Mr. Speaker, I move—

This proposed Bill is a result of the Government’s recent decision to allow Iscor to proceed with the building of a railway line from Sishen to Saldanha Bay and the construction of harbour works in Saldanha Bay for the export of iron ore. As members would have seen from the Order Paper, a separate Bill in respect of the harbour works has been prepared and read for a first time.

This measure does not require much elucidation. It has been drawn up strictly in accordance with the directions of the Cabinet Decision in question and is based mainly on the applicable provisions in existing S.A. Railways legislation.

In brief, Mr. Speaker, the following main principles are contained in the measure before the House:

1. (a) Iscor is being authorized to build a railway line from Sishen to Saldanha Bay for the conveyance of its own export ore and other building materials for the project as a whole.
2. (b) Iscor is being authorized to expropriate land and obtain other materials for the purposes of the railway line and any sidings branch lines and other works which may be required in connection therewith. This strip of land may not be more than 40 metres wide. Because the proposed railway line will pass through quite a number of pieces of State-owned land, provision is being made in clause 15 for the State also to be bound by this Act.
3. (b) The powers of expropriation which Iscor is receiving, do not give it the right to expropriate any property or infringe on rights of the Railways Administration. Where the proposed Iscor railway line crosses that of the S.A. Railways, the necessary arrangements are being made by way of negotiation between Iscor and the Railways Administration. Up to now these negotiations have proceeded very smoothly indeed.

In terms of the provisions of the Iron and Steel Industry Act, 1928, Iscor does in fact have the power to construct railway lines for purposes other than the conveyance of public traffic, and similarly, powers of expropriation were conferred on the Corporation in terms of the Expropriation (Establishment of Undertakings) Act, 1951, by means of a declaration of Parliament. In the first place, however, it has been found necessary to expand Iscor’s existing powers, for the purposes of the construction of the railway line from Sishen to Saldanha Bay, and in the second place it so happens that Iscor’s powers of expropriation which it already has, are somewhat restricted and time-consuming. From the nature of the case and by virtue of past experience, it is clear that the existing powers which Iscor has do not comply with the demands made by the Sishen-Saldanha Bay railway line, and it is deemed necessary to give authorizations, similar to those which the S.A. Railways has in regard to the construction of railway lines, to Iscor.

In this connection hon. members will understand that since Iscor has to deal with private contractors who are going to undertake the construction of the railway line at agreed tender prices and within fixed time limits, the risk of delays as a result of possible time-consuming negotiations with landowners, coupled with the resulting disruption and major financial losses, cannot be taken. To facilitate matters and ensure that land owners are not caught unawares, Iscor officers have already, as I recently stated in a reply to a question in this House, visited every landowner who is going to be affected by this railway line and explained the position to them. No objections to the proposed expropriation procedure were lodged by the persons concerned, and in addition Iscor undertook to comply as far as possible with the wishes of all landowners in so far as cattle crossings, etc., are concerned.

I may add that, in spite of the proposed powers of expropriation conferred on Iscor, it is the policy and the intention of the corporation to refrain from using these powers for acquiring sand, stone and water. The corporation prefers to acquire these necessities by way of private negotiations.

The remaining provisions of the measure all relate to the main principles which I have mentioned and are, as has already been said, derived from the provisions with more or less the same wording in existing Railways legislation. Under the circumstances and because they are so obvious and self-explanatory, I do not think it is justifiable at this stage to take up the time of the House unnecessarily by elaborating on them.

Mr. Speaker, before I come to deal with the Bill itself, I want to protest at the way in which this Bill has been handled in this House. The First Reading of the Bill took place on Tuesday. We received copies of the Bill on our desks yesterday morning and the Bill was down for Second Reading yesterday afternoon. Now how on earth we are expected to deal with a Bill in the afternoon when it has appeared on our desks in the morning, heaven alone knows, particularly when most of us who are involved with this tvpe of Bill are up to our necks in dealing with the Budget. We managed to persuade the hon. the Minister to postpone the Second Reading of the Bill until today, and the hon. the Minister was good enough to make available to us the officials who dealt with the Bill so that we could go through it with them. But, Mr. Speaker, we have not had the time to completely do so. We have not yet had time to really study this Bill. It is a serious state of affairs when members of the Opposition are asked to deal with Bills in this House when they have not had adequate time for study. I understand that our Whips were advised at the beginning of the session that this Bill would be dealt with this session. The Government has therefore had eight weeks to introduce this legislation. Why did it have to be done in a Budget week? I am afraid that what is happening in this House is that hon. Ministers believe that their Bills are perfect Bills, that there is nothing contentious in them, that all they have to do is to produce them to the House, have the First Reading taken, make their Second Reading speech and then expect the Opposition to agree to the Bill. But they are quite wrong, Mr. Speaker. They may believe that their Bills are perfect, but it is still the duty of the Opposition carefully to scrutinize every Bill that comes before the House. [Interjections.] Sir, the noise that is coming from my left is a clear indication of how seriously those hon. members treat the work of Parliament.

They have not even read the Bill.

But you had an opportunity of scrutinizing the Bill.

You have not read it yourself.

Shut up.

Order!

Fancy a Chief Whip speaking like that. What an example! He should behave himself.

Sir, our concern is the protection of the public who sends members to Parliament, and we will do everything in our power to see that we do our job in this House. It is true, Sir, that very often we spend an enormous amount of time on a Bill, perhaps fruitlessly. The hon. the Minister of Transport mentioned the Merchant Shipping Act the other day. I had the unfortunate task of going through that Bill. It took me three solid days and I could not ask the Minister to change a single comma, but that was not the important thing. The important thing was that we had done our job; we had looked at the Bill. We want an opportunity of studying the Bills that come before this House, because that is what makes for good legislation. I think it is quite wrong that Bills of this nature should be brought before the House at a time when hon. members are really working hard preparing their speeches for the Budget debate and trying to deal with the Budget. I hope we will not have a repetition of this. [Interjection.] Sir, that hon. member will hear all about it on Monday, and he will hear much more than he wants to hear.

Sir, now I come to the Bill itself.

Hear, hear!

Sir, I do not think hon. members are going to say, “Hear, hear!” in a moment. Obviously these hon. members have not looked at the Bill, otherwise they would not be shouting “Hear, hear!” Because what is important about the Bill and about the hon. the Minister’s speech on the Bill is not what has been said but what has not been said; that is the important thing. We all know that Iscor is an autonomous body; this is known to all of us, but Iscor has come to this House to ask us to give special authority to it to build a specific railway line from Sishen to Saldanha, and this despite the fact that the Iron and Steel Act already has a provision that Iscor may build railway lines. But apart from the fact that it is quite clear that when the Iscor Bill was passed originally, it was never intended that a railway line of this magnitude should be built by Iscor, it is also quite clear that what is essential to the hon. the Minister is the power of expropriation; he has to be able to expropriate land, and expropriation is always a thorny and very difficult subject, and I hope we will be able to debate this at some length in the Committee Stage.

Mr. Speaker, I think it is an insult to Parliament—and I use these words advisedly—that a Minister should come to this House and say, “I want to give Iscor authority to build a railway line,” without telling us anything about that railway line. There is nothing in the Bill and there is nothing in the Minister’s speech that gives any indication whatsoever as to the nature of this railway line.

No White Paper.

What is this line going to cost? What is the anticipated income from the line? How long is the line going to take to build? Where is the capital coming from? Is it going to be a viable line, and when is it going to be viable? This House is completely in the dark. Hon. gentlemen on the other side are prepared to vote for anything, as we know, but we on this side have a responsibility to the country and we are going to fulfil that responsibility. Surely, Sir, the House is entitled to know these things before it decides whether or not to give Iscor this authority for which it is asking. Sir, what happens when the Railway and Harbour Administration wants to build a railway line? It presents to both Houses of Parliament a report by the Railways and Harbours Board on the whole scheme, and it does so even when it is a guaranteed line, when the Government is not involved in any cost; and although Iscor is an autonomous body, we are going to have to guarantee the funds that Iscor is going to raise to build this line, but in spite of this we are told nothing. Here, Sir, is a report from the Railways and Harbours Board on two railway lines, and what do they tell us when they ask us for authority to build these lines? The entire story of each railway line is set out. In addition to that, there is a full engineer’s report on the railway line; we are shown the topography; we are shown exactly where the line is going to go. We do not even know this about the Sishen-Saldanha line. In the report of the Railway Board we are given a description of the route, of the length, the permanent way, the ruling gradient, the fencing, earthworks, stations and sidings, motive power, train control, crossings and signs, the estimated cost plus a whole description of the line itself. Surely, Sir, the least that is due to this Parliament is that when the hon. the Minister wants us to give Iscor authority to commit itself to an expenditure of hundreds of millions of rands, we must be told what it is all about. We know nothing about this line whatsoever.

Will the Minister answer those questions?

I believe that this House should have been given similar information on the Sishen-Saldanha line as is given by the railways on every other single line or every extension of a line. Sir, Parliament is not a rubber-stamp for Iscor. These autonomous authorities are taking too much power unto themselves and it is time Parliament exerted its authority. But, Sir, we believe that this railway line is necessary for the development of South Africa. This is the fundamental. We are not objecting to the line; we are objecting to the way in which this matter has been handled, and we are going to support the Second Reading of the Bill. But I want to warn the Government that unless it treats this House with the respect to which it is entitled, it is not going to get the co-operation of this side of the House on matters of this kind.

There is one thing that concerns us very greatly in connection with this line. This line is described as a single-purpose line or, to use the terms of the Bill, “the line of railway shall not be used for the conveyance of public traffic”. “Public traffic”, we understand, is anything except the actual ore which Iscor is going to carry. Sir, I understand the problems here. We heard them from the hon. the Minister of Transport when he said that he was not prepared to build the line. He gave adequate reasons for his attitude. But it does seem to me that something has gone wrong somewhere along the line.

The Government has derailed.

How is it possible, despite the differences between the hon. the Minister of Transport and the hon. the Minister of Economic Affairs that they were not able to find a solution to the problem, a solution in terms of which Iscor would do the things that the hon. the Minister of Transport wanted them to do but the country would also get the benefit of a new railway line? It beggars the imagination to find a railway line being built from Sishen to Saldanha, through an area which everybody accepts requires to be developed —and I am sure that we are going to hear quite a lot from my hon. friends opposite who are interested in the development of certain areas in the Cape—and yet for the present moment, at any rate—and we do not know for how long into the future— this line can serve no economic purpose whatsoever for the areas that require development. Sir, I just do not know what to say about this. How is it possible for such a thing to happen? I hope the hon. the Minister is going to tell us that soon he is going to have a beautiful railway line with a lovely train travelling from Sishen to Saldanha and it is going to have no impact whatsoever upon the industrial or economic development of the areas abutting on either side of that railway line.

Nobody can use it.

I understand the problems, but surely some solution could have been found so that we would have been able to say, “We will give you this railway line because we want to export iron ore, but we also want to develop this area of the country, and this railway line will serve that purpose.”

Mr. Speaker, we will vote for the Second Reading.

Mr. Speaker, let me say at once that the argument advanced by the hon. member who has just resumed his seat, that he and his party had not had the time to give proper consideration and thought to this legislation, has no substance whatsoever. For as long a period as the past four or five years we have been discussing this potential project and talking about it. I know of no subject which has been discussed and written about in more detail over a period of several years than this very subject. But I shall tell you, Sir, what the trouble is. The hon. member and his party are engaged in an internal struggle which does not allow them the time to give their attention to the matter. That is their real trouble. It is the Schwarz-hand, Sir, which is wasting their time. For that reason I say that this argument advanced by the hon. member has no substance whatsoever. I shall come back to a few of the arguments advanced by him here, and I think I shall be excused if I make a few remarks of a personal nature concerning this legislation which affects my part of the country.

The first thing I should like to say is that it is truly with great exhilaration in my heart that I can hold this piece of legislation in my hand today, can look at it and reflect on what its real impact will be. I say that there is exhilaration in my heart when I look here at the Sishen-Saldanha Bay Railway Construction Bill to provide for the building of a line of railway between Sishen and Saldanha Bay by the South African Iron and Steel Corporation, Limited, and to provide for matters incidental thereto. Sir. I say that it is with exhilaration in my heart that I support this legislation. In recent years I was able to agitate, in the good sense of the word, together with the people of this particular region, for the establishment of this project which is being given life by means of this legislation. For some years we held congresses throughout this part of the country to talk about and reflect on the possibility of this project. We held conferences, one after the other, to see in what way we could make further adjustments and adaptations in respect of the possibility of this project. We spoke and wrote continually on the possibilities of this particular project, and from time to time in this process I personally acquired many nicknames of which I am very proud today and which I regard with a jealous love. On occasion I have been called “Piet Saldanha” and “Piet West Coast” and “Piet Railway line” and “Piet Growth Point.” Sir, I say that I am very proud when I think of all these names I have acquired in the course of the struggle up to now.

In this process there were even days when we had differences among ourselves. I remember an occasion when we had searching deliberations on this matter and when I had to differ with some of my colleagues. They told me that if the starting-point of the railway line was in the Sishen region, the terminal had to be at Buchuberg. They told me that if we started building the line in the Sishen region, it would be better if the terminal was at Buchuberg. Others said, “Let the terminal be the Olifants River Mouth.” You also know, Sir, of the long fight there was over the question whether it was to be St. Croix or Saldanha.

And. St. Croix won too.

You see, Sir, it was a very long fight and sometimes a difficult fight, sometimes an internal one. There were even days when we despaired in our own ranks, when we really lost heart. It was in days like those that we quoted to each other the words of one of South Africa’s most successful industrialists, Dr. Anton Rupert: He who does not believe in miracles, is no realist. Then we joined hands once again and tried to press further and, in the good sense of the word, agitated for this particular project. It is against this background that I should like to pay tribute to the enthusiasm, idealism and creative attitude of the people of this particular region which will be affected by this project. Yesterday, in this Langenhoven Year, I heard the hon. the Minister of Finance quoting from Langenhoven when he wanted to give more effect to his statements. I should also like to do so to illustrate this point. Langenhoven said (translation)—

To me this legislation is in many respects the personification of the enthusiasm, the idealism and the creative power displayed by the people of this particular region over recent years to bring this project into being.

There are two personalities of whom I would like to make special mention today. On behalf of the people of this region I should like to say to them: “Thank you very much”. The first is the hon. the Minister of Economic Affairs himself, who is handling this legislation. I am aware of the fact that from him, too, this matter demanded great effort over the past few months. He, too had to deal with differences of opinion and sometimes he was up against the opinion of people of great consequence. However, he persisted. I know that he took a mammoth share upon himself in order to bring this legislation to this House and to ensure the realization of the envisaged project. On behalf of this region I want to say to him: “Thank you very much”. On 11th May this region is holding a big function where we shall enjoy ourselves by celebrating and “having a party”, as we say. I want to tell the hon. the Minister at this early stage that we have invited him to be the principal guest of honour on that occasion. Once again in the words of Langenhoven, I want to tell him that I hope he will be there, “to forget his hardships in pleasure” (om sy swaarkry met lekkerkry te kom klaarkry).

The second person whom I think I should thank today and to whom I must also pay tribute in this regard, is the hon. the Minister’s predecessor, Mr. Jan Haak. He is the person who originally started this project. He did all the spadework in the past; the present hon. Minister took it further and followed it up. I think I would be failing in my duty if I allowed this occasion to pass without paying special tribute to him for the work which he did.

Then there is Iscor itself. It has always impressed me over the past few years to see with what determination, imagination and creative power this body set its hand to the task of furthering, advocating and realizing this project. Iscor had its origin at a time when the United Party was still fighting against it. Here again was a case where this body came to the fore with imagination. I have always been struck by the daring and perseverance with which Iscor has always furthered the cause or this project. On one occasion two years ago we held on enormous congress, a regional meeting, in the district of Sishen at which we considered the potential and the possibilities of this project. Some of our most prominent people were somewhat afraid to put in an appearance on that occasion. But the colourfulness, determination and imagination with which Iscor itself took part in this meeting, was remarkable to me.

