The hon. member who spoke towards the close of the debate last night was very complimentary about the Budget and indicated that in his opinion the tax proposals showed no sign of haste whatever. He also delivered himself of the opinion that the Budget was merely a continuation of the steps to combat inflation in respect of which South Africa had been so much more successful than many other countries of the world. I want to say to the hon. member that I disagree with him fundamentally because quite clearly this Budget fails to combat inflation. Rises in prices are inevitable as the result of this purchase tax which has been imposed by the Minister with such haste and so little forethought. I think it is inevitable that prices will rise and that he will pay the penalty for his lack of forethought in the way in which this tax has been imposed. In fact, I will not be surprised if prices spiral to an extent not contemplated by either the hon. the Minister himself or the public at the present time, once they realize what the implications of these taxes are. I believe that the fact of the matter is that the public has not yet appreciated what has hit them with this new purchase tax. I think for the benefit of the hon. member who spoke last I must recall once again the point which has been made from this side, namely that in introducing this Budget the Government has failed to discipline itself. Government expenditure is up by about 10 per cent, while the gross national product is only up by about 6 per cent. That in itself creates an inflationary state of affairs.

Then there is a third point, and that is that the consumer price index is reaching the critical point and this Budget does nothing to combat that situation. What has disappointed me most from the purely fiscal point of view is that no case whatsoever has been made out for the severity of this new purchase tax which is applied in this Budget, the principle may be in order, but the severity of the tax has not been justified. It has already been indicated to the hon. the Minister how he could have got adequate funds without rushing into a tax of this kind, without really appreciating what its implications will be. The moment you start examining this new tax you find that the proposals are rather half baked. One is most interested to find that there is a tax of 10 per cent on a box of matches costing 1c. What do you do about a 10 per cent tax on 1c? The minimum coinage is a ½c, and that is a tax of 50 per cent. Or does the Minister hope that the manufacturer will carry the tax and put fewer matches in the box? Will we then get 10 matches in a box? That is the sort of thing that makes one think. When you look the thing through, you can come to only one conclusion, and that is that this is a rich man’s budget, if ever there was one. Now, I am sure the hon. member who spoke last will forgive me if I do not follow him any further, because what has interested me most in this Budget was something else. This was that despite the warning of what is described as the persistent shortage of skilled labour which causes us to be on our guard against renewed inflation, this Budget has utterly failed to cope with the problem of renewed inflation and it has utterly failed to cope with the problem of the shortage of skilled labour. Of course, it is not only renewed inflation that can and will result from this persistent shortage of skilled labour; there are many other dangers to which it can expose South Africa. Hon. members have listed them before, but I want to mention only four dangers. It can lead to the slowing up of our industrial development. It can lead to a decline in the living standards of all our people. It can lead to vast unemployment amongst our non-Whites, with all its attendant evils. It can lead to the entire undermining of our defence strategy and our ability to defend ourselves.

You have been saying that for the last 20 years.

The hon. member is out of date. Twenty years ago every man in the front line needed seven or eight in industry, but to-day you need between 14 and 20. If we have a shortage of skilled labour, we will not have between 14 and 20, which means that we cannot maintain our forces in the state of efficiency and modernity we desire. I do not want to labour these dangers, because what has been called a chronic shortage of skilled labour, is only one facet of a far bigger problem, and that is the shortage of manpower, as it has come to be called in South Africa, about which this Government has been warned so often and with which it has so signally failed to cope that to-day it has become perhaps the second biggest problem in the Republic. I want to refresh the memories of hon. members and outline the problem briefly once again, and in outlining it I think there are two main points to which we want to give attention. The first is that we are faced with a population explosion, which will probably result in our population increasing from something like 18 million at the present time to something like 40 million at the turn of the century. This means one thing: If we are to maintain our present standards of living and if we are to continue to feed our people we are going to need more work opportunities for more people in the Republic, proportionately. As we will see from figures which I am going to give later, the white sector is already strained to the full to produce the skilled and professional people necessary for that development in the Republic. The latest figures for the population increase indicate that the numbers of non-Whites are increasing roughly twice as fast as the numbers of Whites in the Republic at the present time. Problem number one for South Africa therefore is the absolutely inescapable fact that more non-Whites are going to be drawn into the skilled and semi-skilled ranks so as to create the upper structure which will give work to the masses at the lower end of the scale. That is the first problem. Otherwise, Sir, it is totally impossible to provide that upper structure which is necessary to give us employment for the less skilled and unskilled in South Africa. The second problem with which we are faced is that we have to develop at a faster rate technically, industrially and economically if we are to maintain our present economic status vis-à-vis the rest of the world. We have to do more; we have to do better than that, because we are faced with the fact that relatively speaking we are still an underdeveloped country. We have to so improve our position that we can make up for a declining gold-mining industry which at the present time is still giving us something like R800 million per annum in foreign exchange. In 20 or 30 years’ time we cannot expect that any more; therefore we have to develop fast enough to ensure that we can make up that leeway, if we are to have the wealth to defend ourselves in a dangerous world.

Sir, on the basis of the ratio of output of consumer goods to capital goods, we are probably far and away the most developed country on the Continent of Africa, but we are still under-developed compared with the developed industrialized countries of the Western world. The bulk of our exports are still exported as raw materials or semi-processed materials. Do you know, Sir, that we are not yet producing a 100 per cent South African content motorcar in the Republic; that is something which makes you think. I think when you examine these two main problems with which we are faced, you find that in a modern industrialized state from 10 to 12½ per cent of the population must find themselves in highly-skilled positions. Our population is 18 million. Taking it at the lower end, 10 per cent of 18 million is 1,800,000. So far skilled jobs have been limited to the Whites of South Africa. One million eight hundred thousand is 52 per cent of the White population. That means that 52 per cent of the white population, if we are to develop into an industrialized state, must be occupied with highly-skilled work. Sir, look at the population: 50 per cent of it consists of children too young to work and people too old to work. We are left with the remainder—working men and women, married women, mothers. Sir, is everyone of those capable of taking up the highly-skilled positions in South Africa at the present time and working full-time so as to ensure that we can become a highly industrialized state? The thing is impossible; we cannot manage it, and because it is an impossibility we have to look elsewhere. Sir, there was a solution offered in this House in the debate a little while ago by the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark. He said something which interested me a lot. I do not know whether it carried the concurrence of young Afrikaner businessmen, of Whom there are so many able examples in the Handelsinstituut and the Sakekamers. [Interjections.]

Oh yes, I agree, I think they are outstanding.

It is a pity they do not come to Parliament.

I like to think back, Mr. Speaker, and recall that some of the first outstanding young Afrikaner businessmen in South Africa were members of my own family many years ago. [Interjections.] I know how they feel. This is what the hon. gentleman said. He said if the economic growth is of such a nature that we cannot keep abreast of the demands for trained manpower, he preferred to cool down economic development “rather than abandon my principles”. The principles which we presume he is referring to are the principles of that side. I must say I have a little difficulty in accepting this entirely after having had a look at what is happening in the border industries. It seems to me that these principles must also be the principles of the Nationalist Party. They are reminiscent of the hon. the Minister of Finance when he in his early days told us in this House that where economic principles conflicted with policy, he was prepared to “bend the economy” in order to fit in with those ideologies. I will return to this interesting phenomenon later. We on this side of the House do not accept that sort of solution. We see South Africa’s rapidly increasing population as the greatest source of our future wealth, our strength and our well-being. But we also have to note that, in spite of the so-called principles which seem to be causing such worry to the hon. member sitting on the back bench on that side, certain developments are taking place. The first of those events which we have to note is that non-Whites are streaming into industries at the present time at three times the rate of Whites, despite those principles. We find there are far too many Whites still employed in unproductive occupations. We find thirdly the Government has neglected to train the white minority to its fullest potential. As soon as there is a bit of development in a new industry we have to start advertising overseas for skilled people and experts to come out to South Africa. We found it in the search for oil, which is, perhaps, forgivable because it is something new. But Sasol has had to do it, Escom has had to do it. Almost every one of the big companies in South Africa has had to do it.

Why? Every country in Europe does it.

Why have they had to do it? I will tell the hon. gentleman: Because this Government has failed miserably in promoting manpower training schemes in South Africa. [Interjections.] Manpower training schemes for Whites are what I am talking about with the hon. the Minister of Planning through you, Mr. Speaker. It is time it was brought to his attention very pertinently. What do we have? We have the hon. the Deputy Minister of Bantu Administration and Education announcing a scheme for the training of Bantu factory workers in border areas, a few days ago. But when the hon. member for Hillbrow comes to this House with a scheme for the training of all workers in South Africa, how coolly is he received? The other side of this House voted against his proposals. They voted against his scheme. When he speaks of a Manpower Training Bill which is for workers throughout industry and which aims at stimulating employers to do their duty towards employees and the country by providing a higher standard of training for all workers, wherever they may be in employment, what happens? The Government votes against it.

But that is an integration measure.

I am noting that remark by the hon. the Deputy Minister; I am coming back to it; I am so glad he has made it.

Something else has happened. The Government has lagged in reviewing the whole question of apprenticeship training in South Africa.

Nonsense.

We hear the hon. gentleman say “nonsense”. Let him go and ask his Ministers how many apprentices they have training in certain trades at the present time and whether there is any hope whatever of them making up the falling-away of existing workmen. Ask the architects to-day why they are working less and less in wood. It is because there are not the carpenters and apprentices going in for the trade to enable them to go further.

That is far-fetched.

The hon. gentleman says “far-fetched”. He probably does not know an architect.

Something else is happening. This Government has not provided sufficient incentive to keep our professional people in South Africa, particularly our research workers. What percentage of our M.Sc.s, were we told the other day, who go overseas to further their studies, stay and never come back again? Two-thirds, close on 70 per cent. Look what has happened in the last 20 years. The Government has so neglected education that we are virtually in a crisis position in South Africa at the present time. The hon. the Minister of National Education knows it. Why did he introduce a Teachers Training Bill in Parliament? Of course he knows it.

Lastly, we have a crisis in the Civil Service, the one thing for which the Government is completely responsible. [Interjections.] I am accustomed to this nervous laughter as we get a bit near the bone. I want to quote Mr. Kitshoff. Secretary for Industries: “The Public Service is losing its backbone, the promising, productive men in the middle grades”. This was in October last year.

Laugh now. [Interjections.]

Rather parrot-like, Mr. Speaker. Dr. Enslin, the President of the Public Service Association, said: “If the pay crisis is not overcome, it will lead to total dislocation and disintegration”. What was the reaction of the Minister of the Interior? When opening a conference of public servants he said: “The Cabinet frowns on buck passing. Heads of departments must take full responsibility for the running of their departments”. Then he will agree with me that the Government must take full responsibility for the position in the Civil Service at the present time. That responsibility lies four-square on the shoulders of this Government. That is what has been happening. What has been the result of this chronic shortage of trained labour in South Africa? I think it has meant particularly two things. First of all, it has meant that, because of that shortage, there is a persistent danger of inflationary pressure. I think the Minister of Finance admitted it when he delivered his Budget speech. But just to back him up, Mr. Spiro, Chairman of Union Acceptances, in his annual address said:

I am well aware that our renewed attraction for foreign capital has lifted an important constraint on our capacity to invest and consume domestically. The potential for further real growth has never been greater than it is at the present. I want to say with emphasis that it would be a real tragedy if this opportunity were to be lost because of our inability to reconcile economic and social objectives and to supply the trained manpower necessary to take advantage of this opportunity.

I have said that this persistent shortage of skilled manpower in South Africa has a second result. We have had to slow down where we could have forged ahead. I should like to mention one example of this. The plans for the proposed new Iscor, which I think involve R570 million, have been delayed. I believe that one of the real reasons for that delay is the shortage of manpower. A spokesman for Iscor said recently:

He does not mention new plant—

There is another point I should like to make. A growth rate of 5½ per cent per annum, as is envisaged by the economic development programme, is not possible in South Africa without subjecting ourselves to a dangerous strain on our manpower resources.

That is the picture of conditions at present. What has the Government done about this? How have they tackled this problem? What do you find if you go back over the years? In the first place they have to a large extent tackled this problem by restricting investment. I believe that they have done this in order to ensure that the shortage of labour should not become too glaring a feature of the economy. They have done this by curbs on the importation of capital equipment, especially for industry, and by restrictions on bank lending. They have done this with the aid of large-scale mopping up operations, aimed at keeping surplus money out of circulation. They have taken these steps because they have been restricting investments owing to a shortage of manpower.

What is wrong with that?

I shall deal with that question later. I am sure that that hon. member will agree that these steps were taken for a number of reasons. This was done to combat the unprecedented inflow of money into the country and the excessive liquidity which it caused. I am sure that that hon. member will agree with me in this regard.

Yes.

He will also agree that “excess liquidity” is only a relative term. If at that time we had had an adequate force of trained labour in South Africa, instead of slowing down we might have reached new heights as far as production and prosperity are concerned. This might have been achieved as a result of that inflow of capital into the country. The so-called excess would have been transformed into a windfall of excessive bountifulness which would have pushed our economy forward to unprecedented heights. The essence of the matter is that if only we could produce goods efficiently inflation would be held in check. We know this but we do not have the manpower to do it. What was the second measure the Government adopted? They tried to take industry to labour in the border areas because there of course integration is taking place faster than anywhere else. There you have one white worker to six or seven black workers. There the non-White workers are allowed to do skilled labour at lower rates than those applicable to Whites in other parts of the country. They did a third thing, Sir; they tried to step up immigration on which they have dragged their feet for so long. I do not have to say more about this. There is a fourth thing. They started imposing restrictions on Bantu labour in the established areas. The Minister of Planning is concerned with this. Then, of course, there is a side effect to the extent that the number of Whites taken into employment in those areas is reduced in the set up of our economy in South Africa to-day. That is something which they did not seem to have foreseen. I know we have had a commission inquiring into the question of manpower training, but I do not believe it has reported yet. I do not think we know what they are recommending. We did have improvements of teachers’ salaries. If you look at all the facts and figures it is quite clear that the Government has not been very successful, because from every side we hear of shortages—shortages of trained men, professional, technical, skilled and managerial men. In the Civil Service itself, we know it is a very serious position. The Civil Service is not only short of staff, but it is also losing men who are getting near the top, the men who are the backbone of the Civil Service who keep the wheels turning. That is why I issued a public appeal to the hon. the Minister of Finance to consider the salary scales of those people to ensure that they were kept in the Civil Service.

When they pay less tax, you say it is a rich man’s budget.

Mr. Speaker, this Minister’s lack of imagination is beyond words. Does he not realize that in most cases what these people will gain on the swings, they will lose on the roundabouts of the purchase tax?

This is not a rich man’s budget.

Of course it is a rich man’s budget!

Which civil servant is rich?

Mr. Speaker, which civil servants are rich? [Interjections.]

Order!

When I hear this hon. Minister talking about the civil servants being rich, I understand why he thinks that the farmers are so prosperous. I have never understood this before, but now I do! I want to go further. As I have said there were difficulties in the Civil Service. The Minister of Water Affairs himself said in November last year that he did not have the engineers and technicians to build the storage dams and the tunnels which are necessary to combat our water problems. He also said that he was hoping that the circumstances will be better by 1970. What has happened to the report of the Straszacker Commission in regard to the training of engineers? It seems to have been pigeon-holed for the last five years. It has been raised in this House before but we do not hear about it any more. The hon. the Minister of Agriculture knows how big the shortage of technicians, scientists and research people is in his Department. [Interjections.]

There is one more facet and I want to emphasize this question at this moment. It is that we could not maintain our present rate of growth of 5½ per cent per annum, as is planned for the economic development programme, without continually supplementing the ranks of skilled labour toy immigrants from overseas. We have to remember that if we fall too far below that 5½ per cent we are going to be faced by a massive unemployment of the non-Europeans in South Africa, with all the attendant dangers. I have certain figures here, figures published in the F.C.I. journal as coming from the executive of the Natal Chamber of Industry. They claim that these figures were obtained from the Statistical Bulletin. However, these figures reveal that the growth rate in industry dropped from 6.8 in 1964-’65 to 1.54 for the first half of 1967-’68. I do not know whether these figures are correct, but I am interested to hear the Minister’s reaction to this, because if they are correct they reveal a very serious state of affairs.

Now, Sir, what must this Budget do to alleviate the problems with which we are faced? What must it do to improve the situation? I know I am going to be told that the tax concessions to individuals and to married women are going to be a greater incentive towards productivity. I know I am going to be told of the R9.3 million to universities and for bursaries, and that the costs to individuals of postgraduate studies in certain directions are going to be deducted from their taxable income, as doctors and dentists can do at the present time. I know I am going to be told that pensioners can in future earn more without jeopardising their maximum pension. I know I am going to be told that as soon as the Münnig Committee reports the Government will consider that report and that there are R15 million which have already been voted for professional people in the Civil Service.

Is that intelligent anticipation?

No, Sir. I would say it is bowing to the inevitable and that was after a masterly under-statement about the shortages in the Civil Service by the Minister. When the whole Budget is reviewed against this background and in the light of our manpower problems, one is forced to the conclusion that this Government is only scratching on the surface and is not getting down to the root causes of the trouble. Even the Press have not missed the point. One writer puts it like this—

Apart from the wealthy, there are not very many people who are satisfied with this Budget. It extends limited incentives for productivity, limited almost entirely to the managerial and professional fields. The burden of the mass of the workers, both White and non-White, is going to be immeasurably increased by the manner in which this new purchase tax is going to be applied. The president of the Public Servants Association speaks of “bitter disappointment” about the limited concessions, too limited to rectify the critical staff shortage in the Public Service. It seems that where other countries have affluent societies, all that we in South Africa are allowed is an affluent Government. This situation, Sir, obviously involves certain real dangers, dangers for our economy as well as for the white worker. I think we should have a look at these dangers in order that we may realize what it is that we have to cope with. We find, first of all, that because of the shortage of trained people and the pressure for goods, the increasing fragmentation of jobs. jobs are being fragmented, jobs which have been undertaken before as one whole by Whites. The fragmented parts are now being done by non-Whites and are lost to the white worker, probably for all time. But we are also finding something else. We find that Whites are being replaced by non-Whites in various industries under a Government which has no policy to deal with the situation. It has no policy because there is no rate for the job. This replacement is taking place extensively on the S.A. Railways and extensively in the Post Office. What did the hon. the Minister of Transport tell us only the other day? He told us that his policy was that he had already replaced thousands of Whites with Bantu. 8,000 to 9,000; that he was filling certain positions by Bantu in spite of disagreement on the part of the unions, because he said, he felt it was in the interest of the country to do so. [Interjections.] But there is no rate for the job, you will remember, Sir. The Minister of Transport is a businessman. He is in charge of the biggest business undertaking in the Republic, the S.A. Railways. He knows, and we know, that his Railways are facing a very big headache because of the burden of low-rated traffic, because of the necessity for salary increases to the staff and because of rising costs. I wonder when the stage will come when that hon. gentleman, as a good businessman, will come to this House and say it is in the interests of the country to cut costs on the Railways even more by employing not 8,000 or 9,000 Bantu in jobs done by Whites before, but 20,000 or 30,000 or more. He is not bound by the rate for the job. He can employ them at one-third of the salary at which he is employing white men today.

But there are no Whites unemployed, and you know it.

[Interjections.] What is so interesting is that job reservation does not apply in the business of the Minister of Transport. Oh no, he rides roughshod over that. Trade union disapproval does not worry him. He even defies the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development. He introduces more Bantu into the Western Cape, completely contrary to their policy. His Government has already given the green light for the training of thousands of Bantu workers in border industries. Why should he worry? They are employed at a fraction of the wages the white man is paid.

But I thought there was a shortage of labour?

Of course there is a shortage of skilled labour. Every time that hon. member opens his mouth he puts both feet into it. The fact is that there is a new labour pattern developing in the border areas.

Is your policy the rate for the job under all circumstances?

Wait a minute. I will tell the Minister about the rate for the job. We can expect without question that the main feature in the border industrial expansion to-day is the integration of Blacks in white industries at a faster rate than ever before in our history. Bearing this in mind, we can understand, I think, the statement made by the hon. the Minister of Labour at Dundee in February of this year, when he said that it would be sheer idiocy to hold back South Africa’s development by not allowing non-Whites into the trades; the country’s phenomenal growth rate demanded that more and more non-Whites should fill skilled and semi-skilled jobs.

I told the House that that was a mis-report.

But then you confirmed it in your speech.

I accept at once that the Minister says it is a mis-report. If he would correct it, I would be only too happy to accept it. [Interjections.] I will accept any correction by the Minister and I look forward to his speech on the subject. I can only say that I have read all the reports available to me and I was certainly left with that impression. But what is interesting is the background against which we have this converted apostle of common sense speaking, and the background is this. He agrees that non-Whites under certain circumstances should do skilled and semi-skilled work.

I was referring to the building industry in Natal. [Interjections.]

I accept that. The Minister says he was referring only to the building industry in Natal.

And of course the election was there.

I accept entirely what the hon. the Minister says, namely that in the building industry in Natal it would be idiocy to hold back South Africa’s development by not allowing non-Whites in that trade. But obviously similar conditions can arise in other trades and in other provinces. We know why this decision was taken. The average age of white masons in Natal is round about 43 years and there are no replacements coming forward. No apprentices are being trained. We know there are similar problems in other industries in different parts of the country and, you know, Sir, when a man has sinned once, he sins much more easily the second time. We can see what is going to happen. An excuse has been found in the case of the building industry in Natal and excuses will be found in the case of other industries in other parts of the country. Soon the Minister will find himself in partnership with the Minister of Transport. They will open more white jobs to non-Whites and they will find excuses; it will be in the interests of the country. That being so, it is quite clear that these gentlemen agree that non-Whites should under certain circumstances do skilled and semi-skilled work, but like the Government they represent they are scornful of the United Party’s policy of the rate for the job.

Under all circumstances?

Do not worry, I will come to it. I like this Minister and I am going to help him. I have helped him so much already in his career. He has followed a lot of the advice we have given him over the years. Look where it has got him, Mr. Speaker. But what interested me was that of the mainstay of the Government’s policy, namely job reservation, in respect, I take it, of the building industry in Natal, the hon. the Minister said quite categorically that while the Government’s policy was job reservation, in fact there were not sufficient Whites and the Government was forced to admit non-Whites by way of exemption from job reservations.

That is correct. That is the controlled employment of non-Whites.

Then I take it the principle is accepted that where there are not sufficient Whites, job reservation no longer applies, and of course we know how many determinations there have been giving exemption from job reservations. We know how many exemptions there have been from the various determinations. In fact, job reservation is the rule applied far more by exemption than by application. We know it is the theory. We know it is applied to something like less than 2 per cent of the labour force in South Africa. The answer is that it is not working, and the Minister has recognized this in the building industry and soon he will be recognizing it in a few more industries where there are not enough Whites to do the job. What are they going to do about it? Because we had a statement from the Deputy Minister of Bantu Administration, Dr. Koornhof, to the Sabra Youth Conference in George announcing a scheme for the training of Bantu factory workers in border areas by employers who will be subsidized by the State. He said the scheme would be introduced as an experiment and if it proved successful it would be the pattern which his Department would follow to assist large industries in border areas. In this way every industry in a border area can train as many workers as it needs for specific purposes; it can also be expected that a great number of State-subsidized industrial schools will come into being to give industrial training to thousands of Bantu. Let us look at this position. It seems to me that we are now in a situation which holds out enormous dangers for the white workers in the established white areas, because, first of all, by not advocating the rate for the job, which the Minister of Labour did not, he apparently does not object to non-Whites doing the work of Whites at lower rates of pay, and that is what is happening in the border areas at the present time. Secondly, the opportunity for this to happen is going to be increased a thousandfold by the so-called new pattern of development, that is, industries staffed by non-Whites in the border areas. Thirdly, what is going to happen? The Bantu will form their own massive organizations. I am not going to call them “trade unions” or “labour unions”. They will be living in the Bantu areas and working in the border industries. The Minister’s writ will not run there, and they will form those groups in opposition to smaller groups of Whites, perhaps backed up by Indians and Coloureds. Who is going to win when it comes to competition for jobs, with profit-conscious businessmen; what is the position going to be? You see, Sir, under this policy the moment you abandon the rate for the job, then the White man is fighting a losing battle under this Government despite all the honeyed words that we get from these Ministers. He is fighting a losing battle. The promises which they make to him will not count for a cent.

Will you repeal job reservation?

I have very often stated very clearly what my policy is on job reservation and I will give it to the hon. member again. Let him just have a little patience.

You have made many promises already.

And I will carry them out.

You will not reach them.

Sir, did you hear the hon. the Prime Minister’s remark? He says that I will not reach them. He has been proved wrong so often before; this will be another example. He has proved himself a bad prophet. I do not want to deal with job reservation yet, for a very good reason. I first want to deal with one or two other subjects, to build it up nicely. I want to make it possible for every member on that side of the House to understand it.

That is impossible.

