On Friday I was engaged in demonstrating how unfounded and irresponsible the complaints of the hon. member for Durban (Central) against the Management of the S.A. Airways were, i.e. that, in his opinion, Captain Smith should not have been allowed to fly. I demonstrated that there was nothing wrong with his flying ability and that he executed a perfect take-off and flew beyond the critical stage up to a reasonably safe height, i.e. between 600 and 700 feet. At the same time we must remember that the second pilot sits beside the first pilot and does certain things which have to be done in assisting the pilot in control, precisely according to the pattern in the schedule as inculcated in them during their training. Now, what happened in that cabin from that height onwards and for the next thirty, dramatic seconds, remains a provocative secret. It is also a fact that no shred of objection was or could be raised against the other two pilots. They were both men who were in their prime. There is no proof as to which two of the three pilots were in control of the aircraft. It could have been either the second or the third pilot. This fact therefore makes the accusation of the hon. member for Durban (Central) clearly ridiculous and the Management of the Airways can therefore not be blamed under any circumstances. The accident is clearly attributable primarily to the human factor, as was the finding of the commission. Its nature will forever remain unknown. The only manner in which this enigma could have been solved would have been to have had a film recording taken in the cabin, which could then have proved what had taken place there during the last 30 seconds, but as far as my knowledge goes this type of installation is not yet practicable in aircraft. I want to agree heartily with the hon. the Minister that if a data recorder had been installed it would have given the commission no more facts than they had—perhaps a few more—and it could definitely not have prevented the accident either, despite the hon. member for Albany’s argument here.

The second complaint of the hon. member for Durban (Central) is based on the fact that the Management of the Airways did not ensure that the crew had first flown together. This complaint is just as groundless as the first. The elementary fact is that pilots are trained as individual pilots and not in teams. Every man can handle an aircraft through and according to his own ingenuity and not as a member of the team. Any two pilots who have been trained on any type of aircraft according to schedule can fly together without ever having met or known each other. Each one knows precisely what he must do. It is not even the practice in any other airline in the world to first let pilots fly together. The hon. member may go and make inquiries if he does not believe it. The third complaint is that Captain Smith merely underwent a one-hour conversion course. That complaint is also in fact petty. The position is that this man had already acquired 4,608 flying hours’ experience on all models of Boeing aircraft. The C-model aircraft which was involved here differs very little from the other 707s and the manufacturers of the Boeings have prescribed this one-hour period as a standard period which must be used for a conversion course and you may rest assured that this period will always incline to the side of safety. The Management can really not be blamed here because there was nothing that they neglected to do, and if we accept that Captain Smith was at the controls, he had nevertheless still executed two perfect take-offs and one landing before the accident occurred. The hon. member made mention here of the fact that Captain Smith once struggled to complete a conversion course. I could find no mention of those facts in this report at all, and I maintain that that statement of his is altogether irrelevant. It was actually petty and unnecessary of him to have mentioned it. I do not even know whether it is the truth. It also has nothing to do with the competence of the Airways Management.

The last complaint was that the airport at Windhoek is a very dangerous one, and that it was a pitch dark night. These two statements were simply drawn out of thin air. They are again not relevant to the competence of the Airways Management. It is nonsense that the J. G. Strydom airfield is dangerous. We do not even have to argue further about that; it is obvious. I should like to know how the hon. member wants to execute a take-off on a dark night. Does the hon. member not know that provision is made for dark nights, thick mists, and very difficult flying conditions by way of instruments and that the co-pilot receives a very intensive training in instrumentation? I personally believe that the dark night had nothing to do with the whole matter. I honestly want to say that I was shocked that the hon. member for Durban (Central) mentioned this matter here. I have always appreciated his scientific approach to matters, but in this instance he has failed miserably. I cannot fathom his motive. I really cannot believe that he wanted to use this disaster in order to steal a few political marches.

Nonsense.

I agree. It is too reprehensible for words. But why was it mentioned here then?

In the interests of the country.

Sir, if I have talked nonsense then the hon. member is doubly guilty of having done so. By this he has unnecessarily opened wounds and humiliated the family members of the crew, apart from the groundless and unreasonable accusations and criticism which he expressed here in respect of the Airways Management. Unfortunately this speech of his has not done him any credit and neither has it rendered a service to this very fine undertaking of which we are so proud. He rendered South Africa no service by these actions. I believe that our Airways is as good, if not better, than any other Airways in the world. I think that the Management is the most efficient there is, both organizationally and technologically. I want to say to the hon. the Minister that this House has the fullest confidence in him and in the team of officials supporting him. We want to wish him well and to say to him, “Carry on the good work”.

Mr. Speaker, I do not wish to pursue the subject of the tragic loss of the Boeing aircraft much further, except to say that both sides of the House as well as the country should not lose sight of one fact, namely the evidence did not show conclusively who the pilot at the controls of the aircraft was at the time of the accident. I think it is something that should be borne in mind by this House, by the country outside, and also by the sorrowing families of the deceased crew members.

I wish to appeal to the hon. the Minister to-day for something which I have repeatedly appealed for in the past, and I hope my appeal to-day will not again be in vain, as was the case on past occasions. I wish to appeal to the Minister to apply some of the profits derived from the transportation of fuel through the pipeline from the coast to the Witwatersrand towards reducing the cost of the fuel on the Witwatersrand itself. In the past we may have asked that all the profits should be utilized to reduce the price of fuel on the Rand, but to-day I am prepared to limit my appeal. I ask that only the difference between the profits that would have been made had the fuel been transported by ordinary trucks and the profit obtained from sending it up by pipeline should be used to reduce the cost of fuel on the Rand. I regard it as absolutely indefensible that these huge profits of R15 million and more should be used only for other purposes, and that no benefit is derived by fuel consumers on the Witwatersrand. The people on the Rand are without doubt being milked to-day to provide profits for the S.A.R. Last year the profit was R15 million, this year it will be R40 million. Although this profit of R40 million this year will not all be derived from the transportation of fuel to the Witwatersrand, I do believe that at least half of the profits will have been obtained from it. The Witwatersrand and the Vaal triangle are the greatest users of fuel in South Africa. More road miles are travelled there than in any other part of the country. As far as taxation is concerned, it makes the greatest contribution to the Government’s revenue. Now we find they have to pay much more for their fuel, and one might say it is the equivalent of a fine they have to pay; it is the equivalent of a sales tax on the petrol used by the people of the Witwatersrand. I wonder whether the Minister realizes that this policy of his is pushing up production costs on the Reef. He is hampering economic expansion. Is he so short-sighted that he cannot realize that if he were to lower production costs by lowering the cost of fuel, industries would expand and production would increase on the Reef, which means the Government would obtain so much more in the form of other taxes? He is actually killing the goose that lays the golden egg. If I may use a simile, if agriculture needs fodder which is the life-blood of animal husbandry, then very fairly the Minister sees to it that the fodder is transported at a low tariff. Fuel is the life-blood of our industrial economy, and if industry needs that life-blood the Minister goes to the extreme of taking as much money as possible from the consumer. I believe here we have a shocking state of affairs. The Minister is pumping fuel from the coast to the Witwatersrand at a cost of not much more than 1c per gallon, and he is making a profit of 7c on every gallon, which is a profit of 700 per cent.

I know the excuses of the hon. the Minister. Firstly, he says that if fuel was to be transported by rail, there would also have been a surplus. He would in any case have made money out of it. Therefore, to-day I am only asking for the profits over and above that, which he is saving, to be used to bring down the price of fuel on the Witwatersrand. The hon. the Minister says that he cannot do that. He says that tariffs will have to be increased in respect of other items if he uses the profits to reduce the price of fuel on the Witwatersrand. These words come strangely from a Government which has hidden a R180 million in its main budget. They come strangely from a Government which has wasted millions upon millions of the taxpayer’s money. They come strangely from a Minister who is not using the manpower on the Railways to the fullest benefit of the country. This Minister last year in February was also not even using that pipeline to 100 per cent capacity. Hon. members should know that the pipeline was only being used to a capacity of 68 per cent. I trust the position is better now. If the hon. the Minister wants more money, surely he could use the pipeline to its fullest capacity.

I believe that the hon. the Minister can solve the problem by building more pipelines. A new one is being built this year, and another one will also be built later in this year. But this is not nearly enough. I remember last year the hon. the Minister tearfully told us that if he had to reduce the tariffs for stocks conveyed by the oil pipeline to the Witwatersrand, he would have to increase the price of bringing coal to the Western Province. There is an answer to that. I do not want the Minister to laugh out aloud at the answer. He should start thinking now of doing what they are doing in the United States of America, where they are even to-day transporting coal by pipeline. It can be done. I do not think that tearful excuse of his holds water.

I want to appeal to the Minister to take a much broader view of the use of pipelines, to make it part of his policy to replace a large percentage of our transportation needs by pipelines in future. I wish to bring to his notice the example of the United States of America, a fantastic example of how pipelines can be used and are being used in the rest of the world to-day. In the United States there are to-day 1,000,000 miles of pipelines, four times the length of all its railways and times all its airline routes. 43 per cent, almost half, of all the energy fuel in the United States is being transported by pipeline to-day. Last year 30,000 miles of pipelines were laid, almost 100 miles a day. Crude oil is being taken from Houston to New York, almost 2,000 miles, at a cost of two cents a gallon. Even excluding the pipelines used for transportation of natural gas, as the Minister will know, at least 300,000 miles of pipeline are being used for crude oil and refined products in the States to-day. The hon. the Minister should have a plan for the vast use of these pipelines in future. It will solve many of his manpower problems, as well as many of his income problems. He can reduce the high cost of shipping goods by rail or by sea by having more pipelines. Pipelines have the advantage of being unaffected by weather. They are immune to strikes. They eliminate the necessity of sending back empty freight cars to the point of despatch. Above all, only a handful of people are required to control a huge cross-country pipeline system. Let me give the following example, based on the hon. the Minister’s own figures, just to give him an idea of how he can save manpower through only this one method, namely the extended use of pipelines. He has a staff of 225,000 railwaymen. They produce an annual revenue of R850 million. That means that for one unit of manpower in the Railways R4,000 of revenue is produced. Now let us look at the pipelines. There is a staff of only 305 operating the pipelines and these 305 brought in a revenue of R23 million, that is R75,000 per unit, for the Railways. Here we have the contrast. The ordinary unit of manpower in the Railways, a hard-working man, produces R4,000 of revenue per year, but a unit of manpower on the pipelines produces a revenue of R75,000 a year. I realize there are lots of goods that cannot be transported through a pipeline. One cannot convey passengers by pipeline …

One cannot put the Minister through a pipeline.

Yes, one cannot put the Minister through one, for that matter. As a matter of fact plans are already being made in America to send trains through pipelines by means of air pressure within the next 15 or 20 years. My appeal to the hon. the Minister is therefore that he should take a much broader view of this whole problem of the use of pipelines. It is not only a temporary panacea or something that can be used as a means of transport between Durban and the Witwatersrand, but it is something that can be made use of for transport between all the major centres of South Africa within the next 15 or 20 years. I believe that the hon. the Minister should recognize what is going on in other countries and that he should start planning on a broad basis now so that many of the problems regarding manpower, where our profits are coming from, and in regard to our defence, will be solved. This requires vision on the part of the hon. the Minister and we can only trust that he has it in this respect.

Mr. Speaker, one is almost inclined to be opposed to anything which the hon. member for Orange Grove pleads for, whether it be television or pipelines. One is almost traditionally opposed to what the hon. member pleads for.

In answers which he gave in this House the hon. the Minister has already stated his policy very clearly in respect of the interdependence of the various divisions of our transport system. The hon. member said that there should be a saving and that the profits made on the pipelines should go to the consumer. To the question of where the difference in revenue was to come from, the hon. member made a somewhat feeble contribution and we should like to know from him where tariffs must be increased if the hon. the Minister is to relinquish this revenue so easily. In respect of the conveyance of solids by means of pipelines I want to point out that the medium of conveyance in most of these cases is water and I am of the opinion that at present we have a greater water shortage than a pipeline shortage.

This Budget is the 15th which the hon. the Minister has introduced, and he has once more made an unequalled achievement in respect of the number of years and the amount concerned. The United Party has had to listen to the hon. the Minister for 15 years in the introduction of his Railways Estimates. In married life the ladies in particular like to indicate the number of years of marriage by a certain name and even to link this to festivities. We know of the well-known golden wedding, silver wedding, etc. By coincidence 15 years of married life constitute the tin wedding. This reminded me that of the 15 years in which the United Party has listened to this Minister and his Estimates, this year has really been characterized by the tinniest criticism we have had for years. Their criticism was really poor because they could in fact say nothing about this Budget.

Since we are now almost at the end of the discussion of this Budget, and the money is now being provided for the administration of our entire transport services for the year, it is a fact that this Budget was drawn up with a very careful eye on the general condition of the country’s economy. It was drawn up with due regard to advance estimates, and all factors which can influence the functioning of the economic machine were taken into account. Because there is a mutual influence between the transport system and the economy, this Budget is definitely going to have an important influence on the country’s economy. Just think of the question of tariff increases, which has been mentioned so frequently. If the Minister had come along with tariff increases now, it would have resulted in an inflationary pressure on consumer prices.

There is a specific group of people on whom this Budget exercises a particular influence, i.e. the Railway servants. They are actually the people who stand at the focal point of the Budget. The Railway pensioner looks at this Budget with a smile because of the benefits he derives from it. Many of them are proud of the share they had in the building up of our transport system in the years when they were in active service. Now, after this Budget, they are feeling even happier in having been able to have a share in such an organization which looks after their interests in this way. This Budget, then, has accommodated Railway pensioners to an extent previously unequalled. But also those who are employed by the Railways at present, are particularly affected. It is true that they are not affected in the sense that they have received financial benefits from it, because those were received last year. This Budget affects the Railway servant directly in his daily task, in his productivity, in the loyalty which he displays towards the service and in the sacrifices which he is prepared to make in order to let the Railway services run smoothly. In my humble opinion the Railway official is the most important factor for the ensuing year in any Railway Budget. For me it actually boils down to the fact that we come along to the railwayman and say, “Look, here is the industrial capital for the year. We are handing it over to you. You must now keep this undertaking and all its branches running smoothly. You must keep the wheels rolling”. And we may confidently leave it in their hands. Over the past year they set up a record in respect of the largest volume of traffic dealt with. We expect that in the ensuing year, with the greater volume of traffic which will be offered, they will even exceed this record. And they may tackle this task with confidence. We on this side of the House are happy with the work which the Railway official is doing. We have confidence in his ability to do his work and to improve on previous achievements. But we do not only have the confidence; we also appreciate the work which he is going to do, and if someone knows that his employer has confidence in him and appreciates his work, he will go ahead with confidence. They may rest assured that the Minister, the Administration and this side of the House will look after their interests. Salary increases have always come at the right time. As has been the case with the pension increases this year. There are furthermore all manner of services supplied by the Railways Administration to its servants, services such as housing, training and study facilities, opportunities for work for retarded individuals, and so on.

In addition they need feel no concern about the sound policy pursued by the Minister and his Administration. There is the question of the interdependence of the various subsections. The profits made in one subsection are used to cover the losses in another. This prevents the prices of commodities evidencing large fluctuations. The tariff policy of the Minister as a whole is sound. Because it is so, the Railway servants may enter the years ahead with confidence because they know themselves to be employed in a sound undertaking.

Another matter which this Budget underlines, is the sound relationship existing between the Minister and the Railway Staff Associations. The Railway servants may enter the years ahead confident in the knowledge that these good relationships will continue. Good relationships are essential for sound consultation. This has also always been the case. The relationships at present are such that the Minister can discuss matters with them in a good spirit and in that same good spirit point out to them where they are wrong. In spite of that the good relationships continue. That is very important.

But after having said that now, it is as well for the Railway officials to note what is being said of them from the other side of the House. They must take note of how their efforts are being scrutinized by the other side of the House. The hon. member for Yeoville, for example, specifically referred to “incompetence” among Railway servants. The hon. member for Durban (Point), again, referred to promotions and implied that only those who had the ear of the officials responsible for promotions were in fact promoted.

We have had complaints to that effect.

Those complaints were not sufficiently substantiated. We know what the hon. member for Durban (Central) said about the competence of certain senior Airways officers. We heard that the hon. member for Salt River professed that the safety of the service is being endangered by the Minister’s staff policy. They say these things in such a way as to create the impression that they are taking up the cudgels for the railwayman. But in everything they say about the railwayman there is a hostile undertone. They want to undermine the policy of interdependence, the dependence of one division of the Railways on another. They want to wreck the Railway tariff structure, a policy which has yielded very good results up to the present. They also criticize the way in which staff is utilized. “Use the available manpower”, they said. When the Minister asked them directly what their policy was in respect of the employment of non-Whites, for example, he could not obtain a reply. [Interjections.] The Minister in his turn stated his own policy very clearly so that the railwayman could take note of it. But the Opposition does not want to tell us what their policy is. The railwayman must note that the Opposition plans to use all available labour, without saying in what form or according to what pattern. There is a great deal of criticism, but during this Session and in the Railways debate we have heard no elucidations from the Opposition about what they would like to do in respect of this matter, as was the case with their federation policy.

I find it almost fascinating to listen to hon. members opposite and to the way in which they find reasons for thanking the Minister.

I did not thank the Minister.

