I promised to make an announcement to-day with regard to the measures that the Government still proposes to introduce this Session. These Bills will not necessarily be proceeded with but the majority of them will be introduced.

The Minister of Finance will introduce the following measures Inspection of Finance Institutions Bill; Bill to provide for the continuation of certain war measures; Bills of Exchange Amendment Bill; Finance Bill; and certain financial measures arising from the Budget proposals. The Minister of Transport: Railways Additional Appropriation Bill; Railways and Harbours Acts Amendment Bill and a Bill to consolidate the Railway Board Act. The Minister of Social Welfare and Pensions: Pension Laws Amendment Bill and Pension (Supplementary) Bill. The Minister of the Interior: An Omnibus Bill in regard to the question of Commonwealth relations; the Electoral Amendment Bill and the National Education Advisory Bill, which are at present before Select Committees. The Minister of Bantu Administration and Development: A Bill on the better administration of specified areas in the Transvaal. The Minister of Agricultural Technical Services: The Livestock Brands Bill and the Plant Breeders’ Rights Bill. The Minister of Bantu Education: A Bill amending the University College of Fort Hare Transfer Act. The Minister of Economic Affairs and Mines: the Export Credit Re-Insurance Amendment Bill; the Fuel Research Institute and Coal Amendment Bill; a Bill in terms of which war measures Nos. 146/1942 and 49/1946 will be changed into permanent legislation; a Bill in terms of which the territorial waters of the Republic of South Africa will be expanded; a Bill to consolidate and amend the Pneumoconiosis Act; and a Bill to provide for the establishment of a State-controlled Corporation to undertake the prospecting and mining for precious stones on certain unalienated State-owned land in Namaqualand. The Minister of Defence: Amendments to the Defence Act. The Minister of Justice: General Law Amendment Bill (amending provisions of various Acts); another General Law Amendment Bill; the Liquor Amendment Bill; the Maintenance Bill; the Foreign Courts Evidence Bill and the Legal Practitioners Amendment Bill.

The hon. the Minister will recall that during the second reading debate I raised the question of what relief would be given to those members of the Citizen Forces who, having completed the nine months’ period, subsequently are called up for a further period of continuous training. The hon. the Minister will remember that it was only last year that the Defence Act of 1957 was amended where ballotees were brought in in the year of registration, in the year in which they registered, at the age of 17 or 18, and the moratorium that the Minister seeks to apply in terms of this clause is going to apply to a very small percentage of the members called up. I think the hon. the Minister will agree with me. The reason is that it can hardly be expected that young boys leaving school, who come from school and go into the Defence Forces as trainees, will have incurred debts of a hire-purchase nature or of any other form to a very large extent. The maximum age of intake will be 18, or at the very most 19 years of age. They are youngsters who have just left school, and it can hardly be expected, as I have already said, that large numbers will be affected. But the difficulty as far as these new trainees in this new Defence Force of ours are concerned, will come after they have completed the period of nine months’ training Subsequently they are called up for a further period of training. The Act is quite clear. There are these extended new periods of continuous training that a member has to fulfil. The time that the trainee will need this moratorium is when he has incurred financial commitments after he has returned to civil life, when the Minister calls upon him to fulfil a further period of continuous training. As the Minister knows that is fixed at a maximum of three weeks in any one year. It may well be that in his fourth year, when he has already reached the age of 22 or 23, he has entered into financial commitments. Take the case of an artisan, a daily-or an hourly-paid man. In many of these instances, when he is called up to complete the three weeks’ period of continuous training, he has no income whatsoever other than the 50 cents a day that he gets as a trainee from the Department of Defence. His income is cut off, and it is then that he will look for relief. He has no means to meet his normal commitments. And, as the hon. the Minister well knows, too, there are numbers of unscrupulous traders who, under this hire-purchase system, when these men fail to meet their commitments for one month only, will seize the goods purchased under the hire-purchase system. In a large measure these people are ignorant of their rights. The goods are seized and they lose them. If the hon. the Minister is applying a reasonable approach, a considerate approach towards this new army of ours, I think he will agree with me that there is a good cause to give a moratorium to this class of fellow, who at the behest of the Minister and the Government is called up for further training. It seems to me on the facts and the evidence available that these men will be in more need of the moratorium than the men who are called up for the first nine months’ training. The argument may be used against this that if commerce has the impression that the granting of a moratorium over a period of three years may create difficulties for the trader, it may result in a restriction of credit. I accept that if a blanket moratorium is given—if we were providing here for a blanket moratorium for a period covering the entire time that these men are liable for continuous training, then I would agree with that argument. But surely, if we are prepared to grant nine months to a man who is called up for the first time, before he has entered into financial commitments, then what is wrong in giving a two-month moratorium to a man being called up for a further period of training? That is not going to upset his credit as far as the commercial world is concerned, because traders will know that in the two or three years’ period that he is still liable for continuous service, at the very most he will get a moratorium of four months. In order to give effect to the argument, I want to move an amendment, and I hope that the Minister will accept my amendment. The Minister said yesterday that if we were to come with a reasonable amendment and a strong case, he would give it favourable consideration. The very fact that the Minister said that he would give that consideration, is really an admission that there is a case to be made out for these men. The Minister realizes that there are going to be difficulties and that many thousands of these men are going to be adversely affected. If the Minister is prepared to give favourable consideration, I will move an amendment which will allow the Minister to extend to those men his sympathy. I therefore wish to move—

In line 34, to omit “sub-paragraph (i) of”; and to add the following proviso at the end of sub-section (2):

These are the same men that the hon. Minister is legislating for. It is quite clear that this is the same Citizen Force for which he is introducing the nine months’ moratorium. It is the same moratorium that is being given in this amendment. All the Minister is being asked for is that when these men have completed their nine months’ basic training and they come for a further period of continuous training, the Minister shall at least give them the same amount of relief. I have fixed a period of two months and I hope the hon. the Minister will agree to the amendment.

I regret that I cannot accept the amendment as it seeks to extend the provisions of the Bill to a group of persons undergoing military training not contemplated by the Bill as read a second time.

Clause, as printed, put and agreed to.

Remaining Clauses and Title of the Bill put and agreed to

When the House adjourned last night, I was dealing amongst other things with the number of people who might be affected by this change in legislation. I quoted some figures to the House to show that I believe that the picture the Minister painted was not perhaps a true reflection of the exact picture of the total number of people who would be affected by this Bill. In doing that I quoted a figure of 128,000, and said that I believed that would be the total number affected. But I did not read out a part which I think in fairness to the Minister, and in order to get a clear picture, I should read out, and I want to do that now so that the House can have a true picture. It reads like this—

I am still quoting from the same Hansard report of the Other Place, Col. 3092, 14 April 1961. It was a speech made by the hon. the Minister in discussing his policy motion. It goes on to say that during the same year (1960) 11,758 persons of the Coloured-Bantu borderline were classified, which increased the total for this borderline to 70,605. Up to 31 December, 3,269 objections, of which 511 were from alleged Europeans, were received from persons objecting to their race qualification. That is to say, about 2.5 per cent of the 128,586 race classifications. I am quoting this again so that we get a true picture, without any doubts, without any question. It shows that the number of people concerned, borderline cases, in the space of one year on the European-Coloured borderline (which is the one we are discussing now) was 48,821, in the words of the Minister. In other words, those were the number of cases about which there was doubt, cases which had to be investigated in terms of the Act, and cases which had to be decided. My point is that the number of persons is not 3,000-odd as indicated to the Minister, so that the House may be under a misapprehension. The total in respect of this particular borderline comes to 48,821 and it brings the total for the year to 57,981. I think that clarifies the point that I was trying to make that the number of people affected is a very large number of people. It is the number of people which in one year, according to the Minister, totalled very nearly 58,000. The next point with which I was dealing was the question of the powers of investigation which the hon. the Minister has introduced into this Bill under Clause 4. We have suggested that he gives those people who have already been classified some sort of assurance, not by word of mouth, but written into this Bill, that they will not come up again for consideration.

Order! That point has been made.

I want to quote again from Hansard to show that this is such a complete change of view by the hon. the Minister in the space of one session to the other, that even we who are in close touch with him are confused. Obviously people who are so vitally concerned that their whole life will be affected, must be in such a state that I think it demands from the Minister consideration. I should like to quote from the same Hansard where the hon. the Minister said the following:

This is the hon. the Minister speaking, Sir—

Then an hon. Senator interjected—

In other words, the hon. the Minister in 1961—last year—was absolutely satisfied that he had the best means possible of sorting these things out by leaving them to the community to decide. And now, the very next session, he comes along with an amending Bill which upsets that entirely; a Bill which introduces a new principle entirely into the law as to the classification of White as compared with Coloured. From last year to to-day, he is going to throw the whole position back into the melting pot without any assurance whatsoever to those people who have believed in all good faith that their cases have been decided upon and finalized. In terms of this amending Bill they must come up for reconsideration unless something is written into this Bill to say that they shall not. That is the point I wish to stress, Sir. The Minister has stood up here and has said that he will not re-classify those people. But, as I have indicated earlier, we have seen…

Order! That point has been made.

I want to make a point in regard to the tightening up of the administration of this Act, Sir.

That has also been made.

Sir, I started with my speech last night and you allowed me, with respect, to put my point…

Order! I hope the hon. member will obey my ruling.

Very well, Sir. This brings me to my next point.

That has also been made already.

You see the approach to such an important matter as this, Sir. My next point is this: How does a person admit that he is of Coloured descent? I have given this a great deal of thought this morning. I want to put this very clearly to the hon. the Minister: Is he going to set about classifying every nation of the world, because that is what he will have to do if he is going to allow people to admit that they are of Coloured descent? That is what he will have to do. The House has this complex, Sir, that when they are talking about colour, they talk purely and simply about the relationship between the Europeans in South Africa and the Cape Coloureds of the Cape Province. I want to raise another point in this connection, Sir: the nations of the world vary in colour and they vary in physical characteristics.

Is that so?

Yes it is so; and you should know it.

Sir, nations vary in characteristics and they vary in colour much more than our own Coloured people and our own Europeans in this country do. This Minister knows as well as I do that there are certain chemicals to-day which alter characteristics. The hon. the Minister is laughing. I as a chemist can quote examples. He knows that in one of the non-European journals which his own Government sponsors a preparation is advertised for straightening crinkly hair. He knows this. His Government helps to distribute that journal. The Minister knows that a tablet is being sold in large quantities in this country and throughout the world which changes the pigmentation of the skin so that the person does not suffer from sun-burn. How does this Minister knows that next week a tablet will not come on to the market that will make Coloured people appear White?

