I announce that at a special ceremony held in the Gallery Hall this morning, a display cabinet containing reproductions of the manuscript of “Die Stem van Suid-Afrika”, in C. J. Langenhoven’s handwriting and signed by him, and of the signed manuscript of the musical score by the Rev. M. L. de Villiers was unveiled.

Mr. Speaker, I move—

Mr. Speaker, it is not my intention to make the Third Reading of this Bill an extension of the debates we had during the Second Reading and Committee Stages. The debates we have had thus far have been useful, constructive and fruitful. There are still many clauses of the Bill which we believe can be improved and where, undoubtedly, changes are going to take place in due course. We have been dealing with a Bill not only great in size, but also one which is technically very complicated, and despite the years of study that went into the Bill, one cannot expect to have uniformity of opinion. What I think we shall find in practice is that although the principles in the Bill are well founded, the acid test of practical application and daily usage will bring to the fore cases where compliance with the provisions of the Bill may perhaps be impossible or impracticable. But these provisions will in due course be amended.

Already the amendments accepted in Committee, whether they originated from the hon. the Minister or from this side of the House, have made the Bill a better Bill. I think it was the objective both of the Government and of the Opposition that, as the Bill passed through its various stages in this House, we should endeavour to produce as good a Bill as possible.

The Bill is going to affect practically everybody, the banker, the businessman, professional men and every single investor in South Africa whether he holds a large portfolio of shares in public companies or whether he owns one share in the smallest of one-man businesses. Each and every one will be affected, and few will escape the effects of this Bill. Many will now have to pay greater heed to their responsibilities. This is something that the public will welcome. Thousands will be more secure under the new provisions that are to be found in the Bill.

That is why I believe that it is right and proper to acknowledge the services that have been rendered in the case of this legislation not only by those commissioners who sat on the Van Wyk De Vries Commission and those who gave evidence before that commission, but also by those who were good enough to prepare and submit not only to us, but to the Government as well, memoranda on the Bill as we have it before us. These memoranda have proved invaluable in studying the Bill and in appraising it and assessing the possible impact the various clauses will have. The comment we have had has come from businessmen, from organizations and from people who are daily concerned with these provisions. They see this measure from the point of view of practical application, and their views and suggestions have been important to us. They are in effect the experts in the usage of company law and we are grateful to them for the assistance they have given us.

It has been my lot during my professional and business career to deal with every single aspect of the Companies Act. I have had to deal with the formation of companies and I have dealt with their administration. I have dealt with the preparation and the issue of prospectuses. I have dealt with the obtaining of Stock Exchange quotations. I have dealt with liquidations and judicial managements, but let me make it quite clear, not in the case of those companies which I floated! I have also acted under the provisions of the Act as an auditor. I think it is only right that it should be said at this stage that the old Act of 1926 served us well. Under its umbrella a vast complex of companies has become the norm in our economic life. It is the basis upon which business and industry operate today; they all operate under the umbrella of the Companies Act. I think that in burying this old Companies Act, we should also pay it a word of praise. We live in an age of great technical advancement. We live in an era when the size of companies increases by the day. Horizontal diversification, vertical diversification, take-overs, mergers and acquisitions are the order of the day. Conglomerates, cross-shareholdings, vast pyramids and international giants no longer call for any comment or attract any attention. All these developments have one single common factor. They all need vast sums of money to carry on their existing operations and to provide for future expansion. These huge amounts that are required by the complexity of business today have only one source from which they can come, and that is from the pockets and the savings of the public. It is the assembling of these funds, the use of these funds and the control over these funds that need the regulatory provisions of modern legislation. Here we have the basis for the need of this new legislation which we have been considering over the past few days. But even more important, perhaps, is the certainty that up-to-date legislation can give to the complexity of contemporary finance and business. In many cases this is lacking in the existing legislation, despite the fact that we have had 15 amendments to the present Act over the past 47 years. The new Bill, when enacted, will bring, we hope, not only better measures of control but also a greater degree of certainty. I am not naïve enough to believe, Mr. Speaker, that we will not have the usual spate of conflicting legal opinions when the new Act comes to be interpreted, nor will we escape the submissions to the courts to determine what some of the complex sections of the Bill really mean. But I believe that this Bill makes important progress on two fronts. Firstly, a number of old ambiguities in existing legislation have been eliminated in this new Bill, while new important provisions have been incorporated. Secondly, the establishment of the standing advisory committee will provide a permanent tribunal to deal with problems as they arise, because problems will arise. I think this is accepted by all. We can see many problems already. Those matters we have already referred to in the Second Reading debate and in the Committee Stage of the Bill, and we found these problems before the Bill had even had time to become an Act. Many more problems will arise and be referred to the standing advisory committee for consideration, and its value will lie in the fact that the examination of problems by this Committee will be a continuous process. When new problems become apparent, they can be dealt with immediately and we can expect continuous improvements to the Act.

I think one should also make it quite clear, Mr. Speaker, that it is not only in the protective features of the Act that constant improvement is required. Of the tens of thousands of companies that are registered in South Africa, there are only an infinitesimal number that are not completely honest in their operations with the public, and in most cases our companies in this country are well and ably run, and this goes for the bigeest companies to the smallest companies. I think we in South Africa can be proud of the standard of morality and integrity and ability of our corporations, be they big or small, and it therefore becomes the duty of the Legislature constantly to streamline Acts such as the Companies Act to make for maximum efficiency so that companies can succeed and expand and provide the essential expansion to our economy, without which we cannot continue to exist. All in all. Mr. Sneaker, I believe that we can be satisfied with the new start that has been made. There will be difficulties; there will be teething troubles, but these will be overcome as time goes on. This Bill has been wanted; this Bill has been welcomed by all sections of the community who are concerned with this legislation, and for our part we are happy to support it once again at the Third Reading.

Sir, I should just like to concur with a few ideas expressed by the hon. member for Parktown, more specifically to agree with virtually everything he said here this afternoon. I must admit that it gives me a great deal of pleasure to have had so much co-operation in this House in dealing with this Bill which is so comprehensive and of such a technical nature. This is of course not a matter of a political nature and we were able to examine and review all the various provisions of this Bill quite objectively. As I say, I agree with virtually everything the hon. member said— from this praise for those who had a hand in this legislation, to the credit he gave for the quality of the companies which we have in South Africa. I should like to make mention of the fact that the drafting of this Bill required a tremendous amount of work. This commission sat for many years. The commission provided us with a draft Bill, but even after the draft Bill had been prepared, there was a tremendous amount of work which still had to be done to get the Bill into the form in which it was presented to this House, and for that we want to express our special appreciation to the people in the department who dealt with the Bill. I realize, too, that small problems will still arise, and therefore the most outstanding feature of this Bill, as opposed to that which we had previously, is the fact that provision is being made here for an advisory committee, which will assist us to remedy matters when shortcomings may become apparent from time to time. But, Sir, I am also aware that with the changes which have now been introduced as compared to the existing legislation, it is probable that there will be court cases, but I do not want to be pessimistic about that. I think that the experience we have gained since 1926 of the existing legislation, has most definitely helped us to employ our terminology in the Bill in such a way that it defines more clearly what we would like to have that there may be less doubt as to its interpretation henceforth, and, as a result, fewer court cases.

In conclusion I just want to sound a warning, and I sound it more specifically for the officials of companies who have to deal with matters of this kind, who have to see to the documentation of companies. Yesterday we spoke about the exceptionally heavy fines imposed in regard to the late submission of documents to the Registrar of Companies. A number of amendments have been effected to this legislation which will mean that the officials of companies will have to make a detailed study of these amendments, and I just want to ask, particularly in view of the increased fines, about which we had something of an argument here, that companies ensure, through their officials, compliance with the provisions of this legislation.

Finally, I want to express my appreciation to hon. members on both sides of the House who have made a contribution by way of the discussion of points and the moving of amendments to get the Bill into its present form, with which I think we may be very satisfied. I still have a few small amendments, of a very minor nature, which I shall move in the Other Place. They, too, are really nothing more than the elimination of shortcomings we failed to spot before. But in general I think that we may be very satisfied with this Bill.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a Third Time.

Sir, just to forge a link with the debate which was interrupted yesterday, I want to refer to something that was said by the hon. member for Turffontein. The hon. member for Turffontein attacked the Government fairly bitterly and pugnaciously about the pension of R41 per month which is at present applicable and which is going to be increased in October to R45 per month. The hon. member adopts the view that this pension is insufficient. I am in immediate agreement with him. In the past we have also said that this pension is insufficient to provide for all the pensioners’ necessities of life, and we should also have liked to provide more money if the means were available to us. We may not lose sight of the fact that a pension, as we have always considered it in South Africa, is only a means of assistance to help provide for people’s necessities of life, and here we do not want to exclude the contributions of members of the family, the church and welfare organizations. It remains merely a means of assistance. The hon. member also said that the pensioner cannot live independently of the community. Sir, we specifically want to retain his engagement in the community, not only as far as his life’s activities are concerned, but we also want to keep the social conscience of the community alive so that they can make their contributions in respect of those who are not so well-off. Sir, while I am speaking of social conscience, I just want to say: The United Party could surely, in its day, also have proved how alive its social conscience was, and in that connection I want to put this question to that hon. member: Does he believe that the pension, which the United Party Government provided, was able to meet all the pensioners’ necessities of life in those davs? Sir, it could not. But then they had the responsibility of distributing the contents of the state coffers to the benefit of everyone. Once one carries that responsibility, one soon realizes that there is not always enough in the state coffers to provide as much for everyone as one would have liked to do, so much as to provide for all the pensioners’ necessities of life. We can therefore draw that comparison because the position depends upon attitudes and upon whether one is carrying responsibility.

But I want to confine myself to another matter which I should also like to bring to the Minister’s attention. It is again related to what I said last year under the same Vote. In the discussion of this Vote I asked the hon. the Minister to investigate the consolidation of the pension funds of public servants and the pensioners of the State. I pointed out that such a consolidation would result in a large number of benefits. The funds to which I referred are the Public Service Pension Fund, the Permanent Force Pension Fund, the South Africa Police and Prisons Service Pension Fund, the Provincial and Territory Service Pension Fund and the Government Service Widows’ Pension Fund. The Minister responded positively to my request and undertook to have the necessary investigation carried out with a view to the consolidation of these various pension funds. Today I can joyfully say that the Minister was true to his pledge, because hon. members have probably noted the fact that a while ago the Minister issued a Press statement in which he announced the consolidation of the various funds. But I have also learned that there is legislation on the way which will possibly still be introduced this session, legislation which will give effect to this decision by the hon. the Minister. At this juncture, and since I requested this last year, I feel it to be my pleasant duty and task to thank the hon. the Minister and his department for the quick action in this connection. This entails great benefits for the beneficiaries and, at the same time, also relieves the department of a big administrative task because, where it previously had to administer a whole lot of funds, it is now administering only one fund. Tremendous concessions are being made here, particularly to the widows of members of this fund. Pensions payable according to the Government Service Widows’ Fund were, I believe, fairly meagre. The great majority of the widows who received pensions from those relevant funds, were probably just minimum pensioners. By that I mean that most of them were persons who received a mere R59 per month or R118 per month if they had dependent children. The widow of a person who devoted his whole life to the service of the State, will in the future receive a pension equal to half of her deceased husband’s pension, and the widow will be able to subsist well on that.

Comparing the existing benefits under the existing funds with those proposed after consolidation, I want to mention the following. The widow of an official who has contributed to the fund for 42 years, and retired at an average of R6 000 for the last three years of his service, receives a widow’s pension plus a temporary allowance of R133, and according to information from the department there are 145 000 members contributing to this Widows’ Pension Fund. From the 1st of July this year the widow of the person I have quoted as an example will receive R205 per month. If we also include the gratuity at a rate of 6,72% and the annuity at 1 /55th, this calculation on the new basis also entails great benefits. According to my information there are 205 000 contributing members who will be affected by the consolidation of these funds. In his Budget speech the Minister of Finance announced that the existing pension funds are to be consolidated as of 1st July, 1973, and pensions are at the same time to be increased by 10%, Unfortunately certain members will retire before the 1st of July of this year, but even they will benefit since they will also share in this increase of 10% in their pensions. Such big concessions and improvements require more funds, and members will consequently have to contribute 1% more of their annual earnings to these funds. I believe it would even be a pleasure for members of the fund to make this contribution since they will eventually gain such extensive benefits from the fund.

When the Public Service Commission Vote was being dealt with, the hon. the Minister remarked yesterday that the Public Service now has a pension scheme which has no equal anywhere in the world. He also said that the Public Service Pension Scheme is also better than that which any private undertaking can offer. That is really true. We are grateful for the fact that this could take place, because public servants regard this concession as even more important than the increase of 15% in their salaries which was granted to them recently.

Although the hon. the Minister and his department deserve our thanks for this action and for the consolidation of these funds, I want to tell him that, in actual fact, only one aspect of my request of last year has been met. There are still a few other funds that are being administered by the department. I also think it would be profitable to investigate the other funds and schemes being administered by the department. We have learned a great deal from the investigation into state pension funds, and on the basis of that experience we can build—and with that good background and knowledge we can also take up these other funds so that they will also contribute to the further benefit of the beneficiaries of the funds.

There is something else I want to bring to the hon. the Minister’s attention. This is of a more local nature because it relates to the regional office of the Department of Community Development in Germiston. That office not only serves Germiston locally, but it also serves the whole southeastern Transvaal region. That office is possibly going to be prejudiced as a result of a big level crossing which will be built in Germiston over the railway line. I think it is also high time that we obtained a permanent building for that department which serves such a great area in that region. We now have the opportunity of taking such a step. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Germiston dealt mainly with the position of the consolidation of the various Government pension funds. We have had an opportunity of studying the hon. the Minister’s statement in this regard and we understand from that that legislation is to be introduced. That will give us a further opportunity to study this matter.

When the hon. the Minister made his statement, he indicated the various funds which were to be consolidated. However, there is one fund which requires a sum of R515 000—over R0,5 million—to be voted, according to page 191 of the Estimates. I refer to the long established Widows’ Pension Fund (Cape of Good Hope) under subhead L. I notice that a special contribution to that fund is to be voted. I should like to ask the hon. the Deputy Minister what the future of this fund is going to be and what the present position is as far as the balance is concerned. This is a very old fund and there are not many widows who are still drawing benefits in terms of this fund. It seems that this fund is now to receive an additional amount of R515 000. This fund is not included in the consolidation of the various Government pension funds which is to come into effect after legislation which is intended to be introduced into this House has been passed.

However, I should like to deal with another aspect of the functions of the Department of Social Welfare and Pensions, particularly as far as the social welfare services are concerned.

The latest report of the department was recently tabled in this House, and on page 1 thereof information is given in regard to the shortage of staff, particularly in the field of professional welfare workers and welfare officers. According to the figures in the report, of the 1 105 posts for Whites in the field of professional work, only 52% are presently filled as permanent appointments. The remaining 48% of these posts are filled by persons who have been appointed on a temporary basis. With this shortage of staff in the professional field of welfare work, the department can seriously be impeded in its function, particularly where rehabilitation services and preventive measures are rendered by the department. Over the years, and especially in recent times, very few men have entered the profession of social work. Consequently, the womenfolk are mainly carrying the burden today. It is a vitally important aspect of the function of the Department of Social Welfare and Pensions, and here I would just like to indicate the various aspects concerning the work of these professional officers, which should really be extended instead of being curtailed due to the lack of staff. I hope that the hon. the Deputy Minister will be able to give the Committee some indication today of the steps his department or the Government intends taking in order to rectify this position. When you look at the Children’s Act and the excellent provisions of that Act, you see that there are certain provisions which have never been invoked, such as the provision for attendance centres. When this legislation was passed some 13 years ago by this House, it was hoped that these attendance centres would play their part, particularly in the way of preventive measures in welfare work. We have found that the estimates only make provision for a token amount and that nothing further has happened in this regard.

Probation officers have to undertake another very important task, and I would like to indicate the difficulties experienced by welfare organizations working amongst the youth, the young people. This is particularly the case where it is found that a young person is in need of care, and who is found by a social worker who is in the employ of a private welfare organization. When this social welfare worker wishes to have this young person placed in a place of safety for his protection, and perhaps for the benefit of the community as a whole, it is impossible to admit this person to the place of safety without a detention order. If this should occur at night, or during weekends, it means that this welfare worker has to wait until the doors of the Department of Social Welfare and Pensions open. Then he has to wait till the court is available to him so that the matter can be investigated before he can get a detention order for this person.

The hon. the Minister has announced that as from December last year a 24-hour service has been undertaken and this service is known as “the crisis clinic”. This service is only available in Johannesburg, and it is hoped that provision can be made to extend such a service to the other major centres, particularly to Cape Town and Durban, which are harbour cities and where quite a number of problems arise from time to time which are outside the normal hours of operation of the Department of Social Welfare and Pensions. As far as the service is concerned, this is a failing at the moment, but it is not due to the quality of the staff. We have the highest regard for the members of the Department of Social Welfare and Pensions, and the Minister is indeed very fortunate to have such a dedicated and well-trained staff, but the position is that as the amount of work grows and the number of cases grow, something will suffer, e.g. the standard of work will have to suffer unless something is done about it. I would like to suggest that greater use should be made of welfare organizations and voluntary workers in these welfare organizations. An authorized officer is clearly defined in terms of the Children’s Act, and I believe that the hon. the Deputy Minister should give his attention to the possible amendment of that definition so as to enlist the support which voluntary workers who are connected with welfare agencies and welfare organizations can offer.

There is the other aspect concerning the question of probation whereby a young person is placed on probation. In actual fact, this does not mean a great deal today. Due to the fact that the probation officer is extremely busy with other duties, it is not possible for him to really keep track of a particular young person. This is, after all, an essential part of the preventive welfare services which are the responsibility of the Department of Social Welfare and Pensions. I should like to refer to other aspects concerning the duties of probation officers or professional welfare officers, if one prefers to call them that. The position has arisen that a far greater role can be played by probation officers in the department with regard to the rehabilitation of offenders. We know that these officers are extensively used among juveniles, but when it comes to adult offenders, the question of calling for a report from a probation officer, is one which is not greatly adhered today. An address was delivered by the Chief Justice, the hon. Mr. Justice Ogilvie Thompson, which was headed “Crime, the Community and the Rehabilitation of Offenders” wherein he drew attention to the fact that, as far as the courts are concerned, presentence reports from probation officers are of great assistance to them. However, the judge drew the attention of the audience to the fact that today this is not carried out to a great extent, particularly among adult offenders and a very strong plea is made that greater efforts should be made to extend our probation officer services to enable them to have the time to carry out such pre-sentence reports. With regard to the question of probation, one finds, too, that whereas in most Western countries probational services in respect of a person who is on probation—and this should not be confused with a person who is on parole—are undertaken on quite a large scale, this is not the case in South Africa except in the case of juveniles. In the speech of the hon. Chief Justice which was published in the latest issue of Nicro’s Magazine, Nicro being the National Institute for Crime Prevention and Rehabilitation of Offenders, Mr. Justice Thompson made the following comments—

[Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I do not have any criticism to level at the hon. member for Umbilo. In a case such as this, where the Government and this department are doing welfare work, I think it is necessary for us on both sides of the House to give support to that department and to the Minister. That is also how I have come to know the hon. member, and one appreciates his attitude in this connection. The criticism which he has, in fact, levelled, I regard as well-intentioned criticism. I do not want to go into the speech of the hon. member for Turffontein. It is not so nice to speak after he has spoken, and I did not have that privilege. My hon. colleague opposite has replied to him.