[Interjections.] The hon. member now feels a bit guilty and says he did not thank the Minister, but he did not have to thank the Minister because he had nothing to thank him for. He is now becoming a little worried. I am surprised at the speech of the hon. member. He spoke about our plea that we should use the available manpower and he tried to turn that into an attack on the United Party, and he also tried to run away from what his own Minister said. What was the Minister’s attitude on this question? He stood there shouting at us: Tell us what will you do if the trade unions object to the use of black manpower? He kept on repeating that until eventually we said to him: What would you do, and what did you do? He then hesitated for a moment, taken aback that we should dare to put that question to him, and then he said: “I use Native labour: even if the trade unions are opposed to it, I use it if it is in the interest of the country to do so.” He was quite open about it and I admire him for it. He has been taking credit from this side of the House and from the country and from the newspapers supporting the Opposition, and even from his own trade unions, for the fact that he is a practical Minister and that he does use all the available manpower. But he does not follow his Government’s policy. He ignores it. He stands above the Cabinet; he does what he likes. He is independent in the same way that his newspapers are independent from the rest of the Government Press. [Interjections.] I intend dealing with another matter where he overruled the Cabinet. Listening to hon. members opposite, one would never dream that there were such people as railway workers living in their constituencies. All they have done is to thank the Minister for this thing or that thing. The hon. member for Lichtenburg thanked the Minister for allowing railway water to be used in the gardens. It made the gardens so much better because they were getting railway water. And that hon. member thanked the Minister for solving the truck problem. Why was there a truck problem? Because that Minister’s predecessor cancelled the United Party policy of getting trucks. We ordered trucks and Mr. Sauer cancelled the order, and that is why this Minister himself says that he took over at a time of crisis in the Railways. He had to save the Railways from the Nationalist Party Government, and that is why he sits there now looking like a cat licking his lips after eating cream, because he saved the Nationalist Party.

Now, I am not going to thank the Minister for anything, but I do want to express appreciation to his staff and his Administration for the way in which they responded to my appeal to help those forgotten people in the country, the poor, drought-stricken farmers. I made an appeal to the staff of the Railways to provide tankers to get water for the farmers in my constituency and I must say that I have never seen such a response from any other Government Department as I got from the Railways. It was most expeditiously done, with no waste of time, and I was impressed by the sympathy and the understanding shown by the officials to whom I made my appeal on this occasion. I have been asked by the farmers’ associations to express appreciation to the Administration and the staff for what they did on that occasion. When I deal with the staff and the Administration, how different is the response I get from them and the response I get when I ask the Minister for anything. I make no apology for coming back to this point again. I have raised it on several occasions. This shows that this Minister dominates the whole of the Cabinet. I do not know whether he is a “ver-krampte” or a “verligte”, but whatever he is, he is going to win. All other Government servants who are seconded to the Transkei get an allowance. They get up to R80 a month more than their counterparts in the rest of the country. The people who do not get this allowance are the police, the postal officials, members of the staff of the auditing department and the railway servants. The hon. the Minister makes the excuse that the other Government servants are seconded to a foreign Government. I pointed out that the Transkeian Government was not a foreign Government yet, and he said, “No, not yet, but it is going to be a foreign Government one day and that is why they get this extra allowance”. Sir, I have pointed out often that the Minister’s servants come into closer contact with the Africans in that territory than those civil servants who get the allowance. The railway officials in the Transkei resent the fact that they are not getting this allowance, and I am making an appeal for those railwaymen again. The hon. members for Durban (Point) and Yeoville and others have quoted the complaints of railwaymen against the Administration. Sir, these complaints are justifiable. In addition to those complaints, the railwaymen working in the Transkei have another complaint and that is that their Minister discriminates against them in favour of other officials. When I pointed out on one occasion that it was not only the seconded officials who received this allowance but also members of the staff of the audit department, who are not seconded officials, the Minister said that he would inquire into the position. He did, and he found that that was correct. He said in this House that he would see the Cabinet about it and he did; he took away the allowance from the staff of the audit department. They are now treated on the same basis as the railway officials. Sir, the Minister cannot liken the railwaymen in the Transkei with railwaymen employed in Zululand or in any other reserve. The white people are not leaving Zululand. The Minister of Bantu Administration and Development talks with pride of the fact that the white people are leaving the Transkei. Sir, it is Government policy that they should get out, and the more they leave the Transkei the fewer social amenities will there be for the Whites who remain, and the Whites who remain are the railwaymen; they have to remain.

As far as the bus services are concerned, the Government is training Bantu bus drivers and they are taking over the bus services but the Bantu are not taking over the running of the Railways. When I asked a few years ago what the policy was with regard to the Railways and whether they were going to have Bantu drivers the answer was, “No; that would only come in time”. They are taking no steps to train Bantu to do those jobs which are being done by white railwaymen at present so the white railwaymen will have to stay in the Transkei. Their services are important and necessary and we cannot do without them. And, Sir, they live there with a grudge; they are dissatisfied and you cannot have efficiency from a dissatisfied staff. That is why I again make this appeal to the hon. the Minister. I am not asking him for something indeterminate. He knows how many railwaymen there are; he knows what would be involved in cash payments that he would have to make, because the numbers of the white railwaymen are not going to increase. In fact, if they start handing over the Railways to black railway-men, the number of Whites will become fewer. The Minister cannot say therefore that he does not know what amount of the taxpayer’s money would be involved; he knows that very well. His railwaymen in South-West Africa get this allowance and there is no reason why the railwaymen in the Transkei should not get it.

In South-West Africa they get quite a different type of allowance.

It does not matter; they are getting an additional allowance.

They have been getting it since 1924.

The Minister says that because they have received it for so long they have a vested interest and therefore he cannot take it away. That was his reply. But, Sir, the fact is that they do get it. Why did they get it in 1924? Because they were doing a different kind of work; they were in different surroundings; they were not working in the Union and that is why they got that allowance, and I say that the Minister should give this allowance to the railwaymen in the Transkei. He should put them on the same basis as other white civil servants working in the Transkei. Sir, I will continue to make this appeal on behalf of those forgotten people in the Transkei, the railwaymen.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member who has just sat down said he refused to thank the hon. the Minister. I think if we have ever had a Minister of Transport in this country who should be thanked, then it is the present Minister. I want to say right at the outset that I want to pay homage to the Minister for what he has achieved in the past 15 years since he has controlled this Department. We all know that the Minister knows all about trains and railways from A to Z; as a matter of fact he was launched on a public career from the footplate of an engine. What really astonished me, and I think all hon. members on this side, was the way in which he dealt with complex and very technical matters concerning airlines during the course of his reply to the hon. member for Durban (Central) who spoke about the disaster at Windhoek a few months back. It was a magnificent performance by a magnificent Minister, and I sincerely hope the Minister will be at the controls of the South African Railways for many years to come.

Having closely followed the Railways debate last week it is quite clear to me that the Opposition were having difficulty in finding any serious flaws in the way the Minister handled the affairs of the Railways over the past year. They picked a few points at random and hammered away at them, trying to create the impression that there was a state of seething discontent among the country’s railwaymen. The one main point which they raised once again was the Railways’ staff shortage and the concomitant overtime which railwaymen have to work. When the Minister cornered the hon. member for Yeoville, as the hon. member for Germiston pointed out, and asked him to tell the House how a United Party government would alleviate the staff shortage, he shied away from it.

It is not true.

Yes, you did. The hon. member did not want to tell us whether they would appoint non-White labourers on a large scale on the Railways. The hon. member shied away from it every time. This reticence to give the House a candid answer to the Minister’s question is in my view because the United Party want to open the sluice gates of non-white labour on the Railways should they come to power but they dare not tell the electorate that. The Minister candidly said that in the interests of the country he would appoint non-White workers in certain vacancies so that white men could obtain better positions on the Railways, and now the United Party want to create the impression in the country that the Minister wants to flood the Railways with Kaffirs. [Interjections.]

The hon. member for Durban (Point), who has so much to say now, spoke of much so-called dissatisfaction among the railway staff. Year after year he has filled the role here of a sort of unofficial commissioner of grievances. Every year he reads a few letters here from people who are supposed to be aggrieved about certain matters on the Railways. Surely the hon. member knows there are proper channels through which these grievances, if they are genuine, can be put, namely the staff organizations. The Minister has invited the hon. member to take up these matters with him so that he can go into them personally. But the hon. member prefers to score a few cheap political points in the House by flaunting the few so-called grievances in public.

Do you think there are only a few grievances?

Yes, only a few grievances. The hon. member went further last Friday and made very serious allegations across the floor against certain Railways officials, people who he knows cannot reply to his attacks because they are not in a position to do so. I think it is very unfair. The hon. member said that there are railway servants who are hesitant to disclose information to their M.P.’ for fear of victimization. He also said that railway officials sometimes coerce railwaymen to accept transfers to forlorn places somewhere in the bundu. I think it is a scandalous reflection on our very worthy railway officials who are working very hard, especially as a result of the shortage of staff. I think the hon. member owes them an apology, because he knows that they cannot reply to him across the floor of the House. The hon. member also tried to create the impression here that there is a state of tyranny and inquisition in the Railways, but we on this side reject that accusation about the railway officials with the contempt it deserves.

Before I come to a few other points which I want to raise with the Minister, I want to say that the South African Airways plays an increasingly outstanding role in the transportation of goods and passengers in South Africa and also in the economy of the South African Railways. We are fast becoming a nation of flyers. South Africa is becoming airborne. Whilst a few years ago it was very easy to obtain a reservation on an aeroplane, to-day it is becoming more and more difficult.

It is for that reason I want to touch on a few matters concerning the airlines. Something which has not been raised here and which I want to raise, and which also shows the very modern and efficient way in which the South African Airways are being handled, is the announcement in January by the hon. the Minister that South African Airways have a solution for the continuing hijacking of planes now occurring in the United States. I happened to be in the States when the wave of “skyjacking”, as the Americans now call it, was at its height last year. The American airlines were absolutely helpless. As a matter of fact, nowhere else, as far as I know, except in South Africa, has a country come forward with a method to prevent the hijacking of planes. All kinds of suggestions have been made overseas, such as X-raying the passengers to detect whether they are carrying guns on their person. But in the overseas countries, as we know, where the air traffic is very dense, such a system would be too laborious and time-consuming. The result so far has been that skyjacking, as the common cold, has been accepted as something which has to be lived with and something which cannot be prevented. In fact, because no one has been injured so far, apart from the unfortunate shooting that took place the other day in Colombia, some Americans are even enjoying the adventure of being “skyjacked”. I have heard them say when they fly to Miami: “Will we be taken for a joyride to Havana?” We in South Africa, of course, cannot take the hijacking of our planes so facetiously. We can accept that if one of our planes should ever be hijacked, say to a hostile African country, it could have dire consequences for the passengers. It would certainly not be a laughting matter. Consequently, I want to congratulate the hon. the Minister and the Department on the fact that they have been able to find a way to prevent the hijacking of our planes. Naturally, for obvious reasons, the technique must remain secret and confidential. But I am quite sure that if other nations are interested, we would be prepared to share our secrets, and perhaps we should volunteer our secret technique to them. As I have said we read in the paper last week that an innocent passenger was shot dead during a scuffle with a hijacker in Colombia. The first blood has now flown and perhaps South Africa could make its contribution to prevent this horror in the air spreading.

I now want to deal with another aspect, namely the training of our pilots, and I want to ask the hon. the Minister what the position is in so far as trainee pilots are concerned. Are enough men coming forward in view of the tremendous expansion in air travel which lies around the corner? Are many well-trained pilots still coming from other sources such as the South African Air Force? I know that for very urgent defence reasons as few as possible of these pilots should be drawn away from the South African Air Force and I want to ask whether it will not be a good idea to establish a special College of Air Training, sponsored and financed by the South African Railways Administration, for the training of professional civil pilots.

I also want to raise another matter and this concerns the revolution which is coming in the sky as far as air freight is concerned. First the aim was faster and bigger jets for the transporting of passengers, but now the introduction of aerial freight trains is on the horizon. When we read the annual report of the South African Railways and Harbours Administration for the year 1967-’68 we see that the Administration is doing everything possible to stimulate the carrying of air freight in our aeroplanes. Over the weekend a small news item appeared in a newspaper that Pan-American Airways is establishing a special air freight terminal at Jan Smuts Airport for this very purpose. I therefore hope that the hon. the Minister will continue vigorously in this direction. Giant aeroplanes are bringing about impressive changes in South African commerce and industry in the field of air freight transportation. I want to mention only a few aspects where changes can be effected. It will mean better service and faster delivery that will eliminate the need for much expensive warehousing and the keeping of large stocks by companies. In the second instance shipment by air will cut the delay in transportation and losses in regard to damage and theft. The potential of transporting fresh fruit, vegetables and meat, not only to South Africa’s domestic markets where there may be a shortage, but also to our overseas markets is tremendous, as I see it. I cannot go too deeply into this matter but I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether he will not consider, when ordering new jumbo jets in the future, as he must, buying also one or two convertible cargo-passenger jet planes. As I see it, the South African market may not yet be ready to justify the buying of these big air freighters the Americans are starting to use, but convertible cargo-passenger jet planes may be a better investment for South Africa at this stage.

For the convenience and comfort of air travellers I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether it will not be possible to introduce a hot and moist facial towel service on our internal services during the summer months. I know this will sound like a trivial matter, but those of us who have travelled overseas know that it is general practice for airlines operating in the hot climates like in the Far East, to distribute to passengers these facial towelettes either of cotton or paper, soaked sometimes in eau de cologne. I can assure hon. members that it is wonderful how refreshing the application to one’s face of one of these towelettes is.

Last year I asked the hon. the Minister whether film shows could not be held on our airplanes on the long overseas flights, and the hon. the Minister then said that the matter had been investigated and that it was found to be not very popular amongst passengers. I now want to mention something else and I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether he would not investigate the possibility of installing an in-flight “Theatre-in-the-Air” such as some overseas airlines already have on their long overseas flights. This “Theatre-in-the-Air”, as it is called, consists of eight different channels on which assorted programmes of music can be listened to through ear-phones without disturbing the other passengers. Amongst the programmes on the different channels are such programmes as popular show tunes, classical music, tunes for teenagers, a children’s hour and even a language laboratory in the air by which foreign languages such as French and German can be taught.

I have raised these questions with the hon. the Minister and, as I have said, although they appear to be trivial, I think that all of us who have travelled will appreciate that these conveniences and comforts promote a sense of comfort and well-being for every passenger.

Mr. Speaker, I was wondering whether the hon. mbongo for Turffontein …

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, is the hon. member allowed to address another hon. member in the way he did?

What did he say?

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, it sounded to me as if the hon. member, referring to the hon. member for Turffontein, used the word “mongrel”.

No!

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member said “mbongo”, which is a praise singer. There is nothing wrong with that.

Order! It would be far better if the hon. member would use language that can be understood.

Mr. Speaker, I have no intention of offending the hon. member, but …

You did not offend me; you offended the hon. member for Turffontein.

Mr. Speaker, let us proceed. The hon. members on the other side have accepted and agreed, that there are grievances on the Railways, that there is dissatisfaction and that the hon. the Minister does employ a non-white labourer when he thinks fit to do so. This is accepted, and the hon. the Minister has said so. Tributes have been paid to him, that he is a man who stands head and shoulders above his colleagues. I think that speaking of him as a Minister, that is correct. But the big thing is, that amongst those qualities he has one other quality. That is the rare quality of having the skill of never answering a question, if he does not want to answer it. Many questions were put to him during the Second Reading, which he just left alone or to which he made only passing reference. The hon. the Minister has failed to give any reaction to my request for something to be done about Coloured pensioners on the Railways. When I pressed him at the time, he also failed to give me a suitable answer to what the future of the Coloured people will be, as far as employment on the Railway is concerned. He tried to make a little political capital by doing his best to embarrass this side of the House. Then, by pulling the rabbit out of the hat, he said that he does not take any notice of the trade unions and the staff associations, when he thinks it is necessary, in the interest of the country, to employ them. Within two days of that statement being made, I saw a statement in a newspaper, where the staff association leader, Mr. Liebenberg, said that he had no knowledge of any dispute with the hon. the Minister about the employment of these people. So, how can the hon. the Minister come into Parliament and tell us, that he pays no attention to the objections of the staff association in view of the fact that, in this instance, they did not raise any objections? This is what he has said. This is the big deal. This is the kind of thing which bedevils our relationships with the Coloured man. I am quite sure the hon. the Minister likes to employ numbers of Coloured persons, but he cannot do so because of the attitude of hon. gentlemen on that side. We have heard the other day that, as far as the Coloured people are concerned, the sky is no longer the limit, and that they now enter a cul de sac as far as their future is concerned. We have also had all this talk about separation and no development. I should, therefore, like to ask the hon. the Minister what development can Coloured people expect on the Railways. I would like the hon. the Minister to give us a straightforward answer to that question, so that the Coloured people may know. Many of them, especially parents, feel that the time has come that their children should have the opportunity to share in the Railways and its prosperity.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. the Minister also referred, rather lightly, and flippantly, to my suggestion about the question of overtime in relation to staff and their salary scales. The hon. the Minister said to me, that he did not understand what I meant, and that I must think again. Well, I happened to think beforehand, not afterwards. What I am suggesting to him is that, while this amount of overtime is being paid, Railwaymen regard that overtime as part of their emoluments. They would suffer very serious hardships, if that amount of money was to be removed from their pay packet. When you employ additional people, which I suggest should be Coloured—the Minister possibly thinks he would be able to find Whites, but he does not say where—the value of the pay packets would necessarily be reduced. If Coloured people are involved, there will immediately be a big political “bohaai” over this whole business. My proposition to the hon. the Minister is that an assessment should be made of the amount of overtime which these men work, and that it should be averaged out in relation to the grades and scales upon which they work, and that that should be the normal or the basic wage for the grade. Then nobody would suffer a reduction of great magnitude in his pay packet. That is quite a simple and straightforward proposition, and I ask the Minister to accept in good faith that that is a sincere attempt to help him over the difficulty of acquiring additional labour, which he must have. This would also get him over the political problem of employing Coloured persons in the Railways. We all realize that this problem does exist, and I think I realize this better than anybody else. These are two points which I think the hon. the Minister should reply to in some detail in his reply.

I also asked the hon. Minister how he could explain his attitude over the years, when I have spoken to him across the floor in regard to his refusal to give concessions, or reductions, in tariffs in certain areas. Persons from these areas have stated that the development of the region is militated against by high railway tariffs. This is the one leg. His attitude has been, that he would make no reductions because it has not been proved that railway tariffs militate against the development of industry. But, in the brochure which has been published by the Department of Economic Affairs, it is stated that the Minister of Transport is prepared to give a 15 per cent discount on railage on merchandize manufactured and transported by the Railways from certain specified points known, as growth points or decentralized areas. Here, on the one hand, we find that a group of people are asking for a reduction of tariffs, which the Minister refuses, while, on the other hand, he gives a reduction of 15 per cent, and not only that, but also 25 per cent on harbour dues at the ports to which these goods are sent. I should also like to get a straight-forward answer on that question, so that we may know his reasons for refusing to accommodate one group of people and his ready willingness to assist others.

