I move—

I second.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. the Minister has moved this motion and one would have expected an intimation as to the legislation that the Government intends to pass during the remainder of this Session, a final intimation as to the legislative programme. Therefore I must protest against morning sittings starting at this time of the Session. Earlier this Session there has been a protest of the manner of the introduction of legislation and certain deficiencies, if I may put it that way, were pointed out. That was on 22 and the arrangement of business for the House February. It will be recollected that we started the evening sittings later than normal due to the non-availability of work at the time. The legislation brought forward to a very large extent at the beginning of the Session was not of a particularly contentious nature and the Order Paper was not built up sufficiently to occupy the House in the evenings. So it was not until the 29th sitting day that regular evening sittings started. Then there is a somewhat minor point: It was not until the 71st sitting day that the Tuesday evening was taken away. That is not a particularly important point. It is possible that we did so earlier in previous years to the extent of probably two Tuesdays evenings. It is normal at this time of the Session to take morning sittings, but I contend that the hon. the Minister in his motion is proposing that we take them too early. I can’t see in view of the programme before us that Parliament can finish within the next three weeks or before the end of the month, and to my mind that is asking rather a lot of the House to sit morning, noon and night during that period, particularly when there has been the opportunity of dealing with legislation earlier had legislation been on the Order Paper. And, Mr. Speaker, I must point out that it is becoming quite a problem. I do not deny that it has also been the problem with every government in the past, but I must say that it seems to be a practice, willy-nilly of this Government that contentious and difficult legislation tends to be left over until the end of the Session, the days when we have to sit morning, noon and night. We then have to deal with the most contentious legislation, whereas if it were brought forward earlier it would facilitate the work of Parliament considerably. I would give one instance of a Bill that is on the Order Paper at the present moment—I am not going to discuss the Bill, but simply the machanics of placing it before the House. The hon. the Minister of Justice gave notice to the country as far back as I think December or November, of the General Law Amendment Bill. To process that Bill—that is the drafting of the Bill, the meetings of the Cabinet, the drafting of the Bill by the Department, the sending of it to the law-advisers to knock it into shape—took up to the middle of May and then only did it appear in this House, and then Parliament had to deal with it a week or ten days later, after that long time had been given for consideration of the Bill by the Department. To show the nature of the rush that takes place, Mr. Speaker, the hon. the Minister is in the position of only being able to place members in possession of the amendments that he is going to move to this Bill to-day on the Order Paper, the same day when we are going to consider it in Committee. The Opposition finds itself in the same difficulty with Bills. Because of the arrangement of the work, you have to go on with the matters before you and you have not had time to get the amendments on the Order Paper. It has happened during this Session that when dealing with Bills, we gave the hon. the Minister typed copies of amendments when moving them in the House, a most unsatisfactory way. I think that will be admitted by everybody. I am not trying to make a political point of these things. I am mentioning this in the general interest of the House. Because this machine ultimately does not work, unless we take care of these things, it breaks down. I do not think there is anyone sitting here who desires this machine to break down. From what I hear from my colleagues on the other side of the House they don’t desire that to happen. Therefore, if that is not to happen, we have to find some remedy for the situation we find ourselves in. There is another Bill on to-day’s Order Paper, the Pneumoconiosis Compensation Bill. That Bill is a Bill of 136 clauses and within a day or two of it appearing in print, the House was asked to consider the second reading of the Bill. For two good reasons. Firstly, the hon. the Minister is going away on public business and the Opposition agreed to facilitate its passage. I do not deny that. There was an agreement that we should try and facilitate the passage of that Bill, which is being done. But, Mr. Speaker, a Bill of that nature should have appeared much earlier. Everybody in this House wants the Bill. There is nobody opposed to the principle of the Bill, it is a highly technical subject and many members who have a knowledge of the subject were desirous to discuss the contents of the Bill. When we came to the Committee Stage there was little or no time for discussion. The Minister was even forced into the position of saying when amendments were put before the House: “I can’t accept the amendment, but I will consider it in later legislation”. Why? Because he could not get the Bill reprinted in time before he goes away. No fault of his! We agreed to facilitate his departure so that he can attend to this public business, but it is quite wrong that we should have this sort of situation in the House in respect of important matters of that nature.

The other question that arises—and it has been said repeatedly, and I hope the hon. the Prime Minister will take note of this—is that you cannot get Bills before the House or for publication because of the difficulty of the law-advisers. If there is a difficulty there it is high time that steps were taken to remedy that situation. If more law-advisers are needed, they must be found. I agree that they don’t grow like berries on a tree; they are specialists and are hard to come by, but this situation has now been going on for some time and steps should be taken to train those people to be available in sufficient numbers for the job in hand, to prepare the Bills and make them available to this House in time. Because by doing this sort of thing, and having morning sittings as we are going to have now, we tend to make a farce of Parliament. It becomes to be legislation by mere exhaustion.

I think that is bad. I would appeal to the hon. the Leader of the House to use his best efforts to remedy this situation. I believe he has proposed morning sittings far too early in this motion of his. I wonder how Hansard is going to stand up to this, because normally we have had 11 or 12 morning sittings on an average, for several years past, and in the nature of things Hansard can hardly cope with that. There are too few people, if one may say so, doing far too much, as I understand the situation to-day. Another matter that needs vital and urgent attention, is the recruitment and training of further people, and I would ask the hon. the Leader of the House to go into that matter and see to it that it is brought before the appropriate Committee. I would ask him too to go into this matter of the preparation of Bills and to consider whether they cannot be published during the recess so that a full programme is ready at the meeting of the House at the beginning of next session. I think it would be the wish of all members of Parliament that that should be done. It would certainly make for better legislation. I believe that many of the amending Bills that come to this House are due to the rush and the manner in which legislation is put through this House on occasions, because there has not been an opportunity of outside interested people to express their opinion on the Bill. This very Bill that I instanced, the Pneumoconiosis Compensation Bill, which quite rightly, I think, the Minister recommended to the House as an agreed Bill, is a Bill in respect of which when the hon. the Minister was giving his second reading reply to the debate, we were receiving communications from some of the unions and other interested parties to the effect that they had not yet seen a copy of the Bill. Sir, to me that is farcical that that should happen, that we should have to deal with legislation in that manner. Therefore I make this earnest appeal to the hon. the Prime Minister and the Leader of the House to take steps to endeavour to remedy this situation in the interests of Parliament, and in the hope that next session we will not have such a situation as we are having here at the end of this Session.

I would ask the hon. the Leader of the House whether it is still the intention to come before the end of this Session with a Bill to amend the Shops and Ordinance Act. I may remind the hon. the Leader that at the beginning of the Session there was a private motion asking for certain advantages to be given to the white-collar workers. In his reply the hon. Deputy Minister of Economic Affairs indicated that a Bill would be introduced this Session, amongst other things to make compulsory leave applicable to this type of worker. May I know whether that promise will still be kept this Session. I understand that the Bill has been published in the Gazette for some time.

As regards the last question, I may say that this Bill was published in the Government Gazette and comment was requested on it. It will not be introduced during this Session.

That is plenty of time for comment.

It seems to me there already is a difference of opinion inside the United Party. One hon. member complains that we are going too fast and the other complains that we are not going fast enough.

The hon. member for Von Brandis (Mr. Higgerty) has raised a number of points here to have the business of the House disposed of in a better and more satisfactory manner. He said at the outset, which is quite true, that the things he complained about were not new things; they have always been there. Both he and we are interested in having the business of Parliament disposed of in a more satisfactory manner, and he now makes certain suggestions. To show that that has always been so, I can recall, for instance, that 15 or 20 years ago the complaint was that Bills were rushed through and that then they had to be amended the following year. I still recall that the then Minister of Labour introduced an amending Bill during the second half of the Session to amend an Act that had been passed at the commencement of the Session. I am not blaming him, but these things do happen and have always happened. If we can bring about improvements, we shall certainly do so. As the hon. member himself has said, one of our difficulties is to get Parliament going at the commencement. Parliament is like a great vessel; it begins rather slowly, but once you have it going full-steam, it is difficult to bring it to a halt. I realize, and the Prime Minister realizes, that we should try to introduce important legislation that will evoke discussion at the beginning of the session. The hon. the Prime Minister has now given all the Departments notice that the deadline for legislation to be brought into readiness will be advanced by two months, with a view to the very problem which the hon. member has raised here. We hope—and all other Governments have tried—that if the period within which Departments have to prepare their legislation is accelerated it will contribute to an improvement of the position.

I do not want the speech of the hon. member for Von Brandis to create the impression that there has not been a very good relationship between the two parties in regard to the business of Parliament. I think this side of the House has gone out of its way time and again to meet objections from that side of the House, or to assist them in drawing up the Order Paper in such a way that matters, in which they are interested and for which they are unable to have speakers here on a certain date, can be postponed to a date that will be suitable for them. There has been a very good relationship and we have met them on many occasions. I think that the relationship between the two parties, as regards the business of Parliament, has been better this year than it has been for a number of years.

What about our little group over here?

Then the hon. member asked why we were starting with morning sittings so early. He said it was too early and that the staff would not be able to cope with the work. Those were his two main arguments. Now, Mr. Speaker, why do we start to sit in the morning? The main reason is that the work of the Select Committees have been disposed of or nearly disposed of. We would have started morning sittings much earlier had it not been for the fact that members were engaged in the morning with work on Select Committees. The time to start sitting in the morning is when the work of the Select Committees has been disposed of. The second reason is that we do so at a time when the staff will be able to cope with the work. He expressed his doubts as to whether the staff would be able to cope with the work once we start morning sittings. I have discussed that question with the staff, and I have been given the assurance that there will be no difficulty for the staff to cope if we start morning sittings on Monday. So these two reasons as to why we cannot start morning sittings both fall away. The last thing is the legislative programme. Some time ago I announced what legislation would still be introduced during this Session. We are adhering to that. As regards this Order Paper, we shall take all the Orders, with one exception. The only one we shall not take this year, is No. 11, the Publications and Amusements Bill. That is a very contentious piece of legislation. The hon. member for Von Brandis wants us to introduce contentious legislation early in the session, and I want to assure him that this piece of contentious legislation will be introduced during the first week of the next ensuing session. The complaint that he had to-day will then disappear to a large extent. For the rest we shall take everything that appears on the Order Paper to-day.

Will a Bill to amend the Liquor Act still be introduced?

Yes, on Monday.

And what becomes then of what the Minister of Lands has just said?

No, no, some time ago I announced what legislation would still be introduced. I said that all the measures appearing on the Order Paper except one would be taken. The others that I announced earlier will still come. The list of that has been published in Hansard and I have also given it to the Chief Whip of the Party opposite. No measure that does not appear on that list will be introduced, and all except one of those on the Order Paper will be disposed of.

I move—

The contents of this Bill now make provision amongst others for the following main points: Firstly, there will be three stages of pneumoconiosis instead of, as we now have, four stages. This is a most important provision and it is something which this side of the House has asked for, for a number of years. We hope that this provision will make it possible for more miners who previously entered the fourth stage too late in life, to derive the benefits which were previously paid in the third stage. The disability of the miner due to pneumoconiosis will now be measured scientifically, by taking into primary consideration the cardio-respiratory function. This has been a great step forward and I feel that the mine-worker is going to be more than satisfied with this provision. It will make sure that he is correctly diagnosed and that his disability is correctly assessed. After he has been examined and it has been found that the miner is suffering from one or other stages of pneumoconiosis he will be placed in one of the three categories and will receive compensation, according to this Bill, in relation to his state of disability caused by pneumoconiosis. The compensation further varies according to the size of his dependant family. Provision is made as previously but on a slightly higher scale for the wife and children who are dependent on the miner to receive varying sums of compensation depending on the stage of disability suffered by the mineworker. This question of the size of the family is very important. There is one point which I hope the hon. the Minister will take into consideration because as I see it, the Bill is not perfectly clear on it. I should like to ask him this question: Does the Bill make provision for children who become disabled after the miner has become dependent on the pneumoconiosis grant? Will those children receive compensation irrespective of their age? In other words, we might find that due to such an illness as poliomyelitis the child may become permanently disabled. The child may be unable to make a living and that attack of poliomyelitis may come on after the mineworker has been awarded his final stage of compensation. In such a case will that child receive compensation and will he be recognized as a permanent dependant of the mineworker?

The amounts which are given to the mineworker according to the Bill are such that they may prove inadequate. I do not want to deal with these provisions in detail because I am not sure whether you, Mr. Speaker, will allow me to do so. But I do say that we on this side of the House feel that the provision which is made for the final stage to be plus 75 per cent of pneumoconiosis disability is far too high. We on this side of the House say to the Minister that that provision must be altered as soon as possible and brought down to 65 per cent. I feel that the number of people who are going to be affected by the present provision in the Bill are going to be so small as to make the increase virtually worthless to those people whom we had hoped to bring into the present fourth stage of pneumoconiosis. We were hoping that by bringing the three stage scheme into operation the Minister would provide for more people …

Order! I have allowed the hon. member to make his point; he must not enlarge on it.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Another provision which is most important is the fact that in future all Bantu who work on the mines either underground or on the surface will be medically examined. I think that is very important. Firstly it will make sure, I hope, that no case of pneumoconiosis amongst the Bantu will be missed either in workers on the surface or underground. And secondly is will be possible to deal quickly with the Bantu who are discovered to be suffering from fibrosis of the lungs so as to prevent tuberculosis also infecting the lungs. I feel sure that this provision will serve the purpose of stopping the spread of tuberculosis and at the same time reducing the numbers of Bantu who are getting tuberculosis on the mines and taking it back to the reserves.

The Minister has given us the assurance during the discussion of this Bill that the Director will be a medical man. We on this side of the House are insisting on that. The Minister said that he would look into the matter and I hope that as soon as possible he will amend the necessary Clause in such a way that it will provide for the director to be a medical man.

The next change which is being brought about in this Bill is the re-introduction of some form of appeal. In this case, Sir, it is a reviewing committee which consists of people who examine the mine worker plus the people who certify him. If it becomes necessary these two bodies will sit together and review the case if there is a dispute and settle definitely whether or not the mine worker is suffering from any stage of pneumoconiosis. This is a very, very important step which the Minister has taken and we on this side of the House welcome it.

Mr.Speaker, we welcome these new provisions in the Bill. We hope it is going to be what the Minister has said, namely a Bill which will be flexible and which will be possible to alter whenever it is found necessary to do so. The Minister must realize that the criticisms which have been offered from this side of the House primarily come from those people who have had some experience in dealing with the mine worker. We hope that if in due course it becomes necessary to alter this flexible Bill the Minister will have no hesitation in bringing it back to this House in order to effect the amendments which we have suggested. It is a step along the road of improving the position of the mine workers but it is far from a perfect Bill. I want to say this, that although this appears to be the road along which we will give to the mineworker some of those things which he desires, it is not as yet a road paved with gold.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to welcome, on behalf of this side of the House and on behalf of the miners, the new principles in this Bill and to put forward one request to the hon. the Minister when this Bill comes into operation. What we welcome in the first place is the new method of diagnosis, namely that it will now be done in a scientific manner; it is clear that the cardio-respiratory function is now going to be the decisive factor; that it will be tested in a very scientific manner, and we think that it will generally bring about a very great improvement. That is why we welcome it. The second principle I wish to welcome on behalf of the miners is the provision in the Bill that there will now be a pension from the very first stage of pneumoconiosis. The lump sum is being replaced by a pension to which the mine worker will be entitled, and later on his wife and children too. That is a second thing we want to welcome very heartily. The third thing we wish to welcome, in the question of the Revision Board, so that there will be a right of appeal if a person is not satisfied with the findings. We think that is really a great improvement upon the old Act. Those are the three matters in respect of which I wish to thank the Minister on behalf of the mine workers and on behalf of this side of the House.

Then I should like to put another request to him, and that is that after this legislation has been in operation for a year, and we are able to judge how many people are being certified on the new basis in comparison with the number of people certified according to the old basis, the Minister will reconsider the whole question if the comparison is not a favourable one.

Mr. Speaker, I should like to express my sincere thanks to the hon. member for Randfontein (Dr. Mulder) and the hon. member for Rosettenville (Dr. Fisher) and also to hon. members of the House for the support they have given the great principle of this Bill, and for the manner in which they have assisted us to reach this stage. I should like to give hon. members the assurance that I shall watch the operation of the Bill, once it has become law, very closely and if any amendment is necessary, I shall be the first to come along with that amendment.

I just want to say to the hon. member for Rosettenville (Dr. Fisher) that I have promised to go into the whole question of the director. There are very strong arguments in favour of it that the director should be a medical man. Successive Ministers of Mines in the past, since the very start of this law, have always refused to have this clause amended. They have always wanted to retain a discretionary power. I will go into this matter very carefully and if necessary I will bring about the necessary amending legislation. I have already told hon. members of the House in the Committee Stage that I could not accept the amendment to change the fourth stage from 75 per cent to a 65 per cent minimum. The reasons are quite clear, namely that we do not know what the financial implications will be. We know that under the present formula miners will arrive about 10 per cent earlier in the next stage and we do not want to bring about a change which may lead to unemployment amongst miners.

I want to reply briefly to the question raised by the hon. member in regard to the child of a miner becoming disabled. The reply is contained in Clause 72 (5) of the Bill which amounts to this that a miner may be paid a pension in respect of a child who has reached the age of 18 years and who, due to permanent ill-health or physical or mental disability, is unable to earn a living, only if such ill-health or disability was present when the miner became entitled to a pension in respect of himself. Subsequent ill-health or disability of a child does not entitle the miner to a pension. This has been the position since the Act of 1946 and the Act of 1956. The idea is that children who become disabled after the miner has been awarded a pension will be taken care of by the Department of Social Welfare.

I move—

Mr. Speaker, it is generally felt in our country that the time has arrived when we should have uniformity, particularly in respect of the registration of livestock brands, as regards file control of it, and that it should be of such a nature that it covers the whole Republic. There is legislation in the various provinces; in some provinces it has existed for 80 years; providing for the registration of brands. But this legislation differs from one province to the other, and in those days it also differed because they were still colonies and republics that passed those laws. This Bill now before the House repeals those pre-Union laws. This legislation will therefore replace those old laws. This will then be the first time that we in the Republic of South Africa will have a livestock brands Act that will apply to the whole country.

This Bill should be regarded as supplementary to the Stock Theft Act that came into operation on 1 April of this year. When one reads the provisions of this Bill, one should not look for the provisions that have actually already been included in the Stock Theft Act. This Bill is not intended to be an obstruction for our farmers, but it should really be an aid to farmers when they have to identify stolen or strayed stock. The branding of stock has never been compulsory in South Africa, nor in any of the provinces of our country. This principle of no compulsion in respect of the branding of his stock by any person, is being maintained in this Bill. No one will be compelled to brand his stock, but he who wishes to brand his stock will only be able to do so with a brand or brands registered in his name. In other words, he is compelled, if he wishes to brand his stock, to register those brands in his name so that he can enjoy the protection provided for in this legislation, which gives him ownership of those brands, and so also then the statutory protection that the stock so marked are his stock.

We did not want to incorporate the principle of compulsory brands in this Bill. I believe that in course of time, as more people realize the significance of it, the time will come when we shall have compulsory branding of stock. But that is something I think one should first test out, as the farmers become more accustomed to it. In our country the experience has been, because there were various measures and laws governing this matter in the past, in the various provinces—where we are now applying it throughout the Republic, I think it will be wise first to let the people get used to the change before we introduce that compulsion.

I should just like to refer to what happens in some other pastoral countries. You have compulsory brands in New Zealand, except for pigs, or cattle and horses kept in a properly fenced enclosure. In Tasmania you have compulsory brands, but it is limited to sheep only, except for a few exceptions as regards other stock. In Queensland and in South Australia there is no compulsion, save for stock sold by a poundmaster. In South West Africa it is compulsory for White owners in respect of cattle and donkeys, and permissive in respect of horses and mules.

Now I should like to refer to a few aspects of the Bill. Provision is made for the appointment of a Registrar and the keeping of a proper register of all brands that have been allocated. The Registrar will from time to time, on the direction of the Minister, publish a guide of all brands that have been allocated, together with quarterly returns, in the Gazette, and for the convenience of the public it will be open to inspection without charge at all Government offices. That alone is an considerable improvement on the present systems in operation in the various provinces. All registrations and incidental matters will be dealt with by the Registrar and the magistrates are being relieved of these duties they had in the past. The fees that will be the same throughout the Republic for registration, will be prescribed and will be kept as low as possible, so that it will be just sufficient to cover the costs of administration. At regular intervals of not less than five years, free re-registration may take place to prevent large numbers of unused brands appearing. You may have the case of a man dying and the brand is still in his name, and your list is not effective; it is not up to date, and for that reason we want the right to make re-registrations at intervals if we find it necessary, even with the cancellation of brands, but you do not want to do it at too short intervals either. We are merely providing that the right be given to do so at intervals of not less than five years, but it may be longer too.