Today I want to lodge a plea with the hon. the Minister for a special case. It affects our aged who can no longer manage their own affairs. In the past three quarters of a century medical science has shown so much progress that man’s life span has been doubled. Before 1900 the expectation of life was 30 to 40 years; today it is estimated at 70 years. This does not detract from the fact that we have many aged in our midst who are 90 years old; and being 100 years old is no longer a strange phenomenon either. The increase in our life expectancy has, unfortunately, not always gone hand in hand with the retention of intellectual abilities. From the nature of the case we have many of our aged today who are not always financially badly off, but they do not have the intellectual ability, as a result of disease or age, or whatever the case may be, to manage their own affairs. It is therefore necessary for someone to act on their behalf. In fact, there are known cases where some of these people are living in distressful circumstances. There are many of them who, as a result of stubbornness, as a result of age or whatever the case may be, make it very difficult for family members to take care of them. They refuse to go to a hospital or an institution when they are ill. Our welfare organizations have problems in giving those people good care and help. We even have cases of well-to-do people who live in hotels in their old age and who simply refuse to leave the hotel and go to a hospital or institution when they become ill. Then those people, who actually know nothing of such care, are at their wits’ end, because they do not know what to do with those people and they cannot do anything about the situation either. It is true that via the Supreme Courts a guardian can be appointed for such people.

However, it is a very difficult procedure. It is difficult in the sense that here in South Africa one does not like to encroach upon or obstruct the freedom of the individual. In the first place it is also a very costly process. And the courts do not very easily advocate interference in the freedom of that individual. It is done, but it does not take place as easily as we would like. As things stand today, the appointment of a guardian is actually the only legal expedient for having an aged person, who is not able to manage his own affairs, cared for.

As I have already mentioned, it is very difficult to do such a thing. As the position stands today, a guardian can be appointed in respect of almost any sphere of a person’s life. Thus a guardian can, for example, manage a person’s property interests, his investments, take care of his dwelling or arrange to what institution he must go. A guardian can therefore be appointed for all kinds of purposes. As I have already indicated, however, it is difficult to have a guardian appointed. One has a high regard for our law and for the freedom of the individual, but the rules in connection with guardianship are perhaps no longer all that serviceable. In the circumstances I am discussing here, this has perhaps become fruitless because such extensive costs and long-winded procedures are involved in the appointment of such a guardian. In my view it would be short-sighted of us to allow ourselves to be hampered by that in taking action which would be in the best interests of so many of our aged.

It is under these circumstances that I want to ask the hon. the Deputy Minister whether this matter could not be investigated with a view to determining whether it is possible to design a cheaper and simpler procedure to make it possible to provide for the needs of these people more simply. As I see the position, these are essentially people who are in need of care. It does not matter what their financial position is. It ought not to be beyond the ingenuity of the department to design a procedure, as in the case of children needing care, according to which someone can be appointed to act on behalf of these people. There is another alternative which I may mention, if a simple method cannot be found, which would contribute tremendously towards better provision for the needs of these people.

Thus a magistrate of a specific region can act as guardian in respect of those people. He could then decide what is best for them and how they must be cared for. We could also give the powers to certain welfare officers who are responsible people. They can be people in the Department of Social Welfare who would be able to take decisions for those people and act on their behalf. I think this has really become a need as far as we are concerned. I have experience of this in my constituency. I think other hon. members have also found that there are many problems with those very old people because of the fact that they are not intellectually able to take those decisions. I am therefore lodging a plea with the hon. the Minister to the effect that he should find a way of working out a cheap and practical method so that a guardian, or call it what you will, can be appointed for those people. It must be someone who will look after their interests.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Mayfair has dealt with matters concerning our senior citizens. He raised matters of importance. I wish, however, to deal with another aspect that falls under this Vote namely the question of rehabilitation services. If one considers the Estimates one find that there has been a satisfactory increase in the expenditure which has been allocated to subhead P in respect of rehabilitation services. It is a steady increase over the years, but I submit that it is inadequate in respect of the services required from this particular section. In 1964-’65 an amount of R229 000 was allocated to these services. In the year under review, i.e. 1973-’74, we find that the amount has increased to R532 000. We know, too, that these services are concerned mainly with dealing with alcoholism and drug-dependency problems affecting the White population. While funds available have increased and now exceed the R½ million mark this year, it is significant that the estimates of money accruing to the State by virtue of excise taxes on beer, wine and spirits, have risen from R61 million in 1965 to R187 million this year. This in effect means that for every R351 which the State receives in respect of customs and excise duty on liquor this department allocates R1 for rehabilitation purposes. Put even more simply, for every R35 received by the State, one cent is allocated to rehabilitation services, and I want to say to the hon. the Deputy Minister that it is just not good enough.

I would like to quote a further example. This concerns the latest figures which are available in the report to which the hon. member for Umbilo referred, namely the latest report of the department. It transpires, from an examination of the figures here, that for every R9 821 collected from liquor excise duty, R1 is given by way of subsidy to Sanca for the maintenance and extension of information services. In other words, R98 is collected and one cent is paid out by way of a subsidy to help 17 information centres to fulfil the purpose for which they were designed. Now I only hope that the hon. the Deputy Minister will get up and tell me that my figures are wrong because in the year under review, the present year, he has decided to allocate a much more realistic subsidy to Sanca for the work they are doing in this respect. I feel it is essential, because if one considers the report of the National Advisory Board on Rehabilitation Matters, one finds the following—

The responsibility, as far as the Whites are concerned, therefore rests with this department. What is interesting too is that it is not only the attitude of the advisory board in relation to alcoholism, but in relation to drug addiction as well. And yet—and here again I have to go back to the latest figures available—we find in the same report, in connection with the distribution of expenditure, that 0,19% of the total expenditure of the Minister’s department is allocated to the care and the rehabilitation of inebriates and the retreats and rehabilitation centres. I believe the time has come when this position must be reviewed, in the light of the developments in our modern world.

Then, Sir, I want to deal with the question of dagga specifically. Police statistics reveal that in the last seven years the number of contraventions in connection with dagga exceeded 235 000. The latest police report states that up to the year ending June, 1972, 36 680 cases involving dagga were sent to trial. In comparison we find in the same report that there were 223 prosecutions for drug abuse. This is, of course, excluding the dagga. But what is disturbing —and this is indicated in the report—is that 6% of the people involved in drug abuse, excluding dagga, are under 15 years of age. This is not unique to South Africa; it is a world-wide problem. It is being found that the age of people addicted to drugs is falling year by year. It is a serious factor, Sir. And to revert to dagga, we have this particular problem that South Africa is one of the largest growers of dagga in the world. I believe that we have to try to put dagga into perspective in the minds of the youth of South Africa. I believe that young people have been subjected over the years to scare stories about the effects of dagga, scare stories which we have not really been able to substantiate because our research is in its initial stages. But I believe that these scare stories have led to a counter-reaction which amounts almost to a rebellion on the part of our youth. They have adopted the attitude now of: “Well, pot’s okay”. I think they are very, very gravely wrong about this attitude. But what makes the issue a little more complicated is that there are some individuals whose philosophies suggest and favour almost total freedom for the individual. They have been at pains to imply that dagga is harmless, and that its use could even be permitted under certain controlled circumstances. Sir, let me say emphatically that I do not support this point of view. Much is happening today in the field of research into dagga, and I believe it is a very great pity indeed that research in South Africa into dagga has been held up for the last 18 months because provision did not exist for a genuine bona fide researcher to obtain supplies of dagga legally for his research. I know that the position is due to be changed, but I believe that we have lost 18 valuable months.

Sir, we know that the use of dagga in the Western world, apart from the traditional dagga-consuming countries like India, the Middle East and, to some extent, the Bantu in Africa, is a comparatively recent habit. As I have said, the researchers themselves are only beginning to find out the dangers arising out of the use and abuse of dagga. I want to submit that it has taken civilization and modern society hundreds of years to be able to evaluate the dangers to health of cigarette smoking and of excessive use of alcohol, and I am convinced that as our knowledge of dagga grows, so its dangers to the mind will become more and more evident. Sir, I submit that it is impossible to prohibit the use of alcohol and tobacco, and I do not advocate it, but when it comes to a suggestion, as has been made in Washington, D.C., for example, that the use of dagga could be permitted under controlled circumstances, I say that it will be impossible to ban dagga once it becomes accepted as a social practice, and I say that we have a tremendous amount at stake in South Africa in this particular respect. We have the ideal habitat; we have a multi-racial society, in which all groups are involved; we have an increasing and alarming use of dagga amongst the younger set, and often dagga is the starting point to hard drugs. It is not a soft drug, Sir, but it is a slow drug leading to worse addiction. I believe that more efforts must be directed towards assisting the afflicted rather than punishing them, and I want to appeal to the hon. the Minister to place the emphasis on assistance and on rehabilitation, particularly of those people who are users and not traffickers in dagga. [Time expired.]

Sir, I wholeheartedly want to endorse the plea made by the hon. member who has just spoken in connection with drugs and, in particular, dagga. We all realize that this is a serious threat to us, and I believe it is one of the matters to which a great deal of attention will have to be given in future. But I shall leave it at that, because I am sure the hon. the Minister will respond to the hon. member’s speech.

Sir, in speaking about this Vote, and particularly about pensions, I think it is one of the matters about which we ought to have unanimity and in connection with which we ought to have the support of the other side of the House, because in recent years tremendous progress has been made, particularly in respect of the means tests, which has been relaxed considerably, which has contributed, of course, to the number of pensioners virtually having doubled in recent years. Every year concessions are made to make the lot of these people easier. Certain Opposition members— and here I am thinking, in particular, of the hon. member for Turffontein who is present here—made certain proposals which would, in their opinion, ease the position of the aged, and in that connection the hon. member for Turffontein made certain statements. I do not hold it against him in the least, but I just feel that we must not make statements that are not based on facts. Here I want to refer, in particular, to three matters which have been emphasized here very strongly by hon. members of the Opposition during this debate and on previous occasions. The first is that this Government has neglected its duty in respect of housing for the aged. The second is that if a civil pensioner has to go and work and earn an additional income, or possesses an asset, he forfeits his pension. Thirdly, that pension increases do not nearly keep pace with the increase in living costs. I just want to deal with these three allegations briefly to ascertain whether they are, in fact, correct.

Now, let us look at the first one, i.e. that the Government has neglected its duty in respect of housing for the aged. Statistics are the best standard we can apply. We know that in 1948 there were only 23 homes for the aged; today there are 208—an increase of 800%. These are all fringe benefits for the aged. But let us cross to the second matter and look at social pensioners who earn an additional income or possess assets and then lose their pensions. Married persons can earn R984 and, in addition, possess assets of R9 800 without their pensions being affected in any respect. I think the progress we have made in recent years has contributed tremendously towards improving the position of our people. Then I come to the third statement, i.e. that pension increases do not keep pace with the increase in living costs. The hon. member said (translation)—

What are the facts? I took the trouble to obtain the statistics so that we may see what the position is. The hon. member for Constantia also said there should not be an ad hoc ruling year after year; there should be automatic adjustments every year according to the increase in living costs. I want to state that our aged and our pensioners would have been much worse off if we had listened to that and simply made adjustments. I want to mention the figures from 1964. Adjustments have been made every year since 1964, without exception. Every year pension increases have been granted. In connection with the increase in living costs, I have obtained the figures from the Department of Statistics. In 1964 it was 4,1 and in 1972 it was 7,3. But for the nine years from 1964 to 1972 the increase in the cost of living was 38,2%. If we take this increase, we see that the direct increase in pensions in the past nine years was 60,7% as against 38,2%. If we take the figures from 1948, we see that the increase in the cost of living was 241 % as against 450% in the pensions.

What about the value of money?

Yes, but the living costs are adapted to the value of money and this consequently has no effect at all. I should have liked to elaborate on that further, but unfortunately I have given up some of my time and there is another matter that I also still want to put forward. It is not only in respect of the care of the aged that a great deal is being done; never before has so much been done for child care. There are no less than 160 children’s homes where 10 000 children are being cared for. But I want to speak, in particular, about a certain group, and those are the retarded persons above the age of 18 years. Here we have in mind physically and mentally retarded people, particularly mongols and imbeciles. I have in mind here, in particular, the Lettie Fouché Centre in my constituency. In recent years a tremendous amount has been done for these unfortunate children by way of donations from the public and otherwise, and today there is a fine institution where hundreds of these unfortunate boys and girls are cared for, trained and placed in certain jobs. My representation to the hon. the Deputy Minister is the following: When these boys or girls reach the age of 18, they must leave that institution. They receive an allowance, and sometimes that allowance falls into the wrong hands, and so a large percentage of these boys and girls revert to their old ways again that one is actually worried about the fact. I therefore want to advocate a home and a sheltered industry at the Lettie Fouché institution so that those boys and girls, who have been looked after and nurtured in the institution throughout the years, can remain in such a home and be placed in sheltered work. This would be a tremendous asset. It is no use looking after those boys and girls and then pushing them out as soon as they have reached the age of 18. They can never be taken up by society as normal people, and therefore I seriously want to advocate our establishing such a home with a sheltered industry so that these boys and girls could receive further protection.

Mr. Chairman, I want to raise one or two matters arising out of a question which I put to the hon. the Minister during this session. First of all, however, I want to say that I think that the amount which we spend on social welfare is very, very little considering our total national Budget. We spend over R400 million on defence but less than half that amount on social welfare. Such a position is to my mind not particularly praiseworthy even in a country like this which prides itself on not being a welfare country. As I have pointed out before, in most countries, be they socialistic or capitalistic, it is accepted that the State has very decided responsibilities. I believe that we are not spending sufficient on welfare services in South Africa generally. I know that the hon. the Minister is of course only concerned with social welfare for Whites and although my remarks are clearly intended to cover the field of all races, I have to confine myself to the Whites only when I discuss this Vote.

Earlier this year I asked the hon. the Minister what action was taken as the result of some very alarming reports which appeared in the newspapers about the conditions in certain places of safety and children’s homes on the Witwatersrand. The hon. the Minister in his reply told me that some of the Press reports were false and misleading and that in other cases they could not be identified. He went further and said that in those cases where irregularities did appear suitable steps had been taken against the persons concerned long before the matters were raised in the Press reports. He then went on to say (Hansard, Questions, col. 70)—

Apparently that report had already been prepared and was ready before the Press reports. I do not know why it is always necessary to justify this. It is very good when the Press reveals certain facts to the public and to Ministers who can then take action. I do not think that they should be bothered about the fact that they always have to justify that the department was one jump ahead of the Press. Anyway, let us take it that they were one jump ahead of the Press. Therefore they had more time than simply from the middle of February of this year which roughly is when I put my question. I hope that the hon. the Deputy Minister could perhaps give us a little more information about what is happening to the children in these children’s homes and what steps have been taken to correct the irregularities.

I notice from the report of the department that there is a child-care subdivision which was created in November, 1971. I would like to know too, what progress this child-care subdivision has made in the period since it was established. There was a long report in the newspaper by the director of the National Council of Child Welfare, Mrs. Dowling, concerning the places of safety for children and the children’s homes to which I referred earlier. According to Mrs. Dowling, the National Council for Child Welfare is really starved of funds. It gets very little by way of subsidization. I think that the total amount allowed for in the Estimates for subsidized child welfare societies is R2½ million. Presumably there are other welfare organizations concerned with child welfare, but Mrs. Dowling states that her organization is short of at least R1 million. It is because of the shortage of money that they are very short-staffed, that their staff is not properly trained and those they have are not properly paid. She says her organization could do with at least three times the number of trained social workers that it employs at the moment. I believe that this welfare society takes a large burden off the shoulders of the State. It is true that it deals with children of all races, i.e. also children who do not concern this particular Minister—he is only concerned with White children—but I believe that some consideration ought to be given to giving greater assistance to this welfare organization so that it can do something about the really appalling conditions that one reads about which exist in the various homes. These conditions do not only exist in the homes under this organization’s care, but Mrs. Dowling admits that these centres cannot be properly administered or properly supervised for the very simple reason that they do not have the necessary trained expert workers.

I want to go from the young to the very old. I know that pleas have been made in this House before for war veterans of the 1914 War to be exempted from the means test. In his reply to me earlier this year, the hon. the Minister pointed out that he could see no reason why these old-age pensioners should be singled out from amongst other old-age pensioners. He said that if one did do that, it would mean an additional expenditure of about R100 million. I do think that there is a difference. These men have served their country and there has always been a difference between war pensioners and other pensioners.

There used to be a separate means test.

Yes, there used to be a separate means test as well, as the hon. member for Umbilo has rightly pointed out. Very few of these people are alive right now—in fact at the moment it is costing the State about R½ million, paid out to about 1 100 people. Admittedly, if the means test were abolished there would be more such people, but these people would be 80 and over now and I do not think that their lifespan will be very much longer. Therefore it would be a very nice gesture if the Government could exclude this small number of people from the means test. I have had a number of letters from people wherein they express the opinion very strongly that they are in fact special cases. I know everybody who wants State assistance considers himself to be a special case, but in this instance I feel I would like to support the plea.

I have received a number of letters, more particularly during the last year, since the last session of Parliament, from Magaliesoord. Magaliesoord is the rehabilitation centre for alcoholics.

And for drug addicts.

The hon. the Minister says that it is now for drug addicts as well. I have not heard from the drug addicts as yet. The letters I have received are all from alcoholics at this centre. Every letter tells the same story; it is a long complaint about the fact that no treatment is given. I am in no position to know whether these reports are exaggerated or not, but the week-end leave during which they can visit their families, which they were promised when they voluntarily commited themselves—these people are presumably volunteers—has not been forthcoming. They consider this rehabilitation centre as a work colony and someone, I might say, even used harsher terms, which I will not repeat in this House. The least damning term which has been used in these letters is that this place is a work colony where the men are sent out to do hard physical work presumably in the gardens of the organization, but little treatment is given, and, as I say, the privileges which they have been led to understand they were going to be given when they agreed to go into this rehabilitation centre, have not in fact been granted.