When it comes to the real impact or the benefit of this project, I can speak over a very broad spectrum today, but I want to content myself with just one argument. This is what I would call the political argument surrounding this particular project. It has happened on more then one occasion in history that political implications have been involved in the construction of a railway line. If I see the future correctly, I see that this railway line has certain wider implications than merely that of rands and cents. If I see the future correctly, I think that in years to come this Sishen-Saldanha railway line is going to be one of the biggest investments made in White/Brown relations in this country up to now. I shall tell hon. members why. There was a time in the past when the late Dr. Verwoerd came forward with what I would call his wonder formula of separate territorial freedoms for the Black people of our country. We have been building on this formula throughout the years. We have invested money in the development of the border areas to give this image a new geographical content of separate territorial freedoms for our Black people. We have been doing this with the homelands themselves. In the Budget which was introduced yesterday, it was remarkable to see what a huge sum of money was being invested in the development of separate territorial freedoms for our Black people. If we make a proper analysis of the situation, we sometimes have to look rather hard to find where we have really made a large and calculated investment in the process of spatial organization between White and Brown in this country. If I read the prospects for the future correctly, it is my modest opinion that here we are truly making a huge investment in White/Brown relations in this country. I shall tell hon. members why. Almost three-quarters of the Brown people of our country are concentrated in the Boland today. Now it is true—and I have already said this in the past, but I want to repeat it today—that we in the Boland do not have gold today, we do not have diamonds, nor do we have coal. On all levels as far as growth, development and progress in the Boland in future are concerned, we shall have to have artificial stimulation from outside. We shall have to create it artificially in order to create employment opportunities, to maintain good relations between White and Brown and to keep ourselves occupied in this particular, historical part of the country. If I read the signs correctly, I think that our Government is making an investment here in respect of White/Brown relations which today we are as yet unable to evaluate. It is in this that the real value of this project lies hidden. There are others as well, but I do not want to go into them in detail.

The hon. member who spoke before me, advanced certain arguments here which I should much rather leave to the Minister himself. This is a situation which I think I should leave to him, one which he is to judge more specifically. When I consider the line as such and make a study of the geography of the territory through which this railway line will run—I have already attempted to do this—there is one situation which immediately strikes one. That is that this will really, relatively speaking, be an easy railway line to construct. It is not a railway line which will run through very mountainous regions or through intensively farmed regions. This railway line will run from the Sishen region to the north-west and from there to our West Coast. From there it will run further down. I do not think that complicated situations will arise concerning expropriation in this particular region. I do not know whether my plea will be of any help, but there is one small area and that is the beautiful, picturesque little town on the West Coast called Elands Bay. I think this little town will be very detrimentally affected by this particular railway line. This particular little town is situated in a big picturesque region adjoining one of the richest lobster grounds along our coast. It is a town where some of the longest swells occur which can be ridden by our surfers. This is the region where the picturesque “vloorvlei”, as the people of that region call it, runs into the sea. This is the region where the last Metropolitan horse, Gold Flame, was trained. So this region is something rather special. Now, it is a pity that, before it will be possible for the proposed railway line to run through the Bobbejaansberg, this particular town will have to be cut exactly into two.

At this very late stage I should like to ask the hon. the Minister—I do not know whether this could influence the tenders— whether it would not be possible to reconsider the routing of this one single section of this railway line. It could cause tremendous inconvenience. It is a situation which one would like to avoid if possible. For the rest, it is remarkable that this is really, as I have said, an easy railway line which will have to be constructed and developed there.

Against this background I do not really want to argue the matter any further. As the hon. the Minister said, this legislation speaks for itself. It springs from a debate which has been conducted in our country over many years. I look forward to the realization and implementation of this particular project.

Mr. Speaker, it gives me very great pleasure on this particular occasion to give support and encouragement to a scheme which has been advocated very effectively for a number of years by the hon. member for Moorreesburg. I wish to pay tribute to him for his advocacy of the Saldanha-Sishen project because over the past months and years there has indeed been a dispute, a controversy, not about the merits of this particular scheme, but about the priority which should be granted to other schemes which would serve the country for the same purposes. However, I believe that this dispute has largely been resolved, and I wish to take this opportunity of once again affirming, as we have done throughout the controversy, the attitude of this side of the House in supporting the development of the Saldanha-Sishen project. We believe that, as this country is growing very rapidly, its population demands and its economic demands impose a demand also for increased harbour and railway development; and that a project such as this, which can eventually make a great contribution to our exports and the exploitation of our natural resources, is a most important development. At no stage, either in the past or in the future would we oppose a development of this kind with such intrinsic merits. We believe it is necessary and desirable and the Government therefore has our full support. We do not support as whole-heartedly the Bill which is before us today. My hon. friend, the member for Parktown has already expressed our objections to the manner in which this Bill has been brought before the House and to the very short notice we have had to consider a Rill which we believe has very wide implications. I say again we support the project to develop this particular part of our economy. We will continue to give it our support but we do not believe it is being handled in the right way.

We have before us a Bill which in essence contains very few provisions. What are these provisions? They provide, firstly, that there should be a railway line of a certain gauge; they provide that this railway should have an approximate length or distance between two points; besides, it determines what the two extremities of this railway line are to be. The gauge, the length and the two extrémités are the total of the details we receive about a railway line which is of a length of no less than 880 km running through a very large sector of this country. This is the sum total of the information which Parliament is given in this Bill as regards the construction of the railway line. There is one further point of information as regards the construction of this railway line, namely that it shall not carry public traffic. With that we have the sum total of the information the Government is prepared to provide about this most important railway development in this country.

What else does the Bill contain? It extends very wide powers to a public corporation to do a number of things which were never contemplated when this public corporation was first set up. I am not here to say that the public corporation which has been entrusted with the development of this great project, should not in fact be given additional powers. Quite clearly, if a public corporation is entrusted with such a task, it must have additional powers to enable it to complete that task. It also gives this public corporation extensive powers of expropriation and lays down certain conditions for compensation. That is the sum total of the information which the Government is furnishing to Parliament in respect of a project which touches a major development in this country, one of the greatest developments in this quarter of the century, one of the most important economic developments, for which this Government is responsible and for which this Parliament is therefore responsible, and for which ultimately, if this thing fails, the public of South Africa will be responsible. It is all very well to take the view that a public corporation enjoys a degree of autonomy which enables it to raise money to embark on a great economic venture and to be given the responsibility for the success or failure of that venture, but I want to say that conservatively, to accept the figures given so far in the estimates given by Iscor, we are involving R465 million in the development of this project. This is something like one-fifth of the total Budget of this country on all items. This authority is being given to a public corporation, and this public corporation is one in which, as I understand it, all, or nearly all, the shares are held by the State. In other words, they are held by the State on behalf of the public of South Africa. The State should be answerable to the public of South Africa through this Parliament. The time has surely come, if we are going to permit our great public corporations to expand indefinitely into the economic sectors of South Africa that they will very largely bear the responsibility for the success or failure of our economic policies—because they carry such a large burden of responsibilities within our economy—where we ought not to create a situation in which these public corporations can exercise these vast responsibilities and command control over such a vast sector of our economy and yet not be called up as answerable to Parliament. If we proceed along this route, we will presently find that maybe four-fifths or our whole economy will be in the hands of public corporations which are not answerable to Parliament and for which the Minister himself, who is the Minister of Economic Affairs, does not feel called upon to answer to Parliament. We ask questions about the cost and the economic management of this project. We know what the attitude of the Railway Administration has been to this project. We know the reasons why they have declined to conduct the project themselves as a Railway undertaking. Yet we have a private corporation which within certain limitations and with a defined scope is prepared to conduct business which is essentially Railway business, which according to the traditions and practices in this country are normally carried out by the Railways. This in itself, if acceptable, is at least a thing that needs fuller explanation. We have had no explanatory memorandum and we have had no explanation from the hon. the Minister. We believe that he owes the country not just a cursory explanation; he owes this country a major explanation. We have here a most radical departure from the traditional policy and customs of our country in the economic sphere. This Bill is brought to Parliament in a great hurry but with no explanation. It involves a major departure in principle and a major new venture in the economic practice of this country, and we get no explanation whatsoever.

We have a public corporation, enjoying autonomy, which is being given authority to operate in the field of public transport in South Africa, to run a vast railway enterprise in South Africa. We know that it is the practice in this country and in this Parliament, for the Railway Administration, which is the authorized agent of this Government in the conduct of Railway business in this country, to come to Parliament with details of its development schemes. It comes to us with great punctiliousness and care, to explain to us in great detail, precisely what it is doing in this important public field, in this vital area of our infrastructure. It tells us precisely what it is doing, why it is doing it, what route it will take, what its purposes will be, what the estimated economics will be—it brings all these factors to Parliament. This has been done by the Railway Administration, the trusted servant of our public transport in South Africa, for many, many years. But here we have a public corporation which has no or little experience in the field of public transport. It is given a sector of rail in South Africa 880 km long. It is asked to develop the transport service, subject to certain conditions, in an area of the country which is largely undeveloped, from a Railway point of view, but an area which may be of great significance, economically, socially and strategically, in our future. It is an area where we may have to build one or more harbours in addition to Saldanha. This vast project, with all its implications for the future, is brought to the House in this cursory fashion, in a Bill which merely defines the length and extremities of the railway line, and then goes on to deal with compensation and expropriation procedures. That is all we have, and at such short notice. We are asked to examine a contract of this nature in one day, with all the principles involved and all the implications. This is the notice and information we get.

There is a further implication which I think needs to be looked at very carefully. We have had no time to consult private interests in this matter. Here we have a public corporation which is being given permission to operate a private railway line from which the public interest will be totally excluded. This railway line, occupying so vast a proportion of the country’s economy in the sense of capital mobilization, in the sense of the spin-off from a project of this kind, this vast project is being conducted by a public corporation for a special narrow sectional economic purpose, important though it is, through country which is in urgent need of development. There are farms there which are in urgent need of development. Here I strongly support the arguments of my friend, the hon. member for Moorreesburg. Of course this area of the country is neglected. When we talk of the development of underdeveloped areas, we do not need only to look at Black homelands. Here is a White homeland which has been shamefully neglected over the years. Now, what are we doing to this White homeland? We are building through it a railway line with only two stations, one at each extremity, and the only benefit the farmers in that homeland will get, will be that at night, as they sit in their little houses by guttering candles, they will hear the whistle of the trains as they go by. That is the economic contribution which this line will make to the agriculture of that area. [Interjections.]

*I hope there is going to be electricity. I would be quite surprised if there was any electricity available to the whole of that area. What there will be, however, is a railway line, and that railway line will merely be a single purpose railway line, because there will be no stations. The farmers will simply see the trains go by, and probably also a little smoke on the horizon; they will hear the train whistle while they are lying in their beds at night.

†Sir, the hon. member for Moorreesburg looks forward to great economic development in this area. I am telling him that so far there is no indication whatsoever that his hopes will be realized by this line. There will certainly be an economic contribution made to South Africa in due course, but what we question is not the purpose of that economic contribution. We accept the end in view. What we question very much is the manner in which this is being done. We question the way in which Parliament is being left uninformed as to the implications of this project. We do not accept at all the conclusions the hon. member for Moorreesburg draws about Coloured homelands. He came close to saying in this House today that he believes that this railway will provide the infrastructure for a Coloured homeland. This is what he was saying. [Interjections.] Sir, if he did not mean to say that, then I do not know what the implications of his words were. I listened very carefully to what he said. However, if it is the hon. the Minister’s intention to create in this manner, through the participation of a public corporation with a special private interest, a back door through which he can bring in a Coloured homeland, which is what the hon. member for Moorreesburg suggests, and if he thinks that he is going to solve the problems of South Africa by allowing our transport development to go along on these lines, with this minimal supply of information and detail to this House, then we must express our strongest opposition. We do not believe that this is the way to conduct the economic development and progress of this country. We support this Bill because we believe that this project must go ahead, but we support it with the greatest reluctance because of the nature of this Bill.

Mr. Speaker, once again it is very strange behaviour we are getting from the United Party today. They are blowing hot and cold. After having listened to the Opposition speakers who participated in this debate, one really does not know whether they actually support this Bill in spirit. The hon. member for Parktown raised objections to the procedure which was followed in this regard, and because they did not have sufficient time since they were allegedly so preoccupied with the Budget. But, Sir, surely this Bill contains no new principles. In the first place, as the hon. the Minister stated so very explicitly in his Second Reading speech, the South African Iron and Steel Industrial Corporation has always had the right to build railway lines and the buildings associated with that. Therefore there is no new principle concerned here. Why the hon. member should now want 14 days to study that principle, heaven alone knows.

The second principle to which they object, is the power of expropriation given to Iscor. Sir, one would think Iscor consisted of a lot of people who would simply expropriate ground left, right and centre from the farmers. We know Iscor, and Iscor has left its mark on this country. We are at least dealing with respectable people. Surely we are not dealing with a bunch of hooligans; it is a responsible corporation. As the Minister quite rightly mentioned, the people from Iscor contacted the people who will be affected by the building of this railway line in advance. In this Bill nothing new is being laid down concerning the principle of expropriation; there is no deviation whatsoever from that principle. In other words, the principles which are contained in this Bill, already exist in various Acts. Now hon. members want a lot of time in which to study this Bill. The hon. member for Parktown said that they do not know what the railway line will cost or what is going to be built. Sir, if Iscor builds a blast-furnace or a roller mill or a steel-making plant, must Parliament be asked every time how the money is to be spent and what costs may be incurred? This railway line is a part of a construction by the corporation. Then why are hon. members on that side so concerned about it? They mentioned certain objections to the line. Sir, it is not a dual purpose line; it was stated very explicitly here that it would be a single purpose line and that Iscor is going to construct the line in the most profitable way. It would be foolish to build a number of stations along this line if there will not be any traffic to convey. It will only be necessary to establish the necessary junctions along that line, for the primary purpose of this line is to transport ore for export purposes. Sir, it is a long time since I last heard objections from the Opposition to which one can pay as little heed as the objections which I heard in this debate. The hon. member for Gardens asked what Iscor knows about transport. Sir, I want to extend an invitation to the hon. member to pay me a visit in Vanderbijlpark during the recess. I will show him what Iscor knows about transport; I will take him to Thabazimbi, and I will also take him to Pretoria. Apparently the hon. member only knows what happens here in the Gardens.

You mean the member for Von Brandis, not Gardens.

Well, then he is so much nearer to me and he will be very welcome if he wants to pay me a visit. Mr. Speaker, with regard to the Opposition, here we are again dealing with a “yes, but …” policy. Listening to the hon. members of the Opposition today one thinks of what happened a very long time ago. I think you will allow me. Sir, especially since we are here dealing with an Iscor project, to refer very briefly to the history of Iscor. Today it is almost exactly 45 years ago that a measure for the establishment of Iscor was introduced in this House for the first time, and we know what the United Party’s attitude was at the time. After two months the Bill was rejected. It was introduced for a second time, in 1928, and tomorrow—the 30th of March—it will be exactly 45 years ago that the Iscor Act was placed on the Statute Book. It is a striking coincidence that today is the 29th March and that it will be the 30th March tomorrow when this House will sanction this gigantic project which Iscor wants to undertake in the interests of the country.

Sir, this obstructive attitude of the Opposition reminds me of something which happened at the Iscor mines at Thabazimbi in the old days. That mine is situated on the mountain slope. In the old days they let the cocopans filled with ore run down the mountainside, and when the cocopan reached the bottom, the Mashangaan would shout “Faga lo spraak”, and then threw a spoke in the wheel to stop the cocopan. Sir, hon. members of the Opposition “fago lo spraak” at every occasion when we want to do something in the interests of the development of the country. Every time development is inevitable here, they put a spoke in the wheel.

Sir, hon. members of the Opposition asked what the purpose of this line was; what it would entail if we should allow this project to be piloted through, and what it would mean for South Africa. They do, at least, believe that it would mean something for South Africa, but nevertheless they ask many questions about it. Do these people have no faith and no confidence in the future of this country? Must they always be pessimists? Sir, we know what the attitude was when Sasol was established; we still remember how they objected to it. I still have a little pamphlet here which the then member for Kimberley, Mr. Eden, distributed during an election campaign. In that pamphlet he said (translation): “For Sasol money is here being wasted against adversity; £11 million is being wasted there.” Sir, that was also a project which would bring expansion and development, but that was the attitude the United Party adopted. We know what has happened in the meantime. Sasol has grown and last year made a profit of R6½ million. But hon. members of the Opposition will not refer to that today. Sir, when Iscor was originally planned, the idea was to manufacture 180 000 tons of ingot steel. It was a small project. Today we have that powerful organization which plans to manufacture more than 6 million tons of ingot steel. And what happens now? When we want to expand further in this country, when we want to develop the country economically, when we want to create growth points, when we want to create avenues of employment, to which the hon. member for Moorreesburg referred here in such a striking manner, then the members of the Opposition again put a spoke in the wheel. There is the Iscor organization. It employs more than 37 000 Whites and non-Whites and salaries of more than R100 million are being paid to those people. But now that this corporation wants to proceed with expansion, we are again dealing with obstructive factors. Sir, yesterday we had a Budget where the Minister went out of his way to stimulate industrial development and to stimulate export. Every day we complain that we have to export more. Now that the opportunity is being created to build a railway line to convey that ore to Saldanha, these people have a whole lot of buts— yes, but this and yes, but that; what will it look like when it reaches the other side? Now they ask what this will entail. We know that Iscor has already made considerable progress with negotiations with an Austrian steel company on the manufacture of semi-processed products. But it depends on this Parliament whether they will be able to proceed with those negotiations. If we do not pass this Bill, they cannot proceed with the negotiations with that Austrian company. The idea is to manufacture 1½ million tons of semi-processed products every year, and tentative contracts have already been accepted to export 1 million tons per year during the next ten years. But these people want to wreck this plan. To me it is very clear that these people want to place a boulder on the railway line. I can truly not understand what these people’s attitude is. As I say, it blows hot and cold. I think that if they want to do South Africa a good turn today, they must give this Bill their full support, and not subject to various conditions. However, we know from experience that if one mentions the name Iscor, these people get up on their hind legs. They oppose everything tackled by Iscor. Sir, we support this Bill fully and we want to congratulate the hon. the Minister, for it is in the interests of the future and the development of this beautiful country.