Another important provision is that brands will be prescribed for every group of stock. Different brands will be prescribed for different classes of stock, such as cattle, horses or ostriches. In other words, you will not be obliged to place the same brand on all your stock. I may mention that the Transvaal Ordinance prescribes a three-piece brand with various combinations for each district, and that it has already had the result that in certain districts of the Transvaal it has become very difficult to obtain combinations of brands, because practically all the possible combinations have been exhausted. I have here a whole list of combinations that are valid in certain districts of the Transvaal. Here I show hon. members one, and there is another, and here is still another. They do not seem very attractive to me. These brands are valid in certain districts only. In other words, if a man has farms in various districts, he has to register more than one brand. The object of this Bill is to give one owner one registered brand for a class of stock, and he will be able to use it in any district of the country wherever he may have stock.

Another matter we wished to combat by means of this Bill, is the elimination …

What will become of the present brands in the Transvaal?

I do not want to give a final reply to that. It may be that we shall be able to incorporate them in the registrations we contemplate, but if that cannot be done, I am afraid that the one province for the sake of all will lose its brands as presently registered. I do not wish to give the assurance that everybody in the Transvaal will keep his registered brands, for it only applies to certain districts, and there are too many, so that you will have to make changes, and it may be that they will all disappear. The other provision we wish to make is to prescribe the size of the brand and the places where the animal has to be branded. We wish to limit it to that part of the animal’s body where it can do least damage to the hide, and yet have the advantage that it will be easy to see for identification purposes. It is estimated that the annual losses we suffer in respect of our hides trade, amount to at least R500,000 and arise from wrong branding that damages the hide unnecessarily. From the economic point of view, it is such an important factor for the farmers that in the Federation there is a bonus of 5s. paid on every animal that reaches the abattoirs and which is properly branded in a spot where the hide is not damaged, in addition to the price the animal realized on the market, just to encourage farmers to brand properly.

Is it not 10s.?

I am not sure; it may be 10s. Regulations regarding the size and shape etc. of the brands, as well as the manner in which and the part of the animal upon which branding shall be effected, will be made. We contemplate a few concessions in the Bill, which I think may be made in fairness. The Minister e.g., may grant exemption from the registration of brands to stud marks that are used in accordance with the rules of the South African Stud Book Association. Provision is also made that bodies such as the South African Native Trust and Coloured Councils may use group marks with the Minister’s approval. Provision is also made for stud breeders and the brands they have been using for many years on their stud book animals, and whereby they may also have achieved fame, to be retained and to continue to be used on their stud book animals. But these brands will of course not be able to obtain lawful registration, for it would not fit into the new series. It will be a concession that those brands are exempt from registration under the law, and if it serves a useful purpose for the owners, they will be permitted to be used, but they are not the lawful brands that are registered and enjoy the protection of the Act. Under the Act it will also be possible that a farmer may be able to register a tattoo mark for use on his sheep and goats, but not on the horns, for other marks on the horns and ears of animals that a farmer requires to facilitate the management of his herds, are specifically excluded from the operation of the Bill. In other words, he will be able to use them lawfully for those management purposes, but he will not be able to register those marks that he uses with clips in the ears etc.

As regards the rest of the Bill, I do not believe any explanation is required. The powers in regard to the making of regulations, as well as the proposed penalties for offences, are obvious. The Bill has been discussed beforehand with organized agriculture, and the Stud Book Association, the Provincial Administrations and other interested parties, and the measure has received general approval, and I do hope that it will meet with the approval of not only hon. members, but also the farmers of the country.

In general, and in principle, we on this side have no objection to this Bill. There are a number of points which we would like to discuss, and probably most of them can be dealt with more adequately in the Committee Stage. There are one or two points I would like to make arising out of the Bill itself and what the hon. the Minister has said in his introductory speech.

As the Minister has pointed out, this Bill does not make branding compulsory, although he did say that later it might become necessary for measures to be taken to make it compulsory. I hope the Minister will go very slowly in that direction. What is wanted, I think, is that the benefits to be derived from a measure such as this, which will be applicable all over the Republic, should be appreciated by the farming community. Let the farmers appreciate the benefits resulting from the application of such a measure and they will join in voluntarily. I will come back to this later in connection with one of the clauses, but I think that this is the way we should look at this type of legislation. Let the benefits be seen and get the farming community interested in it and they will adopt the measure because it is to their benefit, and let us take them along with us instead of having to force them.

This Bill will be of immense use to us in fighting disease. It seems to me that some of the provisions here have that in mind, in connection with certain regulations that may be made. But there is one point I wish to raise now, namely that provision is made here for the cancellation of brands. I think we have to be very careful in our use of language, because there are two meanings even to a sentence like that. There is the cancellation of a brand registered by the Registrar of Brands. There is the cancellation of a mark placed on a beast, which is a brand as defined in this Bill. So when we speak of the cancellation of brands, one has to be careful and make it quite clear whether one is referring to the cancellation of a brand registered with the Registrar, or the cancellation of a mark placed on a beast as a brand. I want to deal with the latter case. There is provision in the Bill for the cancellation of a mark placed on a beast as a brand, as defined in the Bill. I hope the Minister will withdraw all reference to the possibility, in this Bill, of cancelling a brand placed on a beast as a brand mark, and that a beast, once branded, will carry that brand without mutilation or change throughout its life. You see, Sir, I know that provision has been made in laws in other countries for the cancellation of a brand mark on a beast, but on this side of the House we think that is quite wrong. We think that the moment you provide by regulation in terms of the law for a legal method of cancelling a brand mark on a beast, you have opened the door to that method being used by all sorts of elements which may be engaged in stock theft or in other unlawful activities related to the livestock industry. The moment it is lawful to cancel a brand mark on a beast, you cannot tell who the previous owner was, because it does not matter what kind of brand you and what kind of mark may be defined by regulation, but the defacing mark, for the purpose of cancelling the brand, placed on top of existing brand mark, which is legible, can immediately be made illegible. We think the law should not permit any alteration or mutilation or cancellation of a brand mark on a beast. I know the Minister and his advisers will have some little difficulty over this matter, but we believe it is fundamental to the good working of the Bill. To in regard to large stock it is proposed to have a brand mark on the cheek—because we agreed with the Minister that one object of this Bill is to protect the hide and skin industry by preventing the placing of brands in such a way that it depreciates the value of the skin, and loses income not only for the farmer but for the country: so if you want to escape that and provision is made for the branding of large, horned stock on the cheek, the Minister and his advisers will have to look at it from the angle of the laws of heraldry, and visualize the cheeks of an animal and the precise position in which in order of priority succeeding owners must brand that animal, so that at a glance any farmer or auctioneer or livestock dealer will know the order of precedence of the ownership of the beast. In other words, the sequence must be certain and it must be unmutilated so that you can trace the ownership of the beast.

The question has been asked outside this House what happens in the case of farmers who have not yet registered their brand with the Registrar. The answer is simple. This is one of the matters where we believe that it is not necessary to have compulsory branding in the Bill, because the farmer who does not register a brand will be the man who has to take care of himself. He will be handling animals branded with another farmer’s brand and if any question arises he will find himself in the position of having to prove that he is the legal owner of a beast with a brand placed on it by another owner. He will perpetually be in the position of not only having to beware when buying another man’s cattle, but he will continually have to beware that he is not running cattle on his property which may have a multiplicity of brands. The only way to do that is to have all those brands clear and unmutilated. I do not want to pursue that any further except to say that we hope that all reference in this Bill to a lawful process of cancellation of brands lawfully placed on an animal will be withdrawn from the Bill so that there will be no method of legally cancelling a brand mark once put on an animal. That brand mark must remain identifiable for the lifetime of the beast.

There is another provision of the Bill, in regard to the powers of the police to take possession of any thing which they find in the course of investigating stock theft. I think it is Clause 15 (1) (d). It says that the police may seize and remove for detention any thing found by them. I am not sure that it is quite clear whether that includes an animal; whether an animal is a “thing” for the purposes of this clause.

Any thing includes even an animal.

I must admit that I had a mental picture of the police driving a herd of stolen stock over some of these hills and valleys we have on the borders of Basutoland, when I read that clause, and I wondered whether that really fitted in very well in the Bill, but we will deal with it in the Committee Stage.

There is another point in regard to this matter of the brand placed on the animal. We, on this side, feel that it must be of a permanent character. The use on small stock of what is called tattoo oil, which is not a paint, which is of a temporary character—we do not believe that that should be permitted as a brand. You cannot use a paint for large stock.

Paint will never be a brand.

I do not know whether some of these oils would be defined as paint, but the point I want to make is that none of those ephemeral things should be permitted, not only on large stock, but on any stock. It must be of a permanent character. I want to say that what has been called a hair burn amongst stock farmers must be ruled out altogether as a brand. In other words, it must be quite clear that the brand will be of a permanent character, and it shall not be a hair burn. A hair burn is a very good thing at stock sales, where you want something which is easily visible in order to identify the animal for a temporary period, and then it grows over again. But we do not want a hair burn to be used on the assumption that it will grow over again, on the wrong part of the animal’s hide. Where you lay down the definition of a brand, we say it should be of a permanent character, and people should be forbidden to put a hair burn on an animal in a place where the hide may be damaged, because it really depends only on the amount of pressure used by the man putting on the brand whether it is a hair burn or a permanent brand.

It would be illegal for any person to use even a hair burn on any other part of the animal’s body than the prescribed part.

Well, that clears up that point. I entirely agree with the Minister. I take it the regulations will tell us precisely where the branding iron can be applied. That is the point I wanted to make, and the Minister will obviously prevent hair burns on any other spot than the prescribed one. May I say in passing that I am sorry that we have in Parliament to be asked to pass a Bill which says that a horse includes any mule or ass. I think that is very sad. Why not use the words “equine” or “bovine”? Perhaps the Minister does not understand those terms, because he is an ostrich farmer. There are one or two other points I would like to deal with in passing. In Clause 13 provision is made for what I may call the five-yearly registration of brands with the Registrar of Brands. It need not necessarily be done every five years, but the period may not be less than five years. It is clear that what is contemplated is a review from time to time by the Registrar of the registered brands. Quite frankly, we do not like that. We think that when once a farmer has his brand registered, it must stay so for all time, until he dies or his son or heir takes over, and he may take over the same brand, because provision is made for it. He may take over the same brand. What we do feel is that the farmer, having got his brand, keeps it permanently, and if it is at any time to be cancelled by the registrar, some means should be adopted of letting the farmer know that that is happening. Provision is made here for a proclamation in the Gazette.

The Minister can use the Gazette to give notice that he is asking all farmers to re-register their brands after a period of not less than five years. But he can use the Gazette for other purposes; he can use the Gazette to advertise the different kinds of brands for different kinds of animals. May I say with due respect and deference, Mr. Speaker, that I am pleased to see you in the Chair, so that when I talk about equine you will understand precisely the point that I am making, because, in the case of equine, quite obviously you want a totally different kind of brand; you should have it in the interest of the animal. The brand should be different to that for bovine. Sir, we do not like the Gazette from this point of view. You have farmers living under circumstances where they do not read the Gazette, and it may well be, even under existing circumstances where farmers have to be fairly well abreast of the times, that they will not realize exactly what they have to do to have their brands registered every five years, or whatever it may be. They may not see those notices in the Gazette dealing with the different kinds of brands for different kinds of animals. Here I want to ask the hon. the Minister to take a bold step. Throughout the years we have been building up farmers’ organizations in this country, and we have had the S.A. Agricultural Union finally accepted by all, I think, as the mouth-piece of organized agriculture throughout. Has the time not come for us to put that in the Statute and say that the S.A. Agricultural Union is going to be notified? It can be put in the Gazette; I have no objection to its going into the Gazette as a permanent record of the intention of the Government, because that is the way in which we bring laws officially to the notice of the public, through the Gazette, that is used in the police courts as evidence at trials and so on. For all practical purposes we have never found a better way of publishing our laws and regulations than through the Gazette, so that must be maintained, but I would like to see something added. I think the time has come, if I may suggest it to the Minister, when he should take a bold step and recognize the S.A. Agricultural Union. Through that you go back then to the various provincial agricultural unions and to the various agricultural societies and associations that are affiliated. There again I want to say quite frankly that what I am driving at is to show a positive benefit to farmers who belong to a farmers’ association which is affiliated with the provincial union and which is, therefore, affiliated with the S.A. Agricultural Union. You always get a small group of farmers who want all the benefits and they do not want to have any of the responsibilities; they hope that they will learn through their neighbours what is taking place from time to time, so that they will not be caught on the wrong foot, but they do not have to pay anything towards the maintenance of the farmers’ associations by way of an annual subscription; they do not attend the meetings; they only wait to milk the old farmers’ association’s cow whenever they get a chance, and they do nothing whatever to keep that cow in condition and to feed it. This is a case in point where the affiliated branches and the affiliated members will get notification of all matters which are set out in this Bill, and those who are not members will just have to chance their arm. In my opinion it will be a positive inducement to the foot-loose farmers to-day who see no benefit in joining a registered farmers’ association to come in as members so that they can get positive benefits. This Bill, Sir, will not apply only to farmers; it will apply to a group of other people outside. Well and good, they will have to follow the Gazette or, through their own associations and organizations, they will have to take proper steps to keep themselves in touch with what is provided for here; it is up to them to find their own way of keeping within the law. But, Sir, we do not like periodical registrations, and we do hope that the Minister will go beyond the Gazette as a means of publication.

My colleague, the hon. member for Transkeian Territories (Mr. Hughes), will deal with certain matters affecting the Bantu areas, and I am glad to see that the hon. the Minister of Bantu Administration is here. Sir, the problems that we have to deal with here are really twofold, that is to say, protection of our hides and skins, so far as their commercial value is concerned, and protection against stock theft and so forth. Those two matters have to be dealt with efficiently and administratively by the Minister and his Department, and if I have any doubt in my mind as to whether it can in fact work out successfully, I will say that the breakdown may possibly come about in the Native areas or in the White areas adjacent to Native areas, and there I have certain very strong mental reservations. I can see the Minister and his Department getting into difficulty. That is not to say that he will not get the goodwill of the farmers and that he will not get the support and the cooperation of the farmers and the farmers’ associations concerned because I am sure he will; I am sure he will find them only too willing to co-operate. But there are certain practical difficulties where Bantu stock is concerned, which I am going to leave to my colleague here to deal with, but it does leave a doubt in my mind.

I think the other matters that I have in mind can be dealt with in the Committee Stage. I will simply say that I think that this is at any rate a first good step forward, and subject to the remarks that I have made we are willing to support this Bill.

I am pleased to see that the hon. member for South Coast (Mr. D. E. Mitchell), with his practical brain, agrees with us in regard to many points. These are matters we have already discussed with the Minister. There definitely are certain regulations that have to be complied with. As the hon. the Minister has already said, this Bill is really supplementary to the existing Stock Theft Act. Of course the great problem is how to prove that stock has been stolen, and this Bill is an attempt to reduce stock theft in South Africa. I agree with the hon. member for South Coast that we should be very careful in regard to registered brands. There are indeed, people who have not registered their brands although they have been using those brands for years and years. Even in the case of pedigree stock you find that people might have been using their own brands, but never registered them. I am pleased also to see that the hon. the Minister has excluded stud books to a certain extent, for by the registration of your stud books you always have your own colour brand system, etc., that may be followed up. Although they may not be used as registered brands, we feel that this system will help a lot without bringing about any difficulties for the stud books. The stud books, of course, are organized bodies; they have their different marks and numbers, and the Bill will not be concerned with them, and we welcome that. But we do feel that there should be something additional. There I agree with the hon. the Minister that for the future one should have a special registered brand. Registration is not compulsory at the present time, and we hope it will be capable of being made compulsory in the future when people appreciate the advantages of compulsory registration. I believe that compulsory registration will still be the best in the long run. I agree with what the hon. member for South Coast has said in regard to a brand on the hip of cattle; I agree that it is not a thorough test, and the Minister will probably come along with amendments later on to bring about an improvement in that respect. I think the South African Agricultural Union, which is our mouthpiece, has been thoroughly consulted in regard to the provisions of the Bill, and also the stud books. You already have your various groupings in agriculture at the present day, and I do not know whether it is necessary to go further than to remain in touch with our agricultural associations. Every agricultural organization has its specific place in the South African Agricultural Union, and I do not think we should use this Bill in an attempt to increase the membership of the agricultural unions; I think that is the matter for the agricultural unions themselves to take up. We should like to see all farmers belonging to the agricultural unions, but I do not know how we can do something in that direction in this Bill; I think it is a matter that falls outside the scope of this Bill. There is co-operation between the Department and the agricultural unions at the present time, and there is co-operation also with the stud books. As the hon. member for South Coast has said, the object of this Bill is twofold. The one object is to combat stock theft; that is something that is absolutely essential. The suggestions made here by the hon. member for South Coast are very good suggestions, and I think the hon. the Minister is thinking along the same lines as he is. It is a matter that should be thoroughly pondered. It is not something you can rectify within a day or two. I also feel that it should be laid down by regulation on what part of their bodies cattle should be branded. The brand should be placed on the spot where it will do the least damage, for instance, on the jaw or on the shoulder or below the thighs. The exact place should be fixed, and there should be uniformity so that one should not have to look all over in order to find the brand. If the police then examine an animal, they will know exactly where to look for the brand. As regards this matter I feel we are going in the right direction.

Mr. Speaker, we realize that the farmers on the borders will have trouble. The hon. the Minister and the Minister of Bantu Administration could co-operate in an attempt to find a solution for the problem of the border farmers, but I do not know whether we can do anything in that regard under this Bill. I think the whole country welcomes this step. Compulsory registration of brands is not being introduced now; it may later on possibly lead to compulsory registration, for I am one of those who believe that if you wish to eliminate stock theft, there has to be compulsory registration of brands. The difficulty at the moment is the old brands that already are on the cattle. How are you going to get rid of those? It is a very difficult matter, and I agree that the eventual solution of the problem of stock theft is the introduction of one system throughout the country.

We fully appreciate that to enable the Stock Theft Act to be effective a universal system of registered stock-branding is essential, so we accept this consolidating measure. We think it is an advantage to have the eight different Acts appertaining to the branding of stock throughout the Republic consolidated in one measure. I am disappointed, however, that in this enlightened age scientific opinion was not sought, or research undertaken, with a view to introducing a more humane system of marking animals than by branding them with red-hot irons, as indicated in this measure. I feel that the system of branding animals with red-hot irons belongs to the Middle Ages and is certainly not in keeping with the Animals Protection Bill which we on both sides of the House eagerly supported during this Session. We fell over each other in support of that measure; in fact, there was rivalry between hon. members in advocating humane treatment of animals. In this debate I would like to hear the opinion of those who claimed to have initiated that Bill. I would like to hear their opinion as regards the use of red-hot irons and even very large irons in branding stock. I think that if the South African Agricultural Union have nothing better to offer than this crude measure, then the Minister should have referred this Bill to a committee of scientists with a view to introducing a more humane method of marking stock. Surely in this enlightened age, with the development of tattoo oils in various colours, it should not be impossible for scientists to devise a method whereby a tattoo mark, visible from outside, could be put on the skin of an animal. We may even have a phosphorescent mark that would show up at night, like the fire-flies have. I think there is a lot of room for improvement as regards the marking of stock. I would like to advocate that the Minister should investigate the possibility of introducing a more humane method of marking stock. The Minister said that provision would be made, in a later measure, for the registration of tattoo marks. I would like the Minister, when he introduces that measure, to provide for everyone to register a tattoo mark. Sir, it has been proved by scientists and by practical men that 400,000 different marks can be put on to one ear, by making use of the numerals and the letters of the alphabet and arranging them in different orders. We have heard the hon. member for South Coast (Mr. D. E. Mitchell) advocating that we should not cancel old brands. Of course, if the marks are on the ear, then they could be cancelled by the same mark in a different coloured ink; it is perfectly simple to cancel a mark on the ear.

You could cancel all the marks just by cutting off the ear.