I have quite a lot to say on the question of drugs and dagga, as the hon. the Minister will probably realize. I see on the Order Paper that there is quite a far-reaching law coming up; so I think I shall save my comments for that particular occasion. I just wanted to state again, as I have stated before, that I personally believe that rehabilitation centres, be they for alcoholics or for drug addicts, should in fact fall under the Department of Health. I really feel that these people need the attention of experts, doctors, who are trained to deal with addictions of different kind. I know the hon. the Minister is particularly interested in this subject, but I really do wonder whether in fact we are doing the right thing in leaving the treatment for addictions of any kind, be they drug addictions or addictions to alcohol, which I believe to be by far the greater problem in South Africa, with the Department of Social Welfare and Pensions rather than the Department of Health.

Mr. Chairman, I do not want to follow up on what the hon. member for Houghton has said. She so lovingly lodged her plea and put her case to the Minister, that she reminded me of a lioness who had donned a sheepskin. Before I express a few ideas, I do first just want to express my thanks and appreciation to the Department of Social Welfare and Pensions, and particularly to the officials who so unselfishly help us with the work. I am not only thinking of the office in Pretoria, but also, and in particular, of the one in Port Elizabeth. When one makes representations to them, no sacrifice is too great in order to meet our aged half way.

Mr. Chairman, you must not blame me now, but this afternoon I want to confine myself to some things which the hon. member for Turffontein said. The hon. member for Turffontein is still young; I do not know whether he is familiar with the days of 1948; in fact, I think that at the time he was still running around in his birthday suit in his mother’s garden. If he had known the history of the United Party, and if he had known how the old people were treated by his party in 1948, he would not have been a United Party man today. I wonder whether he is aware of the fact that it is specifically these old people for whom he is now lodging a plea, who were 40, 45 and 50 years old in those days, who sacrificed their energies to deal the United Party a death blow because those people saw how the United Party treated the aged at the time.

They are now all beginning to vote United Party.

The old people feel hurt because you now want to use them to gain political advantage for yourself from their standard of living here in South Africa. I should just like to point out to the hon. member how the aged lived at the time. Do you know where one found the aged in the days when the United Party ruled? The aged of today still remember how one found the aged of those days in backyard rooms in mixed residential areas.

Where are they now?

I shall tell you where they are now. I shall come to that at a later stage. One found them at the time in old neglected garages; one found them in broken caravans; that is where one found our aged.

Today as well.

Many of our aged sought refuge in the backyards of non-Whites. In United Party days many of our people died long before their time of misery and poverty. The hon. member probably does not know about that, eh? Many of those aged did not even get a proper burial. Those are the conditions which prevailed when the United Party men were ruling. Now the hon. member comes along and laughs! Do you know why you are laughing? Because you are a United Party man. You became a United Party man at your christening. When your father went to have you christened, you wore a red flash and when the minister did not want to christen you, you became a United Party man. Now we not only have a testamentary U.P. man in the House, but also a baptismal one.

Order! The hon. member must address the Chair.

That is what we have in South Africa—not only a baptismal one, but also, in truth, a stupid one. The hon. member comes along and strikes an attitude here. He says that our aged must now live on R41. He surely knows for a fact that that is an untruth. He has been pumped to such an extent by the Sunday Times that he really cannot speak the truth any more.

Order! The hon. member must withdraw the words “he knows that that is an untruth”.

I am sorry, Sir, he did not know it. I withdraw it. He was pumped by the Sunday Times. He surely knows the people do not live solely on R41 or R45 per month. We surely have a means test. A man can have R22 400 and still get his full pension of R41, and from October R45. Some old people have R3 000, R4 000, R5 000 or R7 000 in the bank and they can, in addition to that, still earn R1 008 per year extra. Now the hon. member speaks of only R41, and he surely knows that is not true.

Order! The hon. member must withdraw the allegation that the hon. member knows it is untrue.

I am forgetting, Mr. Chairman; I withdraw it. The hon. member poses here as the great champion of the aged, but I want to ask him whether he knows what the means test was in 1948 when the National Party took over the Government. It was R5 per month, and then a person could obtain a pension of R10 per month. At that time he was only allowed a house of R300, a wheelbarrow and two used blankets. As soon as he owned more, he could no longer obtain his pension. It was not only the hon. member for Turffontein who came along with this; the hon. member for Rosettenville also said the other day that old people have to pay R25 per month to live in a house. That is surely untrue. It is a half-truth. Everywhere in the cities we have sub-economic houses which are made available for our aged.

Order! The hon. member may say that another hon. member is not speaking the whole truth, but it is unparliamentary to say that he is guilty of a half-truth.

Well, then the hon. member was not speaking the whole truth.

Order! The hon. member must first withdraw it.

I withdraw it, Sir. In Port Elizabeth and elsewhere we have economic housing available for the aged. In Port Elizabeth there are Adolf Schauder sub-economic homes. Then there are also the Monty van der Vyver homes, the Adcock homes, the Red Cross homes and Fairhaven, and Holland Park where sub-economic houses are rented out. Here the aged pay R3 for a single room unit and between R7 and R12 for a double room per month. Now the hon. member says here that it costs R25 for an old person to get a house. That is surely not the case. The hon. member surely knows that provision has been made for old people as far as housing is concerned. Over and above the 208 old age homes where the State today accommodates our aged, in 1968-’69 R1 800 091 was allocated for housing schemes for the aged at ¾% interest; in 1970, R3 222 000; in 1970-’71, R3 241 000; in 1971-’72 R5 133 000. In other words, it is not only the R41 which the aged receive. After all, they also obtain accommodation which is supplied to them at an interest rate of ¾%. Why do hon. members not mention these additional matters? Why do they keep silent about these things? Why do they not put the matter in its true perspective? In those 208 old age homes no fewer than 11 000 sub-economic cases are taken care of, while 4 273 debilitated aged are also cared for there. I challenge hon. members opposite to show me one single institution in the days of the United Party where debilitated aged were cared for. They were thrown to the wolves. One had to go and pick them up in the back streets. That is where one found them. This Government cares for our debilitated aged. Today we have no fewer than eight homes where debilitated aged are cared for. And do not think that this does not cost the State money. The hon. member says we are giving the aged R41. We are not giving them R41. After all, those old age homes are subsidized. Ordinary cases are subsidized by R3-50 per capita. The debilitated receive R10 extra. Certain debilitated aged receive a subsidy of R38 at those institutions. The chronic cases receive R53 per month. All this is being done for our debilitated aged. Does the hon. member not know about that? A furniture subsidy of 75% for the old age homes was paid in 1968. This amounts to R90 per capita. In 1972 it was increased to R200 per capita. But then that hon. member persists with R41 per month. Here we are performing a service of love as far as our aged are concerned. Not only are we performing a service of love as far as our aged are concerned, but all our aged are happy. Come to my constituency and see what it looks like on polling day. They do not allow a United Party man near their homes.

They all vote United Party.

No, they do not vote United Party. You are quite wrong. You do not look further than the tip of your nose. This Department of Social Welfare does not confine itself to our aged either. It also looks after those people who are medically unfit. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I am sure the hon. member for Port Elizabeth North could have spent his time more profitably elsewhere instead of making a speech, half of which he had to withdraw. The other half he could simply have left unsaid. All he did was to attack the hon. member for Turffontein because he had lodged a plea for our pensioners.

Hon. members are so fond of comparing the position in 1948 with the present position. We could just as well speak of 1933 and 1938 under another Government. Let me now just ask what the pension was in 1938? What was it in 1933? How many walked along the streets and looked for work? That does not get us very far, however. The only thing that can get us any further is to decide whether we have budgeted sufficiently to help the aged and the pensioners and, in fact, if we should make greater provision. I am not speaking now about these people who, in terms of the means test, can have an income of R24 000 untaxed and still get R41. We must ask ourselves whether the pensioner can live on R41. There is no one on that side of the House, and no one on this side of the House, who can say with a clear conscience that if the pensioner’s only income is R41, he is not living below the breadline. But he cannot come out on that. Why are we still arguing about this? It is not necessary to argue about it. If the State and the taxpayers can only afford R209 million for social welfare and pensions, then it is as much as we can afford. However, it does not prevent us from advocating that this should be more. However, we can do so without making comparisons with the past. We boast of the fact that the Whites of this country maintain a very high standard of living. Both sides of the House boast of the fact. We have a very high standard of living. For that reason I am saying, without fear of contradiction, that R41 per month for a pensioner is not high, but low.

I do not want to devote my time to pensioners. I have done so in previous years. I much rather want to come back to young people. I want to add my voice to that of the hon. member for Kimberley South, who yesterday furnished a plea in connection with kindergartens. I want to begin by saying that as far as the Children’s Act schools are concerned, they are doing great and meritorious work. But there is a problem involved. When a child leaves such a school, there is little, if any, supervision over him by the Department of Social Welfare. How the position is to be improved—for example by making use of more voluntary welfare officers—I cannot suggest at this stage, but a method will have to be found according to which the Department of Social Welfare can give better supervision to our children who were in a Children’s Act school and then leave that school. I am making a special appeal in this connection, because if a child leaves such a school and becomes a criminal, or even a potential criminal, the next step, as far as he is concerned, is the reformatory. The reformatories as such fall under the Department of National Education, and you will not permit me to say much about them, Sir, but the clients—I almost want to call them “patients”—who go there and who are referred to those schools, come from social welfare. These reformatories are doing meritorious work. They do their work under supervision and through the intersection of good psychiatrists and a good teaching staff, but the end product of their functions involves the fact, in the first place, that 25% of those young people cannot be rehabilitated. As a result of the mental states of these young people, which have developed in the period after they have left the Children’s Act schools, many of them can no longer be rehabilitated. Even after three years in a reformatory, such a person can still not be rehabilitated. I have referred to that 25% who cannot be rehabilitated, but in addition there are about 40% or 50% of them who do rehabilitate, and the remaining 25% become criminals, even after they have been in such a reformatory from about 16 to 20 years of age, or from 18 to 21 years of age. There are even some of them who are kept there up to the age of 23 years, at the recommendation of the principal, in an effort to rehabilitate them. Prison is the answer as far as such a criminal is concerned. Then he becomes a habitual criminal. The young people of the White nation are the ones who are exposed to that. I want to make a special plea in this connection. My view is that we must still go back further as far as taking action is concerned. When a child leaves such a Children’s Act school, he must be under supervision so that he does not become a potential candidate for a reformatory, because once he has gone through the reformatory, the hon. the Deputy Minister knows as well as I do what happens to him. If he is not rehabilitated, there is no solution for him. Then Social Welfare cannot do anything for him either, because he has become a criminal. Subsequently he then goes to prison. Then he becomes an habitual criminal, and as far as I am concerned it is a tragedy that we, as a people, allow him to become a reformatory client as a result of insufficient supervision over the child who leaves the Children’s Act school.

In the few minutes I still have at my disposal, I want to come back to a point that was broached by a previous speaker. It relates to the rehabilitation centres, or must I call them “clinics”. The hon. member for Houghton referred to them a while ago when she spoke of Magaliesoord. I want to refer to the institutions we have for the rehabilitation of alcoholics and drug addicts. I think it is an unhealthy state of affairs to have the same institution for the rehabilitation of alcoholics and drug addicts.

That is not so.

It is the case at Weskoppies and Bloemfontein.

I shall reply to that.

That is what happens, in any case. A person who is addicted to alcohol does not need to be addicted to drugs to land up at Weskoppies, and if a person who is addicted either to alcohol or to drugs, needs rehabilitation, he sometimes lands up at Magaliesoord. I do not agree with the hon. member for Houghton in that connection. I think that the work which these addicts do at Magaliesoord, is very essential for the rehabilitation of a person who goes there voluntarily or is committed to the institution with a view to rehabilitation. Some of them work in the library or perform other duties, and the men work in the gardens or in other spheres of activity. I have been there on more than one occasion to investigate the position. I think it is a healthy state of affairs for an addict to keep himself busy and I do not want to speak about that now, but I want to speak about the influence which the alcoholic has on the drug addict, and vice versa. Sir, alcohol and other drugs are all drugs, after all, to a greater or lesser extent, and if an alcoholic comes into contact with a drug addict, it does not take long before he also becomes a drug addict. We find in many cases that alcoholics, who are sent to one of these rehabilitation centres, come out being addicted to both alcohol and drugs. The reverse also applies. I should like to know from the hon. the Minister whether he does not think that we should have separate institutions for alcoholics and drug addicts.

I do not want to make very much of a response to what was said here by the hon. member who has just sat down. I agree with many of the things he said here. I think I should rather leave it to the Minister to reply to the pleas he made here. With respect to the hon. member’s question about whether sufficient money is being made available in the Estimates for pensions, I can also just refer him to what the hon. the Minister has already said frequently, i.e. that we can never do enough for our aged. If it is so that we cannot do enough for them, it would perhaps be fitting to make public appeals so that the taxpayer would be prepared, in due course, to pay higher taxes so that more money could become available for our pensioners. In the second place we ought to appeal today to the children of needy parents. As you know, Sir, it is a basic principle of Roman-Dutch Law that a parent, or at least a father, must support his wife and his children, but there is also a reciprocal obligation for the child to support his needy parent. A claim can even be instituted against the estate of such children if a needy parent finds himself in poor circumstances. Instead of appealing here in Parliament to the Government to pay higher pensions, we would do well to appeal also to rich children to search their own hearts in order to look after their parents better, instead of leaving the parents to the mercy of a pension, which is only intended as a supplementary income, or to leave them to the mercy of old-age homes.

Sir, I want to come to another aspect which is also dear to our hearts. In our country we have had probationary services since 1910. The hon. member for Umbilo has already spoken about this matter, and I should like to link up with him, and then I also want to make a friendly request to the hon. the Deputy Minister. Through the intercession of the then Secretary for Justice, the S.A. Prisoners’ Aid Association was established in 1910, and in 1913 there was already a voluntary welfare organization. Early on these two bodies were already appointing probation officers to help in our courts. Thus the Prisoners’ Aid Association had probation officers in Cape Town and Johannesburg, and the Department of Justice had a probation officer in Pretoria.

In 1915 the voluntary welfare organization, which was established in 1913, allowed probation officers to transfer to the Department of Justice, and since then it is only the State which has appointed probation officers. In 1932 a probation officers’ association was established and in 1933 the name was changed to the S.A. Probation Association. It was a national organization, and its objects were to act efficiently and uniformly and to help with the rehabilitation of first offenders. In 1935 this S.A. Prisoners’ Association and the S.A. Probation Association amalgamated to form the S.A. Social Services Association. In those days I was attached to the children’s courts in Johannesburg and on the Witwatersrand, and I know what first-rate services those probation officers furnished at that time, particularly in the children’s courts and juvenile courts.

Since 1970 this association has been known as the National Institute for the Prevention of Crime and the Rehabilitation of offenders. Throughout the years the Department of Social Welfare has, of course, greatly extended its services. It developed a broad network of field services and its welfare service is unsurpassably good. With the appointment of the Lansdown Commission in 1948, certain criticism was levelled at the department, and from then on probationary services declined slightly or became minimal or too unobtrusive. But in 1971 this small flame again flared up when a judge, in the case of the State V. Adams (1971. S.A. 127) quoted certain passages from the work of the National Council of Crime and Delinquency, the work “Guide for Juvenile Court Judges”. Other judges also spoke about that matter, and it was emphasized, in particular, that as far as juvenile crime and the duties of probation officers are concerned, this ought to be necessary in such a case. There were other judges who also spoke about that, and it became increasingly clear that the court wanted this.

The Supreme Court started it, and other courts were also very keen to make use of probationary services. Section 58 of the Children’s Act makes special provision for the probation officer to be an official of the children’s court as well as of the magistrate’s court, and the Criminal Procedure Act also lends force to this statement by providing that if the court places someone under the supervision or control of a probation officer, he must subject himself to that supervision. Other judges, such as Judge Hiemstra and Judge-President Broome and others, also spoke about this, articles appeared in journals and it became increasingly clear that there was a great demand for probationary services. It is therefore my humble plea and request to the hon. the Minister that although judges and magistrates are alone on the Bench when they have to pass sentence, and because they would like guidance, the probation officer should return to all our criminal courts to take his rightful place, institute investigations and, together with the social work he must do, help the courts in connection with the passing of sentences and also with preventive work. The courts could only benefit by that. An informed court is indeed a court that can best handle the scales of law and justice. I therefore just want to make a friendly request that investigations be instituted to see whether these probationary services cannot come into their own completely at our criminal courts instead of playing an unobtrusive and minimal role, as is the case today.

Mr. Chairman, as the Deputy Minister is handling this debate, I shall take just one turn to speak in order to reply to the questions raised in regard to rehabilitation centres and especially the problem of drugs. The hon. member for Berea worked out in percentages the subsidy which is being paid at the moment; and he worked out certain other amounts as well. Then he went on to draw very impressive comparisons in this regard. My problem with the hon. member’s whole argument is that from the nature of the case he could only take those statistics available to him in the Estimates. Therefore it was not possible for the hon. member to take into account all the indirect forms of subsidy used by us for promoting this matter. I am thinking, for instance, of the subsidies on private rehabilitation centres which are being paid by the provinces from amounts made available to the provinces by Parliament and which have therefore not been earmarked as such in the Estimates. The hon. member was therefore not in a position to take those subsidies into account. I am also thinking, for instance, of the number of persons who are not necessarily being carried as staff at these centres but who are nevertheless, administratively and otherwise, working towards this end but whose salaries are not specifically reflected under this Vote. These things consequently cause his picture to be slightly askew and incomplete. However, I do not take this amiss of the hon. member, for he was not in a position to obtain the figures in another way. He had to take what he could find available in the Estimates.

The hon. member suggested that it was only a very small percentage of the excise duty on liquor that was actually being spent on rehabilitation centres. I want to say at once that consideration was given to the idea of a specific percentage of the excise revenue on liquor having to be earmarked specifically for rehabilitation centres for alcoholics. The advantage implied by something of that nature is of course that one can say that an alcoholic should pay partly for his own rehabilitation. However, there are two objections to this idea. In the first instance, the Treasury say that they are not keen on earmarking specific duties for a specific matter. They say something of that nature does not amount to sound financing. In our whole system of financing there is only one example of something of that nature having been used, and that is that a certain amount of the duty on petrol is being spent on national roads. However, no other example of this is to be found in our whole system.

May I ask the hon. the Minister a question? Will the hon. the Minister concede that that is the basis on which Bantu education is financed, through purchase tax on a very, very nebulous formula?

But it is quite a different matter if it is done in that manner.

But it is another example.