Listening to my friend, the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark, one realizes that the speech he made this afternoon was probably written yesterday. I think he was convinced that the United Party would be opposing this measure, but that is not so. It has been made quite plain that we are in full support of the building of this line from Sishen to Saldanha Bay. I speak as a member representing the Western Cape and I would like to tell the hon. member that he must not just take things lightly. He was telling us about the powers of Iscor and what they can do and what they cannot do, but I would like to remind the hon. member that he is a member of Parliament and we are shareholders in this enormous organization of which we are all very proud. I would like to remind the hon. member that he represents a seat called Vanderbijlpark which was developed during the last war by a wonderful man who certainly did not support his party. I can tell him that the very seat in which he sits today was developed by this side of the House. I think the hon. member must realize that we have responsibilities to the people of South Africa. We are the underwriters of debts incurred by this enormous corporation and our protest here was, I think, a sound one, and I think the Minister will admit that it was. We are presented here with an enabling Bill containing very little detail. I am surprised at the hon. member adopting this attitude. When he talks about Sasol, he must remember that a lot of money was invested in Sasol. It is getting off the ground now but it is doing so by using imported crudes. We are all very proud of Sasol, so please do not let him blow warm and cold. He wrote that speech yesterday and it has miss-fired. He expected us to oppose this Bill wholeheartedly and thought it would be something he could walk round the country with and tell people how the United Party opposed the building of the Sishen-Saldanha Bay line.

I, as one of the members of the Western Cape, give this Bill my wholehearted support in principle. The line is no doubt going to open up an area of vast mineral wealth in the North-Western Cape. When one looks at South Africa, one thinks of diamonds, gold and coal in the Transvaal, but one has to come to the conclusion that the great mineral wealth, the future of South Africa, lies in the North-Western Cape. I am fairly certain that the future steel industries of this country will be located very near to the end of this line. Vast steel industries, very much bigger than we have ever seen in this country, will be located there. With that in mind, we support this Bill. However, we are not supporting it blindly.

The hon. member for Moorreesburg says that this line will establish a growth point for South Africa in the Western Cape. I do not want politics brought into this matter. I agree that it will assist the Coloureds. There are no two ways about it. We in the Western Cape have seen, I am afraid as a result of Government policy and I am sorry to say it, over the years that they have been in power a drift of industry from the Western Cape to the North, and to such an extent that today we are denuded of any major industry. Whenever the Government thinks of a new industrial plan or something like that, you find that it is established very near to Pretoria and never anywhere else. We are pleased that what is being established here will reverse that process.

I have one great disappointment in this regard and that concerns the South African Railways. I think it is necessary that I remind the House of the purpose of the South African Railways and in this connection I should like to quote from the Republic of South Africa Constitution Act, where the position is made clear. I quote section 103(1) of Act 32 of 1961—

I am sorry that we are seeing something new here and that perhaps for economic reasons the Railways and this vast steel organization could not get together to build this line. I am not so worried about it being a single-purpose line, because I am convinced in my own mind that once this line is built full use will be made of it. I think economically it will have to be. We have huge copper deposits in the area and the line will probably have to be used for this purpose as well. It is clear that this line will open up a growth point. One must always remember that the great British Empire and all major countries in the modem world were opened up by the famous sea routes as channels of communication. Roads offer a system of communication, but when you get the vast loads that have to be moved, one must look to the Railways.

There is another point. I am one of those who feel that we should not export all our raw materials. I think that is wrong. It has been said by industrialists all over the world that they cannot understand why we export all our raw materials. We seem to be exporting all our raw materials to Japan so that we can buy the finished products from them. I want to make this quite clear. If we are to become what is supposed to be the workshop of Africa, we have to establish our vast steel industries here and we must use our raw materials within our country. We should process them and only then export them. We have to use our raw materials and we should not only look at them with a view to obtaining foreign currency. We must look further than that. We must look at what could happen in this country.

What about our semi-processed steel?

Yes, we are already doing it with our semi-processed steel, but I should like us to go a little bit further than that. We want to build up a vast steel industry in our country, a steel industry that will come as a result of the opening up of the North-Western Cape. The present steel industry will just be a flea-bite to what will happen when all this development takes place.

I want to reassure the Government side that we are not against this measures; we are very much for it. However, I think it is wrong for us in principle to have a Bill thrust upon us which we have not been able to study. One must not just pass lightly over the provisions of Bills which deal with expropriation.

I am fairly certain that this railway line for which the Bill makes provision passes through rich farmlands and I am fairly certain that the people concerned do not know the contents of this Bill. They may have been approached as far as the expropriation of the route of the line is concerned, but I do not think that they havebeen consulted. We have not been able to study this measure to any great length and we have just had a bare Bill put in front of us. Mr. Speaker, I see that you are paging through this Bill and I am quite certain that you do not know whether we are off the target or not because you realize it is merely an enabling Bill. You will probably say that we have gone too far in our discussions and probably the Bill does not say what we say it does. That is the position. Here we are spending an amount of between R400 and R600 million. We cannot just rush this through this House. I have been listening to the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark. We have a responsibility to the voters and to the people of South Africa, who are shareholders in this concern, and therefore we must know more about measures of this magnitude like this Bill before this House.

Mr. Speaker, the principal objections of the hon. members opposite were that insufficient information is being made available in this Bill, and that they had had insufficient time to study this Bill. The hon. member for Salt River, who has just spoken, is from the Western Cape and speaks a different language to his colleagues who are from Johannesburg. He spoke with great feeling of the development of this part of the world, of the opportunities it would create for the Coloured community and of the processing of our raw materials and semi-processed products since these could then be exported and could earn us money. I am in complete agreement with him on that score. I have no fault to find with that, for that is precisely what we are trying to do here, and it is to that end that we are asking for the hon. member’s co-operation here.

The hon. member for Parktown began by objecting because there was so little time available. I should like to bring it to the attention of the House that we are hard at work on these matters. Hon. members will recall, and I think it is common knowledge—everyone knows because there were frequent reports in the newspapers on this—that the Cabinet in fact took three decisions in regard to these matters. In the first place the Cabinet decided that Iscor could proceed with the Saldanha scheme if it was able to obtain the capital and the necessary contracts. In December 1971, when it appeared, in the light of world economic circumstances, impossible to obtain the contracts in advance, the Cabinet informed Iscor that it could proceed to call for tenders in order to get a better indication of what the costs of this scheme would be so that when tenders were called for, a decision could be taken on the implementation of the scheme. It goes without saying that when one calls for tenders, one is restricted by the time factor. Tenders are called for, after that decisions have to be taken, and within a specific time those tenders have to be carried out, a reply has to be given to those tenders.

For that reason it is obvious that after the tenders were received by Iscor, and after Iscor had processed all these tenders —some of the tenders are very complicated; there are large sums of money involved, and under the circumstances many tenders were received—the matter was submitted to the Cabinet. Only after the Cabinet had decided on the tenders, the amount it was going to cost and that the scheme could be proceeded with, were we able to proceed with the preparation of this enabling legislation. In the light of those circumstances it is obvious that time was an important factor and that it was necessary to work very hard to have this legislation as well approved before the tender period elapsed. Now, the hon. member has said that they were given insufficient time, and that I subsequently agreed not to proceed with the legislation yesterday. That is not quite correct. To tell the honest truth, after the Bills were on the Order Paper yesterday, I contacted the Opposition through the Leader of the House and the Whips. They were asked whether they had any objections to our proceeding with it. It is not they who came to ask us, and it is not we who subsequently agreed not to proceed with it. In fact, we did not get round to the Bills yesterday.

You had a bit of a guilty conscience.

If we had wanted to deal with them, we would have had to delay other work and give precedence to these Bills; otherwise we would not have be able to do so. In fact—and this is where the hon. member created the wrong impression in this House—it was not as a result of representations on their part that we did not proceed yesterday; no, we acted in a decent civilized way; we went to them and asked them whether they had any objection to our proceeding with it yesterday. When they said, “No”, we said, “Very well, then”. The hon. member may as well nod his head and confirm what I am saying. The hon. member also said that they were preparing for the Budget debate next week, and that we could not proceed with legislation now. What on earth should we do then? Should we sit here and do nothing? [Interjections.]

Surely we must proceed with legislation. This is a tiny little Bill. Let me remind the hon. members that they objected last week to not having any work. This is only a tiny little Bill, which they, who are clever people, could have studied since yesterday so that we could have proceeded with it today, but now the hon. member is objecting to the fact that we are proceeding with it today. I do not think there is any ground at all for this argument of his. I must admit that we wanted to pilot this legislation through quickly, but it is obvious that the work which appears on the Order Paper will have to be proceeded with. If we had struck a snag with this legislation today and had asked for an adjournment of the House, they would also have objected. That is the way they are. They are plagued to such an extent by the problems within their own ranks that they want to avail themselves of every opportunity to improve their image a little, to prove that they do at least have a little fighting spirit left.

Why is your Order Paper so hopeless?

The second point which the hon. member raised is that the Railways, when they come forward with that construction of a railway line, make a White Paper available—I think it is a White Paper; I am not certain. In any case, a document is made available in which all the particulars of the railway line in question are set out for this House. Then this document is discussed before the railway line is proceeded with. This hobbyhorse which the hon. member for Parktown saddled up, is one which will never make the running. I shall tell you why. The hon. member for Vanderbijlpark has given the hon. member a partial reply to that question. In the first place the Constitution Act makes it compulsory for Parliament to give its approval to that specific railway line when the Railways comes forward with an extension. Section 105(1) of the Constitution Act states—

Let me emphasize the words “public traffic”—

This provision makes it compulsory for the particulars to be submitted when a railway line is constructed for public traffic. Of course, if it is submitted, it has to be submitted in detail.

Why could you not issue a White Paper?

Wait, let me complete my argument first; then the hon. member will understand it better. The railway line has to be submitted to the House in detail. When it is thus submitted, all the details of it are available. In the case of Iscor it is different, for the simple reason that it is not for the conveyance of public traffic, but for the purposes of Iscor. I see the hon. member is nodding his head. In fact, I am not asking for the consent of the House to Iscor building this railway line. Iscor may build it; all that I am doing in clause 2—and I shall come to clause 2 in a moment—is that I am making a statement to the effect that Iscor may build this railway line. I am not requesting the consent of this House. Section 2(2)(b) of the Iron and Steel Industry Act reads as follows—

1. (b) … construct, maintain, alter improve, manage, work, control and superintend any roads, ways, railways other than for the conveyance of public traffic …

I have omitted a long list of other things because they are not applicable here and because I simply want to draw attention to the fact that Iscor has the power, in terms of its own Act, to construct a railway line other than for the conveyance of public traffic. In other words, it is not necessary for me to come to Parliament for authorization.

Why?

I shall explain everything to hon. members; they must simply exercise a little patience. We are coming to this House now to procure better rights of expropriation for Iscor for the purposes of building this railway line, as I also said in my Second Reading speech. Clause 2(1)(a) read as follows—

In other words, the Corporation may build the railway line in terms of the provisions of its own Act, and that is what I am saying here. I am not asking for any consent here, for the Corporation my construct that railway line.

May I ask the hon. the Minister a question? Section 105(2) of the Republic of South Africa Constitution Act provides as follows—

Was such a report actually prepared? If so, should it not have been submitted to this Parliament?

There may be a difference of opinion as to whether this is desirable or not. Hon. members have the right to differ with me. In section 105, to which the hon. member has now referred, specific reference is made to the Railways and to public use, and not to a corporation or company which construct a railway line for its own purposes.

Here it states “every” railway line.

Yes, but every railway line referred to in section 105, and not every railway line in the country. If that were the case, the bungling when they want to construct a short railway line such as the one they have on the other side of Newlands, will also have to be brought to Parliament for sanction.

Then he bungles everything.

May I ask the hon. the Minister a question? Why is it necessary to exclude sections 62 and 63 of the Railways and Harbours Control and Management (Consolidation) Act in clause 14?

It is difficult for me at the moment to look at clause 14, for we are now dealing with the Second Reading debate; we could preferably discuss this during the Committee Stage. The hard facts of the matter are that we are dealing with Iscor and the construction of a railway line for them. It is actually the expropriation provisions which constitutes the imporant factor in the Bill. In the light of those circumstances I honestly think that it cannot be argued that we should have submitted a White Paper here similar to the procedure we adopt when a railway line is constructed for public traffic by the Railways in terms of section 105 of the Constitution Act.

The hon. member for Parktown said that we had not furnished all the particulars concerning the railway line. In the light of the argument which I have now advanced, it is after all not possible to furnish all the particulars. Nor is that the object with which we are coming to Parliament with this legislation. But I do nevertheless want to furnish the hon. member with a few particulars, since he has in fact asked for a few specific particulars. I think the hon.member is already aware of them; but for the purposes of the record I may as well mention them. Of this estimate, as submitted to the Cabinet, the tenders received comprise 77% of the total costs as set out. Letters of undertaking comprise 9%, and estimates 14%. It goes without saying that in a major construction such as this, everything cannot consist of tenders. For that reason one has this division. According to the submission to the Cabinet, this railway system will cost R200 million.

The hon. member then elaborated on the fact that the Bill provides that the railway line will be used solely by Iscor, and not for public traffic. There are other particulars which I can furnish the hon. member with. I doubt whether this is the appropriate time to do so. He says we do not even know what the length is. Oh well, the length is stated in the Bill, namely 880 km. However, I should just like to express a few ideas on the provision in the Bill that it is going to be used solely for the purposes of Iscor. This is a point which could elicit lengthy and protracted discussion, and which did in fact elicit lengthy and protracted discussion prior to the decisions taken by the Cabinet. There was unanimity on one point. When I speak of unanimity, I am referring to unanimity between myself as Minister of Economic Affairs and the Minister of Transport at least. In fact, I know of nothing at the moment in respect of which there is a fundamental difference of opinion between us. But there is one point on which virtually everyone was unanimous, which was that in a case such as this, where we are dealing with the bulk conveyance of ore or semi-processed steel products, there is very keen competition with the rest of the world. There are various schemes of this nature in the rest of the world, and the profit margins are slender. The scheme is based on efficiency and bulk conveyance; in other words, efficiency on the one hand and the vast extent of the project and the goods to be conveyed on the other. In the light of these circumstances, particularly as far as the slender profit margin is concerned, there is no doubt that the efficiency should be as high as possible. To achieve that high efficiency—in this regard there is no doubt at all in the mind of any one I know—it is by far the best that this should be a single-purpose railway line. Now I want to tell you why. Hon. members said that there were stations at Sishen and at Saldanha only. That is not quite true. There will be various junctions along the railway line. Approximately half-way a “station" will be built where the trains will stop and the train crews change over, where a new driver will take over and take the train further to Sishen or Saldanha, whichever may be the case. The fact of the matter is that there will be a number of junctions. Now hon. members must bear in mind that rolling stock to the value of millions of rand is going to be utilized here. One train, it is calculated, will cost in the region of R4 million, and it is therefore of the utmost importance that that rolling stock to the value of millions of rand be used as efficiently and rapidly as possible. It is of the utmost important that that train which departs fully loaded from Sishen to Saldanha, should be back at Sishen as soon as possible to take on another full load. If that is not done, we will need so much more rolling stock, and so much more capital to purchase that rolling stock. With a single-purpose line such as this, which is being used only for bulk conveyance, one will be able to synchronize the entire system in such a way that preference is given to the fully-laden trains travelling from Sishen to Saldanha, which will of course travel more slowly than the empty trains travelling from Saldanha back to Sishen. For that reason we can build the stations—or rather the junctions; I shall prefer not to call them stations—in such a way that the train will run without stopping from Sishen to the half-way junction, where the train will take on a new driver. It can be done if the system works correctly. The train will therefore be able to reach the half-way mark without stopping. From then the train will again be able to travel on to Saldanha without stopping. The faster-travelling empty trains coming from Saldanha, will always arrive at the stations a little before the full train. In this way we will be able to synchronize the entire system and we will be able to utilize the rolling stock to the greatest possible advantage. These are the benefits, briefly stated, of such a single-purpose railway line.