That is a chance that I am going to take. Sir, what was organized labour’s reaction to this statement by the Minister of Labour? They warned that the move would be opposed if registered trade unions continued to be denied the right to supervise the conditions of African employment in industry. Sir, what is it going to avail the workers of South Africa to protest? The hon. the Minister of Transport has already told us that he put non-Whites in white jobs despite the protests of the trade unions. Will the Government not do the same? Sir, I would like to conclude this section with another reference to the speech made by the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark in dealing with the motion of the hon. member for Hillbrow in respect of the training of manpower. This is what he said—

Sir, to whom was the hon. member referring? Was he referring to the Ministers of Labour and Transport and the Deputy Minister of Bantu Administration and Education or to the United Party?

To the United Party.

I have also asked myself the question: What should the Government be doing? In order to determine that I have been studying the views of many experts, and I came across one lecture given at Potchefstroom University, a lecture which corresponded so closely to United Party policy that I could not help being influenced by it and I want to share the main portions of it with hon. members in this House. Here is the text of the main portion—

Which is what this Government has been doing—

I will concede that the hon. the Minister is moving in that direction.

At last.

I go on to quote—

Sir, I see the smile on the face of the Minister of National Education—

Sir, hon. members will know, because I believe they have all had a copy of this lecture, this lecture was given by Mr. Jan Marais of the Trust Bank …

What is wrong with that?

Hon. members opposite want to know what is wrong with this. Let me tell them. Immigration, streamlining and revision of the apprenticeship system, a change in the tax system to encourage hard work, tax concessions for mechanization and automation, emphasis on training, also in factories and businesses; education and research, development of the brain power, productivity and initiative of all our people—for how long, Sir, have we on this side not pleaded for those things? And what has this Government done? Let them get up and tell us. Not only have we recommended these things but we realize that many of them were long-term objectives, so we assisted the Government further. We recommended to them a crash programme to bring a measure of immediate relief in overcoming this labour bottleneck.

Years ago.

Years ago we recommended to them an increase in salaries for the technical staff in the Civil Service, technical colleges and universities, to prevent the brain drain of skilled manpower. We asked them to raise the salaries of teachers; we asked them to provide State funds to raise the educational standard of able children; we asked them to relax the discrimination against the professional qualifications of immigrants, for a time at least. We asked them, in granting contracts, to give preference to firms which in other respects fulfilled the requirements of the contract and which employed a fair proportion of persons over 45 years of age. We asked them to relax job reservation and raise the productivity of non-white labour. Sir, we did all those things because we realized that if South Africa was to be assured of a sufficient supply of well-trained labour to meet all her needs, the race groups from whose ranks all that labour was drawn, were entitled to an improvement in their present standard of living. We suggested how the position of the white worker could be safeguarded. This will interest the hon. the Minister of Transport, I know. We said there should be guaranteed employment of Whites at real wages, not below those at present received, for at least ten years in those industries where non-Whites are encroaching on white jobs. We said, secondly, there should be special attention paid to the education and re-education of the Whites to ensure the quality of their leadership and their ability to secure and maintain a high standard of living. We said, thirdly, there should be a national minimum wage for Whites. We said, fourthly, there should be an application of the rate for the job at realistic, not minimum, wage levels, in all cases where the normal wage is above the national minimum wage for Whites. That is my answer to the hon. the Minister.

You are the only one who understands that.

It must be so easy. There is a national minimum wage for Whites in those jobs which require no protection. The moment they are competing in another market for a higher wage it must be on the basis of the rate for the job. It has been set out so clearly so often. There is no difficulty in understanding it.

It is as difficult to understand as race federation.

May I say to the hon. the Minister that it is very much easier to understand than the labour charter he introduced for the Nationalist Party in 1942, and it is going to prove much easier to apply. We said there should be a statutory revision of wages in border areas every six to 12 months because the promise has always been given that as there was development in the border areas the Bantu employed in white jobs at lower wages would have their wages up-graded so that they did not compete unfairly with the white man in other parts of South Africa. Through you to the Minister of Labour, Sir, how much up-grading has taken place in those border industries? The Bantu there are still employed at wages well below those of white workers in those industries in other parts of South Africa. Then we said trade unions must be entrusted as far as possible with the task of smooth adjustment in a changing labour pattern. We realized there might be difficulties, so we provided for a court of appeal to which workers could appeal if they felt there was unfair competition. We suggested it should be the Tribunal under the Industrial Conciliation Act, or drawn from it. We made one other proposal, and that is that there should be a national conference on labour at which we could explain to the hon. the Minister exactly how these proposals worked, and then there would be no difficulty. It is high time that these things were made clear.

We realize, of course, that non-white labour is going to be used more, because it is essential for the progress and strength of our economy not only through its effect in increasing production capacity but also through the resultant increase in buying power to the economy in South Africa. Of course, they need work. Remember there are those who believe that the non-white buying demand will probably be trebled in the next 25 or 30 years. They must be better trained so that more efficient use can be made of their labour, and the number of under-employed non-Whites at present indiscriminately employed can be limited or reduced. Hand in hand with this we know must go development in the reserves, maintenance of influx control, decentralization of industries on a basis most beneficial to the whole country, and phased adaptation in the changing labour pattern in consultation with the trade unions in that regard. If there is one thing that emerges from this examination then it is that we have to revise our attitude to the non-European labour force in South Africa. We believe it can be put to greater use. We believe also that it has in fact earned the right to greater opportunities. We believe also the white worker must be protected against unfair competition, and it is just in this protection against unfair competition that Government policy fails every time. It fails because it is relying on this out-dated policy of job reservation which is worked more by exemption than by application. We believe that South Africa’s opportunities are limitless, both on the African continent and in competition with the Western world, but for us to take advantage of them we need imagination, we need courage and we need a realistic approach, three attributes for which this Government has never been famed.

That is why it is a pleasure for me to support the amendment of the hon. member for Constantia.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition spoke for an hour and ten minutes this afternoon. He got up in order to criticize the Budget of the hon. the Minister of Finance. I now want to ask every hon. member in this House and everyone who listened: Did they hear one word from the lips of the Leader of the Opposition whereby he made any positive proposal on his part about what should have been done in this Budget? Did he make one alternative proposal? Every hon. member listened, but I did not hear a single proposal from the hon. the Leader about how anything should have been done differently in the Budget. He did one thing. In respect of the changed system of taxation the hon. the Leader said: “The principle may be in order.” Does this amount to support of this changed system of taxation or does it not? Those were the hon. the leader’s words; I hope I am not misquoting him. The House and the country now know that the Leader of the Opposition is not prepared to say on behalf of the United Party that this changed system which the hon. the Minister of Finance has proposed also meets with the United Party’s approval in principle. He is not prepared to say it, not to me either. In other words, it does not meet with his approval. [Interjection.] The Leader’s words were: “The principle may be in order.” I want to ask the hon. the Leader whether I am misquoting him.

Have you read the amendment moved by the hon. member for Constantia?

I am now speaking about what the hon. the Leader said in this House this afternoon.

I am not prepared to submit to being cross-examined by you.

I shall now give you a second example of the double-talk of the United Party and hon. members opposite. The hon. the Leader also dealt with the hon. the Minister of Transport. In the Budget debate the Minister of Transport challenged the Leader and the United Party to state their policy in respect of our labour situation and the handling of labour matters in South Africa. Did we receive a reply to this this afternoon? Here is an example of their double-talk. The hon. member for Durban (Central) gave the reply as he saw it. According to a newspaper report which I have before me the hon. member said the following in connection with the problems of the non-white doctors in Natal—“Dr. A. Radford, M.P. for Durban (Central) said, I firmly believe in equal pay for equal work. It is a tragedy that it should have come to this, but I feel non-white doctors have in fact been very patient—this matter has been dragging on for too long’.” He is in favour of that principle. I now ask the. hon. member: Is this the policy of the United Party, i.e. “equal pay for equal work”?

Yes.

You see, Mr. Speaker, I have known the hon. member for 30 years. He is an honest man and he says “yes”. But we cannot get the reply out of the hon. the Leader of the United Party. This is the Leader who wants to criticize this Party and this hon. Minister of Finance. Listen to what the Financial Mail wrote after the Railway debate had drawn to a close (and I do not think that this is a Nationalist periodical)—

It is the Leader of that Party who now wants to bring the hon. the Minister of Transport to the fore in respect of our labour problem.

The hon. the Leader made one major point in his speech, i.e. the shortage of labour resources or manpower. The one major point in his speech was that South Africa did not have sufficient labour resources or manpower. To prove this point he said that the delay in the establishment of the third Iscor was caused by, inter alia, the shortage of manpower in South Africa. Let me tell the hon. the Leader that there is not a single word of truth in that statement. The fact of the matter is that South Africa found itself in inflationary circumstances, as is still the case to a certain extent. As a result of that certain Government projects have been not shelved but slightly delayed, as is also the case with other projects such as at Richard’s Bay. That is the reason why the third Iscor has not yet been proceeded with. But there is another reason as well. This Government is not going to announce such a great project and say precisely where and when it is going to be established if every possibility has not been scrutinized in the minutest detail. When the time is ripe and my colleague the Minister of Economic Affairs makes the announcement to that effect, the hon. member will perhaps be surprised to see to what a great extent the Government has scrutinized all the finer aspects of this matter in the interests of South Africa. I repeat that it is not as a result of the shortage of manpower.

But then the hon. the Leader spoke of the “chronic shortage of manpower”. I do not blame him, because the greatest shortage of manpower, surely, is in that party. The hon. the Leader goes to bed with a shortage and wakes with a shortage of people. For the record I just want to repeat what I said at the beginning of the session. I said that when I left for Britain their were 54 members in the United Party. When I returned there were 39. I did not actually want to get up to-day, but now I have had to do so. Since I last spoke they have decreased to 38. Here the hon. member for Umlazi sits on our side, a full member of the National Party. Now there are 38 left. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition with his shortage of manpower has a great deal to be worried about. It is still necessary to ask the question: If, while dealing with the Budget, we look at the ranks of the Opposition, what hon. member on the Opposition side, if such a misfortune should ever befall us, can take over from the Minister of Finance? Their numbers have grown so small that one can indeed ask the question. I have here a cutting from the Sunday Times which reads—

It is not the newspaper who says so—

Do hon. members know what is going to happen? They have such a shortage of manpower that 24 of them will then be shadow Ministers and only 14 will be ordinary members. I have just got hold of the list of Cabinet members. I become anxious when I read it. Let me quickly look who the Minister of Finance is. Hon. members will not guess who it is, because he is not here. It is Dr. Frans-Cronje. They have to go and fetch him from outside. I am not so sure that he is still such a fiery supporter of the United Party. But I want to return to the question of the manpower shortage. The hon. the Leader said, “Go and ask the architects, then you will hear that there are no carpenters. Look at our shortage of engineers. We have a shortage of research workers”. I do not want to quarrel with him about that. We do have shortages. But I do want to tell him that I should also have liked to have heard from him, just in passing, that South Africa, with the few people it has and despite all its shortages, does not take second place to any country in the world as far as research and scientific achievements are concerned. I did not hear this from him. But he went further and said, “The chronic shortage of manpower is the second biggest problem in South Africa”. Then again, not specifically, but just in passing, he asked how we should solve the problem. He did not suggest a method. I do not want to put words into his mouth. But he gave a clear indication of the trend of his thoughts. He said that in all developed countries, such as ours, ten or twelve per cent of the people occupy the top posts. They have to occupy the managerial posts and provide the leadership. Then he made a rapid calculation. He said that we have 18 million people, but that we draw this group only from the Whites. Ten or twelve per cent of the 18 million is 1,800,000; in other words, 52 per cent of the Whites must in fact be in the top managerial posts. He said that this was an impossible situation. What did he say by implication? Does he want to draw that 10 or 12 per cent from the 18 million or not? I want to tell him that if that is the implication, the National Party altogether rejects it on behalf of the white man of South Africa. For the information of his backbencher, the hon. member for Hillbrow, I want to say that the hon. the Minister of Transport did not push a single white man out of the Railways. He is keeping the white man there, because he is getting better work. Not a single white man has been pushed out of the South African Railways. But the hon. member for Hillbrow said (Hansard, volume 25, column 1677): “South Africa is at the crossroads as far as labour is concerned and the non-White is the key to the situation.” From what the hon. the Leader said in respect of numbers …

What leader?

No, the big leader, not the little one. From what he said it is very clear that the big difference between that side of the House and this side is that the white worker in South Africa to-day has full protection and will continue to have it in the years to come. He will not have it if that side of the House is in power.

Let me mention another point now. The hon. the Leader got up to criticize the Budget. Let me tell him that a Minister of Finance and a Government that have ruled for 21 years and come to light with a budget such as this, may be quite certain of ruling for another 21 years. This Budget has been accepted throughout South Africa. I am not speaking of the details. The Minister of Finance explained the matter very clearly. As far as the finer details are concerned, the legislation must still be passed. He has indicated the main course.

But I do not want to speak about the Budget. I want to speak about the fundamental situation which the hon. the Leader of the Opposition never got round to. He spoke of the shortage of labour resources, the manpower shortage. We cannot tackle the future projects which South Africa, with its tremendous development, will need. He said that the Government’s expenditure had increased by ten per cent, while our rate of development was only about six per cent. Why? Because there is this tremendous development in South Africa for which the services simply have to be supplied. We shall supply them. But the complaint which the hon. the Leader of the Opposition has lies at the root of the reason why the hon. the Leader and his people are sitting over there in ever-decreasing numbers, and the hon. the Prime Minister and his people are sitting here in ever-increasing numbers. One can only have such an indictment about a manpower shortage in a country where great development is taking place, where there is peace and quiet and which offers security and a future to its people. When does a manpower shortage arise? There is a manpower shortage in South Africa because, over a period of 21 years, a policy of separate development of the various races has been followed which has brought about this condition of tremendous development. This is the essence, the crux of the whole matter. If the prophecies of hon. members on that side of the House and of the whole world in respect of the policy of separate development had become a reality in South Africa, South Africa would not have had a manpower shortage today, but unemployed people and revolution on the streets. Because separate development has become established in South Africa, has brought peace and quiet and tremendous development and has eliminated friction, we have this charge of a manpower shortage to-day. The charge of a shortage of labour resources is the most striking testimonial for the policy of separate development which anyone could give to South Africa. I now want to make the statement that in making his charge in regard to the manpower shortage the hon. the Leader of the Opposition actually spent an hour and ten minutes on giving the National Party Government the best testimonial it could have over a period of 21 years. Ask a child at school, or anyone not studying politics, for the reason when there are a shortage of labour resources and more work than people in a country. Then, surely, that country is experiencing good times. Then the policy which is being followed in that country is not a bad one, but a good one. It is as simple as that. [Laughter.] That hon. member is laughing very heartily. Do you know why? He came here as thin as a lath and look at him now! He is prospering. I am saying this in the good sense of the word, because I do not want to offend the hon. member. The same has happened to me, because things are going well with me.

As I have said, this is the essence of the whole charge levelled by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. We cannot argue it away. A shortage of manpower is a direct consequence of having had a brilliant Government for 21 years. This is the absolute testimonial that, if South Africa wants to meet with disaster, it should deviate from the policy, and the strict implementation and further implementation with might and main of the policy, of separate development of the various nations on this southern tip of Africa. This is the reason why the hon. the Leader of the Opposition can get up and so vehemently lay a charge of a manpower shortage and why hon. members opposite are sitting there and we on this side. This manpower shortage must not be laid at the door of the National Party. We have brought immigrants into the country. Not the good ones and the bad ones, because we shall never bring in the good ones and the bad ones. South Africa needs only the best. Immigrants will be brought in according to the present system of selection, and in such numbers as we are able to recruit that type of immigrant for South Africa.

What does Twakkies du Toit say about that?

The hon. member need not make an interjection. The Nationalist public of South Africa, because they are after all the only people who count, accept two things. The first is that, with its tremendous development as a result of National Party Government policy, South Africa must obtain immigrants. The second is that they are also satisfied with the control measures of this Government, as applied by my colleague the Minister of Immigration. This is the consensus of opinion throughout South Africa and any person in South Africa who does not accept it, does not accept the policy of the National Party and then I accept that he does not accept it.

We have not done this only in respect of immigration. Ask any person outside this House what boy or girl or even adult in South Africa who wants training in some or other field cannot have it to-day. Where are there such persons? I challenge the hon. member. I will see to it that any person whom the hon. member may bring to me and who is suitable to receive training and has not been able to get it, will get that training. I will play the role of M.P. and do his work for him. I want to make this categorical statement that any person in South Africa, whether boy or girl or adult, who is considered suitable by the bodies that know and who cannot obtain training for some or other reason, may come to me and I will see to it that such a person gets it. [Interjections.]

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition said that there were too few engineers. Does the fault lie with the Government? He knows as well as I do that a commission is sitting at the moment to investigate the possibility of an additional engineering faculty. He also knows that the present engineering faculties are not yet fully occupied. If there are now 10 or 12 boys or girls who want to take engineering, they can enrol at universities, because there are vacancies. The State has not neglected its duty.

Where is the Straszacker Commission’s report?

That has nothing to do with the question at this stage. The fact of the matter is the practical situation. I want to ask the hon. member for Yeoville to bring me one boy or girl who wants to become an engineer and we shall see to it that such a person is placed. We shall see to it that such a person gets a bursary. I want to ask the hon. member if he knows of any such person.

He does not know.

I am not allowed to say that the hon. member is misleading us, but surely he is trying to create an erroneous impression here.

Are you now replying to the fact that there is a shortage of engineers?

I am not replying to the fact that there is a shortage of engineers; I am merely replying to the charge that the Government is to blame for this shortage. The hon. member is nevertheless correct. The Government is to blame for the shortage, because it has governed the country so well over 21 years that there is now a shortage of manpower. In this respect the Government is to blame. I now want to warn the hon. member that, as far as that aspect is concerned, the Government will be to blame for many years yet. This is the crux of this whole matter. The hon. member levels a charge of a shortage of manpower because this country has essentially been governed in such a way as to make it possible to have no unemployment, but that there is a shortage of manpower. The hon. member also mentioned that the provision made for university training has been increased by 30 per cent in this Budget. This cannot merely be glossed over so quickly. It must be proclaimed to all and sundry, and every man and woman in the country must know it. They must appreciate the seriousness with which the hon. the Prime Minister and the Minister of National Education regard this problem, so that although the general increase in expenditure is 10 per cent, it is in the region of 30 per cent in respect of higher education.

This is in order to make up the backlog.

I want to tell the hon. member that with the way in which this Government is ensuring stability and security for investments in South Africa, it will be a tough assignment to make up the backlog, because South Africa is developing too rapidly. We are trying to indicate a growth rate of 5½ per cent, but after a year has gone by we see that it was 6 or 6.4 per cent. We are struggling to keep it in check. Do you know, Sir, what one of our greatest problems is? The world has too much confidence in the Republic of South Africa. We are grateful for that, but one of our greatest problems is the tremendous confidence which the world has in this country. Do you know why this is so? I want to make the statement that I know of no leader in the Western world—and I do not want to offend any one of them, because I have a great deal of respect for many of them—whose position to-day is stronger and safer than that of the hon. the Prime Minister of South Africa. I have not made a study of this, because I am very busy, but I want to ask the hon. the Leader of the Opposition if he knows of a leader of an opposition in the Western world who is in a worse position than he is. I am not postulating that as a statement, because I have not made a study of this. My time is up, but I want to ask the hon. the Leader to reply to me on this when he speaks again.

Mr. Speaker, I am sorry to have to intervene in the discussion between the hon. the Minister of Planning and the official Opposition. I leave it to the official Opposition to defend their own position. I want to say to the hon. the Minister of Planning, however, that he has advanced a very interesting theory this afternoon, namely that it is a sign of the great strength of South Africa that there is a shortage of labour in this country. He said it was one of the indications that South Africa’s economic development is going ahead at full pace and that this is therefore a credit to the Government. I want to say to the hon. the Minister that the shortage of labour is of course a shortage of labour in one regard only, namely a shortage of skilled labour in South Africa. There is no shortage of unskilled labour in South Africa. There is now massive unemployment in a vast section of South Africa’s population, namely among the non-white section and more particularly among the African section. He has forgotten that, because when hon. Ministers talk about South Africa they only talk about South Africa in the context of how it affects the white electorate in South Africa. So the fact that there are millions upon millions of unemployed and under-employed nonwhite people in South Africa, more particularly Africans, is something that does not concern him at all. I must immediately say that the fact that there is a shortage of skilled labour in South Africa is because it has been artificially created. It has been artificially created by all the barriers that are hindering the non-White’s advancement to the skilled jobs in this country. The hon. the Minister admits it. Why he should not therefore immediately take the bold line, since he admits that this is the case, and say that South Africa is going to overcome the shortage of skilled labour which can only after all hinder our development because it means that we cannot deploy our resources to their fullest extent and therefore reach our fullest potential to the advantage of everybody, I cannot imagine. Why does he not say it? Why does the hon. the Minister of Labour hastily scurry back from the position he took up not so long ago during the by-election at Newcastle where he stated that it was sheer idiocy to imagine that the skilled jobs could only be held by white people. This afternoon he has partially retracted that.

I did that on a previous occasion as well. Evidently you are not interested.

I am only too interested. I am utterly depressed at this, because I saw the first sign of light when the hon. the Minister of Labour made that original remark. I said to myself that that was the most sensible thing that Minister has ever said. No sooner had this thought crossed my mind when the hon. the Minister made hasty retractions of this highly sensible statement he made as regards one industry in one part of the country.

I will be very glad if you would refer to the two statements I made previously.

The hon. the Minister is obviously very nervous about this. He must have been taken to task. [Interjections.]

I do not know whether he considers that he is one of the verkramptes against the “verkrimptes”. I am not sure, but he is obviously very nervous about this. With the greatest of pleasure I will get his statement absolutely right. He said it was sheer idiocy in the building industry in Natal to imagine that only Whites could do the job. Now, can the hon. the Minister tell me why this only applies to the building industry in Natal? Why does it not apply to the building industry elsewhere in South Africa; in the Transvaal where there is a tremendous shortage of skilled workers? Every building employer I know of, is crying out for skilled labour and in fact under the lap they are taking on Africans. In the Cape Province, Coloured labourers are to some extent …

98 per cent.

All right, Coloured labourers are filling the gap in the Cape, but what about the Transvaal, which after all, is still the largest and industrially the most developed province in this country? Why is it not sheer idiocy to imagine that all the skilled work, in the building industry in Transvaal, to be specific, has to be done by white people only? Every single building employer is crying out for skilled workers. There is a shortage in every single branch of the building industry and the hon. the Minister knows it. Will the hon. the Minister tell us why it is not sheer idiocy that African people cannot be employed in the building industry in the Transvaal? I am limiting my question to one industry to put his mind at rest or to quiet his nerves in this regard. Perhaps he will explain to us why this does not apply to them. Now, Sir, I am not using this in a political way and hon members must realize it. I do not intend to rush around the country from platform to platform saying that the National Party is doing white workers out of jobs, because the Minister of Transport is employing thousands of Africans in jobs formerly done by Whites or that the Minister of Labour has made this statement; I say this is the right statement, it is to all our advantage and it is the key to our industrial progress and economic progress in South Africa. This is the key to the problem of the hon. the Minister of Finance when he wants to know how the revenue which is to be lost by the lowering of income-tax in the higher levels and by smoothing out the bulge in the middle-income groups, is to be made up. It is the key to the whole solution, because as long as we have this unhealthy situation, where the vast majority of the population, i.e. the non-Whites and particularly the Africans, are not earning a normal taxable income, we are going to be in this extraordinary position in South Africa where the hon. the Minister has to go scratching around in the most extraordinary ways to make up the revenue which he is losing in trying to moderate income-tax scales. We have this extraordinary situation, as the hon. the Minister has said, where something like 6 per cent of the people are providing two-thirds of the revenue collected from income-tax. I am not talking about the racially discriminatory income-tax; I shall deal with that in a moment. As long as we have a situation where the vast majority of the people, the Africans in particular, either through immobility, through being locked up in under-employment in the reserves or in low paid employment in the rural areas, are unable to reach their potentiality and as long as we have this situation where non-Whites are unable to be trained for the skilled jobs in South Africa and even for some of the semi-skilled jobs in South Africa, so long will we have this imbalance in the revenue situation of our country. Now, the rate for the job is always overemphasized in this regard; it is completely overemphasized for it applies to a very small percentage of the gainfully occupied people in South Africa; a very small percentage of occupations is in fact affected by job reservation as such. There are other things which are far more important in the inhibition to African productivity. Firstly, there is immobility because of the fact that as I have mentioned, Africans cannot move from one area to another except under the most extreme difficulty, because of the fact that training facilities are not provided and because of the fact that their educational facilities are not free and compulsory.

Why were you against the universities Bills?

Against the universities Bills? I was against giving a name to something which is no more a university than that hon. member is an economist; that is why I was against the universities Bills. I am not interested in giving tags to things, I am interested in tackling the facts of the situation. That is why I was against the conversion of university colleges by name into universities. But, Mr. Speaker, I do not want to be diverted from the main tenor of my argument.

May I go?

Yes, you may go, although it is a pity. I will miss the hon. member.