That will solve many of the problems in this country.

It is possible; if you can darken the pigmentation why can’t you make it lighter? These things may sound absurd at the moment but these are possibilities which the Minister should take into account. This is the point I am trying to make. What about the Lebanese; what about the Syrians and the like? If you admit descent from one of those races, will you in fact be admitting that you are a Coloured person? I do not know. I am asking the Minister. I do not think he knows either. Where do you draw the line between the various races of the world and our Coloured people in South Africa?

You take a tablet.

Yes, I think you should take a tablet. Where are we going to draw the line? This Minister has introduced something new, Sir, something which he cannot define and which he cannot confine within limits. You may say nobody else can, Sir. But I do not expect the Minister to bring supernatural powers to bear on this subject. What I do want to say is this: We seem to consider only our relationship between the Cape Coloured people in South Africa and the Europeans. I believe that under this power of investigation the Minister intends to deal with a great many cases that he has never been able to deal with before and I want to quote one or two of these to him.

Order! We are not dealing with the intentions of the Minister; we are dealing with the Bill.

May I quote an example to you, Sir, of a further group of people who are going to be affected by this new definition as contained in Clause 1? This group is a group which has caused the Minister and his Department great difficulty in sorting them out in the past. This is a group in respect of which, unless an official makes an arbitrary decision, I cannot see how you are ever going to sort them out. I am dealing with a case in that group at the moment. The group is now coming into the picture because of the Minister’s tightening up of the Act. And I believe this Bill is partly designed to deal with this group. I want to refer to the case of a man who is employed by the Government. To me he is obviously a European. He is married to a woman who I do not know whether she is European or non-European. I do not pretend to be in a position to judge. I criticize the Minister for assuming the ability to be able to judge between the two. I do not assume that ability to judge. I am investigating another case in this particular group of people; I am investigating it together with the hon. member for Durban (North) (Mr. M. L. Mitchell). It is very similar to the first one I have mentioned. This is the case of a European man who is undoubtedly and unquestionably of European descent. But he is married to a woman who possibly is not. What are we going to do with these people? This register and the staff concerned with it, have left these people alone in the past. But henceforth they will obviously try to do something about it. Because if we are going to make the population register work they will have to do something about these people. What are we going to do about this particular group of people? How is the Minister going to cope with them under this Act? These people have children. They have bought houses by their thrift in a European area where they are accepted. The wife will not in any circumstances comply with the requirements of this clause, but her husband undeniably will. I want to know what the hon. the Minister intends doing with people like these. Is he going to split the family in half? Is he going to give the husband some of the children and the others to the wife and settle them in separate areas? This is important, Sir, because this Government have stated that the various group areas are going to be developed by means of housing schemes. In other words, there will be housing schemes for the Coloureds, there will be housing schemes for the White and so forth. What is going to happen to these people? Are the husband and wife, together with various members of the family, going to have to live in different areas? Once the hon. the Minister has classified these people under this clause they are handed over to the mercy of certain other Acts which provide where they can live, what amenities they can enjoy and the like. It is no good shaking heads and being critical. We have to face up to these things.

I want to deal with another group of people who I think deserve the consideration of this House. As I have already indicated our main consideration hitherto has been to compare the European and the Coloured as we see them more or less in the Cape Province, where—although I do not agree with it—the division is either in the White group or into the Coloured group. Those people who are to all intents and purposes Coloured fall into the Coloured group; they are not of a great admixture; they are more or less of an even mixture. In Natal, however, we have a totally different position. There your Coloured group embraces a far greater variety of people. You have in the Coloured classification people ranging from near-White to Black. I think the Minister knows this. If he does not I will give him an example. I will give him the example of a group—Zanzibaris. They were classified as Coloureds but they are now classified as Indians because the Minister did not know what to do with them. They might just as well have been classified as anything because they are certainly not Indians. But they have been nevertheless classified as Indians. Those people very nearly fell into the Coloured group. As the Minister knows they are from the east coast of Africa; they are Black people. They do not deny it. Some of them were accepted as Natives and some were accepted as Indians. I quote them to show you the type of person who can fall into the Coloured group in Natal.

I now come to the other group; those people whom I am trying to save from re-classification under this Bill. Those are the people of Mauritian descent, people of St. Helena descent and various other of those races. Those people have helped to build up South Africa. They are people who are prominent in the sugar industry in Natal and many other industries, people who have made their contribution and who have been accepted by the White people of South Africa under the old definition. There has never been any question about it. But under this new definition, if these people are re-classified, this hon. Minister is going to send these people who are a proud people and a very fine people—I went to school with many of them; they were accepted in all the schools in spite of what the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (North) (Mr. J. A. F. Nel) said—into the Coloured group. Those people and their children have all their lives enjoyed the privilege—and it is a privilege in this country—of living as Whites amongst the White people of Natal. What is going to happen to these people, Sir? They are going to be sent to live with a mixed group called “Coloureds” which varies, as I have said, from almost-White to absolutely Black. I think this is a point which the hon. the Minister must take into consideration. It is very easy for us to sit here and to compare the Whites and the Coloureds. Conditions vary. The hon. member for Kensington (Mr. Moore) even told us how opinions varied. But, Sir, if a man is sent from the Transvaal to investigate these cases in Natal—under this Bill the Minister can send anybody to investigate; that person need not be somebody from Natal; somebody who understands the conditions there—he may readily say: This person is obviously not a White person. These people are definitely in danger of being classified. I think this Minister must give a definite assurance to all of these people. There are some 40,000 to 50,000 borderline cases and they can all be re-investigated in terms of this Bill and re-classified. He must do something about these people. They deserve a better fate than that, that I can tell the Minister.

The final point I wish to make is that since this hon. the Minister has taken over this portfolio, there has been a definite tightening up in line with this amending Bill in the administration of this Act. And I believe that these are some of the problems with which he is trying to deal. One can understand that even the men who have been appointed on this new regional basis to administer this Act have had great difficulty themselves in putting aside the human approach in dealing with it. I just want to read something which was said by Mr. Justice Snyman in dealing with a case under the new administration as introduced by this hon. Minister. He said—

I am quoting from a sub-leader in the Argus of February this year. Now that is a member who sat on the board. The Minister has made the point that these people were not granted personal interviews. He did not come in contact with those people, Sir, he just dealt with the facts that were placed before him and those made him sick. Just think what happens to the officials of the hon. the Minister who have to deal with and investigate these cases. I know what happens to them, Sir. They become sympathetic and they are giving these people the benefit of the doubt. For that I thank them. But now this hon. Minister has to tighten that up. He has got to make sure that the officials who administer the provisions of this Act do not in fact do that, that they rub the sympathetic aspect, the sympathetic approach right out of their considerations. That, Sir, to a large measure is the reason for the introduction of this Bill. Sir, I have no hesitation whatsoever in supporting the amendment of my hon. Leader.

The hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee) invites me to say something original, and he says that if I do so he will give me a shilling. I just wanted to say, Sir, that had I said something original you would have stopped me. I want to commence by saying that I do not agree with all the criticism which has been voiced against the Department. Let me at once say this to the hon. the Minister. I suppose I have dealt with as many cases of race classification as any other member in this House. I was a Provincial Councillor for many years for one of the suburbs where there was quite a number of borderline cases. Because some of them knew me many of them got in touch with me. People from other areas also got in touch with me. My experience with the Cape Town branch office of the Department which deals with race classification has been pleasant. I am grateful for the assistance and help which I have received from the Department, it is something which I will not forget easily. My experience has not been that the Cape Town branch office has in any way dealt less humanly with people since this hon. Minister has taken over. [Interjections.] I just want to reply to what that hon. member has said…

Order! The hon. member must continue. He must not take any notice of the interjections.

I just want to say, Mr. Speaker, that I am grateful for that treatment, because in this matter we are not dealing with animals. We are dealing with human beings, and in particular with that group of people who feel hurt because, as a result of legislation, they find themselves in the position where they have to be classified like stud animals. That is not an easy thing. I have dealt with cases which I have taken to that office, where the father, mother and daughter have all three cried at the same time. If the Minister has witnessed the misery which such a classification—wrongly in their opinion, but perhaps correctly according to the officials—has caused those people, he will realize why we are serious about this matter. Such a classification, even though it is a correct classification, has a stultifying effect on the lives of those people. On the other hand, if the Minister were to see the gratitude of those people when they are classified in the White group, he will realize that, from a human point of view, it is very wrong on the part of anybody to condemn a person in respect of whom there is a slight measure of doubt, and not only that person but his descendants to the third, fourth and future generations for all time—to an inferior position in the country of their birth. I think the hon. the Minister is making a fatal mistake in interfering with this legislation. This is not a great problem that we have to deal with. The Minister himself has said that there are only 3,000 cases in respect of which there is any doubt. He went on and gave as one of his reasons the fact that there were 15 cases who wanted to be re-classified. Fifteen out of a population of 15,000,000 is surely no justification for the introduction of legislation into this House. And 3,000 out of a population of 15,000,000 surely does not justify the introduction of legislation into this House. The problems of those 3,000 have been solved by the Minister, and solved, I believe, very justly and reasonably.

Order! Yes, but that point has often been repeated and the hon. member must return to the Bill.

Mr. Speaker, I wish to point out briefly that this proposed classification will make the problem worse and that it will create difficulties which do not exist to-day.

Order! That has been said repeatedly.

But the points which I wish to raise have not been raised before, Sir.

Then the hon. member must raise them now.

Mr. Speaker, before doing so, I just want to reply to the allegations which some members opposite have made during the course of this debate and in other debates, allegations which unnecessarily besmirch the name of the White man.

Order! The hon. member may not refer to other debates.

But they were also made in this debate, Sir.

All those points have already been replied to.

