Mr. Speaker, I move without notice—

Agreed to.

Mr. Chairman, for the information of the House I should like to make a statement in connection with a matter affecting the Department of Information, before the discussion on the Vote commences.

Since three homeland governments have requested the establishment of an information service of their own, and since there are indications that others will shortly follow suit, this is perhaps the right time and place to turn back a few pages of the history of the internal information division of my department as far as information and liaison services among our Bantu ethnic groups are concerned. There one might possibly find the reason why Bantu leaders, in particular, ar so information-conscious and are endeavouring, even at this stage of their political development, to have an information department of their own.

I should like to take hon. members back to the debates in this House during 1951. It was in that year that the foundations were laid for the political development of our Bantu ethnic groups. That was when the Bantu Authorities Act was finalized. But it was also in the same year and during the same session of Parliament that the establishment of an information division at the then Department of Native Affairs was announced. Apparently Bantu leaders did not ascribe this to mere chance. Due to the sustained contact and opportunities for exchanging ideas with information officers since that time, White as well as Bantu—i.e. people recruited from among their own ethnic group—and particularly due to an awareness fostered in South Africa and abroad, by these officials, of the Bantu’s political development, information is classed as a necessity for their further development, especially now when they themselves are taking the helm to an ever-increasing extent.

Consequently it is not strange that at this stage of their development homeland leaders are endeavouring to obtain an information service of their own. On the contrary. It testifies to sound insight on their part and is a feather in the cap of the department for the department having made them as information-conscious as they are.

After the establishment of information services of their own for homeland governments had been accepted in principle in 1971, the Chief Minister of the Transkei, in consultation with the department, announced the establishment of an information division associated with the department of the Chief Minister. This service was established in the Transkei on 1 April of this year.

Since that time the establishment of similar services at the request of the governments of Bophuthatswana and the Ciskei has enjoyed attention, and announcements in this regard may be expected by the homeland governments concerned within the foreseeable future.

It is also essential to announce that, while the department, at the request of the homeland governments, will faithfully assist them in the development of information services of their own and the training of their officials, experienced Bantu officials of the department—63 in all—are being encouraged to join the information services of their homelands.

Although, from the nature of the case, homeland information services cannot be orientated towards countries abroad at this stage of the political development of the homelands, and the department will still have to lend assistance in this respect, homeland governments are already being encouraged, with a view to training, to make some of their officials available when, for example, foreign guests have to be provided with information in their homeland areas and information programmes have to be drawn up and executed.

Having regard to the development of our Bantu homelands to ultimate autonomous and independent areas and the Government’s obligation to train, inter alia, officials for their responsible task in the service of their own government services, as well as services abroad, the department has, pending formal approval by the Cabinet, already considered and planned training programmes. I might just add that with a view to training abroad and pending formal approval in this regard, suitable graduates were appointed by the Department as Bantu information officers during March of this year. For interest’s sake I might just mention that one of them studied at the University of the North and obtained a B.A. degree with German, inter alia, as a major subject. He speaks German perfectly fluently.

The department intends, especially since formal approval has been obtained from the Cabinet in this regard, involving Bantu officers, too, in this programme early in the coming year when the training programme for 1975 commences. After a short period of training and orientation they will, with a view to further training, be placed as information officers in the following foreign offices of the department, viz. New York, London, Cologne and Paris.

Because these officials are trained and offered an opportunity of gaining experience, primarily for subsequent service to their own ethnic groups, I readily rely on homeland governments as far as the selection of these candidates is concerned, and it is my intention to consult them in this regard.

I might just mention that this training programme is nothing new. Possibly it is just an extension of what is already being done internally. I have already mentioned that, with the establishment of an information service of their own, homeland governments have already encouraged experienced Bantu information officers, who are at present still in the service of the department, to join their homeland governments. They were trained in the department and gained their experience there. Throughout, however, the prospect has been held out of their ultimately rendering service to their own people.

You need not explain it away.

No, no. [Interjections.] I think your party has much more to explain away than I have.

*The abovementioned also applies to Indian and Coloured information officers, of whom there are a total of 13 in the service of the department at present. They not only render valuable service to the department, but are also inspired with the idea of service to their own communities, and will be encouraged in that direction. Consequently it is the intention of the department to involve officials who represent these communities in the training programme during the coming year, as well as to place some of them at foreign offices of this department for further training within the next year.

Mr. Chairman, I want to make a few remarks later on in connection with the hon. the Minister’s statement. Before I begin my speech, I should just like to say that it is a pity that we should find ourselves in the position where we on this side have a total of only 50 minutes in which to form a judgment on the activities of the Department of Information.

Talk to your Whips about it.

I am not blaming the hon. the Minister for that. I just want to say that I hope we shall be able to work out a different arrangement in this connection at next year’s main session.

Under the circumstances in which South Africa finds itself today, particularly with regard to its international relations, the Department of Information has an extremely important task to perform. It is noteworthy that the vote of the Department of Information already runs to R10½ million, which is only R3 million less than that of the Department of Foreign Affairs. The department plays an extremely important role and we are fully aware of this.

Sir, one of the most important projects which the department has completed during the past year, is the publication of the new year-book. It was absolutely essential for us to have an authoritative and comprehensive reference book of this kind about South Africa, and it is pleasing that the void has eventually been filled. Let me add that, as in the case of any new undertaking, there is of course scope for criticism. Personally I think that the year-book could have been made a little less bulky without prejudicing the quality of the content. In my opinion, what is said in the book could have been said in less than the million words which the book now contains. There will not be time to raise further points of criticism. I just want to support my argument that the book could have been less bulky. For example, in the opening chapter, “Calendar 1973”, the following is stated—

Sir, it would have been news if a secretary of a department had differed from his Government’s policy, but it really does not justify the best part of an inch to inform the word that a head of a department supported his Government’s policy. I believe that there is a great deal of unnecessary verbosity and repetition in the book, but in general I must say that it is a fine production and an outstanding advertisement for South Africa.

We are pleased, Sir, that the hon. member submitted his annual report to us timeously this year. I read on page 5 that South Africa “must prepare herself well” in four areas for the coming year or three, and the report goes on to mention that the first and most important task, is to resist “an attack on all regulations, customs and laws that can even remotely be construed as purely racist”. Sir, I agree entirely with this finding, and we should like to hear from the hon. the Minister how he and his Government are going to prepare themselves, to use the words of the report, to contend with this attack in the interests of South Africa.

In a number of the department’s publications one comes across the statement that the Government is applying itself to effecting an improvement in relations with the rest of Africa. For example, I have before me a publication distributed abroad, Progress through Separate Development. In it there appears a speech by the hon. the Minister in which he says, inter alia—

Sir, that is well put, but it does occur to one, if one studies the annual report of the department, that there is an almost total lack of attention paid by the Minister’s department to Black states, including our neighbouring states. Admittedly, in 1973 the department did take part in a show at Lourenço Marques, at one in Manzini and also at one in Blantyre. But the guest programme which brings about a hundred guests and visitors to South Africa every year on an official basis, evidently disregards Africa altogether, and the same evidently applies as far as the department’s film programme is concerned. I see that films are distributed in 26 countries; 11 of them are South American countries, but according to the report, Africa and our neighbouring states do not come into the picture at all.

I should be obliged if the hon. the Minister could tell us something more about the relationship abroad between his department and the Department of Foreign Affairs. The hon. the Minister will concede that that relationship ought to be of the best at all times. Sir, I should not like to mention the names of places or persons, but I did get the impression at a few places overseas—I emphasize the word “impression”—that the Department of Information is pursuing an independent course which does not necessarily always co-ordinate well with the task of the Department of Foreign Affairs. I should like to hear from the hon. the Minister what is being done to ensure sound co-ordination between the work of the Department of Foreign Affairs and that of his own Department of Information.

I have seen a number of the department’s publications. I was particularly interested in the publications that were distributed abroad, and I must say that they are exceptionally good. The publications concerning the homelands, in particular, are exceptionally well done. In my opinion the one dominating weakness of the department is still the fact that it does not have handbooks providing the answers to all those difficult and embarrassing questions concerning race and colour which are continually being put to South Africans abroad. The hon. the Minister will have noticed that the President of the South African Foundation, Dr. Jan Marais, recently drew attention to what he regarded as the 20 most difficult questions which South Africans had to answer abroad and on international platforms. It is fairly easy to reply to questions about the homelands, but it is extremely difficult even for experienced politicians to reply to the kind of question listed by Dr. Jan Marais. I note in the Annual Report that the Government is working on a book in which they say that replies will be provided to the numerous questions which officers of the department, and South African visitors overseas in particular, have to answer daily. Sir, we look forward to it; I think that it is a good thing that this is being done, and I hope that it will measure up to the necessary standards. Because if the Department of Information is unable to assist the thousands of South Africans who travel abroad in replying to difficult questions such as those listed by Dr. Jan Marais, then the Department is not performing its whole task.

While we have full sympathy for the department’s overseas publications programme, I am unfortunately unable to say the same about the domestic publication programme. We can see no valid reason, unless the hon. the Minister is able to convince us in this regard, why the taxpayer, for example, should have to pay out more than R60 000 per annum so that a publication like Comment and Opinion may be published, of which 55 500 are distributed weekly within South Africa, but only 2 300 abroad. The same goes for Panorama; it costs the country R809 000, but the vast majority of the editions of this publication circulate within the country and not abroad. Then there is South African Digest (Suid-Afrika Oorsig), which costs the country a quarter of a million rand per annum, and the entire circulation is domestic. The same goes for some of the other publications. I am not referring to those publications which aim to influence relations between White and other population groups. Sir, our reading public in South Africa is exceptionally well served by news papers and magazines of both a popular and a scientific nature, and I am really unable to see any good reason why a Government department such as this should operate in this domestic field and afflict the taxpayer even more than is necessary.

I note, Sir, that for the first time, mention is made of part-time training for a group of departmental officials. This is to be welcomed, but I do want to point out—and the Minister has already replied to the question in part—that it is going to become imperative for non-White South Africans, too, to be employed and trained in the Department of Information abroad. [Time expired.]

Sir, I think I should mention that today for the first time the hon. member for Bezuidenhout is acting as chief spokesman on the Information Vote. I want to thank him for keeping this debate at such a high level in his speech this afternoon and for the fact that what he said about the department redounded to its credit. I want to thank him for that, too. I want to associate myself with what he said in that I also wart to thank and pay tribute to the hon. the Minister and the department from this side of the House for this fine, illuminating and colourful annual report we have been provided with.

Sir, if one reads this report, one can see exactly what this department is doing and how the officials work. It is no cause for wonderment to see, for example, that over a period of 14 weeks the officials worked no less than 526 hours of overtime. That includes weekends, public holidays, and so on. Then we realize why it is possible for a small department without many officials to do so much for South Africa, both within South Africa itself and abroad. South Africa conveys its sincere thanks to the Minister and to his officials, one and all of them. Sir, the hon. member for Bezuidenhout had one complaint to make about his fine year-book—South Africa, 1974. He quoted one paragraph here and said that to him it seemed a little long. I think we would do well to have a look at what this year-book encompasses. In 1973 the Cabinet decided to publish a year-book of this kind. The last year-book appeared in 1960 and was published by the Department of Census and Statistics. On 20 August of this year, in other words, a year after the decision was taken, this copy was handed over to the hon. the Minister, prepared, compiled and printed—the lot—in its final form, and I can tell you that that takes some doing. This year-book comprises 1 100 pages. It is as big as the year-books of New Zealand and Australia combined. Only the Canadian year-book is bigger, with 1 400 pages. I want to point out to the hon. member that it is not only I and my people who say this. What does the Star, for example, say about this yearbook? I want to quote what Mr. Percy Baneshik says—

That is what The Star says about the book, and I think that we can agree with that. I think that probably it has seldom occurred in the history of South Africa that such a fantastic piece of work has been completed in such a short time. It embraces 55 chapters with three addenda and, as the hon. member said, contains over a million words. This book deals with virtually every facet of South Africa. It deals with the entire country—for example our economy, politics, trade, industry, mining, and judicial system, foreign relations, welfare, education, culture and literature and the various peoples, etc.

Sir, the typesetting for the book required no less than 6,5 metric tons of lead. The index, with its more than 10 000 entries, gives us an idea of how comprehensive it is and how thoroughly this has been gone into. Sir, 90% of the more than 300 maps, photographs and diagrams are in colour— a beautiful piece of work and an advertisement for South Africa. Next to encyclopaedias, this year-book, together with all the questions replied to here over the floor of the House by our hon. Minister and taken up in Hansard, is South Africa’s most copious source of information and we express our sincere thanks for it. But it was not only this department who were concerned with this. There are the various other Government departments and a whole list of names of people in the private sector. We are grateful that those people found the time and were prepared to put in so many hours and so much labour to produce such a fine piece of work for South Africa. Mr. Minister, we pay tribute to you and your Department for this fine piece of work.

Sir, what is the function of the Department of Information as such. It is to gather information and convey it to all the peoples of South Africa, and in addition, to distribute it abroad. Knowledge is power, and to acquire knowledge requires research and study. It is only he who has knowledge who is able to capture his position and to hold his own. It is in this respect that this department has been holding its own throughout South Africa and overseas. I want to tell the hon. member for Bezuidenhout that it was my privilege to visit seven countries in Western Europe during the recess. It was not only my impression, but I experienced and witnessed the fact, that the co-operation between the Department of Information and the Department of Foreign Affairs was most cordial, and I can only praise the way in which these two departments have cooperated abroad to promote South Africa’s name and hold it high.

Sir, it is not the function of the Department of Information merely to sit and look. We have to attack, in that we must approach the other man and get through to him; we must convey knowledge to him. It is also true that we are unable to reach every living soul in the entire world with our information. That is why it is essential that we should reach the policy-makers and the opinion-formers in order that we may convey information to them. One statesman, one leader, one person in the position of power, can do a great deal of harm. It is our task to expose the falsity of the world. There are other things, too, that we have to rectify in the world. I just want to refer to one example. When Mr. Wilson, the present Prime Minister of England, states that the English firms that have interests in South Africa, shoulld pay their skilled labourers here more, we should immediately ask him: “Mr. Wilson, since you say that, why do you not complain about the English firms in Hong Kong who pay their labourers 1/94th of what labourers in Johannesburg are paid for similar work?

Why do you not talk to your English firms in Ceylon, who pay their workers 1/50th of what similar workers in Johannesburg are paid?” Sir, we must conquer the world and bring our information home to the world. In my opinion it is the duty of everyone in this country to strive for that. It is also the duty of every M.P. who goes overseas. I am pleased the hon. member for Houghton is here this afternoon, because I want to ask her: What does she do when she is overseas? [Interjections.] Sir, on 13 April 1967 this hon. member said the following in this House (Hansard, Vol. 20, col. 4179)—

That is her philosophy of life. Sir, I say that when she is overseas she gets up to much more mischief. I wonder whether she has ever said anything to uphold South Africa’s name or said anything good about us. I wonder whether the hon. the Minister could perhaps tell us whether the hon. member for Houghton has ever come to him or to the department to request information in order to facilitate South Africa’s task overseas and promote our name abroad. We must remember that the hon. member often goes overseas. I think she goes overseas once or twice every year. I myself should like to hear the hon. members contribution. But if she does not want to do this, I should like to hear whether the hon. the Minister could perhaps tell us what she has done.

Sir, this afternoon I want to ask what else this department can do. We must entrench ourselves, and one field in which we shall be able to do so, is the field of television, which is to be introduced by the Department of National Education. It is true that television has its pros and cons. One of the pros is that it will be possible for this information to be distributed through the world. Dr. Meyer, the head of the SABC, said that he was going to appoint a committee consisting of experts to advise him. I want to ask that this department be represented on that committee, either by the head of the department, or by his deputy, because I do not believe that there is another department with so much experience of television abroad as this very Department of Information. In my opinion these officials will be able to give good service in this connection.

I also want to ask that when television is introduced, this department be given at least a half hour every day to offer real information in the form of facts and documentary programmes. We know what a fine film service we have. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout has already referred to that. It would be a good thing for South Africa and for the rest of the world if this were to be disseminated via our television service. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I want to congratulate the department on the exceptional feats it has achieved in a few spheres in recent times. It is of the utmost importance for us as South Africans, in the light of the problems confronting us, especially in the light of the sustained attempts at isolating South Africa, to take the greatest interest in he successful execution of the task of his department. I think all of us are, to a large extent, proud and thankful that the department has achieved success with this task in so many respects. When I express some criticism later on, I want to make it quite clear at this stage that it does not arise out of a negative and destructive approach to this matter.

I want to associate myself with what the hon. member for Bezuidenhout said in connection with the year book published by the department. It contains a wealth of information, and although I have certain misgivings about it, time does not permit me to go into them. I find, for example, that at too many places in the year book a type of rationalization is employed in order to defend certain things which cannot be defended. On another occasion I should very much like to indicate more fully the exact points I have in mind in this regard. Here, once again, I do not want to create a negative image by emphasizing what I regard as unnecessary things appearing in the year book, while the other positive things are left unsaid.

I listened with great attention to the hon. member for Sunnyside and basically I agree with him except that I, perhaps due to my limited experience abroad, have serious misgivings about the "et tu” argument, the argument that the other person is as much of a sinner, is in the wrong as well and is not doing right. I wonder whether it would have any impact abroad for the purposes of selling South Africa and South Africa’s image.

The importance of the department’s task is obvious. The necessity for close cooperation between the Department of Information and the Department of Foreign Affairs is just as obvious. In the light of the rumours which did the rounds, I should like to have an assurance from the hon. the Minister that we can rely on proper liaison work, consultation and co-operation taking place between the Department of Information and the Department of Foreign Affairs, the two departments which, after all is said and done, have to represent South Africa abroad and uphold South Africa’s image overseas.

I was also impressed by the more business-like approach—if I may use the term —the department has been displaying in recent times, for we are engaged in selling a product. This product is South Africa, South Africa with its opportunities, South Africa with its problems and South Africa with all its positive and negative aspects. When one is engaged in marketing, if one approaches something as if one is marketing a product, the first task is to determine who one’s competitors are and which products they are selling. I am sure the department does indeed do so. If we can determine who the people abroad are who are aggravating our case to a large extent, and, where necessary, concentrate on those people we shall at least be rendering assistance in eliminating the negative elements. I say again that I know the department is already doing so. I am merely pleading that it be done in a scientific manner, knowing full well that when we come to the leftists and communists we shall not make much progress. It is just as important for us to determine who our friends are. I am grateful to be able to say that I am impressed, in terms of my own experience, with the staff of this department. I am impressed with their dedication, their earnestness and their objectivity. I am also grateful that the hon. the Minister announced that non-Whites were going to be used in this service. However, I should like to go further than the hon. the Minister is going, in that I do not think we should make use of the services of Black people abroad exclusively on the basis of the connection they have with the homeland governments. Now, there again we have …

I did not say so.

Correct. The hon. the Minister also spoke of the others who were being trained. I must say I am particularly grateful that they will be stationed in the four cities of Cologne, London, New York and Paris. It seems to me as though we should direct far more of our energy and capital at those cities since we have the opportunity there of being able to meet the representatives from Black Africa and other non-White countries in the world, with whom we otherwise do not have sufficient contact. In that respect we shall certainly be able to facilitate our work in this way.

Finally I should like to say that, if we want to sell something, our success depends on the product we are wanting to sell. If the product is poor and does not meet requirements, the application of our marketing staff and marketing techniques as well as our marketing concentration and all our efforts to achieve market penetration will be fruitless. I want to repeat that I have often found abroad that the complexity of our question, the problem facing a White minority here, i.e. the problem of the many-sidedness of our population structure—multi-nationality, multi-racialism, or whatever one wants to call it—as well as the real difficulties bound up with the difference in standards of living, can indeed be sold abroad. In fact, we can succeed in having a greater understanding of all South Africa’s problems take root abroad. I think we may also gain a large measure of understanding abroad of the economic and political development of the homelands. But it has also been my experience that we shall never be able to sell apartheid, not apartheid as being the development of the homelands as such, but apartheid which consists of negative, enforced separation between person and person on the grounds of race and colour, and of discrimination which amounts to the subjugation of one group to another on the grounds of race and colour. Apartheid is a product we shall never be able to sell. It is not a saleable product. Consequently I am grateful to see that the department does not emphasize it, but that their attitude is: “We try to get away from it”. However, we are not getting away from those things quickly enough, not quickly enough to counteract the isolation which is threatening us. I am not engaged in a petty argument, for these matters are far too serious for that, both in terms of our internal situation and our image in the eyes of the outside world. I want to say in all honesty and earnestness that we cannot sell that product, no matter what we do. We shall have to bring our domestic policy into line with those basic principles. We cannot indefinitely remain the only country in the world which has laid down its official policy in legislation and in administrative measures by means of which the enforced separation between groups of people is effected on the grounds of race and colour, particularly when people of a certain race or colour are subjected to different and frequently inferior treatment in many respects. One thinks here of the differentiation in respect of salaries and wages, and that type of thing. All I am pleading for is that we get away from the peculiar situation which only we have. To be specific, of all the Western countries in the world we are the only one that has a policy of discrimination and separation between person and person on the grounds of race and colour. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I listened attentively to the hon. member for Edenvale who has just resumed his seat. I have no fault to find with the greater part of his speech, except for the end part in which he displayed a totally false notion of the true situation in respect of the policy of separate development. Even Black people who are abroad at present, for instance Chief Matanzima of the Transkei, say that people there have a totally false notion of what is going on in South Africa. Now, if the hon. member speaks in the manner he has just done, he is definitely not facilitating the task of the Department of Information. That which he is advocating he is making more difficult at the same time by the way in which he expressed himself on separate development. However, I want to leave the hon. member at that.

As is the case with any other country’s information service, it is also the task of our own Department of Information, in the interests of South Africa, to convey to the outside world the fine image of stability in respect of our national government, in respect of our economic situation—in fact, in respect of the whole social order in South Africa—and to propagate South Africa as an unparallelled wonderland with its unspoilt natural beauty and wealth of natural resources, and to make known to the world the excellence of all South Africa’s peoples—White, Black and Brown, people who are living here together in peace, and harmony as an example to the rest of the world. So one can go on pointing out the variety and the diversity of the tasks of the Department of Information.

There is yet another aspect I want to add to this list, and that is to emphasize to the West South Africa’s strategic position at the southernmost tip of Africa, as the basis for the maintenance of the balance of power in the two most important oceans of the world, i.e. the Indian and the Atlantic. I would say that these are the relatively easy and obvious tasks of the Department of Information. Over and above this, the Department also has the unenviable task of neutralizing the cunning, the covert motives and even the direct attacks of our enemies. This is not always very easy since hostile and unpatriotic elements are living and working among us. At present we find them mainly in the ranks of the Progressive Party, with their small cliques which move about in the half-light of the political underworld, inspired by nebulous motives. They are abetted by an information medium which has succeeded in infiltrating the English Press systematically. These people now find themselves in a position of power where they can use the English Press as an information medium for file vilification of South Africa, for malicious exploitation …

Oh, you are talking nonsense.

I am not referring to the hon. member himself.