The question is that as a result of the nonrecognition of the African as an employee in terms of industrial conciliation legislation, which is one of the major factors inhibiting the development of Africans as skilled workers, all closed shop occupations are denied them. It is the maintenance of the industrial colour bar per se which is the real inhibiting factor as far as African employment in the skilled jobs is concerned. I should like the Official Opposition to make its position clear in this regard. They have not given us a clear statement yet in this regard. If the Official Opposition is so interested in utilizing African labour to the full, is it then prepared to take a stand on this issue and to say that it believes in the recognition of the African as an employee in terms of our industrial conciliation machinery. which would mean that closed shop occupations would be open to such Africans once they had been trained? Is the Official Opposition in favour of doing all it can, since this colour bar often is customary rather than legal, to undermine the industrial colour bar? Unless it is prepared to say this, all this fine talk we have had from them this afternoon and yesterday afternoon about the full utilization of our labour resources does not amount to a row of beans. Therefore, I think we are entitled to get some real, straightforward talk from them in this regard.

In this country we have placed inhibiting factors on the productivity of Africans for many years—the pass laws, lack of training and the industrial colour bar, both statutory and customary. In recent years we have had an even more inhibiting factor. This is the policy of removals which the Government has been going in for on a large scale. I am not talking of influx control to stop unemployed Africans, of whom there are millions, coming in from the reserves to our industrial areas where they could become a part of our industrial working force. I am talking now of what is called “efflux control”, i.e. the system of removing thousands of Africans from the urban areas back to their so-called homelands with out the possibility of employment, and where they are prevented from becoming part and parcel of the industrial and economic setup in South Africa. All of us have, no doubt, read the extraordinary speech of the Deputy Minister of Justice who, it appears, is still interfering in the portfolio of Bantu Administration. He could not resist giving us the benefits of his knowledge about the removal of the socalled “superfluous appendages”. I want to say at once that although this was a preposterous speech, a preposterous way of describing what the Government is doing to Africans, he was only being realistic. To me, therefore, this was no bombshell because all he was doing was to describe the preposterous policy of this Government. That is all. It is for that reason that it did not come as a bombshell to me. What is more, he was more honest and realistic in his description of what the Government is doing than the hon. the Deputy Minister of Bantu Administration was when he talked about not dumping people “like suitcases”. In fact, the Government is dumping these people. Let me point out to the hon. the Minister of Finance that these “appendages” are people who themselves have been contributing to the economic development of South Africa, because in every urban African family, dependents of the main wage earner attempt to augment the family income by means of some sort of part-time job. So these wives and children, these so-called “superfluous appendages”, were all in their own way attempting to augment the family income and thereby attempting to contribute to South Africa’s economic development generally.

The hon. the Minister of Planning has now left the Chamber. It is a pity because there is one other thing about which I should like to talk to him. He mentioned the peace and quiet, the law and order, which this country was enjoying, all the result “of the way in which the Government was handling the situation”. Well, I must say that this law and order, peace and calm, is reflected in the enormous increase in the amount we have been spending on Defence, on prisons and on Police. It is true that we have law and order, peace and quiet, but everybody seems to forget that we are spending enormous amounts on Defence, on prisons and on Police. I grant that this country has certain defence commitments, that we have commitments to the Western world, commitments which we must carry out. Therefore, I am not criticizing the Defence Budget as a whole. But I do say that one cannot divorce that from the racial picture in South Africa, from the fact that the enmity and the hostility which we have earned on this continent and elsewhere is to a large extent due to our racial policy. As a matter of fact, everything in the end comes back to our racial policies. I doubt very much whether we would have had to spend these enormous amounts on Defence, on prisons and on our Police if we had a more moderate racial policy and if we did away with race discrimination. I wonder whether this House is aware of the fact that in the Budget for 1969-’70, we shall be spending almost as much on Defence, on Police and on prisons as we shall spend on all essential social services, including education, housing and health. We shall be spending something like R472 million on all these social services in comparison with R437 million on Defence, Police and prisons. We shall be spending three times as much on prisons and Police as we shall be spending on higher education—three times as much. What sort of reflection on our national life is this? Is this the hallmark of the peace and quiet of which the hon. the Minister of Planning was boasting and of which hon. members opposite often boast?

Give us the exact figures.

Let the hon. member look at the Budget; let him look at the figures. I have got them here and they are available to everybody else.

Do you prefer the chaos in the rest of the world?

No. What I prefer is a policy that would not make it necessary to spend so much on Police. I prefer a policy that would not earn us the hostility of the outside world. This is the only country in the world where racial discrimination is maintained by legislative provisions. Of course, there is race discrimination in other countries as well but in no other country of the world is race discrimination being statutorily maintained. That is the main reason why we have earned the hostility of the outside world and why we have to spend all these amounts on defence. The reverse of the coin is the pegging of the amount for Bantu education, a matter raised by the hon. member for Kensington yesterday; the fact that we do not educate African children; that we do not maintain a decent and stable family life for Africans in this country; that we are basing our entire economic system on a migratory labour system, a system which is sociologically and economically bad and is responsible for the enhanced crime rate in South Africa and for the need to spend so much on Police and prisons. We can do better by going to the root causes of these things instead and to spend our money on social services and put South Africa on a better basis in every sense of the word. After all, prevention still is better than cure, in this as in any other respect.

I now want to come to the Budget itself. A lot has already been said about the necessary tax reforms which the Minister has introduced, particularly as far as ironing out of the bulge is concerned and about lowering the high taxation on the higher income groups in order to increase incentive. With this one cannot quarrel. But I must say that the method the hon. the Minister has chosen is open to the strongest criticism, and that is this levelling of indirect tax. It is regressive in South Africa. It is a regressive form of taxation. [Interjection.] I will tell the hon. member why. The Minister has claimed that he is in good company. He says that in most developed countries the indirect tax method is employed, and that is true. In England there is an attempt to get the Government to turn more from direct taxes to indirect taxes, to try to lower the level of income-tax, death duties and capital gains tax, etc., because it is felt that these taxes have reached saturation level and they are affecting incentive in the British economic system. So the emphasis is more and more being placed on tax reforms in an effort to get the Government to convert to indirect taxes. It is true, of course, that in the European countries and in America there is emphasis on indirect taxation, but the situation is completely different in South Africa. In those countries, first of all, there is a much more even spread of income. There is a vast middle-income group which makes up the vast bulk of the populations of those countries. In South Africa that is not so. There is a tremendous discrepancy between rich and poor in this country mainly, of course, on a racial basis because of factors I have already mentioned, such as the inhibition on productivity, etc. There is a tremendous discrepancy between the earnings and income of the small white population in South Africa, the high income group, and the vast bulk of the population, the non-Whites, who are in the lower income group. Therefore indirect tax which bears most heavily on the bulk of the population, is in South Africa a regressive form of taxation. There is a difference not only in the earning capacity but also in the actual spread between skilled and unskilled wages in South Africa. In countries like Europe and America at the most the spread between skilled and unskilled wages is something like 25 per cent to 30 per cent, but in South Africa the spread is something like 400 per cent between skilled and unskilled wages. So I say this is a regressive tax as far as this country is concerned because of this uneven spread of income in South Africa. I might say that in a country like England in any case an enormous amount is spent on social services because it is a welfare state, and even in other countries which are not specifically welfare states, much more is given back to the public by way of social services than is to be given back to the vast majority of the population in this country, as far as the revenue is concerned which is collected from indirect taxation.

I want to say that the Minister’s claim that he has not taxed essential commodities is of course absurd. When I first listened to the Minister making his Budget speech it seemed to me as if it was going to be fairly reasonable because he talked about taxing luxury goods and non-essential goods. But when one comes to look at the list of articles which the hon. the Minister has taxed, quite clearly the document which outlines the scope of the commodities falling within the purview of the new tax goes well beyond what we might call luxury or non-essential goods. The explanatory White Paper to this most extraordinary document, that is the document setting out the scope of the commodities which are going to be affected, at least gives the correct name to the new taxation. It does not call it a sales tax, nor does it call it a purchase tax. I do not agree with the Official Opposition when they call it a purchase tax. It is an internal duty, and that is exactly what the White Paper calls it. And it is significant that it is on the unfortunate customs officials that the collection of this tax is going to rest. Now how on earth it is going to be collected is anybody’s guess. As far as I can gather, the most tremendous difficulties are going to be encountered in the collection of this tax, because nobody really knows how it is going to be levied and how one is going to stop this cumulative snowballing effect from the time that the article leaves the factory until the time it is actually in the hands of the consumer. It seems to me that the Minister has worked, in deciding on his so-called list of essential commodities, on the customs list published by the Customs Cooperation Council in Brussels, the so-called Brussels Nomenclature. He has simply run his pencil down this list marking off 5 per cent or 10 per cent or 20 per cent as the spirit has moved him, and it seems to me that it was a very evil spirit indeed that moved him. I can see no logical explanation for any of these taxes, apart from the obvious luxury articles like furs and jewellery, etc. But for the rest nobody in the world can explain to me how the Minister has decided to tax the essential goods he has taxed and to put for instance 5 per cent next to the section called “Flying Machines and gliders”. I do not know where he gets that one from at all. There is item after item in this extraordinary Brussels list, which I do not believe has any part at all in South African life. Surely it could not have been too difficult for the Minister to work out a list specifically dealing with luxury articles applicable to South African conditions and particularly applicable to South African people. In other words, he should have taken into account the pattern of expenditure of South African people. Now I want to ask the Minister this. He has said that this internal duty is flexible. He is not sure how much money he is going to raise in this way anyway, but he says that these arrangements are flexible. I want to appeal to him immediately to revise this list and to withdraw from the scope of these commodities all those items which are going to have such a disastrous effect on the lower-income group in our country, and more particularly the non-Whites.

Now, a good deal has been said here about the position of people in the R5,000 per annum and less group. But I want to say something about the group into which most of the Africans fall, and that is the R500 to R1,000 per annum group, and I might say that that is pretty conservative. I am sure many of the people I am about to talk about, and particularly the rural African, earn a great deal less than R500 per annum. I want to point out, first of all, that these people pay taxes. There is an attitude in this House which has not changed since time immemorial, and that is the “white man’s burden” attitude, that on the shoulders of the unfortunate white man rests the provision of services for the African. I have mentioned that a large part of this is due to ourselves because we inhibit the earning capacity of the non-Whites by statutory and non-statutory means. But apart from that, people in this country forget that Africans pay taxes where white people do not pay taxes. First of all, irrespective of earning capacity, they pay poll tax. The Minister has reduced the poll tax from R3.50 to R2.50, i.e. by R1, and I will show the hon. member for Prinshof that on one group of items alone, the additional indirect tax is more than 2½ times the saving on this poll tax. That is on one group of essential items, namely on washing and cleansing materials alone, and I am using calculations which were used by Unisa and not by the Institute of Race Relations or that liberalistic Johannesburg City Council, but estimates of expenditure used by Unisa, and I take one group only. On washing and cleansing materials alone, which are essential commodities, the indirect tax will cost the average family, according to that survey, two to 2½ times as much per annum as the saving of R1 in poll tax. This is just one example, but I have other examples I will give as well. But Africans pay poll tax from the age of 16 to the age of 65, irrespective of earnings. But in 1958 a special income tax was introduced for Africans. I wonder whether hon. members have remembered that. Africans pay taxes at levels where no white man pays taxes in this country. Africans pay taxes from the level of R360 per annum. Does any white man in South Africa pay tax if he earns only R360 per annum? As far as I can work it out, white men start paying tax, if they are unmarried, from R500, and if they are married, from R750. I am talking now of direct taxes only. And when one deducts the rebates that white people are allowed for children and dependents, I am sure that most white people do not even pay taxes at R500 and R750, unmarried and married people respectively. But Africans, males and females—who do not get rebates for dependants—pay tax the minute they earn R360 per annum. So we have a discriminatory income tax as far as Africans are concerned and we have a discriminatory poll tax as far as Africans are concerned.

Now let us have a look at the indirect taxes which Africans are paying in any case. They contribute millions to the revenues of South Africa in indirect taxes. Every stamp on a letter and every article that carries excise duty —all these are paid by Africans. It was estimated 10 years ago that in indirect taxes and in general contributions towards their own services, like housing, education, etc., Africans were paying something like R60 million to R80 million per annum.

Nonsense! Do you want them to be exempted from taxation?

No, I do not want them to be exempted, but I want them to pay exactly the same taxes that white people pay. I want them to be taxed at income levels exactly as white people are taxed. And of course they pay those taxes as well as the special taxes I have mentioned, in case hon. members think they do not. They are all going to be subject now to P.A.Y.E., to make quite sure that the Minister is going to glean his little harvest in this respect. I do not want them to be exempted from tax, but what I am pointing out is that this “white man’s burden” is not really the great burden that hon. members think it is. If 10 years ago the estimate was that Africans contributed indirectly and as far as their own direct services are concerned, something between R60 million and R80 million per annum, how much more is it this year? And who is the man who made the estimate? It was the late Prime Minister, Dr. Verwoerd. [Time expired.]

It will not take me long to reply to the hon. member for Houghton. Over the years during which the hon. member has been here, she has already furnished proof that for South Africa and its white population she has, at any rate, only one particular use left. That is that he is the embodiment of the extension of the political aspirations of the United Party. I think the hon. member is sitting here as a constant reminder to white South Africa, when they have to choose between a United Party and a National Party, to tell themselves where the policy of the United Party must irrevocably lead to if they do not accept the policy of the National Party. The echo of the words she once again used here this afternoon, I have heard before from hon. members on the other side; not from all of them, let me concede that; in fact, I think that amongst them there are some members who have certainly been as ashamed of statements made by members of their party. But it is the echo of statements by members of that party which we have heard over the years. And I think there is one question which she has rightly asked the United Party this afternoon, and which the hon. the Minister of Planning has also put to the United Party, namely: If you are opposed to the policy of the National Party in respect of job reservation, what is the viewpoint of the United Party? I want to agree with the hon. member for Houghton at least where she said that it was necessary for them to be honest at some time or other about their viewpoint in respect of the labour problems of South Africa.

I do not wish to pretend that I am an expert on finance, but I listened to the Budget speech of the hon. the Minister with great interest and subsequently I went through it, and I have also listened attentively to speakers on the Opposition side. I cannot help expressing my disappointment at the statements made by certain rather responsible members of the Opposition in regard to this Budget. In the first place, I just want to make a remark in passing about the person who moved this amendment, the hon. member for Constantia, who in his speech as the main speaker on the Opposition side came forward with a proposal which amounts to the fact that the hon. the Minister should keep the sales tax back for a year so that it may be worked out properly before it is implemented. Mr. Speaker, if such a proposal is made by the main speaker on the Opposition side, I suppose that one has to pay attention to it, and then I want to put this question: If such a proposal is to be considered, can you imagine, Sir, how this would favour the rich man who is in a position to buy up for himself those goods on which a sales duty would be levied in a year’s time and how it would affect the poor man who is not in a position to buy up those goods but would have to buy them later? This is the kind of proposal which is made by the main speaker on the Opposition side!

Yesterday we had to listen here to one of the main speakers on the Opposition side, who really gave a performance here which I hold against him personally. This is the hon. member for Durban (Point) who, whenever there is an opportunity for the Opposition to state an alternative policy and to reveal the weak points in the policy of the Government, if there are such weak points, avails himself of such an opportunity in order to rid himself of so many ludicrous things that the whole House goes into ecstatic laughter about them …

A political clown.

We must have some light relief in this debate.

Yes, one is entitled to doing so, but when one’s whole speech deals with that and when one eventually advances absurd arguments, as the hon. member for Durban (Point) did here, then I personally find it disappointing. Yesterday the hon. member very dramatically spoke here of the women of South Africa and of the men of South Africa who would now, because of a tax which is being levied on soap, go about here with long hair and would no longer wash themselves. He spoke of women who would not be able to smarten their appearance because they would not be able to afford to do so as a result of this tax. Let me say this to the hon. member: As I know the men and women of South Africa, this small additional tax which is being levied on certain items, will never prevent them from remaining what they have always been, i.e. amongst the best and most exemplary men and women in the world, men and women of whom one can be proud. It was unnecessary to present a matter such as this in a ridiculous light, as the hon. member for Durban (Point) did. If the hon. member for Durban (Point) were to choose not to wash himself any more as a result of this tax, then it is his own choice, but hon. members on the Government side and other members of this House will continue to wash themselves, even if they have to pay slightly more for soap.

Mr. Chairman, I want to come to a responsible speech, as one is accustomed to getting from the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition advanced arguments here which deserve attention. This afternoon the hon. the Leader of the Opposition advocated industrial development here, and he levelled the accusation that the policy of the Government and the policy which the Minister of Finance once again laid down in his Budget, are such that the industrial development of our country cannot make the desired progress. As an example he mentioned the next Iscor which has to be established. Sir, I could not help thinking of the attitude adopted by that side of the House when the hon. the Leader of the Opposition also belonged to that Party and when an Iscor and a Sasol had to be established in South Africa years ago. I want to ask that side of the House and the Leader of the Opposition whether they still adhere to the view that South Africa cannot carry on without the assistance of Mother England, as was their view at the time when Iscor and Sasol were established. If the United Party has changed its views, I think that it makes all of us grateful to know that we can proceed with the industrial development of South Africa so as to make this country absolutely independent, also as far as oil supplies are concerned, with the full co-operation of that side of the House. It would be a great day for South Africa if that side should promise their full support in this regard.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition tried to brush aside with one word what the hon. the Minister proposed in his Budget. In one single sentence he tried to brush aside all the positive aspects of the Budget when he said: “I know they will tell me of this small concession and that small concession which has been made.” I want to deal with the positive elements in this Budget of the hon. the Minister of Finance and elaborate on what the hon. the Leader of the Opposition wanted to brush aside in one single sentence. I want to point out once again, as was pointed out by the hon. the Minister in his Budget speech, that the expenditure budgeted for this year is R147 million more than was budgeted for last year, and this expenditure is earmarked for matters which the hon. the Leader of the Opposition tried to brush aside with a shrug of the shoulders. The first large amount for which this Budget is making provision, is in respect of Defence. The hon. member for Houghton also referred to it sneeringly, as if the fact that South Africa had to be prepared was something it had brought upon itself. I want to ask the Opposition whether they are satisfied that this increased expenditure is essential for the welfare of South Africa and that it cannot merely be brushed aside with a shrug of the shoulders? The hon. the Leader of the Opposition also referred to the additional assistance which is being granted to the universities. Does he not think that it needs more attention than only one single reference to it—this increased financial assistance which will contribute towards giving South Africa the manpower about which the hon. the Leader of the Opposition expressed concern? Does he not think that this increased financial assistance, which is steadily being increased, should be applauded as being one of the causes towards which the public of South Africa will voluntarily contribute something since it is in the interests of the future of our Fatherland? Sir, an additional amount is being provided for Cultural Affairs. I think even the Leader of the Opposition and that Party would not suggest that this expenditure is not justified.

A major item of expenditure is the increased subsidies to the provinces in order to solve a problem with which the United Party struggled for years when they were in power and which still deserves the serious attention of the Government. As a result of this expenditure it will be possible to solve to a larger extent the problem of taxes levied by the provinces. I want to ask the Leader of the Opposition whether this expenditure is not justified?

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition spoke about a certain matter in regard to which I think it necessary for us to go back to the Budget speech of the hon. the Minister, and that is the Public Service. Sir, I agree that there is cause for concern as far as our Public Service is concerned. This concern was expressed by several persons in the past, and in recent times this matter has begun to deserve more and more attention. But I also want to point out to the hon. the Leader of the Opposition that in this Budget the first major steps are being taken towards solving that problem, or, at least, towards partly solving and alleviating that problem. I think the country ought to express its gratitude and appreciation to the Public Service for the work that is being done by them under difficult circumstances. The concessions made in this Budget are well deserved concessions, which will not merely remain as they are in this Budget. In fact, the hon. the Minister did say in his Budget speech that the recommendations made by the Münnig Committee are still being examined and that positive attempts will continually be made at solving the existing difficulties in respect of the Public Service. We ought to express our gratitude to the Public Service for the work they are doing, and I really think that this is not a suitable juncture for referring, as the hon. the Leader of the Opposition did, to “dissatisfaction”, as he called it, which exists. I think that this is rather an occasion for seeking a solution which will be in the interests of our country.

Mr. Speaker, we have before us a Budget which can in all respects be described as a Budget reflecting the confidence the Government has in the future of the country and in the people of our country. I think there are reasons which one has to face why this Budget can be presented for a country such as South Africa, which is being threatened on all sides. Why is it possible to present such a favourable Budget here in spite of that? I think the primary reason is to be found in the fact that, in spite of the problems we have with our various race groups, we are enjoying here in our country peace in the labour and other fields which is not equalled in any other country in the world. I am looking forward to the day when the Opposition will contribute towards improving and developing these ideal conditions which are in the process of being created. There are methods which the Opposition may apply in this regard. If the Opposition is keen to promote industrial development, the way is clear for them to help with the development of border industries, to lend their support to it, and not only to lend their support to it in this House but also to propagate it outside so that border industries may be developed and so that the black manpower, about which the Leader of the Opposition is concerned, may be accommodated in the border industries for their own good and for the good of the country as a whole. There are methods whereby the Opposition, too, may contribute towards making the favourable conditions which exist in our country even more favourable than they are, but then the United Party would have to stop following the dual course they have been trying to follow, the dual course they have always followed, i.e. one course when they have to deal with the rural areas and another course when they have to deal with the cities; one course when they have to deal with the rich, and another when they have to deal with the poor; one course when they speak to the white man and another course when they speak to the black man. This is what has been the cause and will to an ever greater extent be the cause of the United Party’s downfall, and the country asks that the course followed by them should at least be an honest course, even if it is a wrong track such as the one which the hon. member for Houghton is following.

Mr. Speaker, I want to conclude by saying to the United Party that they should take care that a certain epitaph is not written, for them. I am told that there is a grave here in Goodwood on which the following epitaph is written on a modest tombstone: “Here lies Mary; she signalled a right turn but did the contrary.” I think this has always been the fault of the United Party as well. What they say to-day they contradict tomorrow. The hon. member for Houghton gives the clearest indication of the direction in which the United Party is moving. I think there is only one difference in the epitaph. The United Party did not signal a right-hand turn and turn left. They try to imply that they are indicating a right-hand turn, but they are perpetually turning left. I hope they will now take a right turn.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member began by picking a quarrel with the hon. member for Houghton, and at first I thought that he was going to be more than a match for her, but then it seemed to me as if he began to realize himself that he was going to come off second best, and so he cried off. Towards the end of his speech he went awooing again for a bit but in reality achieved nothing. I just want to say this to the hon. member: He spoke in an almost derogatory manner of English capital in this country but foreign capital is still helping us. Take the oil drill near Plettenberg Bay for example. Is that not foreign capital and foreign skill and is that not something from which we are going to benefit? In addition the hon. member spoke about Government expenditure, and he put it at R147 million, but, Sir, his arithmetic is completely haywire. After all, he must also take the Railways and Harbours Estimates into consideration; he must take the Post Office Estimates into consideration, and if he were to add it all up, he would see that the increase in Government expenditure amounted to R650 million; this is the highest it has ever been in the history of South Africa. In fact, if I were the Minister, I would be having sleepless nights about this, but it does not seem to me as if he is a person who suffers from insomnia. Sir, the hon. member has stated that we must support border area development. Yes, if they declare Soweto and Langa to be Bantu homelands, then the entire Cape Town and the entire Johannesburg can become border areas, and then we would all be satisfied, not so?

Would you be satisfied with that?

Of course we would be satisfied with that. But, Sir, I actually wanted to react to one or two points put to us here by the hon. the Minister of Health.

Planning.

Yes, he is also Minister of Planning. [Interjections.] Very well, then we will discuss Government planning. Here is an hon. Minister who has quite clearly been pushed in to act as lightning conductor. Of course he was completely unsuccessful at this, and I think he was singed in the process. He carried on at such a pace that even as a Cabinet Minister he ended up by thanking his hon. colleague. We have become accustomed to almost every hon. member opposite who rises to his feet thanking the hon. the Minister, and so one always has this chorus of “I thank the Minister” speeches. This hon. Minister became so enthusiastic about the matter that if he had gone a little further he would probably have begun thanking himself as well. I have often wondered what a man like the late Mr. Churchill would have said if he had had to listen to all these “I thank the Minister” speeches. He would probably have described the scene in the following way: “Never before in the history of parliamentary endeavour have so few been thanked so often and so vociferously by so many for so little!” The hon. the Minister of Health and Planning put a question and a certain hypothesis to us. His question was whether we were opposed in principle to this sales tax. But he was not listening because we stated that in principle we accepted a sales tax on luxury articles. We are opposed to what this Government is presenting to us, because if one checks the list one sees that it is not only luxury articles. There are 165 groups of articles which are affected, and this is quite a different matter.

The hon. the Minister of Planning also told us that what we were enjoying to-day we owed to the Government’s policy and the implementation of the policy of separate development. But now it is my chance to put a little question to him. He talks about separate development. This Government has been in power for all of 20 years, and I now want to ask him to mention one district in South Africa which is whiter to-day than 20 years ago. If he can do that then I would say that there is in fact separate development.

Every district is Nationalist.

But they are becoming blacker.