I think the Minister should make provision in this Bill, as drastic as these clauses are, that not more than a third of the ear shall be removed. I think this provision should be inserted in this Bill as a protection for people who do not brand their stock. I myself have been farming now for over 50 years and I have never branded an animal. Sir, it is tragic to see sheep which have had chunks of their ears removed by those who have acquired them as marked by previous owners. We know that in the Native territories one finds sheep with almost the whole ear removed. In fact, I have seen such cases myself. The Minister says that ears can be cut off, but there is no reason why the Minister should not introduce legislation to make it illegal for anyone to possess an animal with more than a third of its ear removed, or it can be made illegal for anyone to cut off any portion of the ear on which there is a tattoo mark, and the punishment for doing so could be drastic; that would be a perfectly simple matter. Sir, one only has to inspect the stock on our stock markets to see how many of the animals are plastered with brands—and not small brands. Many have scars which indicate that these brands were burnt right through the skin. I think this is a matter to which more attention should be paid by the societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals and by the people who initiated the Animals Protection Bill. [Interjection.] Sir, the hon. member for Cradock (Mr. G. F. H. Bekker) is interjecting but he is a stud-breeder, and he is quite pleased to hear that there will be registration of tattoo marks. I doubt whether the hon. member for Cradock ever found it necessary to brand any of his stud-stock. If there is a mark, on the ear, the animal can always be identified. There are many ways of branding that could be investigated. The hon. the Minister knows very well that when a tiny little mark is made behind the leg of an ostrich chick when it is hatched, with a little heated hairpin, which is not painful, it lasts the animal’s whole life. As the animal grows, so the mark becomes larger. There are many ways in which we could mark animals, ways which are more humane that the method used at present. There is no doubt that an identification mark in the ear would be much more effective than the usual registered brand. Sir, the Minister is laughing at me …

No, I am not.

… but I think there is much in this measure that could be improved. For example, no limitation is placed on the number of brands that any particular owner may have. It is also provided that on a change of ownership, a brand has to be cancelled. That means that every time there is a change of ownership there has to be a new brand, and if it is a cancellation brand too it has to be a deep brand. When the Minister replies perhaps he can tell us what the cancellation brand will be; we would like some enlightenment in that regard, especially if the brand is one that obliterates a previous brand or that crosses out a previous brand, or of whatever nature it is to be. I have had to cancel brands myself; I have seen it done, and I know that nobody could regard the cancellation of brands as humane. Generally with the branding of stock the animal is thrown onto the ground, and especially if it is a wild animal there is a certain amount of rough handling, and there is no doubt that when a wild animal is branded the person who inflicts the brand puts in a deep one to make sure that it will not have to be done again. I do say that with the advance that has been made in science we should be able to find some means of tattooing a visible brand, perhaps on the cheek, for example, as the Minister has indicated, and it should not be necessary to do it with a red-hot iron.

It is not suggested that that be done in the case of sheep.

Sir, when we speak of brands we know what they are, and we know that it is not permissible under this Bill to use paint on sheep but only on certain other animals. When we speak of brands we mean the brands that we see on horses, on donkeys, on asses and all livestock. Animals are branded throughout the country to-day and I think that when a Bill of this nature is introduced the Minister should take a more enlightened view and try to introduce a measure which will induce people to mark and brand their animals in a more humane way than the method that is being used to-day.

The benign hon. member for Albany (Mr. Bowker) is so concerned about the ill-treatment of animals that he has given free rein to his imagination. I do not know whether it is so very cruel to animals to brand them if one only does it judiciously. The hon. member will come along just now and tell us it is ill-treatment of animals if one were to milk by hand a cow that is a tough milker. I think if one uses a good hot iron to do the branding properly, there is no ill-treatment of animals. There are many practices that perhaps cause more pain than the ordinary branding provided only that it is done properly.

We welcome this Bill, especially because the registration of brands is not being made compulsory. I do not think it is quite practical at this stage to come along with a system of compulsory brands. People who use brands, do so to enable them to identify their animals, and the people who are not prepared to brand their animals in order to identify them thereby, will just have to bear the consequences thereof. Then of course there are many people also who have only one or two head of cattle and who will not take the trouble to register a brand. So I do not think it is necessary to introduce a system of compulsory registration of brands. The people who do require it for identification purposes, will of course use the system. I should like to refer to the system of branding in the Transvaal. The hon. the Minister has already referred to that. I think the system used in the Transvaal was a splendid system. There is this difficulty, of course, as has been rightly stated here, that with the numerous applications it now becomes difficult to get a registered brand for every person under the existing system in the Transvaal. But the system has worked very well so far. A letter has been allocated to each district—the first letter of the brand—and then there are two additional marks. In other words, there is a three-letter system that has been used in the Transvaal.

A letter and a number?

Two letters and a number. Now I should only like to request that if it is at all possible, the existing brands that are in use, should be retained; in other words, that people who already have registered brands, should be able to re-register those brands. One would not like to have a whole lot of brands on your stock, and where people have had their fixed registered brands for years, I think it is no more than fair that they should be permitted to continue with that system. As regards the regulations, we are glad that provision is being made that the places where the animals should be branded will be indicated by way of regulation; it is very necessary. As has been rightly said here, much damage is done as a result of bad branding that damages the hides. The size of the brands and the age at which the brands should be applied to the animals, are very important. Furthermore, I should like to draw attention to the use of figures, in addition to the usual registered brand. Where people have their registered brand, they sometimes also use figures because the ear-marks are sometimes lost. People who wish to improve the breed of their cattle, grade their cattle and they frequently make use of numbers. I should like to appeal to the hon. the Minister to permit the use of ordinary figure numbers, apart from the registered brands, and that such numbers need not be registered, for a figure number alone will be of no value without a registered brand. As regards the brands guide, I would agree that I feel it is not a very practical clause. I am now referring to Clause 13, in terms of which persons who have registered brands will have to give notice every five years if they wish to retain those brands. In the first place, it is going to mean considerable extra work for the officials concerned, and you can be very sure that a number of people will not know that they have to give notice if they wish to retain their brands. Quite a number of letters etc. will go astray, probably, and in the long run you are going to have only a lot of dissatisfaction, and I feel the game will not be worth the candle. I feel that once a brand has been registered, it should remain there until the person dies and somebody applies to take over the brand. Where there is a complete sell-out, one could make use of the stock inspector or the inspector of brands to give notice that the person concerned is no longer farming. But do not expect every person to apply every five years. You are going to cause a lot of unnecessary work and I cannot see what benefits will be derived from it. Let the existing brands remain. It will avoid a good deal of wasted time, inconvenience and dissatisfaction among the farmers. One wants a system that will work well, but will not cause unnecessary bother and unnecessary dissatisfaction. Even if it were to be published in the Gazette, it will not help much. All people simply do not get the Gazette. And even if use were made of the farmers’ associations, everybody will still not receive notice. There will be numerous people who will be quite unaware of it, and then brands will be cancelled unnecessarily. One would not like to see an animal having too many brands, nor do I think it is necessary. If animals are stolen, you always have a brand, a mark of identification you can rely upon to trace the animal. Personally, when I buy an animal from a person who has a brand, I do not apply another brand to such animal because I do not like to see a number of brands on an animal. It disfigures the animals and is quite unnecessary. But if I buy animals bearing certain brands, the seller has under the Stock Theft Act to furnish me with a certificate to indicate that I have bought the animals and that is the proof that they are my animals now and protects me from prosecution. That is all one needs.

One good thing this Bill will do is that it is going to stop the indiscriminate branding of stock on any and every occasion. To-day on our stock sales, if you travel around the country, you see a number of animals with huge brands all over the valuable parts of the hide, quite apart from the suffering, the unnecessary suffering of animals. Under this Bill the hon. the Minister can prescribe by regulation the size of the brand and where a brand shall be placed, which as I have already said, will save very valuable hide and valuable tanned skins being discarded, or the best part of the hide wasted as far as the cattle industry is concerned and as far as the leather tanneries are concerned.

But I am also concerned with this question of the obliteration of brands. As the hon. member for Natal (South Coast) (Mr. D. E. Mitchell), I am very disturbed to think that a man can legally remove another man’s brand. To-day we all own cattle bearing other people’s brands. If you are dealing in cattle, you buy store-oxen for fattening, or you buy trek-oxen, and most people have in their possession branded cattle with brands other than their own. There is no difficulty under the Stock Theft Act, and, of course, if the police come on your property and say: “Jones has lost, van Zyl has lost, so many oxen, and they are looking for them; there are oxen of his brand amongst your stock, or amongst the stock owned by your Natives on your farm; how does it come that they are on your farm?” Then you produce your receipts. You have purchased them and there is no difficulty. I can see no difficulties on that side as far as the possession of branded animals is concerned. But the moment you allow anybody legally to obliterate a brand or cancel a brand, then you play, to my mind, right into the hands of the stock thief. He can obliterate all brands. Because it is arbitrary to own cattle with obliterated brands and no other brand. One of the most important things under this Bill is that people are allowed to register brands, but branding is not compulsory, as hundreds of farmers do not brand at all. I have not branded an animal for the last 35 or 40 years. To-day, of course, I have only got pedigreed stock, and they are registered, and there is no difficulty, but people who are farming near Native territories and near Native reserves, or who go in for ranching, find it essential to brand stock, and if, as the hon. member for Natal (South Coast) suggested, you have a sequence of places where a brand shall go—in other words, the first brand goes here and the second one there, and the third one on the next spot, then you have only got to look at the animal and you know immediately who was the last man who owned that animal, who had a registered brand. There is no difficulty at all. That applies to the police, the farmer, anyone. But we must not overlook the fact that a large number of farmers do not brand at all. They may buy store-oxen, and we are coming to the stage now that you have highly organized farms where even the store-oxen do not run in huge paddocks, or over the veld almost ad lib, but they are almost always kept in small camps and are fed until they are ready for the market, and that owner who does not brand has no difficulty in proving to anybody that he is the legal owner of that stock. But the man who owns an animal with a number of brands, one or more obliterated, will find it more difficult to prove that it is his animal, and it will be more difficult for the police to pick it up. I think it will be much wiser, quite apart from the fact that you are mutilating the hide, not to have this provision in regard to the obliteration of brands in this way. You know the definition in Clause 1 (iv) says—

livestock means cancel in the prescribed manner.

However, in Clause 22 (h) it says that regulations can be framed by the Minister as to how brands may be cancelled. I do appeal to the hon. the Minister to have the officials of his Department to go into this matter again before we come to the Committee Stage, because I think it is necessary to amend those clauses from the point of view of everybody, and especially the farmer.

There are difficulties already arising from the application of the branding and marking of animals under the Stock Theft Act, which came into force only last month. On 1 April the new regulations in relation to this question of brands and marking on sales came into force, and it has caused so much difficulty in Natal that I see in the latest Naunlv, the official organ of the Natal Agricultural Union, that they are having a special meeting either this week or next week with the police, Government officials, representatives of the Agricultural Union and other interested bodies, such as livestock auctioneers, etc., to discuss the difficulties. I understand that there have been difficulties over driving the stock, some just returning home, others being driven to new homes, and the police have had difficulty in identification in relation to stock passes that the Natives have to carry. Within a matter of two months we have already run into difficulties in respect of the practical application of brands and markings. These things often look well in theory. It sounds quite nice just to obliterate a brand and apply a new brand, but when it comes to the practical application you will find there are very many snags, and it is not easy at all. So I would ask the hon. the Minister to give consideration to that before we get to the Committee Stage.

Then there is this question of the registration of brands, or rather the re-registration every five years. I take it that when there is reregistration, it will be a re-registration for the whole Republic. If that is so, why cannot the hon. the Minister have a notice printed, where you just have to fill in the name and address, notifying all owners that re-registration is taking place on such and such a date? You have the same thing with radio licences, and there must be many more radio licences than you will have registered brands. Can he not give notice to the owners of registered brands, informing them that their renewal is due next month or in two months’ time? You don’t have that every year, but once in five years only, and it would not be difficult to do so, it would not take that much time, and would not cost a lot for the hon. the Minister’s Department to send out such a notice. It could be done by the registrar or by his own Department. As a matter of fact, I think we could even go further and have a form which could be torn off in the form of a postcard, informing the farmers, printed on one side. Then the farmer could, on the other side, just mark the necessary words saying that he wants to re-register or does not want to re-register. He could then sign it and send it back. I think, from everybody’s point of view, that would lead to better registration and more efficiency for the Department.

When we come to ear-marks on sheep in particular, we don’t have quite the same difficulty in the case of cattle, because you have got the colour of the cattle, and shape, and one thing and another by which you can recognize cattle. But when you come to sheep, it is a different matter. I would appeal to the hon. the Minister to make provision, if possible in this Bill, that nobody should be allowed to own a sheep of which more than one-third of the ear has been removed. That is provided for in the old Act. Of course I know that it sometimes happens that a sheep tears off its ear in a wire or something, but in that case you can cull that sheep, because culling an odd sheep when an accident like that happens is neither here nor there, but it does stop people from removing two-thirds of a whole ear, so as to remove the identifying mark of ear-marking, although obviously you can see that an old brand has been combed out of the fleece. When a sheep has been carrying its wool for some time and a brand is getting rather broken up, the stock thieves, especially those in certain of the Native territories, comb out that side of the sheep where the paint mark was, cut off two-thirds of the ear, and you cannot do anything about it. Even if the ears are still bleeding. We have had cases where we went to a Native location or a reserve and found sheep with bleeding ears, two-thirds of the ear cut off and you can’t do anything; you have to prove that it is your sheep, and the police are quite powerless. We had a lot of trouble some years ago when I was sheep farming in the Kliprivier area. You follow up sheep right into the location, and you find a number of sheep, perhaps the exact number of sheep you have lost, with ears cut off, well-combed, so that there are no paint marks of the original paint left on the side of the sheep. So I would appeal to the hon. the Minister to give that further consideration. If you want to stop stock theft, it is essential that we should be able to identify animals, and, as I have already said that if a particular person does not brand his cattle, he can then prove that he purchased the cattle from a certain party. As I said before, many farmers do not brand at all to-day. In my particular area, the Midlands of Natal, most farmers do not brand, and ownership may pass three or four times of animals before they are slaughtered, especially breeding animals. But it is quite easy to prove that you are the owner, and I see no difficulty in that regard.

I welcome the Bill in so far as it is an attempt to make it possible, in carrying out the Stock Theft Act, to have certain marks of identification established and registered. But in carrying out the application of marks of identification upon animals, we have not yet reached the best possible method, in my opinion, to put it beyond all doubt. I refer, for instance, to the case where one uses a registered branding iron in terms of the provisions of this Bill. There you will still have confusion if e.g. you were to use the letters “J.S.”, which you register, and somebody else were to use “J-5”. It is required that an animal shall have the identification brand applied to it at a certain age and on a certain place, but now we know that a comparatively hot iron frequently blots such brands, and where animals grow up and the hide of course stretches, the provision that the branding iron shall be of a certain size is not in my view sufficient. But under present circumstances we have not yet found an improved method of determining identification beyond all doubt, and for that reason we have to accept that the provisions of this Bill are, at the present time, the most obvious and practical. However, I should like to ask the hon. the Minister, in view of the problems we have experienced in applying these identification marks to cause an investigation to be made to see whether a better method of identification cannot be found than the application of a brand.

Now we come face to face with the problem that in addition to the damage to the hide of an animal when the Department of Finance, and now also the Department of Agricultural Economics and Marketing, have to apply certain identification marks to an animal, the registered brand will also have to be applied to such an animal, which will necessarily damage the hide much more than for instance the application of the first marks of identification. In that process, the hide is damaged more and more. That is why I should like to suggest that in applying identification marks for government subsidies, etc., other means should also be considered of making identification very clear. In regard to the matter of notification, referred to in Clause 13, I should also like to express the thought that I do not believe that mere publication in the Gazette will be sufficient to notify the farmers that they have to re-register. I should like to suggest that other methods, that have already been mentioned, be borne in mind when re-registration becomes necessary. The Gazette is read in very limited circles, and that is why another system of notification to the farmers should be put into operation. As we are supporting the Bill in broad outline, I should like to ask the Minister to have regard to the few points I have mentioned to see whether we cannot devise a better system for the application of brands for the purposes of identification.

I can agree with the hon. member for Harrismith (Mr. J. J. Rall) to a certain extent, that it will be a very good thing if another method of branding could be devised instead of the branding with a red-hot iron. If one looks at the branded stock on any farmer’s farm, you find that unless it is a very careful farmer who brands his stock himself, that of 20 per cent to 30 per cent of the stock that has been branded with a red-hot iron, the brand is such that you cannot identify it any longer; it has been branded too superficially or too deeply, with the result that it is useless for the purpose for which the farmer wished to brand the stock. I also wish to agree to some extent with the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Bowker) that the branding with a red-hot iron is a brutal thing. You cannot deny that. The hon. member for Nelspruit (Mr. Faurie) has said that it is not so brutal or cruel. I do not know but anything done with a red-hot iron to the hide of an animal, a live animal, must be brutal from the very nature of the things. But until we have discovered something else in the place of that, I suppose it will just have to remain.

I do not think we can say much at the second reading of this Bill. The points that cause difficulty I suppose we could better deal with in the Committee Stage. The hon. the Minister has said that the main object of this Bill is to achieve uniformity. I agree with that. In the various provinces there are different laws that have been passed relative to the branding of animals, and one has had the position that where a person has had farms in more than one province, he has experienced difficulty in observing the various laws, especially when moving animals from one province to the other. This Bill will now eliminate that. But I do think that the biggest service this Bill will render the country, will be to prevent the damaging of the hides of animals, and that the Minister takes the power to provide by regulation where brands should be applied to the animals. That is the most important and the best provision in the whole Bill.

I want to agree with the hon. member for South Coast (Mr. D. E. Mitchell) that the definition of “brand” in Clause 1 is not satisfactory. As it stands here, it reads “a mark made or applied”. I think the word “permanently” should be inserted before the words “made or applied” in Clause (1) (i). A brand will only be a brand if it is a permanent mark. Then it will make farmers much more careful when branding animals, to see to it that it is a permanent mark.

Then there is the cancellation of marks. The hon. member for South Coast has said that we on this side of the House are opposed to the physical cancellation of brands on an animal, e.g. that they may be cancelled by a cross-line across the mark that has been made already. I am not so very sure that that is the right thing to do. I have thought a lot about it, and have come to the conclusion that I am in agreement with the hon. member for South Coast, that if the Minister is going to take steps to prescribe by regulation that a brand shall be physically cancelled on an animal, you will frustrate the objects of this Bill and of the Stock Theft Act. I think once a brand has been made on an animal, it should not be capable of physical cancellation on the animal. If an animal that is branded is sold, and it bears a registered brand, and the next purchaser does not have a registered brand, he should bear the consequences of not having his own identification on the animal, for after this Bill becomes law, he will not be able to place an unregistered mark on the animal any longer. It will also contribute to most farmers having only registered brands eventually. If it is a purchaser of an animal, and he also has a registered brand, then in my opinion a system of sequence should be prescribed, to provide where Owner No. 1 should place his brand and where the second owner should place his brand, etc. I do not believe that although you find different brands on animals, that there will ever be more than five or six. In any event, I have never seen more than that, and I think there is a place on an animal where it can be indicated in sequence who is the owner thereof without damaging the hide. I do not know whether it is going to be feasible for the Department, but if they do not want the provisions of this Act and the Stock Theft Act to be a failure, they certainly must not try to legalize the physical cancellation of brands on animals. In my opinion that will make both the Acts quite ineffective.

I want to raise a few points with the Minister arising out of this Bill. Let me say this that I think the Bill is widely welcomed particularly in the Transvaal Province whose members in this House have not so far said a great deal about this Bill in spite of the fact that that is the province with the greatest number of cattle in the country. In the course of his speech the hon. the Minister referred to the present system of branding and registration of identification marks of animals in the Transvaal. I asked the Minister across the floor of the House whether it was the intention, when this Bill became law, to retain the existing system of branding and the registration of brand marks in the Transvaal. The hon. member for Nelspruit (Mr. Faurie) made an appeal to the Minister to retain the existing system. The Minister replied to me in these words, I think “Ek kan nie ’n versekering gee nie”. The Minister said that he could not give any assurance that this present system would be retained in the Transvaal. The question immediately arises in my mind—and I hope the Minister will take this further when he replies—whether, when this Bill becomes law, it is intended to initiate an entirely new system of registration of brand marks for the whole country. If that is so it will mean that every owner who wishes to register a brand mark will have to make a fresh application immediately this Bill becomes law for the issue to him of a new brand mark. I can envisage considerable difficulties arising from that, Sir. I think the Minister should state clearly what the intention is once this Bill is placed on the Statute Book. It is of considerable concern to every farmer who runs any number of cattle and any farmer who in the past has had a registered brand mark. If the Minister cannot give us the assurance that the system which operates in the Transvaal at least—I cannot speak for the other provinces—will be retained, it will mean in effect that the majority of the farmers as far as the Transvaal province is concerned will be required to re-brand all their cattle on the issue to them of a new brand mark by the Registrar. According to the system operating in the Transvaal at the moment each district has its registration letter with subsequent identification letters and numbers. I hope that the Minister will tell us what the intention is when he replies. I think this is an important matter and one which is going to affect a great number of farmers. It is one on which we should have absolute clarity in discussing this Bill.

There is another aspect to which I want to refer. Whilst it is rightly said that there will be no compulsion on any owner of cattle to brand, there is in fact a degree of compulsion in this Bill. I wish to get clarity from the hon. the Minister in regard to the provisions of Clause 18. As the Minister knows there are a large number of farmers—I speak for the Transvaal and the Bushveld areas—who have brand marks on their cattle which are not registered. In some case the marks have been passed on from father to son. In most cases where a brand mark has been retained throughout the years those people are prominent breeders although that mark has never been registered as a mark. I should like to ask the hon. the Minister this question, because it says in Clause 18—

(a) subject to the provisions of sub-section (2), brand any livestock with a brand which is not registered.