Now you can imagine, Mr. Speaker, what would happen if you conveyed other goods on that railway line. I do not want hon. members to deduce from this that I am opposed to the principle of a multi-purpose railway line, for I think that if other purposes could be served by this railway line, it would be in the national interest to do so. For that reason I am not opposed to the principle; I simply want to furnish an explanation of the problems, and particularly the economic problems, which will crop up with such a railway line. Suppose there are nine junctions along this line. More and more junctions will be built as the use of the railway line increases, and as more contracts are received, and there are more trains on the line. But suppose there are nine, and we want to make facilities available so that those nine junctions can be used as stations. You now have to use your imagination a little, Sir, and picture what all this would require. If you want to receive goods at a station from private individuals or from companies, you must in the first place have the available staff there. There will have to be staff there to receive the goods, and one would not normally find such people at these junctions for they are unnecessary. In addition there would also have to be staff at those places where the goods are off-loaded. Then, too, there will have to be persons to receive the payment in respect of those goods. There will have to be station buildings, sheds, stores, etc. I am thinking for example of scales and all the other equipment which one usually finds at a station. This railway line will be able to do without these things now, at any rate, while it is still a single-purpose railway line. But you must also bear in mind, Sir, that if this railway line is used for more than one purpose, and if goods have to be loaded at these various places, it is obvious that there will be a greater measure of delay on this railway line. The trains will have stop; goods will then have to be loaded; shunting will perhaps be necessary; trucks will have to be uncoupled, etc., and the synchronization of the system to which I referred a moment ago will be completely disrupted. I have mentioned these few points to give hon. members an indication of the problems which may crop up, and I think it is sufficient for the present to prove what the benefits of utilizing this railway line as a single-purpose railway line in such a system would be.

There may perhaps be different interpretations of a single purpose line. The single purpose to which we are referring here, relates to Iscor’s goods. One could perhaps expand the idea of a single purpose line to bulk traffic, to iron or steel products, not necessarily all from Iscor. Then it can still be a single purpose railway line, and it can still function efficiently as I have explained here, even though the traffic would not all belong to Iscor. This is, however, a subject which is not under discussion at present. However, I should like to elaborate on it in reply to a question which was put to me.

Mr. Speaker, a railway line in itself does not bring any development. If you were perhaps to travel from Hutchinson down to Calvinia one day, past Sak River and Kotjieskolk, and were to see what was going on along that railway line, you would realize that a railway line brings no development. Here and there one finds a station along that railway line, and admittedly the people are afforded the opportunity of loading their wool and other goods there, but apart from that, that line brings no development whatsoever.

Why are we building this line then?

Sir, there has to be other fundamental stimuli to bring development along a railway line, and if those other fundamental stimuli are not there, then development will simply not take place. If for example a copper mine or an asbestos mine or any other kind of mine were to be discovered and developed 50 miles from this railway line, it is obvious that this railway line, if it is made available for the purpose of conveying those goods, will make a greater contribution to the development of that mine and that region. For that reason I say that basically there must be something which will serve as a stimulus to encourage development along such a railway line. Sir, it is my considered opinion that at present, and with the construction of this railway line, there will be a very slight demand, if any, for the utilization of this railway line, particularly owing to the fact that it also runs through part of our country which is very sparsely populated, where there are vast tracts of land which are not being used intensively. If one thinks of farming produce or something along those lines, then it is very dubious whether there will be any substantial demand for the utilization of this railway line. Seen from the point of view of passenger traffic, there will be a very limited demand for the utilization of this line, for today people prefer to travel by car, bus or aircraft. For that reason I think that at present it is extremely dubious whether such a need exists. Personally I think—and I have already stated this in public, after the Cabinet decision, at the Press conference which I addressed—that when such a need rises, we shall have to reconsider this railway line. When a real need exists for the conveyance of other goods, then I think we will have to create the necessary facilities, even if it should mean our having to double this railway line at that stage, because the conveyance of ore and semi-processed products may perhaps be handicapped by the greater utilization of this railway line. Sir, this is my point of view in regard to this entire matter. I do not want to be old-fashioned and conservative; we must tackle new developments and make use of altered methods, if it is necessary, but I still believe today that we should have one organization which should manage our railway system for general traffic in South Africa, and that is the South African Railways. I believe that when the need arises one day, and we take the decision to the effect that this railway line should be used for other purposes, over and above the conveyance of ore, then means should be found to hand over the management of that railway line to the South African Railways. But, Sir, these things can be done as the need arises, and if the need does arise, I have no doubt at all that we will be able to cope with the attendant problems. Sir, that is all that I wanted to say about the aspect of the railway line being for a single purpose only.

The hon. member for Moorreesburg referred to Elands Bay. I am not all that conversant with the particulars of that case, but we Will nevertheless see whether we cannot construct the railway line to by-pass Elands Bay. In addition, he invited me to a celebration. I do not know how many of us he invited. I think there are others as well who might perhaps come along. I thank him very sincerely; we shall come, although I understand that it will carry on into the late hours.

Then there is the hon. member for Von Brandis. I think I have replied to most of the arguments he raised here. He referred a little contemptuously to Iscor. He said it was a “public corporation”. He need only glance through his Hansard. Perhaps he made a mistake, but he said it had “No or little knowledge of public transport”. But Iscor does not undertake any public transport. That is not the intention. But that is the mistake I want to bring to the hon. member’s attention. What Iscor is undertaking here, is what it is already doing at many other places, although not on such a large scale and not with such a long railway line, but it is doing so in many other places without handling public traffic. In so far as the hon. member is concerned about their having no knowledge of public transport. He also said that the hon. member for Moorreesburg had allegedly said that this railway line would develop the Coloured area, or bring development in respect of the Coloureds. I want to correct that as well. The hon. member for Moorreesburg was not referring to the railway line, but to the entire project. In accordance with what I have stated previously, I do not think that the development will take place along the railway line; it will take place at Sishen and at Saldanha. That is where the two major development projects will be. The mining development at Sishen alone will attract hundreds of people. A large town will arise there for mining development only. I do not want to wax lyrical about this undertaking, but I do think there are many people who will agree with me that it will still prove itself to be the greatest economic development we have ever set in motion in South Africa. The figures which have been made available to me hold out the prospect of building a railway line to convey, in the beginning, 15 million tons of ore per annum. But the big money does not lie in the ore, and the income from foreign exchange does not lie in the ore either. It lies in the things to which the hon. member for Salt River referred, the refinement of our raw materials. Therein lies the great success of this scheme. The prospects are fantastic. There is great interest in the world among buyers, particularly since smoke pollution is today playing such a hampering role in the densely populated countries of the world. I envisage that with this scheme, with the refining processes we are able to construct, and with the possibility of the refined materials we will be able to export, crude steel in various forms, it is quite within our reach, perhaps even in my lifetime, that we will be able to earn between R400 and R500 million per annum in foreign exchange. That is quite possible. Over and above that this development project presents prospects which we have never dreamed of before. It is therefore with great confidence that I propose that we proceed with this project.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a Second Time.

Mr. Speaker, I move—

This measure is the second piece of legislation to which I referred while dealing with the Sishen-Saldanha Bay Railway Construction Bill and which is necessary for giving effect to the Government’s decision in connection with the Sishen-Saldanha ore-export project.

This measure, too, is not a complicated one. Its provisions were drafted within the framework of the Government’s decision. In the main it contains the following principles.

The first principle is that the State President is being authorized, in the first instance, to declare the whole of Saldanha Bay as a harbour, to construct, to control and to manage it. The intention is that the harbour will cover more or less the same area as is covered by the existing fishing harbour area at present.

The second principle is that the powers of the State President in regard to the construction, control, and management of the whole or any part of the harbour may be delegated to other bodies and persons. The intention is that part of the harbour will be marked out by proclamation for Iscor’s ore-export project and that this part plus the rest of the harbour will be under the overall control of the Minister of Economic Affairs. However, under this overall control Iscor will have to develop on its own account the part of the harbour assigned to it and will itself and at its own expense have to run and manage the facilities it establishes.

Hon. members would notice that in terms of the proposed legislation the harbour could as yet not be proclaimed a so-called commercial harbour. However, at the existing Saldanha Bay harbour there are already a large number of other vested interests, and this factor, together with the fact that the Department of Industries is charged with the control of sea fisheries and the running of fishing harbours, makes it essential that the harbour about to be proclaimed in terms of this Bill should in its entirety remain under the control of the Minister of Economic Affairs. This idea is being supported by all the bodies consulted in this regard, such as the S.A. Navy, the Railway Administration, Viskor, Iscor, etc.

The third principle is that at present Iscor has no powers for developing harbour works, and consequently provision is being made for such powers in the measure under discussion. The rest of the provision in the Bill are directly connected with the principles I have just mentioned and do in effect require no explanation. In the main they are modelled on the provisions of existing railways and harbours legislation.

Perhaps I may also point out, in conclusion, that in the regulations clause provision is being made for the eventual establishment of a body to assist the Minister and his particular department in exercising control over the harbour. At this stage the position is still too vague to be more specific about the constitution, duties and functions of this body. In any case, the necessity for the appointment of such body will only arise when the Iscor ore-export facilities come into operation in a few years’ time. By that time there will definitely be a very much clearer picture as to the demands that will be made by proper control and precisely how the proposed body will have to be constituted.

Mr. Speaker, I do not want to repeat the arguments which I have used in respect of the Bill which preceded this one although exactly the same arguments apply.

They are just as valid.

They are just as valid and perhaps even more valid, because if the hon. the Minister will look at section 105(1) and (2) of the Republic of South Africa Constitution Act, 1961, he will see that section 105(1) says—

The hon. the Minister should then read subsection (2) remembering that the question of railways and harbours has already been dealt with. This subsection reads—

This seems to be a clear directive that information should be placed before the House. The hon. the Minister will well know that in regard to harbours which are built by the railways we have very full reports. I have here the Report of the Railways and Harbours on Richards Bay. It is a very comprehensive document telling us why it is necessary, what it is going to be used for, how much it is going to cost and so forth. If the fact that I mention this is any sufficient to get the hon. the Minister to give us an explanation as he did in the previous case so that the whole of South Africa will at least have a feeling for the Sishen-Saldanha railway line, I shall be grateful. We did not have this information before, and it is very important because the hon. the Minister wants support for this line. We will give it to him wholeheartedly and we have told him so, but we knew nothing. Now we know a great deal more and it is of a great deal of interest to the whole of South Africa.

I hope he will be able to give us similar information in regard to the harbour. It is an interesting harbour because, as the hon. the Minister said, this harbour is not going to belong to Iscor alone; it is going to be a joint venture of some kind. The Navy is involved, Iscor is involved, the fishing industry is involved, everything is involved except commerce, because it is not going to be a commercial harbour. Presumably Cape Town and its development will take care of the growth of harbour facilities which commerce and industry will need, although again I suppose that if circumstances do arise where Saldanha can be adequately used, the same standards will apply as the hon. the Minister told us would apply in the case of the railway line where, in such an event, new discussions will be held and other arrangements will be made. These are the things we want to know. There has been much comment on the Saldanha harbour and whether it comes from knowledgeable people or people who have an interest in the issue, I do not know. It has been said from time to time that the depth of the harbour is going to be insufficient and that there will have to be constant dredging. It has been said that there will be problems with the turning around of ships, because on account of the winds they will be unable to turn around as and when they want to. The problem of the maximum size of the tankers which will be able to use Saldanha Bay has also been raised. With the growth of tankers of up to 500 000 tons, Saldanha …

They are planning one with a tonnage of a million tons already.

I am told that they are building one of a million tons already; Saldanha will not be able to handle these heavy tankers. Saldanha becomes an essential once you have accepted the principle of the Sishen-Saldanha Bay line, and this we have now done. It becomes essential for the development of the whole scheme and despite what the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark has said, we subscribe to this development entirely. If I had opposed this Bill, the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark would have believed that we supported it. That is the way he thinks; it is just one of those unfortunate things.

He does not think, that is the trouble.

We will support this Bill and we can only hope that the hon. the Minister will give us as much of the interesting information about the harbour that he has given us about the railway line, because I think the country is obviously interested in what he says because it is one of the biggest projects we have ever undertaken in South Africa. Therefore it deserves more than to be dismissed with the short introductory speech we had from the hon. the Minister.

Mr. Speaker, more than 300 years after Jan van Riebeeck founded the settlement here at the Cape, it is interesting that we should now have legislation before Parliament to establish a general harbour at Saldanha Bay. If the fresh water which is at present available in the Cape Peninsula and surrounding areas, and which is today being brought from the Voëlvlei Dam, perhaps 70 to 80 kilometres away, in order to ensure the existence of Cape Town, Table Bay and surrounding areas, if that fresh water had then been available at Saldanha Bay, Cape Town would not have existed here, and it would in fact have sprung up in the vicinity of Saldanha and Table Bay harbour would have been in Saldanha. What is interesting to me today is the fact that it was water shortage at that stage which caused the settlement to be established here at Table Bay on the slopes of Table Mountain, and that the transport of a dry metal over a distance of 800 kilometres should now, after 300 years, create the need for the development of the most beautiful natural harbour in South Africa, namely Saldanha Bay. Those of us who know Saldanha Bay, those of us who roamed that neighbourhood and among those hills in the years of our youth, those of us who gazed at those beautiful natural surroundings and those of us who saw during the last war how whole convoys were brought into that natural harbour and how the entrance was closed with mines, which made it absolutely safe against enemy submarines and other enemy vessels, for those of us who saw this it was obvious that it had to happen. Those of us who realized that all the large existing harbours in South Africa could fit into that natural harbour, regarded it as self-evident that even though it took more than 300 years, Saldanha Bay would come into its own, because what nature gives to a country in the form of a natural harbour like this, is to be found in few places in the world. The hon. member who spoke before me, expressed objections and concern in regard to whether the layout at that natural harbour will in fact permit of the activities in view. I would like to ask him to go there one day and have a look if he has never been there before. I think the hon. member for Moorreesburg, in whose constituency it falls and who is a person who takes a great deal of trouble for his constituency, would take him there with pleasure.

And also invite him to the celebration.

Yes, we could even invite him to the celebration. Then he would be convinced that in the whole of Southern Africa there is not another natural harbour like Saldanha Bay. Therefore I want to congratulate the hon. the Minister on the legislation which he has introduced here today and on the far-sightedness in making provision, not only for the activities of Iscor which have now facilitated the development of the harbour, but also for the other activities which already exist there today on a small scale and which will progressively expand. Looking into the future, one does not doubt that Saldanha harbour will really come into its own. Since its stimulus has to come from 800 kilometres away in the interior and in so far as fresh water is becoming available now, thanks to the planning on the part of this side of the House with the Boland water plan, and coupled with the fact that those elements of development will now combine, Saldanha Bay will become a multi-purpose harbour from which, eventually, the conveyance of imported articles to the interior and the shipping of export articles will take place. It is a privilege for me to support this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I am one of those people who are very familiar with the Bay of Saldanha. I spent a year of my life there, and I am one of those who fully agree that that bay can be developed as one of the major harbours of South Africa. In fact, it will be required for that purpose, because we foresee that the increasing needs of this country and its economic prosperity will depend on the availability of harbours that will be capable of meeting the requirements of a growing economy. Therefore it causes us some concern that this draft legislation does not appear to provide for long-term needs. If this harbour is really going to develop into a major world harbour, surely provision must be made for the kind of development which may take place in a great development scheme of this kind. If one looks at the harbour of Cape Town, of Durban or of Lourenço Marques, or at other harbours which have developed here, one sees that there are a tremendous number of interests for which provision must be made. In this instance we only find the following: The State President may by proclamation assign the whole or a defined portion of the bay known as Saldanha Bay to Iscor. Then there is a further provision to the effect that different parts of the harbour may also be assigned to different juristic persons. This is the only provision made in this Bill for what both sides of this House feel is going to become a gigantic scheme and an extremely important harbour for South Africa. We would like to know what would happen should the surrounding areas and the harbour itself be assigned to either one or two juristic persons. If the land should be sold, developed, owned by one or two juristic persons who may be interested in it now or will be so in the next few years, and the need should arise for varied and extensive development of the whole region, what would happen then? Is it foreseen that the State President will take back those assignments and re-assign them on a new basis? At the moment it seems that a sort of monopoly is being granted to one public corporation, with a possibility of one or two other juristic persons, and that they are going to enjoy a monopoly in that tremendously big harbour which is going to play such a major role in the future development of South Africa. Now, what about the other major interests which must surely develop there? My friend the hon. member for Moorreesburg is looking forward to tremendous development of the area and, surely he does not accept that that big harbour, with all its benefits and all its possibilities, will be limited to one industry only, namely the loading of iron ore. Surely other development must take place there, and other developments will in fact take place there, but what provision is being made for that? Our objection is, therefore, that the hon. the Minister is coming to this House with this extremely limited provision for the future, this extremely limited assignment of the land and the harbour facilities, and once again we on this side of the House ask, as we did in regard to the previous Bill, for more information. We want to know where we are heading and what the planning is for the future. This Parliament is being requested to give approval to the development of a certain part of South Africa which may be of the utmost importance for the future. All that we ask, is please give us the details so that we who sit in this Parliament may at least know where we are heading and what provision is being made for the future. We simply do not accept that the development of Saldanha Bay will in all eternity, into the distant future, be limited to the development of this single segment of our economy. This cannot be accepted this way. The hon. the Minister has laid this Bill before us and, as we have already said, we are of course fully in favour of the development of Saldanha Bay. We should like to see it happen and we shall support it, but we do ask that more details be given so that we may know where we are heading, what provision there is for the future, because we cannot simply, on the basis on which this Bill has been drafted, approve blindly of the development as described here.