The English Press has gone as far as converting the English language as an information medium into, may I say, a despicable weapon for waging war against South Africa and chiefly against the Afrikaans-speaking person and his institutions. Our people are beginning to detest this. One starts to wonder, with heaviness of heart, whether the conservative, well-meaning and patriotic English-speaking person does not discover that this very feeling can take root among the mass of Afrikaans-speaking people.

If time permits me, I shall refer again later on to the important and active role the English Press can play as an information medium when it wants to act as an active partner to the Department of Information to destroy the hostility against South Africa prevailing abroad, instead of igniting it and adopting a negative stand towards it, something to which we have become accustomed over the years.

As I have already said, it is the unenviable task of the Department of Information to neutralize the cunning, the covert motives and even the direct attacks of our enemies. In this regard hon. members in this House have a very important role to play by facilitating through their actions— unlike the hon. member for Edenvale—the task of the Department of Information at all times, the task of conveying a positive image of South Africa to the outside world. And now, one unfortunately gains the impression, which I find regrettable, that there are a few members in this House—and I am saying this in pursuance of the remark I have just made about the Progressive Party —that there are people here in this House who are bent on using their positions to assist our enemies with information which can contribute towards placing South Africa’s image in a poor light.

That is rubbish!

I think you are lending a hand in this regard!

The hon. member has enough problems of his own, so that he should not make interjections about things which he knows are quite correct.

The information obtained in this way— I shall tell the hon. member why I am saying so—also serves as grounds for fierce attacks on South Africa. I am saying this particularly as a result of questions the hon. member for Houghton placed on the Question Paper in this House, for oral reply mainly by the hon. the Minister of Police, of Justice and of Prisons.

That is because the answers embarrass you.

She does this in a particular way, for the sake of effect. She is an expert in that field. Of course, her speciality is questions about conditions in our prisons …

It is not the questions that are embarrassing, it is the answers.

… isolated suicide cases among detainees and the meting out of punishment to communists and other enemies of the State. But about the possible consequences of these people’s actions and their motives she says nothing. In fact, it is masterfully obscured by the way in which the hon. member puts the questions in this House. One might well ask what the hon. member’s intention is with these questions.

To get information.

“To get information”! But she phrases her questions in such a way that they suggest injust, brutal and even cruel treatment of certain people by the State.

However, the consequences of these people’s covert motives and evil actions, if they were to be allowed to proceed with them, leave her cold. She will not put questions in this House in such a way that the outside world will be informed of those motives and actions, for it does not form part of the political scheme she has in mind for South Africa. I do not want to question the hon. member’s indisputable right to put questions in this House. Not at all.

I should hope not!

What I do question is her intention, her loyalty, her patriotism towards South Africa, if one takes note of the nature of the questions she puts and the image of South Africa she tries to create in the eyes of the outside world.

I am going to leave the hon. member at that. I want to come to the English Press as an information medium, and the important influence it can exercise overseas in the interests of South Africa. I want to refer to three matters in particular. The first is the false charge against South Africa, the charge of mass-murder by our soldiers in the Caprivi. The second is the proposed visit of Admiral Biermann to America. The third is the so-called visit of Frelimo leaders to Saso and other organizations in South Africa. These three things are all of the utmost importance to South Africa. In fact, they are very delicate matters.

Which visits are you talking about?

It seems to me the hon. member is asleep. It seems to me he is Rip van Winkle, for he does not know what is going on.

Now, when one looks at the Caprivi question, one finds that the English Press announced this charge under banner headlines. They did so as if there might be something suspicious going on.

How many people read it outside?

The hon. member asks how many people read it outside. It is the only language or medium in which the outside world can read about South Africa. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I think that the hon. member who has just sat down has probably in 10 minutes undone the work it has taken the Department of Information some years to perform. This is the only Government and the only country that I know where, one stands up in Parliament when the various departmental affairs are being discussed, and discusses them, just about every subject that comes up for discussion is too delicate to discuss as it might upset people outside.

Who said so?

We cannot talk about information; we cannot criticize the Government because when we do so we are told that we are unpatriotic. We cannot talk about foreign affairs because of the situation abroad. We cannot talk about defence, we cannot talk about finance because of negotiations that are going on behind closed doors. What sort of Government is this that it cannot face the world? [Interjections.] What sort of Government is it? If the Nationalists had their way there would be no discussion on any topic in this country. That is what they want. They do not want discussion. They want to stifle discussion; they want to argue about every criticism that is passed, and they call it unpatriotic. What sort of patriots are you who try to discard democracy in the way that you do? [Interjections.] What sort of patriots are you? The job of the Opposition is to oppose, and that is what the Opposition is going to do.

Expose.

We are not going to be silenced by the crass arguments of the hon. member for Parys; we are not going to be silenced by these inverted Alice-in-Wonder land arguments that are advanced.

To get back to the Vote, the function of this department is to get through to, influence and convince decision-takers throughout the world—to quote the report of this department—“across the whole spectrum of public life in all countries that are of importance to us.” The department also uses media both ancient and modern. There are private discussions, there is the arranging of tours and interviews, public appearances, advertizing, publications, television and films. All these media have been introduced and are being used extremely well by the department. From the annual report of the department it is obvious that the Department of Information is today being given top priority. However, this is one of the few departments, I would say, which is of a political nature. Its efforts are directly influenced by the general performance of this Government. The department tries to project this Nationalist Government to the outside world in a favourable light.

Impossible!

Its job, the way it is being run, that is, to sell South Africa, and, inextricably bound up with South Africa, the Nationalist Party, is a difficult one.

Impossible!

The hon. member says it is impossible. In its report, the department itself admits—this is in any event self-evident when one looks at the difficulties we face at UNO, in the IMF and on the sporting scene, to name a few —that the progress that is being made is limited. The reality of its limited success is to be placed squarely at the door of this Nationalist Government and not at the door of the officials of the department. This Government is trying to gift-wrap South Africa. This it is doing most elegantly but it is losing sight of the fact that it is the contents of the package which count. It is not the gift-wrapping. South Africa’s policies under the Nationalist Party are highly undelectable, and very few people are prepared to swallow them. I venture to say that those who do swallow them very soon suffer from political indigestion.

The hon. member for Edenvale has already pointed out certain matters. I believe that he was very polite in so doing. I shall not be so polite. I want to be more specific. I want to spell it out. It is no good in a Government publication saying that there is full political debate in South Africa when you ban Land Apart, which reflects a debate across the political spectrum giving the views of all sorts of people. It is a contradiction to say that there is free debate when the citizens of South Africa are not allowed to see a film about politics in South Africa. It is no good during a television interview to talk about equality of opportunity when people of equal qualifications are paid vastly differing salaries merely because of the colour of their skin. Mr. Chairman, we cannot bluff the world; the world knows it. Statements in publications, over television, or in any manner or form, to the affect that there is equal opportunity in South Africa, make South Africa unbelievably unbelieved and make the work of the department more difficult. Sir, it is no good depicting scenes in a beautifully produced film showing that there is no discrimination and showing happy families while thousands are prevented by law from living with their wives and with their children; or painting a picture of a sunny Soweto while overcrowding, squalid living and enormous housing shortages are the way of life for the urban Black population. Sir, it is no good for the Department of Information to talk to a distinguished visitor here in South Africa, of our democratic State while we have laws which are used to ban people, people who have never had and perhaps never will have any say in the formulation of those laws. The democracies of the world are not going to be convinced by glossy pictures as to the rectitude of measures of this kind. It is no good stating at a public meeting in Toronto, for instance, that our legal system is fair and that everyone is equal before the law.

It is not fair?

No, it is not fair. Our legal system is discriminatory because hundreds of thousands of people every year pay in enormous sums of money in the aggregate for petty offences which they commit because of the colour of their skin; they suffer imprisonment for this. We cannot tell the world that we have a fair legal system while we have laws on the statute book which are implemented in the way in which the Government implements those laws. No modern Western country can understand this. All the facts and figures relating to schools, Bantustans and gold pale into insignificance when instances of the kind which I have quoted here are mentioned. Not only are we wrong in our policy but we cannot hide it.

Sir, this is not the fault of the department; it is the fault of the Government. The decisions of the department are largely taken by the Government. We just have to look at the annual report, which says at page 26 that in the past we threw away the vicious criticisms of South Africa as bits of paper and put them into wastepaper baskets but today …

May I put a question to the hon. member?

Mr. Chairman, I have only two minutes left. The report goes on to say that today things have changed in South Africa. Sir, I have here a quotation from a newspaper, and I apologize to hon. members for not being able to give them the reference; it is a week old but I have lost the date. It relates to a TV-film, “Last Grave at Dimbaza”. The Official South African reaction to this TV-film is that it is not going to put the other side of the question to London television viewers. This report reads—

Mr. Chairman, what sort of representation is that? This appeared in a newspaper about a film. Is it correct that this film is being shown? Is it correct that we refuse to answer? No matter how twisted or how wrong the film is—and I do not know the film at all—surely the answer is to put South Africa’s case, if you have got a case, at any time, at any place and before any forum.

Do you doubt that we have a case?

I doubt that South Africa’s racial policies are either saleable, correct, moral or right acceptable to South Africans or to anybody in the world. But, Mr. Chairman, if we have a case let us put it to the world. Let us appear on British TV, unless the 20 million or 15 million people who watch television are in fact of no interest to us. Why is there this selective answering of criticism of South Africa? Surely South Africa should be seen to be putting its case everywhere, and I would like an assurance in this regard.

The hon. member for Sandton tried to “out-Prog the Progs”. But I must say that the hon. members of the Progressive Party hid their heads in shame because of the totally irresponsible, destructive speech made by the hon. member. I want to say, Sir, that if these are the kind of irresponsible utterances we get from the so-called Young Turks, it was a sad day when one of them put his foot inside this House.

Reply to the criticism.

I shall do so. Sir, that hon. member speaks about discrimination. What is his party other than a discriminating party, his party which stands for overall White supremacy? [Interjections.] Don’t ask where—in every respect. They stand for overall White supremacy. Sir, together with hon. members of the United Party, I addressed groups of people in the U.S.A., and these people are not remotely interested in their policy. Ten, 20, 30 questions came my way, and not one went their way. Why? Because their policy is just not comprehensible. No one is interested in it, in any event. But that hon. member speaks about discrimination. Surely it is not the National Party that introduced discrimination into South Africa. [Interjections.] Discrimination is a tradition inherited from British colonial times. [Interjections.] We are in the process of, we are in a transitional period of eliminating discrimination. Our objective is to eliminate it completely.

In the year 5 000?

The hon. members so readily speak of discrimination. The Manifesto of U.N. speaks of discrimination not only on the grounds of race. It speaks of discrimination on the grounds of faith and sex as well. [Interjections.]

Where does more discrimination take place today against women, for example, than in those very countries which criticize us so vehemently? No, we have not yet achieved the joys of Heaven. There are still shortcomings in every country, but not every country’s Parliament has a member who is prepared to stand up and besmirch his country.

Not the country, but the National Government.

In these times in which we are living, in these times in which we have to fight for our existence, in debating chambers all over the world, this hon. member comes along and criticizes South Africa in such an irresponsible manner. He has the right to oppose and to criticize till the cows come home, as long as he wants to criticize this party, but he should at least know that when it comes to loyalty towards his fatherland, patriotism comes into play. I say it is extremely irresponsible to act in such a way.

I want to express a few ideas on the matter of the visitors’ programme, people from abroad who visit South Africa. I notice that in the past year R243 000 was voted for the visitors’ programme and that it has been almost doubled this year, i.e. R400 000. I do not doubt in the least that this is absolutely the best way for South Africa to spend its money in order to defend its image abroad. We publish beautiful publications—and I want to congratulate the department on them—but, as is the case here at home, all opinion-makers in the world are very busy people, and it often happens that our best publications land in the waste paper basket. But it is revelation to the man who is brought to this country, the man who comes along here and sees what is happening with his own eyes. He immediately sees that the position is completely different to what is often presented to him, for in the world outside there are people such as the hon. member who spoke before me, people who are charged with emotion and are totally unreasonable and unwilling to listen to the South African standpoint. Today there is an unwillingness in the world to listen to South Africa’s standpoint, but the people who are invited to this country as guests, to come and have a look at South Africa themselves, are people who can see for themselves quite objectively what is going on. The converse with me, they converse with the members of the Progressive Party, they converse with members of the United Party and they converse with whomsoever they wish. It is an irrefutable fact that the people who come over here, are generally very enthusiastic about South Africa. Many of them defend South Africa’s policy. Many of them arrange evenings at their homes at which they show films and slides. They invite their friends to these shows to bring the truth home to those friends of theirs as well. This is the position even in the case of many of those who were not friends of South Africa prior to their invitation. I want to say that it is decidedly the case that it is not only people who are favourably disposed towards us who are invited to pay us a visit. People who are very critical towards South Africa are also invited to this country. Even those people return with the understanding that matters here are far more complicated than they had thought. At least they return with the understanding that there is a Government here which is in earnest about and dedicated in its endeavour to solve the country’s problems. They return with the idea that they should like to get to know more and more about South Africa and that, if possible, they should like to come back.

In this regard it is a pity that there are local newspapers that abuse their position. I want to refer to a report which appeared recently about the selection of guests. It appeared in the Pretoria News of 2 September 1974, and was written by a certain Mr. Ken Owen, a reporter associated with the Argus Group in Washington. He wrote, inter alia, the following—

Hear, hear!

Sir, there an hon. member says “hear, hear”. I think it is absolutely disgraceful. I had the privilege of seeing the work the department is doing abroad, and if anyone says that this department and its officials have lost their “credibility” abroad, such a person is talking through his hat and does not know what he is talking about. The hon. member for Houghton agrees with me as far as this is concerned. These people disseminate information in a very sophisticated manner, and I think they deserve nothing but praise for the way in which they do so. But this writer went further. He said—

This man stated that the guests brought to this country, of which there were more than 500 last year, were all just “racists and extreme conservatives”. I want to say that this is a totally unpatriotic, irresponsible and dangerous statement. In the first place it can very easily be disproved. I have here a list of the guests during the past year or so, which reflects a large variety of professions and 19 different countries. What kind of witch-hunt would it not have been to pick out only the “racists and extreme conservatives”! In other words, these people are branded by this newspaper and like-minded persons, for people who are responsible leaders in their spheres would surely feel that if they were branded as “racists and conservatives”, they would not be able to accept invitations to South Africa again. This, therefore, is a kind of discrediting process of these people themselves so as to discredit them in their own countries and so as to assail their status in their own spheres. There are various kinds of people who accepted these invitations. A recent visitor was a senior editor who was a member of the so-called “Afro group” of newspapers in the U.S.A. Another recent guest was Mr. Arnold Forster of the “Anti-Deformation League” in the United States. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the near-hysteria this Committee has seen and experienced in the last 20 minutes in this debating chamber is either an indication of a guilty conscience or of uncertainty about a case that is being presented, or of a simple psychological case of an inferiority complex. I do not know what it is, but to me it is a sad day when criticism of the type which has come from this side of the House this afternoon is equated with treason, disloyalty or a lack of patriotism. This is a charge which I—and I am sure that I speak for everybody on this side of the House—reject with complete and utter contempt. I do not regard patriotism and loyalty to your country as implying the sort of behaviour one expects from an Mbongo who says that everything is right when he knows before Heaven that everything is not right. I regard patriotism as an obligation and a duty on the individual to do everything he can to improve his country and to make it worthy of the respect of the outside world. This is my conception of patriotism. For hon. members to criticize the actions of people like the hon. member for Houghton—[Interjections.] Just listen to that, Sir; there you have it. It hurts. The hon. member for Houghton goes overseas and she has the guts, the intelligence and the perspicacity to see the situation in this country in perspective. Whether they agree with it or not, she makes the task of those officials infinitely easier than all this “yes too-ism” that we hear from the other side of the House and of which nobody takes the slightest notice because it is not founded on fact. This is patriotism; this is loyalty. This other attitude which we get from the other side is utter nonsense and I am not going to follow on that. I am not going to follow the hon. member for Parys and the other hon. members on the other side of the House. This is a futile exercise and does this country no good whatsoever. However much it may distress my fellow beings on the other side of the House, I am going to talk in this critical spirit because I believe that this department needs the help of people with our views to make its task at least a little easier than it is.

I should like to begin by welcoming the statement made by the hon. the Minister this afternoon very warmly, the statement about the appointment of people of colour overseas. This is something which should have happened long ago. Like the hon. member for Edenvale I hope this is going to make the task of the Department of Information just a little easier than it is. Whether anybody opposite wants to believe it or not, that is in fact what people on this side of the House want to do. We are trying to make the task of the Department of Information, unenviable as it is, at least a little less difficult. Anybody who tries to sell official race policy—just listen to the howl that is going to come—overseas has almost an impossible task. I do not want to make it any more difficult, and to the extent that the Department of Information tries to counter lies about South Africa and distortions of its policy, of course it has the support of all right-minded and intelligent South Africans. I suggest that consciously and unconsciously the Department of Information is going far beyond that in its printed material today and that in doing so it is making its task infinitely more difficult than it need be. Too often the department is going far too far—I do not know whether it is doing this consciously and deliberately—to justify or to defend little more than party policy, much of which is of a highly contentious nature. I would say again that to the extent that it is guilty of that, it makes its task almost impossible.

This is the spirit in which I want to take a couple of examples from the publications of the Department of Information. I want to refer to the answers that the Secretary recently gave to “Difficult Questions” which the President of the South Africa Foundation—who, heaven knows, cannot be accused of having any sympathy with sickly humanism or communism—said that he and his associates come across in the outside world. In reply to the question: “What are you going to do with your urban Blacks?” the Department of Information gave a reply of about 350 words. This was an obvious evasion and it never got anywhere near answering the question. It contains this sentence amongst others—

That is an unexceptional statement of Nationalist ideology which totally evades the essence of the whole question. The outside world is not interested in a philosophy of this nature. It wants to know what the situation of nearly 50% of the Black people in this country is. What does giving them this kind of information achieve? I shall not call it “mumbo-jumbo”, but really, it is very little more than that. I want to suggest seriously that instead of trying to justify or to whitewash every single aspect of Government policy, the department should in its own, as well as in the national interest, for heaven’s sake every now and again concede that everything in this country is not perfect. They should concede that there are shortcomings and that mistakes are made. We cannot be the only country in the world that never makes mistakes or that never has any shortcomings. Many of the other questions and answers in this list were similarly dealt with and I would suggest in all sincerity that nobody with any real knowledge of the situation in South Africa will see this as a national response, but as a party response. I fear that it will not convince anybody.

Let us look quickly at the contents of the department’s annual report. It reproduces a series of magnificent advertisements which the Department of Information has been publishing overseas. Some of these are fine, but how much more effective and how much more accurate, to put it no higher, would it not have been if, when the department came to discussing what it called “Black capitalists”, it simply admitted the existence of poverty amongst vast numbers of Black people side by side with the developing middle class? Why run the risk of making us look foolish by suggesting that affluence is a characteristic of the Black population? This is simply utter rubbish! Everybody knows that this is not the case. That is the trouble. Consequently, when we are trying to create this sort of impression, nothing is achieved and our credibility goes to you-know-where.

I have very little time left, so I shall have to hurry. I want to come to the yearbook about which the hon. member for Sunnyside became so lyrical. I think it is a magnificent-looking publication, but I am afraid that it is emphatically not an objective yearbook. It is a partisan yearbook which is full of special pleading and self-justification and it is certainly not in the best traditions of a factual publication. I hope the hon. the Minister will accept the fact that I am now talking basically as an ex-newspaperman and not as a member of this party. Let us look at the chapter on the policy of multi-national development. This makes absolutely no effort to be any thing but a statement of straight Nationalist philosophy. Let me quote—

It does so for this consideration amongst others—

For crying out aloud, is this reality? How in the name of sanity can anyone get up and justify a piece of nonsense such as this on any but ideological grounds? Listen to what it has to say about South Africa’s political system—

[Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, it is late in the day when a member of this Parliament of the Republic of South Africa says that he doubts whether South Africa still has a case, as the hon. member for Sandton said here this afternoon. It is even later in the day when a member of the Progressive Party, viz. the hon. member for Parktown, says he defends that member for saying that South Africa no longer has a case to defend in the eyes of the world. To me these are the first signs we are seeing of a bridge which is developing between the Young Turks on the one hand and the Progressive Party on the other. In this we see the outcome of the very lively caucus meetings held in the Parliamentary buildings the last few days as well as these which are still to come.

But I should like to make my own speech this afternoon. Our information people overseas have an enormous task. As a David against a Goliath they have to resist an overwhelming onslaught on the front lines. They are up against suspicion sowing, misrepresentations and condemnations. The worst thing they are up against is the shameless application of double standards. To our critics it is nothing when half a million people in Biafra are annihilated in riots when 50 000 people are massacred in the Sudan, when 1 000 people in Ireland die as a result of a religious feud or when 5 000 are injured and 100 die in America in a series of riots, and when innocent people are massacred by terrorists. But South Africa’s Sharpeville is invariably cast in our teeth by U.N. A persistent and vehement campaign about colour and colour discrimination is conducted against South Africa, but the shocking discrimination we find in other parts of the world, discrimination against the poor, against classes of people, against castes in India, against religion, against colour and even against womankind, continues unchecked throughout the centuries. With certain tribes in Africa it is still the tradition that a woman should be back on the land to do her work 12 hours after her confinement. The husband then gets into bed to receive the visitors and the gifts. The non-Whites of the world are the very people among whom one finds the worst forms of discrimination and nobody in the whole wide world takes any notice of that. The hon. member for Edenvale said discrimination was a product South Africa could not sell. While! was listening to the hon. member speaking. I suddenly remembered something. What I remembered was that I had once read in a newspaper a letter written by a well-known Stellenbosch academic, one Prof. N. J. J. Olivier, in which he put forward an ardent defence for apartheid. I now want to deal with his discrimination. He says it is impossible to sell it. More is being done in South Africa than in any other country of the world to eradicate poverty. This, however, goes by unnoticed. It holds good for all times and in every community in which groups with different cultures and racial characteristics are in contact, that there is discrimination to a lesser or greater degree. In South Africa this is also something we have inherited from history. The key question in South Africa is not whether we have discrimination here, but whether we want to retain it. The key question is what we are doing so as to escape from it and how strong the wish is to escape from it. What did the hon. the Prime Minister say in this House in this regard earlier this year? I read from Hansard (col. 421 of 9 August 1974)—

Sir, this is how our Prime Minister expressed himself on discrimination.

Do you really believe that?