You can correct me, Mr. Speaker, but to my knowledge they have not been replied to as yet. For example, the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Dr. Jonker) made certain allegations which have not been replied to as yet. Moreover he contradicted the hon. member for Kempton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn). The hon. member for Fort Beaufort said that the White people of South Africa had a proud record and that the number of so-called borderline cases which had been caused by White blood was very small. On the other hand the hon. member for Kempton Park said that if we did not pass this legislation to-day, there will be interbreeding on such a scale that within a short space of time we will become a bastard race. The Minister said at this stage that the people best able to judge as to classification were the public. He said if a person walked down Adderley Street the people of South Africa will soon enough tell you to which group that person belonged. The Minister then turns around and contradicts himself by saying that this legislation is necessary in order to determine where that person belongs. He no longer depends on the people in Adderley Street to decide. What are the facts? The facts are these: In the past a strange person was judged to a great extent by his appearance and his appearance alone. How can you judge a person, Sir, other than by appearance if you do not know his background or with whom he associates? The Government is now, however, linking these two together—appearance and association. The Minister also goes further and says that the descent of a person, where he admits it, will no longer be an additional factor, but that it will be a deciding factor in determining his classification.

Order! That point has often been dealt with.

My point is this, Mr. Speaker, that if the Minister makes that a deciding factor he will find himself in difficulty without writing anything more into this legislation,. What will be the position if a group of well-to-do but aggrieved Coloureds take, say, a member of Parliament, to court and say that they have evidence in the shape of his birth certificate or whatever it may be, that he has been wrongly classified because his forefathers had coloured blood in their veins? The Minister wishes to get out of the difficulty caused by a certain Mr. Song, but he is creating a million other difficulties. The Minister is plunging people into misery; he is creating more difficulties for himself instead of getting out of those difficulties. When the Minister spoke, Sir, one got the impression that he was only talking on behalf of his supporters and that we have this legislation only because the Government is annoyed with Mr. Song.

Order! Yes, but that is becoming tedious repetition. The hon. member said he would raise new points, and we are still waiting for those points.

I have already said, Mr. Speaker, that you and I are in danger under this legislation…

Order! No, the hon. member must raise new points.

Mr. Speaker, I thought I was dealing with new points. I have not heard anybody dealing with the question… Take the case of Count Bernadotte, for example. Everybody knows his history and that he has Moorish blood in his veins. Will the Minister in future prohibit a daughter of the Bernadotte family from marrying a White person here in South Africa? Is the Minister going to classify Moorish blood as Coloured blood? How far back will the Minister go?

Order! The previous speaker has already asked all those questions.

How many generations back will the Minister go? If this Government cannot even determine who is Coloured and does not define him, a tremendous number of difficulties will arise. I intend going further into that. However, Mr. Speaker, I hope you will first allow me to reply to some of the allegations which have been made here. You say that those allegations have already been replied to. I do not think the unjustifiable allegations made by the hon. member for Fort Beaufort have been replied to. We know that a number of years ago a certain Mr. Liebenberg— many of the older members will remember him—who was a member of Parliament at the time, wrongly alleged, I think, that it was because of the sins of our forefathers that we had a Coloured population to-day,

Order! That is not relevant. It is only this Bill which is under discussion.

I was just wondering, Sir, in view of the fact that the hon. member for Fort Beaufort dealt with this matter, whether I would be allowed to put the mater in its right perspective. Because I say that is not true, and I should like to substantiate my statement.

No. The hon. member must return to the Bill.

If I have to return to the Bill, I should like to know from the Minister—if you, Mr. Speaker, rule that it is within the ambit of the Bill—what he intends doing with the illegitimate child of a White father and a so-called Coloured mother. I take it that child will be classified as Coloured [Interjections.] Such a child will naturally be classified as Coloured. But what will the position be of a White mother who is classified as White and who has a child by a Coloured? Who does the Minister accept as a White person; does he go by appearance and association alone? Mr. Speaker, I repeat that it is the Minister’s duty to make provision for those cases where people break through the colour bar and numbers of them break through and will break through. It is difficult to go too far but I know of a case—I can bring those people to the Minister, people in respect of whom some doubt existed—where they are as White to-day as anybody else. There are three daughters who are so decent and whose appearance is so good that they have been accepted by the N.G. Church and by a White school. Now that they have returned to their parental home—one of them was in a White orphanage—they are classified as Coloured and it may be that they will marry Natives, but those blonde girls are not allowed to take their place in society amongst White people. We talk about Christian civilization every day of our lives. You sometimes wonder, Sir, if we are really Christians and what Christ would have done had he to deal with a case like that.

Order! The hon. member must return to the Bill otherwise I shall have to ask him to resume his seat.

I am pleading for the classification of those people, Sir.

Yes, but the hon. member is going too far. Those matters have already been pleaded on numerous occasions.

I just want to raise one other small matter and it is this: If this classification of the Minister’s is a success, the Coloured people and the “off-Coloureds” will of necessity become Black in future, and he will be the cause why they interbreed with the Bantu. He is closing the tap.

Order! That has nothing to do with the Bill. The hon. member must return to the Bill or resume his seat.

Seeing that I have been dealing with the Bill all the time, Sir, I will sit down on this note that I have confined myself to the Bill, but I want to say this. If you think about the Jews and how they have kept 90 per cent of their race pure for years, I think the White race of South Africa can also keep itself pure without this amendment. I and this side of the House have confidence in the character and calibre of the daughter and mother of South Africa, we are confident that they will continue to keep South Africa White and not Black. We do not harbour the fear which the Minister does. My experience has been that this type of legislation only harms South Africa and does not do it any good.

I do not intend in the least to take part in this debate merely for the sake of repeating arguments or of prolonging the debate. But as a person who, during the past few years, has dealt intensively with cases which as a result of the population register have come to the notice of the authorities and had to be re-classified, I feel it is my duty, having gained experience of the human aspects of the matter, to bring it in all sincerity to the notice of the House and particularly to the notice of the Minister, because we are dealing here with an amendment to existing legislation, and when it comes to the application of this legislation the most unpleasant task which has to be performed in respect of that application, rests on the shoulders of the officials. At the outset I wish to say that I have the greatest regard and praise for the officials with whom I have come into contact for the manner in which they do their duty and perform this unpleasant task. But the question arises whether it is necesary to have officials who are placed in the position where they have to perform that task?

That is the law.

Apart from the officials who have to perform the task, you also have those people who are concerned in the matter. The hon. member for Omaruru (Mr. Frank) who is unfortunately not present at the moment, triumphantly pointed out that an appeal could be lodged against any classification made in terms of this legislation. Sir, if you study the legal system of South Africa in theory and you take a case which starts in the magistrate’s court and you explain to an outsider what our judicial system entails, he will say: You go to the Magistrate’s Court and if you lose your case there you can according to the South Africa system, lodge an appeal in the Supreme Court and from there in the Appeal Court. In theory that sounds easy and practical but anybody who has had anything to do with court cases knows that costs money. [Interjections.] I will not reply to that interjection.

Order! I will be pleased if the hon. member for Karas (Mr. von Moltke) will remain quiet.

It sounds democratic and practical, but we know that an appeal from one court to another costs a great deal of money. Apart from that, in the case of a classification where an appeal is lodged, you are not only dealing with the amount of money the person has in order to have his demands met, but you are dealing with a person who is lodging an appeal not merely for the sake of the financial benefit he will derive from it. You are dealing with a person whose whole life and way of life is at stake. The social circumstances in which he lives are concerned in it. His children for whose upbringing he is responsible, are concerned. If you look at it for the human angle, it is not at all as easy as it sounds simply to say you can appeal against the classification. Has the Minister or any hon. member who has used that argument, ever thought what their own position would be and what their own feelings would be and what their own attitude towards the society in which they moved would be if they found themselves in the position in which they had to fight for their rights—not their right of existence but their right to exist in accordance with the social plane where they were accepted in the past and which is now in danger—by means of affidavits and by pleading here and pleading there. That is what this legislation entails.

Judging by the explanation given by the hon. the Minister, I cannot accept that this amendment is only concerned with the case of one Chinaman, but I will return to that point at a later stage. I want to re-emphasize that when a person’s entire existence, the future of his children and his entire way of life and the regard which he enjoys in society, are in danger, and he has to lodge an appeal, after he has looked everywhere for assistance and has asked members of Parliament whom he sometimes does not even know for assistance—if we imagine ourselves in that position and we have experienced what those people have, when we have experienced the sorrow and suffering and worry which they have experienced (in some cases they have even committed suicide)—only then do you find a basis on which you can regard the consequences of this legislation objectively. The learned hon. member for Fort Beaufort—I am not sarcastic when I say that; I have the highest regard for his academic qualifications—argued at length to try to prove that only 6 per cent of the Coloured people in South Africa had White blood. He doubted the arguments advanced by other speakers as to the percentage. He also said that their arguments were not based on scientific investigations.

Yes, but that is not relevant.

With your permission, Sir, I just want to draw attention to one aspect of the hon. member’s argument which has not been dealt with. I maintain that any person, irrespective of what his qualifications may be, academic or otherwise, who talks at this stage about the history of South Africa, who argues scientifically about the blood composition of the Coloureds or of the Whites, will find himself completely at sea. It is such an impossible task.

Order! The hon. member must return to the Bill.

The hon. member quoted inter alia from the book of Prof. J. S. Marais.

Order! The hon. member is ignoring my ruling completely. I have told him to return to the Bill.

In the speech of the hon. member to which I have just referred…

Order! The hon. member must return to the Bill or resume his seat.

All I wanted to say was this, Sir: What does it matter what the percentage is in one direction or the other? What difference has it made so far in South Africa? If this legislation had to be applied in accordance with the percentage Coloured blood or White blood in any direction, I contend that it makes no difference in any direction. It has not made any difference for 300 years. The judge as far as this problem is concerned, has been the community.

That point has repeatedly been made. I am asking the hon. member either to raise a new point or to resume his seat.

To return to the wording of the amendment as we have it before us, I just wish to say that we have heard such a great deal in this debate about Singh and about Song that I nearly started an Intervasity Sing-Song. In spite of what the Minister said when he introduced this legislation and in spite of what so many other speakers have said it is still not clear to me where the word “Chinese” appears in this Bill. My submission is, Sir, that no matter how sincere the intention is to prevent the occurrence of Song-cases in South Africa by means of this Bill, looking at it from the point of view of the Minister and the Government who have placed this legislation on the Statute book and who have to apply it, it is clear to me that if such a loophole exists it must be closed. For the sake of argument I accept that, but nowhere in this Bill does the word “Chinese” or “Asiatic” appear. I wish to tell you Sir, what I was told in these Houses of Parliament last Friday by a prominent and well-known leader of the Coloureds in South Africa. Having studied the Bill which we are discussing to-day, he said to me: Why does the Government use us Coloureds as the ash-heap of their racial policy? That is exactly what this legislation is doing.