The last, and final, point is the one about the question of planning on harbours. It has been said here, and other speakers will probably also raise the matter, that the planning of harbours is behind the times and that insufficient attention has been paid to this particular activity. During the debate on another matter earlier this session, the hon. the Minister of Planning, by way of interjection, when I suggested that 100,000-ton ore-carriers might come to Port Elizabeth and that there were no facilities in that harbour to accommodate that type of ship, said to me: “The Government has not said that.” In other words, my suggestion that planning should be taken care of at those ports to enable that type of ship, loaded with ore to be carted away, was not within the planning of the Government. I have a newspaper article here which was published about eight months ago, saying that the Government of Chile is not only providing deep-water berths already for 100,000-ton ore-carriers, but a second port is in the process of being deepened to accommodate similar carriers. The Minister referred to the fact last year across the floor of the House, that the amount of ore being used in Japan from this part of the world was controlled by the easy access to ore from Australia. Now ore from the Mount Newman deposit, which is an enormous one, is already being loaded onto ships with deepwater berths and taking that business away from us. As far back as last year, the Japanese made it clear that they did not intend to take ore from us to the extent that they did before. It is the contention of many, that the planning by the Railways of deep-water berths is very much behind the times. I would say to the Minister that I think the proposition to separate harbours from the railways is not unreasonable. One must remember that the Railways have no competition. They can do just what they like and they do not have to meet any competition of any kind. The law takes care of them, but the harbours are in a different category, because in many parts of the world many harbours, privately owned in many cases, are far in advance in their thinking and in their assessment of the requirements of merchant ships. In my opinion this is a most serious matter. The Minister has treated lightly suggestions of using a place on the west coast as a port and also any suggestion from men like myself, who also think they know a little about the proposition, to do something about making sure that the ore exporting business is taken care of on a scale which it deserves and which it needs. The report on Iscor makes it clear. They also expect to share in the ore exporting business. I do believe, and I say it quite frankly, that the hon. the Minister would be well advised to take the House into his confidence and tell us exactly what he is going to do about the provision of deepwater ports for this type of ship. One sees them in other parts of the world and many of them come around the Cape. I believe that the time is overdue for him to do something about it.

Finally I want to say to the hon. the Minister that I think his remarks the other evening to the hon. the Leader of the Opposition were in extremely bad taste. I do not think it becomes his office, nor his ability as a Minister. I think he is sufficiently competent and has enough efficient people at his back, to give all the answers that are necessary to any queries raised by any member of this House. I think it is extremely bad for a Minister, in his position, and with his experience, and as Leader of the House, to pass the remarks he did about the hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

We are now coming to the end of the debate on Railways and one is a bit disappointed when listening to the Minister’s replies. A business organization such as the Railways which involves a considerable amount of money finds itself in difficulties through lack of forecasting for the future. The Minister is budgeting to lose something like R49 million on his Railways, he does not offer any solution as to how he is going to overcome that, and that is really a serious problem when you look at the balance sheet of the whole organization. Hiding behind the profits of the Harbours and the pipelines is of course unsound. Ordinary business principles would not allow it. If you have a department in business which loses money, you can close it down, but the Minister cannot do that. So he should examine the whole position of the Railways. Years ago he had the same trouble and he appointed the Schumann Commission to go into the whole question of his policy in regard to rates. I say this because industry, the farmers and the whole country should know well beforehand what the Government is going to do. He cannot continue to recoup his losses out of another fund. If you look at his Budget and you examine the replies he gave, he does not offer any solution; he is only hoping that business will be better, but there is nothing concrete. There is nothing really to offset this very big loss. It has been said from the other side of the House that we did not thank the Minister for the extra money he gave the Railway pensioners, but that is something we have been asking for for more than a year, namely better conditions for the Railwaymen. It was really done with the purpose of attracting men to his staff. When one listens to the hon. the Minister and the other hon. members, they feel that we come to this House with little paltry complaints from Railwaymen about what is happening. It shows up the fact that the hon. members opposite are not in touch with their Railway constituents, [Interjections.] I am going to tell you something, Sir. If you go among the Railwaymen, people who are close supporters of the Government, and you see the very deep dissension among them, you get a shock. At the time when the Minister was a railwayman, it was like a religion. A railwayman had a purpose and a life to serve the Railways and his son usually followed him. To-day that is not so. I recently went to a farewell party given for a prominent railwayman and he said openly that if he had his time over again he would not go back to the Railways, because there is no future in it. I spoke last year about the dissension that exists in regard to the application of the disciplinary measures. They do not like it. I asked the Minister to set up a commission of one person to examine the application of the disciplinary code. The disciplinary measures are applied by people who are incompetent. Foremen, charge hands, who have had no judicial experience can never judge the merits of evidence. People are fined and the System Managers invariably do not like to reverse those findings. These people are not competent to apply justice and you get this dissension. The workers do not like it. We have heard cases mentioned by the hon. member for Durban (Point), and I have other cases. It is not right. This could never happen in a firm outside. While I admit that there must be a disciplinary code, I say it must be properly applied, but it is not being properly applied and it is creating very serious dissension. You only have to go around, as I have gone around in this area and elsewhere, to find that there is dissension. If hon. members opposite say it is not there, I say they are out of touch completely.

The hon. the Minister was telling us about his pipelines which are dealt with in another Bill. The hon. member for Turffontein also mentioned the question of pipelines here today. We were pleased to see that the hon. the Minister had broadened his view as far as pipelines are concerned, and that he was making provision for the conveyance of ores, gases, etc., by pipeline. We hope to see gases conveyed by pipeline from Lourenço Marques to the Reef. But I should like to ask the Minister not to adopt the attitude, when he conveys ores and gases by pipeline, that it is high-rate traffic and that high rates must be charged to make up for the loss on the conveyance of other traffic. As far as the principle of applying the rate which the traffic can bear is concerned, it is not correct, of course, to say that principle applies in the case of petrol conveyed by pipeline because all that happens is that the people who pay this high rate simply pass it on to the public. If a person is a commercial traveller, then under his costing system he passes on this high charge to the public, with the result that the public have to pay more. These commodities should be conveyed at a competitive rate. Sir, the hon. member for Karoo has referred here to our ore exports. As far as ore exports are concerned, we are faced with world-wide competition and in order to be able to export our ores we should get down to the lowest possible rate because, after all, the fact that we have to export large quantities of our ore is due to the fact that the Government has not put up sufficient steel works and processing works to enable our ores to be used locally and to export the steel. In that respect the Government has failed.

Then, Sir, we come back to the old question of the manpower shortage, the problem that faces the Government and that faces all of us in this country. If the Government had carried out the United Party policy of bringing immigrants at the time when they were available, the position would have been very much different to-day. We have a terrific backlog to make up and we are not going to make it up because with the prosperity and the very high living standards on the Continent and in the rest of the world, to-day people are reluctant to come here. We have nothing to offer them; we do not have television and we cannot offer them the social services to which they are accustomed. Hon. members opposite are all afraid that we may become a social welfare state. There is no real incentive for workers from overseas to come here. Sir, we must therefore make use of the labour that we have available in this country. The unions over the years have agreed to what the Minister has now done. To-day he is using our labour to the best advantage. These jobs have to be revalued. We cannot have Whites doing jobs which can be done either by Coloureds or by Bantu. These jobs have to be revalued and our white railway workers have to be uplifted. The Minister is acting correctly and we support that policy of making the best use of the labour of this country.

Sir, the hon. the Minister has not said anything about the question of attracting passengers to our railways and about providing air-conditioning in the trains. This is something that must be attended to. We must look at this from a business angle. We can only attract passengers by improving the services we offer.

Then I would like to ask the hon. the Minister to give his consideration to the position of our air mechanics. You find to-day that there are different categories of technicians. The mechanics who are being used for the maintenance of ground vehicles are highly qualified, thoroughly trained people, yet they are not classified as technicians. When the change-over took place even the storemen who work with those mechanics were classified as technicians but not the actual mechanics. This affected the mechanics adversely because there is a difference in pay. I want to suggest to the hon. the Minister that it is wrong to have different categories of mechanics. Take an aircraft mechanic, for instance. The hon. the Minister might say that he is of a higher standard than an ordinary motor mechanic. He might think that but I know a lot of motor mechanics to-day who are very much better than some of your air mechanics. They go through an intensive course of training, and these mechanics have to maintain highly sophisticated machines. There should not be any differentiation in pay.

Another question that I want to raise with the hon. the Minister is the use of the D.F. Malan and Durban airports as international airports. I understand that Durban is an international airport but D. F. Malan has not been classified as such. I know that the hon. the Minister just shrugs this oft but we in the Cape have to suffer the indignity of finding •that aircraft using the now air route to America overfly the D. F. Malan Airport. There is, of course, a saving in mileage, but if these aircraft landed and fueled at D. F. Malan they could carry very much more in the way of cargo and passengers. They could then carry 5,000 lbs. more weight or 25 more passengers. Moreover, if these aircraft fueled in Cape Town they could fly overseas nonstop. Sir, it is all wrong that our airport here, the D. F. Malan, has not been declared an international airport. I say that flights to America should start from the D. F. Malan airport, not from Jan Smuts. We should make use of every pound of weight that we can put on our aircraft to make the service more payable. I hope the hon. the Minister will give consideration to this.

I sat and listened attentively to the hon. member who has just resumed his seat. He made a very pointed indictment here against the mechanics of the Air Force. I think it was altogether undeserved. Sir, all people in the world are not equally good, and all mechanics are probably not equally good, but I give the hon. member the assurance that those are all persons who have received a very thorough training. After their training course they must undergo various tests before they are graded as first-grade mechanics. The hon. member comes along here and reviles the mechanics. I do not know whether the hon. member knows what air mileage is performed in this country by the S.A. Airways. He referred here again to the aircraft accident which took place in Windhoek, but that accident was attributable to human factors, and they will always be present. Only this morning we heard over the radio of the tremendous air disaster in Venezuela. Every day one hears of air disasters overseas. The hon. member wants to create the impression here that it is unsafe to make use of our Airways because our mechanics are supposedly not good enough to check the aircraft properly. Sir, that is blatant nonsense. Take the number of passengers who travel by air to-day in comparison with the position a few years ago. The number of passengers has virtually doubled a hundredfold because people to-day feel that air transport is one of the safest forms of transport. Compare the number of accidents in the air with those on the road. Every Monday morning we read in the paper of the large number of motor accidents which took place during the week-end and in which many people lose their lives. In proportion there are probably 50 to 100 per cent more road accidents than accidents in the air. In spite of all the precautionary measures taken to reduce the number of road accidents, by making the roads wider, for example, by constructing double carriage ways and by the imposition of speed restrictions, a tremendously large number of road accidents still take place. These accidents are attributable to the human factor because one always finds people who take risks. I am not saying that pilots and mechanics take risks by allowing the aircraft to take off without having been properly overhauled. I assume that every aircraft is properly overhauled. But because an accident has now taken place, all the blame is cast on the hon. the Minister. This I cannot accept. I want to take up the cudgels for the mechanics of the S.A. Airways this afternoon, and I want to place it on record that we have the highest regard for them. They do their work in such a thorough, intelligent way that accidents are restricted to a minimum. I cannot see how the hon. member can stand up here and make such an accusation against our mechanics. He is doing them a grave injustice.

The hon. member who just sat down once again referred to the Airways. I want to tell him that we on this side of the House accept that our Airways officials and technicians are of the highest order. They are well trained and efficient. Furthermore, we have their loyalty. That does not mean that when we on this side consider that there are one or two unsatisfactory factors, that we should not raise them. On the contrary, I think we are rendering South Africa a good service by bringing such factors forward.

But I should like to refer back to a matter I raised earlier on in the debate, i.e. the question of an emergency fund. The Minister in reply to me said it was not the function of the S.A.R. Administration to establish such funds. I accept his explanation with reservations. Is there any reason why the Administration cannot make interim payments in cases where it has to pay compensation in the end to persons who died or who were seriously injured as a result of accidents? In the two major accidents over the last couple of years more than a hundred people were killed whilst many were injured. If one were to calculate the number of dependants involved, one would find that there are quite a number. What is more, most of them come from the low-income group and, consequently, they are particularly hard hit when the breadwinner is put out of action as the result of an accident. If the Railways Administration could make interim payments to the dependants, it could help to allay their anxiety over the period until full compensation has been paid. As I pointed out to the Minister, compensation takes a long time to finalize. Could the Minister not, in these circumstances, consider issuing an instruction that interim payments could be made to those people who are subjected to particular hardships as a result of accidents?

I should also like to return to this question of separating harbours from railways. The Minister said that a separation of harbours from the railways would result in an increase in railway rates. He went on to state that the Durban pier had cost the Railways R30 million. To me this seems a case of have your cake and eat it. One moment it is a disadvantage to separate the Railways from the harbours, as it would increase railway rates. The next moment we hear that the Railways had to pay the R30 million for the Durban pier. I would be more convinced by the Minister’s argument if he could quote to me business houses and chambers of commerce, that support him in his standpoint that the Railways should not be separated from harbours. If he could bring me evidence of that, I would be far more happy. If the separation of harbours from Railways would result in an increase in railway rates, how come that the Railways have paid for the new pier in Durban Harbour? The Minister cannot have it both ways. Therefore I should like him to quote to me outside authorities who support him in his view.

The Minister mentioned that sea passenger traffic was falling off, and that, consequently, it would be no sense to build an extra passenger terminal in Cape Town harbour. I pointed out during the debate that figures disproved this point of view because passenger traffic, according to all authorities, seems to be increasing, so much so that at this very moment a new passenger liner is receiving the South African flag here in Cape Town harbour. I think the facts disprove what the Minister has said. In fact, indications point to the opposite. I should like to see the official figures of the number of passengers who have arrived in Cape Town harbour during the past three years. I should like to know whether these official figures bear out the Minister’s standpoint that a new passenger terminal in Cape Town harbour is uneconomic.

I should also like to touch upon the labour question and comment upon the Minister’s statement that no excessive overtime was being worked. The crux of the matter here revolves around the length of a normal shift. The Minister said that a shift of 12 hours was quite normal for an engine driver, for instance. But to work a 12-hour shift week after week and month after month is, in my view, excessive overtime and detrimental to the worker’s health.

Another question I should like to raise with the Minister is the schedule of some of our main-line passenger trains. I should like to know whether the running time of these could not with benefit be changed. It so happens that the main-line passenger train from Durban to Cape Town runs through the most uninteresting part of South Africa at the most interesting time of the day. It misses out the scenery at both ends of the run. Is there any reason why that should be so? Perhaps the Minister has a good reason. But I fail to see why the times of departure at both ends cannot be adjusted so that this part of the trip can be made during daylight hours. There has also been an outcry against the fact that passenger trains have to travel through the Karoo during the hottest parts of the day without being air conditioned. This is a point the Minister should take into consideration.

Another question is that of the admission of the public to Cape Town harbour during week-ends. As reason for the present embargo on the public in the harbour during weekends, is given the fact that the harbour personnel are very busy and that, hence, they cannot afford having tourists running all over the place. But let me remind him that Durban harbour is open at all times, despite the fact that it handles a good bit more traffic than Cape Town. If Durban harbour can be kept open under these circumstances, I fail to see why Cape Town harbour cannot.

Another point I should like to raise is the question of the registration of crew members of fishing vessels leaving the docks in the course of the day. We have had cases along our coasts of fishing trawlers having been reported missing while nobody had the slightest idea of how many crew members there were on board. I should, therefore, like to know whether it is not possible when a fishing trawler leaves one of our major ports for the port captain to be informed of every member on that trawler. Should something then happen to that trawler, it would be possible for the authorities to know just who is on that trawler. Up to now this has not been the case.

The hon. member for Port Natal has referred once more to the question of a passenger terminal in Cape Town harbour. In support of his point of view he cited the fact that a new passenger ship has to-day come under the South African flag. But this is not a new ship in passenger traffic to South Africa. On the contrary, it is a ship which has been plying the trade already for a considerable time. The change of flag only means that the ship has now been taken over by Safmarine. Therefore this is not a new passenger ship in the sense that it is additional to the existing passenger fleet.

Business interrupted in accordance with paragraph (2) of the Sessional Order adopted on the 10th February.

Mr. Speaker, I should like to draw your attention to Standing Order No. 120, which reads as follows—

On Friday an article written by the hon. member for Yeoville appeared in the Cape Town afternoon paper. I am in some difficulty now, because I do not know whether I may quote from this article, as doing so would be contrary to the said Standing Order. Neither do I know whether it is permissible for an hon. member not to state his case in Parliament during the debate while he has the opportunity to do so, but then to have recourse to a newspaper and to write an article for it.

But the debate is still in progress.

It is precisely because the debate is still in progress that I am asking this. Before I go on, Mr. Speaker, I should very much like to know what your ruling is.

Order! If you wish, you may make use of the contents of that article in this debate.

May I ask, Sir, whether it is permissible for an hon. member to write an article in a newspaper on a debate which is still in progress here?

Why not?

Order! I shall go into that aspect and give my ruling later.

Very well, Sir.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Durban (Central) apologized for being unavoidably absent this afternoon so I will not say what I intended saying to him. All I want to say is this. The hon. member again made a charge of incompetency against senior officials of the S.A.A. I expected him to apologize for that but instead of doing so he repeated his charge. I want to say the Assistant General Manager of Airways, Mr. Conradie, and the Airways Manager, Mr. Jimmy Adam, are two of the most competent officials in the Service. I think any other airline would be proud to have two men of such outstanding ability in its service. I am very sorry that the hon. member made such very serious reflections on their ability. But I suppose one has to make allowances for age, and he is a very old man. Old people have fixed ideas and they cannot learn any more. However, I think it is quite wrong for him to have made the charges he did make.