We do not accept the elements of discrimination in our community as being unalterable and permanent, but we realize, too, that they cannot be eliminated overnight. No country with such complicated relations problems can lay claim to being able to eliminate overnight, not even within decades, the elements of discrimination it inherited. The most highly developed countries of the world, such as Britain, America, Australia, Canada and Ireland, are all wrestling with this problem, let alone the under-developed countries. In view of the magnitude, seriousness and complexity of the problems, one wonders whether we, as far as the elimination of discrimination is concerned, do not have a better record than many of these countries. The elements of discrimination which we inherited and which are still in existence, will gradually disappear as our policy of separate development evolves and especially as the tremendous gap in the level of development between White and non-White narrows. These countries who maintain that they do not have statutory discrimination, must not think they can escape criticism. We find social, political and economic discrimination of the worst decree in some countries without their having such discrimination enforced by statute. The extremely discriminatory caste system of India is 2 000 years old. However, it is not laid down by law. In most countries of the world there are discrimination and poverty among millions of people; it has become the inescapable lot of many. Where does one find worse discrimination than the caste system of India? From the Pretoria News of 27 August 1973 I read the following with reference to India—

I am able to mention many more instances. In the single minute I have left, I should just like to refer in brief to the position in America. Ina Corinne Brown writes the following in her book Understanding Race Relations—

She goes on to say—

I can proceed in this vein and quote examples of discrimination from every country of the world. Let us have a look at the situation in England. The Sunday Times of 8 August said under the heading “Race Feelings Run high in Britain”—

[Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the Department of Information has indeed a difficult job to do and deserves the sympathy and support of everyone in this country in carrying out that job. I regret, therefore, to have heard certain speeches made by hon. members on that side of the House which must have made the officials of the Department of Information say to themselves: “If we have friends like these, we really do not need enemies. For example, we have heard what I can only describe as an outrageous speech from the hon. member for Parys. I would say without exaggeration that if I were an enemy of South Africa and I were to be given the text of a speech of that nature to use at the United Nations or anywhere else, I would know how to make very good use of it against South Africa.

He should be ashamed of himself.

We have also had the other variety of the tu quoque kind of defence from the hon. member for Bloemfontein North. This is a technique which simply does not work. South Africa does not gain by making this type of comparison with the evils practised in other countries. South Africa has its own standards and its own reputation to uphold and nothing is gained by attempting to show that we are not guilty because other people are doing the same thing.

Let us consider why we are experiencing the difficulties which we are in propagating the image of South Africa. Is there perhaps some fault in our technique; is there perhaps some inherent difficulty which we cannot overcome? I want to deal with this more perhaps from a technical than a political point of view. There have recently been indications that the Department of Information proposes to use more aggression in putting its message across abroad. In its report we find words like “offensive”; the hon. member for Sunnyside has said: “Ons moet aanval,” and we hear expressions such as “aggressive policy” and “aggressive tactics”. I ask myself whether in fact these intentions are justified and whether they will achieve the object desired. I hope that when one speaks of aggressive policy one is referring rather to the zeal of ones intentions than to the hostility of one’s intentions.

Let us look at this question from two angles. Let us look first at the contents of the message and, secondly, at the market, at the people to whom the message is addressed. Firstly, as far as the content is concerned, it is stated on page 19 of the report of the department—

That is what the department sees as its most important function. On the basis of some experience abroad. I believe that most hostility towards South Africa is in fact directed at Government policy. This has been my experience although there are others who may disagree with me. If my view is correct, namely, that most hostility is directed at Government policy, then is the department correct in trying to counter it by in fact putting Government policy? I would say that it would be better to take the view that these attacks on Government policy are better countered by putting the case of South Africa as a whole. If people cannot stomach Government policies, if they are critical of Government policies or certain aspects of those policies, then surely South Africa taken as a whole with its many virtues, provides the basis of a reply to this kind of accusation which is centred purely upon hostility towards one aspect of South Africa. This is what we would do in our private lives. If a particular characteristic in our personality were attacked we would attempt to defend ourselves by showing the other, better characteristics in our make-up. Is the Government correct in taking the view, which it does—and it has often been argued in this House—that hostilities are directed not towards Government policies but towards South Africa as a whole? I repeat, it is often argued in this House that even if Government policies were different from what they are, if they were those of, shall we say, Portugal, Rhodesia or some other country, that hostility towards South Africa would continue. In other words, hostility towards South Africa is not directed at the policies of this Government but towards South Africa itself. Then, again, surely, if the attack is directed against South Africa irrespective of Government policies, it is South Africa we must defend. Why then is it argued that the main purpose of the department must be to protect Government policy? Sir, let us look briefly at the market to whom the propaganda is directed. This has, I believe, been correctly defined as the opinion-makers and decision-takers. It is to them and against them that this aggression will be directed? Because, Sir, if we are talking to opinion-formers, if we are talking to decision-takers, then surely there is the case for the soft-sell; there is the case for sophistication; there is the case for subtlety What is all this aggressiveness about if in fact we are talking to people who form opinions and to people who take decisions? And I agree that these are the people. Sir, let me put it another way: Recently the director of the Foundation, which makes common cause in many respects with this department, analysed the market and he said: There are those who are outright hostile; there are those who are inherently friendly, and there are those who live here in South Africa, the home market. He dealt at some length with the question as to how to deal with these three types of audiences. As far as the outright hostile people are concerned, these are the movements which cannot be persuaded at any price to like or to support South Africa’s policy; so there is no sale there. There are those who are potentially friendly or inherently friendly. Are we to direct aggression at them? Surely, Sir, these are people to whom we must speak reasonably. Then there are the people at home; I have no time to deal with this now, but these are the people who must also understand South Africa’s special position and comport themselves in such a manner that they do not embarrass South Africa in its relations with other countries. Sir, in all these cases I believe that aggression is out of place and that subtlety has a very important role to play.

Sir, in the few minutes left to me I want to refer briefly to the publication Comment and Opinion. This is a weekly survey published only in English and running into some 58 000 copies. It seems that of the 58 000 copies, nearly 56 000-55-500 are actually circulated in South Africa. Sir, this is a very curious thing. This publication consists of editorials from all the newspapers, all translated into English. If this paper were destined for overseas audiences which have a special interest in South African political polemics, particularly Press polemics. I would say: by all means print it in English and let them have it. But this is directed to a South African audience. Very nearly 56 000 copies are circulated in the South African market. Sir, one can draw only one of two conclusions: Either the Government is grossly ignoring the injunction of the Constitution Act that there should be bilingualism in South Africa in printing this in English only—because if it is directed, as it is purely or almost entirely, to South African audiences, why is it printed in English only … [Interjection.]

Why?

Sir, let me relieve the Minister’s mind right away. I do not believe that he is trying to do an injustice to the Afrikaans language; I believe that we have to look at the other alternative. I think the other alternative is that he wishes to print Nationalist editorial comment in English and to send it to English readers in order that this propaganda or argument may be brought to their attention.

Are you afraid of it?

I am not afraid of it at all, but if this is the intention, why is the opposite not being done? If Afrikaans press comment has to be brought to the attention of English readers at State expense, why cannot the opposite be done? Why is English editorial comment not brought to the attention of Afrikaans readers? Is it the task of the Department of Information to act in a partial way in this matter? [Time expired.]

Sir, arising out of this particularly naive argument advanced by the hon. member for Von Brandis that Comment and Opinion should also be printed in Afrikaans, I just want to tell him that traditionally, the Afrikaner reads English-language newspapers to a far greater extent than English-speaking people read Afrikaans-language newspapers. I want to ask him whether he has thought about the vast number of foreign representatives in our country who obtain some of those copies. Sir, it is just as naïve an argument as to come along and say here that South Africa’s entire image should be sold abroad. Which image of the whole of South Africa? If we were to sell South Africa’s entire image, do we have to include the numerous policies of that party as well? Do we have to include that unpractical policy, which has been wrong? Do we have to include that the Progressive Party’s archaic materialistic orientated policy and sell it abroad?

Sir, I think the hon. member for Sandton is a brilliant salesman. I think we should give him our policy to sell, because the fact that there are a few more of them sitting over there today, proves that they have been able to progress to such an extent with that policy of theirs that they do have a few representatives here, and it must be a brilliant salesman who is able to sell such a poor product to the public.

I want to express a few ideas in connection with the training programme of the Department of Information which was put into operation last year. When one wants to say something about any training programme, one first considers what is required by the practical situation one is faced with, and then one considers what that training programme does, and then one determines whether one’s training programme is going to deliver the product one requires in that market. Then I ask myself this question: Where are we sending our information officers to when we send them overseas? To what environment are we sending them, and what is their task over there? The fact that they are going to face a stream of anti-South African propaganda overseas, is nothing new to anyone of us. We know this, but it is very interesting to consider this matter from a slightly different angle.

It would have been a very good thing had we been able to afford the launching of a campaign to try and win the support of everyone overseas, but with our limited resources and other particular circumstances, one can only, from the nature of the case, direct one’s efforts to a smaller group of people. Of course, that group of people constitutes the opinion-makers, who give the lead in every country. And this does not only mean politicians, because it is not only politicians who give the lead. There are many people who exercise their influence behind the scenes and in the sphere of the political arena. There are ecclesiastics, academics, the Press, the people controlling the mass media, senior military officers, diplomats, and so on, those who give the lead and who exercise a direct or indirect influence in every country in which they live. This area is known as the zone of political influence. It is in this sphere where our people have to do their work, and these people who exercise influence, are the main target area of our people overseas. Where do these people get their information from?

With the exception of a few of them who visit South Africa and some others who make a study of South Africa and everything that concerns South Africa, all those people, together with the great mass of people, have to rely upon the mass media for all the information they have on South Africa. It is the mass media which helps them to form their opinion about South Africa. We know about Dennis Brutus and Sanroc. We also know about all the other people, frustrated South Africans abroad, who find ammunition in the refuse dumps of South Africa. It is not that one wants us to deny these things, but on the other hand one cannot be as naïve as the hon. member for Parktown to advertise the shortcomings of our country. Surely this would be silly to do When one reads an advertisement of a motor car, does one read about the good points and the bad points? Surely, it is a basic fact of advertising for one to emphasize the good points of a certain product, and people who pretend to be super salesmen, should know this, and this applies to retired newspaper editors in particular.

Sir, what does one require when one wants to try and make an impression in this highly sophisticated arena, the zone of political influence? Our people over there are not the only people who are trying. In a place such as Bonn, for example, there are more than 100 embassies, and in everyone of those embassies there is at least one person, and in certain embassies far more than one person, who compete for the ear and sympathetic reaction of the people who are in this zone of political influence. It is a highly sophisticated game in which one has to display great originality if one wants to make any impression at all. How does one train a person to state South Africa’s case in its true perspective over there? I should like to focus attention on three things I believe are important. The first is a proper concept of the basis of communications. One has to know something about the theory of communication; who says what, through what medium, to whom and with what effect. This is the theory of communications, the dynamics of information flow; who is it who says something, and what is going to be the effect of it eventually? If one wants it to have the proper effect, in which should one state it on this side and through what medium? I think it is essential that an information offer should understand the dynamics of communications.

But one needs far more than that. One needs an enormous amount of factual knowledge. On the basis of one’s knowledge of the theory of communications, one then has to apply this factual knowledge to obtain the necessary results. And even should one have both these things at one’s disposal one still has to have the method and the gift to put it across. One has to be able to appear in front of a television camera; one has to be able to make a speech; one has to be able to put something in writing properly. If one is unable to do this, if one is unable to perform in public, one’s theoretical knowledge or one’s factual knowledge is of no use whatsoever.

In analysing this programme which was established for the first time last year, Sir, then I have to tell you that I can only describe it briefly as an honest, brilliant effort by the hon. the Minister and his Department—and, what is more, this is only the first attempt—to equip our people for this difficult task. One sees the golden thread of lectures on communications and the Press running through this entire training programme of training. This forms the theoretical basis. However, this basis is being carried through into practice. The officials paid the Pretoria News a two-week visit last year. They studied editorial practices for two weeks there. There they saw in which way, an editor handles a mass of reports and selects those fitting in with the policy standpoint of his particular newspaper, reports which are going to develop the image of his newspaper. It was probably an eye-opener to them, and I think many of our people who accept everything they read in a newspaper so naively, may well sit down and do the same thing. This taught officials to evaluate the information they receive from the mass media and to come forward with proper counteraction.

Then there is the question of factual knowledge. They paid more than 30 visits to places throughout the country. They received an enormous amount of information on South Africa, on the political situation prevailing here, its history as well as other aspects such as foreign politics and foreign history, specifically in respect of those countries they are sent to. But what is quite interesting and quite effective, and deserves our appreciation, is the fact that these students were not only able to obtain these facts by means of lectures; in many cases they were obliged to obtain that knowledge themselves, because it is simply impossible to remember everything today. One must know where one can find something. In that way one can keep one’s knowledge up to date all the time.

I do not want to say a great deal about public performance. Some of our M.P.s were able to gain some experience in appearing before television cameras there.

Sir, this training programme testifies to years of experience which is now being put into practice.

Finally, I just want to focus attention to two aspects in this connection. The first aspect is that this programme is to a large extent also available to the wives of officials. By means of this course they are able to learn a European language. I wonder whether the wife will ever receive recognition for the role she plays in assisting her husband, behind the scenes, as it were, in politics and diplomacy, and son on, on various social spheres. I shudder to think what an uninformed wife could do who assists her husband in an Information Office abroad where she has to accompany her husband at social functions, where she is cornered and where questions are fired at her by some person who knows that she is unlikely to have received the same training her husband had received. She is also the only person who can act as an honest soundboard to him in the privacy of their home, with whom he may test his ideas before applying them in public. I think it is a brilliant idea also to equip the wife for the extremely important role she is going to play there. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Florida raised an interesting question, namely: Where do people abroad acquire their information about South Africa? I think we are too obsessed with the idea that the thoughts of the millions of people abroad are full of South Africa. There are many hon. members sitting here who know that one can travel in America for two months and can consider oneself lucky if one sees an inch-long column about South Africa in the newspaper. In certain countries such as Britain, of course, countries with which we have had relations for a long time, people are better acquainted with South Africa, but most of the people in the world barely know where South Africa is nor do they care two pins. The real question is what the attitudes of governments are towards South Africa. What that hon. member should concern himself with, is where the governments of, for example, Holland, Australia, Sweden, Britain and other countries which we can take to be ill-disposed towards us, get their information. Do they get it from Dennis Brutus? The truth is that the governments of such countries and others I could mention, are represented here in South Africa. Their representatives have to keep an eye on what is going on here and inform their governments. However, I leave the matter at that. What we should strive for, is that the governments who hold power in their countries, are satisfied with what goes on here and have good relations with us. Then the case for South Africa will be won.

I was on the point of commenting on the hon. the Minister’s statement in regard to the training of staff when my time expired. I want to say that this step is in the right direction and one with which we are satisfied. I do just want to ask the hon. the Minister something—I do not do so in order to exploit anything—and that is, whether the Government could not be a little quicker off the mark in taking steps of this kind in the future. As I have already said, I do not want to rub it in, but we can look back to five years, or perhaps longer, to 10 years ago, even, and see that we pleaded for this very kind of thing under this Vote. However, we were attacked for doing so. In any event, no notice was taken of it. Party interests came before the inetrests of the country. But why can the merits of a case not be spotted at an early stage and action be taken subsequently? I hope that the Government will be far quicker to take action in respect of this kind of thing in the future.

I want to put a few questions to the hon. the Minister. I had to listen quickly to the statement made by the hon. the Minister, for example how long it would take to train these people. In my opinion it is essential for South Africa to present a multi-national image to the outside world as soon as possible. All the emphasis of the department is now on the fact that South Africa is multi-national, “a multinational country” and people abroad want to see that image. If they are unable to see it, we lack credibility in their eyes. For that reason it is a matter of urgency for the non-White populations of South Africa also to take their places wherever South Africa is represented abroad. I should also like to ask the hon. the Minister whether the people will have status abroad so that they will not seem to be stooges in the positions occupied by them or people who have to play second fiddle.

The hon. member for Parys disappointed me because he came along again today and tried to find scapegoats and every time the “English-language Press” was given the blame. If this had been true, one could have left it at that, but we have heard it so many times in this House that we are beginning to get weary of this story. On top of that it is not true, and it is not accepted by us; in fact, it is accepted by no one.

Now you are looking for friends again.

No, we shall not start that argument again today, because there is no point in it. We say that the fault lies with what the Government does and not with the questions asked in this House. In the department’s annual report, mention is made of the cooling …

May I ask the hon. member a question?

My time is a little short. Mention is made of the cooling of relations with Holland, for example. In fact, there are hon. members who say that today Holland is one of the countries most ill-disposed towards South Africa. Now I want to know what role the English-language Press plays in Holland. Years ago I was in Amsterdam and there was a little booklet entitled Een Land Apart displayed in all the bookshop windows. The book was written by a Mr. Piet Kort, a man who had worked in the radio industry in South Africa. What did he do? He made photostats of letters that appeared in the Afrikaans National Party newspapers and took photographs of apartheid signboards. All he did was to publish a factual booklet. In this booklet there were copies of letters which appeared in Die Transvaler, for example, in which a White man, who stated that he was a Nationalist, complained that Black people were allowed to sit on the grass in Church Square in Pretoria. He printed those letters just as they were took photographs of signboards and published a booklet which, as hon. members probably do not have to guess, was banned in South Africa because the Government could not afford to allow its own people to read how effectively that man quoted from the newspapers of the National Party.

That is nonsense.

It is the truth. I want to ask the hon. member whether that is the fault of the English-language Press.

You are confirming my argument.

Let us be fair. We can easily prove this matter. I want to ask the hon. member whether he would address a plea to the hon. the Minister for the election manifesto of the National Party, which was issued at the time of the recent election, particularly the part dealing with labour affairs—the hon. member would do well to read through it again this evening—should be circulated at U.N. as a document furnishing proof of the removal of discrimination. There could be no more deadly evidence against South Africa as far as ugly discrimination is concerned, than the distribution of the chapter on labour policy in the election manifesto of the National Party. The day he stands up and asks that his election manifesto be distributed in the world as evidence of what is happening here, then I shall recognize his bona fides that the blame lies with someone else, and not with his party.

Now they are dead quiet.

It is easy to furnish proof. I have before me the annual report of the South African Foundation. Its chairman is Dr. Etienne Rossouw. This surely, is a body which looks at matters objectively. I just want to mention one example of what they say—there is no time for more. The annual report is a summary of how matters stand with South Africa in the major capitals. The chairman talks about how changes at home help to improve our image abroad. They go on to say—

What kind of ‘“events” are they referring to?—

This refers to the Foundation’s fine efforts to sell South Africa abroad—

There sits the Minister of Information who is also the Minister of the Interior, and in that capacity he is constantly taking steps that cause an uproar abroad and which no one is then able to understand.

That is not true.

It is true; those are the facts. I want to tell the hon. the Minister in all friendliness that he, in his capacity as leader of the National Party in the Transvaal, who helps to compile his party’s election manifesto, and in his capacity as Minister of the Interior, ought to have an earnest consultation with himself as Minister of Information now and then before making a speech about Coloureds or being so quick to withdraw a passport. If he were to do that, the work of the Department of Information would go much more smoothly.

I have mentioned that the emphasis is now on the word “multi-nationality”. It is a good thing that this should be so. However, I just want to suggest that the word “apartheid” should not always be put in brackets when the policy is expounded.

Now I do not want to say that I read through the entire year-book, because that, of course, is impossible; I have looked at the political sections as far as possible and I find it interesting that the word “apartheid” did not appear anywhere. When I looked at the index at the back, I found that there, alas! was the word “apartheid”. The only entry against it was “see ‘multinational policy or policy of separate development’ ”. It is interesting that we should have come so far that the word “apartheid” should no longer be used. I support that standpoint. They should just not become so angry when members on this side discuss that matter. In fact, I see that the word “multi-racial” is also officially used abroad. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, it requires a great deal of courage on my part to speak again today, but I shall do my best in any event. This afternoon I want to try to make out a case that more use should be made of the experience, the knowledge and the skill of politicians to put our case internally, but mainly abroad. As we are sitting in this House, we are a small group of people, out of millions of others, who have the privilege of coming along to this House of Assembly. Now, in the world, one may be as clever as one will, one may be very highly skilled academically and have all the knowledge at one’s disposal, but there is only one place where one can observe and learn politics in all its perspective ramifications, and that is in this House of Assembly and in the Other Place. If I say, on the grounds of this, that we should make greater use of politicians to put our case abroad, it gives me the liberty also to say that we could make greater use of our pressmen sitting in the Press Gallery over there. Some of them are extremely competent and skilful men who may go and put politics and South Africa’s case in just as effective a manner as politicians do. When one listens to all these things, the question arises whether politics in South Africa and the image of our Fatherland is only concerned with White/Black relations or with Black/ Brown relations. Are there not other spheres in which the politics of South Africa is being practiced, formed and conducted? Are there not other spheres in which we can find a common basis, when putting the case of our Fatherland, so that we may do so without trying to market an article which we are unable to market and do not want to market? We do not want to market our policy of separate development abroad. I am not interested in that. I am interested in seeing the policy of separate development carried through successfully here at home, for this forms the basis of quite a number of facets in which history and events in our fatherland are manifesting themselves.

Our information service finds itself right in the middle of a period of crises in the world. In the midst of these crises we have to find a place for ourselves. These crises have different dimensions. So there is the political dimension. In the political sphere the world finds itself in a state of turmoil and confusion. Here on our eastern border and on our nothern border we see the cauldron bubbling. The political dimension is one of instability and confusion. In addition there is a second major dimension we should take cognizance of i.e. the human dimension. Poverty, ignorance and pestilence are what we see in this dimension in many countries. It is a dimension which plays an important role in our relations politics. It is the question of the rich becoming richer and the poor becoming poorer. There is another factor within this human dimension which weighs more heavily in our present-day deliberations, i.e. the population explosion. There is the unclear terror the effective influence of which manifests itself within our subconscious minds. Then there is the major ecological crisis which is now assuming proportions which demand our serious attention. Our Information Department finds itself in the midst of all these crises and it has to ensure that there is a place for South Africa as well. We have our Department of Foreign Affairs which operates mainly on the purely political level. Our Department of Information, however, functions on quite a number of levels. There are so many levels common to the United Party, National Party and Progressive Party that we can try and find those common levels and, with our joint experience and political know-how, our sophisticated way of putting matters, create for South Africa a far better and far effective image abroad than is the case at present. A country’s mightiest weapon is the prestige it has attained on merit. If one has prestige based on merit, it eclipses many other weapons. Today I can say with pride that our Fatherland has prestige which is based on merit. I just want to mention a few instances, and with that I want to conclude.

In the sphere of medical science we have a Barnard. Barnard and I differ; I have never met him. In the sphere of medical science others besides Barnard have made a breakthrough which has given us tremendous prestige. We also have prestige in many other spheres. In the field of uranium enrichment we are a world leader. This is an achievement we can broadcast to the world.

Every aspect I am going to mention here manifests itself within this human dimension, within this crisis. We have the case of Sasol, the only one of its kind in the world. In this energy crisis, which also has a human dimension, Sasol stands out as a prestige project which all of us can make use of, United Party, National Party and Progressive Party.

We lead the world in the sphere of water research. In the sphere of afforestation, as we heard here yesterday, we stand head and shoulders above all the others. We also have Onderstepoort, which has already meant such a great deal to us. Onderstepoort meant a great deal to us in Africa, and it still means a great deal to us. Take our Press as a further example. We criticize the Press in South Africa; sometimes we hit out at one another, but I am proud to say that for the most part our Press in South Africa is a prestige press. In comparison with the Press in the outside world we have a Press which we may use very fruitfully as an instrument for enhancing our prestige. Let us take the parliamentary party system within our democratic structure. Surely no country in the world has such a party system as the basis of its parliamentary system. Has our system not contributed towards the maintenance of stability as far as democracy will allow?