Which clause?

The whole Bill, more particularly Clause I. As far as the Government’s policy of race classification, as circumscribed in this legislation, is concerned, it simply amounts to this that if a person cannot be classified he is simply classified as a Coloured; and on behalf of those people whom I represent in this House, I wish to say that the Coloureds are very upset about that and justifiably so, because whenever the Government does not know what to do with a person because of his racial policy, he is simply classified as a Coloured. That is also clear from what the hon. the Minister has said. He talked about Song and about Singh, but he never said—as a mater of fact, he denied it—that this Bill was intended to tighten the rope round the necks of those persons who may perhaps be classified as Whites but who have Coloured blood in their veins. The Minister confined himself mainly to Singh and Song It is clear to me that the Minister, as a logical consequence of the application of the Population Registration Act, the Act in which Song has found a loophole, has introduced this amending Bill and it simply amounts to this that if it were applied as it appears here it represents a rope which is tightened round the necks of those persons who are not to be blamed before God or man for what happened three or four generations ago; and to classify them as Coloureds and to make them and their children unhappy.

Order! That point has also been raised repeatedly.

If a person is charged before a court in this country, say for murder, and if there are three or four witneses for the Crown the day the case comes up for trial it he pleads guilty, those witnesses are not called. The case is finished and all that remains is the sentence. In other words, if a person pleads guilty, it is accepted that the Crown has proved its case. I want to ask the Minister this: I wish to put this case to him, a case which I have personally experienced. There is a certain family in Cape Town. In 1951 the father in all good faith, completed a confidential document which cannot even be used for income tax purposes, namely a census form. Against the word “race” in that form he filled in “mixed”. What he meant by that I do not know. The father died in 1956, but last year—and again I wish to express gratitude to the officials who were concerned in this—it was my unpleasant task to take two married daughters and an unmarried daughter of 18 years of age, and two children of 14 and 12 to the officials in order to prove that they were White. The father who filled in that document is dead. The children are not responsible for what he wrote or for what happened two or three generations ago, but simply as a result of what appeared in that document those children had to appear before the official as though they were cattle to be judged at an agricultural show, and that official had to perform the unpleasant task of deciding whether or not they were White. My argument is this, Sir. In the event of such person objecting to his classification and he appears before the official concerned—and in this respect another danger lurks in this legislation—the position will not be the same as it was in the past, when it was unpleasant enough. When the person gets there and is shown a census form in which his race is given as “mixed”—or in his birth certificate—and he admits that is correct, then surely the Government’s case against him has been proved. In that case he has admitted that he is of Coloured descent. He may be a public servant. He may have lived in a White residential area all his life and may have attended a White school.…

Order! That point has been raised repeatedly.

I can only say that if it has been raised so often, I hope the Minister will consider it.

I want to go further. I repeat that the only interest I have in this debate is the fact that I know what is happening, because I have experience of it and because I, as a fallible human being, as one who is standing here and talking about the bitterness and humiliation which people have to endure daily, feel that I am not the one to judge and that I have no right to throw stones, and that I cannot commit sacrilege by saying that I have the right to visit the sins of the fathers upon the third generation and even less so the Government.…

Order! The hon. member must return.

There is something else. We have Clause 4 which deals with investigations. It is no longer a question of a person whose classification is doubted appearing before the official in order to convince him. It is different now. That official must also indemnify himself and he is given the right to send people to investigate. I wish to say this in conclusion. I hope the hon. the Minister will give serious consideration to this last Clause and the power which is being given to officials and other people. There is no guarantee as to what the qualifications of those people should be, whether they will be psychiatrists or people with experience, and experience is very important in this case. Anybody who was born in the Cape Province and who grew up here, will apply a totally different yardstick if he has to judge whether or not a person is Coloured. There is no guarantee that those people will have such experience. It is absolutely impossible to find a definition for a Coloured or for a White. Every piece of legislation which contains such a definition differs from one another. If people who lack experience or if people who are not all worried about what they write in their report, are to be sent to probe into the lives of people and investigate their descent, great misery and sorrow will be caused. Sir, I have no right to throw stones, less so the Minister and the Government and we do not have the right to visit the sins of the fathers on the children up to the third and fourth generations.

At this stage it might be well to remind the House of how the definition we are seeking to amend reads. The original definition read that “a White person is a person who in appearance obviously is or who is generally accepted as a White person, but does not include a person who, although in appearance obviously a White person, is generally accepted as a Coloured person”. Sir, the simple meaning of this definition is that if a person is in appearance obviously White and is not generally accepted as a Coloured, he is White. That is the one category. The other category of persons who could meet this test is the person who is generally accepted as a White person. Those were the two categories. Now I submit that test was nothing more than the traditional conventional test we have had all through our history, which each community applied to each individual, because anyone who is honest and not a hypocrite must realize that in the first 150 years of our history in this country there was not strong racial feeling and there was a considerable degree of miscegenation between the races. Even after the beginning of the nineteenth century, when racial attitudes hardened, there was always, in terms of this social convention, the feeling that a person was generally accepted as a White person, even though he might be dark in colour, if through merit he had risen in life or had become educated, and in the feeling that a person was generally accepted by the White community and thus pass over into the White community. I think that is an obviously historical truth and it is well stated by Professor du Toit Malherbe in his book “Driehonderd Jaar Nasiebou”.

That has often been read already.

I will read a new part of it. He says—

Order! That has been read already.

Then I will come to the second part—

Professor Malherbe wrote this book before this Act was on our Statute Book. It proves conclusively that the existing social conventions were a sufficient guard against miscegenation, but as in all societies there was flexibility for the exceptional Coloured man to be accepted in the White community. I say that the Minister, when this Act was passed, simply legislated according to the existing social conventions. This is very well put by the Minister himself in an earlier phase of his art of racial classification, when he said—

That again was in the tradition of our existing social convention. As Professor Malherbe has pointed out, that did not result in South Africans becoming a Coloured race, but it was a far more humane system that this arbitrary classification of people because what happens? The moment you make a legal definition to decide whether a person is Black or Coloured hands of an official who can to a large extent act arbitrarily. It is true that if he exceeds or White, it immediately places that person’s life and his happiness and his future into the certain bounds his decision can be corrected on appeal, but how many ordinary poor people can afford this whole process of going on appeal? The Minister should know that once a decision has been taken, it is not easily upset. It is only where the official has manifestly departed from the definition that the court can upset it. This original definition was unnecessary. It led to a tremendous amount of social misery. I do not want to repeat what other members have said, but they have cited oases again and again, showing what the result was of casting traditional social conventions in legal form. Many of our social conventions, of course, are not acceptable to the civilized Western world to-day, but the moment you cast them in an absolutely rigid legal form so that there is no flexibility, they become completely repugnant to the whole civilized Western world. That was our original objection to this clause. The new definition now goes much further. The new definition is a complete departure from what I have called our traditional social conventions which govern whether a person should be accepted into the White community or not. Let us read the new definition and analyse its meaning. It reads—

That was part of our traditional social conventions. But then it goes on to say—

That departs completely from our accepted practice; it departs from the principle that the Minister himself stated two years ago. The amazing thing is that apparently this fundamental departure is embarked upon just because of one single case to which the Minister has been able to point where this definition does not satisfy him or the policies of this Government. But the new definition has a tail to it; it goes even further and says—

Sir, this is not going to be the last definition, because as this definition reads I can already envisage the amount of litigation that is going to be necessary to determine precisely what this means. One of the consequences will be this apparently that if you are an honest person and you make an admission you will be a Coloured, and if you are a dishonest person and you do not make an admission you will be a White person. That is one of the consequences of this definition. And what does “admission” mean here? Unless the Minister is going to circumscribe what he means by “admission”, what if a person says after he has had a few drinks, “My ouma was ’n halfnaaitjie gewees”? Can the man to whom me makes that statement run to the Minister’s officials and say, “That man has made an admission that he is descended from a Coloured person”? As the admission reads now, it seems to me that would be one of the results.

Order! I would like to point out to the hon. member that all these points have been made before.

I am just making this new point that this definition will lead to endless litigation. I admit that I have cited instances referred to by other speakers. This definition is going to give rise to many difficulties, because the fact of the matter is that in human affairs of this nature, where the division between White and Coloured is so delicate, no legal provision will ever be satisfactory. The fact of the matter is that the Minister is trying to separate the inseparable. He is trying to separate people who are close together, who have the same religion and who have the same Western civilization. Sir, we are always told that apartheid is necessary to safguard our Western civilization. On what basis does the Minister discriminate here? The original definition and the new definition indicate how difficult it is for him to distinguish between a Coloured and a White man. I would say that this is a clear instance where the Minister is simply discriminating for the sake of discrimination; I say that it has no purpose, that it cannot be justified by any civilized test in the whole world; it cannot be justified by any moral test. You simply cannot try to cut this thing so fine. In this respect I have heard another argument, which has rather surprised me, from people who pretend that they are Christians or who probably think in their heart of hearts that they are Christians. They argue that only one or two thousand borderline cases will be affected by this legislation. Where do they find this new quantitative system of morality whereby if you only do injustice to a small percentage of the people, it does not matter? Surely if you commit an immoral or unjust act against one person, it is just as reprehensible as to commit it against a hundred persons.

Order! The hon. member must come to new points.

Sir, I do not think that particular point has been answered. However, I leave it at that.

I do not think you have been present during the whole of the debate.

Have you been?

Yes.

Order!

What will the consequences of this new definition be? I have already traced the past, and we can only really judge what is going to happen in the future by what has happened in the past. Under our traditional system where each community decided for itself whether in terms of its traditional social conventions it would accept new members into that community or not, we found that our national life, our human resources, were enriched. Nobody but a hypocrite will deny that some of our leading families who have contribued in a great measure to our national life have had Coloured blood in their veins.

Order! The hon. member must come back to the Bill now.

The consequence of this legislation is going to be that process is going to be stopped for all time in the future.

I am sorry I cannot allow the hon. member to pursue that point.

I might be making a new point if I say that under this new definition many of our early Christian leaders would have been unacceptable to this Government as part of the White community.

Order! I cannot allow the hon. member to continue along those lines. The hon. member must come back to the Bill.

It is this type of legislation that causes conservative journals and responsible journals like the Times of London…

You are beginning to stutter now; you may as well sit down.