Very well, it is another example, but I want to argue in all sincerity that that is an entirely different matter. Of course, there is also the second problem. A drink addict is only too keen to look for a reason for buying a drink. He looks for such a reason in order to salve his conscience. If one were to make use of the excise revenue on liquor for the purpose of financing rehabilitation centres, one would immediately be providing such a drink addict with a reason, for then he would say: Listen, I drink and by doing so I am paying for the rehabilitation of another old friend in the institution. Surely this is a good excuse, and we know that they are looking for a reason for buying liquor. I do not want to provide them with a reason, and I am convinced that they will in fact use something of that nature as a reason. That is only human.

I want to say that if the funds spent as a result of subsidies were added and the amount involved were to be reflected on our Estimates, the total amount would immediately rise by more than R1 million per year. I want to say at once that I am heart and soul in favour of the emphasis having to fall on rehabilitation. We must make rehabilitation the main theme of the whole matter. However, because rehabilitation is not sensational but severe penalties are in fact sensational, we are getting publicity for the penalties but are never getting any for the rehabilitation. I have no control over that. Our publicity media are in essence orientated to sensation, and I could furnish all the splendid statistics relating to rehabilitation centres and also furnish information on what is being done, but these would never attract attention. However, if I were to say what penalties were being imposed, it would immediately be sensational and would have made the headlines. It is unfortunate that this is the position. I want to repeat that as far as I am concerned, the emphasis falls on rehabilitation in every respect.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask the hon. the Minister a question.

At this stage I would not like to permit many questions, for the hon. the Minister has only ten minutes at his disposal and very little of that is left at the moment.

Can the hon. the Minister tell us what the degree of success has been with the rehabilitation that has been undertaken?

I have these data with me and shall deal with them in a moment.

Then there is another question which I want to touch upon briefly. The hon. member for Houghton spoke about the rehabilitation centre at Magaliesoord. I want to tell her at once that I, too, receive letters from Magaliesoord. To tell the truth, I receive a large number of letters from Magaliesoord. In dealing with these people, and in conducting negotiations with them, one learns—I have often gone there to have interviews with these people—that there is always another side to the matter as well. It is logical, and the hon. member is mature enough to know this, that these people will present the matter in the best light as seen from their point of view; for that reason I have learnt to treat these reports and requests from them sympathetically, but to realize at the same time that there is also another side to the story and that their side of the matter is only one half of the picture. However, I want to tell hon. members at once that I am very proud of the work being done at Magaliesoord. I have gone there on a number of occasions to see what is being done and to carry out inspections personally. I am convinced that outstanding work is being done there and that the idea of a work colony does not exist there at all; on the contrary, what is being applied there is sound occupational therapy. For instance, we have there a woodwork centre and a large number of other places where it is possible for them to realize themselves fully. They can do woodwork and they can even acquire new trades if they so wish. On the farming section at this centre one finds that some of these people are working with animals, with the sheep and the cattle, and cultivating the land. This is not slave labour; these people are given the opportunity of adjusting themselves fully in the open and of recovering fully from the problem they are experiencing.

Do they have some choice of work?

Yes, they do have a choice. They are not forced to do a certain kind of work only, but the fact remains that this is a form of rehabilitation which we could rather look upon as occupational therapy. As I have already said, there are always two sides to the story.

The hon. member also said she believed that the rehabilitation centres should fall under the Department of Health. I just want to tell her that it is being accepted internationally that the health aspects merely constitute one facet of rehabilitation. It is concerned with the detoxification of these people’s bodily constitutions. This detoxification is being done by medical men at present, and in that regard we have the closest co-operation with the Department of Health. Detoxification is done under the guidance of experts, such as medical doctors, but once this period is past, i.e. after a period of 14 days or three weeks, the period of actual rehabilitation starts, the readjustment and the actual reorientation to life as such. This requires knowledge of a social nature and not knowledge of a medical nature. For that reason we have to keep in our employ these people who are not performing medical services. Then, in addition, we also have the psychiatric services which, from the nature of the case, are of further assistance in this regard. Looking at the matter as a whole, I feel that we should continue in this manner and that the department should remain responsible in this regard.

The hon. member for East London City asked me whether rehabilitation was being done simultaneously when drug addicts and drink addicts were being rehabilitated in the same place. This is not the case in practice. There is no rehabilitation centre at Weskoppies. Weskoppies is a place for mentally disturbed persons, and those who land there may come from all categories. At rehabilitation centres, such as Magaliesoord, we do have drink addicts as well as drug addicts, but they are completely separated from each other. They are placed in two completely separate units and never come into contact with each other. However, they fall under the same management, but there is also a fundamental difference in the rehabilitation methods applied in respect of the two groups.

Half of them come from Weskoppies.

No. There is a fundamental difference between the methods used; one cannot use in respect of drug addicts the same methods used in the rehabilitation of drink addicts. That does not work at all. For that reason we have placed together the rehabilitation of these two categories administratively, but they are separated from each other and never come into contact with each other. What is more, the drug addicts are usually younger people, whereas the drink addicts are older people. For that reason, too, we cannot allow those people to be together. That is why the matter is being dealt with in that manner.

Then I want to say that I am satisfied that the Drugs Act as such has already served its purpose to a certain extent. The Drugs Act, which came into effect on 6th December, 1971, has in fact produced results. The prosecutions for drug offences have shown a decrease of 10,5% during the past year, from 41 000 to 38 000 cases. This phenomenon is being attributed by everybody concerned with the matter to the stricter Act and its application. The quantity of dagga seized during the past year has decreased by approximately 50%. This quantity has decreased from 4 218 000 to 2 177 000 kg. Here I want to add that I am satisfied that we are achieving our object, and that we are going ahead on this course. When we have passed this legislation which appears at present on the Order Paper of this House, and which seeks to eliminate certain loopholes and to remedy certain other problems which we are experiencing in practice, I shall be satisfied that South Africa has acted in good time and is on the right course as far as the rehabilitation of drug addicts is concerned, and that it has taken a firm grip on the abuse of drugs as such. There is one more figure I want to furnish. This figure relates to our “crisis clinic”, and I should like to give some publicity to it. I announced that we would open a crisis clinic in Johannesburg as an experiment, and that we would, if this proved to be a success, do this at other places as well. I want to say at once that this is definitely a success in Johannesburg and that we shall definitely consider opening such clinics at other centres as well.

In Durban and Cape Town?

Most probably. Over a period of three months the crisis clinic in Johannesburg had interviews with 215 persons. Of these persons, 72 had problems in connection with alcohol, 39 in connection with drugs, 43 in connection with psychic handicaps, seven in connection with physical handicaps, and so I could go down the list. It is interesting to note that people come forward on a voluntary basis in order to discuss their problems. It is very interesting to note what the home language of these persons is: Out of 143, 48 were Afrikaans speaking and 95 were English speaking; 79% of these cases were under the age of 29—youngish people, therefore. I have one letter here from which I just want to read out a paragraph in which we are being thanked in this regard—

He went on to say—

I could quote more from this letter.

Mr. Chairman, I want to conclude—I know that my ten minutes has been particularly long; thank you very much for it. I just want to conclude by saying that our rehabilitation is succeeding to the extent— and we are only in the initial stages of it; as vet I cannot boast of any other results —that it has now been proved to us that it is unfortunately not possible for a drug addict to be rehabilitated in three or six months’ time. It takes a period of nine months or a year and sometimes longer to rehabilitate such a person. Therefore, in spite of the fact that I have received marvellous letters saying, “I have now been rehabilitated completely; please let me go,” we have ascertained from the experience of the past that such a person should rather remain there until the full programme has been completed and he has been rehabilitated in full. I do not have available the exact percentage of cases that have been rehabilitated, but generally speaking we are satisfied that we are making good progress, that we are gaining more and more experience and that, as we progress along this course, we shall eventually find the final solution to this matter.

Mr. Chairman, in the first place I want to convey my gratitude to everyone who made a contribution to this debate. I also want to thank the hon. the Minister for having discussed the drugs aspect here. This has relieved me of a great deal of effort and trouble and I therefore appreciate the fact that he discussed that part of the department’s activities.

Why don’t you criticize him for what he said?

Just wait until I come to that hon. member. Then he will hear what criticism is.

Naturally this department is not one in regard to which there are any differences in policy among the three parties represented in this House. All one really finds are differences in approach. Sometimes the United Party wants us to give ten times as much money as we are giving for social welfare, which is of course impossible. If they ever succeed in sitting on this side of the House, which in my humble opinion is something which will never happen, we in our turn would want them to spend ten times as much on social welfare as they would then be able to spend. I want to say that since I have been active in this department I have to the best of my ability tried to see as much and tø learn as much as I could. I have visited many places, and all I can say is that I was very deeply impressed by the work which is being done by this department. I want to convey to the officials working in this department my great appreciation for the work which is being done. Naturally officials are people who have to produce certain work, but in this department I have found that the officials are inspired for the work they have to do. It is an idealistic department. I want to give you an example. One night I addressed a meeting of one of the councils of the department at Bethal. To my great surprise I then found that officials from Germiston who had to work in that region had driven there to attend the meeting in order to make a contribution as well, even though the meeting was held in the evening. When officials do that, one cannot but feel that the inspiration which these people evince is above all the reason why this department is accomplishing such a great deal. If one realizes that the department has to administer all the pensions, civil as well as social, and that what is also involved here is the care of the aged, the crippled, the blind, mentally handicapped people, drug addicts, alcoholics and disrupted children, and that professional services have to be rendered, I can only say that the officials in this department are rendering a service which is absolutely uncalculable in our social life. This department is trying, with the means at its disposal, to help everyone who is suffering from physical or mental disruption to be happy and whole people in our society. Statistics indicate that there are far fewer men than there are women doing this work. When one glances at page 9 of the department’s report, one finds that of the percentage registered social workers 11,5% are men as against 88,5% women. I should like to make an appeal to young men who are willing and who feel the distress of their fellow human beings to take up social work as a field of study and then to join our department, to join this band of inspired idealists who are working for our country in this way. I want to give them the assurance that they will not become rich in this department. However, they will experience the pleasure of receiving a smile of gratitude from a bewildered fellow human being. That smile of gratitude will be sufficient incentive for him to complete his life in this department.

I also wanted to express my gratitude to the large number of organizations which are involved in social work. In our country the State does not, as in socialistic countries, do everything in the social sphere. The State does not do everything; a great deal is also done by the various communities themselves. Every community must feel the distress of its own members, must see what is being done about its aged, its crippled and its blind. That community must then make a community effort to provide for those people in its ranks. Then the State appears on the scene and renders assistance to the various organizations. I want to convey my gratitude to them because it is work which is being done without remuneration. Hon. members would be surprised to know how many women of our country are doing work of this nature. One is quite astonished at the number of hours women are devoting to social work without any remuneration. I think I would be failing in my duty if I did not address a word of thanks to those women.

I want to say that in this department we have a few model institutions. The hon. member for Houghton, strangely enough, mentioned one of them, viz. Magaliesoord. I should very much like the Department of Information to send its cameras there, particularly to that section of Magaliesoord where female alcoholics are being rehabilitated. I think that would be an information film which we would be able to distribute throughout the entire world. Hon. members should just see the state in which those women are brought to that institution and admitted to the hospital there. There they are made well again by medical means. They are then sent from one section to the other. They begin making their own clothes again. I am not talking about uniforms. They are really pretty dresses. They have machines with which to work. There is a woman who takes their measurements and who teaches them how to make clothes. They make their own dresses in various styles; they make them in whichever way they please. From there they move to the various sections in the institution. Let me tell you that there is not a single Bantu servant in the whole place. When I was there, there were 80 women who had gone there to be rehabilitated. There they learnt what the therapy of the soil means. I asked one woman what her work was. She said: “My work is first to become well again, but just look what they have given me here. I have been given a whole piece of ground here, and I can plant whatever flowers I like on it.” In that piece of ground she finds her salvation and her health. She has planted the prettiest beds of flowers there. Her spirit was mending. Another woman had complete control over the hen-coop. It was her greatest pride. There were other women who worked in the kitchen. Hon. members should see that kitchen; it is a wonderful place; it is clean and tidy. They prepare the most delicious food there. I can tell hon. members that this is one of the model places. I honestly think that it compares favourably with any institution of this kind anywhere in the world. I have never found such places elsewhere. I simply do not believe that it can be improved on.

It is true that the hon. member has received letters from Magaliesoord. The hon. the Minister has already replied to her on that score. We also received letters. The hon. member must not forget that a person remains there for 18 months to two years. Such a person can literally be dried out in three days. As soon as he begins to crave for alcohol, he finds fault with the institution. He then says: “Look, there are no Bantu here; I have to do the work of Bantu.” Of course he has to do the work of Bantu. He has to work with his hands in the soil there. It is part of his rehabilitation. Then he begins to crave for a drink, and he first writes me a letter. Usually I send a friendly reply. However, I cannot at this stage tell him that he may leave the institution. He then has recourse to his last hope, and he writes to the hon. member for Houghton. She then takes it further. I do not blame her for doing so. I am not quarrelling with her.

I only reacted to one.

I finished quarrelling with her yesterday. I just want to explain to the hon. member what the position is. We give attention to the letters we receive. We go there to ascertain whether anything is wrong. We institute an investigation on the basis of every letter we receive, but if the investigation indicates that nothing is wrong I cannot pamper that person any longer.

Can I visit the place?

It is not a case of visiting the place. I am going to take people from the embassies to see these institutions. However, there is only one thing I want to ask the hon. member: She must please refrain from consoling these people too much. If she did so, she would not be doing them any favour. She should not arrive there as if she is …

Mother Superior.

Yes, as if she is Mother Superior. She should not tell those people that she will soon have them out of there. The hon. member must not do that. But if the hon. member wants to go there as a visitor in the company of other people, she may go. However, I cannot allow her to go there as a one-man commission of inquiry. The hon. member for Umbilo discussed the aged. He asked me what our policy is in respect of the aged. Frankly, we in this department are greatly concerned about our aged. I have said this before in this debate, and I am saying it again. I would not be so stupid as to think that people can manage on R41 per month. In fact, he cannot with that small amount of money meet his total needs. It is simply impossible. But it is also impossible for this Government, or for any other government which may succeed it, to give 131 589 pensioners such pensions that they will not ask for more. We will not be able to arrange matters in such a way that they will tell us that we have given enough. It is impossible. A pension is therefore a supplementary amount. One is entitled to ask where the rest must come from. That is the reason why there is a means test. We do not want to give rich people a pension. Our means test has been constituted in such a way that it should be an incentive for people to save. I honestly do not think—I do not think that even the hon. member for Umbilo suggested it— that anyone can complain as far as this is concerned, for a person can accumulate assets to the value of R34 400, and then still qualify for the minimum social pension.

What about those who have nothing, those who have used up their capital?

I shall come in a moment to those people who have nothing. I am now discussing the incentive to save money. It is the primary task of every person to try to make provision for his old age, if he possibly can. We have made this possible for him by saying to him: “You can save up to an amount of R34 400 before you lose your total pension benefits.” That, in the first place. We have also said to such a person: “You may have R9 800 in the bank, and we will not take the interest of that into account for pension purposes.” Such a person may invest R9 800, and it is not even taken into account. Beyond that, in respect of any amount above R9 800, we calculate the interest at only 4%. I do think it is common knowledge that, in today’s money market, one can earn far more than 4% on an investment of R9 800. Interest of seven or eight per cent may be earned, but that interest rate is not taken into account by the department for pension purposes. The department calculates such a person’s income on 4%. In other words, he can earn R504 per annum, without this affecting his pension in any way.

But that is not all. There are people who have, as a result of the hardships of life, not found it possible to save. There are not as many of them as the hon. member for Turffontein says there are, for I want to point out that other people also have duties in this connection. I want to thank the hon. member for Innesdal for what he said in this connection. There are the children of these elderly people, these senior citizens, who should also look after them. It is not primarily the duty of the State to look after your father and your mother. It is the duty, in a Christian state such as ours, in a Western democracy such as the one in which we are living, of every child to ask himself: “How are things going with my old father, and my old mother?” Those children should supplement the pensions. We shall pay the pensions we are able to pay, but those children have to accept the responsibility of supplementing those amounts. The family must do this, Sir. We did not want to socialize our State. We did not want to break down the fine things of our State.

There are also people who do not have a family, or whose family is in the position where they cannot help their parents. It is these people—this I readily concede— whom we must try to help. But we cannot simply give that little group an additional pension. We have to help them in another way. I just want to mention the figures to you, Sir, in respect of the small group of people, of whom the hon. member for Turffontein apparently has a small group in his constituency.

I have many of them, yes.

Yes, the hon. member probably has many. I do not take it amiss of him for saying this, but in a previous debate the hon. member made political capital out of it. Yesterday he almost began to make political capital out of it again, but I think he tried his best, and I am not going to take it amiss of the hon. member if he asks for something for the elderly people, for it costs nothing to ask. If we had been able to give it, we would have. But the position has to be stated, and it has to be debated. Since 1968 social pensions have increased by 40,6%. The total expenditure in this connection in 1968 was R44,75 million. This year it is R90,75 million. That is an increase of 102%. In respect of civil pensioners, viz. those towards whom the State had a responsibility, we have supplemented their pensions, which were so small. In 1968-’69 it cost us R12,6 million. In 1971-’72 it cost us R24,2 million. As recently as 1971 bonuses on those pensions increased by 100%. We are helping where we can.

In addition we established old-age homes. During the past five years we have made R6 million available at one-twentieth per cent interest for the establishment of old-age homes. In 1968 this department subsidized 140 old-age homes. This number has now increased to 210, which are providing 13 000 beds for our elderly people. We have eight State old-age homes, with 500 beds. We have purchased a hospital in Dunnottar, which we are now renovating. This will give us an additional 200 beds for the infirm aged. Let me tell you now, Sir, I have visited these places—of course I have not yet visited all of them—and we will never be able to thank the departmental officials, both men and women, enough for what they are doing for our infirm aged. In these hospitals I have seen the infirm aged lying there, unfortunate people who cannot even talk to you, and how everything has to be done for them. If you could see how the nurses care for these elderly people in this department—they are angels; they are performing a labour of love—then one realizes that it is a wonderful service which is being rendered. I just want to refer to the subsidies which are being paid to our old-age homes. We have made subsidies to the amount of R6,5 million available to our old-age homes, and special concession to the amount of R1 million. Loss of interest suffered in respect of the difference between one-twentieth per cent and economic interest rate amounted to R1,5 million. State old-age homes have cost us R1 million, and elderly persons in the settlements R1 million. What is more, the expenditure of the State on subsidies alone in respect of the aged, increased from R1,5 million in 1969-’70 to R5,5 million this year. I do not think it can be said that we are not helping our elderly people.