I want to mention two further examples. Take our socio-economic attempts and projects at upliftment in respect of underdeveloped and less privileged people such as the Brown people, the Black people and also a section of our Whites. It has no parallel. This aspect still manifests itself within the human dimension. Take our labour legislation. In respect of the handling and maintenance of industrial peace, our Industrial Conciliation Act is something unique in the world. Throughout the entire world there is a desire to have this legislation. We have achieved these feats on a basis of merit. Take our mining legislation and our legislation dealing with occupational diseases. When the late Daan Ellis went overseas in 1952, he told me that he was so inundated with requests from people who wanted him to give lectures that he simply could not cope.

I now want to conclude by saying that there are many avenues through which we may channel the experience, the knowledge and the skill of a small group of people to the benefit of our country without being obsessed by only one aspect, i.e. the political aspect.

Mr. Chairman, I want to arrange my reply to this debate in such a way that I reply in the first place to the matters raised by the Opposition and then, in conclusion, say something about the future plans of the department.

I want to begin by associating myself with the hon. member for Sunnyside, who congratulated the hon. member for Bezuidenhout on his appointment as the main speaker on information in succession to the former member for Orange Grove.

There is just not enough time for the debate.

I would be pleased if the hon. member would arrange the matter with his Whips. I shall also try to obtain more time for this debate next year. I want to extend my sincerest congratulations to the hon. member and I also want to congratulate him on the level which he maintained in introducing this debate. It is a good thing that we will understand and criticize one another when it is necessary, but always in a way which will not bring down the level of the debate or which will make the case of South Africa abroad more difficult. That we must not do. I shall return to this point again. I just want to tell the hon. member that I wish to extend an invitation to him. We have a training division in our department where we afford our people the opportunity of being trained in acquiring television experience. We have the video tape, we place the person there and we put questions to him in exactly the same way as would be done in a normal recording. After a few minutes we play the tape back and then we criticize the mistakes which were made in order to train these people in this way for television appearances. The only member of the United Party who has up to now availed himself of this opportunity was the former member for Orange Grove. Before he left for overseas he visited us and he went through all the necessary paces there, and made thorough use of the opportunity.

I also want to invite the hon. member for Bezuidenhout—I only hope his fate will not be the same as that of the hon. member for Orange Grove—to come and see what we are doing there some time. In fact, I want to invite any hon. member of the House to come and see what is being done there. He must just let us know when he is coming so that we can arrange the programme. Hon. members are welcome to come and see what we are doing in regard to these matters. We are proud of what we are achieving there, and should like to introduce this to persons who are interested in it.

I want to begin with the criticism expressed by the hon. member for Bezuidenhout. In the first place he had praise for the Yearbook although he was of the opinion that it was a little too bulky. He would have preferred it to be smaller. He quoted one paragraph from it to illustrate his point. I want to say to the hon. member at once that a yearbook is of course a particularly comprehensive document in which one has to say so many things that it is very difficult to confine it to a minimum. If we look at the Yearbook of any country in the world, we will find that all of them are more or less of a standard size. I want to add that this Yearbook will be brought up to date from year to year. However, this will not necessarily entail that it will become bulkier year after year. It will of course be kept up to date, and sections will be omitted as circumstances require and as we continue with it.

There is one interesting point in regard to the Yearbook which I think is worth mentioning here, and that is that the Yearbook has 55 chapters. However, the Yearbook is bound in such a way that each of those chapters may be individually removed and published in the form of a brochure. In other words, instead of compiling a new brochure on a subject dealt with in the Yearbook, one can merely use the existing type, remove the existing unit as it has been bound and have a further 10 000 or 30 000 copies of any one of the chapters printed without any other work being necessary. This is something for which I am grateful and on which I want to compliment the department, and thank them.

The second matter which the hon. member touched upon, was the question of liaison with the Black African states and the need which exists, something which I want to concede at once, that we should achieve closer liaison with the African States. Mr. Chairman, I have no illusions that the successful acceptance of South Africa and of its policy in the outside world will depend to a very great extent on the acceptance of South Africa as an African state in the community of African states.

I have no doubt about that. If we could be accepted in Africa by the other African countries, if it could be accepted that we are a White African country with the right to exist in Africa, then it would be very difficult for people in the outside world to discriminate against us or expel us from world organizations when we are able to take our full-fledged place in Africa and are accepted in Africa. For that reason I want to concede at once that it is important that we should make further progress in Africa. In practice, the position is that one can only open an information office in a country after one has established an embassy there. The hon. member knows of course that one must first enter into diplomatic relations, and only after an embassy or a consulate has been established in a country, can other departments add to the staff of such an embassy. As far as embassies are concerned, at the moment we only have an embassy in Malawi. Of course we have an embassy in Rhodesia, but the only other African state in which we have an embassy, is Malawi. I can inform the hon. member that Malawi is quite high on our list of priorities as regards the appointment of an information man, but one cannot after all, do everything in one year.

There are quite a number of states in which we would like to appoint information officers, but we must of course cut our coat according to the size of the financial cloth at our disposal. That is one of the problems we have here. Sir, as far as guests are concerned, we once again have the same problem. Our normal procedure is to have the guests we want to invite to this country screened by the officials of our Department of Information in the country concerned; they check to ascertain precisely who the guests are and then they are invited to this country, and if we do not have liaison in a country, then it is difficult to invite guests from such a country to this country. But I want to give the hon. member the assurance that in this respect we should like to liaise more closely with other countries, and that we regard it as our task as the Department of Information to do just this.

Sir, the hon. member then asked me please to give him the assurance that there are no problems regarding co-ordination between the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Department of Information as to our actions abroad. I want to give him the assurance immediately and unequivocally that this is the case; that these two departments supplement one another in their operations abroad; that we do not, in the nature of things, want to venture into one another’s spheres; we prefer to work supplementary to the Department of Foreign Affairs. But, Sir, our work differs from that of the Department of Foreign Affairs and our approaches may also be different. Foreign Affairs must, in the nature of things, function against the historic background and traditions of Foreign Affairs, in a purely diplomatic way and according to protocol and the necessary rules. Information has in the course of years developed in all countries of the world as a department in which more emphasis is laid on political issues than in Foreign Affairs; this is an accepted fact.

The Information people in every country are the people who are prepared to speak out loud in the political sphere, while Foreign Affairs, on the purely diplomatic level, acts correctly in accordance with protocol and deals with matters on a completely different level. The two supplement one another; this does not necessarily mean that they oppose one another. Sir, in that spirit we are co-operating. I can assure the hon. member that discussions are held between the Prime Minister, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and myself quite frequently; that our departmental heads hold regular discussions with one another, and that we consult one another, in regard to any action.

Sir, I want to mention one example. The newspapers, particularly in the north, the Pretoria News more than any other, seized upon my visit to America at the beginning of this year and my conversation with the then Vice President Ford, as if a rift had occurred between the Minister of Foreign Affairs and myself, and as if I had gone barging in, with what they called “home-spun diplomacy”, where I did not belong. Sir, the fact of the matter is that before I went to America I held discussions with the Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs at the holiday home of the Prime Minister, Oubos. There were photographs in the newspapers of the place in which we were shown relaxing and holding discussions, and there I received my instructions on which I then based my actions in America; but it suited the Press to present the matter as if there had been no understanding between us, and as if we had acted in a completely individual way and quite independently from one another.

What would Die Beeld have said about you?

No, that I would not know. Sir, the co-operation between the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Department of Information is excellent; it is so good that the two departments even play football against each other in Pretoria. There are no problems in this regard. But, as I say, we have our own sphere and our own mode of action, which in the nature of things differs from those of the Department of Foreign Affairs.

The hon. member asked me about the replies to the questions put by the chairman of the S.A. Institute, the 20 difficult questions which he mentioned. The hon. member will know that the Department of Information furnished replies to all those questions within 24 hours. The hon. member for Parktown belittled the replies to a certain extent and said we had evaded the questions. However, the fact remains that we had to reply to each one of those questions within the space of 200 words at the request of the newspaper concerned. Now, how does one reply in 200 words to the comprehensive question of what one’s policy in respect of the urban Bantu is? Surely that is impossible. In the Yearbook there is an entire chapter dealing only with the urban Bantu, and there the standpoint of the Government is stated in full. For the purposes of this reply, however, we had to do this in 200 words, and no one can in 200 words reply fully and adequately to such a comprehensive question.

You could have done it in two words—“Temporary sojourners”.

Yes, the hon. member always wants to oversimplify everything. I have here a few notes on her conduct abroad which we shall discuss later. The hon. member also criticized the department to a certain extent because the volume of our publications is too great internally, but too small abroad. Inter alia he mentioned Comment and Opinion and we shall discuss this a little later. He also mentioned Panorama. I just want to inform the hon. member that he is labouring under a misunderstanding in regard to Panorama. The figures for Panorama are that 113 000 copies of Panorama are in fact being printed internally—I say “printed”—but the vast majority of these are distributed abroad. The figures which I have are that of the total number of copies of Panorama printed, only 70 000 are distributed internally and more than 200 000 are distributed in seven different languages abroad.

Look on pages 54 and 55 of the annual report where the full “production and distribution” of this publication are shown. That is where I found this information—148 000 internally and 140 000 abroad.

I shall look into that carefully. Perhaps it is merely a way of presenting it. A certain number are printed abroad. I am not certain how it is being presented here. I cannot look into this rapidly. But the position is that a large number of copies are printed in Switzerland. As far as the figures are concerned, I can assure him that more than 200 000 are distributed abroad, and at most 70 000 in South Africa. Perhaps it is simply being presented in a different way here. I shall look into this again. But I can give the hon. member the assurance at once that the position in regard to Panorama is as I have now given it to him.

Then I want to proceed to the question of Comment and Opinion. The hon. member for Von Brandis has also attacked me on Comment and Opinion and asked what its purpose is, why it should be distributed so widely in South Africa, and why it appears only in English and not in Afrikaans as well. I want to say at once that when we announced that a periodical such as Comment and Opinion was going to be published, I also said that its object was that we had people at home and abroad who did not, in the nature of things, understand Afrikaans; that we were dealing at home, in the first place, with numerous immigrants who were unilingual and who did not understand Afrikaans, and, secondly, that numerous visitors to and tourists in South Africa did not understand a word of Afrikaans, and therefore were only able to read the English-language newspapers, and therefore were given only the one side of the story. In the third plac, I said that a need existed in the embassies. I shall cause the number to be established, but many of the foreign embassies here in South Africa immediately took out subscriptions to Comment and Opinion, for not everyone has access to translation services, and there they can immediately find the opinions of all the newspapers in South Africa. I want to add at once—and fortunately no one alleged this—that Comment and Opinion is no attempt constantly to present the Government in a good light. It is objective, with criticism and all, as the newspapers do it, and no one can tell me that it is one-sided in its approach. In other words, the fact remains that we have, in Comment and Opinion, a publication for unilingual people in South Africa and abroad. This publication makes it possible for us to introduce people abroad to the full spectrum of political activities and the standpoints of newspapers of both language groups in South Africa. In London there is the publication Press Mirror, which is a similar publication, and in Belgium there is a brochure which appears weekly. Because Belguim is also a bilingual country, that publication also covers the standpoints of the various newspapers. This publication is known as Hierdie week in die Vlaamse Pers. Many of our foreign offices make use of the information which is published in Comment and Opinion. They distribute that information further by means of their own publications, and in this way it is disseminated far and wide. Consequently I want to make it very clear that the object of Comment and Opinion is to give people who are unilingual a balanced picture of the objective political statements in South Africa by the various political groups. That is the crux of the matter. I want to say in addition that we should like to increase this publication’s circulation abroad. However, this publication was only started a short while ago, and it was not possible for it to have a wide circulation immediately. But the publication is so popular in South Africa—I could quote numerous letters from people thanking us for it—that circulation at home has increased far more rapidly than the circulation abroad. There has been no attempt to abate this rapid increase in the circulation.

I want to point out to the hon. member for Bezuidenhout that I settled the question of Government policy and national policy a long time ago.

I did not mention that now.

You nevertheless mentioned that as far as the internal publications are concerned, we present exclusively the Government’s policy in these publications.

No.

Then I misunderstood the hon. member. The hon. member will probably discuss that matter next year, but I am ready for him.

So simply reply now in anticipation.

No, I shall rather wait until my ammunition is needed.

I want to thank the hon. member for Edenvale for the responsible standpoint which he adopted, and for his responsible conduct. The hon. member said that the “you too” policy does not succeed, and will not work either. I concede at once that it does not succeed everywhere. It does not succeed if one says that someone else is guilty and therefore one is personally not guilty. At the same time, however, it is true that one cannot state one’s case before one at least has the other person in a position in which that person himself has to admit that his own hands are not entirely clean. Once one has succeeded in doing that, that person listens far more carefully than when he adopts a sacrosanct attitude and tells one how hopeless one is while concealing his own disgraceful actions. I am not saying that we should be aggressive or that we should hurt people in this respect. But the method with which we are dealing with the matter should not only be oriented to the defensive but should instead be aimed at going over to the offensive. I shall explain later precisely what I mean.

The hon. member also said that we should not try to condone matters which cannot be condoned. My problem is that the outside world is interested in those matters, for these are matters which are brought to their attention. These are the matters to which they want replies. After all, I cannot refuse to discuss or comment on such matters, for if I were to do so, they would be able to say that I was avoiding the heart of the matter on which we were being attacked. I could mention all the positive steps which we are taking, but if I do not also mention the negative incidents and explain why they are occurring, my argument naturally has no weight. I cannot therefore avoid the crucial problems. This is why we have to deal with this matter in this way, whether everyone likes it or not. It is very clear that we cannot condone discrimination purely on the ground of race or colour, but the facts of the matter are that our policy is in fact aimed at getting away from discrimination. We have already said this. If the policy of separate development is carried through to its logical conclusion, we will in fact get away from colour discrimination. If it is pushed on with too rapidly, however, it will miscarry, and for that reason we are not prepared to precipitate it. However, when it has been carried through to its final conclusions, we will get away from colour discrimination and there will be a series of peoples in South Africa who will liaise with one another in the same way as the Western European people liaise with one another on the sub-continent of Western Europe. That is our objective. [Interjections.] There is no doubt about that; that is where we are going.

The signboards will therefore disappear.

The hon. member must not be petty. [Interjections.] The hon. members must give me the chance to finish stating my side of the case. It is clear that we must at present keep abreast of quite a number of things. We cannot omit to take them into account. There are, for example, people with attitudes which cannot be changed overnight. There are schools of thought, traditions and practices which cannot be changed overnight. One can, however, do this gradually by progressing step by step in that direction. It is in the interests of everyone that this be done. At the same time it still remains in many respects a perfectly simple, practical measure to prevent unnecessary incidents and friction from occurring which would be to the disadvantage of everyone. Many of the things which are still customary are practical and simple political approaches, and have nothing to do with superiority, inferiority, or things which give offence, but are aimed at avoiding points of friction and incidents. As it becomes possible to do so, these will be eliminated. However, we must be practical and deal with the situation as it presents itself to us from day to day. I think that I have now more or less dealt with the speech made by the hon. member for Edenvale. He also welcomed the fact that we are going to use non-White representatives in those four specific countries. I want to inform the hon. members again that those four countries are our areas of priority on which we are concentrating at the moment. Another reason for that is that we have rather ambitious information plans in all four those countries and one non-White person can therefore fit in in such a team more easily than when he has to work with only one person.

Then I should like to refer to the second speech made by the hon. member for Bezuidenhout. I should like to reply to the few specific questions which he put. In the first place, he asked what the duration of the training period of these non-White information officers would be. At present the duration of the training period is approximately nine to ten months. We are commencing the training in January of next year, and it will have been completed by the middle of November. I foresee that it will be possible to accredit these non-White information officers at the various offices in November of next year. I think it is necessary for them to undergo thorough training, for they will become completely confused if they had to be thrown without training into that maelstrom through which they will have to make their way. They will therefore receive a thorough training and I foresee, as I have said, that they will be in action in November of next year. The hon. member also put questions in regard to the status of these officials abroad. They will of course, when they have been accredited to the Department of Information abroad, have the proper status of full-fledged information officers. They will be nothing else, just that.

The hon. member for Bezuidenhout raised one other matter because he had, in passing at least, to put a little sting in the tail. He said that the Minister of the Interior should occasionally consult the Minister of Information before passports and visas were withdrawn or cancelled. I think it is a perfect combination when the Minister of the Interior is also Minister of Information, for when the Minister of the Interior considers a passport or a visa, he also does so with the full responsibility of the Minister of Information. When he is then in fact compelled to take action, he does so in the knowledge of what the effect will be. If the hon. member were to tell me that we should never take action in regard to this matter, then I can of course accept his argument immediately, and abolish the entire question of passport and visa control and say that we need no longer have such control, for what would we do with it? In South Africa 0,8% of all visas are refused.

Mostly for political reasons.

It does not matter what the reasons are; only 0,8% are refused. In the United States of America, which is regarded as being the freest country in the world, 10% of all visas are refused.

For other reasons.

It does not matter what the reasons are. What reasons does the hon. member have in mind?

Illegal immigration.

Who says we do not have the same problem? The fact remains that while America refuses 10% of their applications, South Africa refuses only 0,8% of its applications. Criticism is being levelled at us now because we are refusing 0,8%, while I have never heard anyone say a word about the fact that America refuses 10%. On the contrary. The U.S.A. is constantly being held up to us as an example. I want to mention a very clear example. I do not want to discuss the Interior Vote now, because it is next on the Order Paper, and therefore I want to leave this matter. Since it has been raised here, I shall be prepared to discuss it in full under the Interior Vote. The fact remains that if one has a control system and one is convinced that it is necessary, it is necessary for one to apply it and not shrink from the consequences. It must, however, be done with great circumspection and the consequences must be fully considered and taken into account, but one must not shrink from one’s obligations to South Africa simply because one wants to be popular.

I still want to refer to two other speeches which were made here. The one speech is that which was made by the hon. member for Sandton. I want to say a few words about that. The hon. member for Sandton really did not contribute to elevating the standard of the debate. On the contrary, in fact, I think the hon. member did himself and his party as well as this House a disservice by making that speech which he made here today. I think that his speech, as it is recorded at the moment in Hansard, is a perfect piece of propaganda which the outside world will at the very first opportunity use against South Africa. He summarized everything very nicely and lumped everything together. He would do well to learn a lesson from his colleague sitting next to him, the hon. member for Edenvale who, as an older person, adopted a far more responsible standpoint. It is time that he also adopted such a standpoint. Where is the hon. member’s patriotism, where is his patriotism to South Africa? His attack covered the full spectrum. He mentioned a considerable number of things, simply lumped them together, spat out a lot of poison and then said this was South Africa. Where is the hon. member’s patriotism? Because he is a new member of this House, I want to tell him that this kind of emotional speech is not made in an Information debate. This is our show-window to the outside world, and one does not, after all, throw one’s rubbish into such a show-window as the hon. member did this afternoon. One displays in the show-window the best one has, and this is what this department, in all humility, is trying to do in all respects. The hon. member referred to one matter in regard to which I do want to furnish him with a reply. I am referring to the cutting which he was so kind as to send across to me in regard to Last Grave in Dimbaza, a film which has been shown on British television. The hon. member asked why we did not take any action in this regard. I could just point out to the hon. member that there is a question on that specific matter standing on the Order Paper for 15 October when I shall reply to this briefly. For the purposes of this debate I just want to inform the hon. member in all honesty what our problem in this regard is. Since such a film is being disseminated abroad, we demanded as our right that British television, which gives itself out to be objective in respect of the news which it presents, should give us equal time to exhibit on our part a similar film depicting the other side of the picture. We told them that, if they wanted to be objective, they would have to be prepared to do so. However, they still refuse to do so. We have never been able to succeed in getting equal time, that familiar phrase. We do get it in the U.S.A. The U.S.A. is prepared to give us equal time, but not Britain, or specifically the BBC. What are they doing now? They are exhibiting the film which is presented in a distorted way, from one angle, and which presents a one-sided picture. Then they want us, as Department of Information, to participate in the discussion of such a film. Then they load the opposition against us in the discussion panel to such an extent that we only have a quarter of the time of the opposition to state our standpoint. At the same time they control the cameras at will. They bring us in merely to illustrate that they are also giving South Africa a chance to state its case. In the meantime they overwhelm you with their people who sit in a row, and with the way in which the camera is controlled, so that you can achieve absolutely nothing. We have had experience of that. It means practically nothing to participate in such a panel discussion. Eventually you come off second best—no matter how strong one’s case is —because the person controlling the camera wants you to. For that reason we do not participate in such a discussion. We simply refuse to participate. I want to say at once that if the BBC were prepared to give us equal time tomorrow to state our case, I should accept wholeheartedly. However, I am not prepared to do so in the way they want us to do it. That is my reply to the hon. member.

In the meantime I have received a note in regard to Panorama. The key word is “Production”—look on the top of page 54 of the annual report—i.e. the production point. In this way both the Digest and Panorama are indicated under “in South Africa”. Yet more than half the Digests go to 70 other countries and most of the Panorama edition also goes abroad.

You also find the word “distribution” there.

Perhaps it is awkwardly stated, but the intention is very clear, and I want to give the hon. member the assurance that these are the facts.

I accept that the hon. member for Parktown spoke on behalf of the Progressive Party. He raised quite a number of matters here, and I should like to reply to him in full if I can. The hon. member had great praise for the hon. member for Houghton because she, when she goes overseas and states South Africa’s case abroad, supposedly has the courage of her convictions, etc. I understand that completely, and it behoves him to have great respect for her, but I have here a verbatim report of a radio interview given by the hon. member for Houghton on 17 May 1974 in America on the programme “The Martha Dean Show”. The hon. member will probably remember this. On 17 May 1974 she was interviewed by a woman by the name of Mary McPhillips. Does that ring a bell? In any case, I have here a verbatim version of the interview with the hon. member. She could not have forgotten it, because the interview covers 12 typed pages. I could quote quite a number of things from this specific interview. I cannot of course deal with the entire interview. However I do want to raise a few small matters in regard to it. I want to attack the hon. member on what she said, but also I want to attack her because of the opportunity which she had of stating South Africa’s case—not the National Party’s case—and did not utilize. They gave the hon. member openings as wide as a barn-door, but she did not avail herself of them to defend South Africa as a patriot. She merely used the interview to indulge in petty politicking. In this way, the interviewer said the following to her—

Here the hon. member had an opportunity, for example, to say that we are not perfect, but that this or that is the case. What she said however was—

Is that not true?

Yes, but what could the hon. member have said here? The question does not deal with this aspect. It was put to her that America’s hands were not clean in this regard either. America itself also has a dark record in regard to the way in which it dealt with the Red Indians and its people in the Black areas, in its Harlems, etc. Surely it was logical to say that no one is perfect and that South Africa has the same problems, but that South Africa is trying this or that, that we have done so much for housing, or whatever. But do not imagine that she avails herself of the opportunity. It does not suit her. This is only one of the examples I could quote. At a later stage the question was put as to where our non-Whites are living, and then the hon. member replied as follows—

These are therefore not the urban Bantu, but the rural Bantu. I quote further—

In White South Africa.

No, the hon. member did not say that. In other words, what does this woman and the listeners deduce from the reply? In the first place they deduce that these Bantu on the farms form the nucleus of the labour force in agriculture. In addition they deduce that these people possess no political rights anywhere, and cannot become landowners either. Are we then astonished and surprised if we in South Africa are accused of working with slave labour? This is the kind of thing the hon. member does across the ocean. Subsequently the following question was put to the hon. member—

The hon. member then replied as follows—

Listen carefully now to this piece of untruth—

What proof is there in the history of South Africa that these people objected to the emancipation of the slaves?