Apparently the hon. member does not believe that in the Western world, not by Nationalists standard but by the standards of the Western world, the Times is supposed to be an honest, objective paper, which tries to reflect the best of Western civilization. It is certainly the leading paper in the United Kingdom. Sir, on the occasion of the appointment of Mr. Waring as a Minister, the Times wrote—

Here we have another case where the dignity of the Coloured people is insulted, if one has to go through all this refinement to decide whether a person is Coloured or White.

Why?

I wonder if the hon. member who asks “Why?” would regard it as an indignity if he was classified as a Coloured. That surely is the test.

If I was a Coloured man I would have no objection whatsoever.

That is an admission in terms of the Act.

Order! The hon. member must come back to the Bill.

The Times goes on to say—

Order! The hon. member must come back to the Bill now.

But, Sir, this is a consequence of the Bill. It is the effect of this Bill that causes responsible newspapers…

Order! I am sorry I cannot allow the hon. member to proceed along those lines. He must come back to the Bill.

I can only conclude then by saying that this type of legislation is proof of the old saying that those whom the Gods choose to destroy they first make mad, and it seems to me that God has made his choice in this matter.

Before I reply to the essence of this debate and analyse the various criticisms and comments, I should like to dispose of a few matters which are perhaps of individual importance. The first is just in reply to the question of the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. J. D. du P. Basson) as to whether this Bill will apply to South West Africa. I just want to tell him that Section 22 of the existing Act reads that South West Africa is not included, and in this amending Bill there is no clause to the effect that these amendments will apply to South West Africa. It will not apply to South West Africa therefore.

The other few matters that I first want to dispose of affect my officials in two cases and me personally in a third case. As far as my officials are concerned I should like first of all to put on record my sincere thanks for what the hon. member for Sea Point (Mr. J. A. L. Basson) had to say about the fine co-operation that hon. members receive from my officials in these very difficult circumstances. I want to express my appreciation. The same tribute was also paid by a few other hon. members on the other side.

The hon. member for Boland (Mr. Barnett) unfortunately overstepped the mark by making an attack upon my officials in suggesting that they did not agree with my attitude that the decision in the Song case was perfectly correct. But the hon. member repented and wrote a letter to me that I want to read out for record purposes because towards the end of the letter he gives me the right to tender his apologies here. The letter reads as follows—

I accept the hon. member’s apology and I do not propose to pursue this matter.

Then I come to the hon. member for Durban (Point) (Mr. Raw). The House will recall that when he took part in the debate he attacked my Department in the course of his speech because in a certain case a person had been classified as a Coloured while his parents had been classified as Whites.

They had White identity cards.

Well, then they were classified as Whites. He said that there was a typewritten letter lying in his office ready to be despatched to me. If the hon. member for Parow (Mr. S. F. Kotzé) were here now, he might be sorry that he apologized to the hon. member the following morning. The facts in this case are as follows: The person to whom the hon. member for Durban (Point) referred, applied on 22 March of this year for a birth certificate, which was posted to him on 2 April 1962. His birth certificate indicates his race as “mixed”. This race description was given by the person who registered this man’s birth and not by my officials. But the hon. member created the impression here that it was the officials who had caused this person, born of White parents, to be registered as “mixed”.

That is how we know him.

I went into this matter immediately, and according to the information received by me the individual concerned has not yet submitted an application for his race description to be amended.

I said so.

That is the sort of thing that is said here and that we have to put up with.

He ought to apologize.

My point is simply that where a person’s birth has been registered, whoever may have registered it, and he asks for a copy of his birth certificate and it is recorded on that certificate that he is of mixed race, it is not the fault of the Department of the Interior, and he has the right to apply in the correct way and not across the floor of the House through a politician for his race description to be changed.

The next matter is one which I find very unpleasant. I have tried the whole day to keep myself in check so that I would not use unbridled language in describing what the hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant) did in this House yesterday evening. The hon. member for Turffontein quoted here yesterday evening what I had allegedly said in 1960, which of course is not correct; I made the speech in question on 16 May 1961. The hon. member was good enough this morning to give me permission to get a copy of the Hansard report of his speech. What he quoted was an entirely mutilated quotation, as I propose to prove in a moment.

As usual.

I have here the full text of what I said. The hon. member simply stated that he was quoting from Hansard, Volume 108, without indicating the column number and he did not tell us that he was quoting a piece here and then omitting the next piece. I hope to expose the hon. member here and to show what his approach is and how he makes use of his rights and privileges as a member of this House. I am first going to read out the full text of my speech to the House; thereafter I am going to read out what the hon. member quoted, and then I am going to leave it to this House to judge whether what he read out here yesterday is a correct reflection of what I said, because he said yesterday that it was time the whole country knew what sort of Minister I was. The hon. member quoted from the English Hansard and I shall do the same therefore. Let me quote what I said (col. 6505)—

That is precisely what I said.

Mr. Miller then said by way of interjection—

I used some unfortunate expressions, but I am not going into that now. But what did the hon. member do? He had the whole story in front of him but this was how he presented it; this is what he quoted—

There appears a comma there, but the hon. member stops there; he skips the whole of the next piece and links up that sentence with a sentence which comes after a semicolon further down—

You are quoting wrongly; look at my Hansard.

Let me read on—

Although I said all those other things, the hon. member comes along and only quotes up to the words “is going to accept them as a White community he omits what I said later on in connection with the Chinese not being accepted as Whites, and he says in his speech—

He then takes the last sentence and he quotes my words—

Correct. You were talking about the Chinese.

Order!

The hon. member is going on the defensive now. What did he do? He quotes the last sentence before the interjection by Mr. Miller, and that sentence reads—

And in reply to the interjection, “they have been doing so for years,” I said—

But then I went on to say—

I then went on to deal with the Japanese and I said—

“Or any other group.”

Yes—

But what did the hon. member do? The hon. member said that in the case of the Chinese group everything depended on whether the Whites were going to accept them, and he then came to what he described as the “crucial point” and he quoted this—

There he was referring to the Chinese. I do not know whether I have the right, but if I had the right I would have asked for a proper inquiry because this is a case of misuse (mishandeling), together with omissions, of what I actually said in an attempt to create the erroneous impression that what I had said was that these Chinese were acceptable as Whites whereas I had stated in just the previous sentence that they were not acceptable to the Whites. The hon. member quotes it in such a way that it creates the impression that I said that they were acceptable. And what does he go on to say? He says that he can no longer believe a Minister and particularly this Minister because the Minister has not carried out his promise.

What does his Leader say about it?

I just want to say that in my opinion this is a gross misuse—no, I must not use unbridled language—but I can only place on record my great indignation at the fact that an hon. member mutilates what a fellow-member said—if he wants to quote, let him quote everything—and then presents it here in a mutilated, distorted form in order to create an impression which differs from the impression that was actually created.

It is deceit.

Order!

On a point of order, the hon. the Minister has used certain words here in connection with a quotation which I read out yesterday evening in the course of my speech. He says that I presented it in a distorted form and I ask that the hon. the Minister withdraw it.

He said in a mutilated form.

And he proved it.

He used the word “distorted.”

Order! The hon. the Minister may proceed.

On a point of order, the rule in this House has always been that we cannot use the word “distort” or “twist”, and the hon. the Minister has accused the hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant) of having quoted his words in a “distorted” form. We have always understood in the past that those words are not Parliamentary, and it is difficult to follow how they can be regarded as Parliamentary in this sense.

The hon. the Minister has produced the evidence. The Minister may proceed.

On a point of order, Sir, with all respect, whether the Minister thinks that he has proved it or not is of no importance. As a matter of fact, we do not agree with the Minister’s interpretation.

Order! The hon. the Minister may proceed.

On a point of order, the objection raised by the hon. the Minister to this quotation is no proof that there was any distortion. We are not allowed to use the word “distortion” in this House. That has always been the practice. I am convinced that the Minister will admit that “distortion” is not a Parliamentary term, and at this stage I think I should ask you kindly to request the Minister to withdraw it.

It is deceit (“bedrog”).

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, is it Parliamentary for the hon. member for Standerton to say, “It is deceit”?

May I say that the hon. member for Standerton is a monstrosity (“gedrog”)?

Order! The hon. member for Standerton must withdraw those words.

I withdraw them.

The hon. member for Sea Point must also withdraw the term used by him.

I withdraw it.

On a point of order, may I ask for your ruling as to whether, if in the future the word “distortion” is used and if in your opinion the accusation is proved…

Order! I have given my ruling. If the hon. member is not satisfied he may ask for a Select Committee.

Are we to understand, Sir, that your ruling is that the Minister was in order in using this word because in your opinion he proved his charge? Is your ruling that the Minister is allowed to use this word because he has proved his case to your satisfaction?

Yes, that is the position.

On a point of order, I understand that it has been suggested that a Select Committee should be asked for in this connection, and the hon. the Minister has now challenged me in connection with this matter. I should like to know what procedure I have to follow. Must I ask for it now or at the end of this debate?

The hon. member may give notice immediately.

In view of the Minister’s request and the statement made by him that I allegedly quoted his words in a distorted form…

Order! The hon. member must first give notice of such a request, and he can do so at the end of the debate when the matter has been put to the vote.

On a point of order, Sir, the hon. member has asked for a Select Committee to determine whether he quoted the words in a “distorted” form. I submit that since an inquiry has been asked for the Minister must withdraw those words.

In view of the fact that a Select Committee has been asked for in connection with this matter, I shall ask the hon. the Minister to withdraw the term.

Mr. Speaker, if I have to withdraw the word “distorted” then I can only say, instead of a “distorted form”, that it was a mutilated, false representation of the contents of my speech.

I have asked the hon. the Minister to withdraw the word “distorted”

I withdraw it, but it is a mutilated and a false representation of what I intended to convey in my speech.

On a point of order, the hon. the Minister is now using the words “a false representation.” Surely that is not in order either. Surely the hon. the Minister cannot qualify his withdrawal in that way. He is simply replacing the word by the words “false representation”. [Interjections.]

Order! There are so many interjections that I cannot hear the speakers.

On a point of order, with due deference, it is completely against the rules for the hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant) to give notice in the middle of a speech in the course of a debate that he is going to move that some Select Committee or other be appointed, whatever that Committee may be. That being so, with due respect, Mr. Speaker, the Minister cannot be expected to withdraw something that he said in the course of his speech.