Abuse is no argument.

What abuse? Did I abuse him by telling him he is old? Is that abuse? Is it abuse when you say a man is old, and he is old? [Interjections.]

It is the way you said it.

Mr. Speaker, these hon. gentlemen have a very peculiar idea of what abuse and offensiveness is. I think they should sweep in front of their own doors because they are experts at it. [Interjections.] I would have said much more than that if the hon. member had been present. What he said I regard as a very serious reflection on two of the most competent officials I have in my service, and I think the hon. member for Durban (Central) deserved much harder words than those I used, for repeating that charge after he had received all the explanations and all the information which I gave him in my reply to the Second-Reading debate.

That does not mean you must be personal to the hon. member.

I am personal, and I am going to be very much more personal, I may tell the hon. member. [Interjections.]

Hon. members over there can be personal.

Hon. members are at liberty to do everything they want to, but they do not like being paid back in their own coin. That is their trouble. I suppose when I say this I am also going to be accused of being personal, and what I want to say is this. I think the hon. member for Durban (Point) is a chronic political exhibitionist.

It does not worry me what you think.

The hon. member reminds me of the nude bathers at Graaff’s Pool at Sea Point. They are always exhibiting their nudity, as the hon. member is always exhibiting his propensity to exaggerate grossly, to make wild statements, and to use the most fertile imagination I have ever come across. Let me give one example to show what I mean. In the course of his speech he said, “So one can go on and quote dozens, hundreds, and perhaps thousands of cases …” He said he could quote thousands of cases. He knows that is not true, not so? The hon. member only quoted half-a-dozen cases, but he said in his speech he could quote dozens and hundreds and thousands of cases. He also said he had spoken to almost all the grades in the Service. Well, there are over 630 grades in the Service, but he said he had spoken to almost all the grades in the Service. Do you see, Sir, why I said the hon. member is a chronic political exhibitionist?

Let me deal with some of the charges he made. He said for vaccination against influenza the poor railwayman had to pay R3 for the first person, R2.20 for the second and R2 each for subsequent persons. However, the Management informs me that 40.000 railwaymen in key positions are being vaccinated free, and the rest against payment of 90c per dose of vaccine. The hon. member also said, “We would have expected something more imaginative from the Minister—real modernization … There should be a re-approach to the question of mechanization and modernization and the elimination of the old useless systems.” Thank heavens, I do not have the fertile imagination which my hon. friend has, for then I would have been in real difficulties. He said I must be more imaginative as far as modernization is concerned. But the trouble is he lets these remarks hang in the air. He does not say what he refers to. He spoke about “the question of mechanization …”. He does not say what he is talking about.

I can give you a few examples.

I am always willing to learn. I am prepared to sit at the hon. gentleman’s feet and learn from him, but then he must be more specific and tell me what mechanization he is referring to. After all, I mentioned some aspects of mechanization from which we have had excellent results. I mentioned some modernization and I could mention much more. He must tell me where are we failing, in regard to what mechanization and what modernization are we failing? What “old useless systems” must be “eliminated”? I should like to know.

I can give you a few examples.

I wish the hon. member would, but why did he not do that in his speech? Had he done so, I would have been able to reply to him much better than I am doing now.

Had you introduced the Third-Reading debate by making a speech he could have replied to you.

I made my Budget speech and I replied to the debate with a long speech in the hon. member’s absence, but he said he read my speech and knows all about it. In my Budget speech I spoke about mechanization and modernization, about the resultant staff savings, and things of that nature. Everything was there. I say the hon. member should be more explicit. He said, for instance, he expected an “imaginative scheme” to try and improve the training basis of the Railways personnel. Has the hon. member ever heard of Esselen Park?

I have been there.

Oh, he has been there. Well, well, well, and he still said this! In spite of having been there, he still said there must be an improvement in the training basis of Railways personnel. Apparently the hon. gentleman finds it extremely difficult to learn. Does the hon. member realize that in all the railway systems in the world the Esselen Park College is the biggest and the most modern training college for railwaymen, not only in the southern hemisphere but throughout the railway systems of the world? Does the hon. member know we have people coming from overseas railway systems to see what we are doing at Esselen Park? Yet he says the training basis of our Railway personnel must be improved.

In my days there was no Esselen Park. I had to do my own training and my own learning. Now we have that wonderful college. It is really a Railways university, as we call it. But the hon. member says we must improve the training basis of the Railway personnel.

Then the hon. member talked about the atmosphere of the S.A.R. He says “there is no atmosphere in the Service to make the matriculated youth feel that there is a chance to advance himself.” Atmosphere! I know there is a lot of smoky atmosphere when the steam locomotives come into a station and are blowing smoke, but I do not know what atmosphere he is referring to. Then the hon. member says further, referring to the matriculated youth: “To get promotion, he must be pally with somebody higher up.” Now surely, that is devoid of any foundation. There is no substantiation for that at all.

You have taken that right out of context.

Does the hon. member not realize that all promotions are based on efficiency, according to the provisions of the Act? Only when the efficiency of two or more servants are equal, then seniority comes into the picture.

Why did you take that right out of context?

I have not taken it out of context. I can quote him if he likes. I have his speech here. Apparently he has forgotten what he said a couple of days ago. But I say that statement is devoid of all truth, namely that somebody must be pally with somebody higher up. Promotions are based on merit, on efficiency. That is the provision of the Act. Only when the efficiency of two or more servants is equal, then seniority comes into play. Apart from that, there is an appeal system on the South African Railways which no other Government department has. In other words, any servant who feels that he has a grievance in regard to promotion has the right to appeal. He can appeal to the General Manager and to the Railway Board. They make use of those channels. It is only after very thorough investigation, after weighing all the factors, that a decision is arrived at, either to reject or to uphold the appeal. No other civil servant has that right. They cannot appeal. But the Railwayman has that right to appeal. To think for one moment that all these promotions take place because the persons affected know somebody higher up is, of course, the biggest nonsense one can ever talk. There is no such thing. This appeal procedure has been in existence for 60 years and has been found to be satisfactory. It is supported by the staff. But still the hon. member makes this accusation.

Then the hon. member says that there has never been more dissatisfaction than there is at the present time. He says further that I must not hide behind the trade unions and that I must institute an impartial investigation into this dissatisfaction. Then the hon. gentleman says that if this inquiry finds there is no dissatisfaction, I could make a monkey out of him. I will not interfere with nature. [Laughter.] Of course there are individual grievances; I have never denied that. The hon. member quoted half a dozen. There are and always have been grievances, but any servant who is dissatisfied and has a grievance can appeal through the right channels right up to the Minister and the Railway Board. With a staff of 225,000 it is quite obvious that there must be dissatisfaction among many of them. There must be grievances. There are groups that are dissatisfied. Any group whose requests are refused, is dissatisfied. The hon. member mentioned the assistant foremen. Of course they are dissatisfied, because their requests have been refused.

Had you not said that it was a reasonable request?

No. The hon. member does not really know. The trouble is he always listens to one side of the story, and not the other. That is why he brings these matters before the House. Of course the assistant foremen receive less earnings than the men in the workshop, the artisans working under them. But those artisans do not receive higher wages; they receive higher earnings because they do bonus work. That is not only confined to the artisans in the workshops and the assistant foremen. The running foreman receives less than the driver working overtime and Sunday time. Their earnings are higher than that of the running foreman. There are quite a number of other grades where there are similar conditions. As a matter of fact, the pilots on overseas routes have much higher earnings than the Manager of the Airways. The General Manager of the Railways even receives a bigger salary than I get as a Minister.

It is quite right according to merit.

I said it is quite right. I have never denied him that, because I have given him that salary. Does the hon. member not know that? I am responsible for giving the General Manager the salary he is getting, a higher salary than that of the Minister. As a matter of fact, if this was a private undertaking, he would probably have received four times the salary he is receiving now. He deserves it, as the hon. gentleman said. That is what I am trying to tell that hon. member; it is nothing new. It happens in many grades. Of course these men are dissatisfied. Whenever a request is refused them, they are dissatisfied.

But is that sound policy?

Yes, of course. I have to say “No” very often to the trade unions when they come to me with requests. But I still have their full support and loyalty, despite the fact that I am saying “No”, because these men are responsible men. They are responsible leaders. They know that when I say “No”, it is generally in the interests of the Administration. They realize that. But there is no general dissatisfaction. I reject that entirely.

The hon. gentleman said that I hide behind the trade unions. Does he realize that these staff organizations represent 90 per cent of the European and Coloured workers? If they did not look after the interests of their members, they would not be re-elected to their executives. They are not appointed; they are elected by their members. If they do not do their job as they should do it, they will not be re-elected to those positions. What right has the hon. member to speak disparagingly of the trade unions when they represent 90 per cent of the workers, Coloured and European? They do an excellent job of work.

To show how little reliance one can place on many of the statements made by the hon. member, I want to deal with one of the matters he raised, in detail. The hon. member must listen now. I am quoting his Hansard. He said:

That is what the hon. gentleman said. What are the facts? First of all it was not a driver. There were two ticket examiners in Braamfontein. On 22nd September, 1967, they were on duty on train No. 9589 from Naledi station to Johannesburg. This train should have departed at 10.31 p.m. and was scheduled to stop at all stations. The train actually left I 10.26 p.m. and did not stop at Merafe, Inhlazane and Ikwezi, but stopped for the first time at Dube and arrived at Johannesburg 18 minutes before the scheduled time. I continue to quote in Afrikaans:

This is what really happened. In other words, these men were sentenced after having been found guilty on a charge of assault. This evidence came to light in the course of the Railway Police’s investigation and they had to report it to the public prosecutor and he decided to prosecute. Now what remains of the hon. member’s accusation? The hon. member should make more and better enquiries before he raises a matter in this House. If he does that and hears what the position actually is, he will not be so silly as to come to this House with this sort of charge.

So the only untrue thing is that it was not the driver but the ticket examiner?

The untrue thing is that the blame was placed on the Railways and he said that we prosecuted the man, which is quite untrue. It was done entirely at the discretion of the Public Prosecutor. There was no special investigation in regard to the question of fraud. It was merely incidental to the main charge of assault. The hon. member therefore has no case.

Then you had better speak to your own newspapers.

This is exactly the trouble. The hon. member believes everything he reads in newspapers and I do not.

The hon. member also raised the question of tally clerks. I want to be brief, because I only have half an hour at my disposal to reply to the Third Reading. The Railways employ 441 tally clerks. A special inquiry was made regarding this matter and since this matter has already been raised by the trade union concerned, I think it was unnecessary for the hon. member to raise it here. 125 of these tally clerks were found suitable for appointment as checkers, but only 89 were prepared to be so appointed. The wages of those tally clerks actually performing the duties of checkers were increased to R5.55 per day, which is equivalent to the minimum wage of a checker, as from the 16th February, 1969.

The hon. member also spoke about victimization and mentioned the case of the train driver who was fined for refusing to work after having asked for relief. I think it is important that I should deal with this matter in brief. Staff Regulation No. 86 in regard to the relieving of trainmen reads as follows:

In other words, there is no compulsion that relief must be supplied. It is not a new regulation that relief shall be provided subject to the exigencies of the Service; it has been the regulation for decades. Now what really happened in this particular case the hon. member mentioned? The hon. member gave the names of three drivers from Cape Town. The cases against Aggenbach and Horn are still sub judice and have not been finalized yet. The history of the third case regarding Mr. Van der Westhuizen is as follows—

It was therefore found that this driver was guilty as charged and he was accordingly fined. The hon. member also said that Railwaymen who give information are subject to victimization. I do not know of what earthly use it is to Railwaymen to give information to this hon. member about their so-called grievances. I do not know what they can gain or accomplish by doing that. Surely they do not think that the hon. member will be able to persuade me to agree to their requests or that airing the grievances will make the position any better? They have their official channels they can utilize and there is also a procedure whereby they can appeal. Why do they come to the hon. member and of what earthly use is it?

A lot of them come to us, you will be surprised.

I do not know why they should. Their requests should really go through the ordinary channels.

They do.

They do not go through the ordinary channels, because they do not go as far as they can go if they want to. Having their grievances aired here does not help them in the least, and I take the strongest exception to Railwaymen who write to their members of Parliament to air their grievances, because they have a sympathetic Board, a sympathetic General Manager and a sympathetic Minister. [Interjections.] That is their overwhelming experience. The hon. member quoted only about half a dozen cases out of a total number of 225,000 workers. I do not know what these people can gain by running to the hon. member. They can gain absolutely nothing. As far as victimization is concerned, I want to say that no Railwayman has been victimized because he went to his member of Parliament. As a matter of fact I allowed some Railwaymen to stand as members of Parliament for the United Party. They were not victimized. I allowed them to serve on United Party committees and they have never been victimized for that although I think it is very silly for them to do it. All the Railwaymen who stood as candidates for the United Party have always lost their deposits, but the fact remains that I have never stopped them from doing so. There is therefore no question of victimization. I want to say that they should make use of the existing channels and the appeal procedure whereby they can air all their grievances. If they have grievances that affect them as a group they have got their trade unions. The trade unions are always prepared to fight for them.

*In the few moments I have left I should like to tell the hon. member for Lichtenburg that the railway link between Lichtenburg and Mafeking is something he has raised before. It is an uneconomic proposition, but I asked for a further survey to be made so that I can see what the real position is, i.e. what the traffic is and where the railway link should be built.

The hon. member for Vasco said I should give consideration to the building of harbours and that I should not close that door. I can assure the hon. member that the door is not being closed and that I am always giving consideration to it, but at present there is no justification for it.

The hon. member for Orange Grove again discussed the pipeline, but I am not going to repeat what I already said during the Second Reading debate. The hon. member said I should also plan for the conveyance of other commodities through the pipeline. If he had been here when the Bill was put through Parliament the other day, he would have seen that I had already taken the power to build other pipelines for other commodities.

†In regard to the Transkeian allowance I want to say to the hon. member that this is a hardy annual and that I have replied to the hon. member before. I want to suggest to the hon. member that he should read my reply in Hansard which I gave him last year.

*The hon. member for Turffontein wanted to know whether we are getting enough men to train as pilots. I can assure him that we are indeed getting them. As I said the other day, we are getting them from the Defence Force. The hon. member will realize that in the event of war the entire S.A. Airways will be transferred to the Department of Defence; in other words, all my pilots will then be used by them. That is why there is the arrangement that I can get pilots from them. In connection with air freight, there are already aircraft in service which can be converted into freight-carriers, and it will be possible to do the same with the new aircraft on order.

†In connection with the towels which the hon. member said that we should provide on internal services, but I think the passengers reach their destinations so quickly that they will not have an opportunity of using that service before they get there. Then there was reference to film shows and music channels and earphones. We tried that. We made an experiment with earphones and music on the internal service, but it did not prove a success. The passengers did not like it, and so we abolished it.

The hon. member for Karoo spoke about Coloured pensioners. I explained the position to him last session, and I dealt with it fully then. I suggest the hon. member should read my reply to him last session when he raised this matter.

I want some more money this session, for the Coloured pensioners.

There is no contributory pension scheme for the Coloured workers. They have a savings pension scheme, and after a certain length of service they receive an annuity out of Railway revenue, without contributing at all. In other words, those Coloured servants are better off than the white servants because they do not contribute.

But they want an increase.

The Coloured servants cannot afford to contribute to a pension scheme. That is why the savings scheme was introduced. In regard to the Coloured workers, I wonder whether the hon. member knows that two years ago I received an address from the Coloured Workers’ Association thanking me for what I had done for the Coloured people since I have been Minister of Transport. They actually came to my office in Union Buildings, Pretoria, to present me with this address of thanks and appreciation for what I had done for them.

Would you not like an address like that from the Transkeian Whites?

I would love it. I dealt with the future of the Coloured people on the Railways last session also, and I do not want to repeat myself because my time is very short. In regard to consolidating overtime with wages, I think that is quite impracticable, even if you take an average amount of overtime. All the railwaymen do not work overtime. There are many grades where no overtime is ever worked and where there is also a shortage of staff. There is a shortage of staff in the clerical grades and all the clerks do not work overtime. So that suggestion is quite impracticable. In any case, if they object to Coloured people being employed in posts formerly occupied by Whites, they will still object whether you consolidate their overtime with basic wages or not. [Time expired.]

When this debate was adjourned on Thursday the House was not in a mood to discuss those questions which one wanted to raise, and I hope that in the remaining time one might be able to persuade the hon. the Minister perhaps even at this stage that this Bill and the ones that follow it are not the wisest things to do in regard to Bantu higher education. I think the first and most important question one should ask is whether this change in status and in the manner in which the University of Fort Hare is to be conducted is wise at this stage. Are these Bantu university colleges ready for this step that is now to be taken? I think when one transforms a university college into a full-blooded university, there are certain criteria which should be observed. If one looks at the preamble of the Rhodes University Private Act, No. 15 of 1949, one finds the following—

That is the test. When a university college has achieved all those things, one is entitled to transform its status into that of a university. The figures that have been quoted by the hon. members for Berea and Green Point and others make it quite clear that this Bill is nonsense at this stage; these university colleges have not yet reached that stage, judged by the quality or the size or the money or in any other of the fields, nor passed the tests one would normally apply before giving university status to an institute of higher learning like this. And it appears that certain hon. members opposite agree with this. The hon. member for Mayfair asked what the hurry was. He said: “Ons moet ’n agterstand inhaal”.

The hon. member for Mayfair never spoke.