That was one of the causes of the Great Trek.

But surely the hon. member knows that that is not true? The hon. member could ask any standard VIII pupil taking history and he would be able to tell her that they had not objected to the emancipation of the slaves. After that the hon. member also discussed the position of her party in this House of Assembly. She then said the following—

Now the hon. member for Rondebosch and the hon. member for Parktown in particular should listen—

I come now to the two quotations to which I want to protest most vehemently. Firstly, I want to deal with the question of the homeland parliaments of the Bantu, the constitution of the homeland governments. The interviewer asked the hon. member—

She referred to the Parliament of the Bantu as a “legislative assembly”. The hon. member’s reply was as follows—

That is what she thinks of a homeland government. The same Bantu leaders with whom talks are being held on a large scale and who are being assisted to assume positions of leadership on a large scale, were disparaged here as being members of a “local council”. I come now to housing. In this respect the hon. member for Houghton said—

And then the interviewer says: “Ghettos?”

Pardon?

The interviewer says: “Ghettos?” She was referring to the removal of the Coloureds. The hon. member’s reply to this reads as follows—

She then proceeded with the attack. South Africa’s housing was compared with the ghettos in America. This is the loyalty and patriotism of the hon. member. There is one last point I want to touch on. I do not want to spend any more time on the hon. member.

Stand up now and apologize.

There is the question of the housing of Blacks in South Africa. [Interjections.] Just give me a chance. The hon. member referred to the influx of Bantu to the White areas, and she said that our influx control was wrong, and that we should leave matters as they are, in other words, we should not have influx control. Here it is the interviewer speaking again—

She was referring to the places where these people live. The hon. member’s reply was—

The sting is in the tail, as it usually is with the hon. member. I quote—

In other words, the hon. members’s solution to the problem of influx control in South Africa is simply to build, houses.

Nonsense!

Build thousands of houses—that is her solution; it is very clear. She said “My point is, they didn’t build the houses.”

That was my answer in regard to the slums.

The only solution is to build houses. In regard to this entire matter, her party’s policy is simply that houses should be built. I Shall leave the hon. member for Houghton at that. I just wanted to tell her this.

I am coming back to you.

I should very much like her to come back to me, as long as it is not outside the House. She should do so here in the House.

Right here!

Yes, this is the right place. I just want to tell her that she should realize that she occupies a unique position in the world for doing South Africa good or harm.

Why me?

Because she has for so many years been known as and has become known in the world as the woman who supposedly represents the unprivileged group in South Africa. That is her own standpoint. Therefore, her words count for a very great deal. I just want to tell her that she should utilize that special position which she occupies in the interests of South Africa if she is a South African patriot. If she is not, then we want to know what the position is. I want to see patriotism. I do not care what political party’s policy she is defending, but South Africa comes before her political party or before my political party. South Africa is our only home.

The hon. member for Parktown accused us of trying to condone everything; we never say South Africa is imperfect or wrong or that there is a mistake anywhere. I sent for two of my articles in order to show him what our point of departure is. On 14 May this year I wrote an article which was published in the New York Times. This article commences thus—

Here we immediately have an admission. I want to mention another example. A year or two ago I gave a talk at Chatham House in London. I should like to quote this part of my speech—

Is that your only answer?

That is our point of departure. The hon. member can stop cackling; I am dealing with the hon. member for Parktown. In regard to the question put by the hon. member for Parktown in regard to the urban Bantu, I have already said that a full chapter on the urban Bantu appears in the Yearbook. He referred to a single example. As a former journalist he quoted that it was being alleged in the Yearbook that the joining of people in South Africa into a state had not occurred voluntarily, but that it had occurred under the British colonial policy. He took exception to this—and the entire United Party joined him in laughing at this—i.e. that it was a product of the British colonial policy. I want to put the following question to the hon. member: What else was it? The hon. member may perhaps remember that when Cecil Rhodes introduced the “poll tax” in the Cape Parliament, his argument was: “That it will be a gentle stimulus”, to force the reserve Bantu to come out and work in the White economy and earn their money there. That was the standpoint. That was the reason for the poll tax in those days. If they want money then one forces them out of the homelands to come and work here in the White areas to earn money. In this way they were prepared to move in here. That was the colonial policy of Cecil Rhodes in those days. But let me mention another example: How were we joined together into a unit in South Africa in 1910? In the various provinces here and in the old Voortrekker republics there was a clear acceptance of boundaries, for example between the Zulu state in Natal and the Whites; lines were drawn and agreements concluded. The separate states were already there in embryo. In the old Cape history, British Caffraria was already a separate area in embryo. Then British colonial politics, with its policy of conquest, came and turned us all into colonies of Britain, and joined us together into a Union in 1910 as a result of which all were thrown together into one pot-pourri. Therefore what else are we now but a joining together of state units, under British colonial policy, into one territory, which they see as one multi-racial unitary state but which we see as a subcontinent on which various peoples are living, which we are, in our way, going to separate from one another again, as was originally intended, and as we would have done if there had not been British colonial interference. That is the difference between the two, and I adhere to the standpoint that this is in fact our point of departure.

Mr. Chairman, I have now replied to more or less all the questions, but I do not think I can allow this opportunity to pass without just saying something in regard to my department. A few years ago, in 1972,1 said in reply to this same debate-—

Sir, this was the policy statement in regard to my department in 1972 when we put the new dispensation in the department into effect. Sir, we sprang to work at once and the structure of the department was changed radically. The department was converted from what was primarily a administrative department into a professional department. We effected staff changes and set new requirements. We introduced a considerable number of improvements, in the first place to rectify the structure to be able in that way to have the necessary human material to deal with the situation. One of the achievements which resulted from that is the entire question of staff training, which has already been discussed here by various hon. members and to which I should very much like to accord high praise because I think that the training of our staff at the moment is excellent. Not only does this training take place in respect of the men of our staff, but we are also training the wives of information officers for use overseas, for quite frequently, as one of the hon. members was quite right in saying here, it is the wife of an information officer who finds herself in a position to state South Africa’s case. At a cocktail party she is surrounded by other men and our men are surrounded by the wives of other men. She therefore has a far more favourable opportunity to state South Africa’s case, and in addition a woman’s word is sometimes accepted more easily than a man’s. Therefore these women are also being trained. The training programme is a very thorough one; I am pleased with it; I am satisfied that we are giving our people the necessary background.

Do not train Helen as well.

But, Sir, after this training programme has been carried out, one must come to the next step, and that is what we are going to do in respect of our task as a whole. Previously perhaps we had worked in a haphazard way, and we then decided that we should make a thorough scientific survey to establish where our weak spots and where our strong points in regard to the entire matter are.

†Mr. Chairman, last year the department bought a so-called multiclient survey of the countries where we have offices. This survey or study provided us with a matrix of attitudes concerning South Africa in 14 different countries. It is not an opinion poll, but an in-depth analysis. This survey not only pinpoints our problem areas; it also indicates our unique selling propositions in the respective countries. It delineates the so-called hard and soft areas. The department and its officers abroad are now in a better position to take the offensive instead of responding defensively on a piecemeal basis to criticism from abroad, This study enables us to initiate on a scientifically sound basis instead of reacting in an ad hoc fashion. The actual findings are for the most part, for obvious reasons, confidential and intended for internal use only. There are, however, some aspects which may be made public.

We found, for example, that personal visits, or knowing people who have visited South Africa, served to sharply diminish negative feelings among influential persons abroad towards our country. This finding not only served to confirm the effectiveness of our guest programme, but also to rebut those who still maintain that our situation in South Africa is so bad that we will never be able to improve our image abroad. That was also what the hon. member for Sandton said. Quite to the contrary, it has now been proved once again that if only people would see us as we really are, our image would be considerably better. We also found that in the 14 countries included in the study, there were majority and opposition views among both the general public and influentials in so far as the World Council of Churches’ interference in our internal political affairs were concerned. This data, incidentally, has already been put to good use in a series of advertisements placed by the department in Germany. This series led to extensive editorial comment and drew many letters of support from German readers. I have the advertisement here, Sir, but I am not going to take time to quote from it. This survey does not only serve as a tool for effective planning in the department, but has also been made available to other departments which operate abroad, so that we can co-ordinate our efforts and in so doing obtain maximum results for our country with the limited funds at our disposal. I have indicated that one of the findings of the survey was that personal visits help to a very large extent to improve our image among influentials abroad. It is obvious that in this respect we and the Department of Tourism have a common interest and purpose. This is only one example of the many areas where some common objectives exist between ourselves and the department.

I have said before that my department will not remain on the defensive. We have now gone over to the offensive. We are now equipped with an area map, so to speak, on which we can intelligently base our strategy, a map which shows up enemy strength and weaknesses and their respective positions.

*This survey which we made, enabled us to establish precisely where we can strike and how we must strike. I am keeping an eye on the clock, because I realize I am speaking too long. To say something else about the methods which we are applying, I want to say that we have now trained the manpower to the standard we want, and we are continuing to do so; we are continuing to expand. We have defined the problem task. We know precisely where the problems are and how they must be handled. Now the methods, the methodics. The methodics cover a wide field which I could spend hours discussing but I am not going to do so now. In the first place there is the assistance we provide to foreign correspondents, for example, people who are in key positions. We help them to obtain suitable material. Previously they were frequently in a rather unenviable position and had an unenviable task in South Africa. Few doors were open to them. It was difficult for them to gain access. Few opportunities were created for them. We have now, however, created opportunities for them, for example we have taken them on tours, we have shown them what happens in certain places and have arranged interviews and conferences with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, with the Prime Minister and with the Minister of Defence, in regard to matters of interest. We took them to the Caprivi to investigate what was happening there. All these things have been done to place these people in a position where they are able to obtain the information themselves which in turn enables them to report effectively to their newspapers in the realization that their word will be accepted. Now it is interesting, Sir, that as a result of this enthusiasm in the department and the effectiveness of this policy, we now find that private individuals and companies are coming forward, and are co-operating in this of their own accord. I want to mention three examples of such private persons and bodies. I have here in my hand a brochure issued by Finansbank, in which in a thorough way an entire account is compiled concerning South Africa under the caption: “Why invest in South Africa?” This is published by a private company, Finansbank, and is distributed in Britain and in the U.S.A., and it is also being advertised extensively. The contents have been compiled and the costs of this publication borne in full by this bank, which has nothing to do with politics, but which is purely a business undertaking in South Africa and which wishes to further the cause of South Africa and is doing so in this very effective way. We are grateful for assistance from such a source. I want to mention a second example, of another bank, in this case Trust Bank, which also dealt with this matter by way of advertisements. These advertisements also appeared in all the leading newspapers in the English-speaking world. I have here an example of such an advertisement in my hand—“Economic Sanctions make me Shudder”—

This was signed by Lucas Mangope on 9 August 1973, and was placed as an advertisement by the Trust Bank of South Africa, with its full address, etc. I have here another advertisement in which Mrs. Lucy Mvubelo makes precisely the same request—

This is also an advertisement which appeared in many newspapers, at the expense of the Trust Bank of South Africa. These are the other people who are coming forward to help us. What I appreciate in particular is that persons are organizing themselves. In this way there is the Committee for Fairness in Sport, which published a huge advertisement. It read—

In the advertisement photographs appeared of White and Black athletes who participated together, for example boxers and cyclists. This advertisement appeared as full-page advertisements in newspapers in Australia and New Zealand for athletes from those countries were prevented from participating.

There are only one or two other matters I want to mention before I conclude. I am referring to the methods which we are applying at the moment to state our case. One of the methods which we are applying and because of which, to my astonishment, we have had to endure criticism, is the fact that we have appointed—I want to use the English term of it, because I do not think there is a suitable Afrikaans one—a lobbyist in America. Some of our uninformed newspapers in South Africa levelled criticism at the department for having appointed such a person. They implied that it was a kind of underground or underhand way of trying to exercise influence. When an American, who happened to be in the country, read those reports, he said that our newspapers astonished him. He can of course only read English. He said the fact that South Africa had up to that stage not yet had a lobbyist in Washington was a far more newsworthy item than the fact that we had in fact then appointed one. He pointed out that every country in the world, every group in the world has a lobbyist there, and asked why we were only entering the picture now. Nevertheless, some of our newspapers criticized us because we had appointed such a person. For the information of hon. members who do not know precisely what is meant by a lobbyist, I want to quote an article from U.S. News and World Report. This article appeared under the hand of Howard Flieger—

The article goes on to state—

And—

There is nothing under the counter; it is all 100% in order. The same applies in this case, but nevertheless we have, in this modern age, been criticized in South Africa because we appointed such a person. The results of his actions are already discernible, but I do not want to go into details of this now; I shall do so on a subsequent occasion.

There is one last little matter I want to raise. Criticism has been expressed on the part of the Press that our guest programme is one-sided, that we only invite people from one group—-arch-conservatives and people who are well-disposed towards us. I want to say at once that There are numerous members in this House of all political parties who can testify to the fact that guests who come here are afforded the opportunity of having discussions with members of all political parties. They ask for such opportunities, and these are arranged for them. I want to thank hon. members of all political parties in this House for what they are going and the time which they sacrifice speaking to these overseas guests. I want to thank a long list of peoples outside this Parliament, newspaper editors, academics, people in the business world and others, whom we trouble from time to time to dine out with our guests or spend an afternoon with them. They then offer the guests, on the highest level, direct and first hand information on a specific theme or subject in which the guest may be interested. I am grateful for this. Our guests leave this country with a broad spectrum knowledge of the entire political situation in South Africa. I think that in more than 99% of the cases they leave here with two or three thoughts uppermost in their minds. That is the impression which I gain when I see them finally and conduct a last interview with them. Firstly, they feel that the problems of South Africa are far more complicated than they had seemed from a safe distance of 10 000 miles. Secondly, these complicated problems are being tackled with all the enthusiasm which a party, a government and a country can muster. Thirdly, there is the conviction that work is being done here in an important sphere by people who are tackling and implementing the matter with dedication. The dedication of our people and the spirit which prevails here in South Africa, is a revelation to many people. Fourthly, they are convinced that South Africa is intensely engaged in dealing with these problems, that there is an exchange of ideas, that everyone is conversant with what is happening, that matters are being discussed and that although there is a difference of opinion, there is also a free exchange of ideas and a free exchange of opinions. They therefore become convinced that this is a free country where one is able to air one’s opinion and may speak to a free Press, and that real efforts are being made here to solve the difficult problems without creating any problems for the world outside. They have not been won round to our point of view, but at least they are aware of the problems which we are experiencing, and when they leave this country they will no longer express criticism so readily, or simply express a damning judgment. Ultimately they will view the matter more objectively. That is the success we are having with the programme.

The allegation is being made that everyone who comes here, is from one category only. I want to single out ten names from the scores we have, and quote them to hon. members. I want to challenge any member of the Press, who criticized me to such an extent, to tell me that these ten people can be lumped together into one cadre or that they are all moving in only one direction. These persons are Rev. Daniel Lyons, editor of the National Catholic Register, New York; Mr. Moses Newson, of the Baltimore newspaper, Afro-American, Mr. Arnold Foster, general adviser of the Anti-Deformation League of the B’nai B’rith; Mr. J. A. Parker, a negro writer from Washington; Dr. O. Olson, president of the Central Canadian Synod of the Lutheran Church; Mr. H. Köster, deputy chief editor of the Deutsche Presse-Agentur; Mr. B. Couch, Maori representative on the New Zealand Rugby Board; Mr. P. J. Prins, chief editor of the Algemeen Dagblad; Mr. R. Quesnoy, assistant chief editor of La Voix du Nord, France; and Mr. G. C. van Dam, member of the Second Chamber (House of Assembly), the Netherlands. I want to challenge anyone to put these ten people into one pigeonhole and to tell me that they are people who represent one school of thought. These ten names I have taken from the group which we have invited to South Africa during the past year.

I want to thank hon. members of the House for the discussions in this debate. Times are becoming more difficult, and we are at present living in an era in which the struggle is not a physical one, but is a struggle for the control of peoples’ minds. We are engaged in a war of words, and not in a war waged with rifles and armaments. This war of words is being waged against every individual and every nation, an attempt to control the thoughts and minds of people and to change their way of thinking. South Africa has to participate in that war, and the Department of Information is among the leading combatants in the actual frontline. I want to pay tribute to my department, both at home and abroad, in the head office, and everywhere who are with dedication, with zeal and with enthusiasm taking up the challenge to state South Africa’s case wherever they may go. They are people who do not begrudge the time, and who set no limits to the work they are doing to set this matter straight. I want to pay tribute to a dedicated staff which is rendering excellent service. We are entering the future with a struggle awaiting us, but because our cause is just and justifiable, I have never experienced any problems in stating it. I have frequently found myself in the position that I have had to state South Africa’s case abroad while the most poisonous questions were being asked there and the most venomous attacks were being made on South Africa, and I have never experienced any problems in stating South Africa’s case because I believe that what is being done here is morally and ethically right. Because I believe in that, I can defend and state my case. Because my policy is ethically and morally right, I am also able to defend it against any onslaughts regardless of where they come from and regardless of who may launch them. I want to give the assurance that in the time which lies ahead the department will continue on this course. We shall apply all means at our disposal to state our country’s case. South Africa’s case, the case of all of us jointly, for it is important to us. We are not merely stating a party’s case, but the official case of our country, South Africa. The motto of my department is and remains: “Dynamic action, enthusiasm, and efficiency.” In that spirit we will continue to fulfil our task.

Mr. Chairman, I did not intend taking part in this debate but it seems to me that more time is devoted to me by the hon. the Minister if I do not participate than if I do. Since he has obviously been extremely provocative this afternoon, I simply cannot allow some of the things he has said to go unanswered. I want to tell the hon. the Minister, firstly, that if he was monitoring what I was doing in the United States in May, in my own small way I did a bit of monitoring of him too. I learnt about his visit although everything was done very secretively of course. For instance, the American Press was not notified. It seems rather significant to me that he has to slip in through the back door while an insignificant politician such as I can march in through the front door. That is the first point I wanted to make. Secondly, while I was there, I read the article in the New York Times which the hon. the Minister referred to this afternoon. The article appeared on the “Op-ed” page, as it is known. I have a copy of this article but unfortunately, not knowing I was going to take part in this debate, I did not bring it into the Chamber with me. However, I can tell the hon. the Minister that when I read this article while in America, I was very tempted to sit down and write a letter to the editor of the New York Times exposing some of the half-truths in that article. I will immediately admit that the article was very well written, but he failed to bring out one very significant thing in this article which defended the whole policy of separate development. The point I refer to is the very thing he objected to in a reply I gave in my radio broadcast, namely the position of the Black people who are permanently living in so-called White South Africa. He ignored them altogether although of course the three and a half million people on the farms, to whom I referred, together with the four and a half million people living in the urban areas, represent more than half the African population of South Africa. In that specific article the hon. the Minister made no mention of accommodating those people politically where they live and work and where they are probably going to die, namely in White South Africa. The article consisted of a series of well-put half-truths and I very seriously considered sitting down and writing a letter to the editor.

Why did you not do so?

My patriotism came to the fore. I thought I would rather attack the hon. the Minister here at home over an article he had written than in New York where we were both, after all, visitors. This does not mean that I am prepared, under any circumstances, to put the case of the National Party when I am overseas.

I did not ask for that.

Everything the hon. the Minister objected to that I said in that radio broadcast was in fact the truth. He cannot fault me factually on a single thing I said. For instance, there is the ridiculous comment he made about influx control. I was replying to a question on housing. Obviously, when I discussed the fact that the removal of influx control is often advanced in South Africa as one of the reasons for the development of slums, I devoted myself to that particular subject and did not mention employment opportunities or improvements of the conditions in the homelands which one obviously would mention if one were talking generally about influx control. As for ghettos, the Indian and Coloured people do say that they live in ghettos. As for local councils and homeland Governments, that is the way the homeland leaders talk about it. They refer to themselves as the voteless people for the simple reason that the legislative assemblies, or the homeland Governments if you like, where they are able to operate their vote, are unable to change any of the things that affect their way of life, e.g. their ability to come into so-called White South Africa and earn a living.

I want to tell the hon. the Minister that I am very flattered that he should say that I am in such a unique position as far as putting South Africa’s case is concerned when I go overseas.

Not any more.

Well, I am delighted to add six able representatives who, when they go overseas, will put exactly the same point of view about South Africa that I put. As the hon. member for Parktown said, they will correct distortions, which is what I always do when I go overseas; they will counter lies about South Africa, which I always do when I go overseas; and they will also correct exaggerations. But not one of them will go overseas to defend National Party policy. They will all express their patriotism exactly the way I do. They will tell people overseas that there are thousands of White South Africans who do not agree with the policy of this Government and who are doing their best to get South Africa to take a new direction in racial policy.

Let me tell the Minister that the evidence for this, the fact that I now have six additional Progressive Party members in this House, was produced when I went overseas in May this year, after the election, and it was the finest thing that could have happened to South Africa. Everywhere I went, whether I spoke to Republicans or Democrats, to Conservatives or Labour Party members or Liberals, the increase in the numbers of Progressive Party members in the South African Parliament was welcomed as a sign that South Africa was taking an enlightened direction. That is the best bit of patriotism that anybody can ever advance in South Africa. The hon. the Minister should talk to his own embassies overseas. They will tell him that as exhibit A for South Africa the Progressives have in fact been the very best thing for South Africa. Wherever I go I am told this by members of his own department. Credibility is established not by white-washing South Africa, but by telling the truth. That is how you establish credibility and not by attempting to gloss over South Africa’s obvious fallible points where she has obviously gone wrong in policy and where she is obviously taking a direction which is completely different from the rest of the world. That is the best thing that one can do for South Africa.

I make no apologies whatever for what I said in that radio broadcast. Every word I said was true. There were no half-truths and everything was true. Having said all that, I may add that when I am overseas—despite an incorrect report which I think appeared yesterday in a Johannesburg newspaper about an interview I had given to a Canadian broadcaster—I am invariably asked: “What can we here do to help change the situation in South Africa?” I always reply, then, that first of all the situation in South Africa must be changed from within. Secondly I say: “One way in which you can help change the situation is in fact to aid the economic development of this country, to invest in South Africa.” Then I give a reason which obviously will not be favourably received, but it is my reason, viz. that the economic development of South Africa is the very best way to undermine apartheid in this country. That is what I tell them. When I say that to them, having admitted all our many faults in other ways and having told the truth, believe me, I do better for South Africa than all the money being spent on all those publications, those glossy publications that the hon. the Minister puts out. Finally I should like to refer to the film on Dimbaza. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I regret having to reply again. I would have remained silent had I not felt I had to reply to this. The hon. member referred to my article in the New York Times and said that I had not touched on the matter of the urban Bantu. That, however, was not the purpose of the article. A requirement was that the article was not to exceed 750 words. An exposition of the broad philosophical concepts of the policy of separate development had to be given in 750 words. No one is able to represent the policy in all its details in 750 words. I laid down and outlined the philosophical foundations. From the nature of the case I did not discuss details. There was no opportunity for that. But now the hon. member wants to pass off my statements as being half truths. There is not a single half truth in the article. I do not want to be petty about this, but I want to tell the hon. member that her performance abroad—I want to repeat it and remind her of it—is closely watched by people because she is regarded as the mouthpiece who speaks on behalf of a group of people in South Africa.