If this Bill becomes law the position will be this that those well-known brands, those brands which by now indicate quality as far as the cattle are concerned, will be illegal. My question to the Minister is this: Will those people have the opportunity of applying to the Registrar for the continuation of that particular brand? Because the moment he continues to brand his cattle with the brand which he has been using for years he will, in terms of this Bill, be breaking the law. I think this is an important aspect of the Bill which I hope the Minister will consider. Because if a new system of branding is to be introduced I think provision should be made in the Bill for exemptions. But nowhere in the Bill do I find any provision in terms of which an exemption can be given in respect of a particular mark.

Except in the case of the few I have named.

Yes, as far as breeders are concerned. Take the brand XYZ, for example. People have come to know that as a mark of quality, yet it has not been registered. I would ask the Minister to give some consideration to this aspect that an exemption may be granted by the registrar, perhaps endorsed by the Agricultural Union or the local farmers’ society, in these cases and that that particular mark may be registered even though it does not conform with the system which the Registrar himself has laid down for the Transvaal Province or for the Republic as a whole, because I take it that a completely new system is going to be introduced.

I wish to associate myself very strongly with the plea made by the hon. member for Nelspruit in regard to the numbering of animals. I cannot talk for other provinces but I can talk for my province. It is the practice in the Transvaal amongst numbers of farmers to use a numbering system either for breeding purposes or for checking their herds. The number is usually branded, say, six to nine inches away from the actual registered brand mark. In areas which are thickly populated by cattle it has become a recognized system as an additional form of identification. Also in the case of breeders it is the easiest system which has yet been evolved of checking on the production rate of a cow. There is in fact no easier system for the purposes of keeping records, than the numbering system of the animal itself. I should like to ask the hon. the Minister whether he would consider including some provision in the Bill in the Committee Stage in terms of which the Registrar will be empowered to give an exemption in certain circumstances where a case has been made out. I think the Minister should tell us in his reply whether the intention is to introduce a completely new system of branding throughout the Union when this Bill becomes law and whether the existing systems in each province will be put aside completely. I would like to have complete clarity on that point from the hon. the Minister, because I believe the farming community want clarity in that regard.

The Minister and other hon. members have mentioned the fact that it is necessary to have some control over branding to protect the hides. I would support any measure which is introduced for that purpose. I was amazed the other day to hear from the officials of the Government who deal with hides and skins that in the case of the Transkei where we have over 2,000,000 sheep and over 1,000,000 head of cattle, the wool cheque is only £1,000 more annually than the cheque for hides and skins. So if the hides were better cared for the income of the area will be even greater than the income from wool. It is difficult to believe, but that that is what the officials have told me.

I hope the hon. the Minister has had consultations with the hon. the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development in regard to the application of this Bill to the Native reserves. The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg (District) (Capt. Henwood) has referred to the difficulties which have been experienced in applying the Stock Theft Act to Natal. I can assure the hon. the Minister that it will be much more difficult to apply that Act to the Native reserves. In that Act the Minister is given the power to exclude certain areas from the operation of the Act and I have no doubt that representations will be made to him to exclude certain Native reserves from the operation of that Act. I should like the Minister to give us an undertaking that when we come to the Committee Stage of this Bill he will insert a clause which will empower him to exclude certain areas from the operation of this Bill when it becomes law.

My idea is not that the Native reserves should be excluded for all time from the operation of a measure of this kind but what I do ask for, Sir, is that it should be applied gradually, that we do not apply this Bill as it stands to-day to the reserves. I ask for that because in the first instance you will have great difficulty in explaining it to the Bantu people and secondly you will have great difficulty in applying the Act. As the Minister will know the Bantu do brand, although admittedly they do not brand with hot irons as much as they use the ear mark, but they do brand. I can imagine the confusion which will follow amongst the Bantu when they find that they are not allowed to brand unless they have had that brand registered. It will mean that every member of the Bantu race who wants to brand his cattle in future will have to apply to the Registrar for a brand. The Registrar will have to issue a different brand for each Bantu, not only for the stock as a whole, but for each house. Where the Bantu have a different brand for each house it will mean that they will have to have different registered brands for the various houses if they wish to continue marking in that way. I want to support the plea made by the hon. member for South Coast (Mr. D. E. Mitchell) that the Minister delete the provisions in regard to the cancelling of marks. I am not talking about the cancellation of registered brands, but the cancellation of the brand itself. The Minister and hon. members opposite will no doubt often have seen cattle from Native areas and the disfigurement caused by the obliteration of marks. If a stock thief or even a person who becomes a owner of a beast legally, wishes to alter a mark he often cuts the whole mark out. He sometimes cuts the whole ear off, as my hon. friend has said. He obliterates the mark with a hot iron or he cuts it out completely with a knife. Just imagine the suffering of the animal in cases like that, Sir. I say, therefore, that I would rather see it being made an offence for anybody to obliterate a mark instead of giving him legal permission to do so.

When business was suspended I was dealing with the cancellation of marks. I said to the Minister that I would prefer to see it made an offence to cancel a mark rather than to make provision in this Bill for a mark to be cancelled. I also pointed out that as far as the Natives were concerned there were innumerable marks. A Native owner would not only hold cattle in his own name but he would hold them in the name of the different houses. He may have a different mark for every house. The difficulty will be to register all those marks. The Minister of Bantu Administration and Development will bear me out that under Native custom, such as the lobola system, for instance, cattle often change hands. Under the lobola system the cattle have often to be returned and if the cattle are going to be marked by the one owner and then returned to the original owner you may get the same beast with three brands on it, each one cancelled as the beast is transferred and when the beast is returned to the original owner he gets branded for the fourth time. I hope, therefore, that as far as the Bantu are concerned this Bill will not be applied at once.

There is a further difficulty in respect of the branding of sheep. In terms of this Bill a brand is not a brand if it is made with paint on large stock. I take it then that it is a brand if it is made on small stock. If a Native, or a European for that matter, marks his sheep with paint it becomes a brand and unless that brand is registered he commits an offence. I know that there is another Act which makes it an offence to brand sheep with paint unless the paint is a washable oil so that the wool is not damaged. I think it only becomes an offence when the wool so branded is offered for sale; I do not think it is an offence to brand the animal as such. The Minister will know that they do mark their sheep and I feel that in terms of this Act it is going to become an offence. Because even if they do use a washable oil it may still be described as a paint. You will find that the Bantu in particular do mark their sheep in this way. I should like the hon. the Minister to tell us in his reply whether it will be an offence for them to mark their sheep in that way, that is, to use a paint. I am raising these points now because we want to know what amendments we must prepare to move in the Committee Stage. The Minister may say that these matters should be raised in Committee but we want to know how the Bill is going to operate as it stands.

As I pointed out before the Stock Theft Act which is now applied to the reserves is causing considerable difficulty. I think the Minister of Justice will be approached one of these days by the Minister of Bantu Administration to suspend the operations of that Act in the reserves. In terms of the Stock Theft Act he can do so because there is a provision which reads as follows—

So he can exclude certain areas or certain types of stock or produce from the operation of that Act. All I am asking is that in the Committee Stage the Minister will agree to include a provision in this Bill which will empower him to suspend the operation of this Act from certain areas. I do not think he has that power as the Bill stands at the moment. That is why I am appealing to him now to include such a provision.

There is another point, Sir, with regard to the marking of cattle and sheep at sales. The Minister will know that it is the custom, especially in the reserves to mark the cattle with paint. If the cattle are going to remain in the reserve for even a week or longer before trucks can be obtained or transport arranged from the reserves, it is necessary to hot-brand them. Different brands are used by the buyers not necessarily their own brand but the brand which the auctioneer gives them. You will find that buyers, particularly speculators, often use more than one brand on the same sale. They buy the cattle for different purposes with the result that different brands are used by the same owner. As there is a number of buyers at the same sale the auctioneer is the person who keeps the branding irons and he decides which iron will be used. That will also cause difficulty especially in the reserves where the Native Trust organize the sales and invite speculators and buyers to come from other parts of the country to buy cattle there. I want to know from the Minister whether the auctioneer who has such branding irons in his possession will be committing an offence because those branding irons could be used for hot-branding as well; indeed, they are used for hot-branding. I want to make quite sure that the auctioneer who has these branding irons for a good purpose will not be committing an offence in terms of this Bill.

I return to sheep. Sheep must be marked at a sale. They are marked with oils and not branded. I want the Minister to make it quite clear that the marking of sheep with oils at a sale will not constitute an offence unless that brand is registered. You cannot expect every buyer who comes to a sale to have a brand registered. He may only be there to buy one or two animals for some special purpose and he may not necessarily have a brand registered. He and the auctioneer may be placed in this position that they will be committing an offence if they mark the sheep with oil described as paint.

I am glad the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development is here. I will be pleased if the hon. the Minister who introduced this Bill will tell us whether he has had consultation with the Department of his colleague in respect of the drafting of this Bill and in respect of its application to the Native reserves.

Mr. Speaker I should like to thank hon. members on both sides of the House for having supported the broad principles contained in this Bill. Of course it was to be understood that there would be certain misgivings. However, I should like to say that the greatist objections in principle raised by members on both sides are in connection with Clause 13. Originally there was a clause in the Bill providing for the compulsory cancellation of brands, once an animal changed hands. I agree with the idea that has been expressed that if we were to permit that in principle, you would really be destroying the most valuable provisions of the Bill, because if you permitted a method of cancellation of brands, either by a cross-line drawn across the brand or something else, you would be opening the way for stock thieves to falsify that cancelled mark and then there would be no proof that the animals belonged to somebody else. Now the principle of the cancellation of a brand has been omitted from this Bill. Because the principle of cancellation has been deleted, it seems to me that Clause 13 as it now stands is superfluous, and I am prepared to move an amendment in the Committee Stage for it to be deleted. With that there will then also fall away the five-yearly re-registration of brands, as well as the power the Minister has under Clause 13 (2) (b) that such notification may be given in any form, and then also the objection that it shall be published in the Gazette only, and not by the agricultural unions, falls away. I believe that where the Bill in other respects makes provision for the cancellation of the registration of a brand, it goes far enough. One need not cancel the brand itself. Where this Bill possibly in some respects still causes misunderstanding in respect of the cancellation of a brand as such, I shall undertake to put it right before the Committee Stage, and if I am unable to do so in this House, I shall do so in the Other Place. The object of the Bill is that we seek only to cancel the registration of a brand because there may be offences committed by a person who has a registered brand, and he accordingly will have to be deprived of his brand. Then you should have the power to cancel the registration of the brand in his name, and also in other cases of deaths and estates, and of persons in whose name a brand may be registered, but who for some reason no longer use it. Then you want to cancel it out of his name, but you want to have the right to allot it to a new applicant. Does the hon. member for South Coast follow me now?

I understand, but do not agree.

Where we should really differ is in the Committee Stage. I am prepared to accept any reasonable proposal which will make this Bill as reasonable as possible. I do not want to create any hardships for anyone. I want the greatest possible co-operation from all interested parties.

The question has been put to me by the hon. member for South Coast (Mr. D. E. Mitchell) as to the meaning of “any thing”. It means any thing whether it is alive or dead, which may be needed as proof by the police to prove their case. Where the hon. member talks about a brand, it really means a hot brand and not a mark, whether it is made in oil or with paint. The Bill refers only to marks put on an animal by a hot iron, so that it will be a permanent mark. That is the meaning of the word “brand” in this Bill. No other mark, whether it is placed on an animal by an iron, whether it is dipped in paint or not, can be registered, neither will the use thereof be regarded as an offence in terms of this Bill.

Where does the Bill say so?

If it does not say so quite precisely in the opinion of the hon. member, we can make the necessary provision in the Committee Stage to make it more clear.

Do you accept the word “permanent”?

I cannot introduce the word “permanent”, because then you will have to define it. Even a hot brand, if it only scorches the hair, may be regarded by the owner as being permanent, but other people may not regard it as permanent. Then you must define “permanent” and “temporary”, and I think that would be a most complicated definition. For that reason we must leave it as it is, that only hot brands can be registered and the tattoo marks on sheep.

Therefore all oil brands on sheep will not be included in that definition.

No, if you have made an oil mark or a paint mark on an animal, we do not call it a brand. You have simply given it a number or a name, but it is not a brand. In Afrikaans "brand" means a mark made with a hot iron which is intended to be permanent. Accordingly, all the other kinds of marks, whether you made them on the ear or on the body, are excluded from this Bill.

Now we come to sheep. The hon. member for Transkeian (Mr. Hughes) referred to that. The only permanent mark we recognize in respect of sheep, that may be register under this Act, is not a tattoo mark on the ear, because you can remove it too easily. We contemplate a tattoo mark somewhere on the body, behind the shoulder, that is permanent but which you cannot readily see from the outside, but if you pull the sheep down you will be able to see the mark. In respect of the general question whether we contemplate a new series of marks, my reply to the hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant) is emphatically yes. If we wish to apply the law throughout the Republic, it follows necessarily that we have to devise a new series of brands that can be registered. It is not such an easy matter. I believe it will take several months before we will have clarity on what that series will look like. That is why it cannot be provided beforehand already that the brands that have already been registered in the Transvaal, will be included in this series, for it may prove to be quite impracticable. But now the Act provides that in the meantime, before this Bill comes into operation, those brands will still be regarded as registered brands in the Transvaal, and have the force not only of proving identification, but also ownership, for it can be proved that it has been the registered mark of the man; and even if this Bill is in operation, and such animals are stolen, and the owner decides he no longer wishes to have a brand registered, then I think the Stock Theft Act really comes into operation. I should like to tell the House, as general knowledge that this Livestock Brands Bill does not replace the Stock Theft Act. It is only an additional thing or means that will be placed on the Statute Book to make the Stock Theft Act work more easily. But we cannot combat the whole evil of stock theft by registered brands alone. As regards the various loose figures, the reply is exactly the same. If this series of brands is worked out, and figures are not used in the series, I cannot see why it cannot be provided by regulation that people may even brand a number. But if the series includes numbers, it will be a dangerous thing to permit other numbers to be branded.

I should like to ask you whether it is not clear that once this Bill becomes law, one of its consequences will be that eventually all farmers will have to brand their animals?

The question is whether the difficulty exists that all people will have to re-brand their livestock. The fact is that it is provided here that all people who wish to make use of a branding iron will have to register the brand after this Bill has come into operation and the series has been compiled. I may just say that people who have had registered brands, will be able to acquire a new registered brand without any extra charge.

But he will have to rebrand.

He may re-brand but he is not obliged to. The man who has a registered brand, can decide that he is not going to register again and that he will take the risk because under the old registration he has had adequate protection. There is no duty on anyone who used a brand before this Bill comes into operation, when he registers a brand again, to brand his livestock with it again but he may do so if he wishes. Even in the Transvaal that is so. The hon. member for Nelspruit (Mr. Faurie) says he never rebrands livestock he has bought from somebody else while he has a registered brand, because he does not want so many brands on his animals. So it is optional and no owner is compelled to register a brand.

As regards the other matter the hon. member for South Coast has referred to, that we should go slowly, because I mentioned that it may possibly culminate in compulsory branding of livestock—I agree with him. There is not the slightest intention to enforce this upon the farmers, but I believe that in course of time people will realize the value of such a registered brand, to the extent that public opinion may compel the State to amend the law and to make it compulsory. It may be after my time, but I believe that this Bill has this value to a farmer who desires protection, and that it will pay him to do so.

To the hon. member for Transkeian Territories I should like to say that there has been the closest cooperation and consultation between Bantu Administration and myself. That is why, in the first place, an exception is made for group brand marks the Department itself wishes to apply. But further discussions are still in progress and we are considering the possibility of introducing an amendment at the Committee Stage that will result in the use of brands for various Bantu tribes. The Transkei now has a brand which we are exempting, which indicates that it is a Transkeian animal, but in the Transkei there may be tribes which want to have a tribal brand, and we are considering that. I should like to give the assurance that we want to be as careful as possible with the Bantu, for we want to take him along with us. But I am afraid that if he wants to apply a hot brand to his animals, as distinct from the tribal mark, to show that it is his property, he will be compelled to register a brand in his name. But there are enough ways in which you can mark your own cattle, perhaps by a mark on the ear, even if it is not quite permanent. But if you want to distinguish your livestock permanently from the others, then we cannot permit some people to use branding irons and others not. I am thinking, e.g. of what the hon. member has said in respect of animals that are sold at an auction sale. I think that if people who have registered brands go to an auction, the least you can expect of them is that they should take their branding irons along with them. [Interjection.] The speculator may also register a brand for himself, but he will not be permitted under this Act to use a hot branding iron if it is not registered in his name. The speculator can also use other means of identification. If it is not practicable to pull down an ox at an auction and give it a permanent brand with a hot iron, he can apply other marks that are not applied with hot irons. But if you want to permit the speculator to use branding marks that are registered at auctions why then do you want to compel the farmers to brand only with registered irons? I think it is a basic principle that will have to be maintained that only brandmarks that are registered may be used to place a permanent mark on an animal. If we abandon that principle we have nothing. I think that will be generally appreciated.

I feel I have now replied to most of the points and objections, particularly now that Clause 13 falls away.

I also referred to the special stud mark.

But I have already said we are making exceptions in respect of pedigree livestock, but that mark is not registered. The stud farmer can still decide that he also wishes to have a registered brand, and then he may do so, but he is not compelled to do so. I think we can discuss the various points to greater advantage in the Committee Stage.

Before requesting the Secretary to read the next Order of the Day I should like to make a few remarks in connection with the instruction to the Committee of the Whole House on the General Law Amendment Bill of which notice has been given by the hon. member for Germiston (District) (Mr. Tucker).

The purpose of an instruction is to request the House to empower a Committee of the Whole House on a Bill to consider the advisability of incorporating therein amendments which, although relevant or cognate to the subject matter of the Bill, introduce new and important principles not contemplated by the House at the second reading of the Bill. There is, however, another type of amendment which is either foreign to or destructive of the principles of the Bill as read a second time and which cannot be introduced even on an instruction.

The hon. member for Germiston (District) in his instruction requests the House to grant leave to the Committee on the General Law Amendment Bill to consider the advisability of making provision therein for a right of appeal to the courts by any aggrieved person. In terms of this legislation any decisions which the Minister has to make are final, and in my opinion an amendment which gives an aggrieved person the right to appeal to the courts of law against such decisions would be completely destructive of that principle. I therefore regret that I cannot allow the instruction to be moved.

I want to move—

I have no objection to that suggestion.

Agreed to.

On Clause 2.

Clause 2 relates to an organization which, in the opinion of the State President (which means the Cabinet or the Minister) is carrying on the activities of an unlawful organization. If we read the whole clause or section, as it will now be completed, it provides that the State President may declare an organization unlawful if he is satisfied that (a) the organization professes Communism, or (b) the object of the organization is to further Communism, or (c) the organization engages in activities which are calculated to further the aims of Communism as defined in the Act, or (d) the organization is controlled by a communistic organization, or (e)—which is the new provision now being inserted—the organization carries on or has been established for the purpose of carrying on, directly or indirectly, any of the activities of an unlawful organization. Now, I think. Mr. Speaker, that we should examine for what type of organization the Minister tends to use his additional powers of banning, and why he declares certain organizations to be illegal or unlawful. I must refer, of course, particularly to one committee, the Centlivres Committee for the Defence of Civil Rights. That is the one the Minister attacked so venomously. In referring to this organization, in regard to which the Minister has shown that he has the most absurd suspicions, we must not overlook the fact that he did not even know its name. He confused it with another organization, the Civil Rights League. May I ask him whether he intends to us the powers given to him by this clause to ban either or one or both of these organizations?

To which one do you belong?

I belong to neither, as it happens. [Interjection.] But now I know quite a lot about these organizations since the Minister made his mistake in the last debate of identifying me with the Civil Rights League and then identifying that organization with Communists …

For which he did not apologize.

Of course he would not apologize; he does not have the decency in him to apologize …

On a point of order, must the hon. member not withdraw that?

Well, I will withdraw it so that I can go on with this debate but the Minister said some pretty disgraceful things …

Order! The hon. member must withdraw that.

What must I withdraw?

Order! The hon. member must withdraw what he said unconditionally.

I withdraw the word complained of. Let us not overlook the fact that the Minister made fantastic allegations against ex-Chief Justice Centlivres; the Minister said that he was acting on the instructions of Chief Luthuli …

With which clause are you dealing now?

What I say is in connection with the clause which gives the Minister the power to ban organizations like this Defence of Civil Rights Committee, which is headed by the Hon. Mr. Justice Centlivres, who is its chairman. I am referring to the fact that the Minister has clearly shown that anyone who opposes this Government is called a communist and that he intends to ban organizations consisting of law-abiding people. He has no hesitation in calling great, honourable South Africans communist agitators …

That is untrue.