Secondly, I just want to refer again to section 105 of the Republic of South Africa Constitution Act, which I also mentioned previously to the Minister and to which we have not yet had a satisfactory reply.

It relates to the Railways.

We are talking about a harbour now.

That is as far as the activities of the Railways are concerned.

We are dealing here with a new Bill. The same principle applies here, and that principle is also applicable to harbours. Section 105(1) reads as follows—

Very well, then, sanction is in fact being asked here. There is a small exception in the Act in respect of small branch lines, sidings, etc. Subsection (2) reads as follows—

To whom?—

It is quite clear that with these exceptions, with this qualification, the intention of the Constitution is that any harbour or railway line that is constructed …

By the Railways.

… by the board of the Railways, the Railway Board, must be considered, and that information must be furnished, because it must be considered by Parliament. That is stated here. The whole project must be brought to this Parliament for approval, unless it falls within the list of exceptions. That is the case with every railway line or proposal. As far as I know this proposal has not been considered by the board. The details have in any event not been brought to this Parliament; we have no details. Surely, what goes for the Railways, probably goes for a public corporation as well. The fact of the matter is that the Constitution provides that any new railway line or harbour must be considered by Parliament, because it is a question of general, public interest. Here we have a railway line which is being constructed which does not appear in the list of exceptions. And yet we have not received any details. In other words, an exception is being made where a railway line or a harbour is being constructed by a body other than the Railways itself. Our objection is not so much aimed against the interpretation of the Act by the hon. the Minister, although we do have misgivings about that. What we do object to, is that this extremely important project is being undertaken and that this Parliament, which after all has a tremendous interest in a project of this kind, which is of importance to the whole economic development of South Africa, has to take a decision on the strength of such meagre details. We consider that the Minister owes Parliament more information and details. We have not received those details, and we strongly object to that. With that reservation, we support this project. We shall raise no objection to the Second Reading. But we do want to make it clear that we are not satisfied with the way in which this Bill has been brought before Parliament.

Mr. Speaker, this harbour Bill does not lend itself to a discussion such as the one we conducted on the railway Bill, but, with the means at my disposal, I should nevertheless like to reply to the points raised here.

In the first instance, we had the objection in regard to the submission of two few particulars. I think that the arguments were more or less the same as those in regard to the railway Bill. If I may just refer to them in passing, I want to draw hon. members’ attention to the fact that the heading of the chapter in which section 105 is included, reads “Finances and Railways”. In other words, that whole chapter deals with nothing but finances and railways. Section 105, to which reference was made here, refers to railways; in other words, it concerns harbours developed by the Railways. Therefore it is unnecessary for us, in terms of this broad principle, to follow the same procedure as is followed in the case of general harbours developed by the Railways.

Think of Richards Bay.

Yes, Richards Bay is also a case in point. There are numerous fishing harbours all along the coast of South Africa which are being developed by the Department of Economic Affairs. And yet we have never come to the House in regard to the development of a fishing harbour. This project is more or less the same. It is a monotypical development of a harbour, and this is being undertaken by Iscor for the purpose of exporting its iron ore. That is why this case is comparable with that of fishing harbours, in respect of which we never come to this House. In this case an area will be delimited, as prescribed by this Bill, of which area the State President may then assign a part for development by a particular body. In this case that will be Iscor, and in that delimited area assigned to it for development, Iscor will construct its scaffolding and initiate there the development for the purpose of export its iron ore.

But now hon. members have asked me this question: What about the future, in the event of other development perhaps taking place? That, too, is to my mind similar to the railway system. At the moment the need for that further development does not exist. I suppose you have already seen in the newspapers, Sir, that there is talk of the I.D.C. investigating the possibility of constructing at Saldanha a dry-dock for the handling of super tankers sailing around the coast of South Africa. These large ships are sailing around our coasts every day of the year, and a dry-dock at Saldanha would be approximately half-way between the source and the destination for those ships. It would then be possible for them to be repaired there. This is perhaps one of the developments that could take place there, but that development, too, could cause quite a number of parasite industries to come into being in the area surrounding it, for a dry-dock cannot exist on its own. In order that the dry dock may function properly, there must be machinery, tools, engineers, and so on. That is how we expect the harbour to develop there as well. This is my reply to the hon. member for Von Brandis. I do not envisage that this entire Saldanha complex, probably the finest natural harbour which we have on the coast of South Africa, must be developed exclusively by Iscor. Only a small part of it must be developed by Iscor for its own purposes. When a need for a commercial harbour in the Saldanha area arises one day, this will, as is the practice in South Africa, be developed by the South African Railways. It will be developed on lines similar to the kind of harbour to which reference is made in section 105 of the Constitution. Such a general harbour will be developed just as Richards Bay and the other harbours along the coast of South Africa are going to be developed by the Railways. But at the moment that need does not exist as yet. The only need for which we are making provision at the moment, is that of Iscor for the export of iron ore.

May I put a question? Our very objection, Sir, is that whereas the hon. the Minister is now being very reasonable in saying that he does not want to assign everything to one single body, provision is nevertheless being made in the Bill for just such an Act. It is being provided in the Bill that the harbour as a whole may be transferred to this body. Surely that is the way it is put in clause 2(1).

No, Sir, that is not what it says. If necessary, we can take a look at it at the Committee Stage, but what we are trying to do here, is not to ask Parliament to assign the harbour to Iscor. What we are making provision for here, is that the State President may exercise certain powers in respect of the harbour. It goes without saying that it is not possible for us today to define those powers clearly here. They will have to be exercised in the light of circumstances which may exist from time to time in the future. But if the hon. member thinks that he has found a mistake in that clause, I have no objection to our taking another look at it at the Committee Stage. At this stage it is very clear to me that this authorization with which we are dealing now, is aimed at developing a part of the Saldanha area for the purposes of Iscor, and at giving Iscor the necessary authorization to develop that part for its purposes. It is possible that the need for a general harbour in that area may arise at a later stage. At that stage the further development to which the hon. member for Von Brandis referred, will take place.

The hon. member for Parktown also said they had heard that the harbour was not too deep and that large ships would have to be accommodated there. Reference has already been made to tankers which may perhaps be 500 tonners or even bigger. It is correct that the Saldanha Bay harbour is not a very deep one. I am not saying this on the strength of my own personal experience but, according to the information made available to me by Iscor, all the necessary investigations have already been carried out there and it has been found that at those places where it is necessary, the harbour can reasonably easily be deepened out so as to accommodate ships of 250 000 and 300 000 tons. That is the type of ship which they presume will be used for the purposes of these ore exports. The bed of that harbour is not rocky; it is calcareous and it will be possible for it to be broken up and pumped out fairly easily. Actually, the deepening of the harbour presents no problem.

I have here in front of me a map of the proposed works, which unfortunately I cannot show to everybody now. A wall will be built from Hoedjiespunt on the northern side up to an island situated in the mouth of the harbour, Marcus Island. This will be the only wall which will be built in the sea. Then a long landing will be constructed in the harbour itself, and an entrance channel will be deepened out so that the ships may sail right up to the landing, where the ore will be loaded. From there they will be towed back to where the sea is deeper, in order to turn around there and proceed on their voyage. This is but a part of the scheme that must unfurl, and this is where I think the biggest growth point of the whole scheme will probably develop. In fact, I foresee today that when the need arises—and I have no doubt that it will arise—a large, complex, general harbour will also develop in addition to these works which are going to be constructed for the purposes of Iscor.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a Second Time.

Mr. Chairman, I move the following amendment—

Mr. Chairman, during the reply of the hon. the Deputy Minister to the Second Reading debate he indicated that he would introduce today an amendment along the lines of the one he has just moved. This amendment is also in line with the argument that was raised by most of the members on his side of the House during the Second Reading debate. But, Sir, he is aware of the fact that there were speakers both on his side and on this side of the House who did not agree that this was all that was required. In the proposed new section 5ter(1) it appears to be the intention of the hon. the Deputy Minister to create three new offences. The first is to employ or to continue to employ an alien. The second is to enter into an agreement for the conduct of any business or to conduct any business in co-operation with any such alien, and the third is to harbour any such alien.

Let me say here and now that this side of the House is fully in agreement with the first and the third offences which are being created, because I believe, or I did believe, that the intention of the hon. the Deputy Minister, when he introduced this second offence, which is the one that a person resident in the Republic commits when he enters into an agreement with an alien, was to close a loophole in the administration of these particular provisions and to ensure that when a person was charged with employing an alien who did not have permission to be employed, he could not use as a defence against such a charge the fact that the alien concerned was not employed by his firm but was in fact a shareholder or a partner in that particular concern. If that is the intention of the hon. the Deputy Minister, we are prepared to support him.

It is clear from the Bill.

Sir, with respect to the hon. member for Tygervallei, it is not clear from the Bill. This is the point that we discussed at some considerable length in the Second Reading debate.

The clause is quite clear.

It became quite clear while I was speaking last night, Sir. The point that I am making now is that if that was the intention of the hon. the Deputy Minister, as we believed when we came to this House for the Second Reading and still believed after the Deputy Minister had made his Second Reading speech, we would have been quite prepared to accept it, but it is not his intention. Sir, I want to quote from the debate here last evening. I said this—

Sir, I firmly believed that until the hon. the Deputy Minister interjected and said: “That is intended,” and it was at that stage that I indicated to the hon. the Deputy Minister that if that was his intention we would have to reserve our position regarding this particular clause, because we believe that you are now creating an impossible situation in this country. Sir, yesterday afternoon the hon. the Minister of Finance, when he introduced his Budget speech, did everything he could to improve our economic relations with other countries and our export market and our import market. Exports and imports can only be carried out through negotiations and through agreements with aliens, and what is the hon. the Deputy Minister now saying with his amendment? He is saying that it shall only apply in respect of an alien who is physically in the Republic.

The hon. member for Green Point put it quite clearly in the Second Reading debate that if this is to be limited to an alien who actually conducts business beyond the provisions of a temporary residence permit or any other permit that he may have to be in the Republic, then we are prepared to go along with it. If it is to be limited to one who has actual physical control over or who has to do something with the day-to-day management of the business and whose actual physical presence is necessary for the running of the business, then we are prepared to go along with the hon. the Deputy Minister, but the way he has put it in this clause, it is not limited to those persons. In his own words, when he interjected while I was speaking last night, he intends to apply this to every foreign visitor who comes to this country and who may conduct business here. Instead of putting out the red carpet and welcoming every foreign visitor who comes to this country, especially one who comes here with five million dollars in his pocket and wants to spend it in this country, we are now saying to him: “Before you can spend that five million dollars you must go and get a permit from this department to come into this country for the purpose of conducting business.” Sir, I know that when a Japanese businessman or a West German businessman comes to this country, he has to apply for a visa; he gets a temporary residence permit; he must state the purpose of his visit, and if he states that he is coming here for business purposes, then he will get the permit.

Of course.

The hon. member over there says, “Of course”, but does he want to put that person in the situation where the South African businessman who wishes to deal with him must first say to him: “May I see your credentials; will you first produce your permit to say that I may deal with you because I might commit an offence if you have not got such a permit?” Sir, I believe that we are getting to a ridiculous situation. I thought I was incorrect when I placed that interpretation on this clause but the hon. the Deputy Minister confirmed that I was correct and that it was the intention of the Government to restrict the movements of any foreign businessman who may come to this country and to restrict his negotiations, and because of that I now wish to move—

The effect of this is to reduce the number of offences which may be created by this clause to two only, and I wish to give the assurance now to the hon. the Deputy Minister and to the Government that in the application of these provisions to these two offences and the prosecution of the persons concerned, we will give them every assistance possible. We will assist them in every way to curtail the activities of these persons who yesterday were referred to quite accurately as people who had outstayed their welcome. We have no arguments about that at all.

There is one question I would like to ask the hon. the Deputy Minister. Perhaps he could give me clarity on this point because I was unable to find it myself. It is the question of the employment or continued employment of an alien who is not in possession of a permit. Where a person comes into this country, a potential new South African, and gets a certificate of permanent residence which allows him to be here with his wife and family and which allows him to be employed, does that automatically apply to his wife and children as well? We have the situation where, in the case of many of these foreign people who come here as immigrants, their wives and some of their children are being employed. I wonder whether the hon. the Deputy Minister can just clarify this one point. Is it automatic or must that special permission be sought also by the wife and children of the immigrant?

I should like to ask the hon. the Deputy Minister to clarify one matter which confuses me about this clause. We have so far confined all the discussion to White aliens. As I read the clause, since it is colour-blind, it must also of course apply to Black aliens who are in South Africa as well. Now there is a conflict of penalties here. Let me take the case of Rhodesian Blacks who have come into South Africa. They could not ever get permanent residence in this country because they do not fall within the definition of a person who is “easily assimilable with the European population” of this country, and of course the Mixed Marriages Act and the Immorality Act forbid such assimilation. They are precluded from becoming citizens of South Africa, although very many of them of course have been here for up to 20 and 25 years and have married South African Black women, and to all intents and purposes they are permanent residents. But they are by definition excluded. However, they do come in under temporary permits and they are aliens in South Africa under temporary permits. There is however a third class, and that is the person who comes in without a permit and is an illegal alien in South Africa.

Now under the Urban Areas Act, I think it is section 12, persons who commit offences in terms of that Act, i.e. by employing a person who is in South Africa without a permit, in this case a temporary permit, are liable on first conviction to a fine of up to R50 or three months’ imprisonment and either or both on a second and subsequent conviction within a period of two years. Under the penalties here, anyone who employs an alien who is here illegally is now subject, on conviction of an offence, to a fine not exceeding R200 or in default of payment, to imprisonment for a period not exceeding six months, and on a second and subsequent conviction to such fine or such imprisonment or to both such fine and imprisonment. In other words, the penalty is considerably heavier and I would like the hon. the Minister to tell me in fact how this conflict is resolved; because if persons—and there are many of them in South Africa, owing to the shortage of Black labour of various types—are in fact employing such illegal immigrants—and I am not justifying it in any way, but this happens to be the situation—should they not in fact be warned of the considerably increased penalties which are now going to apply if they continue to employ such people?

Mr. Chairman, I first want to reply to the question put by the last speaker. The answer is that it also applies to Black people who enter South Africa. As far as the offence is concerned, it is clear that there are two offences. It will depend on which offence the person is charged with. If he is charged with the other offence, the other legal provisions will be applicable. However, if he is charged with an offence in terms of this Bill, these provisions will be applicable.

It is an arbitrary decision as to which of the two will apply.

It is a decision that has to be taken by the Attorney-General.

But it remains an arbitrary decision.

Not entirely.

As far as the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District is concerned, I want to tell him that in my humble opinion I can only stand by what I said last night. In terms of this amendment, when a person has an endorsement on his permit, it is the responsibility of the person who employs him to make sure that he is in fact entitled to employ him. That is very simple. It places an onus on him, for if he does not do so, he has also been guilty of an offence and he can also be charged. If he looks at this legislation he will realize that no one is allowed to do this. If a person does this he is doing something which is wrong. The hon. member will see that this is the case if he looks at the first subsection.

I fully agree with the question of employment.

But it does not concern the question of employment only. You will perceive that the first provision deals with a person who does not have a permit and has entered the country in a completely illegal manner. Such a person has crossed our border in an illegal manner. He has entered South Africa in a dishonest manner. He goes to some relative or some friend of his and he starts working there. We are now telling that person for whom he is working that he is also guilty of an offence if he employs such a person or if he enters into an agreement with such a person to conduct business with him. What happens is that these people cross the border in an illegal manner and then enter into partnerships with friends or relatives. Then they work in partnership on farms. There they grow vegetables and all kinds of other crops. The produce of the farm is then sold under partnership. That is the offence that is committed: aliens who have entered the country illegally are involved in a business or employed or harboured. All we have in view here is to try to ensure that people who enter South Africa do so in a legal way, and that, if such a person has an endorsement on his permit which restricts him to a certain part of our country, he remains restricted to that part. If he enters the country for a certain specified purpose, we want to ensure that he is in South Africa for that specific purpose only and that he keeps to that purpose. We want no other people here. I do not think this is an insult to anyone.