So when she does something, she should be aware of her responsibility as she is in a special position. As far as this whole interview is concerned, I just want to tell her that when she makes appearances abroad and makes statements in her easy, free-running way which is so typical of her— after all this is how we know her, she talks incessantly—she should please count her words because erroneous impressions may be created abroad. There are examples of this, but I do not want to take up the time of this House by mentioning them. However I content myself by saying, however, that every argument advanced by the hon. member, is capable of a wrong interpretation because of the way in which she put them. The hon. member may quote as much as she likes. The facts remain as they are.

Finally, I just want to tell her that I did not follow her around and check on her. The department obtained her radio interview and that is how it came to be in my possession. I am not asking her to defend my party or any party. I am asking her to defend South Africa and her fatherland. That is what I am asking of her. Defend South Africa with all its problems, with all its questions and with everything connected therewith. I say again that we are not perfect, but the fact that honest attempts at finding a solution are being made here, is something she will never convey to the outside world. She has nothing but criticism and condemnation of everything being done. In her own way, of course, she wants to build up her party and state her own policy, but I am asking the hon. member to stop being the representative of the Progressive Party. I am asking her to become, for a change, the representative of South Africa as well.

Vote agreed to.

Revenue Vote No. 21 and S.W.A. Vote No. 10.—“Interior”, Revenue Vote No. 22 and S.W.A. Vote No. 11.—“Public Service Commission” and Revenue Vote No. 23. —“Government Printing Works”:

Mr. Chairman, I ask the privilege of the half hour. We have listened to the hon. the Minister for more than 60 minutes in his capacity as Minister of Information, informing us of his endeavours at image-building for South Africa. We have listened to what should and what should not be done by us in this House and by the people of South Africa in regard to that image-building. The capacity in which I want to address him now is his capacity as Minister of the Interior, in which capacity he has a great deal to do with South Africa and the process of image-building being projected overseas from South Africa. It is his department which looks after the registration of our personal deeds and the events of our lives from birth. It records our divorce or divorces, our marriage or marriages, our ability and right to drive a car, to vote, whether we may travel and whether we may get passports, etc.

The Minister also deals with the question to which race group a person in South Africa shall belong. He also deals with other matters which are so very important when it comes to projecting the image of what kind of country South Africa is. I was most interested when the hon. the Minister was speaking. He was talking with great enthusiasm about people who appear in advertisements, particularly Bantu extolling South Africa, the country they belong to. What, however, has the hon. the Minister done in his capacity as Minister of the Interior to one of the very people that he referred to I am referring here to Mrs. Mvubelo. I was unaware of this until the hon. the Minister mentioned it. She was the woman who in an advertisement which she signed, stated: “Don’t isolate us in South Africa.” She was doing what she could for South Africa as a Bantu person. What did the hon. the Minister do? What did he do to this woman when she asked to travel out of this country on a South African passport, to which she was entitled in order to attend an International Labour Conference? What did his department do?

This person is a woman of very high standing in the trade union movement in the Republic—she is the General Secretary of the National Union of Clothing Workers—she stood up vigorously to militant Black opponents of South Africa at the meeting of the International Labour Organization in Switzerland. When she went off in 1962, according to information I obtained from the department, the hon. the Minister’s predecessor, not knowing whether she had a return ticket or not, asked her to make a deposit of R200 in case she had to be repatriated back to South Africa. In 1971 she proceeded to the meeting of the International Labour Organization in Switzerland and, according to a newspaper report, she was asked to deposit R200 to cover this. Later on she visited the United States of America and then the deposit had gone up to R400. She had not absconded before; she had not cost the State a cent.

She is a South African.

Yes, she is a South African. She is also a protagonist of South Africa’s future good relationships with foreign countries. In 1973 when she was going to attend another meeting of the International Labour Organization in Switzerland she was again asked to deposit R400 or provide security to that amount. Is this the appreciation shown to those people who under the most difficult circumstances are doing their best in order to build up South Africa’s image? What is more remarkable is the fact that this has only now become public, and not through this woman. It has only now become public that she has been subjected to this type of discrimination. Because it is discrimination.

An insult.

It is discrimination. I want to say this. The Secretary of the department made a statement recently in which he said that the request for a deposit or security is the exception rather than the rule. According to the last report, in 1973, there were 216 000 passports issued. How many of the recipients of these were asked to provide deposits? What happens? This is the Minister who says that we must be patriots, we must build this country. What happens in his own department? A woman whom he has used and praised in his capacity as Minister of Information has to provide a deposit before she can get a passport to go overseas.

Scandalous!

According to the information given to me by the hon. the Minister, during a period of five years the department has never incurred expenditure of over R10 000 in regard to the compulsory repatriation of persons travelling on South African passports. The highest expenditure has been about R9 000 and the average expenditure has been R6 000— three cents per individual passport that has been issued! Three cents per individual passport, and the hon. the Minister selects this particular woman to be subjected to the indignity of being required to find a deposit! What is more—I should like to know whether this is correct—I am informed that in regard to the UmaBatha company that went overseas to perform in London—where they were well-received— and which returned to this country to perform here, the hon. the Minister’s department required the sponsors of this company, Natal University, to provide a very substantial security in case these people had to be repatriated.

I would like the Minister to confirm whether my information is correct, that it ran into many thousands. The figure that has been given to me is that they had to find R10 000 security before passports would be given to this company. The Minister must not say to us that we sin when we talk about things that are wrong in South Africa, when these things are happening under this Government. When I asked the Minister for the reason why this Bantu lady was asked for a deposit, his reply was that that Bantu Commissioner had advised that it should be obtained. The Bantu Commissioner? But why? The responsibility is this Minister’s. He has the records. But the most disturbing aspect perhaps of the whole of his reply to me was when I asked whether she was in possession of return travel tickets on each of the four occasions when she left South Africa, and the reply was: “Not known.” Surely the possession of a return ticket is a very material matter to take into consideration in deciding whether a deposit should be asked for or not. I hope the Minister will make a full statement in regard to this because it seems to me from my investigations that the only people who are asked for deposits, whether they have return tickets or not, are members of the non-White groups in South Africa.

You cannot deduce that.

From my investigations, that is so, and when I asked the Minister to try to help me in this matter he said that there were no lists kept of the categories of people from whom deposits are asked. It seems to me that is always the best way in which the Government attempts to conceal how many are White and how many are Black and how many are Coloured in such cases. I hope the Minister is going to make it clear what the reasons are for this woman and similar people to be treated in this way.

I want to go on to a matter which we debated very fully in this House during this session and I do not want to take much time over it, and that is the question of the Publications Control Board. I raise it purely for the following reason: In the course of the debate we had, the hon. the Minister suggested that the new system which the House has now approved would be a far more effective system and would give far greater satisfaction as far as the country is concerned. I would not have raised this had there not been two very strange ministerial decisions within the last week or so. It concerns a decision by the Deputy Minister who sat in appeal on a film, and the Minister himself sitting in appeal on a film. The Deputy Minister sat in appeal on the film, Portrait of an Assassin, which had been banned entirely by the control board. It was released, and in the Deputy Minister’s opinion there was no reason for the banning. And it was released without any restriction whatsoever as to age group.

That is not correct.

Then the Minister must tell me if I am not correct. But if that is so, then the decisions between the control board and the Deputy Minister in any case conflicted. But I am more concerned about the Minister’s attitude in regard to the film ,Land Apart. We find that in this case a total ban was imposed and the Minister has now confirmed that. I asked him for full reasons for his decision, because prominent people took part in the production of that film. I believe the Minister himself participated in the film.

He was a co-star.

I asked him to give me a full statement as to why this film should have been banned and I got an extraordinary reply, which I am sure is not going to create very much public confidence in the assurances he gave in the recent debate, that in future when any decision is taken by a control committee or the appeal board, full reasons will be given for that decision. Does the hon. the Minister regard what he said as being full reasons? He referred me to a recital of sections and subsections of the existing Act, and what did he say in effect about this film? He said—I am reading from the sections of the Act to which he referred me— that the film may have the effect of disturbing the peace and good order, or it may have the effect of prejudicing the general welfare, or it may have the effect of harming relations between any sections of the inhabitants of the Republic; and it was further banned by him because it depicted in an offensive manner controversial or international politics. Now, Sir, I have not seen the film, but it is common knowledge that many responsible people contributed to the making of this film. It features, among others, the hon. the Prime Minister, Mr. Dawid de Villiers, the chairman of Nasionale Pers, Professor Wimpie de Klerk, the editor of Die Transvaler, Mr. Dirk Richard, the editor of Die Vaderland, and various White, Coloured and Bantu leaders and various members of this House, and I believe—and here the hon. member for Turffontein may listen to me—that the pièce de résistance in this film was a presentation by the hon. member for Turffontein of the United Party policy in which he so fervently believes and advocates for acceptance in this country. [Interjections.] I could understand that if perhaps the Minister, out of fraternal compassion, decided that that should be cut, because there is the possibility of cutting any matter which depicts in an offensive manner a public character. [Interjections.] What has been said about this film that the Minister has so damned in the answer he gave me? Mr. Dawid de Villiers says this—

This is Mr. Dawid de Villiers, chairman of Nasionale Pers. Then we go on to the other people. There was Mr. Jan Marais of the Trust Bank, and the president of the S.A. Foundation, who were both reported to have been most impressed by the film; they said that they thought it was fair and balanced and expressed surprise that the board had banned it. The director-general of the Foundation said he saw this film on two occasions, and continued—

Sir, those are the opinions of persons not in the political sphere, but people outside the political sphere. I wonder whether I should not quote to the hon. the Minister what Chief Justice Rumpff, whom he quotes so frequently in regard to these matters, had to say. The Chief Justice said this—

Now I want to say to the hon. the Minister that when I read these comments from these prominent citizens and when I know the persons who have participated in this film and their standing in our society, the hon. the Minister must not take it amiss and he must not become terribly sensitive when I tell him that as far as the general public is concerned, his action amounts to nothing else but political censorship of a film because he did not want the public to see the facts it portrayed. If not, will the Minister tell me what are these aspects of this film which are presenting a political situation in an offensive manner? Sir, the whole difficulty of South Africa lies in the political problems that we have with us at the present time. The whole focus is on race relations. Here is a film to which senior and responsible citizens contribute and the Minister decides in his wisdom that that film shall not be exhibited.

Sir, during the censure debate at the beginning of the session I referred to certain aspects of Government policy which have been built up over a period of 26 years and which I believe must now be reversed in a large number of respects and with greater rapidity. They relate particularly to the field of human relationships. Sir, the Population Registration Act is administered by the Minister and his department. I want to remind him, if I may, of the words of the then Minister of the Interior, the late Dr. Dönges. When this Bill was introduced in 1950, he said—

The late Field-Marshal Smuts, in the same debate, expressed the following views—

Sir, I believe that we have reached, the stage when we should look again at the implications of this measure. It is not necessary for me to elaborate on the impracticability of the measure as it stands now; it is self-evident. It is self-evident from the fact that in the course of the years since the passing of this Bill it has had to be amended at least 10 times in various aspects in an attempt to make it workable. Sir, I do not need to tell the hon. the Minister, because he knows as I do from my contacts in this city of ours, that there are thousands and thousands of citizens who have no identity cards. They refuse to come and get identity cards because of the problems of their classification in relation to the lives which they are living peacefully and normally amongst the other groups of South Africa. They avoid this registration, and they live through their lives running the risk of prosecution because they have not applied for identity cards. Many of them risk prosecution in order to exercise their right to associate with whom they please. Sir, it would take me days to go through the records and the details of the cases which I have handled in connection with these classification matters. I am sure that all hon. members on both sides of the House have been faced from time to time with these reclassification problems. Sir, the heartbreak that is involved in hundreds and hundreds of these cases cannot be tolerated any longer in South Africa. You cannot classify people and tell them with whom they can associate by a rule-of-thumb definition on the Statute Book; that has got to stop.

Which Act are you discussing now?

The Population Registration Act.

Sir, let me give hon. members just one example: a couple in this country can be married perfectly legally in terms of the definition under the Mixed Marriages Act, but under the Population Registration Act the one spouse will be classified as Coloured and the other as White, if they are Coloured and White respectively, according to this rule-of-thumb definition. Sir, what happens? When the children are born and the one parent is White and the other Coloured, those children must be classified as Coloured. They are then removed from their own blood relatives, who are descendants of the White parent’s family; they are removed from their own cousins, from their own kith and kin; they are kraaled off and told, “You are Coloured”.

Inhuman.

Sir, that is the situation that we have at the present time. In the midst of this I want to say—and I say this very sincerely this afternoon—that the Secretary of this department is burdened with an intolerable option in terms of the provisions of section 5(4)(c) of the Act, which entitle him to alter a classification at his discretion. I want to say that those matters which I have taken to him have been dealt with in a reasonable and sympathetic manner, but, Sir, he is there to enforce the law; he cannot just accede to every request. As I say he is burdened with an intolerable task. Sir, in the time left at my disposal I want to give you one instance where one parent is classified as Coloured and the other as White; they have six children; the three eldest boys went to White schools; they were classified as White when they turned 16. Their parents kept their own identity cards concealed. These boys, after completing their schooling, went into national service as Whites. When they had completed their military training, they became apprenticed as Whites, and one day the eldest son came to his mother to say that he wanted to get married in three months’ time. She was then faced with this situation: They were associating with Whites; her son’s girl-friend was White and she assumed that he was White, but the mother knew that in her drawer at home there was a Coloured identity card. Sir, how do you convey that to a person who has been accepted as a White person and has associated with White persons all his life? Now suddenly you have to say to him: “Because your mother has been classified as Coloured because one of your grandparents was a Coloured, you must be classified as Coloured.” Sir, this matter was dealt with administratively and in this particular case the matter was put right, but, Sir, you cannot go on for ever having matters dealt with in this form. I want to say to the hon. the Minister that this measure was introduced to implement aprtheid. Apartheid is a word which is no longer accepted by hon. members opposite; they now talk about separate development. Sir, whilst there must be distinction in some form between race groups—I accept that—it is this stringent, inhuman border-line demarcation which I ask the hon. the Minister this afternoon to look into. Sir, will ruin descend upon South Africa if it is left to a Coloured man who marries a Bantu woman, or a Bantu man who marries a Coloured woman, to decide in which race group they want to be accommodated? Would it bring ruin upon South Africa if cases of that sort were decided in that way? Would it bring ruin upon South Africa if one left it to persons of mixed race origins who get married to decide with which group, for all general purposes, they wish to be associated—the group to which they belong by appearance and where they are welcomed by acceptance by those people with whom they wish to associate? Sir, must South Africans, because of arbitrary, statutory classifications in this country, be forced to leave South Africa and proceed overseas in order that they might fulfil their human and Christian concept of marriage because it is prohibited here? Sir, we cannot go on in this way any longer. I believe that the desire for the right of personal choice of contacts in South Africa is growing and growing and is becoming an overwhelming force amongst all sections of our population. South Africans, in increasing numbers, reject the concept that they should be set apart in all political, professional and social spheres of human endeavour. I know that various aspects of the apartheid laws are not the responsibility of the hon. the Minister, but in heaven’s name, can we not have introduced into our laws that flexibility to go back to what is applied and what has been applied in South-West Africa, namely the general acceptance of the highest degree of choice to those people who may belong to one or another of these groups as to where they want to live out their lives in South Africa? I believe this is particularly necessary in Coloured/White relations. I believe that if we can get away from this rigidity, people will find their position amongst those whose interests they share and to whose standards they adhere and our Coloured/ White relations will greatly improve. We have had 24 traumatic years in this country as a result of these laws. I believe that the realism of appearance and acceptance for the purposes of race grouping is long overdue and I hope that the hon. the Minister will see that steps are taken to ensure that this legislation is amended in that way to eliminate the injustices and the hardships which have been endured for so long by so many people in this country.

Mr. Chairman, before I come to the speech by the hon. member for Green Point, there are two other matters I should like to touch on briefly. I read in the newspaper this morning that the hon. members for Parow and Durban Point, as well as one of our respected officials, Mr. Booysens, are shortly departing for overseas to carry out certain investigations there in which the Department of the Interior has an interest. I want to wish them all of the best and hope that they will return to the Select Commitee having acquired a great deal of wisdom and knowledge.

I also want to address a few words to the hon. members of the Progressive Party. They too will very probably enter the debate later on, but I have told the hon. members before that they are known as people with vast knowledge and with all the fine things one should like to have. However, I find it strange that they have asked a number of questions in connection with matters concerning this department to which the hon. the Minister replied that the information they required was available in the department’s report. I am disappointed in the hon. members of the Progressive Party in that before making a thorough study of the activities of a department, they asked certain questions in the House, the replies to which they could quite easily have obtained from the report. If I am doing them an injustice by saying this, I regret it, but quite possibly the hon. member for Parktown or one of the other hon. members will be able to give us further information in this regard. I myself am a little disappointed in the Progressive Party. [Interjections.]

Actually the hon. member for Green Point has a very difficult task. Year after year I listen to him and every year he raises a great many matters. Last year he maintained that the hon. the Minister was doing things far too rapidly and too hastily. The hon. the Minister was supposedly rushing through the community. The hon. member made particular reference to the abolishing of two public holidays and said that a tremendous amount of violence would erupt as a result. However, absolutely nothing happened.

Don’t you read the newspapers?

This year the hon. member spoke for 25 minutes and touched on about three matters. The first two were very minor, but the third matter was something the principle of which had been settled in law for a long time. However, the hon. member’s party provided no answer in this regard. He dwelt on the matter of a certain Bantu woman, Mrs. Mvubelo, and I believe that the hon. the Minister will reply very thoroughly to the hon. member’s questions. I find it amazing, in the light of all the questions he has asked about the deposit and security demanded in respect of the issuing of passports to people who have to return to South Africa from overseas, that that is all he could have made of all the replies. I want to ask the hon. member how old is the principle that a deposit and security be requested in regard to passports. Is the hon. member’s party against that principle? What is their standpoint in that regard? I think that the hon. the Minister could really take pleasure in replying if the hon. member for Green Point or the person after me were to say what their standpoint was as far as this particular principle is concerned.

The hon. member spoke about one or two of the films with regard to which he had technical problems. It seems to me that the United Party is in such confusion that its thoughts are not with the debate in this House, in any event. Their internal problems have caused the hon. member who acted as chief spokesman, to spend half an hour dealing with these minor matters, while in the report on the activities of the department there is a depth and a content from which one could have drawn a great deal more.

The third point mentioned by the hon. member was in respect of the whole question of human relationships and the major injustice inflicted on people through race classification. He also spoke about the disruptions which it caused in the community and also in family life. For myself, I think that there are quite probably a thousand and one things in life in which injustice is inherent. Many things occur in human society which no one likes; perhaps hon. members and I like them least of all. I shall have to come back to the Progressive Party again, but first I want to refer now to the hon. members on that side of the House. They come here with a pious air and present the House with certain exceptional cases. Hon. members know themselves that no one likes exceptional cases, particularly where people are involved. But surely the hon. members must come up with an alternative. They must say how they, with their policy, would handle the fine and delicate affairs of race. The policy of those hon. members is one of race federation. How often have we on this side of the House not asked those hon. members to come and tell us how they, with their race federation policy, would determine when a man was a Coloured, when he was a White man and when he was a Black man?

How do you do it in South West?

We have to accept that physical-anthropological racial distinctions can be drawn, that cultural distinctions can be drawn and that this can be done in a scientific way, just as the hon. members have to establish their policy theoretically, too. In dealing with the human community, however, one finds cases of which one is unsure and where it is not easy to draw dividing lines. I can only say that I know, and I know it with the conviction that emanates from the heart of the National Party, that it is those very things about which we are sensitive. How do the hon. members of the Progressive Party do their classification? A person who, for example, earns one cent more than another person has the franchise, or one with a little more learning than another can have the franchise. The hon. members of the Progressive Party drew up a senate plan—and I do not want to quote them incorrectly—in which they, too, want to make use of a certain race classification. Thus the fact that there is differentiation between the people and that there is diversity among them, brings one to those cases which are not easy to deal with. However, I know that this side of the House, with the department, deals with these matters as carefully and as gently as possible because it, too, grew out of a community in which a degree of discrimination was practised against it which has seldom been equalled by discrimination against peoples anywhere in the world.

I want to go further and get to the real subject of my speech. I am very grateful for the annual report which the Department of the Interior has once again put at our disposal this year. This is really the second time that such a report has appeared, but I do not want to say that this report is an improvement on the previous one, because then the department would perhaps think that I was of the opinion that the previous year’s report was not a good one, but this one really gave an indication of further growth in the very sound policy followed by the department.

In addition, the department is now occupying the new Civitas building in Pretoria to an increasing extent. I think that the Department of Public Works has erected a good building that really shines out among a large group of buildings in Pretoria. In my opinion the building has a very good and suitable name; if my Latin does not fail me, the name “Civitas” really has two meanings. There is the abstract meaning of citizenship, the state of citizenship or the right of citizenship, and the concrete meaning, namely the citizenry as a united community which either refers to the citizenry alone or to the state. I trust that the Department of the Interior, bearing in mind the good work they do, will really find a home in this building too, and that they will come up to all the expectations inherent in the name “Civitas” and will strive towards the finest ideals of the cultural community with its very ancient history which attaches to that name.

I also have the greatest appreciation for the officials of the Department of the Interior. Paging through the report, one notes that there are endless figures and statistics. I want to say that we should see each of these figures as the indication of a transaction in which the public, whether it be the people of South Africa itself or people from abroad, come into contact with our officials of the Interior. Every day the officials handle between 6 000 and 10 000 postal articles. As far as I am concerned the fact that the hon. member for Green Point mentioned only one or two cases constitutes proof of how well and how thoroughly this department carries out its functions, but perhaps the hon. member for Green Point did not put his case very clearly. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Rissik never ceases to amaze me. Every time he gets up I am absolutely amazed at his facility for getting up here and presenting his subject with blinkers on. How he manages to keep those blinkers so firmly in place so that he can only see straight ahead, and not to the left or to the right, never ceases to amaze me.

I keep my eye on the ball.

I can tell the hon. member that we on this side of the House, and particularly the hon. member for Green Point, have kept our eye on the ball. I want to say that the hon. member for Rissik completely missed the ball; he was clean bowled, neck and crop. The stumps are lying all over the Chamber today as we sit here.

Your name should be Charles Fortune.

While the hon. member for Green Point was speaking, the hon. member for Rissik interjected and asked: “What Act are you discussing now?” The hon. member was discussing the Population Registration Act at the time.

I knew that.