I am sorry, I meant the hon. member for Westdene. One gets confused with the constituencies and members with English names on that side of the House. But he agreed that in fact there was a big leeway to make up and that there was no hurry about this matter at all. The hon. member for Boksburg said the same thing. He said these institutions were not ripe for such development, and he said that when the time came when they were ripe, the White Council would disappear. These arguments only bolster up what was said on this side of the House, and I wonder whether the hon. the Minister agrees with that, because the remarkable thing is that the hon. the Prime Minister said in a Press release on 1st April that the Government had taken this resolution in regard to these Bills in the belief that the university colleges and their personnel have given proof of their ability to maintain the same standards which are applied by the independent universities. Now who is right, the hon. the Prime Minister or the hon. members who spoke? What are the views of this Minister? Are they really able to maintain the same standards which apply to or are applied by the independent universities? And if they are, why is it then felt necessary to maintain this stranglehold on them? What a tangled web we weave when first we practise to deceive, as the saying goes. I think we are entitled to ask ourselves whether we are justified in spending the money which is going to be involved in three complete, different universities for the Bantu people, when none of them has developed to that stage where they would in ordinary circumstances, were this not an ideological matter but purely a matter of higher education, have qualified to be translated into independent universities.

One wonders as to the wisdom of the method by which this transformation is to take place. Why should these university colleges for the Bantu be removed from the protective umbrella of the University of South Africa? What is going to be put in its place? If you look at the Bill, what is put in its place is nothing, except the Department of Bantu Education. That is what is put in its place, and nothing else. They are removed from the influence of the University of South Africa and they are removed in the result from the sphere of higher education. How can anyone assume that the Minister and his Department are any substitute for the umbrella of the University of South Africa? All three of these new universities for the Bantu will come under the umbrella of the Minister and his Department. Surely when you are dealing with higher education, you are dealing with higher education. When you are dealing with universities, you must have a universitas. You must have all the influences that there are in the field of higher education. Surely if we are going to have any higher education in this country, we must have higher education which is higher education and it should all come under one Minister. But here we have this Minister who deals with higher education for the Bantu. There is the hon. the Minister of Indian Affairs, who deals with higher education for the Indians. It is hard to believe, but that is what is proposed. Then we have the hon. the Minister of Coloured Affairs, who will deal with higher Coloured education, and we have a fourth Minister who will deal with higher education for the Whites. The question that this poses is whether there is going to be a difference between the higher education, the university education, of the Coloured people, of the Bantu people, of the Indian people, and of the White people? And if there is a difference, what is it? Does the hon. the Minister say there will be no difference?

I will reply in due course.

If there is going to be a difference, we would like to know what it is, because we believe, as I said before, that higher education is higher education; and if you are going to call a place a university, it must have the status and the standards of a university. One wonders whether any service is going to be done to the Bantu people by this move. At the moment these people receive in their university colleges degrees from the University of South Africa, degrees which are recognized throughout the academic world in this country and elsewhere. I wonder, with this sort of institution removed entirely from that academic world, which was accepted, whether the degrees which will be obtained by the Bantu from these universities, controlled by the Department, and unrelated to any university, in that sense, will be recognized anywhere else. I think this is a question which might well be asked and it is terribly important. If you go on to higher education and you wish to expand your field, then you very often have to go elsewhere in order to obtain the experience and the learning that we do not have at some of our own universities. This is extremely important and up to now we have maintained a standard in respect of all our people under the umbrella of the University of South Africa, but now that is to disappear. I wonder whether the hon. the Minister has given that any thought. I wonder whether he has consulted with anyone, and whether any consultation has been undertaken in respect of this matter with other universities and with educational authorities outside of our own borders, quite apart from the fact that we would like to know from the hon. the Minister whether, when he proposed the provisions of this Bill, he consulted with the Transkei Legislative Assembly, the elected body of people who represent the Xhosa people for whom this university is intended. I hope the hon. the Minister will make a note to reply to that question, i.e. whether he consulted with them, and whether, if he did not consult with them, he does not feel that they are entitled also to have some say in the staffing of the council; whether they should not have the right also to nominate persons to this council. I hope the Minister will make a note of that and reply to it when he replies to this debate, part of which he has not heard.

I have been making notes all along.

The hon. the Minister must have difficulty in making notes in respect of a debate which he did not hear.

I made the notes—good notes.

Are your notes better than your thesis?

I made accurate notes.

The hon. the Deputy Minister’s antics in respect of higher education, with his thesis, are not such as to encourage one to believe that he made accurate notes. He might as with his thesis have changed his mind between the time he took the notes and the time he advised the hon. the Minister. Sir, I think the question that we have to ask ourselves is this: Is this the right method to build towards a university? Because this institution is in fact not going to become a university; it is going to become part of a department store, part of the Bantu Administration and Development department store, that part intended to put the Xhosas into one department, and that is why this question is so important. It is envisaged that there are going to be different standards of university education or not? If not why is it that we cannot have one Minister, the Minister of Higher Education, in charge of all these Bills relating to universities?

Sir, there is very little time left but I want to say this: If there is one aspect in respect of which we in the future have to have some sort of contact with the non-White people, then surely it is in the sphere of higher education so that we can have educated people, university graduates, coming together and talking to each other about those matters which concern them all. You can have no dialogue in this sphere if the standards of your education are going to be as different as they might well be. Sir, these universities must develop our way; in other words, they must develop along the lines of Western Christian civilization, and they must develop alongside of and in collaboration with the existing universities.

Who says they will not?

That is why the hon. member for Kensington was at such great pains to indicate what it was that we wanted when we talked about a university. We want a university that is a university in the South African sense, a place of higher learning which will produce a standard which will not only be sufficiently high for our own country, but a standard which will be sufficiently high for those graduates to expand and extend their knowledge in other countries. Sir, there are other things that we would have liked to discuss but procedurally we cannot do so except by having a select committee. Seeing that this umbrella of the University of South Africa is being removed we would have liked to see a South African Bantu University, a bigger umbrella of which all these universities would become constituent parts, but procedurally we cannot do that at all except with a select committee. I suggest that that is a thought which is worth considering and I suggest that this is another reason why the hon. the Minister should indicate that he will ask the House to accede to the request that a select committee be appointed before the second reading.

Sir, I have one minute left and I want to make a plea once again to the hon. the Minister at least to allow this matter to go to a select committee. The debate we have had here is not the foundation for a place of higher education. What we should do is to discuss what is best for all of us in the future by having at least one sphere where the Black people, the Coloured people, the Indian people and the White people can talk to each other as civilized, educated people.

The hon. member, right at the end of his last minute (which, between parentheses, he did not even put to full use) gave me great cause for mirth. I have often had a great deal to say in the House and know that when you come to your last minute you try to cram all the allegations you want to make and all the facts you want to mention into that minute. The hon. member did not use a part of his last minute; the part which he did in fact use, he used to repeat what he had previously said. That just goes to show how insincere the hon. member was in regard to the facts he mentioned, and how unconvinced he was, and how lacking he was in arguments. I shall return later to the hon. member; for the time being this is all I want to say. I want to keep him in suspense until the end, because if I reply now to all the points he raised, he may perhaps leave.

Sir, I really want to begin by expressing my gratitude to hon. members on both sides of the House. I want to express my gratitude to hon. members on my side of the House who participated in this debate and who made my task very easy with the effective way in which they reacted to miscellaneous arguments, and perhaps also more substantial arguments from the opposite side. In that way hon. members on this side of the House of course made my task much easier, and I need not therefore reply to the miscellany of points raised by the opposite side. I therefore want to express my thanks to hon. members on this side who spoke and offer my sympathy to my colleagues on this side who wanted to speak but who did not get an opportunity to do so. In addition I also want to express my gratitude to the Opposition, particularly to the hon. member for Kensington and to the Whips of the Opposition who understood that I would have been unable, owing to official duties, to have been present at the debate which was to have taken place on Thursday, and who were quite satisfied to have the debate heard further by my able Deputy Minister who, very faithfully, left me what are in fact too many notes in regard to this debate. I thank the Opposition therefore, but I am afraid that I must be honest and say that my thanks to the Opposition cannot extend any further than that.

At the outset of my reply I should like to say something which I should perhaps have said in my Second-Reading speech. As a matter of fact, I am sorry that I did not do so, although I am afraid that it would not have been of much use. It would have been a vain attempt. After all, it must be very clear to everybody and it must have been accented by all that although we are now coming forward with this Bill of Fort Hare—and the same applies to the other two which will follow and in fact to the other four which will follow—that we are not now for the first time in 1969 coming forward with the concept of separate universities for the non-white nations. This is not the first time we are coming forward with a thing like this; it is an old thing; it was thrashed out 10 years ago in this House. The important fundamental principles of this measure, and of the others, are simply located in the academic aspect at the university colleges in regard to which a change is being effected. No change is being made to the financial basis and numerous other aspects affecting the college. Perhaps the whole thing is being overhauled and modernized a little as far as the wording is concerned, but the only fundamental feature which affects these colleges in principle is simply the academic aspect. In other words, in preparing these Bills we actually found ourselves in the difficult situation that we had for technical reasons—and for technical reasons only—to draft an entire new Bill for each one of these five colleges, and also for this one which we are now dealing with. Also for technical reasons, therefore, it was not possible to confine the discussion within this Council to that academic aspect which in fact contains the fundamental change. Because an entirely new Bill was submitted to the House, use was made of this opportunity to discuss these matters as if we were coming forward with this concept for the first time in the history of South Africa. This is the technical explanation, and we will probably have to accept it. In fact it is very unfortunate that this debate was conducted on a basis which presupposed that we were now coming forward, for the first time in the history of South Africa, with institutions of this type for the non-white nations. Sir, I am not going to play that little game in my reply. I am not going to pretend that we are coming forward with these non-white universities for the first time. I shall reply to the odd points which were raised, but I am not going to reply fundamentally to this matter as if this were the first time we were coming forward with non-white universities.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Kensington moved as an amendment that this Bill be referred to a select committee.

†Unfortunately the hon. member for Kensington did not elaborate satisfactorily on the amendment which he moved. Sir, what is the object of this House in referring a Bill like this to a select committee? It is to examine the Bill properly—and that is what we did 10 years ago—and to come forward with suggestions as to how to improve it. A select committee can only go into a matter like this theoretically, and that is what we did in 1959. But. Sir, we have had almost 10 years of practical experience of the five university colleges. In the case of Fort Hare we have had 50 years of practical experience, and I say there is absolutely no justification for a select committee at this stage after eight or nine years’ experience in the case of four of these colleges and after 50 years’ experience in the case of Fort Hare. There is absolutely no justification for it and the hon. member for Kensington should have dealt with this aspect first before he tried to make out a case for a select committee on this Bill. We also had the very useful advantage that the five colleges could co-operate with my Department and with the other Departments concerned in drafting this Bill and the other Bills. [Laughter.] Sir, that hon. member is laughing at his own ignorance. We had the staffs of those colleges and the bodies of those colleges who could give their attention to these Bills when they were drawn up. We had consultations over a long period with regard to these Bills. I cannot see therefore what justification there is for a select committee as asked for.

Did you ask the Transkei Government?

I will come to all those points in the course of my reply. I will deal with that point later on in another context.

I then come to the request made by the hon. member for Houghton. The hon. member did not ask for a select committee because she said that such a committee would be useless just as the select committee of 1959 was useless. She would like to have a commission to go into this matter in depth, as she put it.

As you did for the white universities.

Sir, I think it is my turn to speak now and the hon. member’s turn to listen. The hon. member favoured us with her advice as to who should serve on that commission. She gave us three names. Amongst others, she mentioned Professor Thom of Stellenbosch. I hope she did not do so because she thinks he is retiring. He is only retiring at the end of the year; not now. As I say, she gave us three names: Professor McCrone, Professor Thom and Dr. E. G. Malherbe. Now, Sir, who is Professor Thom? He is one of the persons who collaborated with us in the preparation of these Bills. Perhaps the hon. member does not know it, but Professor Thom is the chairman of the Council of the University College of the Western Cape.

I want all sides represented on this commission.

Professor Thom is one of the people who assisted us. He assisted us as chairman of that Council and also in his personal capacity.

The hon. member has forgotten what Dr. E. G. Malherbe said in a book which he specially wrote when we introduced the laws in regard to separate university colleges in 1959. In 1959 he accepted the principle that colleges of this nature could be established in South Africa. I shall come to that point later. I shall then show the hon. member that it is dangerous for her to suggest that Dr. Malherbe should serve on such a commission, because there is a 50 per cent chance that he will not decide as she thinks he will decide.

Would you like to take a small bet on that?

Order! I have stated before that this is not Tattersalls.

Mr. Speaker, I should also like to remind hon. members and especially the hon. member for Kensington, who moved the amendment, that Dr. Rautenbach, the Rector of the University of Pretoria is the Chairman of the Council of the University College of the North. He is also a very experienced man. He is one of our most capable rectors and academicians. He is a man whose advice and assistance were also available to us when we prepared these Bills. The same applies to the chairman of the Council of the University College of Durban, Professor van der Walt. As a matter of fact, Professor van der Walt is not only the chairman of the Council of the University College in Durban, but he is also a member of the Council of the University College of Ngoya in Zululand. These eminent academicians in South Africa co-operated with us when we drew up these Bills. I do not think that there are any other people available in South Africa who could, in a commission of inquiry, give us better information than we already have received from these and other persons. I think that, after what I have said now, the hon. member for Houghton must just be satisfied that nothing will come of her request for a commission of inquiry. The same applies to the amendment moved by the hon. member for Kensington.

*Mr. Speaker, I want to discuss something else now, which various hon. members on the opposite side of the House have touched upon. First of all I want to discuss general matters. Later on I shall deal with the specific matters. The general matters which I now want to mention are firstly the question of academic independence and secondly the general autonomy of these institutions. Hon. members on the opposite side confused these two matters completely. They concentrated on the general autonomy—or let me rather say the alleged autonomy—of the university, while in this Bill we are dealing with academic autonomy or independence. This does not affect other aspects of existing laws. Hon. members who confused these two subjects, sang the same old theme song: of ten years ago, namely that these universities would be hopeless and that they do not even look like institutions which would have autonomy. According to them, I, and I take it the other Ministers as well who will deal with similar Bills, will have a tight stranglehold on those universities. That is what the hon. member for Durban (North) said this afternoon. Sir, perhaps hon. members will recall what I said in 1959 as an ordinary member and backbencher, when we were originally dealing with this matter. If they cannot remember, they would be advised to look it up. We must realize one thing, and that is that if any state, department or minister or high ranking government official plays a role in the constitution and the administration of a university, it does not in any way mean that that university’s autonomy is being affected. Hon. members, and particularly the hon. member for Durban (North), who has become rooted to one single idea complex, must fully comprehend that in the world in which we are living there are many patterns for the idea of a university. There is not only the Cambridge and Oxford pattern. There is not only the French and American pattern. There is a large variety of patterns, and all that we here in South Africa are doing is to apply that diversity of patterns in respect of our non-white universities as well. I want to repeat that there are universities in the world where the state plays a much greater role than we are playing in the case of these five university colleges, or than we have played to date. Yet those university institutions in other countries are regarded and accepted as being autonomous universities, and there the state plays a much greater role than we are playing here. I should like to mention a few examples. It would do the hon. member good to look up this matter in the library. The books are there. If he does not feel like doing that, Sir, he can read my speech I made in 1959. It is very short, but it will help him. If that is too much for him, he must simply listen to what I am now going to say. We are following a pattern which is without a doubt being followed in the Western world. I shall mention examples of this. With this non-white university we are following a pattern which is being followed in the Western world, in Britain as well. Even in Britain we do not merely get the Oxford and Cambridge pattern. There are other universities as well. In America, France, Greece, Belgium and numerous other western countries there is a large variety of patterns. I want to make this very clear to you, so that hon. members can perhaps learn something. There is, for example, a university in Holland, the principal of which himself has admitted in black and white that there is not merely one criterion which is of importance when considering whether a university is autonomous or not. This, is namely, the appointment of its lecturers and the compiling of its estimates. It is in that very case that the State plays a role, but those people still maintain that they are autonomous. But I want to mention better examples than that. I am now coming to what Dr. Malherbe wrote. In 1955 he published a booklet under the title “The Autonomy of our Universities”. On page 4 of that he states (translation)—

That is what Dr. Malherbe wrote in 1959. At the time when these colleges were being established he said that there was nothing inherently wrong with the principle of State universities, apart from that, these five university colleges which are now going to become universities are not even State universities such as are to be found in other parts of the world. So, for example we find in America—and I want to mention three examples only—the State university of New York, the University of California and the State University of Ohio. At these three universities all the council members, the chairman and the vice-chairman are appointed by the governor of the state. In some cases the governor of the state is the chairman and he has made the speaker of the legislative council of his state a member of that council, and the chief official of the department of education is also a member of that council. In respect of the State University of Ohio there is even a provision to the effect that not more than five persons from one political party may serve in the council of that state university. Therefore they even go so far as to lay down provisions regarding the university in terms of party politics. We are a long way from doing this, nor will we ever do so. Those hon. members do not realize that they are talking nonsense when they announce for world consumption here that we are doing something harmful here. What we are doing here does not even approximate to what exists elsewhere in the world. In America there are even institutions such as municipal universities where the mayor appoints the entire council, but we are nowhere near following that example. I want to mention that in America, and particularly in France, there are universities which call themselves autonomous but whose estimates have to be approved by the state. This is something which can be compared to the situation in regard to our university colleges. I am also mentioning the case of the Belgian universities where the minister under whom they fall has to appoint all the lecturers. Here the council appoints the lecturers with the approval of the Minister. The salaries received by the lecturers there are paid out by means of departmental cheques from the state and not even by means of those from the universities. But they do not state that the lecturers are government officials and that they are violating the definition of what a university should really be, as is being alleged by the hon. member for Houghton. They call themselves autonomous universities. I think that if there is any country where one can learn about education and the philosophy of education it is probably Greece. What is happening there? There are universities where all the lecturers are ordinary public servants. This is probably a terrifying idea to hon. members on the opposite side who think that there is only one single pattern which should be followed in respect of a university. We find the same in Australia in respect of the University of Canberra, but I do not think it is necessary to mention further examples. There are many more than those I mentioned.

A further general remark which was made here with such regularity that it seemed to me hon. members on the opposite side had been prompted to say this when they got together in a group, is that there is no need for haste with this Bill. They are trying to imply that we are in great haste with the introduction of this Bill to make universities of the university colleges. I now want to hasten to point out that we are not coming to this Parliament in any haste in order to introduce these Bills. We negotiated with the university colleges, and they with us, for almost two years. There were extensive consultations, and there has been no great haste with this. However, the time is quite ripe for this now, and that is why we are now introducing this Bill.