I think we are now reaching the stage where we should take a closer look at the Budget because a certain number of charges were levelled by this side to which there has been no reaction at all by that side. What is very clear to me is the change that has taken place. When the hon. the Minister submitted his Budget to us I saw in newspapers, particularly those newspapers which are favourably disposed towards him and the Government side, that they described this Budget as a revolutionary one, as a brilliant one, as one which could not be improved upon. But since then there has been a cooling off, since then the enthusiasm with which this Budget was greeted has begun to abate completely. Of course it is quite clear why this has happened. This Budget has a sting in its tail, and the more carefully one analyses it, the greater and the more fearful does the sting become. But I see changes in other respects as well. Over the years we on this side have advocated that the so-called bulge—I choose to refer to it as a hump—should be ironed out. We have often said that the marginal increases are too rapid, that we are reaching maximum point before this was being reached in the taxation systems of any other country. What was the reaction on the part of the Government? They said it was impossible to do anything about it. They said it was undesirable, that it could not be done. Then they themselves appointed the Franzsen Commission, and here the Commission states precisely what we have been saying all these years. What was so undesirable last year is suddenly desirable now; what was impossible last year is now absolutely essential. So we find here a complete about turn, a metamorphosis, the likes of which we have never seen before. We are dealing here with a Government which moves by fits and starts, and as we have often quite rightly said in the past, here we have a Government which did too little too late, and we must now, on the basis of this Budget, say that here we have a Government which takes too much and too soon.

We maintain that the cost of living is going to be pushed up further by this Budget, and not a single hon. member opposite could contradict this in a way which proved satisfactory to us. If one is going to impose a sales tax of 20 per cent when the article is still on the factory floor, the tax, as every expert has already pointed out, will amount to 30 per cent when the article eventually gets to the consumer. How can anyone then assert that this tax is not going to push up the cost of living?

What also troubles us is that this Government is persisting in the traditional Hertzog-Holloway policy, i.e. to overtax us and to underestimate income. Just look at what happened this year. The Minister initially estimated that income would amount to R1,409 million, but if we look at the revised figures in the White Paper, what do we see? We see that it amounts to R1,513 million, an increase of R104 million. These are not even the final figures; where are we going to end up? That is the degree to which the hon. the Minister underestimates his income. The hon. the Minister quoted from Ecclesiastes, but there is a quotation which we can address to him. and that is “Beware the false prophets!” There sits a false prophet!

The newspapers supporting the Government stated in banner headlines that this Budget would result in all of us having more money in our pockets. But that is untrue. That is what the hon. the Prime Minister would call an “ascertainable lie”. After all, the Franzsen Commission clearly states that direct taxes are only being paid by 8 per cent of our population. The Commission states further that two-thirds of the taxes are being paid by 6 per cent of this 8 per cent. If my arithmetic is correct, then that works out to .5 per cent of the population. If the Government and hon. members opposite had said that .5 per cent, or even 1 or 2 per cent, of our population were going to have more money in their pockets, then we would have accepted it, but not otherwise.

The Government is very shamefaced when we say that this is a rich man’s Budget. “Me-thinks they protesteth too much,” nevertheless I shall for the moment not adopt that attitude.

I am going to say however that this is an investor’s Budget. What is happening here? Almost R100 million, which is normally taken away from the taxpayers, is in this case not being taken away. Where will this money go? It will go straight back to the share market. This hon. Minister warns on every possible occasion that share prices are too high. He did so at the start of this Session, and since then the prices have shot up by a further 10 to 20 per cent. Share prices in South Africa are now so high that we are anticipating growth for at least ten years. Why are the people buying these shares? Because it is an escape mechanism, because it is the only guarantee they can find against the erosion of monetary values. This in fact represents a motion of no confidence in the Government, because they know that the Government is not able to combat inflation. That is the reason why so many people are investing in the share market.

What worries me further, is the fact that a great percentage of this R100 million is going to find its way to the property market. We already have land values which are too high. If this money now finds its way back to the property market, land values will go higher and higher.

What about the building societies? The building societies are in fact dependent upon the so-called small investor. The small investor gets nothing from this Budget. The building societies will therefore be entering a period of lean years. Here we then have a classic situation: Land values which are soaring, building societies which have less money, a great backlog which has to be made up. As a result of this Budget, we therefore predict that for the ordinary worker in South Africa, a house of his own is going to become a luxury article which he will not be able to afford. Here is a Government which in its Budget is giving with the one hand and taking away with the other. But it has taken more than it has given. The Scriptures also state “His left hand knoweth not what his right hand doeth”. Here we have a typical case. But to my mind this is another change. Here we have before us a Government which was a patriarchal government, a paternal government, which always looked after the interests of its workers. But now the Government has come under pressure from the entrepreneurs in its caucus and its Cabinet, they are the people who are interested in the share market. Hence we say, quite rightly, that this is a rich man’s Budget, as introduced by a rich man’s government. “For to those who have, shall be given, but from those who do not have, will be taken away.” This is a Jekyll and Hyde Budget. It is more Hyde than it is Jekyll.

But now the hon. the Minister has found a new toy, another new word we can use, the word “sterilization”. Now I would just like to say a few words about this. Our stabilization fund already stands at R341 million. What does the hon. the Minister want to do with it? If he does not want to accept the proposal of the hon. member for Constantia, he must nevertheless tell us for what reason this fund was established, and what he wants to do with all this money.

But let us consider the question of Public Debt, which the hon. member for Florida was so upset about. If we look at the item Public Debt in this Budget, we find that R38 million has been set aside solely for additional interest on Public Debt. Last year our Public Debt shot up to R660 million. It now stands at the phenomenal amount of R4,882 million. Here we have the paradoxical situation that, the more the country flourishes, the more money the Government owes. But what is the hon. the Minister doing about this? He says that we must take this money and sterilize it. What does this sterilization actually mean? It is our money, because hon. members must remember that the Government has no money of its own. It is simply our money which it can keep in pledge. This money it is drawing off and hiding away. As an hon. member said last year, it is hiding it away in its political mattress. The Government will of course bring it to light when, politically speaking, it suits its purpose best. We can all guess when that will be. and we would all be guessing correctly. Here we have a situation where everything is soaring. The cost of living is soaring; the stabilization fund is increasing in size; the Public Debt is increasing.

But our reserves are also soaring. Now I should like to say something about the reserves as well. Our reserves already total R1,100 million. I think some hon. members have the impression that high reserves are an indication of a good economic situation. Often it is an indication of poor financial handling. What does a country do with reserves? Why does a country have reserves? Reserves are usually used to cover imports from abroad for a few months. Most countries think in terms of two to three months. Our imports last year amounted to R1,886 million. When we therefore have reserves of this nature, they are already too high. But then we have another situation here, for money is continually flowing into this country from abroad. The hon. the Minister told us that last year R4,450 million flowed into this country from abroad. It is necessary that we should have this, because we want overseas knowledge and skill which enters the country together with the capital. But 70 per cent of our own savings are tied up in the form of pension funds, etc., and are not available for general investment where the risk element is high. Our foreign reserves will therefore continue to be supplemented by money entering the country from abroad.

But here we once again have this paradoxical situation that notwithstanding the fact that our reserves are so high the hon. the Minister had to go overseas earlier on in the year to negotiate foreign loans. Why? Because he did not have enough foreign capital and apparently because he wanted more elbow room for manoeuvring as far as the gold price was concerned, and apparently also because fixed investment in the manufacturing industry decreased last year by 19 per cent. This is something which he ought to begin feeling concerned about. It is the physical planning legislation of that hon. Minister of Planning which is beginning to have a negative effect. What I also find disturbing is that almost all our reserves, at least 80 per cent, are in the form of gold. The gold which has already been amassed in Pretoria amounts to more than R900 million. That is more than an entire year’s production. It is a situation with which I am certain the hon. the Minister is by no means satisfied. But what can you do about this? It is quite clear to anyone who has made a study of this matter that this two-tier approach, this special drawing rights procedure will probably be with us for a long time. Of what avail is it having all this gold locked up in Pretoria on which we obtain no interest, gold which has a more psychological than economic interest at this stage? It is for this reason that I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether he has not already considered, or whether he is prepared to consider making gold loans under specific circumstances to specific countries. It seems to me that such a step would hold exceptional advantages for South Africa.

In the first place, if these loans are in the form of gold, we will not lose out if there is a reconsideration of the price of gold. In the second place we can collect interest on this money when we lend gold to the value of R1,000 million. Think of the interest which this could entail. If the hon. the Minister is afraid that this would cause a resurgence of inflation, then he can after all sterilize it again and conceal it in his political mattress. But in this way we could also support the economy of overseas countries. The hon. the Minister stated in his Budget speech that it was in South Africa’s long-term interest that a stable international monetary situation should prevail. He also went further and said that he would do nothing to precipitate an international monetary crisis. But that is not enough. Why does he not use his gold to strengthen the economy of some countries, as in the case of France or Britain recently? But, Sir, if we have problems with inflation then the best solution is after all to export our money. South Africa must become a capital exporting country in any case. That is how the overseas states became important and powerful. They utilized their capital for this purpose. This is the strongest weapon we have and now we are locking it up in Pretoria. If we were able to export our capital we would also be able to export our own knowledge and our own skills. In this way we could also capitalize an incalculable, invisible asset as well.

But I think that in another sphere as well we shall also have to be thinking in the direction of South Africa becoming a capital exporting country. Here we have all the trust funds. Apparently they have already accumulated more than R600 million. What are they doing with it? They are pushing share prices in South Africa up to an artificial level. I think that the hon. the Minister, under prescribed circumstances, must consider allowing these trust funds to invest some of their capital abroad. Once again this will hold advantages for South Africa. It will immediately contribute to the investment basis ensuring a much broader distribution for our own people. If this money were exported, it would help to counteract inflation. In this way it could also contribute to share prices in South Africa tending towards a more realistic level.

There is another point to which my hon. Leader referred and which I should like to take further. It is the question of our public service. Here I see a further example of something which encourages inflation, because here we have an organization which grows horizontally, instead of growing vertically. Just consider the increase in numbers. I notice that Professor Roux of Unisa has stated that between 1937 and 1966 our Public Service increased by 276 per cent. The entire South African population increased by only 70 per cent during the same period. In other words, the Public Service is growing four times faster than our population.

Mr. Speaker, the prediction is that by 1980 our Public Service will have increased by a further 75 per cent. In the same period the total South African population will only have increased by 25 per cent. In other words, the Public Service will have grown three times as rapidly as our total population. It is becoming a clumsy body, one which is too large and which, like a dinosaur, will destroy itself. What is the reason for the tremendous growth of the Public Service? The answer to this is that we have a Government which is continually coming forward with useless and foolish legislation, legislation which often can only have an unfavourable marginal influence on the total pattern. In any case, hundreds of Public Servants are required to put this legislation into operation. But in the second place we have this situation in our Public Service because the entire pattern of payment is wrong.

I have been told that if an M.Sc. candidate joins the Public Service, and if his losses in the shape of earnings during his period of studies, as well as his university fees are taken into consideration, it can take him 15 years to overtake a matriculant. No wonder we have so few of these people in the Public Service. But experts would also say that in a large organization such as the Public Service the payment curve should form an angle of approximately .6. In our own Public Service this angle is only .15. This income line is too shallow because our senior officials are not being paid enough. I now hope that since the hon. the Minister is setting aside R15 million for the Public Service, he will not again simply grant a percentage increase. If he does that each one will obtain so little that it will be of no value to him at all. He must use that money to increase the salaries of his senior officials. If he does that he will immediately change that salary gradient. Then there will be a change in the Public Service.

Sir, consider our teaching profession. The Minister recently announced new salary scales, about which a great fuss has been made. An expert calculated that when these scales are in full operation by 1971, only 1 per cent of our teachers will be earning more than R7,000 per year. The comparative figure in respect of accountants in South Africa is 44 per cent. I think that is a disgrace. Is that the value we place on education?

For these reasons I feel that the entire salary structure of the Public Service should be completely revised. It is our senior officials who should be compensated in future for their experience, their skills and their exceptional knowledge. It is for this reason, and a hundred other reasons which unfortunately I do not have the time to mention, that I am fully prepared to support the standpoint and the amendment of the hon. member for Constantia.

Mr. Speaker, I listened attentively to the speech of the hon. member for Hillbrow. If I were to give a summary of his speech, I would say that it was a speech of many words in which he said very little. The hon. member also went so far as quoting from the Book of the Preacher, as the Minister of Finance did. I too am going to make quotations this afternoon. I am going to quote prophets, but unfortunately not the Biblical prophets. In 1957 a columnist in Die Transvaler made a prediction concerning the 1958 election. That columnist predicted that the United Party would collapse. Anyone who has followed this debate, one which the Leader of the Opposition had to enter at such an early stage, will admit that the words used by that columnist were true. The columnist said that when a Republic was declared the United Party would have to collapse inevitably. His words were (translation): “This is the unavoidable destination which awaits them.” I need not emphasize this any further, because the truth has been borne out this afternoon in that there has been so little real criticism of the Budget. But strangely enough that prophet was not the only person who was making predictions at that time. Another was a columnist of The Star who made the following prediction in 1957—

This prediction which was made in 1957 has also come true.

Sir, I should like to emphasize that the Opposition’s criticism of this Budget up to this stage has proved that those predictions were correct. This is particularly true where we have to deal with such a brilliant Budget. These are the very words of the hon. member for Hillbrow. In my opinion this is a Budget which comes up to all expectations, one which fits in with the requirements of the times, one which testifies to imagination and vision with a view to future developments. It bears testimony to a Minister who knows what he is doing and a Minister who knows what he wants. It bears testimony to a Minister who has had the far-sightedness to effect radical changes in our tax system. These changes are welcomed everywhere in spite of the criticism of the United Party. These changes are welcomed everywhere because in this Budget we find the sound basic principle that the emphasis is placed on tax on spending, instead of tax on earnings. The Franzsen Commission put it very well. The conclusion to which that Commission came was—

That is why it advocates the structural changes set out in its report. These include a shift of emphasis in the direction of indirect taxation through a broadening of the base of taxation. As is to be expected, the Minister is entering this new field very cautiously. Various characteristics of this Budget are indicative of this. Where radical changes have been made to our tax system, the first step was to make sure that all components in this system of give and take are getting their rightful share in the prosperity of the country. In this connection I want to refer to the relaxation of the means test for war veterans as a result of which they are now going to receive larger pensions. As far as the means test for the protesting burghers is concerned, this, in my opinion, might have been done away with altogether. They are a group who did not receive pensions when others did. In view of the fact that nearly all of them are over the age of 70 years, the financial burden which this step will involve can surely not be such a heavy one.

Another characteristic of this Budget is that it leaves the tax on gold mines intact. I want to express my satisfaction about this. It has been said here that this is a rich man’s Budget; that it benefits the rich. But I can nevertheless foresee that the United Party will attempt to exploit this fact, that the taxation on wealthy gold mines has not been increased, in constituencies in which gold mines are situated. As far as I am concerned, I want to give my wholehearted support to the decision not to increase taxation on gold mines. We have to accept it as an irrefutable fact that the Republic is dependent on the success of its gold-mining industry for its continued economic growth and prosperity. At the same time this goose which lays the golden egg is at present engaged in a struggle for survival because of inflation, increased production costs and the fixed gold price. That is why it is the responsibility of the State and the mine owners to prolong the life of our goldmines as much as possible or, to put it differently, to decelerate the period of decline in production. The State shows its goodwill to our gold mines in this Budget, and we trust that the gold magnates will also follow this example of not merely looking at large profits, but of being satisfied with smaller profits if a prolonged life of our mines will be to the advantage of our country as a whole. We know that there still are large quantities of unmined gold in the Witwatersrand basin. This is gold which cannot be mined at the moment as the present price of gold makes it uneconomical to do so. It is estimated that to-day a gold mine must be assured of a ten pennyweight gold per ton of ore before it can be mined economically. An analysis of the results of our gold mines has revealed that out of the 50 gold mines there are only seven which can be regarded as rich gold mines. These seven mines produced one-third of the total gold production of our country in 1965 and yielded approximately two-thirds of the tax on gold mines to the State. To my mind the Franzsen Commission describes this in a very informative way. The Commission states very clearly that in the absence of an increase in the gold price, and in the absence of the development of new goldfields, it can be expected that the role of gold mining taxation will gradually diminish. The relative contribution of the gold mining industry to total direct taxes has already declined from just over 40 per cent before World War II to 15 per cent in 1960 and 10 per cent in 1967. As a percentage of total company taxation, it decreased from 35 per cent in 1960 to 25 per cent in 1967. This proves to us that there are many mines with which things are not going too well. At the same time this proves to us that this is an economical asset, which because of its indirect contribution to the Treasury, may not be allowed to go under. We must remember that the gold mining industry is the largest single industry in the country. It finds itself in the unique position of supplying a direct and indirect market for the products of many other industrial concerns in the country. Whereas this economic asset has now reached the cross-roads, it does in fact deserve the consideration it is being shown in this Budget, the more so as demands for better conditions of service are made by employees from time to time. In addition we may not overlook the fact that our gold companies are making a major contribution to social security. Their contribution in this connection is considerable—with regard to pneumoconionis, for example. In view of the fact that we may expect demands for better pensions for mineworkers as well as better pneumoconiosis compensation in future, it is a good thing that this Budget does not increase taxation on gold mines. This ought to enable them to meet the demands I have just mentioned.

But there is another feature of this Budget which I should like to commend. It is making money and credit available to that section of the population that needs it. Here I have in mind the agricultural industry and we welcome the announcement of special assistance to certain sectors of our agricultural industry, inter alia, wool, citrus and pineapples. In the Loan Estimates two large amounts are being provided for general assistance to farmers. In addition to this there is the assurance that these amounts will be supplemented further, if necessary. In this connection we are especially appreciative of the principle adopted by the Government of rendering assistance to farmers through the agricultural co-operative societies. We should like to witness the further development of this system as the co-operative societies are, in the final analysis, the only establishments which can determine with some certainty the needs and capacity of each farmer.

A further feature of the Budget is that it is going to encourage thrift. The principle of taxing spending on luxury non-essential goods ought to have this result. It concerns one when one sees in the White Paper that total current personal income (before taxation) increased by R323 million or 4.5 per cent during 1968 against an increase of R633 million or 9.6 per cent in 1967. In contrast to this private consumption expenditure increased by R589 million, or 10 per cent; direct taxation by R55 million, or 12.3 per cent, whereas transfers to other countries increased by R1 million. The net result was that personal saving decreased by R322 million, or 39 per cent compared to the large increase of R173 million, or 26.5 per cent, during the previous year. I think the fault lies in expenditure on luxury and expensive consumer goods which showed an increase of 15.3 per cent according to the White Paper. In view of the fact that it is mainly durable consumer goods which are being made subject to sales duty, this ought to discourage expenditure on goods and we hope that this will promote saving.

Also as far as the agricultural sector is concerned, the new tax may have a beneficial effect in preventing unnecessary expenditure. As a tax will be levied on goods it will now be possible, because of the new tax rates, to resist the temptation of incurring unnecessary expenditure. We know that the hon. the Minister is setting out on a new course and that there will be many problems at the outset. We nevertheless believe that this is the right course because it can only lead to the promotion of economic growth and the stabilization of the national economy.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Hillbrow made one statement I agree with, but not in the context in which he made it. He said that this Budget was an investors’ budget. That is correct, because it is indeed an investors’ budget, but for investment in the future of South Africa, and not in the sense the hon. member for Hillbrow put it. The hon. member for Hillbrow is always dealing with the material. What is of real value and what constitutes spiritual values, he forgot when he left the plains of the Free State.

I want to say right at the outset, notwithstanding the fact that other hon. members say that we should not thank the hon. the Minister, that I consider this Budget as a gem. In this Budget we have to deal with a completely new concept. In the economic world it is said that drastic action should never be taken. I believe that the hon. the Minister was right in taking drastic action here and that he can justify it. He took this line of action not only because he has confidence in the future, but also because he was able to base the Budget on the stability and the basically sound economy of the Republic of South Africa which has been built up during the past 21 years, particularly after we became a Republic. This same Opposition acted as prophets of doom at the time, and now we have a repetition of that. I expected the hon. the Leader of the Opposition to take this direction, but I did not expect the new young leader of the Opposition, namely the hon. member for Hillbrow, to make such a statement. It is said that South Africa’s development is being hampered, but what norm is being applied? On what formula are such wild statements based? There is talk of a political mattress, but hon. members on that side of the House have talked a great deal of political nonsense to-day, and I shall prove that. Let us look at the growth in the gross domestic product of South Africa in comparison to other big countries for the period from 1955 to 1965. In South Africa it was 4.7 per cent per annum, in Canada 4.4 per cent, in Australia 4.3 per cent, in New Zealand 3.9 per cent, in the Argentine 3.1 per cent, in Britain 2.8 per cent, in the U.S.A. 3.4 per cent, in Sweden 4.2 per cent and in Switzerland 4.6 per cent per annum. No country has greater growing power than South Africa. Let us take a look at the cost of living. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition made a fuss about this. When we take an index figure of 100, we find that in 1965 the figure for South Africa was 114, for Canada 111, for Australia 116, for the Argentine 771, for the United States 109, for Belgium 115, for Germany/Switzerland 118, for Britain 121, for Norway/Sweden/Austria 125, for the Netherlands 126, for Italy 129, and for France 132. In other words, there was no country, except the U.S.A. and Canada, that could be compared to South Africa as regards the cost of living. Our domestic growing power is the greatest in the world. On what basis is the statement then made that the progress of South Africa is being hampered by the National Party’s policy of separate development?

I have already said that this Budget is a splendid one. This Budget is not only in the interests of South Africa internally, but later I shall also discuss it from the international point of view with reference to what the hon. member for Hillbrow said about gold. We find that this Budget is making greater concessions internally in respect of housing schemes, larger subsidies to the provinces and larger contributions to less well-to-do people. These stories about this being a rich man’s Budget are not true. On the contrary, more and more is being spent towards alleviating the position of the lower income groups. When we think back to the situation in 1948 we remember the slum conditions which existed then for both Whites and non-Whites. I believe that this was one of the major reasons for the hate campaign against South Africa. Now it is being said here that this is a rich man’s budget. This National Party has always come to the assistance of the less well-to-do inhabitants of South Africa. We need not be ashamed of the actions of this Government. This year the increase in the cost of living was 2.7 per cent and the increase in salaries was 6.5 per cent. In other words, provision was made for the increase in the cost of living. This Government has never thought of neglecting the less well-to-do people. By way of warning I want to say that it will be a sad day for South Africa if we are going to listen to the hon. member for East London. It will be a sad day for us if in this dynamic country we have to accept that we will always have a large percentage of people in the lower income group.

The pattern that has been set by this Government and the future possibilities that exist ensure that we need not fear that we shall have a large less well-to-do income group. Any person with a sense of productivity and who is prepared to work to-day, can rise from the lower income group to the middle income group and even to the higher income group. We see this happening every day. We see it in our own constitution. People who were struggling ten or fifteen years ago, have through their own initiative and as a result of the possibilities created in a rapidly developing country succeeded in greatly improving their positions. I believe that we shall become stagnant if we should let the accent fall on the less well-to-do persons only. It is an erroneous impression that is being created here which can have detrimental effects outside. The white man in South Africa has the inherent potential to rise, if the possibilities are created for him, to the middle income group and the higher income group.

As regards our foreign affairs, I just want to mention that it is important that we should look at them. The hon. member for Hillbrow tried to criticize the amount of reserves that is being maintained. I thought he was an economist and a clever man who would use his intelligence, but I was deeply shocked at the hon. member. I simply cannot believe that such a statement can be made. The hon. member tried to disparage this achievement of having more than R1 billion in the form of gold reserves and foreign exchange. This is an extraordinary achievement. The hon. member for Hillbrow does not seem to know that the only country that can be compared with South Africa is Israel. It is necessary to have large reserves. This country can never risk not having large reserves. The basis of fundamentally sound reserves is the number of months for which a country can pay for its imports pro rata. One then finds that the reserves of the U.S.A. can meet this need for six months, of the United Kingdom for two months, France 4 1/4 months, Germany 5 1/4 months, Italy 5½ months, Australia 4 months, New Zealand 2 months, India 3 1/4 months, Brazil 2 1/4 months, Belgium 3 1/4 months and South Africa 7 months. There is only one other country that can be compared to South Africa, and that is Israel, which is in the same position as we are. It would be an irresponsible Government and an irresponsible Minister of Finance that did not make provision for the need of reserves for the import of products with our geographical situation at the southern tip of Africa.