That is what I mean when I say that he was speaking with blinkers on. Surely he knows that this is one of the most iniquitous pieces of legislation ever passed in the world, let alone in South Africa? It is an Act that has caused more heartbreak than any legislation ever passed before and I do not believe that any man can dream up legislation that will cause more heartbreak. Has the hon. member not had to handle a case where somebody has sought a different classification? I ask him this because I believe that every single one of us has been confronted with such a case. I am thinking of a particular case which I hope has been concluded or will be concluded soon, if it has not quite been concluded. I refer to a Mauritian family consisting of the parents and two boys who came to South Africa some years ago. They were first classified as Coloureds. Then, on appeal, the parents were re-classified as White but the two sons were left as Coloureds. After a further three years of fighting one of the sons was reclassified as White but the other was left as a Coloured. I am hoping that now, in the last couple of weeks, the remaining son has also been classified White. Can you imagine what that family has experienced over the last eight years that we have fought this case for them? Yet the hon. member for Rissik asks what law we are talking about. Has he never handled such a case? Has he never witnessed the heartbreak which is experienced by a family such as this? A little while ago I had to handle a case connected with one of South Africa’s leading professional golfers, a man who has been overseas and wears a Springbok blazer. All of a sudden they discovered that this man was a Coloured, with all the stigma that is attached to that classification in terms of this Government’s thinking and in terms of the thinking in South Africa today. This is terrible. You must have a heart to see heartbreak; I wonder if hon. members on that side of the House have hearts.

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

Evening Sitting

Mr. Chairman, just before we adjourned for dinner, the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg South raised a matter in regard to race classification. While one has understanding for borderline cases of this kind, and for the isolated cases where heartbreak is caused, and although one sympathizes with such cases, there is nevertheless one matter which was raised by the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg South which in my opinion is deserving of criticism. He spoke of the stigma attached to being classified as Coloured. In these times in which we are living, I think it is very reprehensible indeed to speak of a stigma in connection with membership of any group, whether it be the White, Coloured, Indian or Bantu group. It can never under any circumstances be described as being a stigma to be a Bantu, Coloured or Indian. For the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg South to come along here and to speak of a stigma is in my opinion to derogate from the human dignity of a large group of people in South Africa, and our task is precisely to develop and to achieve recognition for the human dignity of the total population of Southern Africa. [Interjections.] It is obvious that the Opposition is now suffering on account of that insulting remark which they made. For a period of decades the Coloured population of South Africa has never had the opportunity of developing a sense of pride in its own communal awareness. And now this kind of attitude displayed by the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg South is calculated to break down again this status which is being developed.

I should like to refer to another aspect. This is a matter which has frequently given rise to criticism, namely the granting of visas.

Mr. Chairman, on a point of order, someone is standing up and talking.

Order!

The hon. the Minister indicated earlier on during the discussions on the Information Vote that only 0,8% of the applications for visas were turned down in South Africa, as against the 10% in the United States. I notice from the statistics that during the last year, 1973, more than 220 000 applications were made. Of these, just over 1 700 were turned down. This is a negligible number if regard is had to the difficult situation in which South Africa finds itself and the necessity for us to maintain a reasonable degree of peace and order by preventing unnecessary trouble-making and interference in our affairs from outside. If we remember, therefore, that in other countries which are free from problems of this kind, a much higher percentage of visas are refused, I think that South Africa has nothing to be ashamed of. I should like to refer to one particular application by a South African to visit America about which a great fuss was made after the Department of Information had succeeded in obtaining a visa for him. I am referring to the head of our Defence Force, Admiral Biermann. According to the Press in South Africa it was quite wrong that an attempt should have been made to obtain a visa for him through different channels. Surely he is a person who would not engage in undermining activities of any kind in America. I do want to make an appeal that in matters such as these, which affect South Africa’s relations with the outside world, greater responsibility should be shown, by the Press as well. After all, South Africa is one of the smaller countries and we deserve to have more peace and quiet. This requires the co-operation of all concerned, the Opposition as well as the Press. In matters of this kind which are handled by the department, such as the granting of visas, race classification and so forth, it is obvious that there will always be borderline cases which will cause problems. However, South Africa is one of those countries that really go out of their way to handle cases of this kind in a humane manner and to cause as little grief as possible.

As far as race classification is concerned, I notice that during 1973, from the hundreds or possibly thousands of cases which the Opposition has tried to indicate, there was a total number of 46 recorded appeals. Of these, 25 were upheld; that is to say, approval was granted for amendments to be made. Only 21 were dismissed. Nevertheless the impression is being created that this is a brutal department which is treating a large number of people in an inhuman manner. This is not the case. I want to add that of these 25 applications which were approved, 22 involved a reclassification from one non-White group to another. Only three reclassifications from Coloured to White were approved. I know too that the non-White groups themselves are opposed to unnecessary applications by members of one group for reclassification as members of another. I know of cases where Coloured people have objected to Indians having themselves registered as Coloured people. They objected that the Indians were having themselves registered as Coloureds because they could then obtain trade facilities in Coloured areas, which enabled them to exploit the Coloured people. It should really be a privilege reserved for the Coloured community itself to provide trade facilities for its own people. It is quite clear, therefore, that reclassification is not a matter which affects the Whites only, but that it is a matter of concern to the non-Whites as well and that they feel that there should not be unnecessary reclassifications from one group to another. I am satisfied that this department is performing its function in an effective and above all in a humane manner.

The Public Service is probably the most important stabilizing factor for developing and maintaining a stable Government. For this reason one appreciates the work that is being done by officials in the Public Service in regard to Government services in the Bantu homelands. Here, too, through the training which is being undertaken, the training for the embryonic services for the Bantu homelands, stability is being given to those future independent states. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I do not think that the hon. gentleman who has just sat down has had very much experience of dealing with the very matters that he has raised in this House. He should have listened to the hon. member for Green Point who indeed paid tribute to the Secretary for the Interior, which we all endorse, for the “menslike manier” in which he does in fact deal with these cases. That, however, was not the issue raised by the hon. member for Green Point. The issue that he raised—and this is why I rise this evening —was that the basis on which the classification of people is done in terms of the Population Registration Act should be changed. If it were changed to the basis that he suggested, to the basis that has been traditional and has worked in South Africa over hundreds of years, viz. that of appearance and acceptance only—that that should be the test by which one should judge these matters—then we would not have the sort of situation that we have at the moment.

We would have chaos.

The sort of situation that one would avoid would be this affront to the human dignity of people who want to be reclassified and who have to suffer the indignity of having to go to a Government department and take their children with them so that they can all be viewed and so that some opinion can be obtained in regard to what they look like, how they speak, and so forth. This is the point at issue. When the hon. member for Klip River takes umbrage because the hon. member for Green Point and the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg South talk about the stigma attaching to people who are Coloured, then I agree that it ought not to be a stigma. However, under the policy of this Government it is a stigma. In fact, one ought to be proud of what one is but under the policy of this Government one cannot be proud of what one is in this respect. [Interjections.] If the hon. member for Klip River feels that there is no stigma attaching to this matter, I want to ask him whether he is prepared to give equal economic rights to the Coloured people and whether he is prepared to give them equal social rights in that context. If he is not prepared to do so, then he must ask himself whether or not they do suffer from a stigma and whether they do suffer indignities which he as a White man would in fact not be prepared to suffer.

You are suffering from a stigma because you are White.

I especially want to direct my remarks to the hon. the Minister because the plea of the hon. member for Green Point tonight has, I think, come at a stage where the Government must sit up and take notice and apply its mind as a matter of urgency to what he has said. I should like to support what he said, not as a matter of theory but as a matter of practical application from my experience as a member of this House dealing with cases of this nature. Mr. Chairman, I do not know how many hon. gentlemen who sit on that side deal with these cases but I want to tell you that they are the most tragic, heart-breaking cases that one comes across, because the people who come to you are people who are accepted as Whites in the community in which they live. They come to you and say, “What can we do?” Sir, I can tell you that it is not only in isolated cases, but as a matter of routine in my life as a member of this House that I received representations from constituents of mine who find themselves in this situation. They come along, two of them as a rule, and ask you what they should do. The one is classified as Coloured and the other is classified as White in terms of the Population Registration Act. They are in various stages of association; some of them are just associated and in love; in many cases the woman is pregnant, and in a number of cases they have children already. The one has a White card and the other has a Coloured card, and they come along to you for advice. You advise them to exhaust all the remedies and to try, because they are accepted by the White community as White in terms of the Population Registration Act, to get a classification as White. Sir, that falls down, and it falls down for the reason which the hon. member for Green Point mentioned, and that is that the test under that Act is too rigid; it introduces all sorts of presumptions in regard to findings of facts and it makes it incumbent upon the Registrar to classify as Coloured a person who is in fact accepted as White.

It is unrealistic.

It is un-Christian.

Sir, what one then advises these people to do is this, and this is my advice to them because in their situation what else can they do? What one says to them is that in terms of the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act passed by this Government, in terms of the definition of a White person under that Act, they are in fact White people, and that the person who has been classified as Coloured in terms of the Population Registration Act is in fact in terms of the definition of acceptance and appearance a White person. I therefore advise them to go to see the magistrate, which they do. They see the magistrate who is the marriage officer; they disclose all the facts to him and produce whatever evidence is required, and he, as is his bounden duty, then marries them as White persons in terms of that Act. Now, Sir, comes the nub of the whole problem. You then have to advise them that if they do that, they must face the consequence that in terms of the Population Registration Act, because one of the parents has been classified as Coloured, all the children, the natural issue of that marriage, must be classified in terms of the Act as Coloured. Sir, this does not mean a thing until the children have to go to school. You have the situation now that these people marry as White people because they are White in terms of the Act prohibiting mixed marriages; they then get to the stage where their children have to go to school and they are obliged to send them, in terms of Government legislation, to a Coloured school [Interjection.] Sir, that is so; it is no good the hon. the Leader of the House making noises over there.

It is inhuman and immoral.

They have all married …

I am speaking to my colleague here.

Sir, it is a very sick society which says that two people may marry as White, but that their children must go to a Coloured school, unless they happen to be lucky and there is some measure of Government interference which at that stage would change their classification.

You are talking nonsense.

It is not nonsense; these are facts, and not only are these facts, but this is the law.

Hon. members on that side do not want to deal with these cases.

Sir, the attitude of hon. members on the other side demonstrates two things: It demonstrates that they are ignorant of the laws which they themselves have passed, and it also shows that obviously, because of their attitude, nobody in this situation ever comes to them and asks them for help. Sir, I think that Mr. Justice Fagan, in dealing with a case under the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act, which has the definition which my hon. friend, the member for Green Point, wants to be accepted in all cases, and that is acceptance and appearance, had the right approach when he said in a case that came before him that the legislature, by not having these rigid rules, had wisely refrained from drawing a line where the Creator had blurred it. Sir, I think that is the message that the hon. the Minister must accept from the speech of the hon. member for Green Point. But, Sir, it goes further than that. Mixed marriages is something that the hon. the Minister also has to deal with, but under the Group Areas Act you have the same problem. I want to give an example of someone who was a Mauritian and who although dark complexioned was accepted as a White person in the community, but in terms of the Act as it now is, he was classified as a Coloured person. Sir, I want to tell you this that this gentleman who was classified as a Coloured person owned a house in a White area. When he died he left his house to his son, and the question was whether he could leave his house to his son because his son had now been classified as Coloured in terms of the new Act because his father had been classified as Coloured and did nothing about it. [Time expired.]

Sir, with great respect, I think it is a disgrace for the hon. member for Durban North to come along here this evening and to argue about race classification and for the hon. member for Green Point to tell us that the norm, the test, should be appearance, while disagreement still exists in the ranks of the hon. Opposition itself concerning the question of whether the Act under which classification is to be done, i.e. the Population Registration Act, should be on the Statute Book at all. I wonder whether the hon. member for Durban North consulted the Young Turks who are now sitting behind him, the hon. Young Turks who are sitting there, if one may call them hon. members. [Interjections.] I want to point out to them that the hon. member for Sandton and the hon. member for Yeoville, and several other hon. members as well, including the former member for Wynberg, Mrs. Cathy Taylor, said that the Population Registration Act would be repealed by the United Party. Now, in the light of this, is it not disgraceful of them to rake up and scrape together minor incidents here tonight? [Interjections.] Surely that is extremely easy, Sir. One could go through all our legislation in South Africa and one could find incidents under any Act in which human suffering was involved. But have they ever considered the human suffering which would be caused if they were to repeal the Population Registration Act and to throw open the doors? Have they ever thought of the suffering that would be caused by such a step? For that would be the result of what they want to do.

Sir, I have not prepared myself to speak on this subject tonight. I find it very strange, in view of the fact that there are 150 000 public servants in the Republic, that in this important debate, in which they have the opportunity of saying something about the public servants and the position of the Public Service, the hon. members of the Opposition have not said a single word about these matters up to now. The chief spokesman has made no mention of them. This being the case, is it surprising, Sir, that in a place such as Pretoria, which is the home of most public servants, they do not even have a single seat left and they will never again stand any chance of winning a seat there? [Interjections.]

Tell m about the rinderpest.

Order! I want to appeal to hon. members to contain themselves and not to make so many interjections. If this continues, I shall be forced to rule that no interjections whatsoever will be allowed. Therefore hon. members should co-operate with the Chair.

If it had been necessary tonight to discuss the health of the hon. member over there who referred to the rinderpest, one might have raised that subject, but I think it actually falls under Health. Sir, very serious concern has arisen in many circles during the past year about the serious shortage of staff in the Public Service, and if you will allow me, I want to express just a few thoughts on this subject tonight.

On 30 June this year the number of vacancies in the professional section of the Public Service amounted to 13,8%. In the technical section this figure was 14,4% and in the clerical section it amounted to 14%. Now, if one wants to take a general view of this shortage in the Public Service, bearing in mind the fact that in all these various branches a large number of positions are being filled by temporary people, one realizes how serious the staff shortage actually is. In this way I may point out that on 30 June this year, 28,7% of the posts in the clerical section were being filled by temporary persons. If we add this to the number of vacant posts as on 30 June, it actually means that 57,3% of the posts in the clerical section were not effectively filled.

We are inclined to look at this whole situation of a staff shortage in the Public Service from the salary point of view. I want to suggest with great respect that I think the time has come for us to guard against developing an increase psychosis in South Africa, which would lead us to believe that we could alleviate all problems in our Government machine and in the other sectors where there is a staff shortage simply by increasing salaries. The basic truth is that the majority of the young people who leave the Public Service today give as the reason for their resignation the fact that they can earn larger salaries elsewhere. If we look at the total spectrum of economically active people in South Africa, this is such a basic truth that there is hardly any room for argument, for practically 90% of the people, no matter where they are employed, could earn more money elsewhere. If higher salaries were to be the norm, therefore, it would mean that people would constantly be resigning throughout the economy. I want to tell the hon. the Minister and the department in all sincerity that what I am going to say now, I am not saying by way of criticism; I am saying it because one has experienced this and one knows that this is the case. If one asks the young man who is resigning from the Public Service why he is doing so, he may make the superficial reply that he is resigning because he can earn more money elsewhere. He will add jokingly, “Oh well, the Public Service …”.

I think the time has come for us to look very, very seriously at the attitude of young people and of people we would want to have in the Public Service in the future. In the minds of the great majority of public servants and in the minds of many of our young people there is a feeling that they would prefer to be more closely involved in the functional set-up of a specific department. If one asks the average public servant where he works, he may answer jokingly: “I work in the Public Service.” Much more proudly he will then say that he works for the Department of the Interior, of Justice or of Bantu Administration. I want to plead that we should make the public servant fed more closely bound up with the functional set-up of a specific department. By that I only mean that the official should feel more and more that he is associated with a department and that he should regard himself less and less as belonging to the larger whole. There is another truth which we should see together with this, namely that in many respects the average official often feels frustrated in his very being because of the fact that he is being pinned down and regimented by an outside body in respect of things which are very basic to him, such as salaries, post structures and promotion.

I want to ask with great respect whether time has not come for us to have more self-government within each department— self-government in respect of staff matters, under the control of the Minister. The Minister could have sole control over staff matters in that department, assisted, if need be, by a management committee consisting of a few senior officials. I realize that this is a very drastic thought in the sense that these matters have up to now been controlled by the Public Service Commission. I want to ask with great respect, however, whether the time has not come for us to abolish the Public Service Commission in its present form. When I say that the Public Service Commission should be abolished, I certainly do not mean that the Public Service Commission has no role to fulfil, for we must keep in mind the magnificent work that has been done by this body in respect of training, merit and a multitude of other matters. In fact, I think that greater self-government for departments could only be achieved within the framework of general guide-lines laid down by a specific body. I believe that we would have much greater satisfaction among our officials if we could have greater mobility for them within more general guidelines, and greater self-government in respect of staff matters on the part of every Government department. I realize that there are specific categories of officials, for example, in the staff section and in the accounting section, who would prefer to see themselves in a wider scheme of things, with a view to promotion. I honestly believe that the great majority of officials seek and desire greater mobility in respect of promotion, salaries and a better post structure.

Mr. Chairman, on a point of order, may the hon. member play concertina with his speech?

Mr. Chairman, there are many … [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I do not wish to react to the hon. member for Innesdal. I thought he made some constructive suggestions in the last part of his speech, but I am terribly sorry that he preceded it by a rather unfair attack about a matter which is of the greatest concern, and should be of the greatest concern, to all members of this House, namely the question of race classification and the problem posed by our present legislation. Regarding the shortage of civil servants, to which the hon. member has referred, it is obvious to me that we shall have to consider employing far more non-Whites in our Civil Service structure than we are employing at present. We are already doing so in technical posts in the Post Office and in the Railways and we shall have to do it to an increasing extent also in the ordinary administrations and Civil Service.

I should like to come back to a statement made by the hon. the Minister earlier today in which he has indicated that it is the policy of the Government to move away from discrimination to the extent that the policy of separate development becomes implemented—that is, if I understood the hon. the Minister correctly. I am very grateful for that assuranc which has been given by the hon. the Minister. At least it removes one point of dispute from the debates in this House, namely the fact that discrimination does exist, because all along, since I have been present in this House, we have had the problem that there is tremendous division of opinion on that basic fact. I do not think that that fact is in dispute any longer. I also acknowledge the correctness of the statement by the hon. the Minister that many of the practices in South Africa are the product of historical factors and circumstances and of tradition.

Surely not only historical factors?

I am repeating what the hon. the Minister said. I agree with him on that point, but I want to say that it is not traditional in South Africa, not part of the historical pattern, to circumscribe those traditions by way of legislation and to enforce it by way of administrative action. That is not part of the historical policy followed in South Africa in the past. This is the basic problem which is facing us in South Africa today. In view of the seriousness of the situation I should like in all sincerity to put a few questions about the implications and the implementation of the statement which has been made by the hon. the Minister. If we accept, as I do, that it is the policy of the Government to move away from discriminatory legislation and practices “as the policy of separate development is implemented”—to use the words of the Minister himself—a question arises in my mind as to how long this is going to take. Must every man of colour in South Africa wait for the day when we have decided that that policy has in fact now been implemented? Can we expect people of colour in South Africa to be satisfied with an assurance of this nature? Can we expect them to accept that it will take five years, ten years, 15 years or 20 years and that they will have to wait until we as Whites have decided that we as Whites have satisfactorily implemented this policy? And when we have in fact implemented this policy, to what extent will we have solved the problem? Even if we come to the stage where we have granted independence to the Bantu homelands, can we say that we have solved the problem? Will it be the case even if we get to that stage? In other words, if we say that the implementation of separate development has as its ultimate aim the granting of independence to the Bantu homelands, which is what I was led to believe, we will still be faced with the fact that there will be large numbers of Blacks living outside the homelands on a permanent basis. In addition, there will be the Indians and the Coloureds. It has no bearing on the problem to say that, when the Bantu homelands have achieved their independence, the problem in connection with the Indians and Coloureds will be solved too.

Order! I do not think the hon. member should deal with the Bantu homelands as we are not discussing them at the moment.

With respect, Sir, I am dealing with the question of discrimination. I wish I had time to deal with the question of dual citizenship and the fear that exists that, as the Bantu homelands become independent, Blacks who have been South African citizens since the days when the Union of South Africa was formed, might lose their citizenship. However, bearing in mind your remarks, Sir, I would like to carry on with the question of discrimination. I wish to state that I take a dim view of the hon. member for Klip River’s reaction to the term “stigma”. I am delighted to know that he is sensitive about the term “stigma”. I want to say in all sincerity and in all seriousness that if he and I would be happy to be subjected in any country of the world to the kind of treatment we mete out to people of colour in South Africa—and I am no agitator when I say this; if he or I or anyone in this House would be happy to be treated in Lesotho, Swaziland or England as we treat people of colour in this country, then I can say there is nothing wrong with this policy. However, I know that none of us would accept it gladly if we were treated in London or Maseru in the way that we treat people of colour in this country. These are the facts and, in stating them, I am not making myself guilty of playing at cheap party politics. I wish to say, Mr. Chairman that I could quote hundreds of examples on this point if you would allow me and if I had the time. However, if we had all the time in the world, if we had another 10, 15 or 20 years to rectify this situation, I would say: “Fine, we will wait until such time as the policy is implemented to the full”. However, nobody in this House who has any knowledge of or insight into what is happening in this country on this continent and in the world at large, can help being aware of the fact that our time is extremely limited. In other words, what must be done in this connection, and I am following the hon. the Minister in this, cannot be put off for another five or ten years; we must do it today, not even tomorrow. My appeal to the hon. the Minister and, through him, to the Government, is this: Can we afford to waste our time any longer tolerating things that we know in our heart of hearts are unacceptable and unethical, things that can only bring about an escalation of the confrontation between White and Black in this country? I believe that there are thousands of things this Government can do now without even estranging its own voters. I believe that the electorate is much riper to accept these things than is perhaps generally recognized and accepted. My appeal to the hon. the Minister is that we should no longer put off doing what we know we ought to do. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I am unable to react to the theme expounded by the hon. member for Edenvale, for the simple reason that I do not understand his argument. He expressed himself in such general terms that I do not really know which things he wants to eliminate. There is only one thing which is very clear to me, and that is that he is opposed to race classification. But what is not clear to me, is how his race federation is going to work without race classification. Since I am unclear on that point, the hon. member must forgive me if I do not take the matter any further.

I should like to talk about citizenship, which one may obtain by birth or by voluntary choice. Between 65 000 and 70 000 young South Africans reached the age of citizenship last year. They are really the best immigrants one could have, but they become citizens without always realizing it. I know that it has often been said in the past that there are certain problems which cannot be eliminated. Nevertheless I believe that one should give attention to these. We must make these young South Africans aware of the obligations they have as citizens of this country and of the privileges which go with these obligations.