Hon. members on the opposite side—and the hon. member for Green Point was one of them—asked why there should be three universities. They said there could be one, but not three. Do you still remember 1959? Then they did not even want one, and they said that something like that should not be allowed.

That is wrong.

Yes, because their amendment of 1959 merely stated, only if it could be justified, but then it should be a university. However, they said that it could not be justified. Now they are saying perhaps one, but not three.

They are making progress.

They are making progress, as my hon. friend says, and have got as far as one now. However, I do not know whether it is merely an hallucination, because if I read between the lines—and one gets used to reading between the lines here—it seems to me that these hon. members, as in 1959, still do not want a university. However, they are too afraid of their own liberalists to say it. They are playing both sides against the centre and sitting astride the fence again. That is what they are getting up to. They want to imply outside that they want to reduce the number of university colleges, so that they can influence those outside who perhaps do not like the idea of these colleges. This is another variation of the old story, i.e. that the Government is doing too much for the black people. They are making insinuations in this regard again, and they therefore want to reduce the number to zero. However, they are still afraid of the Mike Mitchells and the Cathy Taylors and all the other liberalists in the United Party.

Wait till you see the amendments.

If the hon. member is not a liberalist, we applaud her, but there are many others and she will probably know them better than I do. But she would like to intimate to those people that they do not want to abolish all of them, that there should be at least one. The point which hon. members should understand very well, and which the Bantu outside will understand, is that hon. members do not want to give each ethnic family of the Bantu nations, which ought to have their own institutions because of their distinctive, cultural backgrounds, a university college. That is the whole reason, and I would have liked to have heard, since they have said that there should only be one, whether they intended that one to be for all the Bantu nations, plus the Indians and the Coloureds, or did they mean that the one university should have been for the Bantu nations only. Should the Coloureds and the Indians have separate university institutions, or should these also he closed down and must they go back to the white universities? Hon. members on the opposite side do not talk about this, but merely make insinuations so that they can keep on sitting astride the fence when they get outside.

We came forward with this legislation because we wanted to lay this foundation timeously and this was a good thing for two very good reasons, which I want to mention. The first is that their education must also progress to the highest level, so that they can also have university institutions which would meet the needs of their specific distinctive cultural heritage and national character, and so that these institutions can provide the necessary education in order to further their development as distinctive nations. As hon. members on this side of the House have said, we are not concealing the fact that these university colleges were established ten years ago as an inevitable consequence of our policy of the separate development of each of these nations. For these reasons we brought them together into ethnic groups. The Sotho nations in one, the Nguni in another and of course, up there in the Northern Transvaal another one for the other ethnic groups living there. That is the one main reason. The other is that it is the sensible thing for us to have begun with this basic spade-work, i.e. the acquisition of sites and the construction of buildings, ten years ago so that we did not need to have made a start with it now or in ten years’ time, because what would it not have cost? As far as the costs aspect is concerned, we began too late with this, and we should rather have begun earlier. These hon. members do not want to realize this. This is of course a very important financial consideration as well. When those hon. members state that three universities are too many for the Bantu and that there should only be one, I want to ask them whether it is a valid argument to say to a population of 12 million that there should only be one university for them. Is that a fair criterion?

How many matriculants are there?

I have the figures here and I shall furnish them in a moment. Because of what I am going to say to him the hon. member would do well to go and take some fortifying refreshment.

How many students?

The figures relating to student I shall also mention. We do not run away from arguments which are worthwhile replying to, and all the hon. member has to do is wait. The other very important reasons I also mentioned during the Second Reading, but in order to complete the picture I shall mention them again now. The other reason is that increased independence for these university colleges is inevitable because the University of South Africa, from the nature of its objectives and its functions, cannot make provision for all the things we need. I have mentioned an example and I shall do so again. The University of South Africa cannot and need not have a faculty of agriculture. For us however it is very important and that is why we have made a start with the faculty of agriculture at Fort Hare by means of which we will at least be able to help all the Bantu nations in that faculties of agriculture have not yet been established at the other Bantu universities. This is not the only example I can give of academic justification for the step we are taking. I want to mention the example of law studies. I insist that Bantu law, as practised by the Bantu among themselves and in their homelands can come into its own far more successfully in the law courses offered at Bantu universities than it can at the white university institutions. There are still other examples I could mention. Each nation has specific needs which are peculiar to it, and that is why these universities can make better provision for those specific needs, i.e. because they are specifically designed and because they are not generally designed to further them.

We all know that the successful maintenance of a university, and particularly the maintenance of its academic standards, of increasing its status and ensuring work of a high quality, depends to a large extent upon its academic staff. It would be a tremendous stimulus to the academic staff of these institutions to know that they were attached to a university which had academic independence in the South African sense of the word even if it did not have complete independence in the South African sense of the word. It is important therefore that we should do this now and should not procrastinate because the time is ripe for it now.

Another point mentioned by hon. members was the costs aspect. It was argued here by hon. members and particularly the hon. members for Green Point, Berea and Kensington that the costs aspect was, to tell the truth, very disturbing. I want to say here that, to my mind, the whole tone of the arguments by hon. members on the opposite side smacked too much of the political opportunistic technique which they are always displaying, when it suits their purpose, of telling people that the Government is doing too much for the Bantu. It is the same technique which is being applied to the universities, only with a different variation. Hon. members made strange calculations, because they added the current costs for the year plus capital costs, divided this by the number of students and then stated that this was the cost per student, as if all the capital costs had to be redeemed in the first year. They do not think of it as a long-term undertaking. That hon. orator for Pietermaritzburg (District is now shaking his head. I am going to mention the cost figures to this House, and I want to say to hon. members that I am far more inclined to rely on the Controller and Auditor-General of the Republic of South Africa than on them, and these are his figures which I shall quote. I want to mention to you the unit costs, but before I do that, I want to make an assertion which will substantiate these costs and which is one that hon. members on this side of the House have made, i.e. that there is a very intimate correlation between the number of students at the university and the fact that it is a young university on the one hand as opposed to the costs on the other. There is a relationship between these two facts. The younger a university the fewer the number of students attending it, and the higher the running costs, and surely that is obvious. The older a university becomes, the lower the costs. This phenomenon has already made itself apparent over a period of four years, for which I want to furnish these figures. I am giving you the figures from 1963 to 1967, as furnished by the Controller and Auditor-General. In 1963 the unit costs per student at Fort Hare, according to him, were R2,135, and in 1967 this decreased to R1,490, because the number of students increased from 239 to 436. The number of students increased appreciably and the unit costs per student decreased appreciably—cause and effect.

We find the same phenomenon at all three the other university colleges, and I am certain that the same figures will be supplied by my colleagues here, the Minister of Coloured Affairs and the Minister of Indian Affairs. In Zululand the unit costs in 1963 were R1,714 per student, and at that time there were 136 students. In 1967 the costs were R1,418, and then there were 331 students. At the University College of the North the costs in 1963 were R1,291. with 248 students, and in 1967 the figure decreased to R1,096 with 538 students. At all three institutions there is the same phenomenon therefore, although perhaps not with the same differences in percentage. As the number of students increase and the institution becomes older, so the unit costs per student decrease and for that reason they are going to decrease even further in future, except perhaps unless purely temporary circumstances crop up which may cause fluctuations. But as a normal phenomenon the figure will continue to decrease in future. So much for the question of costs. I can give hon. members no better reply than to say that it is a perfectly normal phenomenon that the costs should be high at the beginning. We have all realized this. But the costs have decreased and will continue to decrease to the extent to which these phenomena will be able to continue normally.

As regards general matters this is all I wanted to say, and I shall now come to more specific points raised by hon. members.

I come now to the miscellaneous points. Usually I believe that one should not play at loose balls, but I am going to do so now because these loose balls are really tempting. The hon. member for Kensington said that the fact that these university colleges are now going to become universities is a great blow to African countries because Fort Hare is now going to be closed to them. But Fort Hare is not closed to them in the sense in which the hon. member referred to it. There may be reasons why it has been closed to them temporarily, perhaps because there is no accommodation for students from those countries. The hon. member will probably agree with me that these university colleges have first and foremost been established for our Bantu. During the past two years—I did not go back further than that—these three colleges admitted 17 people from Rhodesia and Malawi because there were facilities for them. The normal basis in regard to the selection of students was applied. If there was no possibility that we would be depriving our own Bantu of opportunities by doing so, then provision of this kind could in fact be made in future as well. What did the hon. member want to achieve with the categoric allegations he made here? After all, it is irresponsible on his part as an old parliamentarian and a person who ought to display the correct pedagogical approach.

Hon. members asked me what consultation there had been with the Bantu in regard to this Bill. I now want to inform hon. members that there was consultation. Hon. members must bear in mind that we have at each of those colleges an advisory council, and that that is the body we have to approach. It is not necessary for us to approach the Bantu Governments. Why not? Because the Bantu Governments are represented on those advisory councils. The Transkei Government are represented on the advisory council of Fort Hare and there is also the necessary liaison with the Ciskei Bantu in that advisory council. The same applies to the others. Thorough consultations were in fact held with the advisory councils in regard to the principles and objectives of this measure. I can inform the hon. member that when I was at Fort Hare in 1967 the advisory council discussed this question of academic independence with me. The council, under the chairmanship of a Ciskeian Bantu, even asked me whether we could not give attention to this matter and I told him that we were going into it and that the necessary negotiations would ensue. They did ensue and at all three Bantu university colleges which my Department deals with, unanimous appreciation was expressed for the academic autonomy for the university colleges which we are now effecting. I think that with these few words I have replied adequately to that question.

Since I am now discussing the advisory councils I would also like to say the following. The hon. member for Kensington in particular tried to dramatise this matter by asking what kind of things the senate and advisory council were. He wanted to know where else in the world one found things like this. But that is no argument. Where else in the world does one find Natives? Where else in the world does one find the many other things one finds in South Africa? Where else in the world, for example, does one find United Party men (Sappe)? Such things one finds only in South Africa. Should we now prevent a university or a university college in South Africa from having an advisory council simply because nothing like it exists in other parts of the world? We must develop our university colleges and universities according to the needs and according to the circumstances of our people and the situation in which we find ourselves. That is why they are there, and they are doing excellent work. We are allowing the councils to continue doing that excellent work. As I have said, the necessary representation is there. The Transkeian Government itself is represented on the advisory council and the Transkeian administration is represented on the council. Similarly the Ciskeian Bantu are represented in the advisory council and the Ciskeian administration in the council of Fort Hare. The hon. members opposite tried to chase up a hare where only a skunk was skulking. Someone on the opposite side made very pointed insinuations about clause 10 (1) (c) and the word “such” which is contained there. It was insinuated that the senate will be composed of “such professors and senior lecturers of the University” who were approved of. There is a very good reason for this. The Minister must keep an eye on what is happening there. It is quite correct. The hon. members for Durban (North) and Kensington would do well to look up the Act for the white University of Natal and they will find the word “such” there as well. Section 9 of the University of Natal Act—the white, not the Indian university—also makes provision for selection in the appointment of members of the senate. I just want to say that we do not apply selection. Of course we will appoint all white professors and heads of departments who qualify for the senate. Similarly an advisory council can in turn appoint the Bantu who qualify for that.

But you yourself said there was no such thing as an advisory senate.

I said that if it could be done, it should be done, and it would be done.

It has not been done in 10 years.

Is the hon. member sorry about it, or is he glad about it? It is a tragedy that he is apparently glad about it. The eloquent hon. member asked us here with much gesture and jest, “Is a chancellor now going to be appointed by the council? Where does one find that?” And he then mentioned Stellenbosch, the Witwatersrand and Pretoria, I think, and he stated that their chancellors were not appointed by the councils but were elected by the convocation.

That is correct; that is what I said.

But surely we do not have only three universities in South Africa.

This happens at the three I mentioned.

Why did the hon. member mention only three?

I was referring to the two here in the Cape, and the other one is Wits …

No, the hon. member should not tell me now. He should have said this when he was making his speech. After all, I made the interjection and asked, “What about Potchefstroom?”

Yes, but I told you that it was different there.

No, wait a minute. I remember that reply very well, it is fresh in my memory. The hon. member said that he had not had a chance of considering them all; apparently he had only had a chance to look at the institutions where the chancellors were chosen by a convocation. But the chancellor of Potchefstroom is appointed by the council.

I know that.

The hon. member says he knows that. The hon. member went into ecstasies here; he said it about 10 to 12 times. In fact, it is one of his educational cliches—that Professor Chris Coetzee of Potchefstroom is a man for whom he has the greatest admiration. He was rector of Potchefstroom for many years, and despite the great admiration which the hon. member rightly has for Professor Coetzee, Professor Coetzee has never caused his council to relinquish the procedure of appointing the chancellor and having him elected by the convocation. But that does not count. The chancellors of the Universities of South Africa. Natal, Rhodes, the Free State, Port Elizabeth, and the Rand Afrikaans University, seven universities altogether, are all appointed by the council in South Africa. But when the non-white colleges become universities and the council appoints their chancellors the hon. member for Kensington says: “wickedness” superlative. The hon. member for Durban (North) asked a while back why we could not develop these universities on the pattern of the University of South Africa. If the chancellor of seven white universities is appointed by the council and the chancellor of only four is appointed by the convocation, which is South African, the seven or the four?

What about those universities which do not have a convocation, such as Port Elizabeth and Cape Town?

The hon. member for Kensington is thinking now of explanations for his nonsensical statements of last week. He shall get another chance later on.

The hon. member for Durban (Berea) and other hon. members also had a great deal to say about the Bantu children at school. They said that the numbers attending school were too small for the universities to draw upon for material for university training. Mr. Speaker, in the first instance I think that you were very generous to allow hon. members to have such a lot to say about the children at school. It is slightly relevant, but not to the extent to which they discussed the matter.

You are reflecting on the Chair.

No. I am merely saying that the Chair was generous to them. I thank the Chair for that, for now I am getting my chance too. Let us consider the figures for a moment.

[Inaudible.]

Yes, the hon. member for Wynberg may as well say I am “terrible”. I am not half as “terrible” as she is. I want to furnish only two figures to hon. members, namely that of Bantu students who passed St. 10 with matriculation exemption, and those who did not. The number of students who passed with exemption in 1959 were 72; in 1968 there were 775 (more than 10 times as many); the number of students who passed with school-leaving certificates (without exemption): 152 in 1959 and 491 in 1968. The percentage of passes: in 1959 (all the groups in St. 10) 29 per cent as against 55 per cent in 1968. This is a very large increase. We admit—why should we deny it?—that initially there were very few students which the universities could draw material from. But it has improved appreciably, and it will gradually improve even further. The figures prove this. This is the tendency. Connected to this there is another matter which is aften raised, i.e. that the figure indicating the ratio between students and lecturers is extremely unfavourable as far as these non-white university institutions are concerned. I have the figures in respect of the University Colleges of Fort Hare, Zululand and the North here. To save time I am not going to repeat them. But here, too, there is a very clear correlation between the number of students, in other words the size of the university, and the lecturers. In 1962 at the University College of Fort Hare there were 3.7 students per lecturer. This year that figure has already increased to 5.5. In Zululand it was 3.4; it is now 5.3.

In what year was it 3.4?

1963. [Interjections.] No, 1962. But for the hon. member’s information, it was 3.4 per cent in 1963 as well. At the University College of the North it was 4.3 in 1962. For 1969 the figure was 7.7. Let us compare the figures with those of white universities which are many years older. At Stellenbosch the ratio in 1966 was 6.6 students per lecturer, according to the Department of Education. This is one point less than the figure which applied at the time to the University College of the North. In 1966 the ratio at the latter institution was 6.4. That at Stellenbosch was 6.6. How’s that? Let us take another example. The University of Cape Town is probably a very fine example for hon. members on the opposite side. In 1966 the figure in respect of the University of Cape Town was 7.8 students per lecturer. To-day the figure at the University College of the North is 7.7, that is .1 behind Cape Town, which is almost a century older. The University College of the North is eight years old. Let us take another fine example, i.e. the University of Rhodes. The figure for Rhodes was 6.9 students per lecturer in 1966. This is less favourable than the figure for the University College of the North to-day, i.e. 7.7.

And they are even conferring degrees.

They are even conferring degrees and doing many other things. If hon. members on the Opposition side want to oppose our measures, they must not come forward with such imbecilic arguments.

The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg (District) raised only one matter about which, for the sake of fairness, I must say something. The hon. member stated that he was very mixed up. That I can very well understand, because he is still so to-day. He was very confused last year, he said, when I made a speech at Ngoya and spoke for the first time in public about the coming academic independence. He said that he was terribly confused and that he could not understand it. I do not find that strange. I think there are many university matters which he cannot understand. Then he wanted to know what I had said, because he said that the Bantu were also confused. The Bantu were not confused. They wanted to know from me what the Prime Minister had said, and what I had said. We had said precisely the same thing. We always say the same thing in respect of all matters.

Both “verkramp”.

If the hon. Prime Minister and I think alike because we are both “verkramp”—a word for which I have an eternal loathing—then I say, hooray that I am “verkramp”. Now somebody will probably say that I am as “verlig” as the hon. Prime Minister. Then I also say, hooray that I am as “verlig” as he is. As long as I am thrown into the same boat as he is in I am in good company. The Prime Minister said last year that the Government had decided that the five colleges could be separated academically from the University of South Africa, that is to say in respect of curricula, training of students, examinations, courses, degrees, diplomas and certificates. This is what the Prime Minister said in a Press statement which was issued on 3rd April at 7 o’ clock in the evening. In my speech at Ngoya I said (translation)—

These are syllable for syllable the same words as those of the hon. the Prime Minister.

Read a little more of what the Prime Minister said.

I am talking now about what I said at Ngoya. I said the following as well (translation)—

Only a person who cannot understand these things, could not have understood this. [Interjections.]