I cannot identify myself with the standpoint of the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District at all. Many of us have been overseas and we know that the people there are entitled to ask you what you are doing there and where you come from and whether you have a visa. They can also ask you whether your permit is endorsed and how long you are going to stay. Those questions are put to all of us and no one feels insulted by them. After all, we cannot expect South Africa to be the land of milk and honey to which any person can come from anywhere on earth to come and act here just as he pleases. After all, he cannot just negotiate contracts here or enter into partnerships or whatever in an illegal manner. Surely there has to be some control. I do not think that anyone will blame us for exercising a measure of control. I want to make this very clear because the hon. members are quite wrong in saying that any alien who comes here does so at the risk of not being allowed to enter into in an agreement. After all, we are speaking of aliens within South Africa. In the Second Reading debate yesterday the example was mentioned of a person who is overseas and who is not allowed to conduct business with South Africa. We must be careful, for such a statement is irresponsible. We welcome business with foreigners from overseas, but when a man comes to South Africa for a specific purpose his purpose must be very clear. The purpose must be disclosed and he must also disclose his purpose to the persons with whom he is conducting business. He must say that he is entitled to do so and that he is not just on holiday in South Africa. He must be able to show the necessary endorsement on his permit.

Mr. Chairman, we really must try to come to terms or to an understanding with the hon. the Deputy Minister because what is under discussion here is a very important principle from the point of view of the conduct of our international business relations. We wish to give the hon. the Deputy Minister the assurance that we are not opposed to the principle of maintaining a reasonable check on foreigners who come into this country for purposes other than those for which they have been permitted. It is common practice in every country that I am aware of, in every civilized country, that when people enter that country they are asked to declare, if they enter on temporary permits, what the purpose of their visit is. Usually the purposes for which they are admitted exclude the taking of employment in that country unless it is specifically allowed. We are all familiar with the circumstances in which young South Africans go abroad to Europe. They take jobs while they are abroad. For example they wash dishes, they take employment as au pair girls and they take various forms of employment in order to earn pocket-money while they are abroad. If they wish to obtain employment of that kind they have to go to a labour exchange and have to get permission to take employment while they are in that country on a temporary permit. The general experience is that this kind of permission is handled by the local authorities in Britain, France and the United States of America with enormous tact and sympathy. They are reluctant to allow people to enter their countries without proper authority or for purposes other than originally stated on entering the country but they give them a reasonable period of time in which to adjust their affairs and they give them an opportunity, if they do not interfere with the employment opportunities of others, to earn a little bit of pocket-money and to make their journey onward to wherever they are going. This happens all through Europe and elsewhere. In the first instance we believe that this kind of prohibition which the hon. the Minister is applying here should be exercised with similar tact, discretion and discrimination. We entirely support the hon. the Minister in trying to stop the kind of activities which are harmful to this country, which are lawless and which can create conditions which are undesirable. I suppose that there is no way of really discriminating between those kinds of people, the kind of people he does not want, and the other kind of people who also fall under the clause as stated here. Our greatest difficulty is with subsection (b) because while we fully understand his object under (a) of preventing people from taking employment when they are in South Africa unlawfully or for purposes other than those which were allowed when they came into South Africa, we cannot really agree that subsection (b), which is going to hit indiscriminately at all kinds of businessmen, is acceptable. In the modern business world people fly backwards and forwards all the time. People travel from one country to the other at short notice. A telephone call is made, a telex is sent, people get on the aeroplane and they arrive there the next day and they stay there for three or four days. They may have business or investments in each other’s countries or they may have an exchange of shares between companies in the one country and companies in another and these people are constantly travelling to and fro. These people very often land at an airport and are met at the airport by their business associates. They enter into business right away, and so it continues. This kind of cross-fertilization or cross-pollination of international business is going on the whole time. People constantly come to this country with the object of investing; they invest in South African companies and bring capital to South Africa. The difficulty is not that these people, according to the application of this subsection, will now be subject to permits. The difficulty is that any South African who does business with these people is committing an offence unless he has satisfied himself in advance that these people have got permits and that he is entitled to do business with them. This puts an intolerable obligation on your business relations; if you are going to meet a man you must ask him whether he has got a permit. Surely this cannot be the purpose of this Bill. We fully understand, sympathize and support the hon. the Minister’s real purpose, but we are saying that the application of this clause is too wide; that is all. The hon. the Deputy Minister’s amendment does not do any good at all. These people do not stay abroad while they are doing business; they travel to South Africa, do their business, stay for a week or a month and then go away again. Why should these people have to submit their permits to their hosts? Surely it is possible, if the hon. the Deputy Minister wishes to apply control to these people, to apply it with discrimination as is done in other countries. If, for example, I go to New York to do business and I go on a temporary permit, a visa which permits me to stay there for a month and in the course of my stay in New York I take employment, which I am not allowed to do, I will be sought out and told to leave. However, if in the course of my month’s stay, I in fact engage in ordinary business discussions, sign contracts and so forth, nobody is going to interfere with me at all. There is no obligation on my American host to ensure that I have a permit to talk contracts with him. The whole measure goes too far. The hon. the Deputy Minister has made a little weapon here which, in fact, turns out to be a bomb that can destroy everybody. If he wants to strike at a particular abuse, let him make a law which attacks that particular abuse and does not indiscriminately mow down everybody who happens to fall within this measure.

Give me your suggestions.

Yes, I would like to give the hon. the Deputy Minister my suggestion.

Give us an example.

So far as (a), employment, is concerned, I have no difficulty.

Well, what would you do in respect of all these partnerships?

I have not drafted an amendment on this particular clause, but I would like to suggest to the hon. the Minister that he might look at this matter not in terms of function and so forth, but in terms of time. I think that the kind of people he is after, the kind of people he is trying to prohibit, come here and enter employment or enter into business agreements with a view to prolonging their stay indefinitely in South Africa. Is that not the case? On the other hand, business people who come here on bona fide business, do not have that purpose in coming here. If the hon. the Deputy Minister were to introduce a time element into this matter so that people who stay, for instance, for longer than a month must in fact get a permit which describes the purpose of their business, whereas those who come for a period of less than a month can simply be permitted; it would be reasonable. It allows time for people to suit their convenience when they conduct such operations. If the Minister would consider introducing a kind of time qualification—I am not sure how this might be done; he might have to consult his law advisers—this would help to ease the sifting out process so that those who come here to enter into employment or to enter into a business arrangement with a view to securing, illegally, a kind of permanent residence facility, can be sifted out by this time clause while in respect of those who come here on bona fide business, stay for more than a month, which rarely happens, it is not unreasonable to ask them to obtain, perhaps, extension on certain conditions. This would, I think, cut out a great deal of inconvenience. However, it is not for me to write the hon. the Deputy Minister’s laws for him. He asked me for a suggestion and I think this is one of many ways in which this legislation can be modified or moderated to meet his real objectives while not injuring a lot of other people and other interests which we do not wish to injure.

Mr. Chairman, the plea made by the hon. member for Von Brandis was in point of fact that the department should act with more tact towards bona fide businessmen. Am I right?

Yes.

I assure the hon. member that the department does not lack tact. My country does not lack hospitality, but is virtually over-abundant in the hospitality it extends to people. We are sometimes too tactful, but I do not want to cross swords with the hon. member on the question of tact. I want to assure him that those people whom he has in mind, would in all probability not even be aware of this legislation. I shall tell him why. If an important businessman from Europe wished to assist in building this Sishen railway line we learnt about this afternoon, it would indeed be specified on his temporary permit that he was entering the country for the purposes of a business arrangement, but that would be the end of the matter; everybody would know why the man was here. There are no problems with bona fide types. These are people who do not conceal what they are coming to do here, but who openly tell the Press that they are here to do this or that, for example, to look over our businesses. We do not have problems with those cases, nor is there a lack of tact. We have problems with people who cross the borders at night, who come from islands and all sorts of other places and then gather here in groups. The terms of this legislation are wide, but it is inevitable. A time limit cannot be imposed, because one cannot tell a businessman that he must conclude his transactions within a month. It is not possible to do something like that. I can assure the hon. member that the department knows which people come to do bona fide business in South Africa. We are well aware of them and there will be no problems. If the hon. member hears a single complaint by an overseas businessman, I shall apologize to such a person in public and consider an amendment. However, an amendment is not necessary now, because the legislation refers to something completely different. We know what it is for and it must be stopped and it will be stopped. I cannot consider any further amendments here. I want to apologize to the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District for not having replied to him just now. He asked a question which actually does not have anything to do with the clause, and that is whether wives and children are automatically admitted. For permanent residence that is indeed the case and they automatically receive a permit to stay here with the husband. That is in terms of section 4(3)(e) of the Aliens Act. With regard to temporary sojourn, each one must of course receive his own residence permit. I think that answers the hon. member’s question. I want to assure the hon. member that the largest degree of tact will be exercised. The Department of the Interior is just as aware of the fact that South Africa needs good businessmen and we are the last people who will make it difficult for people to come to South Africa to do business. On the contrary, we welcome it and I can assure him that the department will know when to pay strict attention to this section and when not to do so. It is not necessary to bring this Act to the attention of businessmen who come here and who have such bona fides. This also applies to the people with whom they come into contact. There will not be any problems if they act within the framework of the admission. Bona fide businessmen always act within the framework of their admission. Usually the person who is law-abiding, is law-abiding by nature and one does not have to run after him, bringing the law to his attention. He admits openly that he comes here for the purposes specified on his document and he is not afraid to tell that to all businessmen with whom he transacts business.

Mr. Chairman, we readily accept the assurance given by the hon. the Minister that tact will be exercised. We also accept that it is not his intention to offend businessmen who come to South Africa to transact business; we accept that readily. However, that is not our problem. Our problem is that a law is being made here in terms of which provision can be made only by way of exception for those businessmen who do not fall within this concept. We regard it as very bad legislation. Furthermore, an obligation is being imposed upon the South African citizen to see to it that the visitor, before they discuss any business or enter into contracts, has a permit which allows him to discuss business while he is in South Africa. That is not a tactful attitude. It is most undesirable that a person be placed in such a position. Now the hon. the Deputy Minister comes forward with a Bill which provides for exactly that. When we on this side object to it, he says that such persons will be dealt with by way of exception. That is not good enough. We are in this House to see to it that proper legislation is passed. This legislation does not meet the requirements. We say it cuts too widely and too deeply, and we should rather consider better legislation. That is all. We unconditionally accept the assurance given by the Deputy Minister with regard to tact. But tact in exceptional cases is not the answer. The Act itself should rather be specific, and in addition it should be applied with tact. We want to ensure that it will be good legislation, and not legislation which will be applied by way of exception to meet the requirements of tact and good relations.

Mr. Chairman, I just want to put this tact story of the hon. member in its proper perspective. The hon. member has just told me that when people go to London and they do not have a work permit, they may not work there, for the simple reason that the British Government first has to say that one is entitled to work there. The person who employs one, has to make sure that this is the case. It is also an offence there. Why does the hon. member say that their legislation is tactful and ours is not? Surely that is not the case. The same thing applies in Germany and Holland. Strict control is exercised over people coming there to work, because one automatically does work which could have been done by local people. This Bill is just as tactful as is any other piece of legislation in the world. There is nothing wrong with it.

May I put a question to the hon. the Deputy Minister? This question most certainly has nothing to do with tact. We are dealing here with legislation. Let us assume that a businessman comes here on leave. His visa allows him to do business. If he has discussions with somebody and an oral agreement is reached on business which will be conducted later on, would they be contravening the Act—yes or no?

If a person has the right to come and do business here, he is not limited to a specific transaction. He comes here as a businessman and to settle a specific matter. He may conclude as many contracts as he likes. That is a fact. He is allowed to enter into certain agreements. He may come here as a businessman for the purpose of selling motor-cars, for instance. In that case he may sell motorcars wherever he likes. He is not limited to one specific transaction.

Mr. Chairman, I do not know why the hon. the Deputy Minister is being deliberately obtuse here this afternoon. The hon. member for Von Brandis has put a perfectly reasonable case to him. I believe that the hon. member for Von Brandis was deliberately clear in the way in which he presented his case, but the hon. the Deputy Minister deliberately misconstrues what the hon. member says. He does not accept what the hon. member for Von Brandis said about this at all. The hon. the Deputy Minister mixes up what the hon. member for Von Brandis said about a businessman coming here and contracting business with the position of a person in employment. Sir, I want to put our attitude on record again. We have made it quite clear in the debate on this measure. We have no argument with the Government regarding the employment of an alien who is here and who has not got the necessary authority to be employed—no argument whatsoever—and I do not want to hear any more from the hon. the Deputy Minister or anybody on that side regarding the employment of an alien. Our argument with the hon. the Deputy Minister is on the question of the interpretation of this clause dealing with the matter of entering into an agreement with an alien. Surely he must have understood this by now, but he insists on coming back and throwing in the face of the hon. member for Von Brandis the laws overseas dealing with the employment of a South African citizen.

That is not in dispute.

No, that is not in dispute at all. There is no dispute at all over the question of the employment of an alien. The dispute is over the question of entering into an agreement with an alien, and I believe that we on this side of the House are acting in the best interests of the Republic. Sir, can you imagine what one of these Japanese millionaires is going to say the first time a South African businessman says to him, “May I see your permit?”

He must say it.

He must say it. The hon. the Deputy Minister must not pull a face. He must say it to that Japanese businessman, because the Bill says that if the South African businessman does not satisfy himself that that Japanese businessman has the necessary permit, the South African businessman commits an offence, and for that offence he can be fined R200 or sentenced to imprisonment for six months. That is what we are dealing with today. The hon. the Deputy Minister talks about the tact of his departmental officials. We concede the tact of his departmental officials. We concede their tact as far as the visiting businessman is concerned. That has never been brought into question, but, Sir, that still does not affect the position of the South African businessman who breaks the law. The hon. the Deputy Minister, in quite a peevish tone of voice, said to the hon. member for Von Brandis, “Give me an example of an amendment”. I ask you, Sir, are we here to do the business of the Government? The hon. the Deputy Minister has now been in office for six months; he has known for six months that he was going to introduce this legislation. We on this side saw this legislation less than six days ago, and yet the hon. the Deputy Minister comes here this afternoon and asks us, peevishly, to do his work for him. The hon. member for Von Brandis has given him one idea as to how this could be amended. I want to give him another one which was given to him by the hon. member for Green Point in the Second Reading debate, as the hon. the Deputy Minister would have known if he had only taken the trouble to listen to the hon. member. The hon. member for Green Point gave him a clue as to what he should do, and that is to limit the application of this subclause (b) (and I quote from the hon. member’s Hansard) to cases where the co-operation between a South African and an alien involves—

Do you really want that in an amendment?

Sir, it is not for me to fix the legislation which the hon. the Deputy Minister is incapable of producing. I have not got the facilities at my disposal which that hon. gentleman has. He has his law advisers; he has this vast army of people behind him who can assist him to draft this sort of legislation. We would be prepared—and this was indicated to the hon. the Deputy Minister—to accept such an amendment; let him limit the provisions to those persons who come here illegally and then enter into a contract or a partnership—I think the hon. the Deputy Minister talked about a partnership to produce vegetables—or to do any other business. By all means, Sir, we agree with him, but we cannot accept the provisions as they stand now. With all respect to the erudite member for Bellville, who gave us that lengthy discourse yesterday afternoon on the interpretation of the law, this law must be interpreted as it is written here, and I do not believe that any member on that side of the House can say to us that the instances mentioned by the hon. member for Von Brandis and by myself are not covered by this law and that in fact any South African citizen doing business under those conditions could not be guilty of an offence or, in fact, would not be guilty of an offence. Sir, I suggest that the hon. the Deputy Minister reconsider his decision. I believe that it is possible to bring an amendment which will satisfy us, but until such time as he can work out that amendment, I believe that our amendment must stand, and that is that we should create two offences only instead of three; that we should make it an offence for a South African citizen or a resident in South Africa to employ an alien contrary to the terms of his permit or to harbour such an alien contrary to the terms of his permit. But I believe that this general clause—and I mean “general”—which prohibits a person from entering into any contract or agreement with any alien, except in terms of a permit, goes far beyond what was intended when this legislation was first drafted, and therefore we must oppose the inclusion of that subsection.

Because I suggested yesterday that in the light of the definition of an “alien” this legislation should be reconsidered. I am grateful for the amendment the hon. the Deputy Minister proposed today. I think it puts the matter beyond all doubt and it will therefore not leave us at the mercy of the eventual judicial interpretation of this legislation. I am satisfied that this amendment proposed by the Deputy Minister has solved the problem of the gap that could possibly have existed in the Act.

But I am not so satisfied that the amendment proposed by the Hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District takes the matter any further. Both he and the hon. member for Von Brandis are labouring under two misconceptions. The hon. member for Von Brandis was talking of tact towards the foreign businessman coming to South Africa, and then he pretended that this legislation we are dealing with this afternoon would affect the position of the foreign businessman. But surely that is not the case. If the hon. member had read the Bill, he would have seen that this Bill only affects South Africans, i.e. people who are in the country already. It does not affect the person who comes from abroad to do business here. His position is still affected by the Act as it stands, i.e. by section 5 of the existing Act. The hon. member dictated this afternoon for us to be very tactful in our dealings with these people, and to give them an opportunity of doing business in South Africa, and not to curb them if they want to do business in South Africa. That is right, and I share his sentiment, but that situation is not affected by the legislation we are dealing with here today. That situation is affected by the existing Act, i.e. by section 5 of the existing Act, which provides very clearly—

1. (a) to enter the Union or any particular portion of the Union and to sojourn therein temporarily; … for such purposes, during such periods and on such conditions as may be set forth in the permit.