Of course it is untrue. The Minister said in the second-reading debate that this Committee for the Defence of Civil Rights is led by the Congress of Democrats, and then he went on to say that the Congress of Democrats are communists. He said that I subscribed to an organization which is led by communists, and inspired by communists. Now, in terms of this enlarged clause he can declare an organization unlawful if that “organization is controlled by a communists organization”. In fact, he did say it was. As he believes that, so he can use this section as it now stands, getting additional powers from the amending clause where he introduces the vague term “directly or indirectly”, in order to ban these two organizations. He may ban organizations like these as “unlawful organizations” and thus classify people like Prof. Beinart, Mrs. Ballinger, Adv. D. B. Molteno, the Ven. Wood, the Very Rev. King (the Archdeacon and the Dean of Cape Town) and Mrs. Stoy of the National Council of Women, in addition to ex-Chief Justice Centlivres, with communists, merely because they oppose this Government. I say that we will not let him ride roughshod over us in this way; we will not let him goosestep over the grave of democracy, which he is now digging. I say that this clause will be used in a shameful way. I say that the Minister should not be trusted with the powers contained in this measure. I say this because he has shown that he judges by hearsay; he is the judge and he is going to decide what should be done in terms of this clause; he decides whether an organization is or is not “unlawful ’. What a judge! He listens to telephone snoopers and bases his decisions on what he hears …

Order!

I am showing, I hope, that this Minister is incapable of exercising the proper judgment necessary in order to carry out the terms of this clause equitably, unbiassedly or justly. I say that we cannot expect justice from him. I say further that he has proved that he acts on hearsay, on malicious slander. What a judge, what justice! He has shown that he relies on unchecked telephone-tapping stories. That is the only way in which he could have got the information on which he based his false charge against me. I challenge him to deny that allegation. Added to that he did not even know how to distinguish the one organization from the other! Sir. I conclude by saying that we cannot and will not be prepared to grant powers of this wide nature to a Minister who has shown himself quite unfit to exercise impartial justice in any cause that might come before him.

I really do not think it is even necessary to reply to the tirade which we have had from the hon. member who has just sat down. We are accustomed to his advancing that type of argument when he is cornered. I do not wish therefore to reply to the type of nonsense we have had from him because we are conducting a decent debate in which decent people are trying to convince each other.

On a point of order, is the hon. member entitled to insinuate that the hon. member for Wynberg (Mr. Russell) is not a fit person to take part in what he describes as a decent debate?

The hon. member may continue.

It is quite clear from Clause 2 what is envisaged and which kind of organizations the hon. the Minister has in mind. We have often been faced with the problem in the past that having gone through the long procedure of banning unlawful organizations, a new organization simply pops up under a new name which carries on along the same lines and then the whole process has to be gone through again to ban that new organization which is simply a successor of the previous one. Those organizations are the only ones which are aimed at in this clause. If the Minister is convinced that the new organization is simply a continuation of the old one, he should have the right to ban it. It is a very clear fact that those are the organizations which this clause is aimed at and I appeal to the hon. the Minister to insist upon this clause.

I do not know what the long processes of the law are to which the hon. member for Smithfield (Mr. J. J. Fouché) referred. As far as I can see the hon. the Minister has vast powers already in terms of the existing laws. The section which the hon. the Minister wants to amend by means of this clause, that is, Section 2 of the principal Act, already gives him vast powers. In terms of this section as it stands he may ban any organization that professes. Communism, propagates or furthers the principles or objects of Communism, which engages in activities which are calculated in the opinion of the hon. the Minister to further those objects, or even one which is controlled by any other organization of the kind just mentioned. He has very vast powers already to ban any organization which he believes is calculated to further the aims or objects of Communism. But every now and then the Minister strikes a snag. Some organization that he has banned, some meeting that he has banned, some gathering of persons that he bans, appeals against the ban and the Minister finds every now and then that he loses the case in the courts of law. Sir, these are not long processes of the law that we are talking about; they are the normal rights of redress enjoyed by people whom the hon. the Minister has banned or gatherings that he has banned. As I say, he already has vast powers in terms of Section 2 of the principal Act. People have appealed against his decision in the courts of law and they have had redress there. It is to this, Sir, That the hon. the Minister takes exception and that is why he now comes forward with an amendment to Section 2 of the principal Act, which in fact will empower him to ban the activities of any organization, even if such activities were entirely lawful and had nothing whatever to do with Communism. It also enables the hon. the Minister to ban any organization which indirectly in his opinion, may be carrying out the objects of an organization which has been banned—directly or indirectly. For instance, one might even get to a stage where the hon. the Minister decides that an organization which has been set up to try to raise funds to defend persons whom the Minister is prosecuting under the Act, should be banned. Any organization of this kind which attempts to provide normal defence will now be banned by the hon. the Minister, and that is the purpose of this clause. It is not the long processes of the law that the hon. the Minister is trying to circumvent; it is in fact any redress to the courts whatsoever. Sir, I hope that this House, if it has any concept of democracy as it is practised in any other country in the world this side of the Iron Curtain, will think very hard indeed before it grants the hon. the Minister even more extensive powers than he now possesses under the principal Act. I hope therefore that the Committee will negative this clause.

In reply to the hon. member who has just sat down I think I can honestly say to this Committee that there is nobody in the Parliament of South Africa whose meetings have been more often prohibited under the Riotous Assembly Act than mine. I, therefore, wish to put a pertinent question to the hon. member. She belongs to the Jewish race. There were seven or eight Jews in Parliament at the time and not a single one of them got up in this House to plead for me the way she is pleading for the communists to-day. The hon. member can check it in Hansard; not a single one of them did. Morris Alexander was here and Morris Kent-ridge and a number of others; they were members of the Jewish Board of Deputies and they did not say a word. I say that if this is a question of freedom of speech, which is what the hon. member professes to be pleading for, then a voice should have been raised in protest from those benches, either by the Opposition or by the Government, in those years when I was persecuted like that by Gen. Smuts.

[Inaudible.]

That hon. member was still in short pants. Mr. Chairman, I want to remove the mask of hypocrisy from the faces of those people who are talking about this clause.

Order! The hon. member must withdraw the word “hypocrisy”.

I withdraw it, Sir, I am sorry that my Afrikaans is so poor that I cannot find another word, but I withdraw it. We should try to get at the root of the motive of those hon. members opposite who are making such a fuss about Clause 2. I want to ask the hon. member for Houghton whether she can tell me what motivated her to make the speech which she did make; and if her motive was an honest one she must explain to me why members of her race did not raise a plea on my behalf when I was deprived of my freedom of speech—and I was never a communist. I just want to tell the hon. member that my forefathers with their blood …

The hon. member must return to the clause.

I just want to tell her that I had a greater right to freedom of speech in my country than any communist. Why do hon. members plead to-day that the communists should have freedom of speech but when other citizens were deprived of their right to freedom of speech they did not plead their cause.

I think I must reply to the hon. member who has just sat down before I deal with the matter which is under discussion at the moment. I regard it as the grossest impudence on the part of the hon. member for Karas (Mr. Von Moltke) to get up here and to suggest that a member of the Jewish faith who happened to be a member of this House should have pleaded for the right for Grey Shirts to preach publicly …

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

Mr. Chairman, surely you will give me the opportunity of replying to the hon. member.

Order! The hon. member must deal with the clause.

I will come back to the clause in a moment, but surely I have a right to answer the hon. member on what I regard as a gross slur …

Order! The hon. member must deal with the clause or resume his seat.

With great respect, Sir, I am just replying to the hon. member.

On a point of order, the hon. member …

Order! Will the hon. member resume his seat.

On a point of order, are we to understand that hon. members are not entitled to address you on a point of order?

The hon. member is not entitled to address me on a point of order on which I have given my ruling.

On a point of order, Mr. Chairman, you have not listened yet to the hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant); he may have a different point of order entirely; it may have nothing to do with your ruling. Is that what we are going to be subjected to?

Order! What is the hon. member’s point of order? Has it anything to do with my ruling?

No, it is a point of order in respect of the statement made by the hon. member for Karas.

Order! That is not a point of order. Will the hon. member resume his seat.

Is the hon. member not to be allowed to say what point of order he wishes to raise?

The Chairman does not know what your point of order is.

My point of order is whether an hon. member in this House is entitled to make an attack upon the religious faith of other hon. members?

Order! That is not a point of order.

And if I shouted “Heil Hitler” to hon. members opposite?

Don’t be insulting.

Order! Will the hon. member proceed.

Mr. Chairman, in deference to your wishes I propose now to leave the hon. member for Karas alone.

Treat him with contempt.

I really think that this clause is drafted in the widest possible terms. In terms of this clause, as drafted, the Minister takes the power unto himself to deal by way of banning with any organization which carries on or has been established for the purpose of carrying on directly or indirectly any of the activities of an unlawful organization. The hon. the Minister will appreciate that an unlawful organization may carry on lawful undertakings as well as unlawful undertakings, and as I read this clause, the hon. the Minister would be able to ban any organization which carries on any of the activities of an unlawful organization; in other words, let us assume that an unlawful organization carries on some perfectly lawful activity; in terms of this clause the Minister would be entitled to ban such an organization. I do not think the hon. the Minister intends taking such power. I think all he intends doing is to deal with any organization which carries on any of the unlawful activities previously carried on by a baned organization. I do feel that the hon. the Minister should take this clause back for the purpose of further consideration, because as it is presently drafted it would be competent for any Minister of Justice to ban an organization merely because it carries on some of the lawful activities of an organization which has been banned. The clause, to my mind, is so widely drafted, that it will cover any organization carrying on any of the lawful activities of an unlawful organization. If the Minister thinks that additional powers are necessary, then I think this clause should be re-drafted so as to curb the powers of the Minister to deal with organizations which carry on unlawful activities and not lawful activities. I agree with the hon. member for Houghton (Mrs. Suzman) who has already pointed out that under Section 2 of Act 44 of 1950, there already exists adequate powers under which the Minister can deal with any organization which carries on unlawful activities. I say that as this clause reads the Minister—not necessarily this Minister but any Minister of Justice—could curb the activities of any organization even though it carries on lawful activities once it is proved that the activity carried on by it is similar to the activity carried on by an unlawful organization. I urge the hon. the Minister to give re-consideration to the drafting of this Bill.

I cannot understand the argument advanced by the hon. member for Peninsula (Mr. Bloomberg). He did not tell us what legal activities an unlawful organization could indulge in. Can the hon. member give me an example of any legal act which an unlawful organization can do? He did not give us any example, Sir. If an organization is an unlawful one that organization cannot perform any lawful activity. But that is not all; I should also like to know from the hon. member what innocent organization has ever been banned under this Act? All the organizations which have been banned were undermining organizations and nothing else. If the hon. member can give me an example of one organization which was banned and which functioned legally, I would be prepared to listen to him but the hon. member cannot give me such an example. The problem which faces the Minister is the fact that the same people who belonged to the organization which was banned, simply continue their activities under the following organization. You find that they subscribe to the same principles; the same documents are found in their possession; it is exactly the same organization except that it has a new name and the hon. the Minister only wants to take action against those organizations under this Clause, not against innocent organizations. I shall be pleased if hon. members will give us the name of any innocent organization which has been banned in the past

I do not want to go back again to the remarks that the hon. member for Karas (Mr. von Moltke) except to say that he justifies the clause with which we are dealing for a very peculiar reason, and he does so for a still more peculiar cause. Sir. I think the hon. the Minister should take the Committee into his confidence and tell us precisely what type of organization he intends to deal with under this clause. There are a number of organizations in existence, and I think he should tell the Committee precisely what their nature is and why he wishes to deal with them.

The United Party is safe.

Then I come back to the remarks of the hon. member for Smithfield who seems to justify this rather wide and harsh provision on the ground that it would hasten the proceedings. The only hastening of proceedings is that the Minister will now be able, in anticipation, to ban an organization which he will then call the successor to an unlawful organization. Surely the correct procedure in justice is to allow a situation to show itself, and not for the Minister to anticipate what is going to happen. Because that is precisely what this power is that we are now going to give him if it is defined in the way that the hon. member for Smithfield has indicated. Sir, hasty justice is no justice at all, and the hon. the Minister knows that very well. I think that this clause is unduly wide. It is, as I described it in the second reading debate, a monstrous power to give a Minister of Justice, unless he can justify it by examples and I invite him to do so now.

I am surprised at hon. members for attacking this clause the way they are as if it is the first time that they have heard of such a clause in this House or as if it is the first time that hon. members opposite have been asked to vote for such a clause. Those hon. members have very short memories. Not only have they heard about such a clause but they unanimously—each one of them—voted for this clause. This clause has been taken over word for word from Act No. 34 of 1960 which was supported by hon. members opposite. For the purposes of the record I want to read that clause which hon. members voted for and which was transferred word for word from that Act to this Bill. You can then judge for yourself, Sir, whether hon. members on that side have a case or not.

I did not vote for it.

I take it that certain hon. members will say that they did not vote for it. I read the following from Act No. 34 of 1960—

In other words, this section goes much further than the clause to which hon. members opposite are objecting. The position is very clear, as has been stated by hon. members on my side of the House, namely that what we are doing here is to close a loophole which we expect will exist where a communist organization has been banned. The hon. member for Wynberg (Mr. Russell), of course, was quick to rise to his feet, even before the hon. member for Houghton who has an amendment on the Order Paper, whereas his party has not.

She has not.

Read it to us.

If the hon. member looks at his Order Paper, he will see that that is the case. In any case the hon. member for Wynberg availed himself of the opportunity of making a vehement attack upon me in passing. Let me say at once that I do not pay much attention to the attacks made by the hon. member for Wynberg. I just want to tell him in passing that if some people were as courageous as they were arrogant they would have joined Mr. Centlivres on the platform the other day when he addressed a meeting.

His poor son gets pushed forward.

The hon. member possesses a large amount of the one but unfortunately he does possess too much of the other. Let me tell him at once, seeing that he has asked me the question, that I do not in the least intend to ban the organization of Mr. Centlivres. I will definitely do so even less when that hon. member shows the courage of publicly joining that organization, because if he does so I know that this Bill will receive even greater support than it is already receiving to-day. I want to state it very clearly that the object of this clause is purely and simply this that where an organization is banned, as hon. members know, certain machinery has to be set in motion; it takes that machinery months and months to produce a report. Just as happened in the case of Rhodesia we in this country can expect that when organizations are banned, they will immediately re-appear under a different name. I have given hon. members the example of an organization which was banned by the Rhodesian Government. It was none other than a political party which was banned by the Rhodesian Government. The next day that party continued its activities under the same office bearers and in the same offices under the name of the Zimbabwe Peoples Party. If it were done there there is no reason for us to believe that it will not also be done here because the modus operandi of those people is precisely the same, whether they operate in Rhodesia or anywhere else. Hon. members are at liberty to ascribe motives to the Government and to me as much as they want to. I repeat that the only reason why this amendment has been placed before the House is to close loopholes of that nature. I am determined not to allow this kind of organization to make a fool of the Government as it has made a fool of other governments by appearing the next day, after it has been banned, and carrying on with the same activities as though nothing has happened because they have availed themselves of certain technicalities. That is why this clause simply provides that such an organization can be banned without first setting in motion the machinery to obtain a report on the facts, if you are convinced that that organization, directly or indirectly, is continuing to promote the objects of the banned organization. I think, therefore, that it is right and proper that the principal Act be amended and it is obvious that it is definitely not my intention to accept the amendment of the hon. member for Houghton.

I don’t think anyone can deny that both in actions and intention; in our consistent opposition to its aims, we on this side of the House hate Communism as the devil hates holy water, We dislike the communist as much as the hon. the Minister and the hon. member for Karas (Mr. von Moltke) both of whom at one time embraced and practised the doctrine of National Socialism, liked Nazism. We have shown where we stand. The hon. the Minister has now become a lover of law and order; he is only a lover of law and order as long as he makes the law and as long as he barks out the orders. He always attacks our courage when he gets up to speak. I say what I think to him straight out. He resorts to sly innuendo after listening to his little telephone snoopers who come to him with inaccurate, unchecked stories. He does not attack openly and directly, always indirectly, through a backdoor. He now says “I will not ban the Centlivres organization”. Why then did he call it a communist organization. Why then did he say that it was led by communists, by the League of Democrats? Those were his words at the second reading; “the Civil Rights Protection Committee was led by communists”. Now sub-section (d) of this clause refers to “an organization which is controlled by a communist organization”. The Minister said in this House that the Centlivres Committee and its members were controlled by a communist organization. Will he deny that? He better read his Hansard report, and he will see that he said it. Yet now he says he will not ban it. I say that he exhibits more than inconsistency. He exhibits all the tendencies of a man who still believes in National Socialism. We should remember, Sir, that only the accident of our winning the war, prevented him from becoming Gauleither of the Eastern Province.

I think for the purpose of the record, it should be made perfectly clear what the circumstances were under which the Act to which the hon. the Minister has just referred, that is the Unlawful Organizations Act No. 34 of 1960, was passed by this House. Hon. members will remember that at that time, March/April, 1960, the country was in a state of emergency. An emergency had been proclaimed over a vast number of districts in South Africa, and the Government came before Parliament and said that this was an essential measure in order to preserve the security of the state, and to preserve peace and order. Now the hon. the Minister read sub-section (2) of Section 1, and I invited him to read the following sub-section (3), which says “any proclamation issued under sub-sections (1) or (2) shall remain in force for a period not exceeding 12 months”.

That is so.

That the hon. the Minister did not tell us. That is a very vital provision in this Act and one which is so obviously missing in the Bill which is now before us. If that provision had been in the Bill, and I invite the hon. the Minister to put it in, we might view the clause in a different light, but standing as it does now, it goes far beyond the terms of the Act he referred to and tries to use as an example.

I think the hon. the Minister was less than candid when he castigated this side of the House for having supported words similar to those presently being discussed when the Unlawful Organizations Act was dealt with in 1960. The hon. the Minister read a section, a portion of the sub-section concerned where, of course, the words we are dealing with do appear, but one has only to glance for a moment at the context of the amendment we are presently dealing with and compare it with the context of those words in the Unlawful Organizations Act to find that no comparison can be made at all. I invite the hon. the Minister to look again at subsection (2) of Section 1 of the Unlawful Organizations Act, where the words we are dealing with in the Bill presently before the House are directly related to and qualified by the Minister having to be satisfied “that the safety of the public or the maintenance of public order is seriously threatened or is likely to be seriously threatened in consequence of the activities of any organization which, in his opinion, has been established …”, and then follow the words we are dealing with. In other words, he can only make use of that wider qualification if he has satisfied himself as to the requirements of public safety. In that context those words, even if they are capable of the wide interpretation we suggest they are, have a safeguard, quite clearly. But if one looks at the context of Section 2 of the Suppression of Communism Act, and one puts in the amendment which the hon. the Minister now seeks to put in, the wording is absolutely unqualified. All that is required is that the Governor-General must be satisfied in terms of these words, and then he can ban. So quite clearly the hon. the Minister has not scored a point when he attempts …

He has exposed a point.

That is so. The one cannot be used as an argument against the other. There is no comparison. Then the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (North) (Mr. J. A. F. Nel) suggests that one cannot conceive of any lawful act which can be done by an unlawful organization. Well, if he were in trade, I doubt very much whether he would support the point of view that if an unlawful organization tries to pay its debt, it is doing something unlawful. I think the argument of the hon. member for Peninsula (Mr. Bloomberg) stands. At its lowest, this amendment in Clause 2 is capable of two interpretations: the one is that you get at the organization, which, I believe, is the hon. Minister’s intention, and get at a similar organization dealing with similar activities only if it is carrying on its activities for the benefit, so to speak, of the unlawful organization, or if it is doing things which are unlawful because they are what the unlawful organization does. I believe that is what the hon. Minister wants to get at, judging by the speech he has just made, but these words here are so wide that they are quite capable of the interpretation that if there is a mere similarity between one activity of an unlawful organization, although that activity is perfectly lawful in itself, if there is a similarity between that and another activity carried out by some other organization, divorced entirely from the unlawful one, the Minister is thereby empowered to ban the latter of those two organizations. It is that wide. But that is not the hon. Minister’s intention, as I understood his speech. He does not wish to have that power. He wishes merely to get at a similar organization, a rose by another name, which is carrying on the activities which were unlawful when done by the earlier one. If that is his intention, surely his road is clear, and he must modify this clause so that it is not capable of the interpretation which we say it is capable of. He should remove the objectionable part of the clause.

I do not know what the United Party has in mind in opposing this clause. In the first place they have omitted to move any amendments and in the second place the hon. member for Houghton (Mrs. Suzman) has moved an amendment to the effect that the entire clause should be deleted. Had they wished to improve it it would have been their duty to formulate an amendment or amendments; if they want to reject the entire clause it is their duty to second the hon. member for Houghton. They are doing neither of the two.