In regard to the gold aspect the hon. member for Hillbrow said he thought it was not healthy to have large gold reserves, that the position should be more liquid, and that we should get a means of paying for it so that interest could be collected on it. But, does the hon. member have no confidence in the future of gold then? Does the hon. member, as a South African, have no confidence in the future of our most important commodity? Does he not realize that when the price of gold is increased the capital appreciation will be much more than the interest we are losing now? It is very irresponsible to state that we should convert it into currency at this stage and at the present price. It is simply not logical. Furthermore the hon. member for Hillbrow said that he simply could not understand why loans should be negotiated with other European countries. But surely this is logical. One keeps the channels open. Even if we do not need the money at this stage, it is always a good thing to bring about international liquidity of money, and this is one of the main reasons why we are trying to obtain an increase in the price of gold. The Minister can only be congratulated on his handling of the matter of the increase in the price of gold. The whole gold question has been handled calmly, coolly and with foresight, and now a wrong-headed person like the hon. member for Hillbrow comes along and wants to upset everything here. I find it a great pity if someone does not think before making statements in this House. Did it never occur to the hon. member that the Minister’s handling of gold has been phenomenally good and that he has to deal not with a poor Opposition such as this one, but with the strongest powers in the world fighting an increase in the price of gold, that he had to deal with America under the previous regime of Mr. Johnson and his officials, who opposed it and came forward with the two-tier system and prohibited all the international banks from buying newly mined gold from South Africa? In spite of that his handling of the matter has been excellent to date and notwithstanding the pressure they exerted and their attempts to demonetize gold, there is still confidence in gold all over the world. That in itself is an achievement. On the face of opposition from all over the world our gold has retained its rightful place, but I think that the patience of this hon. Minister of Finance, whose patient handling of the gold problem has gained great admiration from all who have any love for South Africa, is not going to last very much longer if America does not start changing her views. He will lose his patience if South Africa will be detrimentally affected, and the danger is that if the price of gold is not increased, or if gold sales are not being made easier, we shall not have sufficient exchange for the importation of products, although we have sufficient security to buy products. But then we shall not have the exchange for the importation of these products. This is dangerous to a certain extent, because it can be the cause of an increase in the cost of products, which may result in the new sales duty being affected, which may then cause inflation. In other words, it is very important that a compromise should be arrived at to enable gold to take its rightful place, but through the capable handling of the matter by the Minister on a scientific basis, and not on a basis such as the hon. member for Hillbrow proposed.

I am also grateful—my time is up and I want to let this suffice—that the Minister has made greater concessions in his Budget and that the fiscal system has been made more flexible, and that the Minister has greater powers in the fiscal system. I believe that we should grant such a Minister greater powers in times when we have to deal with international crises, monetary and financial crises, and since we have the privilege in this country to have a brilliant Minister who ought to enjoy greater powers. If this Opposition is worth anything, they should realize this. It does not take much intelligence to notice it, and in this case they should join us in granting the hon. the Minister greater powers, particularly regarding the fiscal system, in order to make that system more flexible.

The hon. members for Rustenburg and Virginia have both touched upon the position of gold in relation to our economic life. I want to say at once that I was somewhat astounded as I sat listening to the hon. member for Virginia to find that that Hoggenheimer of organizations, the Chamber of Mines, is not really such an unreasonable body as we have been led to believe over a number of years and that the gold mining industry was deserving of the consideration which has so often and for so long been pleaded for by this side of the House. But the hon. members will forgive me if I do not continue with this particular aspect of the debate, because I wish to return to the question of manpower and the skilled manpower shortage.

It was a matter which was raised by my hon. leader, to whom a reply was offered by the hon. the Minister of Planning, who allowed himself, I am afraid, to wander a little far from the subject of the manpower shortage and to indulge in other rather general discussions which have no particular application to the manpower shortage. But he did make this statement. The hon. the Minister said that the shortage of manpower was a reason for the Government to boast because it proved that there had been great progress in this country. Even if one concedes that there is some modicum of justification for making such a statement, I want to suggest to him that to allow that shortage to continue as a problem in South Africa would be a disastrous course to adopt by any Government.

I want to deal with one or two aspects ana I want to deal with them not under the Votes of the responsible Ministers but under the Budget, because they are aspects which were introduced and touched upon by the hon. the Minister of Finance in his Budget speech. I want to revert to these matters because I believe they are matters about which the Government has been warned. The difficulties which exist are something about which the Government has been warned over a long period of time. I refer, of course, to the Civil Service and I propose to go into the question of the Civil Service in some detail in the time at my disposal.

The legislative programme which has been adopted by this Government over recent years has placed a massive burden on the shoulders of the few dozen heads of departments we have in the Civil Service to-day. There is an urgent need to recruit and to retain in the service competent men and women who can shoulder these burdens in the years to come. I believe there has grown up in the service a blank, a gap, between those civil servants who have been in the service for a long time and have achieved senior positions and those who are now in the service and are to follow up and to take over from these men in due course. I say this is a matter which has been brought to the attention of the Government over a number of years and a matter which has reached such proportions that it needs more than a Münnig Commission to solve the problem. It was reported last year, and I do not think it was denied, that in Johannesburg alone, in the Department of Community Development, out of a staff of some 200, seventy of the personnel resigned in two months. That is the type of thing that is happening, but I want to get down to it in more detail.

In regard to the existence of this problem, I would like to draw the hon. Minister’s attention to the remarks that were recently made at a conference in East London. It was a conference of the Public Servants’ Association. In his address to that association Dr. Enslin the president, said that if the pay crisis in the Public Service was not overcome it would lead to a total dislocation and disintegration. Dr. Enslin continued to plead for the immediate appointment of a commission of inquiry to go into the Public Service matters, and according to the Press report he continued and said that the position had reached such proportions that there was a crisis which threatened the continued existence of a healthy and effective Public Service. For the future development of any country, and possibly more so in South Africa with its complicated problems, an effective Public Service is a pressing necessity. The official journal which is available to the hon. Minister, The Public Servant, has expressed similar views. In his Budget speech the hon. the Minister of Finance, dealing with this matter, said this—

I have no quarrel with the hon. the Minister in regard to that statement, but this is not a new problem, and that is where we lay the blame at the door of the Government. This problem has existed for years. The attention of the Government has been drawn to it year after year by the reports of the Public Service Commission. I propose to analyze the position as reported upon during the last four or five years.

During this period, from 1964 to 1967, the establishment has expanded considerably, partially due to the take-over of Coloured education but also due to the establishment of Government Departments to handle various aspects of new legislation and due to natural growth in other Departments. One finds that from 31st December, 1963, when there were 167,000 permanent posts in the Public Service, the number has increased at an average of 10,000 posts per year, until at 31st December, 1967, there were 212,788 posts controlled by the Public Service Commission. But what is more alarming and what has been apparent from the reports year after year is that the number of posts on the permanent establishment not filled by permanent incumbents has increased from a figure of 22,606 in 1964 to 27,004 in 1967, and, according to a reply which was given to me in this House yesterday, at the end of 1968 it was 28,305, and I might add that in the Posts and Telegraph Department there were another 11,271 permanent posts not filled by permanent employees. Sir, even when one takes into consideration the fact that a large number of temporary employees has been employed, the figures are still startling and certainly afford no grounds for complacency. One finds that with the appointment of temporary employees to occupy these permanent posts, both in respect of male and female employees, there still remained unfilled 11,979 posts at the end of 1967. Sir, the Public Service Commission has reported each year. In 1964 the Commission reported—

In 1965 the Commission reported—

In 1966 the Commission reported—

But what was the position one year later? The hon. the Minister of Finance is trying to do this year exactly what was done in 1966. Within one year after those ad hoc increases and adjustments, the Public Service Commission reported—

Sir, these ad hoc attempts to adjust the position in the Public Service will never put that Service on to a proper footing. This state of affairs goes back over the years. In the professional and technical posts one finds that the number of vacancies has varied from 15 to 20 per cent of the establishment. The Government made an adjustment in salaries as from the 1st April, 1966, but the benefit of that step was short-lived. In this Budget the hon. the Minister has again said—

Then the hon. the Minister, with more optimism than conviction, I think, went on to say that these small increases to the public servants would present no justification for renewed salary and wage increases in the private sector. Sir, that will happen. I say that the Minister said this with more optimism than conviction, because the private sector will compete and the individual person cannot be blamed if he offers his services on the most rewarding market. Let me give an example. In the case of architects, the Public Service scale commences at R2,400 per annum, and after 18 increments reaches a figure of R5,100. The post of chief architect in the Government service carries a salary of R6,600, increasing by R300 per annum to R7,500. Sir, there was an advertisement in the Sunday papers by a Cape Town firm of architects, offering a salary of R12,000 per annum for a chief assistant architect R12,000 per annum to an assistant architect in a firm of architects in Cape Town. I believe that the present salary adjustments are not only necessary but that they are overdue. I believe that new thinking and planning is necessary in the staffing of the Public Service. I know that this Government unfortunately is hamstrung by its political talk about integration whenever one talks about using the non-White labour of this country. Sir, these temporary increases—this palliative of R15 million to the public servants—average less than R5 per month for each public servant. Sir, these salary adjustments are completely out of line with the salaries paid in other sectors. Sir, you might ask me what steps I suggest. We have from this side of the House from time to time suggested various steps which we believed can and should be taken, apart from the question of a new salary structure. The first question—and I do not think I need elaborate on it—is whether the Public Service is mechanized or computerized to the maximum possible extent; whether it is mechanized in all aspects where mechanization is available for administrative and office purposes. When you visit the offices of a State Department you find a relatively senior and busy man sitting down and drafting letters in long-hand, when the most junior person in any business firm uses a tape recorder. When one sees this sort of thing one wonders whether something cannot be done to get some degree of efficiency. Why are these facilities not provided? They are provided in every modern office. One finds in office after office that officials have to write out their letters laboriously in long-hand and then send them to a typiste pool to be typed. I believe that in the Public Service itself the O. & M. sections are doing their best to introduce modernized equipment and I can only hope that the Government will not dillydally and that the new hon. Minister of the Interior will give quick answers to the requests which come from the Public Service Commission for improvements in these respects.

Sir, the second point is that I do believe that public servants in this country should no longer be subjected to the position of getting sporadic and limited salary adjustments and having to wait each year to see when the Minister delivers his Budget whether or not they are going to get a few more rand per annum.

When there is an election coming.

I believe that there are two facts which make this quite unjustifiable so far as the Public Service is concerned. Firstly, whether one likes it or not, the purchasing power of the rand depreciates every 12 months.

Every month.

Whether it depreciates at 2 per cent or 2.5 per cent of 2.25 per cent, the fact remains that it depreciates; and the second thing is that as surely as night follows day, the cost of living goes up. Having regard to those two factors, surely the public servant should not be placed in the position of having to wait until the Budget comes before this House and then be told, “a lump sum is being made available; the Minister of the Interior will decide how it is going to be distributed and something might come to you somewhere at some time”. It would be simple to adopt the suggestion that we have made over and over again and that is that there should be an automatic adjustment on the basis of the increased cost of living and the depreciating purchasing power of the rand each year. That adjustment should automatically be made each year in the salary of every person in the employ of the State. This would be a simple matter, and I believe that if that is done the salary scales would be more attractive because of the automatic adjustments and the public servant would not feel that he is joining an organization in which his advancement is subject to a stop-go policy so far as his employer, is concerned.

Sir, I want to come to one other matter in which I believe something must be done and that is what the hon. the Minister of Labour this afternoon referred to by way of interjection as “controlled employment” of non-Whites. One wonders why it is that the Government has not gone into the question as to the extent to which more non-Whites can be employed in the Public Service to make up the shortage of manpower. As I have said earlier, the Government must get over this political complex, this political phobia, that the employment of non-Whites will lead to some form of integration. We cannot continue to ignore the efficient labour force that is available in South Africa, and we must not forget that the Government and the country are paying for the education of something like two million Bantu children at school and half a million Coloured children at school. I am not sure of the number of Indian children at school, but it will probably be about half a million or something very near that figure. These people will become available in increasing numbers for effective employment. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition referred this afternoon to the declining percentage of Whites in industry in relation to the non-Whites. I believe that this trend must continue and must apply to the Civil Service if we are to have an effective and fully staffed Public Service. We know that the hon. the Minister of Transport was behaving almost like a bashful debutante about the number of non-Whites that he was employing against white posts. It was only after considerable pressure and investigation that he eventually admitted that 8,000 were being employed in the Railway service. The Public Service Commission has found it necessary to employ non-Whites against white posts. That is to follow the procedure that has been followed by the Minister of Transport. One wonders, with all this fear of integration being sowed in this House and the accusation being hurled at us that we are advocating integration whenever we suggest finding a way in which this manpower can be used, whether it is appreciated that apart from the Railways where 8,000 non-Whites are being employed against white posts, there are 761 non-Whites being employed in the Department of Posts and Telegraphs against white posts and that in the Public Service at this very time approximately 600 non-Whites are being employed against white posts. This is referred to in the 1967 report—

Sir, I want to ask the hon. the Minister and those who are responsible with him for the Public Service whether the Heavens have opened, whether the earth has quaked because these non-Whites have been utilized against vacant white posts in the Civil Service? No disaster has befallen South Africa as a result of this, but the disaster is that this Government has to do this under the lap instead of publicly re-assessing the Public Service and finding those posts or departments which can correctly and properly be staffed by non-Whites. Sir, I am not pleading here for the replacement of Whites by non-Whites; that is not necessary. I am pleading that the Whites who are employed should have work allocated to them which is not too much for one man to carry, and that where there are departments in which the work can be done by non-White persons, non-Whites should be employed to do that work. Sir, there is a middle way between complete integration and complete apartheid.

Surely you are aware of the fact that non-Whites are being employed in their own Civil Service in the Bantustans.

I am talking about the responsibilities of the Public Service Commission.

And what about the Coloured Representative Council?

I am not talking for one moment about the Coloured Council. I know exactly what they are doing; I know that Coloureds are going to be employed in their Department of Coloured Affairs, but there are many other services for which the Public Service Commission is responsible and which are not going to be given over to communal councils to look after but which are provided for the whole of the population of South Africa.

In the time which is still at my disposal I want to deal very briefly with the question of the salaries of non-White medical men employed in the provinces. I think there are two points which must be made perfectly clear about this matter. I know that the hon. Minister of Health is not directly concerned with this matter as it is the problem of the hon. the Minister of the Interior. I want to make it quite clear that the fixing of the salaries of the non-White medical personnel employed by the provincial administrations is the responsibility of the Government. The provincial administrations are not empowered to adjust these salaries by themselves without Government approval.

I said so yesterday.

Yes, but I want to get this matter quite clear. The second point I wish to make is that the question of the relationship of salaries is not a new one. The hon. the Minister will find that according to the report of the Public Service Commission in 1964 the salaries of non-White doctors were readjusted. The salary scales of these officials from doctors right down to clinical assistants, interns and so on, were set out in the report of the Public Service Commission. I personally was associated with this matter in that it was applicable in the Cape Province when I was a member of the Executive Committee of the Province. The new scale was a departure from the ratio which had existed before. This was an approximate ratio as the scales were not calculated to correspond to the last cent. Previously the relationship was 10 for a White, eight for a Coloured or Indian and six for a Bantu. In 1964 this ratio was changed to ten for Whites, nine for Coloureds and Indians and eight for Bantu. I want to say that at that stage although the Coloured doctors still felt that they had a moral reason for wanting the same salaries as the white doctors there was not one dissatisfied Coloured doctor in the whole of the Cape Province. But what has happened in the interim? The whole matter must be seen in the light of the ad hoc manner in which salaries are adjusted when pressure is brought to bear on the Government. I know that the hon. the Minister of the Interior said yesterday that he did not intend to take any action in this regard now, but what has happened is that the salaries of white doctors have been increased by the Government without the salaries of Coloured doctors being increased. The result is that the ratio of ten to nine between the salaries of white doctors and Coloured and Indian doctors has now deteriorated to a ratio of approximately ten to five in some posts. The present position in regard to the salaries of doctors has come about because the Government has departed from a settled ratio which was accepted by the non-White doctors in 1964.

What is your own view about the ratio?

I want to say that as far as I am concerned the rate for the job must apply. I also want to say that in 1964 the Coloured doctors showed themselves to be a highly responsible group of men because they said that there had at least been a closing of the gap as far as salaries were concerned. They accepted this and they continued in their posts in every hospital as far as the Cape Province is concerned. I do not know what the position was in the other provinces. But the ratio was not maintained. As I said the ratio has not been precisely ten, nine and eight as far as rand and cents are concerned, but the ratio could nevertheless be maintained. The damage has, however, already been done because this matter has not been dealt with departmentally as should have been the case. I am sorry that the hon. the Minister of Health and the hon. the Minister of the Interior to-day have to reap the fruits of the seed sown by their predecessors, but this is what has happened in the years that have passed since 1964. I believe that the matter can still be put right by the hon. the Minister of the Interior. He can see to it that the ratio is adjusted until a more reasonable relationship is arrived at. I believe that if the same attitude is adopted as far as the Civil Service is concerned, we will do justice to those senior men who are now overworked. I also believe that we will then draw the right kind of person to the Civil Service and that we will then not have vacancies which cannot be filled either temporarily or permanently as is the case at present.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Green Point expressed great concern about the staff position in the Public Service, the great number of resignations, etc. He also quoted very dramatically from the report by Dr. Enslin in regard to the staff problems in the Public Service. However, if the hon. member had studied that same report somewhat more intensively he would have come across a graph. With the aid of that graph he would have found that during the régime of the United Party the cost of living increased far more rapidly than did the salaries of public servants. The graph indicates further that from 1948 to the present the salaries of public servants increased more rapidly than the cost of living of public servants. This is indisputable proof that that hon. member and hon. members opposite are really not concerned about our public servants and their salaries. Those hon. members are simply aware that the election is approaching and they are trying to canvass a few votes. It is a fact that this Government has proved time and again that it has the interests of the public servant at heart, and that, where it is in any way possible, it tries to alleviate the lot of these people. Of course we are sorry that we are losing good officials but in an economy such as that of South Africa where there is a shortage of trained people it will always happen that bids will be made for trained people. Nobody can prohibit these people from making application for better posts. Of course, the Government also has its responsibility in regard to the country’s economy. The Government cannot simply grant irresponsible salary increases and in this way aggravate inflation. It is a well-known fact that the Münnig Commission is also engaged in investigating this matter and that a satisfactory solution will be found.

When the hon. member for Constantia moved his amendment yesterday he accused the Government of having neglected to supplement the manpower shortage. This afternoon the hon. the Leader of the Opposition also waxed very loquacious on this matter. Inter alia he accused the Government of having neglected education in this country. If these hon. members were not worthy front-benchers and senior members of this House one could have accused them of in fact being Rip van Winkels who have been slumbering peacefully for the past 20 years. When an hon. member makes an accusation like that, surely he must be aware of certain basic facts. Surely he must be aware of the fact that during the past decade a world-wide revolution in the field of natural sciences and technology has taken place. This tremendous knowledge explosion in the field of technology has caused a worldwide shortage of trained men. This is not a phenomenon which is unique to South Africa. The shortage of manpower is a world problem and not only the problem of South Africa. The same phenomenon occurs in countries with large white populations such as the U.S.A., Germany, France, etc. All these countries are struggling with this problem. Throughout the world there is an excessive and insatiable demand for trained scientists, technicians and technologists. That is why the so-called brain drain is taking place, in terms of which the countries with the best facilities and the most money are drawing these people from other countries. This, too, is a world problem. In this connection the position of South Africa is far more favourable than that of many other countries of the world. I read recently an article dealing with the position in Western Germany. The people in Western Germany are bewailing their lot because their trained people are going to America. In addition we are also fortunate in that, apart from the fact that these people are leaving us, we are getting back other scientists who are coming to work here. Consequently, if this is a world-wide phenomenon, and if it is a fact that other countries with far larger white populations than we have are wrestling with the same problem, then it is obvious that in a country like South Africa, where the explosion in the technological field has been so much greater, more spectacular and more exciting, a manpower shortage should arise, and it is also obvious that it will be an acute one. If one takes into account South Africa’s relatively small white population of 3½ million and that we not only have to supply leaders for the 18 million people of South Africa but also for other countries in Africa and that we must also see to the development in other countries of Africa, it is remarkable that in spite of these restrictive factors we have been able to maintain a higher real growth rate than virtually any other country in the world with the exception of Japan. We have maintained a real growth rate in South Africa which was higher than that of virtually any other country in the world. Mr. Speaker, any person who is not fast asleep like a Rip van Winkel must take cognizance of this and must congratulate the Government on its farsightedness and its vision as well as on the wide-awake and capable way in which it has made provision for everything with the manpower it has at its disposal. The Government is to be congratulated because it has made provision to such an extent that our machinery is still functioning and that we have been able to maintain a growth rate which is higher than we actually want it to be, in spite of all the serious problems which exist and in spite of the accusations of short-sightedness which have been levelled by hon. members on the opposite side of the House against the Government. It is a fact that the development of any country depends upon the rate at which its human material can be trained in order to be absorbed to good effect by commerce, industry and the great variety of sophisticated activities of modern society. It is also a fact that our future development will to a large extent depend upon our ability to train and to educate our people. Our limited potential as far as our white population is concerned makes this problem all the more complicated. I want to return at a later stage to this question.

In the light of the hon. member for Constantia’s accusation of neglect and omission, and in the light of the hon. the Leader of the Opposition’s accusations of omission, let us just briefly go into this Government’s record in regard to the training of manpower, and specifically in the field of education. Let us see how this compares with the lack of achievements which marked the period during which the United Party was in power. I want to use this training as a basis, because manpower training must of necessity begin at this basic starting point. It begins at the schools, and moves later to the universities, the technical colleges, etc. In 1948 there were 110 white high schools in the Union of South Africa. In 1968, 20 years later, there were 485 white high schools, that is to say more than four times as many high schools in a period of 20 years. In this same period the population did not even increase twofold. The number of pupils at our high schools in 1948 was approximately 70,000, as opposed to 276,000 in 1968; that is to say the number of pupils at our high schools increased almost fourfold. Why did this number increase? It was not the population so much which increased. It was for the simple reason that better opportunities were created for them. The number of pupils at our vocational schools, where the future technologists and technicians undergo their basic training, was 4,860 in 1948, as opposed to 31,213 in 1968. In other words the number increased almost eightfold over a period of 20 years.

Now I want to compare the amounts spent by that Government on education with those spent by this Government. In 1947 that Government spent R5,419,000 on education, as opposed to an amount of R50 million for higher education alone to-day. Apart from that R274 million is being appropriated for the provinces, and this amount is also to a large extent being utilized for educational purposes. One can say therefore that for 1969-’70 an amount of more than R300 million is being set aside in this Budget for education. This represents a more than sixtyfold increase. In spite of this minimum amount which the U.P. Government appropriated at that time for education, they are the people who to-day point an accusing finger at this side of the House. They are the people who state that we are failing to make provision for the training of manpower; it is they who are saying that we are neglecting education in our country. Let us now compare the amounts paid out in the form of subsidies to universities on the same basis. In 1947 the meagre, one can almost say disgraceful, amount of R1,400,000 was appropriated by the United Party for universities, whereas the present Budget appropriates R31,176,000. In addition to that R2,686,000 is being appropriated for buildings and equipment at universities, that is to say the total amount being appropriated for universities, amounts to R33,862,000. To this amount must be added the amount of R1,505,000 donated by the C.S.I.R. for research bursaries at the universities. A total amount of more than R35 million has been appropriated for the universities, as opposed to an amount of R1,400,000 20 years ago. If technical colleges and higher technical teaching institutions, on which more than R5 million is being spent annually, is added, the total amount which this Government is spending on higher education amounts to more than R40 million; therefore an amount of R40 million is being appropriated by the present Budget, as compared with the meagre amount of R1,400,000 in 1947 under the United Party Government. On these grounds I think the hon. the Leader of the Opposition should preferably have refrained from making his accusation that this Government is neglecting education in this country. This accusation carries even less weight if one takes into account that in 1962 the Government established a scientific advisory council, something which did not exist before, with the purpose of promoting the expansion and the application of natural science knowledge according to requirement and in the interests of the country and investigating and making recommendations on the need for the training of scientists, technologists and technicians. Thus a body which that side of the House did not have at its disposal during their period of office. This Government cannot be accused of neglect or negligence in respect of its manpower provision; nor of neglecting its education system, and least of all are hon. members on the opposite side of the House able to presume to point an accusing finger at this side of the House in regard to these matters. I want to repeat that this Government ought to be congratulated on the vision and the far-sightedness it evinced. But when hon. members on that side of the House accuse this Government of neglecting to make provision for manpower, then what they actually mean is that this Government is neglecting to train non-Whites for industry. They mean that the Government is neglecting to train them, not where they are at present being trained in their homelands and border industries, but they mean that the Government is neglecting to train them in Cape Town, Johannesburg, Pretoria and Port Elizabeth. They want these people to be trained so that these people can compete on an equal footing with white workers in the white areas and not in the non-white homelands, in other words, they want to do away with the colour bar. That is actually what this accusation amounts to, but they are too afraid to say so.

We must face up to the fact that we do not have enough Whites in this country to maintain a growth rate of 5½ per cent. That is why I want to put in a plea to the hon. the Minister this afternoon that since we are now experiencing large-scale economic prosperity, since we are now experiencing the golden age of the Republic, a positive and large-scale attempt should be made to increase the white birth rate in this country.

