. Those are the 16 people.

It sounds like a very urgent matter if they have all left or are in gaol.

I have told the House that this is a matter of principle as far as we are concerned. When it comes to principles it does not matter whether it is one or whether it is 15 or 500. It is a matter of principle. I have also been asked: Has the list been closed? Can they come back again? Can their names be removed from the list? My reply is that we now have to distinguish between two groups, the group whose time has expired and the group consisting of those who may possibly be listed in the future. Those are the two groups between which we have to distinguish. Allow me to deal with the last group first. A person who may be listed in future may object to the liquidator, in the first place, and to the Minister, in the second place. In addition he has access to the court. He has access to that same court for which hon. members have been pleading all along, and that court may tell him that he has been listed in an irregular manner. There is nothing which can prevent him. That is laid down in the law, and we also have court decisions in that connection.

We now come to the question of the removal of a person’s name from the list. The position is that we removed the names of 21 communists from the list in 1964, 7 during 1965 and 12 in 1966. Those people were communists. In addition we removed the names of two members of the Congress of Democrats from the list. As far as legal practitioners are concerned, we actually removed the names of three persons from the list, namely Mr. George Findlay of Pretoria and the two Snitchers.

The position is therefore that, as far as the second group is concerned, namely the group whose time has already expired and who can therefore no longer go to court, the Minister is the only person who may remove their names from the list. It is quite clear from the figures I have just mentioned, however, that we are indeed prepared to remove people’s names from the list. My predecessor proved that he was prepared to do so, and I shall also be prepared to do so if circumstances should justify it. As I have said, however, there must be a “change of heart”.

I regard this measure as one to be discussed mainly in Committee. Concequently I do not want to say much more at this stage. I want to make one further point, and that is that in spite of all his egg-dancing the hon. member for Transkei did come forward with one good idea. I want to grant him that. He made the statement that it would be impossible for a person to practise under the existing circumstances if he had committed and had been convicted of one of the offences mentioned. To my mind that is wrong and should not be the position. For that reason I am prepared to move during the Committee Stage that notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained in the Bill, such a person be readmitted by the court on the submission by such a person of a certificate signed by the Minister and in which the Minister states that he has no objection to such a person being readmitted. In any case, I am grateful to the hon. member for having drawn my attention to this flaw. The hon. member for Durban (North) also referred to that.

How many of those who were listed and whose names were read out by you are at the present moment in South Africa and free to practise as attorneys or advocates? I think there were three persons in respect of whom you did not say whether they were still in the country.

I think the majority of them are either in gaol or overseas. Apparently they are not among those to whom the hon. member referred. But I have said there are two groups between which we have to distinguish. Firstly, there is the present group. Secondly, there are those who may still come. The names I read out are those in the present group, because I have been asked repeatedly how many people will be adversely affected by this. I pointed out to hon. members that there were 16 people who might be adversely affected by this. Most of them, however, have either left the country or are in gaol.

Question put: That the words “the Bill be” stand part of the motion.

Upon which the House divided:

AYES—99: Bekker, M. J. H.; Bezuidenhout, G. P. C.; Bodenstein, P.; Botha, H. J.; Botha, M. C.; Botha, M. W.; Carr, D. M.; Coetzee, J. A.; Cruywagen, W. A.; De Jager, P. R.; Delport, W. H.; De Wet, J. M.; De Wet, M. W.; Du Plessis, H. R. H.; Du Toit, J. P.; Engelbrecht, J. J.; Erasmus, A. S. D.; Erasmus, J. J. P.; Frank, S.; Froneman, G. F. van L.; Greyling, J. C.; Grobler, M. S. F.; Haak, J. F. W.; Havemann, W. W. B.; Henning, J. M.; Hertzog, A.; Heystek, J.; Knobel, G. J.; Koornhof, P. G. J.; Kruger, J. T.; Langley, T.; Le Grange, L.; Le Roux, F. J.; Le Roux, J. P. C.; Le Roux, P. M. K.; Loots, J. J.; Malan, G. F.; Malan, J. J.; Malan, W. C.; Marais, J. A.; Marais, W. T.; Maree, G. de K.; Maree, W. A.; Mc-Lachlan, R.; Meyer, P. H.; Morrison, G. de V.‘, Mulder, C. P.; Muller, H.; Muller, S. L.; Otto, J. C.; Pansegrouw, J. S.; Pelser, P. C.; Pienaar, B.; Potgieter, J. E.; Potgieter, S. P.; Rall, J. J.; Rall, J. W.; Rall, M. J.; Raubenheimer, A. J.; Raubenheimer, A. L.; Reinecke, C. J.; Reyneke, J. P. A.; Rossouw, W. J. C.; Roux, P. C.; Sadie, N. C. van R.; Schlebusch, A. L.; Schlebusch, J, A.; Schoeman, B. J.; Schoeman, H.; Schoeman, J. C. B.; Smit, H. H.; Smith, J. D.; Steyn, A. N.; Swane-poel, J. W. F.; Swiegers, J. G.; Torlage, P. H.; Treurnicht, N. F.; Uys, D. C. H.; Van den Berg, G. P.; Van den Berg, M. J.; Van den Heever, D. J. G.; Van der Merwe, C. V.; Van der Merwe, H. D. K.; Van der Merwe, S. W.; Van der Spuy, J. P.; Van Tonder, J. A.; Van Wyk, H. J.; Venter, W. L. D. M.; Visse, J. H.; Visser, A. J.; Volker, V. A.; Vorster, B. J.; Vor-ster, L. P. J.; Vosloo, A. H.; Vosloo, W. L.; Waring, F. W.; Wentzel, J. J.

Tellers: P. S. van der Merwe and B. J. van der Walt.

NOES—38: Barnett, C.; Basson, J. A. L.; Basson, J. D. du P.; Bennett, C.; Connan, J. M.; Eden, G. S.; Emdin, S.; Graaff, De V.; Hopewell, A.; Hourquebie, R. G. L.; Jcobs, G. F.; Kingwill, W. G.; Lewis, H.; Lindsay, J. E.; Malan, E. G.; Marais, D. J.; Mitchell, D. E.; Mitchell, M. L.; Moolman, J. H.; Moore, P. A.; Murray, L. G.; Oldfield, G. N.; Raw, W. V.; Smith, W. J. B.; Steyn, S. J. M.; Streicher, D. M.; Sutton, W. M.; Suzman, H.; Thompson, J. O. N.; Timoney, H. M.; Wainwright, C. J. S.; Waterson, S. F.; Webber, W. T.; Wiley, J. W. E.; Winchester, L. E. D.; Wood, L. F.

Tellers: A. J. Bronkhorst and T. G. Hughes.

Question affirmed and amendment proposed by Mr. T. G. Hughes dropped.

Question: That the word “now” stand part of the motion, and a division demanded.

Fewer than four members (viz. Mrs. H. Suzman) having supported the demand for a division, Question declared affirmed and amendment proposed by Mrs. H. Suzman dropped.

Motion accordingly agreed to and Bill read a Second Time.