A person who is coming to South Africa therefore should go to the passport control officer. He should first obtain his visa overseas and should then come to the passport control officer. There he obtains his temporary permit on which the conditions are endorsed, i.e. whether he is coming in for business purposes, for a holiday, or to be trained at a university, or whatever the object of his visit may be. This legislation we are dealing with here does not affect that alien’s position in South Africa. All it affects is the South African who should do business with such an alien, if that alien should not have authority in terms of his original permit to do business. And if you consider it to be an insult to a South African to ask an alien: “Look, before I do business with you, are you entitled to do business in South Africa?” then I differ with you. I think it is the natural right of any South African to find out whether the people who are enjoying our hospitality have the right to do business here in this country. This also seems to me to be the major complaint of the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District, i.e. that we now have to ask aliens who are coming into the country whether they are entitled to do business in South Africa. I am co-responsible for South Africa, just as the passport control officer is. It is not only the passport control officer or the Government that should be able to ask these questions; I have a co-responsibility for the situation in South Africa and I think it is my good right as citizen to ask this question of an alien in order to ensure whether he is entitled to do business in South Africa. I therefore accept this concept of the co-responsibility of the public together with the responsibility of the Government for the maintenance of good order in South Africa.

Now I want to go further. I fear that although the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District has had six days to study this legislation he does not even have half a notion of what it is about. I will tell you why I am saying this. He proposed an amendment in terms of which he wanted to delete section 5ter(1)(b). While proposing this amendment he is arguing all the time about people who have to be dealt with in terms of section 5ter(2); in other words, people who possess these temporary permits. Section 5ter(1) does not deal with people who have permits. It simply deals with people who are not authorized to stay in South Africa.

Somebody is off the track.

No, the hon. member must please listen. Section 5ter(1) does not deal with persons who have authority to be in South Africa permanently or temporarily. Section 5ter(2) deals with such cases. The hon. member however, wants section 5ter(1)(b) to be deleted as though that would solve the problem in this regard. He has a problem with people who have authority to be in South Africa temporarily for transacting business here, and he wants to make it easier for South Africans to do business with such people without asking them the necessary questions, i.e. whether they are allowed to do business here in South Africa. That is the intention of the amendment he proposed, but he proposed the deletion of the wrong subsection. Actually he proposed that a subsection be deleted which has nothing to do with that class of person. I think the hon. member needs another six days to study this legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I believe the hon. the Deputy Minister will agree that we all want to do only what is in the best interests of South Africa. I should like to ask him two questions. In the first place I should like to ask him whether he has discussed this provision with business leaders in South Africa, and whether they approved of it. The second question is the following: Surely we know that business often arises from private discussions between people. If an important businessman from overseas pays a visit to South Africa, which may be a holiday visit, and if in the course of his stay in this country he has a talk with a prominent South African businessman—it might be that he is being entertained—and if in the course of that private discussion he, as a bona fide businessman gives the South African businessman certain important information, and if that South African businessman should ask him for an option to sell or manufacture certain goods here, surely some good might result for South Africa from that private discussion which started by chance. If something like that should happen, would that be in conflict with the law, or not?

You should read the Bill. Have you read the Bill?

Yes, of course. I think the hon. the Deputy Minister has, after all, been a member of Parliament for a long enough period to know that our study groups and caucuses do after all discuss legislation.

But then you probably were not present.

It is true that I was not here this afternoon—I could not be present when the discussion started—but we know very well what stands in the legislation that is before the House. Will the hon. the Deputy Minister answer these questions of mine? If out of a chance discussion a situation arises where a South African businessman makes an agreement with a visitor who did not come here for business purposes in the first place, will he be breaking the law, or not? I should like to tell the hon. the Minister that if there is any doubt about that, he should withhold the clause so that clarity on that matter may be obtained. It would create an extremely bad position for us overseas if the impression should take root there that when businessmen are having a discussion with important South African businessmen they have to stop at the point where any business or agreement may arise from their discussion. It may harm our business interests if there should be any doubt about such a legal provision. For that reason I am hoping that the hon. the Deputy Minister will remove this doubt. I should like to have a frank reply from the hon. the Deputy Minister.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Bellville commenced by saying that he did not believe that the amendment which I had moved took the matter any further. I want to disabuse him immediately of any impression that he may have that I was hoping that it would take matters further; I intended to curtail them. That is the exact intention of the amendment I moved.

Order! The hon. member must address the Chair.

My apologies, Sir. The whole purpose of the amendment is to delete all reference to any agreements, business undertakings, partnership or whatever it might be with any foreign businessman. That is our whole object—not to extend it, not to take matters any further, but to curtail them. I believe that this is exactly what can happen if this amendment is accepted. The hon. member for Bellville goes further and he says that the case of the businessman is covered by section 5 of the Act. He quite correctly quoted section 5 of the Act to the effect that when a businessman comes in he will get a temporary residence permit and that permit will state that he has come here for business purposes. This has never been in doubt. We have never queried this. Nobody on this side of the House has questioned that at all. What are we doing now? What is the hon. the Minister doing now? He is now introducing a new subsection which refers to section 5 of the Act. This new subsection refers to “any such alien” and I accept that such an alien is an alien who is not deemed to be in possession of a permit issued to him in terms of section 4, section 5 or section 7.

Why did you introduce your amendment?

I introduced my amendment because I do not want that extension to the provision of section 5. We are extending section 5 further; we are now making it an offence for a South African citizen or a resident in the Republic to enter into an agreement with somebody who does not have a valid permit in terms of section 5. That is what it is.

It is normal.

The hon. member for Bellville says it is normal. But as has been pointed out by both my other colleagues, we know of nowhere in the world where any businessman who goes in has to produce to his co-businessman in the other country, his host, a permit to say that he can come into that country to do business. He does not even have to talk business. He does not have to produce a permit to that effect. I accept that he may have to have a visa to go into that country and I accept that businessmen must have visas and temporary residence permits to come into this country. But what I am opposing is the fact that a South African businessman must first say: “Before I can talk to you, let me see your permit! I must have a look at your permit to see if I can enter into association with you and that I will not commit an offence in terms of the crazy laws of the South African Government”. Sir, can you imagine the embarrassment not only to the South African businessman but to the businessman from overseas? Do hon. members think this is the way to encourage business with overseas countries? The hon. member for Bellville went further and said that subsection (b) did not deal with persons who had come into the country temporarily under a permit in terms of section 5.

Quite right.

The hon. member said it is quite right. I want to ask the hon. the Deputy Minister whether he would indicate now whether he agrees with the interpretation of this clause by the hon. member for Bellville.

Of course, I do.

The hon. the Deputy Minister says he agrees. The hon. member for Bellville goes further and says that I am moving to scrap the wrong clause. Which clause does he suggest I should have scrapped?

You should have moved to delete clause 5ter(2)(d) or something like that.

Did hon. members hear what the hon. member said? He does not know which one should be scrapped. I know, and we on this side of the House know, what we want to scrap. We wish to remove all reference to businessmen. As was put by the hon. member for Bezuidenhout there is a doubt.

Now there is no doubt.

The hon. the Deputy Minister must not say there is no doubt at all. He admitted last night that there was a doubt, and earlier on too he was prepared to admit that there was a doubt. As long as there is a doubt, I believe this subsection should be scrapped.

Mr. Chairman, if I understand the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District and other speakers on the opposite side correctly, their fear is that this clause will make business dealings between aliens who are coming here and residents of South Africa illegal if the permit does not make special provision for that. This is however not at all what this clause says. This clause refers to entering into an agreement for the conducting of “any business”. It does not deal with doing business; there is no prohibition in this clause to the effect that any person coming in under a temporary residence permit may not enter into an agreement with any person in South Africa to sell certain goods to him in future—and that is doing business. Wherever reference is made to “any business” in this clause, reference is made to the singular concept of “a business”, and a business is a business undertaking. That is what the meaning of this word shall be. To pretend that we want to pilot a Bill through this Parliament prohibiting a visitor to South Africa, for example, from merely making an investment here, from buying shares in a public company or from entering into an agreement to buy goods, or later to sell goods operating from his own country, is far from the actual and literal meaning of the Bill as it stands.

We never said that.

Furthermore, following on what the hon. member for Bellville said, I want to put it clearly to the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District that his amendment applies to a subsection which refers in no way to persons who are here under a temporary residence permit. The proposed new subsection (1) is quite separate from subsection (2) because subsection (1) refers to dealings with persons who are in South Africa without any permit. Then follows subsection (2); subsections (2) and (3) repeat the same provisions in respect of persons who are here under a permit. If he wants to propose an amendment like the one he is proposing he must also amend subsection (2) and (3) because the amendment by the hon. the Deputy Minister leaves no doubt about it that any foreseeable problem in connection with subsection (1) is hereby eliminated. But the hon. member proposes an amendment of subsection (1). This cannot help making the impression on us that he has only read subsection (1).

We have had remarks from the opposite side that hon. members of the Opposition never suggested that they were fearing that one would not be allowed to enter into an agreement, but the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District repeatedly and literally said that we were now prohibiting the entering into agreements with aliens who are visiting us.

I never said that.

Those were literally the hon. member’s words. It is far from the intention and the literal meaning of this Bill that there should be such a prohibition. This Bill places a prohibition upon the entering into an agreement to conduct “any business”, i.e. a business undertaking, and also prohibits the actual conducting of “any business” jointly. For that reason I think that there is no danger of our giving any visitors who want to do business with us offence in any way, or of our requiring them to whip out their documents the moment they start talking business. To talk business and to enter into an agreement to establish “any business” or to conduct such business jointly, are two totally different matters.

Mr. Chairman, I should just like to ask the hon. the Deputy Minister a question. In the English version the expression “conduct any business” is used; in the Afrikaans version it is “vir die dryf van ’n besigheid”. Does the term “business” exclude an agreement, for example on the selling of an article? Does “business” mean only a business such as a firm that must be established here?

Mr. Chairman, I will come to the hon. member for Bezuidenhout in a moment. I should first like to say that I think the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District is now beginning to find that his amendment was not as intelligent as he first thought it was. If the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District reads the Bill carefully, he will see that the new section 5ter(1) deals with people who have no permit and who are in South Africa illegally. Now he should like these people to be able to do business. He now wants to eliminate this. These are people who have no permits, aliens who are not or are not deemed to be in possession of a permit issued to them under section 4 or 5 of the principal Act, or who are not exempted under section 7 or 7bis. These are persons who are here quite illegally, and now the hon. member comes with an amendment and wants us to give to those persons who are not allowed to be in South Africa an opportunity to do business. We are saying he is not allowed to do business.

Now I come to the hon. member for Bezuidenhout, and I do so in all friendliness—I know my appearance is not always friendly—but I want to give him the assurance that I am not unfriendly. A moment ago he nearly jumped out of his seat when I asked him whether he had read the Bill. I am glad to see that he has now read the Bill. Let us read the Bill together now, because then he can solve his own problem; he can now solve the problem himself of that businessman of his having a chance discussion with another businessman. The hon. member now has the Bill before him. Let us now read subsection (2) of the new section 5ter: “If any alien to whom a temporary permit has been issued under section 5 is prohibited by the conditions subject to which such permit was issued from … conducting a business …” He is now prohibited from doing so. In such a case no one may conduct a business with such a person. This is when a person is prohibited from doing this, but now hon. members are coming here with a lot of theoretical little examples of businessmen who should be admitted tactfully and who should be asked tactlessly whether they have a permit or not. All I want to ask hon. members on the opposite side is to read the Bill.

Amendment proposed by Mr. W. T. Webber negatived.

Amendment proposed by the Deputy Minister of the Interior agreed to.

Clause, as amended, agreed to.

Clause 6:

Mr. Chairman, I should just like to reply to the question the hon. member for Berea asked me yesterday. It was an interesting question, and I should like to refer him to the Bill. While listening to it, the argument was a little complicated, but after I had analysed it, it amounted to the following. The hon. member objected and mentioned the case of a person who was legally in possession of a habit-forming substance which is written into the Act to which reference is made in this Bill. The hon. member was concerned about those who are legally in possession of something this Bill may prohibit them from possessing. I think the hon. member will be quite satisfied when I refer him to section 43 of the Act which reads, inter alia, as follows—

Then follows a reference to the schedule. The other section to which reference is made here, is section 13(e). The hon. member will see in both these cases that before this part of the Bill can apply to him, he must have been sentenced first. In other words, it can never apply to a person who is legally in possession of a habit-forming drug. He will only become a prohibited person if he is charged, found guilty and sentenced. Therefore it cannot cover those cases the hon. member mentioned.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank the hon. the Deputy Minister for his explanation. I understand the points that he has made. My main object in raising this matter was to indicate that this provision was a broadening of the scope of the old provision. It will mean that in the administration of the initial charge there will be problems of interpretation between the Medical, Dental and Pharmacy Act (Act 13 of 1928) and the Abuse of Dependence-producing Substances Act. But I accept the hon. the Minister’s explanation.

Clause agreed to.

House resumed:

Bill reported with an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, as we explained to the hon. the Deputy Minister yesterday evening, we think that this clause, as it stands here, is altogether too narrow in scope and could perhaps exclude that child who needs essential additional tuition. In such a case such a person will then also have to register as a private school. Consequently, on behalf of this side of the House, I want to move the following amendment—

Sir, from this amendment of ours it ought to be very clear that we do not, in any way, adversely want to affect the Minister’s function and the function of his department; we do not want to prevent them from registering private schools. That is not the object of this side of the House. All we want to state very clearly with this amendment is that we want to give Coloured children the opportunity of receiving additional tuition in subjects they are perhaps weak in, thereby to enhance their achievements. Sir, I believe there are quite a few members in this House who themselves can testify that it has been necessary to send a child of theirs for additional tuition to a person who has an excellent knowledge of a specific subject and who succeeds in transferring that knowledge to children. They do so to enhance that child’s achievements. Sir, why can we not state clearly that the Coloured parent will have the same right in respect of his child as the White parent has in respect of his child? This right already exists today in practice, but I am asking that we should state it clearly in the Bill. I do not want to repeat the argument we have already raised in the Second Reading debate. Coloured education is going to become more and more important in the future and we shall have to do more and more in this respect, and the Coloured parent himself will also have to do a great deal more in that connection. Just as there are people available today for us, as Whites, whom we can use to help our children, I am convinced there are already Coloureds who have had sufficient training and whom Coloured parents can make use of to give this additional tuition to their children.

Are they teachers?

No, they are not necessarily teachers. I can mention the example of a person who sent his child to an ex-teacher who is today employed by an insurance company. He is not registered as a teacher. That person does an excellent job of teaching children, out of school, in a science like mathematics, for example.

What does it now cost to register him?

If he wants himself registered as a school, why is it then necessary for him to be inspected? It is surely not necessary, because as soon as he has himself registered as a private school, he must act in accordance with the provisions of clause 2, and then he is subject to inspection in any case. Sir, this does not happen today in the case of persons giving tuition to White children. I as an ex-teacher, for the sake of argument, can teach up to a maximum of five children in the Cape. As soon as the number of pupils exceeds five, I must have myself registered as a private school, but as the relevant clause now reads, I must have myself registered as a private school even if I give one Coloured child additional tuition. Why cannot we also have the position here that applies as far as White chilren in the Cape are concerned, for example? I want to ask the hon. the Minister to give this amendment of ours very thorough consideration, because we want to help him. But then he must also be prepared to help us on this side of the House, because our object is solely to help the Coloured pupil and his parents.

May I ask whether I may discuss this amendment?

Yes.

The hon. member for Newton Park is clearly under a misapprehension. It seems to me as if he wants to create the impression that we begrudge the Coloureds what we do not begrudge the White children. It seems to me he is creating the impression that White children can receive extra classes from their teacher in the afternoons without remuneration, or that the parent can ask a female ex-teacher, or a married woman who used to teach, to help Johnny with his sums this afternoon, and then the married woman can say: Very well, I shall do so, but it will cost R1 per lesson. The hon. member for Newton Park now wants to imply that we want to allow this for the White children, but not for the Coloured children. That is nonsense. Let me put it this way. Any teacher will find that there are few pupils in his class who fall behind. If that teacher is worth his salt, he will tell the children: This afternoon after school, you come for an extra lesson. That teacher may not, and neither will he, let the children pay for that. The Coloured child also has that privilege. The Coloured teacher may do so. Secondly, if there is a boy or girl in the class who is doing badly, the parents will be worried about that and the father or mother will go—and there are many such people in every town—and ask the teacher whether he would not like to give Johnny or Susie an extra lesson that afternoon for payment.