Order! The matter has been disposed of already. The hon. the Minister may proceed.

On a point or order, may I ask whether it has not always been the rule that when something is withdrawn, it must be withdrawn without qualification and without any additions whatsoever.

An hon. member is always allowed, if he withdraws a certain charge or a certain word, to substitute for it another word or words which are Parliamentary.

On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, the hon. the Miniser amended his words and talked about “false”, which is worse than the word “distortion”. I ask you to ask the hon. the Minister to withdraw that word.

Order! The words “false” and “wrong” have always been allowed. It is only the expressions “deliberately false” and “deliberately wrong” which are unparliamentary. The hon. the Minister may proceed.

I should like to reply to the debate as briefly as possible because I have had the valuable assistance of hon. members on this side who have actually replied fully to most of the arguments, and if I were to go into those arguments in detail I would perhaps be guilty of repetition. I do not want to mention the names of hon. members who have helped to reply to this debate, but I just want to say that hon. members on this side have shown that they know what they are talking about; they have replied to the various points in a calm, moderate and convincing way and have come forward with facts. I really cannot understand why it was necessary to drag out this unsavoury debate so long to make out a case, particularly after the replies given from this side. It is a pity that so much time has had to be taken up. I just want to say that I think the United Party has made very little impression on the public outside, because in acutal fact the public Press and public opinion have not been aroused at all by what has been happening in this House in the past few days. It is perfectly clear to me that the public has the fullest confidence in the way in which the Government has administered this Act in the past twelve years and that nobody has been impressed by the scaremongering that we have had here.

I should like to start with the stories which have been concocted about the so-called “hard-luck cases”. Hon. members on the other side really enjoyed themselves in mentioning all these cases. We had to listen to one story after another, to one difficulty after another. I just want to say in advance that it is not this Act that created these cases of hardship; it was not the Act of 1950, nor will the amendments of 1962 create these borderline cases and these cases of hardhsip. They will always be there, whether there is an Act or not, but the first question is how they should be dealt with under the Act and in the Act. I should like to know from hon. members who had so much to say about these cases what cases they can produce. Let them mention a single case of hardship, a single hard-luck case, which has not been justly dealt with in the past twelve years. Let them mention one genuine case where a person has had to suffer because of the misdeeds of the parents or has had to pay for sins for which he or she has not been responsible and where we have acted unfairly. There are no such cases. The hon. member for Sea Point (Mr. J. A. L. Basson) shakes his head. The cases that he dealt with have been settled, just as all other cases have been resolved. These cases which have been mentioned here are apparitions without flesh—rattling skeletons. That is what they are. The public no longer allows itself to be scared by these spectres. No evidence has been produced and no evidence can be produced that these difficult cases are not dealt with compassionately. That has always been done. I challenge any reasonable person to produce any evidence that under this Bill it will be more difficult in the future in difficult, borderline cases for a single person to obtain his legitimate classification. All sorts of allegations have been made in an attempt to substantiate that statement, but hon. members have not succeeded in doing so in this debate. All that is necessary for me to do therefore is once again to give the whole country the assurance that these amendments, if they are inserted in the principle Act, will be applied with the same degree of compassion as before. This is an assurance which I propose to link up presently with our legal system, with the judgments of our courts, and on which I stake the good name and honour of this Government. Even the proposal of the United Party, which does not want the test of acceptance only, will not eliminate the borderline cases. They say that we should have no law but that we should accept people as they were always accepted before the passing of this measure. But that would still not eliminate the borderline cases or reduce their numbers. Everything depends on how these cases are dealt with, on the degree of compassion that they are dealt with, and the Government is not ashamed to refer to its record over the past twelve years in this connection. Hon. members opposite think that they have a monopoly as far as sympathy for these people is concerned. They are making a very big mistake. We show just as much or perhaps more compassion, and I propose to prove in a moment that with these amendments particularly we are showing greater compassion than hon. members opposite who, unconsciously perhaps, are not showing the same degree of compassion. Is there any person who has the quality of Christian compassion who is not sorry for a person who finds himself in difficulties through no fault of his own and who has to pay the penalty for the misdeeds of his forefathers? I say therefore that it has always been accepted by this Government that these people must be treated with circumspection.

I come now to the substantive arguments, aspects, and the first is this question of reclassification. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition who introduced this debate on behalf of the Opposition made a great issue of this. I just want to say in parenthesis that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition made a good speech from his point of view. If the Opposition had left the matter at his speech, they would have fared much better, and we could then have devoted all our time to his arguments. I want to quote what I said in my second reading speech about reclassification—

Those were my specific words. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition says, “That is not worth much; that is only your assurance as Minister; the Act provides differently The hon. members for Pinelands (Mr. Thompson) and Durban (North) (Mr. M. L. Mitchell) have even gone so far as to put forward an amendment to the effect that no re-classification should take place. Others have alleged that this is going to lead to a witch-hunt, and the hon. member for Houghton (Mrs. Suzman) has said that” all borderline cases can now be re-classified”. The hon. member for Zululand (Mr. Cadman) was also very perturbed and worried. The question is this: Have we asked ourselves how a re-classification can take place? There are two methods whereby people can be re-classified. The first is that in terms of Section 11 of the principal Act anybody can object to the classification of another person but only within 30 days after having become aware of such a classification. In terms of the amendment contained in Clause 3, an objection cannot be lodged after the expiry of this period, unless the Minister extends the period, which may then not exceed one year. If a person lodges an objection, he is required in terms of the regulations to deposit R20 and he even runs the risk of having to pay all the costs connected with such a re-classification—legal expenses, etc. What has happened with the implementation of Section 11 over the past 12 years? Not a single objection has come in from a single member of the public over the past 12 years. The hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Gorshel) has come along here with a touching story as to how a person can go and complain that his neighbour is not a White person if the neighbour looks a little dark to him, when in fact he has been sun-tanning perhaps. The hon. member says that he can do that if he wants to get rid of his neighbour. He almost shed tears in telling this touching story. But over the past 12 years not a single person has complained under the old definition against the classification of his neighbour or any other person. What is this terrible danger; where does the danger lie? If we are not in the habit of going out on a witch-hunt, if we are not in the habit of checking these borderline cases continually to see whether we cannot upset the classification of people, why should our citizens now suddenly undergo a change and go out on a witch-hunt? Will they do so as the result of the amendments made here? Will these amendments inspire them to do so, when they are not in the habit of doing so to-day? No, Mr. Speaker, hon. members are revealing a lack of knowledge here, even a lack of imagination; the cases mentioned by them as examples do not even show sufficient imagination. The hon. member for Hospital went so far as to mention an actress to put little life into his own stillborn case.

What is the second method of re-classification? The second method is that in terms of Section 5 (3) of the principal Act, the Secretary has the power to amend an incorrect classification at any time. In this connection I have given the assurance, and I do it on behalf of the Government—what more can I do—that it is by no means our intention that a re-classification campaign should be set in motion by my officials or anybody else as the result of these amendments.

Does that also apply to the Song case?

Yes, also for Mr. Song. I am sorry for the poor Mr. Song because he will be the only White Chinese in South Africa. I think one of these days he will ask to be re-classified into his correct race. However, hon. members apparently do not regard this as sufficient assurance. What does the hon. the Leader of the Opposition really want? He says he does not regard it as sufficient for me to give assurances. If that is the case why does he not give notice of an amendment? Why did he not ask me that when I reply to the debate I should give the assurance by way of a legal enactment that I will not instruct my officials to conduct that witch-hunt and to re-classify all those persons who have been classified on a certain basis? What does the United Party want? Don’t they want any re-classification, as the hon. member for Pinelands has said? Don’t they ever want re-classification?

You can do that under the Act.

Yes, that is all very well, but what does the hon. the Leader of the Opposition want? He cannot come here and shuffle from one foot to the other and not tell us what he wants. I want to say this: I will not be the Minister to say that this right should be taken away from the public and from the Secretary of the Department. Nor will I say that it should be limited. I have very strong reasons for saying that. The first reason is that it is surely necessary in the case of persons who themselves want to have their race re-classified? Or do you not want that poor chap who is registered as “mixed”, to whom the hon. member for Durban (Point) has referred, that person with White parents, to be re-classified? If it is really a genuine case do you not want him to come of his own accord and say: “When I applied for my birth certificate I discovered for the first time that I belonged to a mixed race”? Do you not want any person, like these 15 Coloureds, who have really also been held up to ridicule, but who are perturbed as a result of the wrong classification, to have the opportunity of having that classification changed? The hon. member for Durban (Point) said that they were probably all cases where love was involved. He was sure of that. He challenged me. I do not know where he traced those 15 cases. Those are his own ideas, but he preaches that as the Gospel. Let me say this that if we did not allow re-classification the United Party will be the ones to champion these “hard-luck” cases; they will tell us these “hard-luck” stories. It will always happen, for generations it will still have to happen that the case of the person who comes forward voluntarily and says: “I am not satisfied with my classification” will have to be dealt with. According to the Leader of the Opposition he should not have the right to have himself re-classified.

May I ask a question? I should like to have clarity. If there is re-classification for some reason or other in respect of an individual who was already classified before the introduction of this Bill, will he be re-classified under the new definition or under the old definition?

I said very clearly that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition did not want re-classification to take place.

That was not what I said.

Well, the hon. member for Pinelands said it and the hon. member for Durban (North) said it. They said they were against reclassification.

Which definition are you going to use?

The hon. Leader of the Opposition said “He wants no re-classification, and it is only your assurance…”.

I will give you the Hansard copy of my speech and you will see that was not what I said.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition has argued himself into a knot, he has talked himself into a corner, together with his two lieutenants who support him and who even went a little further than he did.

I go further: A limitation of this right to re-classify is the very thing which will give rise to the dangers and the problems which the Opposition envisage, namely, it will create additional colour barriers, with additional cases on both sides of the barrier, cases where objections are lodged. If the Opposition does not realize that I just wish to give them this assurance that I think it is extremely dangerous to give examples, and I do not wish to do so, but I do wish to say that if that person to whom the hon. member for Durban (Point) has referred should not have the opportunity of being re-classified, he will be branded for the rest of his life as belonging to a mixed race; and he will remain that and his descendants will all have to be registered as mixed. Yet hon. members opposite are the very people who plead that we should be more flexible. They are very concerned about those people who will not be classified as Whites and who will remain Coloureds. It now appears that the sympathy comes from another quarter. We are the people who are concerned about those “hard-luck” cases, about those borderline cases, about those people who experience difficulty and we have included the principle of acceptance.