Mr. Speaker, up to now we have been very fortunate and this Government has seen to it in a marvellous way that the shortage of manpower is alleviated by means of immigration. During the past five years the Government has brought an average of 40,000 immigrants into this country per year. They have not merely been scraped together, they are not “the good and the bad” which were brought in regardless, as happened in the days of the United Party; they are people who have been carefully selected. They are trained technologists and technicians, etc., who can really make a contribution. If we want to maintain our development we will, in the years which lie ahead, have to continue with this selective recruiting of immigrants. But we cannot build our future on that alone. We need more white people, we need millions more white people. Apart from immigration there is only one way of doing this, and that is to have larger white families. We are living in a time of economic prosperity, and I think in all humility that this country can afford to spend several million rands every year in increasing our white birth rate. It is a fact that economic prosperity in all countries results in a decrease in the birth rate, and this is what we find in South Africa as well. In comparison with other Western countries our birth rate of 22 per 1,000 is still reasonably high, but if we compare it to the increased birth rate of the non-Whites in South Africa, which is approximately 45 per 1,000, one of the highest in the world, then the prospects for the Whites do not seem too favourable. If we want to maintain the White percentage of the population, i.e. approximately 19 per cent, we will by the end of the century have to have 8 million Whites in South Africa. If we can maintain the present tempo of immigration then we will have to increase the white birth rate to approximately 25 per 1,000. This is not impossible because we had that figure at the beginning of the century, and it can be done again. I think, and this has to a certain extent been proved by research, that economic circumstances are in fact responsible for a decrease in our birth rate. I am no sociologist, and do not want to suggest solutions, but I do nevertheless think that if this Government could make pre- and post-natal medical services available, and if such a thing as marriage loans could be made available to married couples, the position would improve. I am thinking for example that such loans can be granted to couples who are getting married, and with the birth of each child part of that loan can be written off. I think that these methods can nevertheless result in an increased birth rate. Increased tax concessions for children can also help, and I am sorry the hon. the Minister could not see his way clear to accepting the recommendation of the Franzsen Commission in this connection. But I know, and we know that we can safely leave this matter in the hands of our very capable and far-sighted hon. the Prime Minister and his able Cabinet. We know that they will give the necessary attention to this matter as well.

I should now like to avail myself of this opportunity of congratulating the hon. the Minister of Finance not only on a brilliant Budget but in particular I want, as ex-teacher, to avail myself of this opportunity of congratulating him on the wonderfully pure, honest poetic language he used here. It was an unalloyed pleasure to be able to listen to a man who is able to use his mother tongue so well, even in a Budget speech.

I now want to conclude. I listened this afternoon and yesterday to hon. members on the opposite side, and I cannot help remembering over and over again a sight I saw in my youth. It was in the year 1934 when the Orange River was in flood and I stood above the Augrabies Water Fall looking down at the seething waters. On the surging waves tree stumps floated past at frequent intervals until they were suddenly drawn into the vortex of the rushing waters and disappeared into the depths. On one of the stumps I noticed a number of field mice. They were sitting peacefully there moving about a little from time to time, but they were sitting on the stump apparently unconcerned, except for one. This one field mouse suddenly jumped into the water and swam out. It was a difficult feat, but he managed to reach safety. The other mice remained sitting there calmly. Even the mouse who was apparently the leader of the group made no attempt to lead his little company to safety. Before they fully realized what was happening, they were in the maelstrom and they disappeared into the depths. I am not a prophet; nor am I a presager of doom, and I do not want to make predictions, but I am afraid the time for hon. members opposite to jump off is becoming short. Their Augrabies, the 1971 election, is close at hand, and we would not like to see them disappearing into the depths.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Green Point devoted virtually his entire speech to the question of the shortage of officials in the Civil Service. As the hon. member for Florida pointed out yesterday, the shortage in our Civil Service is not a phenomenon of recent times only. Prior to the war years, during the war years and ever since the war years we have had to cope with this problem. We must accept that as long as we have this large degree of expansion and these new undertakings in South Africa, as long as so many new services have to be provided to the nation, we shall never reach that stage when each post in the Civil Service will be suitably filled. If we look at the overall figures we find that 20 per cent of the posts in all the Departments are not suitably filled, i.e. they are not filled by permanent staff members. The real shortage in each Department is approximately 10 per cent. Now the question arises what can be done to decrease these shortages. When the hon. member for Green Point was asked what he suggested as a solution to this problem, he actually made two statements only. The first was that more extensive use should be made of automatization, of mechanization and all possible means that can be employed for alleviating human labour. But this is already being done to a large extent in the Civil Service. His other solution was that there should be a continuous adjustment of salaries. He said that the Government gave attention to this aspect only when complaints were received from time to time, and that increases were given at intervals, but that there was no continuous adjustment of salaries to the rising cost of living. If we examine this solution of his in practice, we find that this statement is not correct. According to the figures furnished by the hon. the Minister of Finance the rise in the cost of living over the past year was approximately 2.7 per cent.

Business suspended at 6.30 p.m. and resumed at 8.05 p.m.

Mr. Speaker, when business was suspended, I was saying that the only real solution the hon. member for Green Point, one of the main speakers of the Opposition on the question of the staff shortage in the Civil Service, had to offer on behalf of his party, was that there should be a continuous adjustment of salaries from year to year in order to keep abreast of the rise in the cost of living. I said the percentage increase in consumer prices was 2.7 per cent during the past year. Therefore, if the suggestion of the hon. member for Green Point were to be accepted, it would mean that the Government would have had to make an adjustment of approximately 2.7 to 3 per cent to the salaries of civil servants. But long before this suggestion was made by the resourceful member for Green Point, the Government had announced a special pensionable allowance on the salaries of civil servants amounting to 6 per cent per annum as from 1st April this year. In addition the Government has committed itself to add a further 4 per cent on the same basis to salaries as from 1970. Then the Government has also committed itself to a consolidation of scales and a revision of scales for the Civil Service to be undertaken during 1971. I think the hon. member for Green Point will have to give the matter much deeper thought if he, as the main speaker of his party on the staff shortage in the Civil Service, wants to suggest this as the only means of solving these problems. The fact of the matter is that in this Budget alone there are four or five different measures which according to the Minister, will be applied by the Government in an attempt to solve or, in any event, to decrease the staff shortage in the Civil Service. One of them I have already mentioned. Another solution is that the Government is giving consideration to subsidizing the interest on housing loans of the lower as well as the middle-income groups in the Civil Service. I do not doubt for one single moment that this will be one of the measures which will be welcomed most warmly by those categories in the Civil Service, where the greatest shortages are being experienced at present. In fact, it is the loss of these officials, who have been working for four or five years in the Civil Service, which hits the Civil Service the hardest. If a young official can receive the assurance from the State when he wants to get married, that he will receive a subsidy on the interest for the house he can afford, and that he will pay a much lower rate of interest on his housing loan than the current rate of interest, I believe that that will be a very strong incentive to civil servants and that many of those who have five or six years’ service will be retained in the Civil Service. There are other reports as well, such as the Münnig Report, and other proposals the Government are considering at the present time. As we have come to know the National Government throughout these years, we can accept that everything that can reasonably be expected will be done by the Government in an attempt to solve the shortage in the Civil Service.

But we must also view the question of the manpower shortage in this country, which consequently exists in the Civil Service as well, against the background of this Budget presented by the Minister of Finance. I do not think any Budget has ever before been introduced in the history of our country which could have done more than this Budget for overcoming the manpower shortage in South Africa, in the private sector as well as in the public services. The fact that enormous tax concessions have been made to the middle-income groups will mean that people in the private sector will be more prepared than ever before to work harder. We will get a better utilization of trained people, highly qualified people. We shall find that in future the golf-courses will be more deserted on Wednesday afternoons, and perhaps even on Saturday mornings, and that the offices will be fuller. [Interjections.] I do not doubt for one moment that the motto put forward by the Minister last year, and which we as a nation must accept, i.e. “work and save”, can be carried into effect by these means. Therefore I think that the Civil Service will benefit from this. One of the main reasons why the private sector always used to be inclined to outbid the public sector in salaries, was the very fact that they, who were paying reasonably high salaries to their employees, found that even a large increase meant relatively little to those employees. Such an employee had to refund a very large proportion of his increments in the form of income-tax. As a result of the new approach which is now being adopted by the Minister with the introduction of this Budget, we may find that not only the public sector, but also the private sector will work harder. The tendency amongst officials who have been trained to a certain extent to change over from the public sector to the private sector may show a decline.

The United Party, through its Leader, suggested that more use should possibly be made of the non-white labour. I do not think there is one person in South Africa who will disagree with that statement as such. The relevant question actually is in what way should trained non-white manpower be utilized. On the one hand we have the approach of the Opposition that the non-Whites should be employed together with the Whites in all spheres of industry, and that, as they become more fully trained, they should take up their places alongside the Whites in factories, in offices, in our business world, etc. Directly opposed to this is the policy of the National Party. The National Party is prepared to provide non-white manpower with maximum training, but they must in the first place be employed in the service of their own people. It was the National Party that gave our Coloured population a university of their own. It was the National Government that gave our Coloured population their first technical college, i.e. the Peninsula Technical College. These are the institutions at which the future leaders of the Coloureds can be trained. It was a National Government that made Bantu education what it is to-day. The National Government not only did everything within the country’s power to get Bantu children into school, but also gave each national group among the Bantu peoples a university of its own. In years to come our country will be able to enjoy the fruits of this wise policy of the National Party. Whereas we found in the past that municipalities in particular were bodies which also drew civil servants away, we may find that as the Coloureds become able to provide more and more staff for their own services, and as the Bantu become able to provide the necessary staff, so the burden on the Whites of having to provide those services for the non-white peoples will diminish. I believe that we shall then find a smaller shortage in our Civil Service. Therefore we have to see this Budget as a turning point, also as regards this problem in our country. But apart from this the National Party, which looked after the interests of the Civil Service in the past, can be trusted to do this to the same extent in the future as well. Every possible means that can be employed, will be employed in order to eliminate the shortage which exists in the Civil Service at present. Therefore I do not believe, if the one means suggested by the hon. member for Green Point is the sum total of the contribution the United Party is able to make towards the solution of this problem, that we as a Government on this side of this House need have any fear whatsoever that, as a result of this Budget, the charge can be levelled at us that we have neglected our responsibility to ensure that the Civil Service is functioning in the best possible way.

Mr. Chairman, I want to express my gratitude for the hon. the Minister’s approach. He was prepared to introduce a completely new pattern into our tax system. In addition to all the adjectives used by other speakers in this House, I want to call this Budget the most scientific budget in the history of our country, because the fact of the matter is that, except for the report that was published by the old Social and Economic Planning Council in 1945, this is the first Budget which has been based on an extensive and scientific study of our monetary and taxation system. I believe that this direction which is now being taken will be of great benefit to our country in the future, not only because we are giving greater encouragement to those who are prepared to work hard and to save, but also on the other hand, because we have the courage to distribute the incidence of taxation evenly over the entire population, White and non-White.

I listened with great interest to the hon. member for Vasco. He was attempting to make a serious contribution to this debate, but I feel that he has done himself irreparable harm in the Nationalist Party, because he was heard to say that if all these things happen the golf-courses would be much emptier on Saturday mornings. Sir, we thought that was part of the outward-looking policy of the Nationalist Party that members should be encouraged to play golf, after all the hon. the Prime Minister was given a gold medal for his ability to play golf. I therefore feel that the hon. member has done himself irreparable harm through what he has just said. I feel that hon. members opposite have missed completely the point that my hon. Leader made this afternoon. He made the point that the Government was falling behind and was rendering it physically impossible for the white man to maintain the rate of growth in this country, the only guarantee of safety the white man has, because of the ideology which prevents this Government from accepting the non-white population in certain grades of work which are becoming vitally important because there are just not enough white people to fill them. They are thereby detracting from the effort made by the white man, the economic effort; and I say again that the only thing which can guarantee the safety of the white man is the growing involvement of the non-Whites in the economy of South Africa.

Is that the theme for your election?

Will the hon. member deny it? This is the only thing which can guarantee the white man’s safety because the non-white will be building up for himself something of his own to protect. But not one member opposite has attempted in any way at all to answer the charge made by my hon. Leader that the Government are failing, because of their ideology purely and simply, to include in their reckoning and their thinking the employment of non-white people under guarantees which will ensure the safety of the white man and the white worker. They are completely excluding three-quarters of the population of South Africa. To my mind this is shortsightedness of the utmost degree, but that is what we expect from hon. members opposite, because they can see nothing which is not Coloured, Black and White in South Africa. They are unable to see what we have said for years and years, that the various population groups in this country work together as one.

Integration.

The hon. member says it is integration. That, of course, is the parrot-cry you get from those hon. members, and even that hon. member did not mean it seriously, I am convinced. But I want to go even further. The problem that the Government is facing is even more than simply allowing the non-Whites to do work at certain levels. They are falling behind with the training of the non-Whites who can be leaders in their own society if and when such a society is ever created by that Government. I wish to quote from a work by the American sociologist, Edward Banfield, entitled “The Moral Basis of a Backward Society”. He says—

But the sociologist goes on to say that the assumption is wrong because it overlooks the crucial importance of culture—

That is what this Government is failing to do. They are failing to take adequate steps to-day by means of the association of the Whites and the non-Whites in various grades of administration in the Civil Service to train those people with practical experience on a big enough scale for the homelands which they themselves are pretending to be creating here in South Africa.

What does that all mean?

The hon. member asks what it all means. I think I must take him out and give him one or two simple lessons in elementary statecraft and administration.

The Budget has excited a certain amount of interest in respect of the many points which have come from the Bible, and I verily believe that this Budget will come to be known as the Biblical Budget because the Minister introduced it on a Biblical theme and we have had various quotations from one side or the other. I wish to add my contribution, my quotation, from the Holy Book, a contribution which I believe typifies the Budget the Minister has introduced. It is from Haggai, Chapter 1, verse 6, which says: “Ye have sown much but brought in little; ye eat but ye have not enough; ye drink but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put into a bag with holes”. That typifies and sums up the Budget that the Minister of Finance has introduced. The wage-earner, particularly the person in the lower category, is earning wages to put into a bag with holes, and the holes are the little holes made by the Minister by his consumer tax which he has introduced on a wide variety of commodities which are sold in South Africa. It has been said quite freely on the other side that this is a tax mainly on luxuries, and perhaps, if you go through the list, you can say that it is a tax mainly on luxuries, but I want to tell the hon. the Minister that the volume of sales will not be in respect of luxuries but necessities and these are being taxed in this Budget. One can quite easily resist buying expensive radios and expensive motor-cars and that kind of thing, but one cannot resist soap and toothpaste and similar necessities. Toilet paper is one of the necessities taxed by this Government. [Interjection.] Here we have the basic fallacy in the thinking of hon. members opposite, because while they talk about the luxuries which are going to be taxed, they put the tax on what are necessities for the poor man, the common man. The bulk of this money is going to come from the poor man and the common man, the people who buy boxes of matches and toilet articles and that kind of thing. The bulk of the tax will come from those articles and not from luxury articles. The hon. the Minister of Finance has given us an estimate or guesstimate of the income that he will derive from this consumer tax. He has estimated it at more or less R100 million. Sir, I believe there is another way of looking at it. If one takes the estimated spending power of the Bantu population in the year 1970, it amounts to R3,000,000 a day. If you take it that half of one per cent of everything spent by the Bantu is going to be levied by the hon. the Minister’s Department and if you assume that the tax is going to be paid on 300 days in the year, then you are going to get an amount of R90 million in taxation from the Bantu population alone, and it is reckoned that the consumption of the Bantu population is less than 20 per cent of the whole of the money spent in South Africa.

We know that figures can lie.

Sir, I wish the hon. the Deputy Minister would get up and take part in the debate. I hope he will demonstrate to us where figures can lie that liars cannot figure. If you take it on the spending power of the Bantu population alone at one half of 1 per cent, then the hon. the Minister will collect something like R90 million in 300 days. As I have said, the consumption of the Bantu population is less than 20 per cent of the total consumption in South Africa. So I believe that the Minister is going to end this financial year with a colossal amount of money, with far more than he has estimated, and I think we deserve some kind of explanation from the hon. the Minister as to how this figure was arrived at and, if there is going to be a surplus of some sort, which I am convinced there is going to be, what he is going to do with it, because we have found year after year that this Government is incapable of budgeting accurately or else the Government does not attempt to do so. It comes out with surplus after surplus—money which is taken out of the pocket of the taxpayer unnecessarily. I believe that it is time the Government made some serious attempt to explain what has happened and in the meantime I believe that the Government should accept what is a reasonable amendment moved by the hon. member for Constantia, that we should balance the Budget by the means set out by him and levy only a nominal sales tax on certain items which can be classed as luxury items, to give us the necessary experience in levying a sales tax, experience which we do not have at the present moment and which we are going to find essential before we can introduce a sales tax on a larger scale. Sir, I fail to see the reason behind the complete failure of any member on the Government side to make any serious attempt either to defend the sales tax or to deal with the fact that the people at large are going to suffer as a result of this particular tax.

Sir, I wish to raise one other matter with the Minister and that is the question of the gold price, which was also mentioned by the hon. member for Virginia and another hon. member on the other side. I would like to make a suggestion, which I put forward to the hon. the Minister in all modesty and which I hope he will consider. I am convinced that the hon. the Minister does not want to see a devaluation of the dollar, because I believe that such devaluation in to-day’s circumstances would lead to a chaotic condition in international trade and international finance. I think we must accept certain facts here. The point of view of the last American Administration was made quite clear. They were not prepared to consider a change in the price of gold under any circumstances at all, for various reasons, basically because gold was totally inadequate to meet the internal needs of the American economy. They turned their backs on gold internally a long while ago. Gold is produced by unfriendly countries like ourselves and a hostile country like the U.S.S.R. That was the official attitude of the previous American Administration. Gold is passing into industrial use where it is becoming unrecognizable as a monetary medium, at an increasing rate, and we expect newly mined gold in the free world to be tailing off severely, failing major new discoveries of gold in the free world. I think the fifth point is that there is a vast amount of gold held in speculation against the devaluation of the dollar. The hon. the Minister has said on numerous occasions that he is certain that there is going to be a revaluation of gold in terms of the dollar. That, of course, is a different thing from the devaluation of the dollar. But I believe that the American Government is in the position in which King Henry VII, the first Tudor King of England, found himself, where it was said by the Spanish Embassador that he took all gold that came to him into his coffers and paid out only in debased coinage. I think the point about it is that you have gold tied to-day to the dollar at a price of 35 dollars per ounce, 35 years after that price was first fixed, and what has happened in those 35 years is a steady depreciation of the dollar, and with it gold has depreciated at the same time at the same rate, and I think we find ourselves in this position that gold is at a discount in monetary circles in the world because of the standing of the dollar, and you have currencies such as the West German mark and the Japanese yen and the Swiss franc which are harder than the American dollar. It would hardly pay these countries to hold gold because of the depreciation of the dollar over this period of years. The hon. the Minister faces this problem when he talks about revaluation: revaluation is not simply a matter of changing the prices of all international currencies in terms of gold as they are, in the same proportion, but I think he will find when revaluation is discussed, that the harder currencies will insist, when revaluation takes place, that some adjustments take place between their currencies and the dollar. I think that this is the stumbling block we are going to come up against. I do not think one can stress enough the importance to South Africa of ensuring even the official price of gold at 35 dollars an ounce, for the life of the gold mines which are so important to our economy. Sir, I am convinced of one thing and that is that if the American Government can get the Special Drawing Rights system to work through the International Monetary Fund, they will then turn their backs on monetary gold as soon as they can, and I think the consequences to South Africa are of the utmost importance. I think the consensus of opinion is that something new is necessary in the way of international credit, in the way of financing international trade, because it is not merely a question of trade which is growing to-day between the various countries of the free world, but we face the immense burden of financing the development of under-developed countries. Special Drawing Rights are being created to some extent to enable world trade to flow on an expanding basis, something which gold at its present price is absolutely unable to do and becomes progressively less able to do as it passes into other uses and as it is locked up in speculation. I think the problem with the Special Drawing Rights is that they are only as good as the credit of the countries which make credits available to the International Monetary Fund for Special Drawing Rights, and these are things which fluctuate day by day. Sir, a major devaluation of any one of the major currencies can bring the whole system of Special Drawing Rights into very, very serious question, and I believe that we have to face the fact that the question of gold to-day is no longer the question of gold as a monetary medium, but that it is a question of international politics. I believe that the Minister might try playing America at her own game. I wonder whether it would not be possible for the Minister to suggest to the International Monetary Fund that credits which are made available to the Fund for the purpose of Special Drawing Rights, should be made in deposits of gold.

Mr. Speaker, this may sound like a paradox, because the Special Drawing Rights are being created in fact to try and get away from gold. But if gold had to be deposited by member nations with the fund itself, one would then have something with a real value in terms of the fixed price of gold at 35 dollars an ounce under the control of the International Monetary Fund. There are countries that do not have gold to deposit, like Japan. Japan has never yet thought it worthwhile to hold gold in the present state of the world currency. They are beginning to buy to-day, because they believe they can sense that there might be a change coming. But if these credits were required to be deposited, the fund itself would control gold and make credit available from the gold which it holds. We have already the example of a two-tier system of gold: monetary gold, which is fixed at a price of 35 dollars an ounce, and gold which is on the free market, able to fluctuate up and down. I believe that we might well be able to create something of a new status altogether for gold under the control of the fund where the fund itself might be able to vary the price to suit its need to finance the tremendous expansion which is foreseen in the need of the world to finance trade and the like. I wonder whether something on these lines might not be possible to try and get around the block that America has put, quite obviously in her own interest, to the change in the price of gold which so radically and vitally affects us here in South Africa.

Mr. Speaker, I was not going to reply to the speech of the hon. member for Mooi River, but you will allow me nevertheless, Sir, to reply to him in brief. I was pleased to see him with the Bible in his hands this evening and to think that this Budget might have inspired him to this. Now I want to address a polite request to him. I hope he will not only read the Bible while the Budget is under discussion, but will also do so throughout the year. This is the second day on which we have had to listen to the Opposition’s complaints in regard to this Budget. As far as I am concerned, it gives me great pleasure to congratulate the Minister on this excellent Budget, on this drastic change he introduced as compared with budgets of the past. This is so. Yesterday the Opposition set the ball rolling with the speech of the hon. member for Constantia. This reminded me of something that happened many years ago When I was still a young boy, my father-inlaw—at that time he had not yet become my father-in-law—had an old Chev car. When it became over-heated while one of my brothers-in-law was driving, I used to pull the choke, otherwise it would not get enough petrol. Yesterday while I was listening to the speech of the hon. member for Constantia, who spoke in fits and starts, I wondered when someone would get up to pull the choke on the whole performance. Then I listened to the hon. members for Pinetown and Parktown. Then we had the choke in the person of the hon. member for Durban (Point). He began, in his opinion, by tearing this Budget to shreds. He began with the most expensive perfume one can buy for one’s wife and concluded with dishwater. But up to now we have not heard anything constructive.

I want to congratulate the hon. the Minister on this Budget. I am speaking on behalf of my constituency. I want to thank him for the concession that was made in regard to the tax reduction in respect of proto teams, the emergency teams who performed that enormous task at the time of the disaster at West Driefontein. I want to thank the Minister very sincerely to-night for that concession.

Tell them what a proto team is.

Yes, I think I should. I have received two telegrams since yesterday: One from the management of the proto teams and one from my constituency, congratulating the Minister and myself and requesting me to thank the Minister for this major concession.

As far as the reduction in income tax is concerned, I also want to thank the Minister on behalf of my constituency. Perhaps we are more privileged than many other constituencies as far as income is concerned, for they are the people, those earning more than R6,000 per year, who complained to me the most for being taxed so severely. [Interjections] Yes, Stilfontein is not all that quiet. If hon. members want to pay Stilfontein a visit, I can show them around. The constituency can become quite lively at times. I want to express my gratitude for this concession. As hon. members know, we still have the problem of providing the miners with a good pension for the future. I believe that this concession can make a contribution towards enabling the miners to make better provision for their future.

Then I am also pleased that the Minister went so far as to introduce a sales duty. We heard yesterday and to-day that approximately 8 per cent of our community pays income tax to the State. We realize that the sales duty is going to hit a certain section of our population. But this affords our non-white section, numbering some 13½ million, to contribute towards the progress of this country. The Bantu and the Coloureds are asking more and more from this Government. Those requests must be met. They are using the same roads as the Whites. They also want the same hospital services we want. They want all the facilities which the Whites enjoy. Here is where they can also make a contribution now. The only thing is that this should have been introduced 25 years ago. These problems will solve themselves in the course of time. Certain sections will be hit, but the line taken by us as Government, will enable us to overcome those problems.

In addition I am pleased, that we have a recorded history. To some people, history is something beautiful, but to others it is a curse. I listened to-day to the hon. member for Houghton. She did not deliver her speech for local consumption; it was delivered for overseas consumption. In her speech she wanted to cast reflections on this Government and everything it does. Unfortunately the hon. member is not present at the moment, but I am asking her to calculate the income of the non-Whites on a percentage basis and to draw a comparison. I am asking the hon. member to compare the earnings of the non-Whites in the major cities during the years 1947 and 1948 with what they are earning to-day.

What did you earn in 1947 and 1948?

Very little under the United Party Government, but after the National Party had come into power, both the hon. member and myself expanded tremendously … This is not indicative of poverty. The standard of living of the Bantu has been improving in the same way. Let us consider what the Government has done for them in the field of housing, but yet the charge is levelled at us that they cannot afford housing. I want to say now that the Bantu and every other non-white group in this country are privileged. This Government will continue to create even more opportunities for them. The Government will create even more facilities and employment opportunities for them. [Interjection.] Unfortunately you are mentioning this; you are dragging it into this Budget debate, while you have no knowledge of it.

Can the white pensioner afford the new taxation?