The hon. member for Houghton had a great deal to say and she behaved herself here in the way a venerable old member on our side who always used to sit here formerly used to refer to her, i.e. as a mother superior. On Thursday she was in fact again mother superior making merry, or grandmother superior. She said things like “There is no autonomy” and “With the grip of the Minister”, etc. I had in fact pointed out in my introductory speech how there were much firmer grips on universities which were autonomous and which called themselves this in the world, firmer grips than what we are experiencing here. But in addition I should just like to add this: We have had eight to nine years’ time to judge what kind of grip the three Ministers have had on the university colleges, and I maintain the grip they had was a magnificent one, because they have made something valuable of those colleges, and they are now able to become universities. It was not a grip which strangled them, but one which caused them to flourish, caused them to expand. She said the institution would be “only a creature of the Minister”. It is nowhere near “a creature of the Governor” as they have in Australia and America and other countries. And if a creature of the Minister can be of such a good disposition as we have had here, then I say that the Minister may as well create more such creatures in South Africa. She said the universities would not even have an opportunity “to take part in the work of the committee of university principals, and they will be excluded from the joint representation to the Government.

†But that was always so. These colleges did not have free access to the Committee of University Principals. They could be called in for joint consultations when it was necessary, and in future that will also be the case.

Yes, but they were colleges then.

Yes, but now that they will become universities, they will have their own joint committee of rectors, of principals, where the five of them will come together and where necessary they will have the required liaison with the other white universities in matters of interest. But it is not necessary to come into one body for every single thing that has to be discussed there.

*Then the hon. member for Houghton spoke of her definition of “the right to decide who shall teach, what shall be taught and who shall be taught”. As far as this definition is concerned, I just want to say that if ever there was a hackneyed phrase, this is it. This definition does not hold water as far as the universities are concerned; it does not hold water as regards those overseas universities to which I have just referred. It does not hold water as regards our white universities, nor does it hold water as regards these universities of ours. But least of all does that definition hold water as regards our white universities prior to 1959, because if it did, I want to ask the hon. member for Houghton how many professional men were produced by Cape Town, Wits, Rhodes and Pietermaritzburg, who were prepared to allow non-Whites into their ranks and into their lecture rooms? How many teachers, architects and engineers, and graduates for all the other professions for which Whites can qualify themselves at those universities, did those universities produce? Not one. Why not? Because as far as they were concerned the issue regarding the Bantu was not exercising the right of teaching the Bantu; the issue merely was to gratify their liberalistic beliefs, to tell the world: “We are a multi-national university; we are a university that takes in everyone ‘without any recognition of colour or creed’ ”. They have a few Natives and a few Indians and a few Coloureds at their university and that raises them to the status of sacred academicians who say about themselves: “We are sacred, because look, we have a few non-Whites amongst the thousands of Whites.” They did nothing for them. They did not train them for a profession. Those universities did not produce a single person who could be a principal of a school to-day. They enrolled them merely for the sake of trying to soothe their liberalistic consciences. I say that definition was a lamentable failure when they had the right and the opportunity to train non-whites at their own universities. Then they did not do so. The hon. member also spoke of clause 14 and said that in terms of that clause I could appoint the lecturers to teach history, etc. What nonsense! There are not two positions. The main object of clause 14 is to ensure that appointments will be made in a proper way so that non-white lecturers, in particular, may also be considered for appointment when the time is ripe, and, above all, to deal with all positions above that of labourer. As far as my three university colleges are concerned, I have been dealing with all positions above that of labourer up to now, and when the time arrives, we shall make a differentiation and we shall say: “You may appoint the lecturers, or the junior lecturers, yourselves.” But there are not two kinds, one of whom is appointed by me and the other by the university. [Interjection.] No, the hon. member for Houghton wants to interpret the clause in this way. But this is not how the clause reads. In practise there are not two kinds of posts. I have to confirm all posts, and this may subsequently be changed as and when that is justified by circumstances.

In regard to clause 17 she spoke oven more nonsense. She said clause 17 was something which had been taken from the Coloured Persons Education Act and went on to say, “Now note that we are making ‘glorified schools’ of these university colleges”. To that I want to tell her in the first place that in my opinion it was a very unbecoming remark to have made to have spoken of a “glorified school”, which clearly contains the insinuation that the position of the non-White teachers was inferior. It is an insult to the entire teaching profession of the Bantu, Coloureds and Indians to say that if anything at the university seems to have something in common with a school, that is a “glorified school” as though a school is something which cannot have its own inherent character and value and virtue. But what is the position as far as this provision is concerned? It does not come from the Coloured Persons Education Act. I have never thought the hon. member to be stupid, but since she has become a Grandmother Superior, it seems to me as though she is becoming so. This provision is contained in section 30 of the existing Fort Hare Act, which was passed long before the Coloured Persons Education Act. It is also contained in the Extension of University Education Act of 1959, and it is a provision derived from the Public Service Act. Now, according to her, the Coloured Persons Education Act has also been derived from the Public Service Act. What a stupid argument of the hon. member! She could have found other arguments. She also said the degrees would not be recognized by overseas universities. That may be the case; I do not know, but that will not be the case because of the academic standards. That will be the case if politics were to be brought into play and it will not surprise me if certain hon. members were going to do their best to have politics brought into play. [Interjections.] Any failure to recognize the academic certificates and the work of the non-White universities will not be based on the intrinsic value of the academic work itself, because we do maintain standards. Every measure for doing so does exist, and the hon. members know that.

I can assure hon. members that I have nearly come to the end of my speech, and that, of course, also means the end of the opposition to this Bill. I still want to deal with certain questions raised by the hon. member for Green Point, but he is not present at the moment. The one I want to deal with is the question of all questions he wanted me to deal with, and I shall do so now, because I know there may be a good reason for his absence. The hon. member asked whether the attitude adopted by the Government was to extend education over a wide level so that there might be general literacy amongst the Bantu, or whether we wanted to offer education merely along a narrow course to a selected few which would enable only them to receive secondary and university training. I should like to reply to this question. I think the hon. member for Green Point and the other members know what the answer is, because we have this every year under the Education Vote. The reply to the first question is, “Yes, it most definitely is the Government’s policy to bring literacy to the Bantu on a wide level by means of the school system”. The primary object is to make as many Bantu as possible literate, and the literacy rate proves that we may be proud of what we have already achieved. The second question was: Now what about education on the more narrow level? I say this is our secondary object, our additional object, i.e. the best ones should be able to go to the high schools, the vocational schools, the universities and the colleges for the training of teachers. I think I have now replied to the question of the hon. member which he called the 64 million dollar question. He also said that it was wrong to extend the universities as we were doing here. This is not what we are doing here; the hon. member put that wrongly. We are not extending the universities; we are only giving the universities a new status. The universities already exist and they themselves will extend intrinsically with their increase in numbers. He also had a great deal to say about costs. In my remarks right at the outset I replied to that. The hon. member for Green Point also raised the question of health training, which is not at all relevant here, because the doctors to whom he referred, are not being trained at Fort Hare or at the other two institutions, and for that reason I shall not go into this matter.

The hon. member for Durban (North) had a few things to say to which I have already replied fairly fully, but in passing I still want to put him on the right track. Once again he did not study this matter properly. On previous occasions I caught him out for not having done his legal study work properly, and in this case he did not do much easier work properly. He asked, “Why has Rhodes no representative on the Council of Fort Hare?” In the first place, there, is no such thing as giving representation to this or that university, representation is only being given to certain other bodies, such as the Government, for example. We are not giving white universities representation on the non-White councils. It is not to the university that representation is being given, an individual is taken from the university. [Interjections.] The hon. member is still grumbling. Has he failed to notice that Professor Gerber of Rhodes is in fact a member of the Council of Fort Hare.

Not as a representative of Rhodes.

But I have just said there is no such thing as representation for Rhodes. We take people from Rhodes and from Stellenbosch as well as from other places. We are not giving Rhodes representation; we are giving that to an individual from Rhodes whom we want to have on the council. But the hon. member did not study this matter properly.

Then I come to the final question which was raised by the hon. member for Durban (North) and to which I said I would give a reply. The hon. member asked whether there would be any difference in the academic standards of the Bantu universities, the Coloured university and the Indian university. I am now able to reply more fully to that question. There was no need for the hon. member for Rosettenville to have giggled as he did a short while ago, because I cannot give a proper reply to such a question sitting down. There is no need for him to giggle now; now he must listen. My reply to that is that we are doing everything in our ability to prevent such a difference in standards amongst the five universities from developing, and in order to ensure that we are taking the necessary measures. We take many measures. In the first place, as hon. members know we anchor the academic standards of the non-White universities to white universities by introducing of their people into our senates and into our faculty boards as co-opted members. Therefore one very important measure is the anchoring of the academic standards of the non-White universities to white universities. Another measure is consultation amongst the five non-White universities, consultation which also existed throughout the years they were colleges. There are two main bodies of consultation. There is the co-ordinating body of officials of the three departments concerned in this matter and on which officials of the universities will also serve to ensure not only the necessary academic co-ordination but also administrative co-ordination. Then there is the body to which I referred a short while ago and for which, if necessary, further provision may be made by legislation, and this is that the rectors of the five universities of the non-Whites will have joint sitting on a permanent body where they will be able to have consultations. I maintain that these bodies along with the general attention which the Department will give to the five universities, plus the anchoring to the white universities, will create sufficient opportunity for ensuring a proper balance amongst these five universities as far as academic standards are concerned.

Sir, I have replied very fully to this debate—perhaps for too long a time—but I am satisfied that I have replied to all the most important points, and consequently I am looking forward to the hon. member for Kensington withdrawing his little amendment, if that is possible. We shall not hold it against him if he were to do so.

Question put: That all the words after “That” stand part of the motion.

Upon which the House divided:

Ayes—99: Bodenstein, P.; Botha, H. J.; Botha, M. C.; Botha, M. W.; Brandt, J. W.; Carr, D. M.; Coetsee, H. J.; Coetzee, B.; Coetzee, J. A.; Cruywagen, W. A.; De Jager, P. R.; Delport, W. H.; De Wet, J. M.; De Wet, M. W.; Du Plessis, A. H.; 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.; Havemann, W. W. B.; Hayward, S. A. S.; Henning, J. M.; Herman, F.; Hertzog, A.; Heystek, J.; Horn, J. W. L.; Janson, T. N. H.; Keyter, H. C. A.; Koornhof, P. G. J.; Kotzé, S. F.; Kruger, J. T.; Langley, T.; Le Grange, L.; Le Roux, F. J.; Le Roux, J. P. C.; Lewis, H. M.; Malan, G. F.; Malan, W. C.; Marais, J. A.; Marais, P. S.; Marais, W. T.; Maree, G. de K.; Martins, H. E.; McLachlan, R.; Meyer, P. H.; Morrison, G. de V.; Muller, H.; Muller, S. L.; Otto, J. C.; Pansegrouw, J. S.; Pelser, P. C.; Pienaar, B.; Pieterse, R. J. J.; Potgieter, J. E.; Rall, J. J.; Rall, M. J.; Raubenheimer, A. J.; Raubenheimer, A. L.; Reinecke, C. J.; Roux, P. C.; Sadie, N. C. van R.; Schlebusch, A. L.; Schlebusch, J. A.; Schoeman, B. J.; Schoeman, H.; Smit, H. H.; Smith, J. D.; Stofberg, L. F.; Torlage, P. H.; Treurnicht, N. F.; Uys, D. C. H.; Van Breda, A.; Van den Heever, D. J. G.; Van der Merwe, H. D. K.; Van der Merwe, S. W.; Van der Merwe, W. L.; Van Rensburg, M. C. G. J.; Van Staden, J. W.; Van Tonder, J. A.; Van Vuuren, P. Z. J.; Van Zyl, J. J. B.; Venter, M. J. de la R.; Viljoen, M.; Viljoen, P. J. van B.; Visse, J. H.; Visser, A. J.; Volker, V. A.; Vorster, L. P. J.; Waring, F. W.; Wentzel, J. J. G.

Tellers: G. P. C. Bezuidenhout, G. P. van den Berg, P. S. van der Merwe and H. J. van Wyk.

Noes—33: Basson, J. A. L.; Basson, J. D. du P.; Bronkhorst, H. J.; Eden, G. S.; Emdin, S.; Fisher, E. L.; Graaff, De V.; Higgerty, J. W.; Jacobs, G. F.; Kingwill, W. G.; Malan, E. G.; Marais, D. J.; Mitchell, D. E.; Mitchell, M. L.; Moore, P. A.; Murray, L. G.; Oldfield, G. N.; Raw, W. V.; Smith, W. J. B.; Steyn, S. J. M.; Streicher, D. M.; Suzman, H.; Taylor, C. D.; 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. Hopewell and T. G. Hughes.

Question affirmed and amendment dropped.

Motion accordingly agreed to and Bill read a Second Time.

I move—

Mr. Speaker, for two reasons it is a special honour and a special privilege to me to introduce the Second-Reading debate on the University of Zululand Bill. The first reason why this is an honour and a privilege to me, is that I can do so after the excellent reply given by the hon. the Minister of Bantu Education to the Second-Reading debate on the University of Fort Hare Bill. There is a second reason why this is a great privilege to me and this is a personal reason, but hon. members opposite will allow me to mention it, because it weighs heavily on my mind. Shortly after I had returned from Oxford and had been appointed as research officer in the Department of Bantu Administration and Development in 1953, one of the first instructions I received from the then Minister of Bantu Administration and Development, Dr. H. F. Verwoerd, and the Secretary for that Department, Dr. Eiselen, was to prepare a memorandum on the planning of the two Bantu university colleges that were to be established. Those colleges were that of Zululand and that of the North. That is why it is a special privilege to me to make this Second-Reading speech here.

This Bill seeks to divorce the university college of Zululand academically from the University of South Africa, just as was done in the case of Fort Hare, and to entrust it with university status and greater academic responsibilities.

Right at the outset I want to draw the attention of hon. members to the fact that the principles embodied in this University of Zululand Bill do not differ in any way from the principles laid down in the Fort Hare Bill. Except for the name, these Bills are precisely and absolutely identical. In fact, if hon. members compare these two Bills, they will see that the provisions, apart from that provision which is specifically concerned with the university college in question, are absolutely of the same tenor throughout.

We have already been told here that the only principle which is truly new as far as the university colleges are concerned, is to be found in the fact that the academic ties which the university colleges have had with the University of South Africa up to now, are going to be severed and that academically these colleges are going to act autonomously in future.

Mr. Speaker, this principle, as well as the other principles which are being duplicated in this Bill, has already been dealt with in detail and you will therefore pardon me if I do not elaborate on it any further, as I am of the opinion that it would only be a waste of the time of the House.

The day when the university college of Zululand acquires university status and greater academic responsibility will indeed be a most historic and memorable day for that university college and for the Zulu nation. This measure involuntarily reminds me of another day which was also exceptionally significant in the history of the development of the Zulu nation, i.e. the day on which a university institution of their own was established for that nation at Ngoya in Natal in terms of the Extension of University Education Act, 1959. I can also state now that, if the Opposition are not of this opinion, I can inform them that the Zulu people do in fact think so and that they do in fact mark that day as a special day in the history of the development of the Zulu nation.

Did you consult them?

I did my field-work there. I paid a vistit to Zululand recently. I am speaking with full responsibility when I say that the Zulu people regard it in this light. It would do those hon. members good if they were to do what I did and were to ascertain personally what the Zulu nation’s views are in this regard. For the first time in their history the Zulu nation has been granted, on the road to independent development, a university college and now a university. As will be proved by the figures which I shall furnish presently, the Zulus are availing themselves freely of this university. They would, therefore, be a peculiar nation if they did not mark such a day as a special day in their history. They are in fact doing so.

How long were you in Zululand?

I did my field work there and I lived there for nine months. Since then I have lived in Natal for six years. I was there recently for two weeks, and I visited some of these places then.

*Sir, the establishment of the university college ushered in a new period in the history of the Zulu nation in 1959. I just want to tell that hon. member that this is the one nation I got to know as a student. I have a very soft spot for the Zulu nation. I became very well acquainted with the then Zulu king, Ciprian Ka Dinizulu, when as a student I was doing field-work there. A week prior to his death I had a very interesting conversation with the Zulu king. I just want to mention this to the hon. member in passing. The establishment of this university college was not only a further recognition of the identity of the Zulu nation, but also brought university training within easy reach of the children of the Zulu. When I was staying there as a student, I could not think, not in the wildest flights of my imagination, that 20 years later it would be my privilege to testify here, on behalf of the Zulu nation, to a university institution that was established in order to afford the children of the Zulu the opportunity of receiving university training. For the first time, with the establishment of this university college, the Zulu nation had its own university institution which could, with the right attitude, produce the trained manpower which the Zulu nation had always needed so for its own social, economic and cultural development. This is something which every nation yearns for and which every nation needs. It would now be possible to send trained Zulu men and women out into the world to render services to their own community. My own Afrikaner nation has had a great deal of experience of this in this century. In this way a stop was also put to the suspicious attitude towards education which had developed in the minds of many responsible Bantu as a result of the fact that, having completed their training, their most capable sons and daughters had usually become quite estranged from their own nation and its problems. This has also been the case in the history of other nations. I should now like to say something to the hon. member who asked me those questions a moment ago. In this respect I am thinking of the words used by the Zulu paramount chief, to whom I referred a moment ago, who gave evidence before the Native Education Commission in 1950. I, who knew that paramount chief, know that he spoke from his heart when, amongst other things, he said the following on that occasion (translation)—

Sir, this distrust which existed formerly is undoubtedly something of the past. This National Government can be thanked for that. To-day the university college of Zululand is being accepted and supported fully by the Zulu nation. Its products accept their responsibilities towards their nation and the nation assimilates them into the Zulu community with confidence.