May I ask a question? Does the hon. the Minister not admit that there is a difference between re-classification by the State, where the Government takes the initiative, and re-classification on appeal by a person who objects to the classification of the State?

What applies to the one applies to the other. If the Department of the Interior has to deal with a real problem case which it cannot reclassify because it has made a mistake, what then? If hon. members only knew how many clerical errors slip in in such cases! How must they classify a person on the information they have before them? After a person has been notified of his classification, he does not immediately run to the Appeal Board and lodge an appeal if a mistake was made in his case. The first thing he does is to write to the Department and to say to them: “A mistake has been made; you have classified me as being of this colour or that colour and I am not of that colour.”In that case the Department goes through the documents and they may find that a mistake was made and then they re-classify that person. Does the hon. member for Houghton want the position to be that the person must first go to the Appeal Board and ask them? My Department is not “snooping around”. The officials do not go snooping around in order to see where they can remove somebody. That is not what is happening. As far as Clause 4 is concerned, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition made the following charge: He said we were introducing an amendment empowering the Secretary of the Interior to authorize somebody to investigate certain cases. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition was very concerned about this and said, “This is snooping about in other people’s private affairs”. The hon. member for Pine-lands even asked whether I would not perhaps appoint private detectives to obtain the information for me in regard to these cases, so that they may be investigated. How can this thing be so exaggerated in the face of the existing facts! With what object is it done, if one reads Section 12 of the present Act together with what is being added now? If one does so, it is simply inconceivable that people can say anything like that. The present Section 12 reads—

He can do that now. But now the difficulty is, and that was the difficulty also in the Song case, and that is why I said unhesitatingly that the Appeal Board could give no other decision, because when he came along with all his proof of acceptance, all his sworn statements, the Secretary for the Interior did not have the right to make any further investigation. As I have said, that was the difficulty. The Secretary just could not do so; he was bound. All we are doing now is to insert the provision that the Secretary can do so. Now I want to put this question: If now already there is all this suspicion, then I am quite prepared for the Opposition—and I shall also do so myself—to move in the Committee Stage that the people who may be employed by the Secretary for the Interior should only be officials of the Department. I am quite prepared to do that, to allay the suspicion of the Opposition. Because it is not the intention here to institute a witch-hunt. The object is to give the true facts to the body which has to decide, because to-day the Secretary for the Interior does not have the right to obtain the true facts. Why also look for hidden motives unless one has something to hide? Why all this suspicion, and why not accept a record of 12 years during which people were decently treated, and people did not go about all day poking their noses into things? Now it will be said that there were cases where these people had to appear before officials in order that the officials could see what they looked like. I think it was the hon. member for Durban (North) who mentioned the pathetic case here of people who had to put in an appearance merely in order that the officials could see what they looked like. What is wrong with that? What is wrong with it, because the principle of acceptance is based primarily on what the man looks like. How does an hon. member accept someone to whom he gives a sworn statement? Does he accept it because the man says he is White, or does he accept it after having seen him? In any case it is no use arguing in this way with adults. I am now prepared to do what I said, namely to insert that provision in Clause 4. But I am not prepared to do anything else to take away this power granted to the Department, because I say unequivocally that it is not being inserted with the object of having a witchhunt, or to persecute these people. It is not the intention now to make investigations in regard to people who have already been classified in order to see whether we cannot re-classify these people under the new Act. Re-classification will remain based on those two principles of Section 11 and Section 5 of the Act, viz. that the person himself asks for it, and that the Department itself can make a reclassification in case it becomes necessary to do so because a bona fide mistake was made.

This reclassification must be linked to the provision in regard to descent in Clause 2. I again start with the end of that clause. This provision is intended to prevent a person, from ignorance or for other reasons, admitting that he is a Native or a Coloured, thereby causing distress to innocent persons and relatives, from pure selfishness. As the amendments read, that is the only case where the Department will investigate descent. Then I come to hon. members like the hon. member for Jeppes (Dr. Cronje), who spoke about the question of descent. The second object is to grant this power to investigate in order to prove the correctness or otherwise of evidence of acceptance. Surely one can only do that after having investigated the matter. At present, because there is no power to institute such investigations, one is unable to obtain counterproof that people have not spoken the truth. It was as the result of these defects that we landed in difficulties.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I come to the very important point around which all the Opposition arguments turned right throughout the debate, viz. that borderline cases, on the borderline between White and Coloured, may be deleteriously affected by the proposed amendment. I immediately say that is not so. If this proposed amendment has any effect at all on these borderline cases, it will rather be to improve their chances of being classified as White. I am going to prove that. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition should not shake his head. The words “but not also someone who admits that by descent he is a Native or a Coloured person, unless it is proved that the admission is based on facts” (that is the portion I am going to insert) cannot if the court decision of the past is taken into consideration, be interpreted other than as follows. The element of descent which is being introduced does not mean that persons who have a slight admixture of Coloured blood in their veins are non-Whites.

Where does the Act say that?

Just wait a moment. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition is a lawyer, and he allowed all his advocates to talk, and they all quoted to us from books. Although I am only a stupid fellow, I can also read these books. The peculiar thing is that they quote cases decided before this particular one, and again cases decided later, but they do not quote the correct one. I have here “Decisions of the Supreme Court of South Africa, 1950 (4), Oct.-Dec. South African Law Reports”. I refer to the case of Rex v. Gill. The Judge who presided in this case was none other than Judge Fagan as he then was. But the case of Rex v. Gill was not quoted by hon. members opposite. In his judgment on page 205 Judge Fagan, inter alia, said the following. I may just say that Judges Newton-Thompson and Searle sat on the Bench with him. In his judgment the Judge said the following—

The report then continues on page 206—

Now Judge Fagan continues and says the following in his judgment—

Hon. members opposite wanted to know from me what percentage of blood is allowed—one-eighth, one-quarter, one-sixteenth, or onethirty-second—when is someone a Coloured? We have repeatedly stated that two very important yardsticks are used. The first is appearance—and they cannot be separated—what does the person look like? What is your first impression? Surely one will not judge a person if one does not immediately gain the impression that this one is White and that one looks like a Coloured and another looks like an Indian. After having looked to see what he looks like, the second test one applies is: In what circles does the man move; who are his friends, in what society does he move, where does he attend church, where does he live and where do his children attend school? Then one perhaps accepts him and says: This man looks like a White man and he is accepted by the Whites. That is precisely what this judgment says. We are not out on a witch-hunt here to ascertain what percentage of strange blood flows in anybody’s veins. We are not out on a witchhunt to ensure that a person with a certain percentage of Coloured blood in his veins will never be classified as a White person. We are dealing here with what a person looks like, something which this judgment of Judge Fagan states very clearly, and how he is accepted. For this statement hon. members need not accept my word alone, they need not accept the word of the Government alone, but they have the administration of justice in the courts of the Republic as an unassailable guarantee.

You did not understand the Judge.

Now I want to know, Mr. Speaker, what greater assurance can be given in regard to this matter? In order to obtain some possible political advantage, attempts have been made to cause uncertainty on the part of these people, and also on the part of other members of the White group. That has been exploited here. We have had a clumsy and unscientific approach here, and in regard to this matter attempts have been made to bring this Bill and the original Act into disfavour with the public once more. Strenuous attempts were made to do so and to sow uncertainty and confusion. The addition of these words which I will insert in the Committee Stage, “unless the contrary is proved”, are in fact a further guarantee which will ensure, Sir, that anyone—I hope the hon. the Leader of the Opposition is listening now—who has a slight admixture of Coloured blood, or no such blood, will not be able to harm himself and others by making such an admission.

Where is that contained in the Act?

But of course it is contained in the Act. He can admit only one thing, namely: I am a Native or a Coloured. That is all he can admit.

When is that regarded as a fact?

Supposing a man knows that there is a little Coloured blood in his veins derived from his antecedents three or four generations ago. Now he is faced with the question of an admission. Somebody asked now he must make the admission. Supposing it is extracted from him by one of the so-called unwise officials. The question is put to him: But is there no Coloured blood in your family? Now he makes an admission. Or somebody else, his neighbour—that neighbour of whom the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Gorshel) is so afraid—comes to discuss the matter with him and he admits that in the third or fourth generation before him there was a little Coloured blood, that his great-grandmother was a half-breed, as somebody put it here. Supposing he admits it. Now we want to prove the contrary because by this admission of his this man may perhaps cause great misery. He makes the admission through ignorance, perhaps, or for selfish reasons. That is what this Mrs. Singh may perhaps try to do. She may say that she admits that she is an Indian—for selfish reasons—without considering what she is doing to her brothers and sisters and the rest of her family. Then we ask that we should be able to prove the contrary and prove that these people are telling lies. What is wrong with that? We are not going to ask these people to make an admission. The man voluntarily makes the admission and says: I am a Coloured person or a Native, for whatever reason; perhaps for reasons of his own, or because at the back of his mind he is afraid, because he knows that there is a little dark blood in his veins. He will not say that he is pure White. The hon. member for Durban (Central) (Dr. Radford) says we all have a little foreign blood in our veins. He is going very far. He is very sceptical about any of us having pure blood. I cannot understand why the hon. the Leader of the Opposition cannot grasp the position. I cannot understand his failing to realize that in fact this affords protection for the very people whom he wants to protect. But he wants to protect them without this protective measure. I cannot say more than this. What is meant by a slight admixture of blood is also clear from the decisions quoted, and it is determined by the factors I have mentioned.