The hon. members for Turffontein and Umbilo also referred to the service centres. I want to tell you, Sir, that we are quite passionately in favour of those service centres. We would very much like organizations to establish such service centres, where one hot, well-prepared meal can be cooked for these people every day, and where these people can also be helped in other respects. It is our view that there should be service centres at strategically situated places. At central points there should be home-aid services, for example meals on wheels, laundry services, nursing services, etc. There are a number already—there are two in Cape Town—which have been established through the agency of our department. It is also my pleasure now to announce that the Government has decided to be of assistance to welfare organizations in this regard, and to make a financial assistance available on the following bases with effect from 1st April, 1974—

1. (a) A 100% loan at 1% interest, repayable at 1¼% capital redemption over 40 years for the approved establishment costs of a centre;
2. (b) a subsidy of 75% of the rental of approved accommodation up to a maximum of R5 000 per centre per annum;
3. (c) a non-recurring subsidy of 75% of the total purchase price of furniture and equipment up to a maximum of R10 000 per annum, and thereafter a subsidy of 75% for essential repairs to or replacement thereof after the expiration of not less than five years, also up to a maximum of R2 500 per centre;
4. (d) a subsidy of 50% of the approved current expenditure up to a maximum of R10 000 per centre per annum.

The detailed particulars of this scheme can still be worked out, and although I do not want to place a damper on the announcement, I nevertheless think it is necessary to point out that the service centres are in fact intended to keep in check the ever increasing demand for institutional care for the aged. Apart from that it will be necessary to guard against the possibility of establishing service centres haphazardly, simply because some wealthy person or other wishes to leave behind a monument. We think it is necessary to exercise great selectiveness with the establishment of such centres, and in this regard I want to say that members on that side and on this side of the House can help us—for every member of the House of Parliament is acquainted with his constituency—to ensure that where such a service centre is necessary, it will be established in the easiest way possible and in the most appropriate place so that it will really be possible to help people.

Sir, as far as the aged are concerned, I have quite a number of letters here which I do not intend quoting. I have here a whole file which is virtually a thank-you file. I know that there are many members who have built up a complaints file, and I do not blame the elderly people who wrote to them; but fortunately there is also a thank-you file in my office. I have here a number of letters written to me by people describing the fine treatment they had received from the department, etc. I think I will, after all, read out one of them—

We received quite a number of letters of this kind, and we are grateful that these people are grateful. Actually, it makes one feel humble to receive these letters because we cannot do enough for them, but I wish that we had been able to do far more for them. But, Sir, then we also receive letters of this kind, which I deeply regret; I am referring to a letter from a friend of one of my colleagues. I do not know this person, but judging from the nature of his letter and the profession which he practised, it would seem to me as though he is a very decent person. I cannot vouch for the facts contained in this letter, but I am almost certain that these facts are correct. I am not going to mention the name of the person to whom he wrote, but he wrote as follows (translation)—

This was communicated to him—

Not to vote for the National Party or the United Party, but to refrain from voting—

Sir, it is really quite reprehensible when persons visit people and urge them to refrain from voting because they are supposedly not receiving an adequate pension.

Sir, I want to say a few words about children, and in this regard I want to make this further announcement. We have gone into the matter and we have found that the working mother is here to stay in South Africa. Some time ago the problem of caring for the children of young working mothers received attention from the Family Life Commission, appointed in terms of the National Welfare Act, 1965. That commission found that working mothers had become such a part of the economic life of our country, that they could not, without major disruption, be withdrawn from professional employment outside the home. Although a scheme has been in existence for many years in terms of which the establishment and maintenance of crèches was subsidized by our department, the building costs, and thus the establishment costs, of such crèches have increased to such an extent that welfare organizations are finding it increasingly difficult to finance the establishment of such crèches. The Family Life Commission has also found that assistance on quite a different basis will be necessary if justice is to be done to caring for the children of working mothers. Consequently it was decided to replace the existing scheme, with effect from 1st April, 1974, with another scheme, the details of which I want to furnish here briefly. It was decided that—

1. (a) 100% loans be made available at 1% interest, repayable at 1¼% capital redemption over 40 years for the establishment of crèches;
2. (b) a subsidy of 75% of the rental of approved accommodation up to a maximum of R1 500 per annum be made available for crèches;
3. (c) the per capita subsidy of 20c be increased to 30c per crèche school day in respect of the children of parents whose income does not exceed R200 per month.

As in the case of the service centres the possibility of injudicious establishment of crèches will have to be guarded against in this case as well. We want to express the hope that the employers will also make a contribution towards caring properly for the children of employees. It will then be easier for people to go to work and care for themselves, so that they do not become impoverished and become a burden to the State. Those are the two announcements I wanted to make.

I want to tell you, Sir, that as far as emotionally disturbed children are concerned, of whom mention was made in this debate, we find that a certain group of the children are so extremely emotionally disturbed, as the hon. member for Kimberley South said, that none of the children’s homes want to admit these children. For example I visited a place of detention where I saw a young boy of 18 months whom nobody wanted. None of the children’s homes wanted him. His mother had abandoned him, his father was entirely unknown, and the little fellow was quite mentally disturbed and almost an idiot. There he is now. He did not ask to come into the world, and there he is. We are now instituting an investigation to see whether it will not be possible to establish a special school under the department, so that the extremely emotionally disturbed child, that child who has become so confused by the society in which he is living, by the environment, by his parents and by his unfortunate situation that it is not at all possible to let him fit in easily with other children, may also be accommodated. We should like to try to rehabilitate those children by means of welfare and psychiatric services, and with “ground” therapy, if I may call it that, to see whether we cannot turn them into useful citizens of South Africa.

I just want to furnish one or two figures, for the issue is again one of responsibilities. In 1960 a doctoral thesis was written dealing with failure on the part of fathers to pay maintenance after maintenance orders had been issued against them. In 1960 the percentage of Whites who paid regularly was 9,95. The percentage of those who paid irregularly was 44,50. The percentage of those who did not pay at all was 35,55. These are people against whom a maintenance order had been issued, and who did not even want to care for their children. I have here the report of the Committee of Inquiry into the Payment of Maintenance Allowances, and I want to express my gratitude towards this committee, and particularly for its recommendations, to which we shall give attention. Let me just quote a figure from this report. In certain cases contribution orders were issued against fathers in regard to legitimate children. We find that 66,3% of these persons did not pay these contributions. Of the number of fathers against whom contribution orders had been issued, 66,3% contributed nothing to their children. Contribution orders were also issued against fathers of illegitimate children, and 91,2% of them, persons against whom orders had been issued, had not paid. These are figures which shock and which demonstrate the disgrace of people who procreate children and who are then not prepared to look after and care for those children. If those people would look after and care for their children, we would have a lot more money left over to enable us to help our elderly and other people. We are going into this matter to determine whether we cannot compel these people to live up to their responsibilities. In my opinion it is an exceptional blot on the name of a father who procreates such child, legitimately or illegitimately, and who is then not prepared to care for that child financially until it reaches adulthood.

I just want to say a few words more concerning matters raised by hon. members to which I have not yet replied. I think I have already dealt with the first speech made by the hon. member for Umbilo. The hon. member for Kimberley South indicated the position of the handicapped. Places of work for the handicapped form the subject of a service which we could still expand tremendously. We must see whether people who are severely handicapped cannot be given light work to do in the institution in which they find themselves. For example, in an institution for severely handicapped persons a workshop could be constructed in which packing services could be rendered. A contract could be entered into with an enterprise packing some commodity or other, and these people could then do such packing work in that workshop. This is a simple yet easy way of keeping badly handicapped persons at the institution in which they are resident, and giving them work to do there which they find pleasant and which lets them feel that they are at least doing something useful. In addition, they could earn money in this way. We are working on an organization of that kind.

The hon. member also referred to special children’s homes. This is something to which we are giving attention at the moment. I want to thank the hon. member for his contribution in this respect.

I think I have already replied in full to the speech made by the hon. member for Turffontein.

I want to thank the hon. member for Westdene for the speech which he made in regard to children. We are giving attention to the professional assistance which we have to provide for them.

The hon. member for Constantia confirmed what I hoped he would confirm, viz. that we do not want to become a welfare state. I did not think the hon. member for Constantia would advocate a welfare state. I am in complete agreement with him that it is the full responsibility of the community to try to care for its handicapped persons itself, and that the State should only lend assistance.

The hon. member for Germiston thanked us for the consolidation of the State pension funds. It is true that when this consolidation has been finally completed, our public servants will, with effect from the middle of next year, have a far better pension scheme. I want to say that the hon. member for Germiston has had not a little, but a lot to do with it. I also know that he has done a considerable amount of work outside the House of Assembly in that connection. He said there were other funds as well which were being administered by the department. Coming from him, I know that this is a suggestion which deserves attention, and I shall definitely do so. We shall see whether we can do anything in this regard.

The hon. member referred to the regional office in Germiston. He was kind enough to give me a small sketch setting out the position. I shall at an appropriate opportunity go there myself to see what things look like there, and I shall also try to expedite this matter, for that is an important region. I think we shall have to try to cause that envisaged road which, if it should be constructed, would necessitate demolishing the building, to be realigned. We shall give attention to this matter as quickly as possible.

The hon. member for Umbilo mentioned several matters in his second speech. Inter alia, he discussed …

The Cape Widows’ Fund.

Yes, the hon. member discussed the Cape Widows’ Fund. The position is that expenditure from this fund is at present being paid out of the Revenue Account; that is what the Act provides. The moment all those widows are deceased this fund will of course cease to function of its own accord. In terms of the provisions of the Act we have to make provision for the payment of pensions for those widows. The hon. member also discussed the probational services. I want to agree with him. Recently we had a conference at which a South African judge was present. We are going to give a great deal of attention to probational services. I agree with the hon. member that our probational services could be expanded considerably. I myself practised in the courts for 18 years, and I am of the opinion that we should not only have a probational service for children’s cases, but also a probational service for divorce cases and any case in which an offender must in fact be punished after consideration of his background. I think that the probational service there will be of tremendous assistance, but this is a matter which one will have to take up with the Department of Justice, and it will have to be seen to what extent we can reach an agreement to expand the probational services further. The hon. member for Innesdal, if I am not mistaken, made a similar plea. We are giving attention to this matter and we are very keen to expand these services.

The hon. member for Mayfair discussed the establishment of curators for aged persons. It is a very important point which he raised, and I want to thank the hon. member for doing so. The position at the moment is that there are a tremendous number of aged persons who are so old and senile that they are not able to handle their own affairs. In such a case it is very difficult to have a curator appointed by the courts. This matter will also be taken up with the Department of Justice, for the hon. member will himself appreciate that we are dealing here with an important change of status. It is very important for every person that he should not lose his status. It is, if I may put it this way, one of the fundamental freedoms. I see the hon. member for Houghton is raising her eyebrows, but it is true.

I was thinking of something else.

It is one of the fundamental freedoms of man that he should not easily lose his status. For that reason I am afraid that this aspect …

I hope that you are not inferring that I am senile.

No, I would not go that far. I just want to say that we will take up this matter with the Department of Justice. Particularly as far as the senile aged are concerned, I am keen to have curators appointed more easily, so that these people may enjoy more protection. An aged person who gets hold of money and cannot work with it, allows the money to slip through his fingers. He does not even remember that he received it. It is essential that we should appoint a well-disposed person for each of those senile aged persons, a person who could handle all his affairs for him.

The hon. member for Berea discussed the matter of a subsidy for Sanca. I think the hon. member forgot that Sanca also receives subsidies from the provincial council. For that reason I do not think we should make ourselves guilty of paying an insufficient subsidy.

The hon. member also discussed dagga, but the hon. the Minister has already replied to that.

The hon. member for Bloemfontein District …

He spoke politics.

No, he did not speak politics at all; he made a very fine speech. The hon. member stated the standpoint of the Government very well, and I want to thank him very much for doing so.

He spoke nonsense.

The hon. member discussed the matter of people who have to leave school after reaching the age of 16 because they are virtually mongols. This is a very real problem. The hon. member referred specifically to the home in Bloemfontein, the Lettie Fouche. This is something to which we could give attention. As far as that specific case is concerned, I have ascertained that they fall outside the municipal area and cannot receive a loan there. That is really their difficulty: They cannot expand, because they cannot get a loan, for they fall outside the municipal area. But the general problem which the hon. member stated is a very real problem, viz. that people can only be looked after in a school up to a certain stage. After that the Department of Education commits the child elsewhere because it is no longer able to keep that child. We then have that child, an adult as it were, on our hands, and we have to give him some amount of money or other to keep going. I shall have an investigation made into the possibility of finding places for such people, whether we cannot keep them.

The hon. member for Houghton referred to Norman House. It was Norman House in Germiston to which she referred, was it not?

I did not specifically mention it.

No, you did not specifically mention it, but you did refer to it, did you not?

Yes.

I can tell the hon. member that I actually went to Norman House myself and had a look at it after the report appeared in the Press. I can give the hon. member a first-hand report: I personally saw nothing wrong at all either with the administration of Norman House, the building, the people in it or the children in it. I went through the whole building; it is absolutely a new school and there is nothing wrong with it. It is brand new and a perfect building. I do not know whether the hon. member has had a look at it.

I have not.

I would like the hon. member to go and have a look at it, because if she looks at it she would see that there is just nothing in the report.

All right.

I called for a report on every instance mentioned in the Press. I have that report here. I am not going to read it to the hon. member, but I will make it available to her if she wants it. I can give her my assurance that I went through this report myself and found no substantiation whatsoever of the Press report. I actually went to Norman House myself and had a good look at it. I spoke to the people administering it; I spoke to the parson there and I spoke to the children. I want to admit that I was there probably two or three months after the reported incident took place, but I cannot for the life of me imagine that the situation would have changed at all. The school was being well run; it is a nice, neat place. I myself spoke to the children in the dining hall.

Why do you imagine did these reports appear?

I do not know; I am not going to make any allegations, but I have with me the report concerning those reports and in it everything is explained. The reports are completely unsubstantiated. I will give this report to the hon. member so that she can have a look at it.

I want to mention Magaliesoord again, for this is what the hon. member spoke about. She can go to Magaliesoord too and have a look at it. She will see particularly that the women’s section is one of the best in the department.

*Mr. Chairman, it does not seem to me that there is anything left to discuss. All that is left is the hon. member for East London City. He discussed the matter of the children in industrial schools. I just want to inform the hon. member that industrial schools and reform schools are two completely different institutions. A reform school is a place which falls under the Department of Justice. It has nothing to do with an industrial school. An industrial school is the institution in which we place children when they are referred to us. I agree whole-heartedly with the hon. member when he says that, when children disappear, we must look after them. I want to inform the hon. member that we are to the best of our ability keeping track of all the children who have left such places. We look after those children as far as we can, but it does in fact happen that many of them disappear and we cannot trace them at all. However, you can think for yourself that one cannot have a person following that child all the time. However, we try to maintain contact with them as far as we possibly can. I think it is essential that we maintain contact with them. When they disappear, and subsequently become criminals, it is a great pity. However, we are doing our best with the rehabilitation and the after-care of these people. The hon. member also discussed drugs, to which matter the hon. the Minister has already replied.

I think that I have now replied to all the points which were raised, and I want to thank everyone for the contribution they made.

Votes agreed to.

Revenue Vote No. 16, Loan Vote N and S.W.A. Vote No. 6.—“Bantu Administration and Development”:

Mr. Chairman, may I have the privilege of the half hour? I do not believe that the relations between the African people with any government have been more strained than they are today with this Government. There have been isolated cases in the past of clashes between various groups and governments. I think back to the early ’twenties with the I.C.U. in Port Elizabeth. We had the Bulhoek affair with the Israelites under Gen. Smuts and then we had Sharpeville, but never have hostility and distrust been as general as it is now. There is nought for comfort for anyone, be he White, Black or Coloured, in the confrontation which is now building up. When African leaders warn us about possible bloodshed it is time for everyone to take notice. It becomes the concern of everyone, not merely of the police. A race conflict or clash will leave no one untouched and the threat will not be met, nor the evil or danger removed, by merely denouncing non-White leaders for making provocative statements.

I do not intend dealing with all the contentious speeches made by African leaders in the past year; I would not have time. They make distressing reading. I only want to refer to a few. There have been clashes before between the Chief Minister of the Transkei and the Minister. There was a personal clash between the two just before the meeting of the Assembly last year or the year before, but the first time he appeared to be blatantly critical of the Government was in January this year, when he made a speech in Bophuthatswana. This is important because this is the African leader who was the first to accept the Government’s policy of separate development. He was the first African leader to co-operate with the Government and the Government used him to effect to get other leaders to accept their policy. In making the speech, which was outside his own territory, he said—

Here he accuses the White man of mala fides. Just recently he made another speech, over the weekend, at Butterworth. This is what he said—

What paper are you quoting from?

I am now quoting from the Despatch of 14th May. It however appeared also in other Cape papers. I quote—

Then he went on to attack the Leader of the Opposition Party, Mr. Guzana, for championing the cause of the Whites in South Africa. Chief Kaiser is reported to have said that—

He admits that he attacks the Whites and that Mr. Guzana, the Leader of the Opposition, comes to their defence and therefore they must be rid of him.

Now, Sir, for those members who have forgotten all the speeches that have been made in the last few months by the different leaders of the Africans, there is a good summary in last night’s Argus, prepared by Mr. John D’Oliviera. I do not intend reading them all, but I want to refer to some of them. I have dealt with Chief Kaiser already and will now quote Chief Buthelezi. The article reads—

Then there is Professor Ntsanwezi, the Chief Minister of the Gazankulu who says—

Earlier in the year Chief Mangope said—

And then last week Mr. Cedric Patudi the new Lebowa Chief Minister warned that the policy of separate development would have to be scrapped if it did not lead to a fair deal for all in South Africa. There are three columns of reference to speeches made by African leaders. I have not got the time to read them. I am just reminding members of some of the statements that were made.

Most of those statements deal with land. But I want to read extracts from a speech made by Chief Buthelezi on another point. He said this—

Chief Buthelezi said—

Sir, that last speech made by Chief Buthelezi is a warning that they are learning to appreciate the power of non-violent action.

Chief Kaiser referred to the impatience of the youth—the Black Power. Last year the United Party appointed a committee to go into the position of the urban Bantu and we visited all the main centres, as I have mentioned earlier this session. We were struck by this point that was made by leaders of the Africans whom we saw there in the presence of officials; they are leaders of the Africans in that they are members of the advisory boards and of the councils, and they told us the same story, and that is that the youth were impatient; that they could no longer control them and they feared that they would be the first to be attacked by the youth because the youth regarded them as a stumbling block in their way to the attainment of power. Sir, I say that we cannot just write off the views of these acknowledged African leaders, acknowledged by this Government as leaders of the African people. What is the main grievance of these leaders? They have many grievances; they are critical of many things. They are critical of the humiliations they have to suffer, of the way in which some of the officials treat them and of the indignities that they have to suffer, but their main grievance is on the question of land. They want land. They want land because they contend that if the Government is going to pursue its policy, if it is going to carry out the policy of establishing separate Bantustans, there must be enough land in those states to succour and support all their citizens.