That hon. member opposite is now acting as the champion of the poor man. Do they think the poor man in this country is going to believe them? We know those hon. members, do we not? What did we get in those years? I shall tell you, Sir, If they want to drag politics into this matter, we shall oblige. I say that one was compelled as a poor youth to take part in the last war, and if one refused to do so, one was placed into an internment-camp. [Interjections.] This is so. One was compelled to contribute to those funds and if one declined to do so, one suffered and was dismissed from one’s job. As a boy I walked from one mine to the other, but I could not get a job because I refused to fall for that joke. We know the history. The poor man and the worker—and I can speak on behalf of the worker—will not believe that side of the House. If that side were to be judged, I would not know what criterion to use. We are grateful for this Budget. [Interjections.]

Order!

Even the Fifth Column would not take you.

Order! What did the hon. member for Durban (Point) say?

I withdraw that, Mr. Speaker.

I do not think he was very wrong! This country is growing. The United Party with its ever decreasing numbers, will not succeed in disparaging the achievements of this side. I say the workers believe in the National Party. The miners believe in the National Party, because what they did receive, they received from the National Government. They received nothing from that side. The persons concerned are no longer members of this House to-day, but they always fled when we, as mineworkers, wanted to see them. When we looked for them in Bloemfontein, they were in Johannesburg, and when we looked for them in Johannesburg, they were in Cape Town. The doors of our Ministers and of hon. members on this side of the House, have always been open to the workers. I trust that the workers in my constituency will thank the hon. the Minister for this concession. They will gladly pay this sales duty. I want to direct a kind challenge to any hon. member on the other side. I want to address a friendly challenge to any hon. member on the opposite side as well as to the hon. member for Mooi River. I want to tell him he need not bring his Bible along because I will see to it that I have mine available in case he gets stuck. I invite any hon. member of the Opposition to appear with me on a platform in my constituency. I am addressing this invitation to them. I want to say this to the hon. member for Wynberg. The Stilfontein constituency is a fine constituency, but it is not all that still.

Mr. Speaker, we have now listened to the Opposition and also to hon. members on the Government side speaking on the Budget. Sometimes the subject was discussed thoroughly, but at other times many nonsensical statements were made. I feel that we have already overemphasized the matter and I think that we can transfer our attention to another field. Before I do so, I want to refer to what the hon. member for Mooi River said. In passing I want to mention that I never knew that there were so many scribes among the Opposition. It was quite an experience. I shall rather not mention the other one. It was a revelation. Yet it does not prevent them from talking disparately at times. I want to refer to what the hon. member for Mooi River said about our policy in respect of the training of Bantu. He said that for purely ideological reasons the National Party had thus far refused to train Bantu as experts and technicians. He also said that we were afraid of integration. He has a very short memory because in his speech the hon. the Leader of the Opposition said that the National Government was actively introducing integration at our border industries because they were giving expert training to non-Whites there. Unfortunately the hon. the Leader was not telling the whole truth. The truth is this. I admit that Bantu are in fact receiving expert training at our border industries, but this is specifically to enable them to act as information officers in their own homelands at a later stage or to enable them to train their own people as experts.

The Opposition’s continual harping on the manpower shortage is, I think, already an argument which has served its purpose. Anyone with a little logic realizes that under National Party rule this country has developed so tremendously that we simply cannot keep abreast of it. Our natural growth is too meagre. Our nation is too small to supply the necessary manpower for the tremendous development taking place in our mother country. I say that this is attributable to the good and sound policy of the National Party.

If the Opposition are really sincere in wanting us to train more people as experts, researchers, technicians, etc., I put this question to them, with reference, of course, to the private sector. Why then is the private sector not prepared or inclined to make its contribution in respect of the training of experts, technicians, etc., for our country? They could make a great contribution if they were willing to have even one out of every four people in their service trained in those fields. What is happening in actual fact? As soon as the State has trained young students, by means of all the schemes already described by hon. members on this side, and made them proficient, the private sector comes along and simply snatches those men away from the Public Service. Then it is said in this House that the Government is not doing its share in supplying the necessary training.

I regret that it is necessary for me to refer to certain conditions which prevailed in the twenties under United Party rule. Under this Government large schemes are being tackled in the country. It is being done by proper planning and within the framework of the annual budget. What happened in the days when the United Party members ruled? I should like hon. members opposite to listen now. In the twenties dams were built in South Africa, but not with the money made available by the then Minister of Finance. I am now referring to the Hartebeespoort Dam of Pretoria, which was built in those days by relief workers, people who were without work. The unemployment situation in our country was so critical that the then Government was compelled to build those dams so that those people could remain alive, and that was all done at the wonderful remuneration of 45 cents a day. Yet hon. members opposite come along and vociferously reproach the hon. the Minister of Finance for this Budget and level all manner of nonsensical criticism at it.

Notwithstanding the so-called manpower shortage the hon. the Minister has this year budgeted for an amount of R74,250,000 for Water Affairs. I have now just referred to the Hartebeespoort Dam and other works which were tackled during those years by relief workers. This Budget makes provision for an amount which is R10,180,000 more than the amount set aside for Water Affairs last year. It is therefore clear that this Budget makes ample provision for the necessary extension of all the essential sectors in the development of our country.

As far as Water Affairs is concerned, I should like to express a few thoughts. I couple these thoughts to the amount budgeted for this year. As far as State Water Schemes are concerned, there are no less than 90 services which are going to be implemented. Loans and subsidies to councils, administrations and individuals amounts to 40. Loans in terms of section 157 of Act No. 54 of 1956 amount to seven. This gives us a total amount of R74,250,000. It is a habit with the Opposition, is it not, to criticize everything the Government does. If the Government, on its own initiative, does anything in the interests of the country, hon. members opposite, come along boastfully and say that the Government has at last been wise enough to accept the Opposition’s advice. They then claim the credit for themselves as if the Government is incapable of doing anything good for the country on its own initiative. What is the actual situation? I should now like to express a few ideas which the hon. Opposition cannot claim credit for in the future.

However, before I proceed to do so, I want to express my thanks and appreciation to the hon. the Minister, despite the grin on the faces of hon. members opposite when we speak about this. I find it more important to express my thanks for what I have received and for what has been done for me than to pay heed to the grin of the hon. Opposition. I want to assure the hon. the Minister of my appreciation for his praiseworthy idea, which he has already announced, i.e. that a water festival is to be held next year. Last year we celebrated the festival of the soil and it was a great success. It made the nation soil-conscious again and we hope that the hon. the Minister’s noble efforts will be crowned with outstanding success. Such a festival will bring home to the nation that water is one of the most valuable possessions of human beings on this earth. I have here a cutting from Die Transvaler of 16th February, 1967. Inter alia, it reads as follows (translation)—

I am proud to be able to say that the mover of that motion was the hon. the Minister of Water Affairs, before he became Minister. I feel that the nation must be educated to regard water with love and admiration. I can go further and quote from the Sunday Times. In an article it is stated that—

Water is being referred to here. From the earliest times in man’s history mention has been made of water. Certain bodies even claim —and I am not going to pose as a scribe now—that paradise was possibly situated between the Euphrates and the Tigrus Rivers. What is water? Apart from its chemical composition water was and still is the life source of man, animal and plant alike. Thus we see that the old Babylonian kingdom developed beside these two rivers which I have just mentioned. We see that the Egyptian civilization grew and developed beside the Nile. We see that the Indian civilization developed beside the Indus and Ganges Rivers. Also that the Chinese civilization was established beside the Yellow River. In their day the Romans, when had virtually conquered the whole of Europe, had already built those beautiful aqueducts which are to-day still to be seen in Spain. It stands as a monument to the Romans for the great work they undertook in their time.

Is it different in South Africa? Not at all. The first immigrants to come to this country settled beside our streams. Eventually, they spread into the far Northern Transvaal where the Voortrekker Hendrik Potgieter, on arriving in Potchefstroom, immediately began to build a water furrow from the Mooi River. When he subsequently moved to Ohrigstad he also dug a water furrow there which is still in existence to-day. It is now known as the Voortrekker furrow. Therefore, there is in fact a profound realization that water is man’s life source. I have mentioned these historic facts to emphasize how dependent man is on water. I then want to put the question as to whether we have sufficient water to provide for primary, secondary and tertiary uses in South Africa. Under present circumstances I must unfortunately state emphatically that we do not have sufficient water. Here I could also quote from the Sunday Times again but I am afraid that my time is so limited that I cannot do so. If we then do not have sufficient water and we cannot make more, what is there left for us to do?

There consequently remains only one avenue open to us, and that is that we should utilize the water which we have as efficiently and economically as possible. According to this article in the Sunday Times to which I referred a moment ago, the picture appears to be a little gloomy, and yet the situation is not completely hopeless. We can in fact do a great deal with the little water we have. Our first consideration must be water conservation. Water conservation means the storage of water in dams as well as the preservation of catchment areas and their flora. Dams have up to now been the only manner of storing water, but evaporation remains the major enemy of large storage dams. At this point I could also quote statements from the Press by great authorities in this field. Some of them said that in our country evaporation remains one of the greatest enemies of large storage dams. They also referred to the evaporation process taking place in the Vaal Dam. We must accept the fact that we must also have planning there and that we must make the necessary provision. Dams with large surface areas which are exposed to the direct rays of the sun will obviously lose more water through evaporation than dams constructed in narrower chasms with consequent deeper water levels. Therefore I plead in this connection for the hon. the Minister to consider having the necessary investigation and research carried out to see if, in the future, we cannot plan for the construction of our dams at places where the least evaporation will take place. Even the height above sea level has a great deal to do with this.

I should like to refer to what the hon. the Minister of Water Affairs said on 21st June, 1968. He said that canals conveying water to consumer points were also sources of tremendous evaporation. Since the hon. the Minister feels as I do, I should like to bring to his attention the possibility of considering the future use of pipelines in preference to canals for conveying water. Large canals, especially cement canals, get tremendously hot during the summer months and it goes without saying that the evaporation process there is tremendous. I feel that more research will have to be done to see whether we cannot convey water via pipelines. It is done to-day at the great cities. Water is to-day conveyed by pipelines from the Vaal Dam to the Witwatersrand and even as far as Pretoria. I think it is a thought which ought to enjoy further consideration.

I want to go further and I should like to mention something else which is also of great importance as far as water conservation is concerned. Certain projects can be moved towards the water supply, while others cannot be moved. Projects which can be established at and moved to the water supply are, for example, new towns and industries. We ought to plan our new towns in such a way that they will be near the water sources. This also applies to our industries. However, in the case of agriculture the position is different. We cannot bring agriculture to our water sources. We must bring the water to agriculture, because we cannot move the ground, can we. It is specifically in that connection that I am of the opinion that all possible steps should be taken to combat evaporation.

I should like to deal with another matter while I still have time. I also want to bring this matter to the attention of the hon. the Minister and to ask him to give it serious consideration. Subsidies are at present being paid to farmers for boreholes so that they can pump water out of our soil. If we are serious about water conservation we must try to apply it in all fields. I think that with their watercloset system the farmers waste a lot of water A lot of water goes to waste as a result of this system and it even causes soil erosion. However, as a result of the present high production costs the farmers cannot afford to acquire spray irrigation systems. I should like to ask the hon. the Minister if it would not be possible to subsidize those farmers who want to introduce spray irrigation, as is the case with those farmers who have boreholes drilled. I consider it imperative that this should be done. As a result of this we shall save a great deal of water and the farmers will also do less damage to their ground. They will thus preserve the fertility of their ground and it is, of course, in the country’s interests that they do so.

I should also like to raise another matter, but I actually regret having to do so. It would appear that in our great cities and towns it has become a status symbol for our millionaires and even people who are not so rich but who are nevertheless well-off, to have dams in their gardens. It would appear as if they believe themselves to have no status unless they construct a fine dam in their gardens or lay out a park. I believe that the time has come for us to consider the large-scale saving of water through the exercising of control in this connection. We will save a lot of water if we make less use of unnecessary swimming baths. If people want to bath, they can do so in municipal swimming baths or in their own homes. Hon. members can laugh at this but I am serious. If an appeal can be made to our farmers to conserve water then we have the right to make the same appeal to our city and town dwellers. We can also ask them to save water as far as possible. [Interjections.]

Order!

I regret that I cannot agree with those hon. members who passed remarks.

Order! The hon. member for Koedoespoort must please listen when he is called to order.

I now come to the last matter that I want to raise, i.e. our plans in connection with the construction of dams. I want to ask the hon. the Minister to consider appointing a planning commission in connection with the construction of dams in the Eastern Transvaal as he did in the case of the Western Transvaal. The eastward-flowing rivers are not being utilized to the full. It is in the interests of South Africa that in those free-flowing rivers proper storage dams should also be constructed.

Yes, the Government has delayed too long.

When the United Party was in power, nothing was done. In conclusion I want to thank the hon. the Minister on behalf of my constituents for the dam which is to be built in my constituency and for which provision is made in the Budget. An amount of R7,200,000 is being voted for the construction of such a dam in the Blyde River Canyon, and we want to thank the hon. the Minister for this.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Lydenburg has made a plea for the conservation of water and the better distribution of it. I do not propose to follow him on that but I suggest that he should make the speech again when we deal with the “Water Affairs” vote. I want to refer, however, to the remarks made by the hon. member for Stilfontein who, I regret, is not in the House at this moment. In this day and age, in 1969 … [Interjections.]

Order! Hon. members must please allow the hon. member for Karoo to make his speech without interruptions.

I cannot see how that hon. member, 25 years after the war, can stand up in this House and make a statement that during the war certain people who refused to go into the army, were interned. I want to say that this is untrue, because the South African Army which acquitted itself with great distinction throughout the war included people from all sections of our community where language meant nothing. The great common cause was to do something on behalf of South Africa, to fight for it with distinction under its own flag. These men were volunteers and I would like to say that no man was forced into the army and what is more I have heard it said before … [Interjections.]

Order! I want to point out to hon. members that I do not call “Order” for nothing.

References have been made to internment camps, but these men who are so proud of being interned or being threatened, have never told us what they did to deserve that. They have never disclosed what they were up to so that the Government) of the day found it necessary to lock them up, because those of us who were in Germany after the war and who saw what was going on there, can only say that any man who supports and views in a favourable light the activities of the Nazis under Hitler has no right to be in decent civilized company. I regret to say, Sir, …

Mr. Speaker, it now becomes very difficult to remain silent!

Order! I think the hon. member must refrain from referring to or making insinuations about Nazis and so forth. The courts have disallowed that word and I am also disallowing it.

Mr. Speaker, I accept that. I want to say, Sir, that you must realize that the whole crux of the matter is that there were people who wanted Hitler to win, but the West German Government takes the activities of the Nazis during the war in such a serious light that even to, this day, they are bringing them to trial, finding them guilty and are hunting them down relentlessly and ruthlessly. That has been done by the German people themselves. But, Mr. Speaker, I do not propose to pursue the matter any further, except to say that I hope that we shall have no further comments from any member of Parliament in this House regarding the activities in the war. It happened 25 years ago and it has become history; West Germany has become a part of the Western group of nations, whereas our main object in life is to deal with communists and communism. I think the sooner we forget what has happened, or what did not happen in those long ago days, the better for all concerned.

Why did you mention it?

Who raised it?

Order! Will the hon. member please proceed.

Mr. Speaker, coming to more mundane things, I do hope that the hon. the Minister will take heed of what was said by the hon. member for Green Point. He has made a case for the civil servants and I believe that it is a good case; so much so that I am convinced that if the hon. the Minister would follow the advice which has been tendered by this side of the House, he will find that the civil servants would be a happier and more efficient group of men and women. I am confident that the good logic and the sense which have been enunciated by various speakers on this side of the House, and particularly by the hon. member for Green Point, will bear fruit for the people concerned if the hon. the Minister will only take heed of those remarks. We have had many quotations from the Scriptures and the hon. member for Hillbrow said this afternoon that to him that hath shall be given and from him that hath not shall be taken away, but he did not finish the quotation, which is in Matthew, Chapter 13, verse 12, where it is stated that to him that hath shall be given and from him that hath not shall be taken away, “even that which he hath”. This is the cardinal point—even that which he hath. So the poor man has been soaked in this Budget—and I refer now to the very lowest income groups, to the people who are going to foot the bill, the people who will find out what the cost of living really means, or rather the cost of survival—and I say to the Minister that he would do well to take heed of the remarks made and the suggestions offered by the hon. member for Constantia.

This, as has been said, is a rich man’s Budget and I do not think even the Minister himself realizes what is really in store. My proposition to him is that in order to collect this money he should not disguise it by way of an internal duty, as was suggested by one other speaker this afternoon, but that he should collect it by way of stamps. Let every man and woman see what they are paying by means of a revenue stamp on the packet or parcel of whatever it is they purchase. Then we will see what is being paid by the consumer, because this is nothing else but a buyers’ tax. We cannot disguise it because the person who goes to the shop counter is the person who is going to pay. He is the man who will feel the pinch. I am sorry to see that the Minister and speakers on the Government side did not realize the wisdom of the suggestions made by the hon. member for Constantia when he offered a reasonable proposition on how to balance his Budget and not to make the impact of these taxes too severe on the people concerned. We have had considerable discussion here on the use of Black and Coloured labour. I do not propose to develop that theme because the Coloured community and many of the African community whom I know realize and appreciate that it is inevitable and inexorable that more and more of them will be brought into industry and commerce and trade in this country. You cannot turn the picture back; you cannot reverse time, and I believe that the great cardinal failure of this Government is that the suggestion made by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition was not taken in the serious light in which he intended it. The great gap in our relationship with Coloured and Black people is that there is not adequate machinery to cover and to protect white workers from the introduction of Black and Coloured labour as and when it is introduced. The expression has been used that it is haphazard and that is exactly what it is. I do not propose dealing with matters affecting labour because this can be discussed under the Vote of the Minister of Labour, but I say to the Minister that if he wants to collect the money he expects to collect, he must persuade his colleagues to realize that the introduction of Black and Coloured labour haphazardly into trade, commerce and industry spells disaster for the white man, because the white worker has not to be protected against the Coloured or Black worker but he has to be protected against the unscrupulous white employer. These are the people who employ labour at lower rates of pay. When we in the Opposition say that we should have the rate for the job, we mean exactly what we say. There is nothing there that is not straight and clear. A job can be assessed and the rate must be for that job and nothing else. If hon. members opposite persist in introducing Black labour at lower rates of pay, it is only a matter of time before the flood will be upon the white worker and he will find himself out of a job. I want to say on behalf of the Coloured community that no Coloured man expects to enjoy any improvement in his position at the expense of any white man. All he asks is that he should get the same opportunities and that if he does the same job he should get equal pay for work of equal value.

I want to raise a matter which has not been dealt with except in passing by the hon. member for Hillbrow, and that is to refer to the question of building societies and the provision of housing for those who need it most, namely the lower group of white workers who must buy property through building societies and who must spend many years of their lives paying for it. I did make passing reference earlier this Session to this subject, but I now want to deal with it in some detail and hope that the hon. the Minister will not only give me a detailed reply but that he will give serious consideration to some of the suggestions I wish to offer.

A few years ago building societies found themselves with plenty of money, and the Minister will recall that he allowed a system of participation bonds which enjoyed an interest rate of 8½ per cent. There was such a flood of money into that particular investment that the Minister saw fit to change the law in regard to participation bonds and insisted that they should remain invested for a minimum period of three years and to a maximum amount. Not only that, but he then suggested to the building societies that they should reduce their rate of interest on fixed deposit, and when the building societies reduced the rate of interest to 6½ per cent I believe I am correct in saying that the Minister gave an undertaking that he would put some pressure upon the banks and other financial houses to bring their fixed deposit rate down to 6½ per cent as well. But what happened? Other financial institutions offered 7 per cent. Not only that, but limited companies, particularly private companies, were prohibited from investing on fixed deposit with building societies, and so a very fruitful source of income to them on investment went by the board. I believe that the effect of that has been—and I know it to be so—that building societies have great difficulty in retaining fixed deposit money at the expiration of the term of investment for the reason that they can invest their money elsewhere—I refer to the investor—at a higher rate of interest. I think the Minister is aware that some institutions even offer a commission on the side of ½ per cent and sometimes more to persuade the investor to invest with that particular organization. I believe that the first thing the Minister should do is to take fixed deposits into consideration and reduce the term to as low as even six months. To-day it is 12 months, or 60 months. I am sure the building societies will have more money with which to operate then. You may not know, Sir, that building societies to-day work on a quota because they borrow short and lend long. The Minister the other evening made an appeal on the screen for people to save. I want to say to him that savings, to be real, should have some inducement. Savings bank accounts carry an interest of 4 per cent. Not all of it but part of it should in my opinion be free of tax, because the Minister is competing with the R.S.A. 5 per cent and 6 per cent Treasury bonds to a degree where the building societies cannot compete. I believe he would be well advised to examine the building society finances as they stand to-day and to encourage the small man to put his money into savings bank accounts. I would say that limited companies should also be encouraged to put their money into savings bank accounts. The limit for savings bank accounts was set as far back as, I think, 1930 at R6,000. I believe that R10,000 is not an unreasonable figure and I ask the Minister to agree that that should be the figure in future. I believe also that the non-taxable shares, which stand at a limit of R6,660 in any one name, producing R400 income tax-free, should also be increased to R10,000, this giving building societies an opportunity of building up funds with the express purpose of lending to the small home owner. When this was originally agreed to by the Minister, this R6,660 free of tax, the building societies gave an undertaking that they would spent 50 per cent of that money on the provision of houses for the lower income groups. I believe that half the problems we are facing to-day in this country through the lack of housing for this group of people, would be resolved if the Minister would give the building societies some concession to enable them to compete. To-day competition in the movement is severe and the Minister himself has had to make a concession in that in the 100 per cent loans to public servants, the “assisted loans” as they are called, he is making a concession of, I think, 3½ per cent on the 8½ per cent, bringing down the rate of interest to 5 per cent, which he proposes to subsidize. But there are many thousands of people who are not public servants and who still have to pay per cent. Building societies have agreed among themselves to retain their rate of interest at 6½ per cent to enable them to lend money at 8½ per cent, and it is no use suggesting that the interest rates on fixed deposits and the like should be increased because that means that the rate on bonds rises proportionately.

These are a few of the points to which I should like to draw the Minister’s attention. I want to say in anticipation that I understand that a Bill will be introduced in due course, and that in this Bill, which I do not wish to discuss now, building societies are considering asking for the right to develop land. I put it to you, Sir, that the development of land is costly and the acquisition of land is more costly still. If land is in close proximity to the major urban areas, it can only rise in price, and a tremendous amount of speculation has taken place over the past few years by the land development companies who have set out to exploit the acquisition of land on the perimeters of urban areas and sometimes within the municipal boundaries. The community as such, wherever it may be, creates the value in that land and not the developer. There are cases on record where speculators, with a pre-knowledge of the direction in which development was going to take place, have bought land at low prices and have sold it to development companies at much higher prices. When these plots come on the market, they will be very expensive—far beyond the ability of the ordinary home-owner to pay—so I do appeal to the hon. the Minister to take heed of what I say. I do commend to him that these few suggestions of mine, if adopted, would put the building society movement on its feet and give the building societies an opportunity to fulfil their rightful function, which is to provide houses for small home-owners.

Finally, I would like to ask the hon. the Minister whether or not it is true that when the open-end trusts, the mutual funds, were first established, the limit was fixed at six funds, and I see that there are now seven of them. I would like to ask the Minister how he proposes to control this tremendous rise in the value of shares, because all and sundry are buying mutual fund units in expectation of growth, but I think it must be alarming to even the Minister himself that some of the biggest companies in the country are paying dividends, on the present market value, of even less than 1 per cent. I ask the hon. the Minister where people can invest their money to-day if they do not invest in the trust funds? Sir, these are the suggestions which I offer to the hon. the Minister, and I do hope that he will give some thought to them and give me his answer when he replies next week.

Mr. Speaker, I am not going to make the customary apology to the hon. member for Karoo for not following up his speech, the reason being that the beginning of his speech was of such a nature that I do not want to descend to the level at which he started and then find I cannot lift myself out of those depths. I also want to do something to-night which I have never done before and that is to congratulate a Minister, the hon. the Minister of Finance, on his Budget.

Are you also going to talk about the verkramptes?

I want to convey these congratulations to the hon. the Minister on behalf of my constituency without any fear of being contradicted. I see this as an enterprising, an imaginative and a challenging Budget, a Budget which is generally welcomed. During the recent recess, I had the opportunity of obtaining comment on this Budget from various parts of the country, and nowhere was that comment negative or destructive.

Where were you—in the Game Reserve?

Was it in Waterkloof?

I was in Waterkloof as well. But I will come to the Opposition in a moment. At this stage I should like to say something further about the Budget. I welcome this Budget because it is in fact one which will stimulate the initiative and the labour production of the single entrepreneur. It is this very group of individuals who are the greatest single contributors to the revenue of the State, and I have had the experience recently, during the period preceding this Budget, that several of them said to me that they worked either for only nine months in the year or for only three and a half or four days a week; on the other days they play golf or take a holiday because they would gain nothing by working longer or harder. Others again have invested their money in such a way that they need not pay tax on their profits; they have bought expensive farms, and others have bought lorries and other expensive articles which they can use in their businesses. I believe that we have come to the end of this phase in the pattern of expenditure in our country; I believe that we have come to the end of this harmful waste of precious manpower and working time, on the one hand, and of this kind of expenditure directed at draining away income from where it is taxable, on the other hand. I foresee that in the case of the self-employed man, whether he be a professional man, an industrialist, a small building contractor or a retreader or trader, he is now going to change into top gear with new zest because he will in fact be able to taste the pleasures of his own labour, and this, I believe, will also be in the interests of the country.