In the second place, unlike as is provided for in the Suppression of Communism Act, under the Unlawful Organizations Act of 1960 it is within the discretion of the Minister to find that an organization is a danger to the State, and if the Minister, in the exercise of his unlimited discretionary power, finds that he has to ban an organization, then in precisely the same terms as contained in this clause, he can ban the successive organization. I say that it is unadulterated nonsense which hon. members are talking and they know they are talking nonsense when they say that this clause gives the Minister more power than the 1960 Act on unlawful organizations gives him. In this case the provisions are coupled with the Suppression of Communism Act which prescribes a procedure to be followed whereby the original organization should be found to be a communistic organization or one which supports Communism. The only point which hon. members opposite have is that in terms of the Unlawful Organizations Act the proclamation of the Minister is effective for 12 months, and in this case there is no such limit. That is the only point which hon. gentlemen have. Their third attack is based on this that related organization can be drawn into this and even the hon. member for Zululand (Mr. Cadman) was not serious when he advanced that argument. The first and foremost significance of this clause is obviously that the Minister’s power is limited to organizations which carry on the activities of unlawful organizations, in other words, that there is a “nexus” between the organizations themselves and not only between the kind of activities which they perform. Mr. Chairman, if we were to interpret this clause very strictly according to formula, we would perhaps be able to advance the theoretical argument that in certain respects the clause can be abused or even applied to an absurd extent. Very few powers vesting in human beings do not lend themselves to something like that. But when we look at the record of the Government over the past years and when we consider the fact that no Minister who has been so empowered has abused that power—hon. members are laughing but let them mention one instance where the Suppression of Communism Act has been abused—they are not able to meet the challenge and to prove that those powers have been abused. Let them mention one instance where it has been abused. Surely there is this guarantee that the Minister has to account to Parliament, not only to members opposite as a powerless Opposition, but to members on this side as coresponsible members of the governing party. Are you suggesting that these powers will be abused here in South Africa? No, I say the United Party is either wasting time on this clause or putting up meaningless opposition, because had there been any sense in their opposition, they would have moved an amendment or they would have supported the hon. member for Houghton, but they are only talking now to show their ill-will.

The hon. member for Kempton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn) suggests that further amendments should have been introduced in relation to this clause. I cannot see the purpose of any further amendments, because my contention is that under the existing law the Minister has ample powers to deal with the banning of any organization if he feels that the activities of that organization are unlawful. I think that the hon. the Minister has ample powers now. The hon. member for Kempton Park has pointed out that no examples have yet been given of any misuse by the Minister or his predecessor of the existing powers that the hon. the Minister possesses. I cannot give any examples of misuse and I do not suggest for a single moment that there has been any misuse up to now, but what I do suggest is that this clause as it now stands is so wide in its terms that there exists a possibility of misuse in the future, because in terms of this clause the hon. the Minister can, without being answerable to the courts or to Parliament for that matter, at his own discretion declare an organization which he considers is carrying on, directly or indirectly, any of the activities of an unlawful organization, place a prohibition on that organization and ban such an organization. I feel that those powers are far too wide.

What becomes of your argument that I have those powers already?

The hon. Minister has adequate powers under Section 2 of Act 44 of 1950, as amended, to deal with the activities of any unlawful organization.

May I put a question to the hon. member: In view of your conviction that the hon. the Minister has ample powers under the existing Section 2, it is your intention to second the amendment of the hon. member for Houghton?

It is not necessary in terms of the Rules and Orders that that amendment should be seconded, but I am prepared to say that I am in favour of negativing this clause because I think it is unnecessary for the reasons I have mentioned. This clause to my mind widens the scope of the Minister’s powers to such an extent that no organization in future will be safe. The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (North) (Mr. J. A. F. Nel) asked whether we can give any examples of an unlawful organization carrying on lawful activities. There are hundreds of examples that comes to one’s mind. I will just mention one. An organization is established which has as its object the propagation of Communism in the first place. That is unlawful, but its second object is to collect funds for the Cape Times Fresh Air Fund, which is a lawful object. That is one example. The hon. member laughs, but there are hundreds of activities which are lawful and which can be carried on by an unlawful organization. But in terms of this definition if they carry on such lawful activity, the Minister can ban them, despite the fact that some of the activities of such an unlawful organization are perfectly lawful. The hon. the Minister in trying to justify the wide terms of this clause, drew attention to the fact that there exists a similar provision in the Unlawful Organizations Act No. 34 of 1960. As one of the previous speakers has already pointed out when this Act was passed in 1960, it was passed virtually as temporary legislation. And it was passed at a time when this country was faced with an emergency. This clause, however, which we are considering now is intended to become the permanent law of this country.

Does that affect the principle at all?

I should think so. In an emergency this Parliament is prepared to face up to certain steps of a temporary nature, but it is a totally different thing when it is the intention to make it the permanent law of the country. In terms of the Act No. 34 of 1960, the hon. the Minister before he could do any banning had to be satisfied in respect of various things. In the first place the ban was directed against a body known as the Pan African Congress or the body known as the African National Congress, and by proclamation in the Gazette he could ban them. Then in sub-section (2) he could only ban a similar organization if he was satisfied that the safety of the public or the safety of public order was seriously threatened, or was likely to be seriously threatened in consequence of the activities of the organization, and if it had been established in his opinion that it was carrying on the activities of a body which in terms of sub-section (1) had been declared an unlawful organization. In other words, there was the prerequisite to any banning that the Minister had to be satisfied that the safety of the public or the maintenance of public order was seriously threatened. Now in terms of the clause that we are considering at the moment, there is no such prerequisite. The hon. Minister can, either he or his successors, if they so wish ban any organization merely because that organization is carrying on one of the activities of an unlawful organization and notwithstanding the fact that that particular activity happens to be a legal and lawful one. I say that it is unnecessarily wide and I think the Minister would be well-advised in the circumstances to reconsider this clause, particularly as this is likely to remain the permanent law of the country. I suggest to the hon. the Minister that the Minister does not require additional powers, and if he does require further powers, they could be so drafted as to bring them within the scope of reasonableness.

I want to explain once and for all that the object of this clause is nothing more nor less than to make it impossible for a banned organization either directly or indirectly to continue with its activities afterwards. I readily admit that as it stands it is broad, it is wide. But surely I said at the second reading that it was deliberately framed in such a broad and wide way because I did not want to come back to Parliament every second day and because—and I make no apology for this—I wanted to close the loopholes once and for all as far as this legislation was concerned. I will, therefore, not reply again to the arguments to which we have been listening the whole afternoon. That is my attitude in respect of this matter.

The hon. member for Zululand (Mr. Cadman) tried to get away from and to elude the fact that the official Opposition voted for the Unlawful Organizations Act in 1960, by shielding behind the preamble to the relevant Section which reads: “If the Governor-General is satisfied that the safety of the public or the maintenance of public order is seriously threatened”. There is no difference whatsoever between that wording and the wording in this Bill. If the Governor-General is convinced that an organization is dangerous, he can under the Public Safety Act ban that organization, and in this case with which we are dealing at the moment there must first of all be a lengthy investigation. In other words, it is not only a question of the Minister or the Cabinet or the State President having to be convinced. In terms of the 1950 Act a report on the facts has to be submitted and motivated. In other words, this Act goes much further than the 1950 Act to ensure that organizations will not be discriminated against. But in spite of that the Opposition voted for that Act. Let me ask the hon. member for Peninsula this: Does a principle change according to whether you accept it on this day or that day, or does a principle remain the same in all circumstances? My contention is that a principle is not influenced by the time when it is accepted. If it is wrong to accept this principle in these circumstances, in view of the dangers which I have sketched to hon. members which are threatening us on the part of communists and their fellow-travellers, it was equally wrong to accept it in 1960. Time does not affect the principle. A principle remains equally true no matter the circumstances in which you are faced with it. Consequently I do not appreciate hon. members’ argument. I repeat that to the extent to which we interfere with this clause to that extent will we be encouraging that type of organization which hon. members know will be affected by this clause. Hon. members know as well as I do that no innocent organization will be affected by this clause or will even know of its existence.

I think the hon. the Minister in his latest explanation of this clause has given us a most remarkable approach to legislation. The Minister in fact admits that we are right on this side of the House, when we say that this is very widely cast, but he says that it was purposely done so that he need not come back to this House in future to amend the Act.

To be effective for all time.

That is precisely the point that we have made on this side of the House continually. The Minister is taking far more powers than warranted. This is the first time that the Minister has admitted it. What the hon. Minister in effect has just said is that he is taking additional powers because he does not want to come back to Parliament again. The hon. member for Kemp-ton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn) is a lawyer, he admits that this is in effect what this clause does, but all that the hon. member for Kempton Park could say was that we cannot bring any examples of misuse of the powers under the Suppression of Communism Act, and therefore we can trust the hon. the Minister and we can give him the power to curtail and to determine the rights of all these individuals. I must say the remarkable thing about giving this hon. Minister the power is that this hon. Minister is the only Minister of Justice, I think in the history of South Africa, who began his career as a Minister of Justice with the statement to the Afrikaanse Sakekamer, somewhere in the Transvaal, that all rights are getting out of hand.

That is nonsense!

May I ask the hon. member a question? Is he altogether opposed to this clause?

The hon. member will see what happens when the Chairman puts the question. The hon. the Minister said that he wants the powers in this clause because he does not want a repetition of what happened in Rhodesia between the Zimbabwe People’s party and the government there. Well, Sir, the Unlawful Organizations Act banned the A.N.C. and the P.A.C. The P.A.C. and the A.N.C. or any other organization, as has been pointed out, will be affected. If he wants to ban one of them which in his opinion furthers one or more of the objects of the A.N.C. or the P.A.C. he can ban it. Even if it does not and it affects the safety of the State he can ban it. Under this very Act if the Minister suspects that one of the purposes of any organization is to propagate or promote the spread of Communism or further the achievements of Communism he may, by proclamation in the Gazette, declare the organization to be an unlawful organization. So, Sir, if it is Communism which the hon. the Minister is fighting in this clause then he already has the power in terms of the principal Act to deal with them. If he is afraid of the Zimbabwe Peoples’ Party or the A.N.C. or the P.A.C. he was given the power in 1960 to deal with them.

Then he must go through the whole rigmarole.

What an incredible thing for the hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee) to say. The Minister must apply his mind to the organization whether he acts under the clause in this Bill or whether he acts under the old Act; he still has to apply his mind to it.

Of course he has to apply his mind to it.

What the hon. member for Vereeniging seems to forget is this: If this clause were passed into law the hon. the Minister would still have to apply his mind. He still has to determine whether it is an organization which has been established for the purpose of carrying on directly or indirectly any of the activities of an unlawful organization. So he has to apply his mind to it in any case, Sir. If he feels that it is communistic or might further the aims of Communism or has one object which might do so, then he can ban it under the Suppression of Communism Act. If, on the other hand, it is an organization which is not communistic but which he thinks might affect the safety of the State then he can ban it under the Unlawful Organizations Act.

Order! That point has been made.

The hon. the Minister does not in fact need these powers for the purpose that he has said. I should like to ask the hon. the Minister to tell the Committee what he really wants these powers for. I think if the Minister is going to rely for support of this clause on the sentiments expressed by the hon. member for Kempton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn) and the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark (Dr. de Wet) I think the Minister is expecting a lot from a Parliament which hopes to keep any of the powers it has, by saying in effect “Give me all the powers then I won’t have to come back and bother you any more”.

Mr. Chairman, it is a pity that we have to continue in this absolute nonsensical and shocking way of wasting the time of this Committee. I want to tell the hon. member who has just sat down that he has not been in this House for long, but that every piece of legislation of this type was opposed with precisely the same arguments. Even in those cases where the United Party voted in favour of it, it was opposed by the then Labour Party, by Mrs. Ballinger and others, and precisely the same arguments were advanced by Mrs. Ballinger, Mr. Hepple and their supporters. The argument was the same namely that the Minister can abuse his powers. Let us get this very clear. It is quite correct, and it is not necessary for them to make such a hullabaloo about it—of course, the Minister can abuse his powers. Of course he can ban the United Party; of course, he can ban any organization if he wants to. It is not necessary, therefore, for them to make such a hullaballoo about that. He could have done that a long time ago because he has the power today to do so. But if the Minister were to do that, if he were to abuse his powers and ban an organization which was completely innocent, what would the Minister be faced with in such a case? In the first place he has to keep count of the Cabinet. I want to ask the hon. member for Durban (North) (Mr. M. L. Mitchell) this: Does he honestly think that if the Minister abused his powers he would remain in the Cabinet for another week? In that case it will no longer be a so-called Nazi Minister; then it will be the entire Cabinet.

Order! The hon. member may not refer to the Minister as a Nazi Minister.

I said “so-called”—as he is called by them.

Order! The hon. member must not say that either.

Honestly, Mr. Chairman, surely it is quite true what I meant. It is the party opposite which referred to the Minister as a Nazi Minister—not in this House. Their newspapers and their supporters outside did so. It would not be allowed in this House. If the Minister abuses his power he will be faced in the first place with the Cabinet. If he were to abuse his power and were to ban an innocent organization, he would in the second place be faced with the National Party caucus. And thirdly he will be faced with this House. These hon. members would have us believe that the hon. the Minister could simply ban an innocent organization and that that would be the end of the story. Of course it is not the end of the story. The other side of the House say these things time and again. Let us be dear on this point: The Minister can abuse his power, but in that case it still rests with the Cabinet to decide whether he acted correctly; it rests with the National Party caucus and with this House to decide whether he acted correctly, and it rests with the electorate of South Africa to decide whether he acted correctly. If the Minister wishes to abuse his power there are many respects in which he can abuse it. I want to make a test. I want to ask those hon. members this: Do they agree that the A.N.C. had to be banned? I think they agree with that. In any case they agree that the P.A.C. had to be banned. I now want to ask the hon. member for Durban (Point) this question: If he agrees that the P.A.C. had to be banned and imagine the leaders were Sebukwe and Nandela and a number of those people. Very well the day after the Minister has banned the P.A.C. they form, not another P.A.C., but a P.A.D. or a P.A.K. or something else, but Mandela is chairman and Sebukwe is secretary—exactly the same people. The hon. member for Durban (North) should be reasonable. If something like that happens does he not think the Minister should have the power to put an end to it immediately?

He has the power.

He has not got the power. The position to-day is this that before the Minister can ban an organization he must institute an investigation. Reports have to be submitted and a long procedure has to be followed before he can ban an organization because if he does not do that the organization can go to court. It is a process which takes months. The point is this that the P.A.C. which was banned yesterday, reappears to-day as the P.A.D. but the leaders are the same—Sebukwe, Mandela and the rest of them. The Minister cannot ban them. He must first go through the whole procedure again.

May I ask a question?

No, I do not want to reply to the question. As I say, the Minister must go through the whole procedure once again. Only one duty rests on those hon. members opposite and that is to say that they refuse to give this power to the Minister. If they think that the Minister should have the power when an organization such as the P.A.C. is banned to-day and reappears tomorrow as the P.A.D. with precisely the same members, to ban that organization, they should get up and say it. If they think the Minister should have that power, and if they think this clause goes too far and that it can be done in some other way, those “bright boys” should get up and tell us in what other way it can be done. Mr. Chairman, if they were to move amendments I am quite convinced that if the Minister were sure that they would serve his purpose, he would consider those amendments. But not one of them has advanced any argument along those lines. I do not believe that hon. members opposite are communists. I do not believe that the majority of them support that type of person, but they are only doing what they are doing to create the impression in the world outside that the Minister is taking far greater powers than he needs and that he is taking these powers in order to abuse them to the detriment of innocent organizations. I say that is a shocking allegation. Had there been any ground for it it would have been a different matter. If one member opposite could give one example or a few examples where former Ministers of Justice, with all the powers they had taken, had abused those powers, they might perhaps have had a case. In that event people would have been scared. In that event they would perhaps have made me scared of giving the Minister such wide powers. But they did not give a single example of that nature to the House. I repeat this Mr. Chairman: If hon. members opposite cannot reply to this they have lost their case completely. If there is such an organization and it reappears the following day under the same people, with one or two insignificant amendments to its constitution, should the Minister have the power to ban it? I say that if they are not prepared to reply to this question they are not serious in this debate and they are only wasting time.

The hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee) wants an answer to his question. I want to tell him, Sir, that you do not have to be a bright boy to be able to read an Act passed by this Parliament. The answer to his question is very simple, it is this: He asks what is the Minister to do if the A.N.C. or the P.A.C. is banned and to-morrow operates under the name P.A.D.? The answer to that is that if the Governor-General or the State President as he is to-day, is satisfied under the Unlawful Organizations Act that the A.N.C. or the P.A.C. has reappeared in a different form he has the power under that Act to ban it. That is the simple answer to that question.

Why did you oppose that Act?

Once again, Sir, one does not have to be very bright to have a memory so good as to be able to cast one’s mind back to 1960. I was not here then, Sir, but I know that we supported this. That was the time of the emergency; perhaps the very dull gentleman over there has forgotten that. Another thing which the other dull boys in that corner seem to have forgotten is that it was to be banned for a period of one year at a time. That was renewed the other day during the course of this Session. It is ridiculous for the hon. member for Vereeniging to come here and to say that if we can prove one case where the Minister has abused his powers we will have a case. That shows abysmal ignorance of what this clause is about.

Why?

Why? I will tell the hon. member why. Because the purpose of this House, as I understand it, is to legislate; to make laws so that the individuals will know what their rights are under the law. Not so that the Minister can determine what their rights are. That is not the rule of law. The rule of law, Sir, which the hon. the Minister earlier in the Session described as a useful political slogan, means simply and plainly that you are entitled to know what your rights are under the law, and to be governed by the law. That is how we on this side of the House understand the law. My answer to the hon. member is that the individual must know what his rights are under the law and he must not have to rely on whether the hon. the Minister will be nice to him or will not be nice to him. The hon. member over there does not believe that the Minister can do anything which is wrong. He does not believe that he will misuse his powers. He may be right; I do not know. But I do not think it is the function of this House to determine the character of the Minister. It is the function of this House to determine what powers and functions he shall have over the individual.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee) objects to the somewhat lengthy process which is peculiar to our system and under which there is a greater chance of justice prevailing, having to be followed. Like many other people, the hon. member has also been involved in a court case. In his case it did not relate to Communism, but to pornography.

That is untrue.

How would he have felt if in a case in which he was seeking his rights, the judge could simply use his own discretion without the required legal procedure being followed, and if the judge had been permitted simply to take a hasty decision. Our whole parliamentary system is in fact based on checks to eliminate over-hastiness. The mere fact that we have a House of Assembly and a Senate is due to the fact that, even with the large number of legislators which we have to examine matters, we do not want a Bill of the house of Assembly to become law until it has first gone through the Senate. We are opposed to undue haste, because we want to make sure that justice will prevail. Hon. members opposite are now raising the objection that the Minister cannot act quickly enough. Mr. Chairman, the measure of delay which exists under the present powers and which place some restriction on the Minister are in fact basic to the whole democratic system, and that position should remain.

The hon. member for Port Elizabeth North (Mr. J. A. F. Nel) has said that an unlawful organization or an organization which has been banned cannot have lawful objects. Most communistic organizations want the mines to be nationalized. That is one of their many objects. But there is a Minister in the Cabinet who has that same object.

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

I am mentioning this to show how wide the Minister’s powers are. One the basis of one such object the Minister can summarily ban such an organization without any inquiry into its general objects. Mr. Chairman, the crux of the matter here is just this. This side of the House feels that no matter what degree of delay the present procedure may embody in order to ensure justice as far as possible, the hon. the Minister has the necessary powers to ban any successor organization without undue delay. The A.N.C. and the P.A.C. have long since already been banned, and identical organizations have not replaced them, as hon. members opposite apparently seem to fear will happen. That has not happened yet. It this has happened, I shall be glad if the Minister will give us the facts. But even if that should happen, we on this side feel that the Minister has the necessary powers to deal with such a situation. Secondly I listened carefully to the Minister during the Second Reading debate, and I must say that my impression was that he is a most imprecise Minister, judging by the remarks he makes. He is so strongly prejudiced politically that I form the impression that he does not investigate a matter sufficiently before summarily forming an opinion regarding such matter. We know the Minister, he is inclined to form an opinion regarding a person or organization without well-founded evidence. I therefore say that the behaviour of the Minister is such that I do not have sufficient confidence in his descretion to give him these further powers.

The accusation that I am politically biased has now come from the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. J. D. du P. Basson). It is true, Mr. Chairman, that I feel very strongly about matters and principles. But the hon. member will obviously not appreciate that because he does not think in terms of principles but in terms of seats. There is obviously a vast difference.