He is not allowed to do so.

If the parent is willing to tell that teacher that he will pay him extra, that teacher can do so but he will not, because how can teachers, who do not do their work well in class hours, or perhaps do their work by halves on purpose, think they will earn extra money in the afternoon by letting the children pay? There are no such teachers. But it may happen that there is a married woman in the town who taught Latin in her day. My child is weak in Latin, and I may go and ask that woman if she would give Johnny some extra classes in Latin this afternoon or once a week, for which I will pay her. That person may do so. The same also applies to Coloured parents, who can ask someone to give their son extra Latin classes in the afternoon. That is not a private school. It is help that parent is seeking for his child. But when one makes it one’s daily task to collect 10, 15 or 20 such children together who are doing badly in school, and one begins to employ teachers or other people to teach, then one has a private school and then that school must be registered and be subject to the rules of the department and its inspectors. It is very simple. I do not think the hon. member need worry about this matter. It is correct as it stands here in the Bill.

I am very grateful for the short speech of the hon. member for Worcester, because apart from his conclusion he supported our case fully, particularly when he said—and I just want to repeat this for you—that if there is a person who can give Latin, but is not an acting teacher, the parents are free to send the child to that person from whom the child then receives classes for reward. He says that is the position, but our whole point is —I want to quote it again—that in terms of this clause no person shall, except at a State school, a State-aided school, a school of industries or a reform school or through a correspondence college recognized in terms of section so and so, provide for reward education to Coloured persons.

He may do so for nothing.

Yes, he may do so for nothing. In other words, the child who is so weak in Latin can be sent to the person to whom the hon. member referred and that person can give the child tuition for reward. For the Coloured person he can only do so if he is prepared to do it for nothing. I can just point out to you again that the definition concerns the provision of education. If you look at the principal Act, you see that “education” is defined as education other than university education. In other words, if I give a child tuition after hours, I am still giving him education. If I explain Std. 6 mathematics to him, I am giving him education in terms of this Act. There is no doubt that if a person does this for remuneration he is guilty of an offence. I really think the hon. the Minister ought to give attention to this, because otherwise it will create an intolerable position.

Subsection (3) of the proposed section 6 deals, of course, with the power which the Minister obtains to cancel the registration of a private school. We agree that he must have that power. As the provision reads at present, this can only be done after a date has been determined by the Minister and after it appears, to his satisfaction, that the conditions of registration have not been complied with. I therefore move as an amendment—

The reason why we would like this amendment accepted is that if the Minister were to order the cancellation of a registration in terms of the existing subsection and without this amendment being accepted, he would definitely find himself in the position of being accused of harsh action. I do not believe that this is a state of affairs we should create, particularly when we are dealing with the relations between Whites and Coloureds. In addition, this provision is definitely unjust and unfair, because nowhere does it give the owner of a registered private school the opportunity to correct what he has done wrong. He does not get the opportunity to in fact comply in future, as he ought to, with the conditions of registration which he did not comply with.

The amendment I have moved, does not deprive the Minister of the right to cancel the registration of a private school if the owner of the private school administers that school in a way that does not accord with the conditions that were laid down when the school was registered. All we want is that the Minister should give the owner the opportunity to correct what he has done wrong. The second reason is, of course, quite obvious and I spoke about that yesterday evening. If we go into the position of White private schools, we find that in the legislation of the Transvaal, Natal and the Free State, there are similar provisions. A person must be notified in writing that what he is doing is wrong, and if he does not reply to the charge within a certain period, his registration can be cancelled. Yesterday evening the hon. the Minister referred to Act 41 of 1967. That is the educational Services Act. All I can say to him is that the Natal ordinance, from which I quoted yesterday evening, and which I happen to have here, is the one which was promulgated in 1969, and that this is till the position to the present day. It has not yet been changed. In the case of Natal, the direction, in the case of private schools, first give written notice of what is wrong in that school and then he must furnish the reasons for that. Then he can lay down a period for the person and say that before a certain date he must reply to that, and correct what is wrong before that date, otherwise registration is cancelled. That is surely reasonable action; it is surely the only way one can deal with such a case. Since we are dealing here with the Coloureds, and indirectly also with relations between Whites and Coloureds, we may not place such a measure as this on the Statute Book, because it can definitely be regarded as harsh action.

Mr. Chairman, I should first like your decision about whether in this case we should deal with both the proposed amendments in succession and decide about them simultaneously or whether we should adopt another procedure.

Is the hon. the Minister asking this in connection with the question as to how the amendments are to be put?

Yes, Mr. Chairman.

I shall first put the first amendment moved by the hon. member for Newton Park; after that has been disposed of I shall put the second amendment.

I shall therefore first deal with the first amendment. With this legislation something has happened again that reminds me of the old proverb in our area which goes like this (translation): ‘To be stupid is a gift from on High, but one ought not to abuse it ever.” The United Party tried to intimate to us yesterday that they would very much like to help Coloured education and that I must convince them that all these steps are being taken to help Coloured education. As a result of a few technical points, on which we can disagree with one another, in respect of one single clause, they are voting against the principle of this legislation. I shall therefore have to tell the Coloureds—I cannot do otherwise —that the United Party is opposed to our extending this training college aspect. They are opposed to our establishing private schools and giving bursaries to the people and legalizing this as it has been applied in the past. I cannot do otherwise, because hon. members voted against the principle.

You legalized it, but you did not qualify it.

That does not matter. You need not to qualify it because it is there in writing. I am also going to leave it at that now because I have made my point. The hon. members could have voted for the principle, and they could have opposed the clause. For that reason I am saying that if one has a shameful lack of understanding, one should not abuse it.

The second matter I want to raise is that the impression was created that in many cases, even in thousands of cases, as the hon. member said and as the hon. member for Durban Central said in his speech, we are, with this provision, denying Coloured children the opportunity of obtaining good education. He then actually means education out of the school context and even completely out of the context of the ordinary school. That is what hon. members are advocating. They want us to throw open the door so that people can do what they want to. In other words, what does this amendment mean? I should like to meet the hon. member half way. In the amendment it is stated:

In other words, anyone who is a good salesman, can collect together a lot of children—the amendment does not restrict the number to five or 14 pupils, as is the case in the original Act—and before a school can be established, without control, without registration, without inspection and without the school context and the type of syllabuses he can go ahead; that is the logical conclusion as far as this is concerned, because there it stands in black and white. There is no other conclusion. I must read the amendment as it stands and tell the hon. member that I am very sorry that I cannot accept it as such. It throws the door wide open. If the hon. member were to have said “four” or “five” we would have been able to argue the matter on different lines. As far as I am concerned, I am very sorry, but it is my duty to explain our view in connection with this clause. I also want to say that when the hon. member speaks of “additional education” he is being extremely vague. The words “additional education” can deteriorate into anything. This could fall completely outside the envisaged control. Education must be controlled within a certain framework. The hon. member himself said yesterday that education is a tremendously wide definition.

But it is the definition that appears on the Statute Book.

Exactly! In other words, one may by these means provide people with a foothold for circumventing the position that in terms of the provisions of the Education Act there should be order in education. A teacher, who is a professional person and gives education within the school context, can in any case not do other remunerative work if he does not have the permission of the Administration. If he therefore gives tuition outside the school context and simply does as he likes, it could affect his work. Then he has, in any case, already contravened section 16 of the same Act. This must take place within the school context. The most important point here is that the qualified authorities must decide what persons may give tuition to children. They must decide about what kind of syllabus must be used. There are the cases of old mathematics teachers who teach very well. I am not saying that is wrong; on the contrary, that person can make himself available for that purpose. In Coloured Affairs we already have a rule according to which thousands of people receive education outside the school context. These teachers are paid for that, but it takes place within a specific, well-ordered syllabus. These people get certain lectures after hours, and there are teachers appointed for that purpose. People such as that can, in this manner, still carry out their duty in a well-ordered way. A person must have knowledge of the methodology of education. Hon. members indeed want the standard of education of the Coloureds to be the same as that of the Whites. We cannot allow such a door to be opened for them, because they could thereby be exploited. The relationship between the teacher and the child is of utmost importance in the school. Those are important aspects that also come into things. What is most important is not that a person should be prohibited from furnishing a service, but that he should register. If one receives money for something, and if one includes people that must give one money for a service one furnishes, it must be well-ordered; there must be someone somewhere who exercises control. One cannot do otherwise. Such a person must register. I cannot help it, but I cannot get past that. As far as that is concerned, we shall have to leave this clause as it stands here.

There is still encouragement when we are dealing with the Coloureds. The hon. member spoke of thousands of Coloured children whom we will deny the opportunity of receiving tuition. But who are these thousands of Coloured children the hon. member is speaking about? The Coloured child who specifically wants to go to a private school, is the child of people who usually earn quite a bit of money, the higher class of Coloureds. They are not the people of whom the hon. member spoke. The custom is that principals and teachers teach children who need it free of charge. That is consequently, within the school context and the children also do not feel that they stand apart from other children; they feel they are included with them. We must keep educational standards in this country on a correct footing and therefore the pupil, the public, the student and the educational authorities must be protected. As far as I am concerned, it is very important for us also to apply this protection in this case. So much, then, for the first amendment that was moved. I am very sorry but I shall not be able to accept this amendment.

I want to point out to the hon. the Minister that the question he put to me a while ago was not clear to me. I now give him the opportunity to reply to the second amendment as well, because the question before the House is clause 2 in respect of which a couple of amendments have been moved. If the hon. the Minister does not reply to that, and there are no further speakers, the debate closes and I have to put the question. Therefore, I am now giving the hon. the Minister the opportunity to reply.

Mr. Chairman, then there was evidently a small misunderstanding. Thank you very much for having put me right. I want to speak about the second amendment, because I owe it to the hon. member. Incidentally, I just want to say thank you to hon. members for having placed the amendment on my desk this afternoon when I came in so that I could have a look at it. The hon. member’s point of departure was—and he came to light with it every now and then—that we are now doing in respect of the Coloureds what we are not doing in respect of the Whites. The Central Government handles Coloured education and we base our educational legislation largely on this original Act, i.e. Act No. 41 of 1967. That Act deals with Whites. By the way, the Department of National Education only gives vocational education, and that is why I said yesterday, in respect of private schools, that this is something completely different. The word “vocational education” is there, but education is education. As far as the private schools of Whites are concerned, section 15(4) of Act 41 of 1967 provides as follows:

This applies to Whites, and it is word for word the same as that which is being set out here for Coloureds in this clause. The hon. member may read it for himself; it is exactly the same.

May I ask the hon. the Minister a question? Is the Minister aware of what the position is in the Transvaal, the Free State and Natal in respect of this aspect?

Yesterday the hon. member took pains to explain it to me properly. He himself was a teacher and therefore knows about these things and knows what goes on in provincial education in the Transvaal, the Free State and Natal. As he said, the ordinance in respect of Natal is that of 1969. I do not know whether it was necessary, whether it was essential to write something into an ordinance that has in any case been done in White schools for the past five years. One is not simply going to cancel a school’s certificate; there is a procedure that is normally followed. Investigations are made and a report is received. One asks a person questions and afterwards one decides what has to be done. Sometimes one even gives such a person time to meet the requirements. If Natal is then such a model example, I want to suggest that they use, to a lesser extent … [Interjections.] The hon. member implied it yesterday; he must not object now. Then I want to suggest that they use less paper to write on, which is in any case done in a civilized education system. Only essentials must be written into the Act. We have already had this Act for six years and it has caused no problems throughout the Republic in respect of Whites. In other words, I want to state that we have proved over the years that everything which it is necessary for us to write into the Act, regardless of what was written into a provincial ordinance two or three years ago, already stand there and that it is not necessary at all to add this long explanation to it. Now, in respect of this provision, a spectre is being conjured up that has never been visible in the six years that this Act has been administered with respect to Whites. If it is good for Whites, it can surely be good for Coloureds as well, in the same spirit in which the hon. member put it. After all, there is an inquiry. There are also the opportunities. Everything the hon. member said there, Natal has thought fit to write out in the finest detail. Mention is made here of certain action in the form of inquiries, and how one eventually arrives at making a decision to Cancel. I state that it is unnecessary to put this on paper. If it were so necessary, it could have been written into the regulations. Therefore I am also sorry, in this case, that I cannot accept the hon. member’s amendment.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Minister says he cannot accept this amendment because it opens the door for the exploitation of the Coloureds. I now want to put the position to him. In terms of his legislation anyone can give tuition to dozens of children as long as he does not ask compensation for it. If that is the position, why not also allow the same to happen in cases where compensation is, in fact, requested? The hon. the Minister is quite unreasonable in his view. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout has just drawn my attention to the fact that there are many members in this House who have received music tuition from the local organist, as he or she has also given children lessons in his/her private capacity for payment.

[Inaudible.]

The hon. member for Parow probably learned to play the mouthorgan or trumpet in that way. If someone now wants to do something like this, he must register in terms of the hon. the Minister’s legislation. The mistake the Minister is making is that the facilities for the White child—let us be quite honest in this matter—are ten times better than those for the Coloured child. Because the situation amongst the Coloureds must still improve a great deal, and the hon. the Minister intends to introduce compulsory education for them, the hon. gentleman can surely understand that in future, with such large classes, it will not always be possible for the teacher to give that additional tuition. It could be done as well by someone else, even if he or she is not a teacher at that stage. Sir, that is our approach. Our only object is to give those people this additional assistance. We do not want to open the door for them so that they do not have to register as a private school. We understand very clearly that these schools must be registered and that they must be subject to inspection and to the regulations which the department draws up but because the Minister now states the clause in these terms, he is going to prevent this additional tuition from being given to Coloured children. I must honestly say that I cannot understand the hon. the Minister’s attitude.

We cannot understand your attitude either.

Why is he not prepared to accept this amendment? If it is abused in any way in the future, he can return to the House and say: “I am sorry, but the United Party persuaded me to accept an amendment that is wrong.”

We know this already.

He would then be justified in amending the Act.

This is not a matter of party politics.

There is no party politics involved in this matter. We told the hon. the Minister from the very beginning that it is only this one clause that we cannot agree with, and now he says that he will go and tell the Coloureds at large that we are opposed to bursaries for Coloured children; that we are opposed to the opportunity being created for training more Coloured teachers …

I will simply leave it if it bothers you.

The hon. the Minister says he will simply leave it, but he surely knows that those things, for which provision is being made in clauses 1 and 3, have previously been done illegally, after all. All the hon. the Minister is doing now is to make these things legally possible so that there can be no dispute about them in future. That is the only reason why he brought clauses 1 and 3 to this House.

Sir, I want to ask the hon. the Minister to think again about the amendment of this side of the House. It is not a dangerous amendment; it is a fair and reasonable amendment. The intention of this amendment is simply to assist the Minister’s Department of Coloured Affairs and their education division. Sir, if it were our view to reduce educational facilities for the Coloured child, one could perhaps have understood the hon. the Minister’s attitude, but we want to create even mort opportunities for Coloured pupils. We should like to see the pass figure increasing, and we want to lighten the burden on the limited number of teachers the Minister has. Those are the reasons for this amendment.

Sir, I should just like to focus the attention of the House on one or two points. When the hon. the Minister replied a little while ago, he kept on referring to the Educational Services Act and said that that is the position in White education, but what he did not say is that it is the position in respect of schools that fall under the Department of National Education.

I did say so.

Sir, since technical schools have been transferred to the provinces, the department handles merely a small facet of education as such. It has been mentioned here that this system has been working well for the past six or seven years. It works well in respect of a small section. Sir, the hon. the Minister spoke here of the understanding of education. I really believe that if the hon. the Minister had a better understanding of this aspect he would have accepted these amendments. But the difficulty we are faced with is that it is not the Minister of National Education that introduces educational legislation here, but that we have four different Ministers who try to deal with education in South Africa, and therefore I accept the Minister’s problem when he speaks about understanding. Then, Sir, I should just like to refer to section 16(e) of the principal Act as well. The hon. Minister tried to create the impression that a Coloured teacher may not actually accept any additional work for payment. Surely he may do so. Clause 16(e) does not impose a total prohibition on that. He may do so with the permission of the Minister, because there are delegated powers, and the person can accept it with the permission of the principal. I want to conclude by saying that I believe that the hon. the Minister is negativing these amendments as a result of a lack of understanding on his part.

Amendments proposed by Mr. D. M. Streicher and Mr. P. A. Pyper negatived (Official Opposition dissenting).

70–A.H.

Clause put and the Committee divided:

Tellers: S. F. Kotzé, G. P. van den Berg, H. J. van Wyk and W. L. D. M. Venter.

Tellers: H. J. Bronkhorst and J. O. N. Thompson.

Clause accordingly agreed to.

House Resumed:

Bill reported without amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I move—

Agreed to.