If the Government’s policy is to return the Africans in the urban areas to the Reserves, then there must be enough land to accommodate those people, to provide a living for them, and that is why they are now coming forward with their claim for more land. They say that they are not committed to the 1936 legislation; that they were not a party to the 1936 legislation, and we want to point out to the Government that when the 1936 legislation was passed there was no intention then of establishing separate, independent states. This is a new policy. In 1936 there was no question of establishing independent states. This new policy was introduced by Dr. Verwoerd, and I want to remind hon. members opposite of what Dr. Verwoerd said in this House on 10th April, 1961; he said—

Sir, I say that this policy announced by Dr. Verwoerd is not the traditional policy of South Africa. This demand for land which is now being made is because of a policy formulated for us by a man who did not have the traditions of South Africa; he was not a traditional South African; he was an idealist, and he was the man who persuaded this Government to accept that policy. He seemed to have some uncanny power over the Nationalist Party.

It was implicit in the 1947 legislation.

Sir, the hon. Chief Whip over there was here with me, as were some of the older members here, when Dr. Verwoerd first went to the Senate and spoke there in one of his earlier speeches about the Government’s policy of “algehele apartheid” (complete territorial separation) and they knew that Dr. Malan denied in this House that that was the policy; he said that that was an ideal. I do not know whether the present Minister was a Member of Parliament at that time. I do not think he was.

I know what happened better than you do.

You will remember. Sir, that at the time we were not slow to note that there was division in the Nationalist ranks on this issue. Hon. members who were here at the time will remember that we continually asked, monotonously asked., hon. members on that side, “Wat is apartheid?” and we could never get a proper reply. What happened, Sir? They tried to change the name of the policy to give it a new image. They changed it to “separate development”, to “separate freedom”, to “parallel development”, and to “multi-nationalism”; they changed the name, but they did not change the policy, the policy still remains unrealistic.

Will you admit that the idea of separated States was implicit in our policy already in 1947?

The Chief Whip cannot get away from the fact that Dr. Malan denied that. He was in the House when that happened. And if that has been their policy it is quite clear that that policy is not working now. They cannot feel happy about what is happening. They cannot pretend to be satisfied with what is happening. And if they are not satisfied with our policy and they do not think our policy is the answer, then they must come forward with some other policy of their own. But they are rapidly reaching the point of no return and something must be done to stop it before we reach that point. Now, fundamental for the success of the Government’s policy is the proper and efficient development of the Reserves, and that is where the problem arises. The Reserves are not being sufficiently developed. Again, that is Dr. Verwoerd’s fault. The Tomlinson Commission recommended dynamic development. They made several suggestions which he ignored. He gave them political rights instead of seeing to their economic needs. He ignored the warnings of Lord Hailey, the British official, who said, “Never let it be said that when they asked for bread we gave them the vote.” That is what Dr. Verwoerd did. He started developing them politically but economically they stayed behind.

Let me give one example. We have the report here from the Xhosa Development Corporation, the latest annual report, and a very good one too. The Xhosa Development Corporation reports that it has created employment opportunities indirectly and directly, including on its own staff, as well as on the staff employed by White agents and sub-contractors acting on behalf of the Corporation, for 7 006 Africans in the Transkei from 1967 to March, 1972. I admit at once that this corporation is doing good work but it cannot hope to cope with the problem. It cannot hope to supply the needs of the Africans. I want to remind hon. members also that when the Tomlinson Commission recommended the creation of a development corporation, Dr. Verwoerd ignored it and said he would not do it. Only years afterwards was this corporation appointed. The Tomlinson Commission recommended a corporation with a capital of £25 million. I believe this corporation now has a capital of R27 million.

What about the others?

I am talking about development in the Transkei now, where most of the development is taking place. The Transkei is the show-piece. If they cannot cope with the Transkei, how can they cope with Zululand? What has been done in Zululand? Let the Minister tell us. Does the Minister realize that according to the latest figures 60 000 new workseekers are coming in from the homelands yearly and 53 000 from the non-homelands? Work has to be found for them but unless the homelands are developed so that they can absorb their own people there is no hope of the Government’s policy succeeding. If this fails, then the rest fails because the Achilles’ heel of the Government’s policy is the urban African. We now hear talk of a temporary permanent workman. What is a temporary permanent dweller?

It is the same as a de facto de jure population.

I want to congratulate the hon. the Deputy Minister on his first session as a Deputy Minister in this House. He dealt with the urban Bantu the other day. In three debates this session, the Prime Minister’s Vote, the No-confidence debate and the Second Reading debate on the Appropriation Bill, we raised the question of the urban Bantu and we set out our policy in full. I read out a detailed statement on what our policy is and Nationalist members have it, the hon. the Minister and the hon. the Deputy Minister have it. What reply did they give to this? The hon. the Deputy Minister replied to us and said (Hansard, 1973, col. 5002)—

I should like to give a reply to those points seriatim.

He said that they had accepted and done all these things, but I want him to tell us what they are doing to ensure the enjoyment of undisturbed family life. What are they doing to ensure that? What are they doing to foster actively the emergency of a responsible and stable class of Bantu town-dwellers?

I shall tell you that too.

What are they doing to raise the living standards and the facilities for education and training as well as the creation of better opportunities for the Bantu’s production and gainful employment? Is he going to tell us how they are going to abolish job reservation? [Interjections.] Is he going to tell us how they are going to arrange for collective representation of Bantu labour in a manner to be determined after consultation with existing White trade unions and organized management? Is he going to tell us how they are going to give the urban Bantu councils the greatest possible control over their own local governments? Is he going to tell us how they are going to make elementary education available to all Bantu children? More important, is he going to tell us what they are going to do to provide secondary and technical education facilities for urban Bantu in the White areas and to assist the Bantu to gain admittance to universities by restoring their autonomy to these institutions?

What about a few books?

Is he going to tell us what they are going to do for the Bantu migratory worker; whether they are going to allow him to stay on for longer than one year and whether they are going to accept, as he said they do, the principle that single Bantu women will be treated on the same basis as single men? Is that also his policy now? Will he tell us that the wife of a Bantu worker will be permitted to join her husband in a Bantu urban area provided that he is in permanent employment, in a position to support his family and suitable accommodation is available?

And suitable accommodation is available.

Is the hon. the Deputy Minister accepting all that? I am very glad to hear that we are getting seriatim replies. Is he going to tell us that he will restore the spirit of section 10 of the Bantu Urban Areas Act of 1945 and that he accepts that Bantu who have obtained permission to enter a prescribed area in terms of section 10(1)(b) may acquire the right to permanent residence as in the past?

What was the spirit of that section?

The spirit of that section was to give the Bantu a sense of permanency. That hon. member was not here when Dr. Verwoerd amended the Bantu Urban Areas Act. He amended it by introducing a provision of 72 hours. They could not be in an area for more than 72 hours without a permit. However, to protect the people who were living there lawfully, he introduced certain reservations, for those who were born there, etc. I am not going to go through all of them, because he knows what section 10 provides. Dr. Verwoerd is the person who gave those people rights and we accepted the amendment because of that.

The Minister’s department is becoming overtaxed with work. They cannot possibly hope to do their work efficiently because far too much is being thrust upon this department.

Jake says we have too many people in the Public Service.

What is going to happen now to this department, I do not know. The department cannot even cope with the transition of the Transkei. The delays there are inordinate when it comes to dealings in property transactions. Now we have the proposal to declare a huge area of the Ciskei as a released area with the result that the Whites will have to get out of the area and that they will have to dispose of their property to the Bantu Trust. Then there are proposals for Natal and also for the Transvaal. I cannot see how this department is going to cope with all that work, as there is only a limited number of officials. We also know that the officials must be trained to undertake a task of this nature. I do not know how the department can possibly undertake this new task. We see that the officials themselves are now having problems in the Bantu areas. The Bantu are no longer as willing to work as amicably as in the past. The hon. the Minister must realize that although the Xhosa Development Corporation is doing a lot of good work—tribute was paid to their efforts in this excellent survey in the Financial Mail—they have to bring in White officials and the companies have to bring in White officials to be able to manage their businesses. These people will want to know that they are going to have services and protection in these areas. We know that health services have been handed over to the Transkei Government already and I see that the superintendent of the Butterworth Hospital has already left and an African is going to take over. What relationship will there be between the White staff, the Department of Health and the Department of Bantu Administration and Development on the one hand and the Transkeian Government on the other hand? It is most important that an efficient medical service be maintained in the Transkei because if it is not, the Whites will be leaving the area and eventually there will be a collapse in the administration and in the development. We also want an assurance from the hon. the Minister that the White Police will be left there under the control of this Government. I see that there is now a movement by Chief Kaizer Matanzima to have the Police transferred to his Government.

The economic development of these reserves, and I think especially of the Transkei now, is most important because of the growing unemployment in the area. With growing unemployment you get dissatisfaction and unrest. The hon. the Prime Minister is worrying about unemployment and he says that he has sleepless nights when he thinks about it. The home of the unemployment is the Reserves themselves and the hon. the Minister will have to find a way of giving immediate employment to these people. We see in the paper that they are apparently flocking illegally into the Cape. We read in the paper that numbers of them are convicted today for being here without passes. On one day 27 young Africans were sentenced to strokes for being here without passes. This sort of practice cannot go on. We are building up a hostility while it is bad enough as it is. We will have to find some other way of dealing with those who come here looking for work. They are not coming here to steal but to find work because there is no work for them in the Reserves. When the hon. the Minister of Indian Affairs says there is no unemployment, he is talking absolute nonsense. Of course there is unemployment. We only have to read the speeches made in the Transkei Assembly by Government supporters as well, to find out about the unemployment and about the desire to find work and the necessity of going out to seek work. I asked the hon. the Minister to give us details about the aid centres and to tell us how they are working. Why cannot those people be sent to the aid centres? Why must they be brought before the courts and punished? I hope the hon. the Minister will give us a detailed statement on what is happening here because, as I say, this is becoming a very critical question for the Government and for relationships here between the Whites and the Blacks.

As I said earlier, the development of the Reserves is fundamental to the success of the Government’s policy. I want the hon. the Minister to tell us whether he is satisfied with the development that is taking place. Do they hope in the near future, just in the next five years, to be able to cope with the natural increase of the Africans in the Reserves? If they cannot cope with that, they will be in trouble, and the warnings by the African leaders must not be ignored. As I said at the outset, they are being pressurized; pressure groups are working on them and they cannot sit idly by and watch this distrust grow amongst the people. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, what we have heard here this afternoon from the hon. member for Transkei was merely a rehash of the things he always dishes up here. There was a little left and this he took and warmed it up in the oven to take out here this afternoon and dish up again. We have heard all these points over and over again from the hon. member in the course of this session.

[Inaudible.]

What have you done about them?

I do want to ask hon. members to listen a little. The hon. member for Umlazi who is being so noisy, was a well-disciplined policeman in his day. Now that he has come here, he is completely out of his depth. [Interjections.]

Order!

The hon. member for Transkei referred here to statements made by certain Bantu leaders in respect of certain matters. It concerned one matter in particular, viz. the question of land. I now want to ask this hon. member and the United Party to tell me in the course of this debate, on any of the days in the course of which we will be conducting this debate, of one Bantu leader in South Africa who supports the policy of the United Party.

They support the federal policy.

Show me one who supports the federal policy of the United Party. Just tell me of one. We have heard statements made by Kaiser Matanzima and by Buthelezi in regard to this matter. Recently, only a week ago, Kaiser Matanzima said that only a silly leader would support the federal policy of the United Party. In this debate, hon. members on our side of the House will deal with this matter in chapter and verse. They will demonstrate what the statements of these leaders are. We challenge the United Party …

On your policy!

On your policy. We challenge the United Party— and in particular the hon. member for Hillbrow who is so talkative—to show us where the Bantu leaders of South Africa have openly said that they support the federal policy of the United Party. [Interjections.] I refer to the policy of the United Party, because they are the people who want to join them in a federation. I now want to ask the United Party: Where did they ever consult these leaders when they drew up this policy of theirs? In the 10 minutes at my disposal, I am unfortunately unable to reply to all the things the hon. member mentioned. I only want to dwell today on a very minor aspect of their policy, namely the Bantu in the White areas, whom they call the “urban” Bantu and whom I call “the Bantu working in the White areas”. They use this terminology and maintain that we say of these people that they are supposed to be here on a “temporary permanent” basis. There is no such thing and that is not our policy. We say that these people are only “casually” here in South Africa; they are only temporary workers here, and there is no question of any degree of permanency being given to the sojourn of these people, temporary or otherwise, in the White areas. I now want to put a few questions to the United Party and ask them please to furnish frank and clear answers. The United Party acts on the premise that the Bantu who live in White areas and work here, are one homogeneous Black mass. I want to prove here today that these people are not a homogeneous Black mass. The Xhosas comprise the largest group of Bantu working in the Republic of South Africa, in the White urban areas. I am now referring to Bantu in urban areas throughout the whole of South Africa. There are 1,048 million Xhosas, 1,01 million Zulus, 116 000 Ndebela, 169 000 Swazis, 319 000 North Sotho, 639 000 South Sotho, 579 000 Tswanas, 204 000 Shangaans, and 63 000 Vendas. The unspecified ones, viz. the people about whom hon. members opposite have so much to say and who are supposed to be the so-called uprooted Bantu, the “detribalized Bantu”, to use their term, number 238 000. These Bantu can still be ethnically classified somewhere. They only comprise 5% of the total Bantu population in the White urban areas. The argument of the United Party that these people comprise a homogeneous Bantu population, is therefore absolute nonsense. These figures I quoted here, prove that these people are properly classified, ethnically speaking, in regard to the homelands where they belong.

How many boards are there …

If the hon. member does not have the intelligence to follow an argument, he must please not make nonsensical interjections. These people are, ethnically speaking, properly classified, and as a result of this ethnic classification, they have a link with the homelands. For the hon. member to say here that these people are frustrated, is ridiculous. In this new creation of ours, I see a tremendous chance and an opportunity for us in that we are able to organize the Bantu in the White areas by means of these Bantu Administration Boards. A closer contact between the Bantu in the White areas and their homelands can be effected by means of these Bantu Administration Boards. It is only in areas under the control of the United Party city councils, such as Johannesburg and Cape Town, where we find this kind of thing referred to by the hon. member for Transkei, namely that there is frustration among these people. In city councils which are well disposed towards the policy of this Government and which have ensured that this policy is carried out and that everything is done correctly, we do not have this kind of frustration referred to by that hon. member.

The hon. member spoke about the training of young people. He said “it is the youth that is frustrated” and “it is the youth that will come into action against this Government”. Let me tell the hon. member that one has that same phenomenon among the White youth, too. It does not really matter. It is most likely only a tendency of the times. After all, the hon. member knows that what he said here is not the truth. Why does he not read the report of the Department of Bantu Administration? In that report he will see what tremendous progress has been made in the field of education for these people in the locations. There he will see what our policy is. We are giving these people high school training and technical training in their own homelands. I am convinced that with the development of this policy of ours and when these Bantu Administration Boards are utilizing their potential to the full, many of these things will be solved.

Mr. Chairman, we have heard an exposition in this House of a background of complete reality as exposed by the hon. member for Transkei, and a complete picture of unreality which the hon. member who has just sat down has dealt with. His inventive mind has even invented a further appellation for the urban Bantu, who, despite the breakdown in figures, number nearly a million in Johannesburg alone. Generally, they number just under 8 million throughout the urban and rural areas of the White Republic of South Africa. He has invented a new term called “casual worker”. He has now taken people who have spent generations in the towns and urban areas—some of whom will never believe that they are otherwise than permanent residents, which in fact they are—and goes further than “temporary permanents” and calls them “casual workers”. He translates it in his impeccable Afrikaans by “tydelike werker”. How he allies the two, I do not know. But what he has exposed is very interesting, namely that the Government believes and hopes blindly, and in a sense of unreality, that the administration boards which it has now set up through the entire country will be the solution to destroy this question of the permanence of the Bantu in South Africa, namely those Bantu who are embedded in the whole of the economy of the country. In all the statements that have been made by the hon. the Deputy Minister of Bantu Affairs he has gone to great lengths trying to indicate how they will build enormous cities in the homelands to accommodate these people. The hon. member who has just sat down and who is chairman of a commission indicated how the areas are divided up, in order to enable the links to be closer so that there can be means of transport to bring workers into the cities and to the industrial areas and take them back. It is a complete unreal, mythical picture which this Government is trying to build up as the new concept of how to destroy this whole question of a reality which is the permanence of the Bantu and the integration of the Bantu into the economic life of this country. I cannot see any Government at any time destroying this. They want to unscramble the egg with a new form of administration in which they hope to make use of all the funds they collected through the Bantu services levy and all the funds which they now hope to collect under the Bantu Labour Act of 1971. Sir, let me say immediately that what we said at the time in 1971 has now been proved to be absolutely correct. The question of mobility of labour, which was put up as a smokescreen, was only incidental to the main purpose, because mobility of labour was necessary in any case. There was pressure from commerce and industry and there was the weakness of the Physical Planning Act, which was destroying the emergence of new industries, and there was difficulty in meeting the continuous demands for more and more labour for the industrial development of the country. This new system was introduced as a smokescreen, although they argued that they were establishing a better and a more pliable and a more useful and a more advantageous system of administration. The hon. the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development himself has said specifically, “We will have no person as chairman of any board in this country unless he strictly follows Government policy and is in fact a Nationalist.” The object of that is quite clear. The Government is struggling to maintain this policy of establishing independent Bantu nations in this country, and they themselves have now found that unless they can take away control completely from every body controlling Bantu affairs in the White urban areas and hand the control over to Nationalist-orientated administrators, they cannot achieve their objective, and that is why they have established the Bantu administration boards. The hon. the Deputy Minister, in all his speeches, has been trying to convince all the industrialists in this country of the great benefit of being able to bring a continuous flow of Bantu labour to industry from the contiguous Bantu homelands, and the hon. member who has just sat down has said clearly that that was the purpose and the objective. Sir, I would like to ask the hon. the Deputy Minister, who is apparently in charge of this debate, what he is going to do in order to ensure what he referred to in his own statement, namely a sense of contentment in the minds of the urban Bantu in this country. He himself calls them “urban Bantu”. Is he going to provide them, as he has been asked for by the Chief Minister of the Transkei, with proper homes? Is he going to try to help to educate their children? Is he going to build more houses in these areas for them? Is he going to deal with the problems of family life and help to provide those things which make for a stabilized community?