I want to repeat that the sole object of this clause is to deprive a banned organization of the right to continue existing in any form. I think that nobody, who listened to the debate impartially, does not know that this is the intention and does not grasp that this is the intention. But I wish to add that the communists will be laugh heartily up their sleeves to think that, if we do not take steps, we could be such fools that we go through the entire process—in which they do not believe; which they have never respected and which will certainly not continue to exist if they get their way—that because of the type of arguments which have so far been advanced, we are prepared to allow them to continue doing as much harm as they possibly can until those processes have come to an end, in spite of the fact that we know, as the hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee) that it is the same persons with the same aims with which we are dealing. They will indeed think that we are the biggest fools in the world and they have every right to think so, if we do not now put an end to that type of action by legislation in Parliament.

The hon. the Minister sought to answer the hon. member for Zulu-land (Mr. Cadman) by referring to the fact that an investigation must take place before the powers in Section 2 of the Suppression of Communism Act could be invoked. But I want to point out to the hon. the Minister that this safeguard, if it can be called one, certainly does not apply so far as concerns the new power which the Minister is taking in Clause 2 (b) of the Bill which inserts a new sub-section (c) in Section 2.

Because it is the same organization

Clause 13 of the present Bill excepts organizations referred to in subsection (e) of Section 2, and consequently there need not be any investigation whatsoever. The point made by the hon. member for Zululand was that the hon. the Minister did not under Section 2 have to satisfy himself that the safety of the Republic or the maintenance of law and order was seriously threatened.

If you are dealing with the same organization why must you satisfy yourself twice.

My answer to the Minister is this. At the very best from his point of view there is an investigation; but he is no in any way bound to act upon the recommendation of the investigating body, nor does it state that he can only act after there has been an investigation and after it has been determined that the safety of the Republic or the maintenance of public order is seriously endangered.

You can only ban an organization after you have had an investigation.

You can have an investigation but you need not accept their advice nor accept the recommendations of the investigating body, whereas in terms of the Unlawful Organizations Act very different considerations apply.

I should like to deal with a point raised by the hon. member for Kempton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn), a point which was also touched upon by the hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee). Because I think the approach which their speeches indicated is possibly genuinely believed by members opposite to be a justifiable one. The hon. member for Kempton Park said “Wys my net een geval waar die Wet op die Onderdrukking van Kommunisme misbruik is That was the line on which the hon. member for Vereenigng also proceeded. This, Sir, is the whole point. People can be prohibited from attending meetings, people can have their rights limited in countless ways without the right of recourse to the courts of law. Consequently it is not possible for us, or for hon. members opposite, to say whether there has been a misuse of powers or not. In fact, we know that at least half the people who are indicted following an instruction by the Attorney-General are found not guilty. Therefore the probability is that, if many of these people, whose rights are affected, could in fact resort to the courts, they would be able to show that there has been an abuse of power. This is the fact which emphasizes so much the great wrongs which can follow where there is a denial of the right to approach the court. I think that where the hon. the Speaker ruled that for us to come with a motion for an instruction to the committee to permit an appeal to the courts, was destructive of the principle, bears out the entire attitude of this side, namely that we had to fight the second reading in order to prevent the complete negation of the right to resort to the court. That is the reason, I suggest, why the hon. the Minister has found himself with a misunderstanding with the Bar Councils. Because he thought there were only the two principles in the Bill which he enunciated, namely combating Communism and sabotage whereas we know, and after the Speaker’s ruling it has been proved, that many fundamental rights are in fact denied in this Bill.

Sir, I cannot challenge the hon. member who has just sat down on his arguments as to why it is going to be ruled out of order to put any amendments on the Order Paper as far as appeals to the court are concerned. Whether it is because it is one of the principles in the Bill or not I do not know, but the fact remains we will not be able to put these amendments on the Order Paper. It has now become a principle which we cannot amend. To come back to the immediate clause which we have been discussing, the hon. the Minister in an interjection, said that this side of the House did not understand that before an organization could be banned there had to be an investigation. Precisely, Sir, and that is what one wishes to retain, that the Minister must make an investigation.

It takes months and months.

Why should it take the Minister months and months? He has a very quick mind if he wishes to apply it, and he certainly applies it in cases such as these very swiftly indeed.

I do not think you know the Act at all.

Perhaps I am over-rating the hon. the Minister’s swiftness of mind. As far as I am concerned he acts only too swiftly. Whenever he does not like an organization or a person it does not seem to take him anytime at all to get his way.

I want to come to a point made by the hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee) when he said that the object of this clause was purely and simply to make sure that people like Mandela and Sebukwe, for instance, former members of the A.N.C. and the P.A.C. which had been banned, could not form a new organization and call it the P.A.D. and continue with the same objectives. The Suppression of Communism Act makes it quite impossible for those people to do that. Any person who has been banned—and all these people have been banned—cannot, according to Section 3 of the principal Act in any way—and I hope the hon. member for Vereeniging will listen to this—take part in any activity of the unlawful organization or carry on in the direct or indirect interests of the unlawful organization, any activity in which it was or could have been engaged at that time. Surely, Sir, that will prevent any person who has been banned from continuing with any activity under another name. They could not belong to any such organization. It says “any organization carrying on indirectly the objects of the unlawful organization”. I believe that the Minister had too wide powers there but he is now seeking even wider powers. He need not investigate, he need not go through any of the processes which the Suppression of Communism Act lays down. That Act has already been amended several times in this House—at least twice. And each time a Minister of Justice comes back to the House to amend the Suppression of Communism Act it is to take wider and wider powers. We have had a complete erosion of the normal civil liberties enjoyed by citizens of this county. Not only communists, this goes far wider than only Communism. It can affect anybody. It affects anybody whom the Minister feels is directly or indirectly carrying on any of the objects of an unlawful or banned organization. That is why it is such an objectional clause. I do not care that this is exactly the same clause contained in the 1960 Unlawful Organizations Act. I do not know whether it is the same and whether or not the Minister is drawing the correct analogy. I do not believe he is. But as hon. members here have pointed out, there were prefaces to that clause and additional conditions which did make it somewhat different, but I must point out that the Unlawful Organizations Act is a permanent part of our law, and the question of coming back to the House once in 12 months does not make the slightest difference, because the hon. the Minister comes back to the House. He comes back this year, and he came back last year, and nobody raised a finger against him, so therefore he has those powers and is using them, and it is no good trying to pretend that there are such vast differences between that section in the Unlawful Organizations Act and this clause. As far as I am concerned, both are thoroughly objectionable clauses, and I voted against them then and I shall vote against them to-day.

I want to get on to this question of the abuse of powers. Various hon. members like the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (North) (Mr. J. A. F. Nel) and others have said: Show us examples of abuse of powers. I will give two examples. One is the banning of the Coloured Convention last year, and the other is the banning of Patrick Duncan as a communist.

Ah!

The fact is that Patrick Duncan is opposed to the Government and he is vehemently opposed to Communism also. Every argument he has used in every issue of the journal he edited was strongly anti-communist. But I do not believe that examples should be sought. The point is that we want limitations in the statute of the powers of the Minister, and we do not simply want to rely on the Minister not abusing the vast powers he is taking. The point I want to make is that there is an old medical saying that the more you eat the more you want to eat. But I think here is also another saying which we can use in this House, and that is that the more power you have the more you want, and that is what is happening to this Minister and to this Government. It has vast powers, and the more powers it has the more it wants.

Before we discuss this clause, I just want to explain, and I do so for the benefit of the hon. member for Wynberg (Mr. Russell), that this clause deals with communists and communists only. If hon. members will look at Section 5 of the principal Act they will see that people who are affected by this clause are in the first place people whose names appear on the list, i.e. listed communists or people who were active members of the communist party before 1950 when that party was banned and people who had the opportunity to prove to a legal officer that they were not members of the communist party and who failed to prove it or who ignored it. In other words, it deals firstly with the active members of the old communist party and secondly with people who have been found guilty under Section 11 of the Act in the past, i.e. they propagated Communism. Thirdly it deals with people who are known communists. Hon. members must please not advance the argument that it can apply to any person because it is quite clear that the Bill makes no mention of an intention to do so because that provision relates to communists and communists only. The former section said “not to attend any gathering in any place within an area and during a period specified in the notice”. All that is being done now is to put this more clearly because of problems which we have had in this respect, but to which I need not refer because hon. members are aware of them. We now put it in two parts, viz. “not to attend any gathering or (2) any particular gathering, or any gathering of a particular nature, class or kind”. In other words, it is quite clear that in the one case we are concerned with meetings with a common purpose and secondly with meetings with no common purpose. It is to give effect to certain decisions of the courts regarding which meetings have a common purpose and which do not have a common purpose.

Notwithstanding the hon. the Minister’s explanation, I want to move the amendment standing in my name—

The purpose of this amendment is to try to limit the Minister’s powers in regard to listed persons attending meetings. The Minister is perfectly right when he points out that the section which this clause amends is Section 5, which refers specifically to persons whose names appear on the list, or who have been convicted of an offence under the Anti-Communist Act. It is therefore clear that this specifically applies to listed persons, but notwithstanding that, I think the Minister is really taking tremendous powers against listed persons, and if the Minister wants to make political capital out of this I could not care less. The Minister is really going very far now. He says that he does not wish listed persons to attend any gathering whatsoever, be they gatherings with a common purpose or any religious or social gatherings, or gatherings which persons may have to attend in order to earn their living. Far-reaching penalties can be applied to listed persons if this clause is adopted. The Minister gives as the reason for this certain difficulties which arose out of cases decided in the courts. I believe the main reason for this is the case of Rex v. Kahn, in 1955, where the court emphasized that the Legislature could not possibly have intended that the Minister should have power under Section 5 of the principal Act to prohibit a person from all social intercourse with his fellow-men, despite the fact that such a person was listed. The courts held that there were certain limitations intended in the existing law. As the result of this, the Minister finds that he cannot ban listed persons from attending gatherings that are not gatherings for a common purpose, which is the main reason why he is later going to amend the definition of “gathering for common purpose”, by removing the reference to common purpose from the definition of “gathering”. I think this is a cruel provision, even against persons who are listed as communists, to give the Minister the power to ban such a person from all social intercourse with his fellow-beings, and to prevent him from attending any meeting whatsoever, whether it is social or religious. I think that is going very far indeed and therefore I move this amendment.

I want to move the amendment standing in my name—

Clause 4 empowers the Minister to prohibit certain persons from becoming office-bearers or officers or members or certain organizations. As the clause reads at present, if the Minister wishes to prohibit a person, he need only publish a notice in the Gazette and he need not give any notice to the person concerned. My amendment is designed to make it obligatory for the Minister not only to give notice in the Gazette, but also to give notice to the person concerned. I believe that this amendment is not only reasonable, but, having regard to the severe penalty for failure to comply with the prohibition, I believe the amendment is also necessary. I suggest that it is surely unreasonable that a person should be prohibited from doing certain things without giving him personal notice that he is prohibited. The position is even more unreasonable when one has regard to the type of publication in which the notice is to be published. If the notice were to be published in a publication which is widely read throughout the country, the position would not be quite so unreasonable, but in fact the notice will be published in the Government Gazette, which is read by very few people indeed and which has a very small circulation. In order to justify the clause as it stands, the Minister may argue that he may find it impossible to trace the person concerned so as to be able to give personal notice to that person. Sir, that argument may be justified in relation to some parts of the Act—I say “may be justified” I go no further—but I suggest that it cannot be justified in relation to Clause 4 because Clause 4 deals with persons whom the Minister should have no difficulty in tracing. Clause 4 empowers the Minister to prohibit a person from being an office-bearer, etc., of certain organizations. There are two types of persons hit by this clause, the person who is already an office-bearer, member or officer of an organization and whom the Minister wishes to prohibit from continuing as such, and the person whom the Minister wishes to prevent from becoming an office-bearer, officer or member of an organization. In the case of a person who is already an office-bearer, officer or member of an organization, there can be no difficulty in tracing him. He can be traced through the organization concerned. In the case of the person whom the Minister wishes to prevent from becoming an office-bearer, etc., I suggest that even in that case there should be no difficulty in tracing the person concerned because if he is likely to become an officebearer, officer or member of the particular organization, then his whereabouts must be known, and the Minister will then be able to serve personal notice on him, as well as publishing the notice in the Government Gazette. I suggest therefore that it is reasonable to expect that there should be personal notice in addition to notice in the Gazette. But I think one can go further. One can, I believe, show that if one has regard to the severe penalty for failure to comply with the notice, it is not only reasonable that personal notice should be given to the person concerned but it is necessary that that should be done. The penalty is one of imprisonment for a period not exceeding one year. The court has no discretion to impose a fine; it must order some period of imprisonment. The person concerned may be completely ignorant of the prohibition and may be honestly ignorant of the prohibition, because he may not see the Government Gazette in which the notice appeared. I believe that it is reasonable and necessary that the person who is to be prohibited should be given notice, in addition to the notice appearing in the Gazette, and I therefore move the amendment which stands in my name.

I hope that the hon. the Minister will not accept this amendment because the amendment of the hon. member for Durban (Musgrave) (Mr. Hourquebie) simply represents a negation of the whole clause. The Minister’s difficulty, as he said in his second reading speech, is that these people who must receive this notice and on whom this infamia is imposed so that they cannot hold certain offices, do not make it very easy for the Minister and the police to service the notices on them. The hon. member’s amendment cannot be aimed at securing the serving of personal notices, because Section 5 of the principal Act already specifically provides that the Minister must give such a person personal notice. It provides—

But if that person hides away and the police cannot find him at all, then the Minister, according to the hon. member’s amendment, must still seek him out and serve the notice on him personally. Let us examine the wording of the amendment. It must be signed by the Minister and it must be addressed—that is easy—and delivered or tendered to the person concerned. Both these verbs imply that this must be done in the presence of the person concerned. If the hon. member wants that, then the position will be very much worse and even more restrictive than the very situation the Minister wishes to counter. I therefore, say that this is an absolute negation of what the hon. the Minister wants to do. In this particular case it only relates to persons “whose names appear on any list in the custody of the officer referred to in Section 8 or who were office-bearers, officers or members of an organization which has under sub-section (2) of Section 2 been declared to be an unlawful organization”. In other words, these are all people who came within the ambit of Section 5 of the principal Act, that is to say, the communists and the communists alone, as the hon. the Minister has made clear, The hon. member for Musgrave now claims that these people do not know of the position, that they are quite ignorant, that they are like strangers in Jerusalem, that they are sweet innocence personified. Mr. Chairman, before a person’s name appears on that list, he has a very long history. A liquidator is appointed if a communist organization is involved. There is a long story involved. The person had the opportunity to say why his name should not appear on the list, and in terms of this Bill he even has the opportunity to ask that his name should be removed from that list. What is more, when he is affected because he is a member of an organization which is affected by other later provisions, he will also know how late in the day it is as far as he is concerned. I think it is no more than right and reasonable to expect of those people that they should know what is in store for them. All the people who are communists, all the people who are communistically inclined, must know that the people of the Republic of South Africa are ill-disposed towards them; they are becoming less well-disposed by the day, an anyone who pleads on behalf of such people is tarred with the same brush. I want to tell the hon. member that the submission he has made here will not be interpreted as a humanitarian plea; it will be regarded as representing great concern for the communists.

I would like to move the amendment standing in my name on the Order Paper—

The purpose of this amendment is similar to the purpose of the amendment which I moved in Clause 3, and that is to try to limit the powers of the Minister. The Minister already has the vast powers under the relevant section that he seeks to amend, and what I suggest now is at least to exclude from the orbit of ministerial power, people who are engaged in “a partnership, company, syndicate or other association of persons exclusively engaged in carrying on any lawful trade, business, profession or occupation or an association of persons membership whereof is necessary for the carrying on by such person of any lawful trade, business, profession or occupation I know that there are certain exceptions already included in the law, that is to say, persons belonging to registered trade unions; I know that they are exempted from certain provisions of the Act, but there are other such organizations which are not exempted. There are all the professional organizations and various other trade associations other than employees’ associations or employers’ associations, which fall within the exceptions. I believe that the hon. the Minister should limit his powers so as not to interfere with the normal earning of his livelihood by a person, even though the Minister has listed that person. In his second reading speech when the Minister was discussing Clause 8, the house-arrest clause, he said that one reason why he was introducing this was to enable him to keep people under his control but at the same time allow them to go on earning their livelihood. I suggest that the Minister’s own argument could be used here in support of limiting his powers in this particular clause by not making it necessary for such persons who have been listed to get his permission or his exemption before they can join the necessary professional or other organizations which are necessary to carry on their trade or profession.

Hon. members will see that as the clause now reads, it only states that persons may not become office-bearers. The intention is not only to provide for the future; we therefore have to insert the words “being or”. In other words it relates to the present as well as the future. The words “particular organization or” are only being inserted to clarify the position. Apart from the amendment of which I gave notice and which I am now moving, I also wish to move another amendment in the same clause, and I move—

Hon. members will find this same provision in Section 5 of the principal Act. It was actually not necessary to insert it here as well, but I only do so because I want to put the position very clearly so that there can be no misunderstanding in respect of the matter.

With regard to the amendment moved by the hon. member for Durban (Musgrave) (Mr. Hourquebie), under normal circumstances one would have had no objection to this amendment. In substance the argument which he has used, is quite correct but the hon. member is unfortunately forgetting the circumstances with which we have to deal. Firstly I wish to repeat that the people with whom we are dealing are essentially the same people with whom we dealt in the previous clause, namely listed communists, people who are guilty of offences. Now we are adding people on whose movements restrictions are placed under the Suppression of Communism Act as a result of their activities. I say that under normal circumstances one would gladly have accepted the hon. member’s amendment were it not that for all practical purposes it would be impossible to implement his proposal, because if we do implement his proposal it would mean firstly that we would have to serve another notice on all the old members of the communist party. Apart from their numbers, the fact remains that one does not know what their addresses are at the present moment. But apart from that, the fact remains that many of them have run away and cannot be traced or that many of them will run away if one wishes to serve such a notice on them. As if this is not sufficient, do hon. members know that the communist party and the communistic elements at least 30 to 35 different organizations; it is the Congress of this and the Youth league of that and the Congress of this and the Youth League of that. There are between 30 to 35 communistic organizations who may be affected by this provision. Althought it may sound very good in theory to say that one must serve a notice on the man concerned, it would be impossible in practice because of the circumstances which we have to combat. The hon. member’s argument that the people will not see the notice in the Government Gazette does not impress me. Hon. members will know that these communists will be the people who will know first what has been published in the Government Gazette. They are the people who are wide awake; they are not as innocent as the hon. member for Musgrave thinks they are. In fact they are the most alert people we have in South Africa.

In spite of the fact that every one of them will know immediately that it relates to them, the fact still remains that every prohibition under this provision, as the hon. member knows the Press and as I know the Press, will immediately appear in the Press. If it does not appear in the daily papers the hon. member can be sure that it will appear in the Sunday Times, and if it does not appear in that paper, and if hon. members want a still worse paper, it will appear in the Sunday Express of that Sunday. But the hon. member can be sure that it will appear in a newspaper and the argument that these people will not know what is going on can therefore not be advanced. I therefore want to repeat that if it were not for the circumstances which I have mentioned, I would gladly have accepted the hon. member’s amendment because basically I find nothing wrong with it, but it is impossible for me to put his proposal into practice.

I am glad that the Minister disagrees with the argument advanced by the hon. member for Standerton (Dr. Coertze). It is unnecessary for me therefore to deal with the hon. member’s argument. The Minister has made it very clear that what he intends to do under this clause is to deal generically, if I may use that word, with three groups of people: persons whose names appear on the list, persons who were office-bearers of officers of an unlawful organization and thirdly, persons in respect of whom any prohibition under this Act has been served. The hon. the Minister has moved two amendments in effect. The first one is to insert the words “being or” after “from”. This means that when the notice is put in the Gazette, a person can then be prevented from being an officebearer. In other words, he might at that very moment when the Gazette is published be an office-bearer or a member of any organization. It means that from the moment it is published in the Gazette that person commits an offence if he does any of those things listed in Clause 10, for which he gets a minimum sentence of one year. I think it is unnecessary for the words “being or” to be inserted. I presume that by putting this in the Gazette the Minister wants to give them notice, but if the words “being or” remain, what will the position be in Cape Town, for instance? It appeared the other day from a reply given by the Minister to a series of questions that it takes three days for the Gazette to come to Cape Town. But from the moment that man’s name appears in the Gazette, if a policeman in Cape Town asks him for his name and address and he does not give it to him, then he commits an offence.

This has nothing to do with names and addresses.

No. I know it has nothing to do with names and addresses, but a person who is prohibited falls under Section 10. Section 10 quat talks about a person “in respect of whom any prohibition under his Act by way of a notice addressed and delivered or tendered to him is in force”, so it does affect a person such as this; this is a prohibition under the Act.

But this only deals with the organizations to which he can belong.