Whereas the University College of Zululand is once again about to experience a historic moment in its existence, i.e. to enter the next very important phase in its development, I want to show you briefly, Sir, to what extent this institution has been developed and become established in less than ten years, so that you may form an idea of what has been brought about and achieved over the past nine years. I drafted one of the first memoranda on the planning of a university college in Zululand, and now it is my privilege to-day to introduce this legislation in this House. When I drafted my memorandum at the time, a university college for Zululand was merely an ideal. There was nothing at the time. At that time nobody even knew that it would be situated at the beautiful spot where it is situated now, i.e. at Ngoya. I have no alternative but to describe it as a miracle that, although there was nothing at the time, I am now in the position to sketch the following picture to this House. Buildings to the value of more than R2½ million have been erected since 1960. Apart from the well-equipped lecture rooms, laboratories and the library, excellent provision has also been made for the needs of the students. I wonder how many of those hon. members have been to the university college to see how matters stand there. Modern hostels with every convenience have been provided, hostels of which any nation, and therefore the Zulu nation as well, may justifiably be proud, while adequate sport and recreation facilities, such as tennis courts, a football field, a swimming bath, etc., have not been forgotten. Now you might as well say that too much is being done for the Bantu. But these things have been done for them, and these people are happy and contented. At the moment there are three full-fledged faculties and 30 departments. You must bear in mind that all of this was brought about in the comparatively short period of nine years. In addition, 75 lecturers, of whom ten are Bantu, and 39 other members’ of the staff, of whom 23 are Bantu, are in the service of the university college at present.

With your leave. Sir, I now want to digress for a moment, since a question was put to me and I said that I could answer that question. When it was asked, there was doubt as to whether this was in fact possible. Therefore I want to answer that question now. It is interesting to note the following ethnic classification of Bantu pupils who sat for matriculation and senior certificate examinations in South Africa in 1968. You will recall that in the absence of the Minister the hon. member for Green Point put a question the other day. Bay way of interjection I said at the time that I could furnish the necessary figures. That is why I now want to furnish the relevant figures. I notice that the hon. member is not in the House at the moment. The figures in respect of the year 1968 alone, are as follows:

I think I should also furnish you right now with the figures in respect of pupils in secondary classes. I am doing this more particularly in reply to the statement the hon. member for Green Point made during the Second Reading stage of the Fort Hare Bill. I know that the Opposition has agreed not to conduct a lengthy debate on the other two university Bills and I also want to prevent that. I also want to thank them for agreeing to that. I want to furnish them with these figures because I think they are important, so that they may form an idea of the pool from which students for these Bantu universities may be drawn. The hon. member for Green Point questioned these figures the other day. I shall now furnish you with the figures in respect of Bantu pupils in secondary classes. In Forms 4 and 5 there were 2,576 pupils in 1960. This number increased to 5,562 in 1968. That means that this number has more than doubled itself. In Forms 1 to 3 there were 45,022 Bantu pupils in 1960. This number increased to 76,677 in 1968. I mention these figures merely to give you an idea of the fact that the pool from which students may be drawn for these Bantu universities is steadily showing a substantial increase and that we are really convinced that that problem that was envisaged does therefore not exist.

The University College of Zululand started with only 41 students in 1960. That was indeed a modest beginning. There was a consistent increase in this number until it was 94 in 1962. A year later it had therefore been more than doubled. In 1964 the number of students totalled 180, in 1966 it was 299 and in 1968 it was 368. It is expected that more than 400 Bantu students will enrol at the University College of Zululand this year. It is also important to note that 354 of that 368 enrolled Bantu students are Zulus. This means that only 14 students belong to other ethnic groups.

There is a steady increase in the number of degrees and diplomas conferred at this university college every year. As against the meagre total of 2 degrees which were conferred in 1962, a total of 30 degrees were conferred in 1967. I repeat that in regard to what was merely an idea and a thought in the initial years, it can to-day be reported that up to 1967 the following degrees and diplomas were conferred: Twelve honours degrees—and this has, after all always been an advanced degree—were conferred. I wish it could have been 112 or even 1,012. In addition, 86 baccalaureus degrees were conferred by this one university. In addition to that ten postgraduate diplomas and 128 pre-graduate diplomas were conferred. In addition to the courses of instruction offered at the University of South Africa, this university college may, in terms of section 22 of the University Education Act of 1959, also offer study courses on diploma level in any subject or course of training in which the University of South Africa does not offer instruction. The university college has profitably availed itself of this provision and introduced several diploma courses of its own. We want to pay the highest tribute to them for having done so. In such cases the university college itself determines the curricula and even conducts the examinations. The university college and its staff have exercised this power with a great deal of responsibility. The standards that have been attained, compare favourably with those of any other university. Just let me tell you here to-day, Sir, that in that planning stage to which I referred a moment ago, when this university college was merely an idea and no more, one of the problems with which we struggled most in the planning phase was how to ensure that it would be possible to maintain real standards at these Bantu university colleges. I want to pay the highest tribute to the hon. the Minister who has had so much to do with the implementation of these university colleges. He is the person who has all the information in this regard at his finger-tips. Why? Not because this is a “creature of this Minister”, but because it is an ideal …

[Inaudibe.]

… which has been converted into something fine and proper which really means something to those nations and which, both in the physical and in the spiritual sense, means much more to those people than the Liberal lady has ever been aware of in her wildest dreams. Speak to these people and find out for yourselves. It is easy merely to talk about these things, and that is why it is so easy to be liberal, but to implement them, this is what commands appreciation and this is what this side of the House has been doing so faithfully. That is why things are going well in this country; that is why the necessary good relations exist and that is why there is mutual trust. This is not brought about by talking only, for that is easy. I congratulate these people because from the outset they have had the sense of responsibility—and I wish I could say this for that side of the House—to make such a splendid success of this opportunity which they have been afforded. I want to repeat that one of the major problems in the planning stage was to attain standards. Spectacular success was achieved in this regard. We shall still live to see students from overseas universities going to those university colleges. This afternoon, in fact, the hon. the Minister mentioned figures in this regard. That is why I say that at present the standards compare absolutely favourably with those of any other university.

The following loans and bursaries have been made available to the University College of Zululand. The Department has granted 148 loans averaging R100 each. These loans amount to R14,800 in all. Fourteen bursaries averaging R115 each have been granted by outside bodies—and this is addressed to the hon. member for Houghton who implied here the other day that this was not possible. The total amount granted by outside bodies is, admittedly, still rather small at the moment, but it does amount to R1,610. The principle therefore is not what the hon. member said it was in her argument. The Department has also granted six bursaries averaging R200 each. The total amount granted by them comes to R1,200. The college has granted 18 bursaries averaging R180 per student. The total amount granted by the college comes to R3,240. Outside bodies have granted 135 bursaries averaging R110 per free bursary, i.e. not loans. The total amount donated by outside bodies in respect of bursaries comes to R14,850. The total amount of these bursaries and loans therefore comes to R35,700. As I mentioned to you, Sir, a very large percentage of this amount was donated by outside bodies. We are therefore not quite such bumpkins as we may appear to be.

In addition to these the Department of Bantu Administration is also making the following bursaries available. Students who have completed their studies must undertake to render service to the Department of Bantu Education or to a Bantu authority for a certain number of years. Twenty bursaries of R100 p.a. each are being granted to suitable in-service married Bantu officers who are, with the retention of their full salaries, exempted from service so as to enable them to study on a full-time basis at one of these university colleges in an approved course of study. Finally, 50 bursaries of R300 per annum are being granted to suitable Bantu students for full-time study in an approved course of study at one of the Bantu university colleges.

I want to refer once again to the major contributions made by the University of South Africa in also making such a major academic success of this institution. The co-operation, the guidance and the assistance of the University of South Africa have been cordial and spontaneous at all times and on all levels. This most definitely redounds to the credit of this country. Whereas in future Zululand will have the services of lecturers from other universities in its senate, I want to express the hope that in future this sound constructive academic inter-action between the staff of these two university institutions will take place continually.

At the moment these university colleges are already offering nearly all the courses of study for which there is a need amongst the Bantu. Furthermore, statistics prove that the Bantu are no longer as keen as they were before to go to white universities for their training. Over the past four years, i.e. from 1965, 32 applications—namely eight in 1965, seven in 1966, nine in 1967 and eight in 1968—were received from Bantu persons who wanted to continue their studies at white universities. What is important, is that it was only necessary to approve five of these 32 applications, i.e. four for engineering at the University of the Witwatersrand and one for practical laboratory work at the University of Natal. Why? Because the necessary provision, which was to the satisfaction of the Bantu students by whom the applications were made, could be made at the various Bantu university colleges for the other 27 applicants. That is why I conclude by saying that the Government is convinced that the University College of Zululand is ready and fit for greater academic autonomy and that it will be capable of coping successfully with this major task which awaits it. Personally I do not have any doubts whatsoever as to the results which will be achieved in the next ten years.

Mr. Speaker, there is one great advantage in these debates and that is that we have the opportunity of removing any misunderstanding and for clarifying statements which have already been made.

I have not very much to say about the introduction of the hon. the Deputy Minister, except that I liked that quotation from the Zulu chief. I have heard it several times in this House and I have heard it outside this House; it shows that the chief had a feeling for figurative speech, it is a very beautiful statement. However, I do not see how it helps us in this debate, but still it is very nice to hear it. The hon. the Deputy Minister asked us whether we have ever been to Ngoya, whether we have ever been to the Zululand University College. I have never been there, but I want to go. I have never been invited. I went to Fort Hare before it was taken over by the Department, because I had the opportunity, but I have never had the opportunity since the takeover.

Why should we invite you?

The hon. Minister and his staff on the other side seem to keep this as a closed preserve. Why has the hon. Minister not arranged that our groups could visit these places? They have taken me to Ovamboland, but I do not get the opportunity of going to these university colleges, much as I should like to go.

Oom Flippie, we shall arrange it!

I want to say that I come from Johannesburg and I have been anxious to visit the primary and secondary schools in Soweto and after many requests the hon. Minister has given me carte blanche to go there.

I gave the hon. member that permission two years ago!

It is a privilege which I will never abuse. I shall be very glad to have it and naturally I shall not discuss details of what I see there in this House. I have never had that opportunity, but I should very much like to have it. As I have said, this is an opportunity to remove misunderstandings. There is one misunderstanding which I should like to remove immediately. In the last debate we have had the old story again. I quote from what the hon. member for Koedoespoort said on 6th March, 1969, in column 2063, because it is another way of stating the same old story:

That is the United Party,

That is absolutely untrue. I have used the expression “ethnic colleges”; I cannot think of a better word. I do not use the words “tribal colleges”. I have asked Africans before how they would like to be described. I think “ethnic group” is a very good name, but the other statements are quite untrue. I have to do something which I do not like to do, in order to disprove it, and that is to quote from a speech which was made by myself. This speech was made when these university colleges were created in 1959. I quote from col. 3518 of Hansard of 1959:

That is members of Parliament—

Where do I refer to bush colleges? I quote further, from column 3519:

Mind you, the Burger was with us—

That was three weeks before the debate. The Burger said—

I thought this quotation necessary so that there would be no misunderstanding. We have been anxious to make these colleges a success. When we served on the select committee which became a commission, we actually drafted a Bill. We sat on the select committee after the Second Reading. Does that show that we were not co-operating? We sat on the select committee and we drafted an alternative Bill—it is a pity it was not accepted. The position was that we co-operated at every stage and the evidence we received from all the universities, and especially from the Afrikaans language universities, supported our view.

I now want to come to one or two principles of the Bill which have been quoted here. One of the principles we have to deal with is the question of an advisory council and an advisory senate. That is important because it comes in the constitution of the university and there are clauses devoted to it in the Bill itself. What is our view? Our view is that we should not have an advisory council or an advisory senate. Now, hon. members say that the senate has worked well. It has not worked well! I say this, because the hon. the Minister in reply to a question of mine said, during this month:

There has never been an advisory senate.

Now I come to the question of the advisory council. We say there should not be an advisory council; we say it is humiliating for those people that they should not be members of the council which should be what they call—I do not like the word “mixed”, it is a bad word—a mixed council. The hon. the Minister has quoted a few names here; I am now going to quote a few names of people who gave evidence on this matter. One of them has been mentioned by the Minister himself; I can mention two of the names that the hon. the Minister has mentioned. I refer to Professor Chris Coetzee, Rector of Potchefstroom University. Here is a question which was asked by one of the members of our commission:

I come now to number 2, namely Professor Olivier, a delegate from SABRA. Let us see what he says about the same thing. Whenever a witness appeared hon. members from the other side who were on the commission insisted on getting replies to this question. They wanted to establish an advisory council. This is what Professor Olivier said; I will not quote too much of it—

You are proving to us how wrong you are.

No. I will now quote Professor Rautenbach who was mentioned here this afternoon by the Minister. This is what Professor Rautenbach said in reply to questions. He is advising the hon. the Minister; he is a principal at one of these colleges.

No, not the principal.

This is what he said—

There you are; there is the position laid down by the leaders of Afrikaans thought; they have laid down the same principle as we have adumbrated here in this House. If men are to learn how to run the council, if the Africans, the Coloureds and the Indians are to learn, they must be members of the council.

We have given them a better way to learn it.

Well, the Minister quoted the professors and I thought I would join him in doing that.

I want to go on to an examination of this university college. [Interjections.] The hon. the Minister of Indian Affairs will have an innings presently because he has a similar matter to deal with. I want to quote certain figures as the Minister and the Deputy Minister have done. I want to give the authority for my figures. I must say this. Whenever we ask a question of this department we get all the information we require. I must pay them a tribute. The Department of Bantu Education are excellent in that way. What I am quoting now are replies to questions given by them. All the figures come from the department. I have fixed my time as the end of 1967 because I then had the Auditor-General’s report for checking the figures. There is sometimes a slight difference, but the reason for that is obvious. The Auditor-General’s report reflects the position as at the end of March and when I ask a question it is for the calendar year. So any minor discrepancy is explained in that way, and I do not doubt the figures for a moment. Let us have a look at this college which it is proposed to establish as a university.

In December, 1967, the number of students at the college was 331. There were only 174 matric students, i.e. 53 per cent. Just about half of them were matriculated students who should be at a university college at all. The others could be at a training college or some place where they could take another course for a diploma. I am speaking of university students. There were 157 non-matriculated students. The staff figures were as follows. There were 12 white professors and one non-white. There were 50 white lecturers and 8 non-white, together making 71. We had 71 staff members for 174 matriculated students. We are now talking about a university, not a diploma college. It means for the matriculated students there were rather less than 2½ students per lecturer. Let us say 2½. If we take 15 students at that institution on this ratio, there is one professor and five lecturers for them. It seems to me to be rather an expensive method.

Don’t you think we are giving them the very best then?

Oh, as they say in the army, they are getting jam on it. Taking all the students into consideration, not only the university students who should be there if it is to be a university, it works out at 4.7 students per staff member, rather less than five. So it is not a big show, it is not a large college on the point of becoming a university. I think we are all agreed about that. What is the cost, not to the Government but to the taxpayer of South Africa? I have the figures here and I have the total cost which I was given by the department. It is a little less than the figure given by the Auditor-General but I am taking the department’s figures for the end of December. When I talk about total cost, I do not mean capital cost, I mean expenditure and income. For salaries alone it costs the matriculated students R1,980 per student per annum, other expenditure per student is R974 per annum, and the total for each matriculated student is R2,954 per annum, let us say R2,950.

Are you unwilling to pay that?

Yes, I should think I am unwilling! Everybody is unwilling to pay this amount if we can get the same service at a lower rate. Surely it is not necessary to have these high costs at this stage? Let us go a bit further. Taking all the students at this college which we are now considering in this debate it cost in salaries R1,040 per student per year and other expenditure is R512, so for all students it is R1,552 per student per year.

Now, I know a certain Deputy Minister says that numbers do not matter, but apparently figures and money do not matter either. I do think the same service could be obtained without this cost. That is the point I want to make.

Let us move on and take the progress report of the student through this college. How does he go through the college? It is a question of selection, how you select your students and how they go through. I got the most recent figures in reply to my questions because I wanted the best in this respect, seeing the Auditor-General does not come into it. How many passed their first-year examinations in December of last year? Thirty-two passed, which is 37 per cent. How many passed their second-year exams? Eighteen, which is 30 percent. How many passed their third-year exams? Thirty, which is 66 per cent. What happens when a student fails? Is he promoted to the next year’s class? I should like the Minister to tell us that when he replies to the debate. How many years at this rate does it take a student to get an ordinary B.A. or B.Sc. degree? Let us work it out. If this happens every year, perhaps some of them give it up in despair; I would not be surprised. But those are the figures I should like to get.

I want to say I regret the hon. the Minister refused to accept our amendment on the last Bill because we made an offer of co-operation. We are anxious to co-operate. What could we have discussed?

Order! The hon. member may not discuss that now.

I am going to move it again, Sir.

Then move it.

I keep telling the hon. the Minister of Indian Affairs that his innings is coming; there is no reason why he should come in now. I am going to move that the measure should go to a Select Committee, as I did with the other Bill. If it were to go to a Select Committee what could we discuss? What constructive ideas should we give?

Constructive?

What can we do with him, Mr. Speaker? [Interjections.] I will give the Minister one suggestion, one thing we should discuss. How did university education commence in South Africa? How did it take root? We had a University of South Africa, not the present University of South Africa. I regard this as a misnomer, and when the Bill came in to establish it, I said so.

Why?

It is not the University of South Africa. The University of South Africa was a university with constituent colleges. There was the Free State College, the College of Natal, the College of Johannesburg; they were constituent colleges of the University of South Africa of those days. As things developed, in the course of time, the constituent colleges came along to this House with Bills to ask that they be recognized as universities.

Why not?

Do not ask me why not; I think it was a spendid thing to develop in that way. It was an excellent way; that is how university education has developed in South Africa. How does it apply in this case? We could have considered an umbrella arrangement, a University of Bantu Colleges with three constituent colleges. If the Minister wants it broader or not, I do not mind, then we would have a University of South African Bantu Colleges. The three would have been constituent colleges. I think then the Minister would have been able to develop on much better lines than to-day. Then the University of Bantu Colleges would have granted these degrees.

Business interrupted in accordance with Standing Order No. 23 and debate adjourned.