Yes.

I am very glad to hear that. That is what we wanted to know. Is he also going to try to ease the pass laws and to remove some of its attendant evils? Is he also going to try to avoid the migratory labour system, with all the viciousness which goes with it when people are brought into the urban areas temporarily as labour units and then sent home again in order to obviate their becoming permanent members of an industrial community? Is he going to do all these things. Sir? Is he going to take away the frustrations of the urban Bantu and the dreariness of their daily life and the unnatural system of allowing only unmarried labourers in the urban townships? If he is going to do these things, we would very much like to know it.

The other point that I want to put to him is this: The Government is now endeavouring to ensure that Bantu labour in this country will be trained to meet the demands of industry in South Africa. Is he going to have them trained in order to be sent back to the homelands to make use of their training there? Does he not realize that a trained labourer remains a permanent member and a contented member of the labour force and of the community? Then, Sir, I want to put another question to him, on which the hon. the Prime Minister challenged our leader the other day, when he said to him: “You talk about the urban Bantu and you talk about civic rights; why don’t your local authorities give these people civic rights?” Sir, I can tell the hon. the Minister and this Committee that in January, 1972, the biggest municipality in this country, which has the biggest urban Bantu council in the country and which has the most sophisticated urban Bantu council in the country, saw the then Deputy Minister of Bantu Administration and Education (Dr. Koornhof) and discussed this whole question with him. The then Deputy Minister said that he noted their views and that he wanted their detailed motivation for his consideration. In fact, a Press statement was issued with his approval. Nothing further happened during that year. In February, 1973 again, about five months ago, a deputation from the city council saw the present Deputy Minister and asked him what could be done, and in fact, at his request, they gave him a picture of what they wanted to do. They wanted to do some simple things to bring about a contented community, about which the hon. the Deputy Minister speaks. What were these things they asked for? To give them the right to deal with the allotment of trading sites and shops and the determination of types of trade; the priority for the construction of sites for sports fields; priority for the construction of roadways and parking places; and for the construction of stormwater drains, for the establishment of clinics, for the establishment of doctors’ consulting rooms and premises for professional men; the right to approve grants-in-aid to recognized welfare societies—all simple things which would enable the Urban Bantu Council to maintain a standard of dignity instead of a state of frustration, into which they have fallen. And what did the hon. the Deputy Minister say then? He said that this matter had to be further considered, also from the point of view of the link between the various ethnic groups and the homelands, and he would be prepared to have the matter investigated by a departmental committee and they would then ask the council to submit a memorandum to them. We have heard nothing about it since. We have heard nothing about any of the statements he has made. But let me say immediately about this question of the link between the various ethnic groups and their homelands—what has that got to do with the sophisticated community who would have told the hon. the Deputy Minister, if he had spoken to them, as I am sure he has, who in fact told the previous Deputy Minister and who told us, that this question of ethnic links for the homelands is a lot of balderdash, a lot of nonsense. They have intermarried, Sir. They have lived together. They work together and they have the same problems and the same common aims and the same desires and the same aspirations. [Time expired.]

The negative speeches made by the two previous Opposition speakers have been very conclusively replied to in the past, both in this House and outside and therefore I shall not try to reply to them again. If the hon. the Minister should consider it necessary, he would perhaps reply in due course, but I have often heard the replies to those arguments.

After 25 years of National Party policy the people of South Africa—all the people within the borders of South Africa—are today in the fortunate position where they can pluck and enjoy the golden fruits of the policy of the National Party, inter alia, of the policy of separate development in South Africa. Bearing in mind what has happened in Africa in the past 25 years, particularly what has happened to the Whites in Africa, one shudders at the thought of what would have happened in South Africa if the National Party had not achieved that God-given victory for South Africa and for all its people 25 years ago. In 1946 the then prophetic crown prince of the United Party, the late Mr. Jan Hofmeyr, spelt out the policy of the United Party as we see it unfolding today within the United Party, or at least in sections of the United Party. At that time he spelt out that for which at least the hon. member for Bezuidenhout stands, and he has the moral courage to say that he stands for that, namely to make this Parliament a multi-national Parliament, a multicoloured Parliament. Mr. Hofmeyr said so in this House when the United Party gave the Indians representation in Parliament. Then the National Party came into power in 1948 with a definitive mandate from the majority of the voters of South Africa. We carried out that mandate and we are still carrying it out and we have made this Parliament White. It is true that we removed the Bantu representatives from this Parliament but I hasten to say that we did not leave a vacuum. We created an opportunity for the Bantu to realize himself in South Africa. We created an opportunity for the White man to have his say in this Parliament, and we also created opportunities for all other peoples in South Africa to realize themselves. We are grateful to notice a growing national pride as the policy of separate development is developing. This is something of which many of the hon. members opposite do not understand a thing. We are grateful to notice that a growing national pride is manifesting itself in each of these various peoples in South Africa. All of these peoples see in the development of the policy of separate development the instrument with which they are able to maintain their own identity. They see in this that one people will not be a threat to another. I am very glad to be able to say that what we in South Africa have experienced in past years, indicates that the policy of separate development is a positive policy. It is a policy which offers living space to all the peoples within the borders of our fatherland. It offers living space to all those peoples who have good intentions.

To the Indians, too?

I am referring to people with a national pride; I am not referring to deserters. I am referring to those people who want to be members of a nation.

I want to relate what we have achieved up to the present, and I shall have to hasten so as to do so in the few minutes at my disposal. What has happened in the homelands up to now? The figures I want to quote, were obtained at the end of January this year. I say that up to the time of these figures we did not leave a vacuum, but established six self-governing territories within the borders of the Republic under Chapter 2 of the Bantu Homelands Constitution Act, namely the self-governing territory for Bophuthatswana on 1st June, 1972, for the Ciskei on 1st August, 1972, for Gazankulu on 1st February, 1973, for Lebowa on 2nd October, 1972, for the Transkei on 30th May, 1963, and for Venda on 1st February, 1972. I am pleased to be able to say that within the foreseeable future, Basotho-Qwaqwa and KwaZulu, too, will certainly grow and develop into the same political units similar to those of all these other homelands and they will certainly also attain the same status. The six homelands mentioned are each governed by a legislative assembly comprising selected and nominated members. There is a chief minister and six departments and there is a minister at the head of each of these departments. A total of 14 100 posts have been created for Bantu officials in all these various homeland administrations and those posts have been filled.

The picture which I have painted, is completely different to the one we had when we had that sham-representation when Bantu representatives had representation in this Parliament. These changes were effected under the policy of separate development. Besides this number of posts mentioned there are also a large number of labourers in a casual capacity as a result of working conditions arising from the activities of the Governments concerned.

We are also in the process of gradually granting responsibility to those Bantu leaders within the homelands. White officials have been seconded to the homeland governments and they are now gradually being withdrawn and replaced by members of the particular people. I would like to quote the figures. In 1963 there were 455 White officials in all the departments of the Transkei; this comprised 18,6% of the total staff. In 1972 that number was reduced to 268 and the number of White officials comprised 6,5% of the total staff. The staff position as regards the S.A. Police is as follows: In 1963 there were 99 posts, three of which were filled by Whites. In 1973 there are 169 posts, seven of which are filled by Whites. The Government is honest in its policy of separate development. Elections were held. I am grateful to be able to say that this policy is succeeding. Time does not allow us to go into all the achievements which have been accomplished. We know and the people of South Africa know that we strive to live together in peace and harmony in South Africa; not intermingled, but everyone on his own terrain and in his own areas. That is why it is necessary and essential for statesmanship of the highest order to be exercised. In the first place this attests to a sense of responsibility and devotion to the interests of one’s own people. One can only attain this if one creates an inherent identity and an inherent national pride in each of those members of a nation. We know of various statements made by Bantu leaders, and we have listened to them. We also know that other statements are made, but they are not sensational and for that reason they are not published. No one begrudges the Bantu leaders the right to promote the interests of their own subjects, but all we ask is that those statements be made within the bounds of reason and with regard to what is practically possible. It will benefit no one continually to assail the Government with impossible claims. We also know that there are many responsible leaders within the homelands territory, but time, unfortunately, does not allow us to deal with that in detail. We are grateful for the progress that has been made and all we can do is convey our very best wishes to the hon. the Minister and his department for pressing on with this policy. It is also through the policy of separate development that recognition is granted to those homelands which have already been established. To them, too, we can only convey our best wishes. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Wolmaransstad devoted the best part of his speech to telling us how successful the Government’s policy of separate development was and that South Africa should be grateful for that policy. We on this side of the House of course do not agree with him. We believe that this policy is failing before their eyes. I want to say that I believe that one of its basic weaknesses is the fact that it bases all its plans for the development of the homelands on the Tomlinson Commission’s report which in 1954 estimated that the Bantu population of South Africa would be 21 million at the turn of the century. This weakness becomes even more apparent when you look at what I believe are very conservative projections based on the 1970 census figures. These figures indicate quite clearly that at the turn of the century the Bantu population of South Africa will not be 21 million, but a staggering 36 million. What is even more important is that of these 36 million Bantu, no fewer than 15 million will be living and working in the Transvaal and will be dependent in the main for their living on mining, manufacturing and the service industry in the Black and White areas. It is against the background of these facts that South Africa’s urban Bantu problem, which I believe to be the most sensitive aspect of the whole policy of separate development, should be seen. We must remember that it is this problem of the urban Bantu that is going to affect the life of every single person in South Africa, irrespective of race, colour or creed, to an ever greater degree. Unfortunately for us, for almost 25 years now, the Government has talked so much about its policy of separate development and has become so enmeshed in theoretical blueprints for their development, that it has in a very ostrich-like way skated around the whole problem of the urban Bantu, a problem which I believe is far more urgent than the homelands.

It is in the swelling Bantu townships that the real racial tensions are being compounded to a very alarming degree, tensions which I believe could quite easily lead to the urban Bantu becoming the dangerous flashpoint in South Africa’s race relations. I know that these are strong words, but I use them advisedly because we must remember that in the urban Bantu townships the whole tribal way of life is crumbling. At the same time racial rejection inhibits them and prevents their way of life from being changed by a new Western way of life. This situation, quite obviously, leaves the Bantu in a very precarious no-man’s land with a completely inadequate code of social control. This is where family life, the very basis of traditional Bantu society, is being devasted by the harsh application of the pass laws, by influx control and by the many other apartheid regulations. It is here in the urban Bantu areas that economic ambition is first awakened in the Bantu and then promptly frustrated by lack of education, lack of technical training and, of course, the completely unnecessary application of job reservation. It is here that racial conflict is at its harshest and that racial inequities are most evident. I want to say that it is also in the urban Bantu areas that a completely new, educated middle class type of Bantu is arising, a Bantu who is very conscious of the fact that he has no security of tenure, that he has no stake in the place where he lives and that he has absolutely no say in the making of those laws that govern him virtually from the cradle to the grave. All these factors and more are at their most magnified in the urban Bantu townships of South Africa.

It is against this background that I want to ask the hon. the Minister sincerely how long he believes the millions of urban Bantu will be prepared to suffer the infringement of so many basic human rights, rights that we as Whites take for granted. In saying this, I want to add that it is no use the hon. the Minister coming back with the old stock reply which has become almost a cliché that the Bantu can enjoy all these rights in his own homeland, because we are dealing here with millions of human beings, human beings with one life to live and they are living that life today in the urban areas of South Africa. I want to say to the hon. the Minister, too, that the time to correct these wrongs grows shorter by the day as more and more non-Whites do jobs that were traditionally done by Whites, as education amongst the Bantu spreads and as Africans in the rest of Africa become more enlightened. I want to say to the hon. the Minister too that we, the Whites, just like the urban Bantu, live today not in a traditional society, but in an adaptive society. This calls for the greatest degree of flexibility in both attitude and approach and I believe that this is where the Government is falling down so badly and letting South Africa down.

I want to make this appeal to the hon. the Minister, namely that if the Government is going to insist on its attitude that the millions of Bantu in the urban areas are mere temporary sojourners and migrant workers, then I say they are morally bound to create as a matter of the greatest urgency a special migrant workers’ charter based on the Council of Europe’s Migrant Workers Charter which lays down specifically that all migrant workers should be housed, educated and enjoy health and all other services on a basis similar to that enjoyed by the people in the country in which they work. I say this is the least the Government could do.

I want to say to the hon. the Minister too that the urban Bantu is without any doubt the most articulate section of the whole Bantu population. I believe that from the urban Bantu the future Bantu leaders of South Africa will be drawn. I believe too that there will be a ready approach from these Bantu leaders if they are approached in a spirit of reasonableness and a spirit of tact. I want to say to the hon. the Minister that he is the man charged with a very great responsibility today. The hon. member for Transkei mentioned earlier the spirit that is developing in South Africa. These are not just idle words. We see evidence of this every day. That is why I believe that this problem of the urban Bantu, a problem that has so many ramifications, a problem that holds out so many dangers for South Africa and every person living in it, deserves far greater attention both from the Minister and from the Government than it has received in the past. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Johannesburg North used one argument here which in my opinion he should rather leave well alone. To be specific, he used the migrant labourers of Western Europe as an example and said that we in South Africa should deal with the migrant labourers on the same basis as they were being dealt with in Western Europe. I can only say to the hon. member in passing that I do not know whether he has heard about the “hot beds” in Europe, where one bed is hired out to three people and the Germans, for example, have brought accusations against themselves claiming that less floor space is prescribed for a casual labourer than is prescribed by law for an Alsation.

I want to confine myself to another matter. I should like to mention that when the National Party gave political shape to the policy of separate development by creating opportunities for political leaders in the Bantu homelands and those leaders were in fact established by their own people as political leaders in their own right, there were people and organizations who ridiculed these leaders and ran them down as being “stooges of the Nationalist Government”. But now that these homeland leaders, as a result of this very policy of separate development, have been stabilized as leaders of their own people in their own right, there are, inter alia, some of those very organizations and people who had previously abused them as being “stooges of the Nationalist Government” who are concentrating their attention on these people whom they previously called “stooges” in an attempt to influence them and to interfere in the affairs of those homelands and those homeland leaders. I want to make it quite clear by way of repetition that I am by no means attacking the Bantu leaders. However, I want to express my concern about certain persons and certain organizations that are causing certain homeland leaders to have notions which are disturbing relations with the Government and with the Whites and which are misleading certain Bantu leaders into making irresponsible and unfortunate statements and remarks. There are certain White organizations and individuals abroad who are guilty of this. What is pathetic and wrong, is that there are Whites and White organizations within the Republic who are also guilty of this. Unfortunately it appears that there are certain Bantu leaders who do not realize that this interference is not aimed at the advancement or promotion of the Bantu homelands and Bantu leaders and peoples. This interference is really aimed at bringing about, and calculated to bring about, the failure of the policy of separate development. Listening to certain recent remarks and speeches, one may rightly say: The voice is that of Jacob but the hands are those of Esau.

You have hit the nail on the head.

These Whites and these organizations are playing with fire which is very dangerous indeed. They are doing all the people in South Africa a disservice.

Who are they?

One of these people whom I want to mention by name is one Frans E. Auerbach, a German by birth and living in Johannesburg. Let us consider briefly what he is like and who he is. This Auerbach is a member of Spro-Cas and he is someone who liaises with O’Leary of Wilgespruit fame. In 1966 this Auerbach was chairman of the Transvaal Teachers’ Association. In a letter to The Star he protested against the banning of Ian Robertson, the then president of Nusas. This Auerbach is also a man who writes letters. In 1970 in a letter to the Rand Daily Mail he wrote the following, inter alia, about the statement by Dr. Koornhof dealing with legislation to prevent White women and non-White men working together—

He is also the author of articles which have definitely done South Africa no good. On the contrary, they have harmed South Africa. One of the articles read, “Many are not free to learn,” and a great uproar was caused abroad by this. Then, too, there was “Education beyond Apartheid.” This same Auerbach was elected in 1970 as chairman of the Southern Transvaal region of the South African Institute of Race Relations. At a meeting in 1971 he advised certain Bantu leaders as follows—

Here he revealed his whole strategy.

[Inaudible.]

Order! The hon. member for Umlazi should stop making interjections.

I should like to take the House into my confidence this evening. It has reached my ears that this Mr. Auerbach is liaising with Chief Gatsha Buthelezi of KwaZulu. One can take it that this is in connection with Chief Gatsha Buthelezi’s many speeches and memoranda, etc., inter alia, in regard to matters of consolidation. Sir, perhaps certain Bantu leaders should beware, in these times in which we are living, that they are not eventually called by the people and also by their own people “the stooges of certain people and certain organizations”. I have in my possession quite a few speeches made by a few Bantu leaders, particularly one of them, which are freely available, and when I look at these speeches, I see in them the style and the hand of an expert. Strange to say, Sir, some of these speeches are provided with a complete bibliography, cross-references, etc., and everything in them is typed as is into the speeches which the leader concerned usually reads to his audience. Sir, one repeats: The voice is that of Jacob, but the hands are those of Esau. It has also reached my ears that another well-known person, namely Mr. Beyers Naudé of the Christian Institute, is actively involving himself with the leaders of Bantu peoples and trying to influence and advise them and provide them with all kinds of assistance in accordance with his own distorted convictions.

Who wrote your speech?

I write my own speeches. Furthermore, Sir, I have heard that a strong feeling is current in Natal that one Mr. Alan Paton is exerting himself in giving advice and assistance in miscellaneous forms to Chief Buthelezi. Sundry names are of course being mentioned in regard to this movement, and one wonders whether they are not perhaps involved with a line of communication which may be traced to countries abroad and to foreign aid. One cannot help thinking back to the Defence and Aid Fund, for example. Sir, also as regards the case of Auerbach, I want to ask the hon. the Leader of the Opposition not to allow certain members of the United Party to be used by Auerbach. [Time expired.]

Nonsense, rot.

Order! The word “rot” has been ruled unparliamentary and the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central must withdraw the word.

[Inaudible.]

I withdraw it.

Mr. Chairman, may I address you on that?

Order! The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District must not interrupt when I give a ruling, and I warn him not only for today but for the future too.

Mr. Chairman, I have a very good suggestion for the hon. member for Lydenburg. I think the hon. member for Lydenburg is a perfect person to be co-opted on to the Schlebusch Commission. He has a wealth of information, and he ought to place his services at the disposal of the Schlebusch Commission. I want to tell the hon. gentleman, too, that he does Chief Gatsha Buthelezi a disservice by suggesting that the chief is unable to think for himself. Believe me, Sir, as one who knows this gentleman very well, he is more than able to write his own speeches and to make up his own mind about the policies that he wants to follow.