Secondly I want to welcome this Budget because every buyer of articles on which there is a sales duty, to a very large extent has a choice as far as his spending is concerned.

That is not true.

I say that he has a choice to a large extent; I do not say completely. In other words, the tax he pays by way of sales duty can be regulated by himself to a large extent.

In other words, you can grow a beard.

In this connection I want to say to the hon. the Minister that his Budget reminded me of Father Ryk Tulbagh, Governor during the early days at the Cape, who came forward with his sumptuary laws, perhaps in a time such as the one in which we are now living. This Budget is going to curb senseless, extravagant expenditure on the one hand; on the other hand there is the sales duty on essential goods, a washing machine which has to be replaced or a polisher or a motor car. Our people may just as well take note that they will be able to buy a good deal before equalling the amount by which their income tax has been reduced.

That is not true.

You buy too much; that is your trouble.

That is so. A person now saving R600 on his income tax …

What must his income be in that case?

… must buy a motor car for R3,000 and other goods for R6,000 before equalling that amount.

You have lost touch with the people completely.

We shall see at the next election. I say that our people themselves can select now, but apart from that people will now be forced to spend with more restraint and more selectively, and it is a sound principle which is being introduced here. I should like to refer to the argument put forward that young couples making a start now are going to be hard hit by the sales duty. In the case of most of these young people both husband and wife work, and these people live in flats. I want to give this advice to them: They must be prepared to start with less, to make do with the minimum, if necessary. My advice to them is that they should save now and spread their purchases over a period. They will definitely gain by doing so. A refrigerator, a floor polisher or a washing machine is an item which is only bought once every 10 or 20 years, and a motor car also lasts long if looked after well. If purchases of these articles are discriminately spread over a period, our buying public and especially our young beginners will definitely come off best.

Mr. Speaker, thirdly I want to welcome the Budget because some of our younger entrepreneurs who are already past the beginner’s stage are being offered the opportunity of establishing themselves well now by the income tax relief they are being granted. Through their undertakings they will now be able to take part in and contribute to the growth and prosperity of South Africa, to the progress which South Africa is experiencing under this Government. They are also being activated to greater personal initiative and productivity. They are therefore being activated to the benefit of South Africa and I want to say to the hon. the Minister: Congratulations. But at the same time I want to take the liberty of pointing out two aspects which in my humble opinion should receive the attention of the hon. the Minister at this early stage. Both have to do with exploitation. Firstly, I have encountered the fear among members of the public that certain suppliers will not be able to resist the temptation of helping themselves to a little more profit under the pretext of the sales duty which is being levied. I respectfully want to suggest that it should be made compulsory by way of regulation that on all goods which are subject to sales tax the following should be clearly indicated: (1) the percentage of sales duty levied; (2) the amount on which it is levied and (3) the amount itself which is levied. If for some or other reason this is not possible, I want to suggest that the amount of the sales duty itself should at least be indicated on each article.

Hear, hear!

Sir, it is being done in overseas countries and, to my knowledge, with good results. Any misrepresentation in this connection should be liable to heavy fines. In this case, where control would be expensive and necessitate a large staff, the fine must serve as a deterrent. The offence itself must be constituted by the false statements. I believe that such an announcement will be welcomed by the public with great joy. It would also appear as if some suppliers are already guilty at this stage of exploitation in that they collect sales duty on goods on which it should not be collected. In this connection I want to suggest that in any suspect case the buyer should insist on a specified statement indicating the sales duty which will then be levied, and that he bring any such suspect case to the notice of the hon. the Minister. I suggest that the hon. the Minister invite the public to do this. Such a step will have a very reassuring effect in regard to any fears which the buying public may have in this connection.

A very good suggestion.

I want to thank the hon. member for Yeoville. I now come to him and the Opposition, and I am rather sorry that the hon. member for Durban (Point) is not here, because we were expecting a jeremiad from him over this Budget. And, as we expected, his jeremiad was about razor blades and soap. I want to tell the Opposition that if they cry so much over the sales duty on razor blades and soap they should stop using those articles; the hippies and the flower children have also stopped using razor blades and soap in England. They are after all the political hippies of South Africa. If they do not like that, they may perhaps still go and buy some soap. Perhaps they should start growing beards in order to save on razor blades. I sat looking at them. The hon. member for Mooi River is not here either, but perhaps he will present quite a good appearance with whiskers, good old English whiskers. I also thought about the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. I could not think of a beard to suit him. The beard which I had in mind for him, should rather go to the member for Hillbrow, a goatee and also a pair of half-framed glasses. I wondered how the hon. member for Durban (Point) would look with a splendid full beard. At the same time he can put on a pair of leggings and take a field-marshal’s baton in his hand.

In conclusion I want to refer to the hollow sound of this Opposition’s comment that this is a rich man’s Budget. They pretend to be the spokesmen for the poor people of South Africa. The whole of South Africa is laughing at them when they come forward with such talk. The United Party, once the party of Oppenheimer, of Suzman, of Bloomberg, the party of Graaff, representing the constituencies of Yeoville, Rondebosch and the like in this House is now becoming the spokesman for the poor man!

Dr. Treurnicht is coming to stand in your constituency.

He can come. You can also come. He will not come. This is the party which some years ago, when it was the United Front, got R1 million from Oppenheimer to try and remove this Government from office. This is the party which now speaks of itself as a party for the poor man. South Africa is laughing at them. This party will never be able to live down its past. Its past is catching up with it step by step and piece by piece. Over against that the National Party, with the vigorous, revolutionary Budget we have just had, is the party, also for the future, in South Africa.

Mr. Speaker, this Session is my third in Parliament. After this Session I shall once again return to my constituency, as I did after the two previous sessions, to report back. Strangely enough, on both previous occasions this question was put to me and I think that this time it will be put to me again: “What does a full-blooded United Party M.P. look like? After all, there are a few of them in Parliament.” You may think that this is a strange question, Sir, but if hon. members knew the circumstances in my constituency, they would appreciate that this is not a strange question, because in my constituency there are few full-blooded United Party supporters left. In the past five elections we held there, the United Party had to import U.P. supporters from elsewhere unless they wanted to lose the election without contesting the seat. During the latest election, which was my own, they really could not even find a U.P. supporter somewhere else. They had to be satisfied with a Van der Merwe U.P. supporter from Pretoria, namely Professor C. van der Merwe himself. Fortunately for Professor Van der Merwe the confusion of Van der Merwe versus Van der Merwe was the cause of his receiving 120 votes as against our 6,000. As I did in the two previous years, I shall once again be able to tell my people this year that the U.P. M.P.s in the House are “no people”, as they once again revealed themselves to be in the course of this debate, because they say “no” to everything which is good for and in the interest of South Africa. Years ago when the National Party thought it would be a good thing for South Africa to have its own Iscor, the then United Party said “no”. When the National Party thought it was necessary for South Africa to have its own Sasol, the United Party said “no”. And when the heart-beat of the Afrikaner nation inclined to a Republic being called out in South Africa, the United Party said “no”. Only last year we heard how they said “no” when we wanted to remove the Coloured Representatives from this House. Sir, what is a “no person”? A “no person” is a person who is tired. A “no ox” is an ox that says “no” by lying down in the yoke and refusing to pull. Now, I do not wish to say that the members of the United Party are “no oxen”. I have too much respect for my fellow-man to say that, but I want to quote from what was said by an hon. member of the United Party itself. The hon. member who said this, is to my mind an honourable man. I understand that he is a good farmer. As it would appear to me, he is a person who would speak the truth at all times. This person said the following: “The United Party needs a heart transplant.” In a speech made at the Eastern Cape Regional Congress of the United Party at Graaff-Reinet Mr. Wally Kingwill, the hon. member for Walmer, used these words: “The United Party guarantees white safety and adheres to its principles. The Party adheres to its principles,” Mr. Kingwill said. He went on to say the following: “The United Party continued to exist as the Opposition for 20 years, which is an achievement. It has not been easy. It is like being an architect who draws up plans which are never put into practice. We shall not be able to survive on this pattern for another 20 years. We shall have to get a new heart so as to be able to survive.” This is what an hon. member of that Party said.

Sir, I should like to join the ranks of the thousands of people in the Republic of South Africa who have in these past few days extended their congratulations to the hon. the Minister. It is a fact that from the moment when the Minister made his Budget speech, and very strikingly and fittingly walked hand in hand with the Preacher, it was an experience to listen to him. In the same way this Budget will have its effect on the Republic of South Africa and will give added impetus to the economic life of South Africa. Of the numerous excellent features I just want to mention briefly the four which I found to be the most outstanding ones.

The first is the exceptional concession which the hon. the Minister made in respect of the working married women of South Africa. I think we can tell the hon. the Minister to-night that, when the women of South Africa refer to him from now on, they will say: “We like a real man.” The second point which to my mind is worth mentioning, is the relief that was also mentioned by the hon. member for Waterkloof, i.e. the relief to people earning between R5,000 and R14,000. It is true that owing to many circumstances, as sketched so strikingly by the Minister of Planning this afternoon, we in South Africa are experiencing a manpower shortage, partly because of the prosperity which the National Government has brought about in South Africa. Those earning between R5,000 and R14,000 are for the most part highly qualified people. Our medical practitioners, our lawyers, etc., are to be found in this group. Those people will in future do their utmost in order to render so much more service, because they will no longer pay so much in taxes. It is true that in the past there was a stage at which the people could ask themselves: “Is it necessary to work so exceptionally hard, for if we do we pay exceptionally heavy taxes?” Mr. Speaker, the third point I want to mention is the increased tax in the case of major undertakings backed by large capital resources. As was mentioned yesterday by the hon. member for Wonderboom, Anglo American alone will, as a result of this, pay R1½ million per year more in taxes. It is being calculated that the various undertakings in this category will jointly contribute between R15 and R16 million per year more to the South African Exchequer. The fourth point—and here I want to associate myself with what the hon. member for Stilfontein said—is the purchase tax. It is as the hon. member said, i.e. difficult to reach the Bantu and the Coloured in South Africa by means of direct taxation. It is true that these people are enjoying exceptional and more and more advantages in the Republic of South Africa, and therefore it is necessary that they also contribute their share. I often see the Natives who are employed in the industries of the Vaal Triangle, and I can tell the hon. the Minister that as far as this matter is concerned he has taken a wise decision. Nowadays there is hardly a single Native factory worker who goes about without a portable radio in his hand. Now these Natives will also contribute their share in taxes. The eating habits of the Native have changed to a large extent. They no longer eat porridge. They also eat tinned food. As a result of the duty on tinned food they will also contribute their share to the Republic of South Africa.

The United Party is very concerned about the white workers and the pensioners. I want to tell them now that the white workers of South Africa have never been afraid to contribute their share. The white workers are not afraid of spending for the sake of their continued existence here in South Africa. The white workers know that they have to contribute towards ensuring their continued existence in South Africa. The same applies to our pensioners. For the most part they are people who have already rendered their service and contributed their share to the Republic of South Africa, and that is why they, too, will not object to once again contributing something in this manner.

I am a farmer, and there are people who say that a farmer cannot conclude his speech without making a request. I have a small request to make to the hon. the Minister. It is not a difficult one. When one travels about in South Africa one often hears members of the public complaining that the relations that prevail between the taxpayers and the tax collectors of the various parts of our country are not very good and that they are not on good terms with one another. This may be attributable to the fact that these people are overworked to a certain extent or that they are very busy. I think it is necessary for every receiver of revenue to regard every tax payer in his district as a client of the Republic of South Africa. If a client of mine walks into my business in order to pay his account, I treat him in the most friendly manner, because he is an advantage and an asset to me. If a tax payer walks into a revenue office in order to pay his tax—be it R20, R30, R1,000 or R20,000 —he is an asset to the Republic of South Africa and I think it is necessary for him to be treated as such. A prominent business man told me—and I do not call his words into question because I know his business—that he paid between R30,000 and R40,000 in taxes every year. Two years ago this person claimed R2,000 for entertainment expenses in his income tax return. The receiver of revenue rejected it summarily. When he went to see the receiver about this matter, he was accorded very cool and aloof treatment. A person or a citizen who pays between R30,000 and R40,000 per year in taxes is entitled to be treated well, just as a person who pays his R20 per year is also entitled to such treatment. This reminds me of an anecdote I heard about a circus owner whose various attractions in the ring included one where a very strong man squeezed an orange until no more juice would come out. Then the circus owner issued a challenge to members of the audience and offered a prize of R100 to anybody who could squeeze some more juice out of that orange. No member of the audience succeeded in doing so. However, one evening a slightly built man walked towards the ring and with an aggressive look on his face he squeezed that orange until the juice ran. When the circus owner asked him who he was, he said that he was Van der Merwe. When he asked him what he actually did or what his profession was, he said that he was the local receiver of revenue. Then the circus owner said to him: “I shall employ you and instead of paying you R100 for your performance every night, I shall, if you do it with a smile on your face, pay you R200 for each performance.” What I am trying to bring home by quoting this, is that when I have to pay R100 to any person, be it the receiver of revenue or whoever, then I do so very gladly and with a much easier and open mind when I hand it over to a friendly person who shows that he is grateful than when I have to hand it over to a person who may perhaps look at me askance or level reproaches at me. To keep my own slate clean, I just want to say that the atmosphere in the offices of my own receiver of revenue is excellent. What I mention here, I heard from persons living elsewhere.

In conclusion I want to say that I come from good country stock, and in our home we were taught to show gratitude and respect to whom and where it was due. I belong to the National Party, a Party which acknowledges gratitude when it is necessary. I belong to a nation that can fight when it is necessary, but I also belong to a nation that can acknowledge gratitude when it is necessary. That is why I, on behalf of my constituency, also want to extend my sincere gratitude to-night to the hon. the Minister of Finance for this Budget of his, in all its many facets.

Mr. Speaker, I hope that with my upbringing I have a little more of what is known as common decency or good manners, than I can say for the hon. member for Waterkloof. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member must withdraw that.

I withdraw. What I set out to say was that I do not intend, as did the hon. member for Waterkloof, to ignore the hon. member who spoke immediately before I rose. The hon. member for Heidelberg came, when he first got up, with nothing but a vitriolic political diatribe, something which had no place whatsoever in a debate of this nature. He then subsequently toned down and came with a request to the hon. the Minister for better treatment for the taxpayer, a better relationship between civil servants and the taxpayer. Now, Sir, in this I find I can support the hon. member but I am afraid in nothing else. Particularly I find that I cannot support him in his views with regard to the load which non-Whites must now carry within the field of indirect taxation in South Africa. But to show a degree of good manners, I must also refer to the hon. member for Waterkloof and tell him that I take exception to the personal comments which he has made about some of my hon. colleagues. I must also say that I take exception to his comments about the hippies, his attempt to equate the United Party with the hippies of England, to say that we also need not use the blades and the soap on which the sales tax has been placed. I want to ask the hon. member why this tax has been imposed in such a discriminatory manner. Unfortunately, I see the hon. member is not in his seat any more—here he comes now. I want to ask him why this tax has been placed in such a discriminatory manner—in such a way that it discriminates against us on this side of the House. Sir, he went further by denigrating the United Party: he castigated us for the association of certain wealthy persons with the party. But, Sir, I want to ask the hon. member whether he was one of those members on that side of the House who gave an audible sigh of relief when the hon. the Minister of Finance announced that there would be no capital gains tax?

I am definitely not one of them.

Well, for his sake I am very sorry that he is not one of them, because there was most certainly a very audible sigh of relief from many members on that side of the House when the hon. the Minister made his announcement.

A sigh of jubilation.

The speech of the hon. member for Waterkloof was merely another manifestation of the arrogance of this Nationalist Party and merely another manifestation, as has been said by hon. members on this side, of the fact that the Government has completely lost touch with the common man. This Budget is the final proof thereof.

Mr. Speaker, while dealing briefly with the so-called sales tax, which is nothing other than a purchase tax, because it is the purchaser, the consumer, who pays this tax, I want to bring to the notice of the hon. the Minister something of which he might or might not be aware. I have not seen any report on it and I have not heard anything on it. The hon. the Minister is aware that there have been various complaints from commerce and from industry about the application of this tax, about certain anomalies which exist and questions which there are in the interpretation of it. I have here a slip which was attached to an invoice dated 3rd April which accompanied goods transmitted to a retailer by a manufacturing concern; a concern which is world wide, one of the largest concerns in the world. This slip, printed in red, reads, Important Notice.

Until the effect of the new sales duty can be calculated, we are continuing to invoice at existing prices and discounts. A separate debit note will be sent to you in due course for sales duty for goods delivered after 26th March, 1969. In general and subject to detailed interpretation the sales duty will apply only to the following goods at the rates shown: Scouring powders and polishes, 5 per cent; soaps and detergents including dish washing liquids, 10 per cent: toilet preparations including toothpaste, 20 per cent.

Sir, I want to ask the hon. the Minister what does a retailer do when he gets an invoice for a R1,000 worth of goods with a note like this? [Interjections.]

Order!

What does a retailer do? Does he take those goods and add 5, 10 and 20 per cent to the cost of them after he has calculated his mark-up? Does he sell at the old price? On which cost price does he operate? These are the anomalies which the hon. the Minister must surely have foreseen when he imposed this tax. As has been pointed out by this side of the House, we are not against the principle, we are against the manner in which it has been imposed. My hon. friend, the member for Constantia, has put forward logical, sensible, workable suggestions to the hon. the Minister. It is not too late for the hon. Minister to accept those suggestions and I would urge him in the light, not only of this complaint also, but of other complaints of which he is aware, to accept the suggestion of the hon. member for Constantia that he should take a year to investigate the full implications of this purchase tax which has been imposed on the people.

The hon. the Minister had the courage to come with a change in the taxation system, but unfortunately he has not gone far enough He did not have the courage to go the whole hog and to eliminate all of the anomalies which have existed. In some cases I feel that he has not given the concessions which were warranted. The phrase was passed to me immediately after the Budget speech of the hon. the Minister that “he quoted as a parson, but his concessions were parsimonious”. One example I have taken from the Budget is the question of deductions for medical expenses. I know that the hon. the Minister claims that this is fair, but I want to make a case about the unfairness of it. It was previously allowed that actual expenses up to R250 per annum could be deducted. We now find that there is an allowance of a fixed amount of R75 per annum for single persons and R150 per annum for a married taxpayer; a fixed amount for every married taxpayer irrespective of the number of children or dependants. This is where the anomaly comes in. The Minister says R150 is much higher than the existing average medical expense actually incurred or claimed; he said “incurred” in his speech, but I am sure that he meant “claims per tax return”. But, Sir, this is an average per taxpayer which includes childless couples. I am sure that an analysis would show that childless couples are among the higher income bracket while those in the lower income bracket are those with many children and they are the ones who are going to be hit by this. They will not be able to claim all their medical expenses. They are going to be limited to the amount of R150 every year. At the same time we have the hon. the Minister for Bantu Administration, the Minister for Community Development and others calling for more babies for white South Africa, but the hon. the Minister has not come with any inducements. Admittedly he has continued the allowance of R100 deduction from taxable income in the year in which a baby is born, but he makes no allowance, apart from the R35 to R40 allowance which has been allowed over the previous years, for the upbringing of the child.

There is another aspect, which has been touched on by the hon. member for Durban (Point) and I wish to elaborate further upon it. That is that the hon. the Minister here had the opportunity of eliminating the injustice which he has done to divorced people with dependants. Unfortunately he did not have the courage on this occasion to grasp that nettle as well. He grasped others but unfortunately he has left this one. I refer particularly to those people divorced after March, 1962, who have dependent children. I want to quote figures in regard to basic income tax, which are separate from provincial taxation or personal tax. We find that a widow or a widower with no dependants would pay R50 on R1,000 income, but a divorcee with the same income would pay R15 more, because the divorcee is taxed at the single rate and not at the married rate as is applicable to a widow or a widower.

So far, so good. But what is the position of a divorcee with two children compared with a widow or a widower with two dependants? If we take as basis an income of R2,000 we find the widow would pay R110 less R70 rebate, that is a net R40, whilst the divorcee would have to pay R145 less a rebate of R70, namely R75, which is R35 more—nearly 100 per cent more. This is the anomaly to which I refer. As I say, this is only basic income-tax, and when provincial income-tax and personal tax are calculated on these figures, the excess becomes even greater. I once again ask the hon. the Minister whether this is fair. It is not fair; I should be glad to hear from him the reason why there is this discrimination. I am not condoning divorce. In fact I deplore it, but it is a social evil with which we have got to learn to live; it is something which has unfortunately become part of our life. I say we cannot continue to discriminate against these unfortunate people who find themselves in the position of being divorced and having dependants and having to pay about 100 per cent more tax than a widow or widower with the same number of dependants.

I now want to break away from this and deal with the effect of this Budget on the non-white people, more particularly the Bantu people. I know the hon. members for Heidelberg and Stilfontein both said it is time the non-Whites paid their share towards the taxes of this country.

Yes.

I hear the hon. member for Vryheid agrees with them. It has already been pointed out during this debate that the Bantu people alone already pay in indirect taxation an amount in excess of R90 million per annum. This is almost the sum of money which the hon. the Minister wants to collect with this new purchase tax which he is placing on certain commodities. We find, firstly, that the hon. the Minister has made a concession. He has given a concession to every male Bantu of R1 per year in his general tax. He has reduced the general tax from R3.50 per annum to R2.50. This is a commendable gesture and I am sure that many Bantu at first flush will thank the hon. the Minister for this concession, but when we consider what the hon. the Minister has done in effect I would say this is an iniquitous move on his part. What happens to the Bantu’s general tax? All the general tax collected goes to the Bantu Education Account and the effect of this concession on the part of the hon. the Minister is merely to rob the Bantu Education Account, and I wonder if the hon. the Minister knows by how much he is going to rob that Account? Has he any idea how much less money will be collected in general tax if it will now be R2.50 instead of R3.50 per Bantu per annum? In other words, by how much will the Bantu Education Account be reduced? Has he made provision for making that amount up?

A survey shows that in the 1966-’67 tax year it was estimated that he would collect R10 million in general tax, and it was estimated that in the following year he would collect R12.4 million. In the following year the estimated figure was R10.5 million and we find that for this year the hon. the Minister has budgeted for another R10.5 million to be collected from this general tax of R3.50 per head per annum. That is all right for the financial year 1969-’70, but what is going to happen in 1970-'71 when this reduction is felt? I will be very glad to hear from the hon. the Minister whether it is his intention to reimburse the Bantu Education Account with the amount which will be lost.

In passing I should like to mention something which has already been pointed out by other hon. members. This reduction of R1 per annum is going to be more than swallowed up by the new purchase tax.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. the Minister has also seen fit to reassess what he calls a general tax based on income which is imposed only on the Bantu people. The hon. member for Houghton did ask the hon. the Minister a little earlier on why this discrimination, so I leave it at that. I do hope we will get an answer from the hon. the Minister.

The heading on page 299 of the Minutes reads “a general tax based on income is to be paid by all Bantu at the following rates …”, and then it goes on to give these rates. The first paragraph reads “subject to the provisions of an Act to be passed …”. I wonder whether the hon. the Minister or the hon. the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development or one of his Deputy Ministers … yes, I see the three blind mice are all there …

You are being foolish now.

Perhaps that hon. the Deputy Minister would answer me straightaway. Is it the intention of the Government to allow rebates for married Bantu? … There is no reply. I am serious when I ask this question. Is it the Government’s intention to allow rebates for married Bantu, or is this rate for all Bantu? Nobody knows. So I must assume that what is written here is correct, namely that the general tax based on income is to be paid by all Bantu at the given rates. Let us examine these rates. Whether it is a single or a married Bantu, whether he has one child or ten, he pays this amount. That is what is written here.

Whether he has one wife or five.

Exactly, whether he has one wife or five wives, this is the tax he will pay. Let us compare this with the tax he has paid in the 1968-’69 financial year.

We find if he had an income of under R360 per annum during the 1968-’69 tax year a Bantu paid only his general basic tax of R3.50, and after 1.3.1970, when this provision comes into effect, he will pay only R2.50, so he has a concession of R1. But immediately he goes to R361, or R31 per month, under the existing system he pays R3.50 and under the new proposed system he will pay R1.20 general tax based on income plus R2.50, which makes a total of R3.70, which means his tax is up.

What did he pay previously?

R3.50.

No, he did not.

He paid no income tax. If the hon. the Deputy Minister will look at his tax table he will see what I am talking about. I have them here and I am prepared to discuss them with him at any time. It is clear the Bantu will pay more immediately he earns more than R360 per annum.

Have you read the old Act?

Yes, I have read it. Let me go further. We find that those in the income-tax bracket of R481-600 have paid up to now R3.50 and after 1.3.1970 they will pay R5.26. A single Bantu earning R650 per annum has in the past paid R5.50 and in future he will pay R6.82. If we go higher up the scale we find that a Bantu earning R651 per annum in the past paid R11.50. In future he will pay R6.82.

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