Mr. Speaker, I now want to come to this important Clause 2 and briefly state my standpoint. This was the most contentious clause. It was alleged that this Act was introduced in 1950 with the clear understanding that acceptance would be the decisive determining factor. I definitely want to deny that. My colleague, the Minister of Finance, introduced the original Act. I do not know how many hon. members opposite have read General Smuts’ speech, and also the speeches he made in the Committee Stage. I am not going to take up the time of the House by quoting from his speeches, but if hon. members read them they will see very clearly that he repeatedly said that appearance and acceptance have equal weight and that one cannot apply the one without the other. One cannot accept a person if he does not look White. That is a very important factor. The hon. member for Ceres (Mr. Muller) especially referred to it. Appearance takes such an important place in this legislation that Section 19 (1) provides that a person who in appearance is obviously White will, when this Act is applied, be presumed to be White until the contrary is proved. Here appearance is accentuated, but hon. members opposite aver that it did not count; only acceptance counted! Because the new definition now also refers to appearance, we have this furore. If someone alleges that he is White, but he associates with Coloureds and passes for a Coloured, they will look to see whether he is a White person, and even though he looks like a White he will still not be classified as such. What hon. members have missed in this whole amending Bill is this: What happens in fact is that the emphasis has gradually in these 12 years been shifted to acceptance. That has happened; I admit it. Appearance has become a less important factor in determing race classification. But not a single one of us objects to the principle of acceptance. But divorced from appearance, we land in the maze, as we had in the Song case. Now we do not divorce it, oh no. In terms of the new definition, the judgment of society is not thrown overboard. That has not been proved in any of the speeches we have heard. I listened attentively to find proof that we are abandoning the judgment of society. But the Song case has proved that the judgment of society is not always interpreted correctly, because the tendency has been to attach less weight to appearance than to acceptance. This approach works quite smoothly in the majority of cases, but from the Song case it became clear that appearance and acceptance must be taken together because appearance is the primary basis on which society puts a person’s acceptance. One first sees what a person looks like before one accepts him. That is quite a human, natural and psychological action. Surely one will not accept a person on the face of it and say his case appears quite in order. But in addition, this new definition will prevent unscrupulous groups of persons giving an artificial judgment for their own purposes, a judgment which is not supported by society. That is important. That has become more necessary if one notes the views of the Opposition in regard to the classification of a Chinese as a White person. They ridiculed it. They said it was just one single case. They asked whether we were passing an Act for one Chinese; there are other ways of dealing with it. However, it showed conclusively that the loophole in the existing legislation had to be closed and that it was absolutely essential to consider both appearance and acceptance when classifying Whites as well as Coloured persons.

Summarizing everything, Sir, I want to say that the object of this definition is to determine the exact judgment of society and to interpret it, and to prevent the judgment of society being contravened by small groups or individuals for their own purposes. For those reasons this amending measure has become necessary.

The Opposition has tried its best to show that these borderline cases are not treated justly. Twelve years ago they also shed tears about all these innocent people and the children who would suffer. For years they were responsible for the indescribable misery and sorrow of those people. They were responsible for that. They allowed the thing to continue. They allowed mixed marriages to continue. They allowed these mixed races to continue. They allowed the fear to increase in the mind of the fair-skinned child born from those people. That child became afraid and thought: What about my future? I look like a White person, but I associate with Coloureds; what must I do and what is going to happen to me?

A very important matter referred to here and in regard to which I was challenged was the question of the Japanese, the Chinese, and the other people of dark complexion. I was asked what would happen to them. In this debate the Opposition could not resist the temptation to follow in the footsteps of the anti-Government Press which ridiculed the Government for having allegedly declared the Japanese White. The hon. members for Durban (North) (Mr. M. L. Mitchell), Durban (Point) (Mr. Raw), Zululand (Mr. Cadman), Orange Grove (Mr. E. G. Malan) rejoiced in ridiculing and almost jeering at the Government for having done this. In spite of the clearest statements already made by the Government in regard to these misrepresentations, they continued to do so. Conclusions in respect of the Chinese, Coloureds and other non-Whites and other dark-skinned people from Southern Europe, Cuba, and other parts of South America were dragged into this debate and the question was asked as to what we were going to do about them. The object was to put all those groups up in arms against the Government—that was the clear object, and even to strengthen the Opposition to us overseas. The Opposition was not in the least concerned with the consequences of their actions. On the one hand they get up here and piously preach that we should tie bonds of friendship with the non-White states of Africa and Asia, but in the same breath they destroy the positive action of the Government in negotiating trade relations with Japan. They do so deliberately. On the one hand they plead that we should have good relations, and if there are good trade relations which are of advantage even to them, they ridicule the Japanese and say, “It is pig-iron and not pigment” which counts, and they do not care if those trade relations are disrupted. Then they continuously emphasize the discrimination in favour of the Japanese, in an attempt to make all the other non-Whites feel hurt, particularly the Chinese, with the object of destroying good relations. Once again I want to condemn in the strongest words possible these tactics of the Opposition of arousing enmity towards South Africa. Just in order to come into power they do not mind what they do and what harm they do to South Africa. This method of attack is only intended to undermine our traditional policy of separation. The Opposition no longer sees a chance of obtaining the support of the electorate by means of a policy of integration, and now they resort to this subtle propaganda in order gradually to condition the public to accepting integration in all kinds of spheres as being nothing extraordinary; it is just a bit of “small apartheid” which we might as well abandon. It is one of these pin-pricks, these little things which we need not do. All the prophets of doom have again got up here and spoken about the harm it will do us overseas because we have introduced this amending Bill. Now the Opposition Press in recent times has particularly concentrated on this form of integration and it deals with these minor matters, in the sphere of entertainment and sport. It all seems so insignificant and innocent, and it seems so unsporting of this Minister not to be a little conciliatory. They refer to the Olympic Games and then again to a stage artiste, and we must be conciliatory and allow these people to enter, because it cannot do much harm. The Opposition Press concentrates on this sort of thing. Here the Opposition has an opportunity, and they have used this debate to do so, and it will continue, under the guise of a flexible application of apartheid, to try to attain what they could not attain by means of exerting pressure in the economic sphere. As examples of how they want to enforce integration, we have what they say about stage performers having to play to mixed audiences, and mixed sport.

I now want to put the position beyond all doubt on behalf of the Government and with your leave, Mr. Speaker, because it quite fits in with this debate in which the Japanese were mentioned, and I want to make a statement in regard to the matter so that the whole country will now once and for all know what the attitude of the Government is in regard to this race classification, and in order that this statement may in future be referred to without unnecessarily wasting the time of the House. The statement reads as follows—

I just wanted to make this statement, and with reference to the debate which has taken place here, in regard to all the other nationalities and groups, the Government will, when the opportunity offers, and if it should become necessary, and if it considers it to be in the best interests of South Africa, judge every case. The means are available to us. The possibilities are there, and I now really want to make an appeal that we should stop saying all the ridiculous things we have heard here.

Question put: That the word “now” proposed to be omitted, stand part of the motion,

Upon which the House divided:

AYES—96: Badenhorst, F. H.; Bekker, G. F. H.; Bekker, H. T. van G.; Bekker, M. J. H.; Bezuidenhout, G. P. C.; Bootha, L. J. C.; Botha, H. J.; Botha, M. C.; Botha, P. W.; Cloete, J. H.; Coertze, L. I.; Coetzee, B.; Coetzee, P. J.; Cruywagen, W. A.; De Villiers, J. D.; De Wet, C.; Diederichs, N.; Dönges, T. E.; Du Plessis, H. R. H.; Fouché, J. J. (Sr.); Frank, S.; Froneman, G. F. van L.; Greyling, J. C.; Grobler, M. S. F.; Haak, J. F. W.; Hertzog, A.; Heystek, J.; Hiemstra, E. C.A.; Jonker, A. H.; Jurgens, J. C.; Keyter, H. C. A.; Knobel, G. J.; Kotzé, G. P.; Kotzé, S. F.; Labuschagne, J. S.; Le Roux, P. M. K.; Loots, J. J.; Louw, E. H.; Luttig, H. G.; Malan, A. I.; Malan, W. C.; Marais, J. A.; Marais, P. S.; Maree, G. de K.; Maree, W. A.; Martins, H. E.; Meyer, T.; Mostert, D. J. J.; Mulder, C. P.; Muller, S. L.; Nel, J. A. F.; Nel, M. D. C. de W.; Niemand, F. J.; Otto, J. C.; Pelser, P. C.; Potgieter, J. E.; Rall, J. J.; Sadie, N. C. van R.; Sauer, P. O.; Schlebusch, J. A.; Schoeman, B. J.; Serfontein, J. J.; Smit, H. H.; Stander, A. H.; Steyn, F. S.; Steyn, J. H.; Treurnicht, N. F.; Van den Berg, G. P.; Van den Berg, M. J.; Van den Heever, D. J. G.; Van der Ahee, H. H.; Van der Merwe, P. S.; Van der Spuy, J. P.; Van der Walt, B. J.; Van der Wath, J. G. H.; Van Eeden, F. J.; Van Niekerk, G. L. H.; Van Nierkerk, M. C.; Van Nierop, P. J.; Van Rensburg, M. C. G. J.; Van Staden, J. W.; Van Wyk, G. H.; Van Wyk, H. J.; Van Zyl, J. J. B.; Venter, M. J. de la R.; Venter, W. L. D. M.; Verwoerd, H. F.; Viljoen, M.; Visse, J. H.; Von Moltke, J. von S.; Vorster, B. J.; Vosloo, A. H.; Wesbter, A.; Wentzel, J. J.

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

NOES—49: Barnett, C.; Basson, J. A. L.; Basson, J. D. du P.; Bloomberg, A.; Bowker, T. B.; Cadman, R. M.; Connan J. M.; Cronje, F. J. C.; De Kock, H. C.; Dodds, P. R.; Durrant, R. B.; Emdin, S.; Field, A. N.; Fisher, E. L.; Gay, L. C.; Gorshel, A.; Graaff, de V.; Hickman, T.; Higgerty, J. W.; Holland, M. W.; Hourquebie, R. G. L.; Hughes, T. G.; Lewis, H.; Malan, E. G.; Mitchell, D. E.; Mitchell, M. L.; Moolman, J. H.; Moore, P. A.; Odell, H. G. O.; Oldfield, G. N.; Plewman, R. P.; Radford, A.; Raw, W. V.; Ross, D. G.; Russell, J. H.; Steenkamp, L. S.; Streicher, D. M.; Suzman, H.; Swart, H. G.; Taurog, L. B.; Thompson, J. O. N.; Timoney, H. M.; Van Niekerk, S. M.; Warren, C. M.; Waterson, S. F.; Weiss, U. M.; Wood, L. F.

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

Question affirmed and the amendment dropped.

Motion accordingly agreed to and Bill read a Second Time.

During the course of the hon. the Minister’s speech you indicated to me that if I wished to take any action I should do so after the conclusion of the debate. If you would permit me to explain, Sir, I would like time to consider the form of the amendment and I understand the rules permit me to give notice to-morrow.

The House adjourned at 5.55 p.m.