I want to raise with the hon. the Minister the question of the urgency of the situation as regards housing in the urban townships, and in this regard I want to mention the very special disabilities that are being suffered by the African women. I am not sure who exactly is to blame for the existing situation in the urban areas. I am, of course, most familiar with the Johannesburg situation, in Soweto, but I also understand that the conditions which I describe in Johannesburg are more or less prevalent in most of the urban townships throughout South Africa. We all know that the Government has boasted for years— and I would say with some justification— how it cleared up the urban slums which it discovered around Johannesburg particularly and other industrial areas when it first came into power 25 years ago. But I want to warn the Government that if it does not take care, exactly the same sort of bad housing conditions are going to develop over the next few years, because we are really reaching a situation of considerable urgency. The official estimate for Johannesburg is that there are 13 000 families on the waiting-list for houses, and I would say that this figure is obviously a tremendous under-estimate. There are, incidentally, something like 2 500 houses needed just to cope with the natural increase in Soweto, whose population is 700 000 to 1 million —it is anybody’s guess—of these “casual” people living there, many of whom were born there and many of whose children were born there as well. [Interjections.] There are people in the urban areas who qualify to be there, but do not qualify for housing. I am referring now to the many women who are legally in the urban areas, heads of households and of families, because more and more women, as I shall show in a moment, have in fact taken over the role of the head of the household and the wage-earner of the family. These women are unable to get themselves put on any housing list. So, as I say, the number of 13 000 families is obviously an underestimate. Women who are divorced and women who have been deserted and women who are unmarried but are nevertheless the heads of families if they have children, find themselves unable to be put on housing waiting-lists. I am glad to say that there has been some relaxation in so far as widows are concerned. I am very grateful for this concession, because many widows used to find themselves deprived of their houses, for themselves and their families, the minute the father, the head of the household, the husband, died. Now I understand that in certain areas, anyway— and Soweto is one of them—there has been some relaxation in this regard, and one is very grateful for it. Sir, it is an impossible situation for these women who cannot get themselves on housing-lists. They must find lodgings, and anyone who knows the situation in Soweto knows that it is hopelessly over-crowded in regard to lodgings, and accommodation for women with children is almost impossible to find. The other alternative which they are told about, of course, is to put themselves into hostels and to send their children back to the homelands. The trouble is that most of these children have been born in the urban areas and the woman has very often lost all contact with their people in the homelands, despite the ethnic links that the hon. member for Langlaagte spoke about a little while ago. It is an impossible situation for them. If they send the children to the homelands, those children very often lose the right of returning to Johannesburg and other urban areas. Female children particularly suffer from this disability because they cannot come in, most of them, even as contract workers. Of the thousands of work contracts signed last year and the year before, very few in fact reflected that women were being allowed to come in as contract workers. This is an absolutely anguishing decision for the women to have to make. If they send the children back to the homelands, very often those children will not be able to rejoin their mothers when they want to come to the urban areas to look for work. Now I should like to know who is responsible for this state of affairs. The hon. the Deputy Minister’s predecessor, now the hon. the Minister of Sport, told me in this House last year, or two years ago, that he had approved of every single housing loan that had been asked for by the Johannesburg municipality, in order to build houses for Blacks. Where is the log jam? Is it because the Department of Community Development does not release the money, or the Housing Commission? I am not sure how the actual allocation works, but once the Minister has approved of a loan that has been asked for by a municipal authority, why, may I ask, has that money thereafter not been forthcoming? I would like the Minister to give us some information about this. I want to point out that women are really suffering in this regard, and I think it is high time we had an inquiry into the disabilities of African women in these respects; employment from the homelands, housing as heads of families, inability to inherit, because this is another disability these women suffer from under tribal law. There was a departmental inquiry set up many years ago, but still during my time in this House, to inquire into the disabilities, legal and otherwise, of African women, but we have heard nothing further about it. It was simply dropped and we have heard nothing further. I, as a woman who enjoys all the privileges of being a White citizen of South Africa, with a vote and all the other privileges that go with the vote, am asking now for an inquiry to be set up to examine the legal and other disabilities from which African women are to a great extent suffering.

In the few minutes left to me, I want to ask the Minister something about his plans for Alexandra. We all know about the two huge hostels which were erected last year. The male hostel is full, and I believe there is a waiting-list for it. One need not be surprised at this because in Soweto alone there are something like 18 000 single men on the waiting-list, with the word “single” in inverted commas, because many of them are married but their wives are in the homelands and they are eligible for single accommodation. The women’s hostel, of course, is not full. I think there are about 400 women in the hostel. Women who are domestic servants who are living on their employers’ premises are most reluctant to leave those premises, even though they are often not ideal. But those premises provide a certain amount of privacy and comfort and most of all, they are on the spot and the women do not have to travel these miles to and from the hostel to get to work. The hon. the Minister, I believe, has changed his mind now about the second large hostel—he is going to fill that with men as well. I understand these are his intentions. The new hostels which are going to be built are going to be of a different design. They are going to be smaller and they are going to be double and single-roomed hostels instead of the six-bed and four-bed rooms and very few double and single rooms which are provided in the existing hostels. I want to ask the hon. the Minister to scrap the idea of these hostels for women altogether. They are most unpopular and there is no doubt about it. Even those of the new design, which will certainly be an improvement on the old ones, are not going to be acceptable to the domestic employees whom the hon. the Minister is thinking of putting in to these hostels.

I do not approve of the hostel system at all. Even for men I think these hostels are very bad. I think they could be a sort of temporary refuge for men who are single and who are contract workers—a system which everybody knows I disapprove of strongly but nevertheless exists—until family housing can be provided. Well, if they are used for that purpose, that is one thing, but to put people into these hostels as their permanent homes, to expect them to live their entire working life in a room with other people whom they have probably never met before and to have that as their whole future pattern of life, is quite inhuman. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the speech by the hon. member for Houghton, who has just resumed her seat, was about better housing for Bantu in the urban areas. I shall not follow up her argument; on the contrary, I want to concentrate on something totally different. The hon. member for Transkei made a number of points, but I want to confine myself to only a few. He said that the Black leaders were demanding more land, the Bantu from the homelands who were coming to work in the Western Cape were creating serious problems and he also said that there were 16 million Bantu in South Africa as against the four million Whites. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition has repeatedly made the statement, as have hon. members opposite, that the Black man in South Africa possesses only 13% of the total area of South Africa. That is a half truth and not the whole truth. All they aim to achieve by this statement is to create a feeling of guilt in the Whites, a feeling that we owe the Black man more land. On the other hand they are trying to create the impression among the Black people that the Black people will get more land if they insist on it. I should like to know what the policy of the United Party is in regard to these demands. Would they, if they were to come into power, give the Black leaders more land or would they not give them more land? I expect a reply to these two question: Do the Black people have too little land in South Africa, in their opinion, and would they give the Black people more land? Would they perhaps give the whole of South Africa to the Black people? I want to come back shortly to the statements made by the hon. member for Transkei regarding the Blacks who are absconding to the Western Cape. Is it not the position throughout the whole of South Africa that the Black people want to come to the White areas? To begin with, however, I just want to dwell on the land situation. I have already dealt with this matter on a previous occasion in this House when I said that we could not regard Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland as separate from the 13% of South Africa’s territory which comprised the Bantu homelands.

You are talking nonsense.

Prior to unification that land formed part of Southern Africa and I should like to mention the total area of all that land. The total area of Botswana is 220 000 square miles. The area of Lesotho is 11 716 square miles and the area of Swaziland is 6 705 square miles, altogether that gives us a total of 240 421 square miles. When we add the 13% of South African territory, comprising 61 287 square miles, the total area allocated to the Bantu in South Africa is 301 708 square miles.

You may just as well add the rest of Africa.

I think that as far as these matters are concerned, the hon. member and I are not on the same wave length, because I at least want to be honest towards the Bantu as far as these matters are concerned, while he wants to mislead the Bantu. The total area of South Africa inhabited by Whites is 410 168 square miles, but not only the Whites, but also the Coloureds and the Indians inhabit this area. This means, therefore, that the Whites inhabit four-sevenths of South Africa while the Bantu inhabit three-sevenths of South Africa. There is a point which I should like to emphasize, one which is a source of mirth to my hon. friend on the other side of the House. The question is whether all Bantu who are on South African territories are South African Bantu. I say; indisputably no, and I shall prove this with chapter and verse. Let us take the natural increase of the Xhosas in the Transkei and in the Ciskei which is 2,4% in both cases. In KwaZulu the natural increase is 3,2% of the population per annum. The natural increase in Basotho-Qwaqwa is 2,5 % and in Bophuthatswana it is 4,8%. In Lebowa it is 2,8% and in Venda it is 4,8%. The natural increase of the Swazis is 2,9 % and the increase in Gazankulu is 3,2%. What is the natural increase of Botswana? It is 2,9% while that of Bophuthatswana is 4,8%. We can allow for mortality, but a crossing of our borders into South Africa is undeniably taking place which one cannot control under all circumstances. The natural increase of the Vendas is 4,8%, while the natural increase in Mozambique over six years has been 1,26% per annum on average.

Are our borders so poorly guarded?

It is not a question of our borders being poorly guarded, but just as the people of the Transkei desert the Transkei to come and work in the Cape, so the inhabitants of those countries cross the borders into South Africa to come and work here. I want to point out to hon. members that the whole Western and North Western part of the Transkei is Sotho speaking. In the course of years these people have infiltrated into the Transkei from Lesotho. This does not mean that a very small percentage per annum does not still come over to the Transkei from Lesotho today. That is why I say that this applies to the whole of South Africa. South Africa is the “jampot” which attracts people from neighbouring states. Where the people are in the homelands, the White areas attract them. They follow the work and that is why they come from across our borders and that is why we get them here in Cape Town and everywhere in South Africa. Those 14 million people are not all our people. I therefore maintain that the land which we have made available for these people is big enough for them. If the provision we had made were for South Africa and the legitimate increase of South Africa’s Bantu alone, there would be far fewer Black people in South Africa today than is at present the case. Therefore the White man need have no feeling of guilt in respect of the Black man. We know our duty and we shall carry out our duty under all circumstances.

Mr. Chairman, after the statistical survey of the hon. member for Aliwal, I do not think there is much more I can say on the subject of population and areas in the Republic. There is another matter of broader policy that I would like to deal with. There are in this country many misguided “verligte” intellectuals who are misleading the public into believing that the policy of separate development has reached the point of no return. This policy, I believe, has reached not only the point of no return but also a point which, through the ideological ineptitude of the Government, will lead to God knows where. There is no evidence to show that a peaceful and evolutionary process will be maintained. The frequent and outspoken demands of the Bantu leader and the recent strikes are a very clear indication of an increasing frustration, a growing disquiet and a disenchantment with the policy of separate development. The labour pattern and, indeed, the policy of the Government prove conclusively that the golden year of 1978 which was predicted by Mr. Blaar Coetzee, recently of Rome and now of the Sunday Times, is a mere figment of his ideological imagination. Laws are perpetually being passed by this House and proclamations made by the Minister to give more paper power to governments that are realizing more and more the symbols of political power are utterly meaningless without the possession of a real and meaningful share in the economic cake of Southern Africa. The Government must be fully aware of this and it is past high time for them to stop banging the ideological tub and playing with words and get down instead to recognizing the true facts and begin governing the country in the interests of all its people and not just in the interests of the ideology of the Nationalist Party.

What have we had from the Government and the Minister over the past year? Have we had anything that gives us any joy? Last year, on 3rd February, and then again on 8th May in a speech which is reported in Hansard, col. 6741, the Minister enunciated six points with which I want to deal here briefly. His first point was that his policy was based on multi-nationalism: “Veelvolkigheid” full stop; we had to accept this. This House, this Government and this country should realize that, if you accept multi-nationalism, it means a form of balkanization, “verbrokkeling”, with all its potential dangers and all its instability.

Do you believe in a one-nation concept?

I shall tell you. We believe that South Africa is a multi-racial country and that a common loyalty to South Africa as a whole should be built up and engendered in the interests of all races and all minority groups in this country. I come to the second point the hon. the Minister made. He said that there was a parallelism in his policy in respect of the Bantu in the White areas and the Whites in the Bantu homelands. This is ideological claptrap. It is political palliative of the worst and most misleading kind. A parallel cannot be drawn between the Bantu in the White areas and the Whites in the Bantu area. Anybody who believes or imagines that this can be done must be verging on the insane. Thirdly, the hon. the Minister said that the Bantu in the White areas enjoyed their own rights of citizenship in their own homelands. He mentioned the Bantu Citizenship Act. This naturally is a ridiculous theory and has been dealt with and will be dealt with by some of my colleagues. One might as well say to me: Go and exercise your citizenship in your countries of origin, namely Britain, Scotland and Holland. The urban Bantu, and not only the urban Bantu, but the Bantu who have been living in White areas for centuries, some of them as long as us who are sitting in this House, are not interested in exercising the vote somewhere else. They need a place to exercise their vote with people with common interests, if they are to have the vote.

The fourth point the hon. the Minister made was that he said that as far as possible the Bantu should be present in their own homelands to the maximum extent and to the minimum extent in the homeland of another. Had he used the term “in their own residential area”, it could have been acceptable; one could perhaps have understood that, but does the Minister understand and realize the hardships that the homeland-map-drawing and the township-building in the homelands have created for individuals? Does the Minister realize that the homeland township of Mdantsane near East London is 12 miles away from East London and that if one lived there and worked in the industrial area of the Westbank you have to get up at 3 o’clock in the morning in order to wash and have your breakfast?

Nonsense.

You go and check; I have been there. You have to do this in order to get to work at 8 o’clock and you are very lucky if you are back by 9 o’clock. Does he believe that that is the way in which you can get maximum productivity, the maximum happiness and the maximum usefulness out of people? No, this is wrong. What about the proposed town at Committees where we have had a section of the Bantu area at Grahamstown declared a Coloured area and the Bantu are to be moved 20 miles away? It is not subsidized bus services you need here when you move people away from their place of work and move them to a place miles away. They do not want a subsidized bus service or a subsidized train service. It should be a free one. Can the hon. the Minister tell us how you buy the time you lose with your family; how you buy the time you lose away from your home, travelling backwards and forwards? These are things that the hon. the Minister should think about seriously when he thinks about the ideological idea of sleeping in your homeland and working somewhere else.

The fifth point the hon. the Minister made was that in regard to the Bantu within the White areas there should be adequate housing. That is most acceptable to us but why does he then not see to it that there is adequate housing for the Bantu in the White areas? I have just mentioned the fact that there is perpetually the argument that we cannot build more houses because they have to be moved from point A to point B. The position in my own constituency, as the hon. the Minister knows, is that a town is being planned 20 miles away. There is an urgent need for 1 000 houses now and immediately. What has the department granted? One hundred houses and a possible further 100. I do not believe that the planning of the other town is ever off the drawing-board. No road has been built to the site; there is no water, so when is that town, if ever, going to be buiilt? You can put a man in a castle, but if he is far away from his work and if he is poor, he will be unhappy. I say that our policy is to put houses where they are necessary and where the people work.

In the cities?

We have had them in the cities all your life-time and that position will continue during your lifetime and your children’s lifetime. In spite of the ideology of the Government he supports he will continue to have them in increasing numbers if he wants to live off the economy of South Africa.

I now come to the sixth and last point that the hon. the Minister made. He said that the Bantu in the White areas should have good liaison with the Bantu in the homeland areas to which they belong. Sir, there are many hundreds of thousands of Bantu who haven’t a clue to which homeland they belong. They want to have an affinity with the people they have common interests with.

You are talking tripe.

If the hon. the Minister says it is tripe he may come along with me and I will show him people who have not a clue to which homeland they belong. [Interjections.] I said hundreds but I personally know of thousands. He said that there should be good Bantu relations with the Bantu in the homelands. We have warned him before that he is creating and building a nationalism which is boomeranging on him. What is the cardinal point that is necessary today in South Africa? It is not so much the need for good Black/Black relations. Is it not of cardinal importance—and the hon. the Minister never mentioned this—that there should be first class relations and constant liaison between the Bantu in the White areas and the Whites in whose areas they live? [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, in the few minutes at my disposal I should like to apologize firstly for not dealing with the points that have been raised by the hon. member for the Transkei. I do so out of respect for the hon. the Leader of the Opposition who raised quite a few of these same points during the discussion of the Prime Minister’s Vote. I think it is only right that I should reply when the hon. the Leader of the Opposition is present in the House. I will try to do so if I am granted the opportunity. In the few minutes left to me I would like to deal, firstly, with the points raised by the hon. member for Jeppes who was kind enough to inform me that he will not be here tomorrow. Hon. members will therefore excuse me if I jump from one point to another. I will try and explain as briefly as possible the points to which he objected.

*In the first place the hon. member put a question in regard to the chairmen of the appointed administration boards. In a way which was really rather unlike him, the hon. member became somewhat excited. I think that it is necessary for me to say that I shall not tell lies to this House or operate in an underhand way. I have said this before. The object of the administration boards is to operate in the interests of the Bantu and in the interests of the White man, but in accordance with the guide-lines and policies of the ruling party that has a mandate to work along those lines. Therefore I accept full responsibility for the appointment of the members of these boards. However, there is something I want to state very clearly. I have never asked anyone for his National Party membership card. Nor have I asked him whether he belongs to the Party. But I did ensure before considering all these names, that the chairman was prepared in all respects, not only to carry out the policy of the Government of the day, but also to lend it impetus. I do not want to have a quarrel with hon. members about that. I tell you in all honesty that that is my standpoint. Anyone who argues against that must be naïve to think that I would appoint as chairman of such a board, a person who would undermine my policy. In the second place I want to make a statement regarding the officials serving on the boards. As I have already said publicly and as the hon. the Leader of the House has repeatedly said, where the appointment of officials on the basis of merit is concerned, it has been and will remain my standpoint that these people who are to work as officials for the boards, will be appointed on merit, as long as they are prepared to execute the instructions they are given. I shall treat them honestly. From the start I have tried to do this in executing the mandate I have received from my Minister and Government. This much as far as the administration boards are concerned.

†Mr. Chairman, I want to deal very briefly with the question of migrant labour. I want to tell the hon. member that I am also not always happy with the system. I can say to the hon. member for Houghton too that there are many things in this country with which I am not perfectly happy and that is why we are always trying to improve these conditions. I have told hon, members that these measures which we are taking are taken with a view to improving conditions with which we are not happy. I have also said that I am inviting the advice of all hon. members and of people in the academic field who criticize us at times, to give me positive views on how to improve certain things with which they are not satisfied. Therefore, I did say that I am not perfectly happy with the Alexandra Hostel scheme.

Business interrupted in accordance with Standing Order No. 23.

House Resumed:

Progress reported and leave granted to sit again.