Yes, but it is nevertheless a prohibition. It says that the Minister may “prohibit” a person, therefore it is a prohibition in terms of Clause 10 (1) (a), which says that while a person’s name appears on any list or while any prohibition under this Act by way of a notice addressed and delivered or tendered to him is in force, if he changes the place of his residence or employment without reporting that change to the police, then he commits an offence for which he will go to gaol for one year.

He must be in one of the three prior categories. He must be either a listed communist or a member or an organization which has been declared unlawful.

Or subject to a prohibition. Sir, in the first place it will have that effect. The second point I wish to make is that again it is quite clear that the people in Durban will be placed in a most difficult position because there is no depot in Durban for the distribution of Government Gazettes. I do not know why there is not but there is not. In Johannesburg Government Gazettes are distributed and sold by the Central News Agency, so that the public can go and buy them. But in Durban, unless you are a subscriber, you just do not get the Government Gazette. Sir, why does the Minister not provide in this claue that there must also be publication in a newspaper published and circulating in the area in which the prohibition is to apply?

But some people do not read newspapers.

Again the hon. the Minister has cast the net so wide here that it affects ordinary shareholders in a company. If the hon. the Minister says that you cannot belong to any organization, then it means that no one can own any shares in a company, because the moment he becomes a shareholder he becomes a member, and it is clear that an “organization” includes a limited liability company. The definition of “organization” is “any association of persons incorporated or unincorporated and whether or not it has been established or registered in accordance with any statute.” I think the hon. the Minister should re-consider the first of the amendments that he has moved because it is going to provide for these extraordinary circumstances which I have mentioned, and it is going to make the hon. Minister’s task much more difficult; it is going to make the task of the person who is prohibited even more difficult to know from what moment he could reasonably have expected to have notice of the prohibition. Why does the hon. the Minister not take out the words “being or”? It does not make any difference to his powers. You can prevent him from becoming a member, etc., but should not prevent him from “being” at the moment the Gazette is published.

I do not know why hon. members over there want to inflict so much suffering on this Committee. Let us first examine the provisions of this clause. There are three categories of persons, that is to say, listed communists, the office-bearers and members of unlawful organizations and persons who have been placed under restrictions. These three categories are potentially liable to be affected by this clause. What can happen to these three categories of persons in terms of this clause? The Minister can by notice in the Gazette prohibit any persons falling under any of the three categories or all three categories from becoming members of an organization or office-bearers of a stipulated organization, and in terms of the Minister’s amendment they can also be prohibited if they are already members or office-bearers of the organization. The hon. member for Durban (North) (Mr. M. L. Mitchell) has tried to link this provision to the restriction on movement which is absolutely irrelevant and which has no potential connection with the clause. What I have just set out is all the clause embodies. The criticism is that we are here creating the possibility that a man will commit an offence by infringing the notice in the Government Gazette by becoming or remaining a member of an organization after the relevant notice has been published in the Government Gazette before the offender knows about it. But if this were to happen in practice, is the reasonable assumption not that there would be no prosecution? Why assume that under such unreasonable circumstances there will be a prosecution? After all we have the general legal presumption that all regulations which affect hundreds of people and often create offences, are known to the public as a whole if published in the Government Gazette. Why make an exception in this instance? I shall tell you why, Mr. Chairman. It is a question of partnership. The United Party has entered into a partnership with the Progressive Party in respect of the first clause which we have discussed, and they have hitherto been the partners of the Progressive Party throughout the Committee Stage. But now they are also in partnership with the communists. This clause and the previous clause deal with the defined and proved communists, the people who want to destroy the Church, the State and law and order in South Africa; and now hon. members opposite are so concerned about these defined and proved communists, the people who deserve the firing squad rather than friendship …

Do not talk nonsense.

Nonsense.

The hon. member is talking nonsense; he does not know what is in the Bill, and I readily accept that he does not know what is in the Bill because his powers of comprehension are too limited to understand it. They are taking the proved listed communists under their protection, and they say that such a proved communist will not commit a further offence until such time as the notice has been rubbed under his nose. Are these proved communists people who must be treated with an excessive measure of fairness? Or is this a case where we must adopt the reasonable and practical provision that if the prohibition is promulgated in the Government Gazette, then the prescribed categories of communists are obliged to comply with the notice in the Gazette? Why must everyone of these despicable persons be sought out? Does the hon. member for Durban (Point) (Mr. Raw) know the names and addresses of all of them? Does he want to offer himself as the server of notices on communists? Perhaps the hon. member for Hillbrow knows where they are. We do not know in what fox-holes they are hiding. That is why this provision is necessary. The United Party’s opposition to this provision is mere a revelation of their unwitting (and I say “unwitting” in respect of certain members) support of the communists.

It is no good the hon. member who has just sat down getting excited. The amendment moved by the hon. member for Durban (Musgrave) (Mr. Hourquebie) is a very reasonable amendment in the circumstances, as I will explain to the hon. the Minister, and I hope the hon. the Minister will pay some heed to this amendment.

I told the hon. member frankly why unfortunately I could not accept the amendment.

I want to point out to the hon. the Minister that he himself in the course of the amendments he has given notice of has sought to remedy a situation such as is envisaged by the hon. member for Musgrave. In respect of Clause 9, the hon. the Minister himself has given notice of an amendment in which he virtually enables notices to be served “by fixing to the main entrance of the last-known residence of such person a copy of such order, notice or document”.

It shows that I have given a lot of thought to this matter.

But why can’t the hon. the Minister consider a similar amendment in the case under discussion now? As the hon. member for Kempton Park has rightly pointed out there are three categories of persons who are affected by any notice that may be given in terms of Clause 4.

There are hundreds of them. Do you expect me to give notice to each one of them?

There are three categories of persons who can be affected. Firstly there are persons who have already been listed, there are persons who were office-bearers of certain organizations, and then there are persons in respect of whom any prohibition has been served. Now in terms of the new amendment, the hon. the Minister can prohibit them from being (that is continuing to be) or from becoming office-bearers of any particular organization that has been prohibited. That is the effect of this clause. Now the hon. the Minister asks that he should have the right to do that merely by publication in the Gazette. I want to speak perhaps on behalf of some unfortunate misguided Coloured people who at some time or other were listed communists. Now the Minister wishes to have the power, in the exercise of his discretion, to prohibit those persons who are already listed from becoming office-bearers in a particular organization, and the only notification that they will have of that fact will be a publication in the Gazette. I ask the hon. the Minister in all seriousness which Coloured person does he really think ever sees the Government Gazette. They hardly ever come into contact with it.

It will be in the papers and will come over the radio.

The hon. Minister may think so, but the hon. the Minister can take it from me that there are many who don’t even know of the existence of the Government Gazette.

The communists know all about it.

Some of them in the dim and distant past may have been listed as communists. Although they no longer are communists, they may appear on the list, and in the meantime by notice in the Gazette, the Minister is prohibiting them. Surely it is the easiest thing in the world for the hon. the Minister to incorporate in this clause (if the hon. the Minister does not like the working proposed by the hon. member for Musgrave) certain words on the same lines as in Clause 9, where the Minister says that it will be affixed to the main entrance of the last known residence of such person. Surely it would be possible for the Police Force to affix such notice in that way. That would enable him to know that he has been prohibited from becoming an office-bearer of any particular organization, or his neighbours could tell him. The point that the hon. the Minister seems to lose sight of is that this is a penal section. The contravention of this section is subject to a sentence of imprisonment, and surely the hon. the Minister will appreciate that in penal sections of this sort, one of the basic principles of our law is that the accused must have knowledge of the fact that he is committing an offence.

I first wish to reply to the hon. member for Houghton (Mrs. Suzman). I am sorry that I have not done so earlier. This clause and the hon. member’s argument have nothing to do with the livelihood of a person, nothing to do with his “livelihood” about which the hon. member is so concerned. Other clauses deal with that aspect of the matter. But what the hon. member wants, and this is what her amendment is in substance, is the free association of communists to do as they please. That is the effect of her amendment.

But I want to come back to the hon. member for Peninsula (Mr. Bloomberg). He now objects violently to it being published in the Government Gazette. The hon. member must then object, on principle, to all Acts that endanger people because every Act that we adopt here punishes some or other person.

But that is a personal matter.

But what difference is there in principle? But I shall come to the personal aspect presently. In the first place the principle is that all Acts which affect people are printed in the Government Gazette and in the Government Gazette only. Yesterday it may not have been illegal for such a person but immediately after publication in the Government Gazette it is an offence. We know that this is the general rule and against that the hon. member can have no objection because that is the only way it can be done.

In the case of general laws.

Let us now take 1950 when the communist party was declared an unlawful organization. Then it was also one by publishing a notice in the Government Gazette that this Act had been passed and the following day it was illegal to be a communist. It affected thousands of people but then the problem did not arise. We then declared the A.N.C. and the P.A.C. unlawful organizations …

Every listed person received a notice.

No, only afterwards was a notice saying that he should show the reasons why his name should not remain on the list served on him but from the commencement of the Act it was illegal for a person to be a communist or to say that he was a member of the communist party.

That was a general Act.

No, it affected the individual just as it affects the individual in this case. And with the banning of the A.N.C. and the P.A.C. we did not draw up lists. No liquidator or official was appointed to draw up the lists. We merely said that from the day on which the notice was published in the Government Gazette it was illegal to be a member of the A.N.C. or the P.A.C. Exactly the same principle. Then no objection was made. Individuals were affected then and they are affected now as well. Furthermore, have hon. members not seen these notices in the Government Gazette and the form they take? The notices do not say that “from this moment it is illegal”. If hon. members will look at notices in the Government Gazette—and this will also be the type of notice which will appear in terms of this clause—they will see that it reads “from such and such a date it will be illegal …”. A reasonable time will be given in the notices.

And if the man does not read it?

Hon. members are now really looking for examples. I do not wish to accuse hon. members but if they are going to start looking for absurd examples, I put the same question as I put during the second reading debate: “Why this sudden concern for Communism”? I really do not know. After all hon. members know the communists. Why must we be so sensitive about a lost communist who perhaps did not receive a notice, although he knows all the time about such a notice? Why must we be so concerned about these people? They will not for one moment be concerned about the hon. member. I am amazed that in spite of the practical difficulties which I have mentioned to hon. members and in spite of the fact that hon. members know what the practice is when notices of this nature are served, hon. members still seek out absurd examples of people who will supposedly not receive this notice. Let us be practical and realistic about this matter. We will then realize that what we are doing is the quite normal thing which would have been done under all circumstances, whether it affects or whether it does not affect communists.

The hon. Minister was very keen earlier this afternoon to say that he is a man of principles if he believes they are the right principles. That is exactly the same position here. If people are communists, there are surely certain rights which they as individuals are entitled to enjoy.

I have already said, that it applies to all people, communists or not.

Sir, there are severe penalties, and I am not only talking about the imprisonment for a contravention of the law, but I am talking of the restrictions upon people. These are severe penalties and people are at least entitled to know what sort of restrictions are being placed on them before they run an additional risk of a year imprisonment. The second point is that I think the hon. the Minister will agree that this does not only apply to communists. The hon. member for Kempton Park says that it applies to communists and office-bearers of unlawful organizations. But that is wrong. This clause goes much further than that. It applies to anybody surely who was a member of the A.N.C. or the P.A.C. As I read this clause together with Clause 20 of the Bill, this makes anybody who was a member of the A.N.C. or the P.A.C. subject to the same penalty.

Yes that is right.

So it is not a question of just a few communists or a few officebearers.

Of unlawful organizations.

Yes, and Clause 20 read in conjunction with this clause means that any African who at any time was a member of the A.N.C. or the P.A.C. is subject to these penalties, very severe penalties indeed. Many misguided people joined the communists way back in 1930. They were listed. Many people may have joined the A.N.C. or the P.A.C. without even fully realizing the aims and objects, but they are all subject to this particular clause, and therefore they are entitled to know what is going to happen to them. I think the hon. Minister is not correct, when he says that this does not affect the livelihood of people. This refers to any organization, and if the hon. the Minister looks at the definition of “organization” in the principal Act, he will find that it is very widely defined indeed. It says in Section 10 that “organization” means any organization of persons incorporated or unincorporated. That can be a company or a partnership, a private company or a public company.

The organizations are specified.

It may be any organization, and in terms of the principal Act, “organization” is very widely defined indeed. It can be an organization which affects the livelihood of a person. It can prohibit a person from being for instance a member of the Bar Association, or it might prevent somebody from belonging to the Association of Architects, from being registered on the Medical Register. What is to stop the hon. the Minister under the terms of “organization”, as defined in the principal Act, to specify that any listed communist if he was an officebearer of any banned organization, or if he was a member of an unlawful organization, such as the A.N.C. or the P.A.C., may not be a partner in a business …

But it is all specified.

But the Minister can do it. It is no good telling me that he won’t do so. Therefore the amendment which I have moved is simply to put the necessary words in the statute, and I am not prepared to go on the good offices of the Minister or the Government. The hon. the Minister says that he is a man of principle, well I am also a woman of principles.

I want to make it clear that we on this side of the House are dealing with this matter not because of a sudden concern for Communism, as the hon. Minister avers, but because of a lasting concern for common justice. That is the reason why we advance these arguments, and the tirade of the hon. member for Kempton Park deserves to be treated with the contempt I now give it.

I come back to the position that the hon. Minister himself accepted that the amendment moved by the hon. member for Musgrave (Mr. Hourquebie) was a reasonable one. He set out to say that he could not accept it because of certain practical reasons which made it difficult to do what he conceded was a just and reasonable approach to the problem. Now, Sir, the prohibition which is issued in terms of this clause will not only have executive consequences, but it is quite clear that it is going to have penal consequences as well. That is why there is this need to see that not only justice is done but to know that it is being done. I want to draw the hon. Minister’s attention to a later clause, Clause 6, where we come to the situation that powers are going to be given to remove people’s names from the list. That to my mind is a clear indication that there are names on this list which should not be there, either because they got there wrongly or because people have recanted.

That is something different.

No, I say that it is clear that there are names there which should not be there, and I am suggesting that they may be there for the reason that they got there wrongly, or that possibly persons have recanted.

They could not have got there wrongly at all, because anybody on the list was notified and could make representations to the liquidator.

Did everybody take the opportunity of making representations?

They got an opportunity, but Sam Kahn and some others did not want to avail themselves of the opportunity.

The hon. the Minister is now trying to make a debating point of something which impinges on real justice, and he knows it. But I say that there are people on the list whose names should not be there. I don’t know how long it would take to remove these names from the list, but meanwhile these people are going to be subject to this prohibition, which also has penal consequences. The only reason which the hon. the Minister has advanced is this practical question of being able to reach the people whose names are on the list. I do not think that that is such a practical reason that the hon. the Minister should therefore ignore what he himself accepts as being a just outlook in regard to the matter. I hope therefore that he will reconsider the position, and that he will accept the amendment moved by the hon. member for Musgrave.

So far as the second amendment is concerned, I would like to point out that the emphasis on this whole thing is that there should be exemption in respect of any case where it is a “lawful” trade, business or occupation. If it is unlawful, the Minister will deal with it, but if it is lawful, the opportunity of being exempted should be permitted.

The hon. the Minister said something which was followed up by the hon. member for Kempton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn). He said “why this sudden concern for communists?” The hon. member who has just sat down referred to that, and then the hon. member for Kempton Park laughed and so did many of his colleagues on that side of the House. I want to remind him that out attitude to Communism is well known. It was well known in 1950 when we submitted an alternative Bill to the original of the principal Act in the Select Committee and we moved that any person or organization which on or after the date of the commencement of the Act propagated the principles of or promoted the spread of Communism should be guilty of an offence and dealt with as if he had committed the offence of high treason. And high treason carries the death penalty. That was our attitude to Communism. Where it can be shown that a man is a Communist, he deserves to be dealt with as if he were guilty of high treason. That was our attitude. But that was not the way that this Government decided to deal with Communism. They decided to deal with them with this cloak and dagger Act of theirs.

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

Here we have the situation where via the Gazette anybody on the list, anybody who has been a member of an unlawful organization and anybody who has been prohibited under this Act from doing anything, can now be banned. Sir, let me put it this way: The persons concerned under Clause 10 are persons under a prohibition which can now be imposed under the Gazette in terms of this clause. Now I want to point out that under this clause the hon. the Minister cannot give personal notice. He is only given the power by this clause to prohibit by notice in the Gazette. There is no other way he can do it. The situation that will then arise is, as I have indicated, that persons concerned will not see the notice. Let us not pretend that everybody reads the Government Gazette. When one passes the letter-boxes of hon. members on the Government side, one sees lots of Government Gazettes lying on the floor. They don’t even read them when they get them. The fact of the matter remains that if the hon. the Minister cannot do it any other way—and the hon. Minister says that he cannot do it in another way because he cannot find all the people—then he must do it in the most practical way. If he does have practical difficulties, then the hon. the Minister must not insist upon the court’s hands being tied if a man is prosecuted for an offence of which the only knowledge that exists is contained in the Gazette which he has not seen, an offence of which he may only know three days after he has committed the offence. He can only know it if he lives in Cape Town three days after the Government Gazette has appeared or in Durban if he is a subscriber, and if the Gazette has reached him in that time. If that is so, then the hon. the Minister must not tie the hands of the courts, because there is no doubt whatever that in normal circumstances, and in such a case, if the accused could show that he did not have any knowledge of it and could not have had any knowledge of it, the court would obviously treat such a person more leniently, and so the hon. the Minister would wish it to be. But here the hon. the Minister has tied the hands of the court so that the moment he does commit such a contravention, because it is in the Gazette, although he has not seen it, he must go to gaol for one year, although if he had seen it, he might not have committed the offence.

So if the hon. the Minister considers that this is the only practical way in which he can do this, he must consider amending the other clauses in this Bill to meet the situation which is obviously going to arise otherwise.

Despite the fact that I have said what the practical difficulties are, the hon. member has come with the same argument, notwithstanding the fact that the same argument can be used against the promulgation of any Bill. I told the hon. member emphatically that what would happen in practice would not be what happened before—and the hon. member now forces me to repeat what I said during the second reading, when I used the example of the hon. member for East London (City) (Dr. Moolman), when he referred to the “kakieridders” (khaki riders) as baboons. At that time the regulation was issued on 4 February and on 5 February, the next day, the hon. member for East London (City) got into trouble because he was unaware of the regulation. But that was not to-day. I then took the point that the hon. member did not know of the regulation and the court rejected it, and did so lawfully. But the court ruled that it was not an offence to call a “kakieridder” a baboon. That was all the court could find under the circumstances. But the hon. member is leading me away from the subject now. It was not an offence then. The people who are objecting now made no objection then because at that time it only affected people whom hon. members on the other side did not like. It was nothing then, it could affect them then. The everyday rule was acceptable because it was aimed at the opponents of the Government and it did not matter if they were affected. But now it amazes me that, while hon. members opposite were not affected at that time, and while nobody rebelled against it, because it only affected Jan Moolman, the Jan Moolman of those days, hon. members opposite are so perturbed to-day when it affects the communists. I cannot, with the best will in the world, understand them. And this despite the fact that I have told hon. members that it will not be customary to act as hon. members acted when they were in power but we shall see to it that from a specified date, published in the Government Gazette, it will be unlawful for them to do so. I do not even want to stalk a communist as hon. members stalked us in the days when they were in power. Let me now very honestly and clearly state what our intention is. I have conceded to hon. members that it would be better if we could personally serve the notice. I made no secret about it. But do hon. members not want to understand my practical difficulties viz. that it is practically impossible to do so in view of the fact that there are numerous organizations, communistic organizations, because communists are so resourceful that they establish new organizations every minute? And yet hon. members would like me to follow all of them and to serve notices on them all! That is after all an impossible task. We are after all not playing the fool or playing with dolls, but we are combating Communism. Let us therefore be serious in doing so.

Mr. Chairman, I want to say this to the hon. the Minister that we on these benches—and I am sure all hon. members on this side do—repudiate with the strongest possible indignation any suggestion that we who represent the Coloured people by voting against this Bill, are supporting Communism. The Minister has not said so, but we have had that implication from the other side, especially from the hon. member for Kempton Park (Mr. F. S. Steyn). I want to say this that I will appeal to the Chairman and if necessary to Mr. Speaker if any hon. member on that side again dare to suggest that because we do our duty as we see it, we are aiding Communism in this country. I want to appeal to the hon. the Minister as a lawyer not as a politician. I said the other day and I repeat it that he must not allow his legal heart to be misled by his political mind. I want to say this, Sir, that a basic principle in a democratic country, which the Government claims this country is, is that in the case of anything which affects the personal liberty of persons, there shall be personal service on that person. That is the principle which the hon. member for Peninsula (Mr. Bloomberg) has asked and which I am asking the Minister to observe in this Act. We are appealing to him not to destroy a legal principle in this Act which has stood the test of time. Unless the Minister is prepared to accept the suggestion that a notice should be served at the person’s last known address, I say the Minister is unreasonable and I shall vote against this clause.