Now I want to come to the people who become citizens of this country of their own free choice. They are the immigrants who come to this country for various reasons. There are those who fled from communism after the last war. We know them. We know those, too, who are coming from African countries and elsewhere at the present moment. Then there are those who are coming to this country for various other reasons. A previous Prime Minister of Israel, Ben Gurion, once said: “Israelis love immigration but they hate immigrants.” That is putting it a bit strongly, perhaps. However, I wonder whether this is not the case in other countries as well, and particularly in our country, South Africa. Displeasure is frequently expressed in this House about the fact that only 10% of the persons who immigrate to this country eventually become citizens of the country. This must be a matter which the Government cannot feel very happy about. If a person has left his home country and travelled such a distance to make a home for himself in his new country, and to make a sound contribution here to our economic development, one wonders why he does not want to accept the full consequences and the responsibilities of citizenship. The Government is frequently requested, too, to bring pressure to bear on these people to become South African citizens, but this could lead us to turn a good immigrant into an inferior citizen, for an immigrant is happy where he feels safe, where he is able to make a good living, where he and his family may live together. A good citizen is happy when he is living where his heart lies, even if he does not always feel very safe, and even if he does not always make such a good living. One wonders, then, why so many people who immigrate to our country do not become citizens. In a report which appeared in The Argus one finds certain facts. In this report a man is mentioned who has been in the country for only five years, a certain Mr. Ray, and he said—

Here again is another man who has been in the country for 24 years and who is only now thinking of applying for citizenship. Then there is a certain Mr. Bob Kemble, of whom the following is said—

He is a good immigrant who has been living here for eight years and he is probably making a sound contribution to our national economy. He has not become a citizen, however, because he does not want to learn one of the official languages. Now one wonders why a knowledge of Afrikaans is required of a man who wants to become a citizen and who will be a good citizen, while another person who merely wants to remain an immigrant may live here for 24 years without complying with this requirement. We must bear in mind that the people who go to a different country and who do not become good citizens quite so easily are usually people of our age. Great sacrifices are required of them. For such a person it is sometimes not easy to learn to speak two foreign languages. What is important to us, however, is that among those 65 000 to 70 000 young men and citizens who were able to claim citizenship last year, there were many children of immigrants, and that they are good South African citizens. I want to ask that we should in all fairness accommodate these people who want to assume South African citizenship. Accordingly I want to appeal to every South African, even though we might believe that the immigrant as such is not so welcome here, just as is the case in Israel, that we should accommodate these people. Unless our White population is supplemented by means of immigration, I do not believe that we could survive. So it is the duty of each of us to make the immigrant so happy that he will not want to stay here merely to help develop the economy, but that he will want to stay here to become a citizen of South Africa.

The hon. member who has just sat down will forgive me if I do not respond to his speech, except for saying that I agree with him.

I want to make an unqualified statement in this House tonight, namely that we have a good and efficient Public Service in South Africa. Apart from my personal knowledge of the Public Service, I should like to advance the following two reasons for my assertion.

The first is that the Public Service provides a service for all people in South Africa, for the Whites, the Blacks and the Coloureds, i.e. for approximately 18 million people. In order to perform this enormous task, the State employs approximately 149 276 people. This is in addition to the officials employed by the Police Force, Posts and Telecommunications, the S.A. Railways, the provincial administrations and the various corporations, where approximately 549 000 people are employed.

Consequently it could be said that these 149 000 people work approximately 1 100 000 man-hours a day.

So every day thousands of officials come into close contact with the public, Whites and non-Whites. On these levels on which they come into contact, the possibility of complaints is great. What does one find in practice? We find few complaints. If one considers the large number of hours during which the public comes into contact with the officials, the number of complaints that are laid is really minimal. One could almost ignore it. I believe that our Public Service is not getting enough credit for the really good work it is doing and for its promotion of good race relations in this country.

I have a second reason for saying that we have a good and efficient Public Service. As the hon. member for Innesdal has told us, the Public Service is suffering from a very serious shortage of staff at the moment. In this way, only 86,2% of the posts in the professional sections are filled. In the case of the technical posts, only 85,6% are filled, while in the clerical section only 86% of the posts are filled. Here we must take into consideration, too, the fact that some of these posts—a large percentage of them—are being filled by temporary staff. In spite of this, the functions which the State has to perform continue to be performed very efficiently. I think that we and our public servants are justified in feeling very proud of this achievement.

However, this shortage of staff also holds a warning for us. I should like to make a few remarks in this regard. The staff situation in the Public Service is alarming. We cannot get away from that; that is so. Nor can I imagine, in view of the manpower problems we are experiencing in the country at the moment, that there will be any material improvement in the position within the foreseeable future. This only means that the functions of the State will have to be performed by a smaller staff in the future. So, in order to maintain the present high standards, we shall have to concentrate on the better utilization of this reduced staff. This will not be easy, and we shall be forced to utilize to the maximum the full potential of every available unit. There are many methods by which this may be achieved. I want to mention only one of these. I suggest that one of the means by which this may be achieved, is by organizing the functions which the State is called upon to perform in such a way as to ensure that there is a minimum of duplication and overlapping of work. In this respect the investigation into this matter ordered by the hon. the Minister last year was a step in the right direction. I wonder whether I may ask him tonight to give us some information as to the results of that investigation.

As in the rest of the world, it is a fact —we cannot get away from it—that we have a problem of overlapping and co-ordination in our Public Service here in South Africa as well. We must face this problem, but as is our custom on this side of the House, we do not run away from problems and we want only the best for South Africa. For that reason we shall take the necessary steps and make the necessary adjustments in this regard as well in order that our Public Service may continue to maintain the high standard which is necessary and which we had in this country in the past.

As a logical outcome of this problem, I should like to express a few further thoughts in connection with a possible rearrangement of State functions in an attempt to find a solution. If we go back a little further into the past, we see that when the Union was established in 1910, there were 14 ministries of State, 14 State departments and four provincial councils. Today, 64 years later, we have 18 ministries, 64 State departments, four provincial councils, one legislative assembly for South-West Africa and many control boards, advisory councils and research councils which have been established by the State for particular services or functions. I want to mention a few examples to hon. members of the situation which may result from this large number of bodies performing State functions. I have already mentioned that there may be duplication and overlapping of functions. Unco-ordinated action in planning and execution leads to unnecessary inflation in legislation, which requires more work and more workers. A much larger number of highly qualified and competent professional management and even technical staff is required than would have been the case with fewer executive organizations. There is unnecessary multiplication of internal auxiliary organizations, which every body must possess, such as a staff and an accounting section. In addition, it prevents greater and more efficient use being made of mechanical aids, particularly in regard to the proper utilization of computers.

Sir, I want to mention an example to the Committee of one of these matters which is a State function and where we have a good deal of overlapping and duplication, and that is the public health function of the State. There are approximately 22 bodies at the moment that are involved in performing this public function. I am going to mention a few examples to you to indicate all the bodies which are involved in this; there are the provincial administrations; there is the Department of Health; there are the local authorities, the Department of Mining and the Department of Defence. Mr. Chairman, time does not allow me to mention them all to you, but there are at least 22 of them. Sir, one could think of other examples as well. Duplication occurs in regard to tourism as well, and several bodies are involved in this, in addition to the Department of Tourism.

But, Sir, one should like to be positive, too, and for that reason I want to consider this matter more closely. If we look at the functions of the State, we see that the State has a protective function; the State has a function in regard to national administration; and the State has a function in regard to public services. If we consider these more closely, we find that the protective function consists of national defence and legal protection. The function of national administration consists of financial and economic administration, domestic administration, and foreign administration. The function relating to public services consists of social services, community services and economic services. I should like to analyse these further, but my time has almost expired. However, we could analyse the financial and economic administration in greater detail and say that they involve organization of and control over public finance; they involve the organization of staff efficiency promotion in the government machine; and they involve the provision of works, services and supplies.

Sir, I want to summarise, and I say to you that our Public Service is functioning well and efficiently. We have people of great ability in the Public Service. However, we are being confronted by a situation of staff shortages over which we have little control. If we want to maintain the very high standard of service provided by the Public Service, we shall be forced to utilize to the maximum the potential of every available and trained public servant, and for that reason I believe that better co-ordination and the elimination of overlapping of State functions will contribute greatly towards the achievement of this ideal.

Mr. Chairman, like the hon, member for Verwoerdburg, I also want to say a few words about our civil servants, although I shall want to approach it from a different point of view. But before I do that, I want to touch on another very topical matter for a few minutes only, with your consent, Sir.

†Sir, the hon. member for Green Point raised the question of the banning of the film, Land A part.

Hear, hear!

Hon. members opposite may say, “Hoor, hoor”, but I am worried about what other people will say about it; they might not say, “Hoor, hoor”.

Why look so worried about it?

Sir, this is a decision which, I can assure you, has astonished people who have no politics whatsoever.

What does Sea Point say?

Sir, I am now quoting the man who produced this film and who, I suppose, is not an entirely objective observer, but he has had tremendous experience. Sir, what worries me is what people in the outside world are going to say when they see this film. This film is going to be shown and there are not going to be any “Hoor, hoor’s” then for its banning. What is the outside world going to say when they see what kind of norms we apply? That is the one banning item I want to raise. The other is the confirmation by the Supreme Court of the Cape Provincial Division today of the banning by the Publications Board of the Afrikaans novel, Kennis van die Aand. [Interjections.] Sir, I am not going into the merits of that banning order. I hope that this Committee, and the hon. the Minister, will take note of the reaction there is going to be. This novel will be published in 10 days’ time in English in Britain and in the U.S.A., and it takes no kind of imagination at all to realize the gales of laughter which will greet this country when people read this novel overseas and realize that it has been banned here. [Interjections.] What are they going to think of us? People are going to rook with laughter when they realize that the laws we pass make possible the banning of a novel of this nature which after all has been approved—and do not take my word or that of any other sickly humanist for this—by great Afrikaners in this country, who have hailed it as one of the great novels in Afrikaans. But now it has been banned, and what is the outside world going to think of it? This decision —and I am not questioning the correctness of it; I am simply making this statement as a statement of fact—is going to cause the outside world to regard this as an even stranger society than Alan Drury found it to be. [Interjections.] If we are going to be ridiculed, it will be on the heads of those who shout, “Hoor, hoor!” when this kind of thing happens. I raise this matter only because I hope that the hon. the Minister, who is sincere about these things, will bear this in mind when this new censorship machine of his starts grinding into operation. We spoke this afternoon about defending South Africa’s good name and reputation abroad. This kind of thing, I suggest in all seriousness, makes the task well-nigh impossible, and all I want to leave with the hon. the Minister is this one thought expressed by Dirk Opperman.

*I do not call him so, but others call him our greatest Afrikaans poet, and he speaks of the tragedy for which we are headed: The new censorship. [Interjections.]

†Sir, let us leave it at that. I hope the hon. the Minister will take note of it.

I now want to talk about something which is a little less emotional than this. I want to express gratification that the Government has expressed its awareness through the Prime Minister of the need to reduce what he has called the historic wage-gap between Black and White employees of the State. One is grateful that the need to do this has been taken into account in the salary adjustments made earlier this year. I want to say, however, that, taken by any kind of standards, this has been a disappointing performance which falls, I would suggest, far short of what is required. I shall try to say why. An analysis of the levels of the salaries of public servants as given to the hon. member for Sea Point by the hon. the Deputy Minister of the Interior a few weeks ago shows that in most cases the inter-racial salary gap has been widened rather than narrowed by the increases granted in July this year.

Let me try to substantiate this. Let us take the case of a medical officer. The salary gap between the White on the one hand and the Coloured or the Indian doctor on the other is 26,7% on the present average wage, scale. On the previous wage scale it was between 17 and 21%. Comparative figures for White and African personnel are on the one hand 29% and on the other hand between 26% and 27%. For the Coloured, Asian and African personnel the figures were respectively 12% and 5%. In every case, instead of being narrowed, the gap as the result of these new salary scales has been widened. Let us take the case of a senior sister.

The position of Coloured and Indian sisters vis-à-vis Whites has been improved by between 2% and 3%. I say that is fine. The position of Africans, however, has been worsened by similar percentages while the gap between the Coloured and the Indian on the one hand and the African on the other has been decreased by between 3% and 4%. The salary gap between Whites on the one hand and Coloureds and Indians on the other has, in other words, in every case increased. Between White and African it has remained practically the same while the gap between Coloured and Indian on the one hand and African on the other has decreased. There are other examples of racial discrimination in salaries to which I believe we ought to draw attention for a very good reason. The position of Black and White teachers is a case in point. I shall, however, not take the time of the Committee to go into it, but the position is very real and I believe that we ought to take cognizance of it. Last week I saw a report in the Press—

We know what effect this kind of thing has on human relations. I should like to say to the Committee that this country and the Government in particular should face the consequences of this state of affairs. It is later than we think. A medical man, Dr. George Cohen, whom some people may know as the founder of the flying doctor service to Swaziland, has recently warned us that unless racial discrimination in medicine is abolished—this includes salary scales —South Africa will be in danger of being kicked out of the World Medical Association. He also warned that South African medical degrees might no longer br recognized overseas, that doctors would not be allowed to specialize overseas and that South African doctors might not be able to obtain posts to attend congresses overseas unless we eliminated racial discrimination in medicine.

I say again that this also applies in regard to salary scales and is the responsibility of the hon. the Minister of the Interior. We have had that warning and we have also had a warning from another quarter, from an authority like Fred van Wyk of the Institute of Race Relations who warned that unless Black workers in the public sector are given adequate increases in salaries, the consequences of a seriously disturbed labour force ill have to be taken into account. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member who has just resumed his seat, raised quite a number of subjects. He concluded by referring, inter alia, to the wage gap which exists between White and non-White in the various services. No one disputes the fact that a gap does exist. This is not a new phenomenon in South Africa. This is something we inherited, something which is many, many years old.

But you have been in power for 26 years.

One important fact, however, that is as plain as a pikestaff is that this Government, has through all these years, been striving to narrow this gap. The hon. member cannot deny this.

But the gap is getting bigger.

When it can serve as propaganda for the Progressive Party and for a section of the United Party, consequences do not apply at all. I want to challenge the hon. member for Parktown, who is associated with a major financial organization in the country.

No.

Yes, he is.

No, not at all.

I want to ask that hon. member what would become of Anglo-American tomorrow if …

I have nothing to do with Anglo-American.

Indirectly.

I am convinced that a wage gap also exists as far as that hon. member is concerned. I want to challenge him to tell me what would become of Anglo-American if this Government were to decide …

You are being jealous, man!

… that, as from tomorrow, equal salaries had to be paid within the organization.

Ask them; do not ask me.

It is no use backing out of it in this way. This Government, which also has to accept responsibility for the economy of the country, can take steps for the economy of the country to be able to bear it and so that the economy of the country is not disturbed in such a way that the people they are pleading for—and whom we want to have the benefit—will be the ones who are going to suffer in the economy which is going to follow. They know that it is the policy to narrow the gap systematically and on an economic basis.

Eliminate.

The hon. member adopted a second and comical attitude in this House; I say comical, because he was unable to hide his utter disappointment with the decision of the court in respect of the book Kennis van die Aand. In a very subtle manner, he tried to perform an egg-dance about his disappointment. What he really wanted to indicate was that the book was banned because the Court was bound by the Act alone. I want to ask the hon. member to go and study the judgment of the Judge-President. He should read the arguments advanced by the Judge-President for banning the book. If he does that, the hon. member will find that this court case reveals something else, too, i.e. that although judgment was given by three judges each one of them advanced different reasons as to why his book had to be banned. In other words, the personal opinions of the judges also had to be expressed in the court case concerned. I say again that the Judge-President expressed himself in very strong terms on this matter.

I do not want to respond any further to what the hon. member said, except that I want to say something about three speeches that were made in this House— the speeches made by the hon. members for Durban North and Parktown, as well as a speech made by the hon. member for Edenvale in this House on a previous occasion. It was interesting to listen to all three these speeches. All three speeches dealt with race classification. The hon. member for Durban North expressed himself quite clearly and emphatically in favour of the principle of race classification. What the hon. member said, was that other norms of classification should be applied within the Act concerned. The hon. member for Edenvale …

But he is a Prog.

I mean the hon. member for Parktown; I am now confusing the Progs with other members opposite. The hon. member for Parktown, of course, enunciated the principles of the Progressive Party, i.e. that they are against race classification. I see them shaking their heads. This is so. What is very interesting, is that the hon. member for Edenvale did not express himself in favour of race classification. He performed an egg-dance around the principle. I want to ask the hon. member for Edenvale whether he is in favour of it that we should have a race classification Act.

Registration, yes, but not classification. [Interjections.]

When the hon. member for Edenvale has swallowed that hot object he now has in his mouth, he should tell me whether he is in favour of the principle as enunciated by the hon. member for Durban North.

Yes, or no?

Mr. Chairman, do you want me to reply to it?

Order! The hon. member cannot reply now.

This is the most simple question I can put to him.

I am not allowed to reply now.

I want to repeat that the hon. member for Durban North specifically said that he was in favour of the principle.

Nonsense. I said it would be unnecessary to retain that Act on the Statute Book should our test be accepted.

I want to say that the hon. member for Edenvale was well on his way to saying that he is in favour of it. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member who has just resumed his seat was a member of the Commission of Inquiry on Publications and entertainments. He was one of those who was in favour of the abolition of the appeal to the courts. He referred to the court case we have just had and I think that both he and the hon. the Minister will be fair enough to agree that here we have an example of perfect co-operation between law and court. That hon. member and the other hon. members who are sitting at the back there should stand up and ask to be forgiven for ever having advocated the abolition of appeal to the court.

Are you contesting this judgment too, now?

No we have always been prepared, when the court passes a judgment … [Interjections.]

May I put a question to the hon. member. Does the hon. member agree with the opinion of the hon. member for Park-town in respect of the court?

What did I say about the court?

As I understood the hon. member, he did not object to the fact that the court expressed a judgment. If I remember correctly, during the debate on censorship the hon. member took the attitude that there should be no censorship at all. That, apparently, is his standpoint. He therefore took up a different standpoint to ours.

Mr. Chairman, may I put a question to the hon. member? Does he agree with the opinion expressed this evening by the hon. member for Parktown in respect of the judgment of the court?

My standpoint is that the court passed a judgment. Those who lost the case may go to the appeal court. To me, however, this constituted outstanding evidence of the fact that when the court and the law co-operate, one finds the perfect situation. If ever there was proof that it was wrong to have abolished the right to appeal, then it is the judgment we have had today.

Before coming to the points raised by the hon. member for Green Point, I just want to put two questions to the hon. the Minister. The one is: When does he think the new publications machinery is going to come into operation? The second is: When does he think we shall reach the point when there is automatic registration of voters? If I understood the position correctly, the original aim, when the computer system was introduced, was for people to be automatically registered as voters at the age of 18 years wherever they might be living. I just want to know whether that is still the intention and in addition, when we are going to get that far.

The hon. member for Green Point raised two matters of major importance here this afternoon. The one concerns passports and the other, race classification. I want to tell the hon. the Minister that the question of passports is one that causes extreme bitterness among non-Whites. There are two reasons for this. In virtually all cases, when a non-White person applies for a passport there is a delay of months.

Do not generalize.

But that is in fact the case. So many cases have come to our attention already that it seems to me as if this is a tendency. There is a second matter that causes a great deal of bitterness. Time after time it is the non-Whites that have to pay a deposit. [Interjections.] But it is true. I concede to the hon. the Minister that there is no provision that it should only be applicable to non-Whites. But let me just provide him with the proof. He will remember that a month or two ago, the Commissioner-General for the Indigenous Peoples of South-West Africa convened the churches in Owambo. He asked why thousands of Ovambos were crossing the border and going to Lusaka and Tanzania. The three churches he consulted, drew up 17 points as reasons for the Ovambos being dissatisfied and embittered and consequently leaving the country. One of the reasons was No. 11. I quote it to him from the document which was published by the churches on the request of the commissioner—

This refers to the Ovambo people—

… the point I made earlier on. Then it goes on—

This is given as one of the reasons for people leaving Owambo. It has been known for a long time that this is the cause of much bitterness among the non-Whites. The hon. the Minister will be able to realize that when a person has managed to come to the point where he is going overseas and is using his savings for that purpose, it would be extremely difficult for him to find another R200 to R400 to pay another deposit, too, for the convenience of the Government. This matter gives rise to much bitterness. The hon. the Minister advances the reason that it is often necessary for the Government to repatriate people who find themselves in the position overseas that they do not have sufficient funds to return. It is true. There are such people. But if we take it that it would cost the country an extra R10 000 or even R20 000 per annum, I want to tell him that it would be far better for South Africa to pay that R20 000 per annum if he were to do away with this discrimination. I think it is imperative for the hon. the Minister to give his attention to this matter and in particular, to assure the peoples of South-West that no one need feel that because he is non-White, he will be discriminated against in this way.

The second matter is the question of race classification. I want to tell the hon. member for Bloemfontein East and the hon. member for Rissik, who raised the matter, that we are the only country left in the world which has a system of race classification. We are the only one and the last one. The hon. the Minister will agree with me, particularly in his capacity as Minister of Information, that if there is one thing that is harmful to South Africa, it is the existence of the system of race classification. Unfortunately—I know that this is not the reason for it having been introduced here—wherever one goes abroad, it is compared with the system in force in Germany under Hitler. As a result this matter does us enormous harm. I want to give the hon. the Minister an example. Recently General Dayan paid us a visit from Israel. He gave South Africa a fine testimonial. He was very impressed with the country and its economy. But what upset him? When he was on the point of departure, he issued a statement in which he said, inter alia, the following, and I quote from a report in this regard—

That was the one bad impression he took away with him. I could quote many other examples. I have before me a newsletter from the South African Foundation in which they complain bitterly about incidents that hamper the work they do abroad. In this newsletter, one of the latest, two incidents are mentioned—

This matter does not fall under the hon. the Minister’s department, but I read on—

This affair of Mr. Dirk Kotzé did enormous harm to South Africa in Australia. One asks oneself the question whether it was worth the trouble. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I do not think that there is any Vote in the Budget which is of greater importance to every citizen in South Africa than the Vote we are discussing at the moment. For that reason I think that all of us who have the interests of our citizens at heart are listening with more than usual interest to the debate which we are conducting at the moment. I, too, have been listening to it with more than usual interest. Frequently I have listened with appreciation, but frequently, too, I have listened in confusion to the contributions that have been made. Certain things have been said in this debate which I cannot understand. I do not want to go back too far, and I shall confine myself to the previous two speakers. In the first place there was the hon. member for Parktown. I have known him for many years and I esteem him very highly indeed as a person. I esteem him very highly indeed for his sincerity, his perspicacity and his firmness of principle. I must say tonight that I am completely flabbergasted by the fact that the hon. member for Parktown, perhaps the most eloquent advocate of the rule of law and of the function of the courts as an impartial arbiter in South Africa, actually rose tonight and distantiated himself from the ruling of the court concerning the book Kennis van die Aand.

That is utterly untrue.

I am glad to hear that. If my hon. friend says that, I accept it and I am glad to be able to accept it. Why then did he make his speech?

I stated it as a fact, and I discussed the legislation which gave rise to it.

The hon. member does not know what he is talking about. If he had criticized the legislation, you would have called him to order, Sir, for he is not allowed to criticize legislation during the Committee Stage of this Appropriation Bill.

You can do better than that.

No, you are trying to escape now. I sat here listening to the hon. member while he was criticizing the ruling of the court. This may have been because the court obeyed the law. In other words, he is now criticizing the courts which enforce the law. He cannot do as he pleases. He cannot just chop and change and ignore the realities and the facts. I have said that I have great respect for him, but it seems to me that no matter how much respect one has for someone’s intelligence, once he has accepted the standpoint of the Progressive Party, he betrays everything that is good and practical. [Interjections.] I just want to say that I am shocked that a member such as the hon. member for Parktown should have risen and condemned the banning of Kennis van die A and a day or two after the ruling by the court which upheld the original banning.

You are very easily shocked, Marais.

No, I am not easily shocked. All I want to say is this: The Progressive Party must please never get up sanctimoniously again and speak in my presence of the rule of law and the function of the courts as a body of appeal in matters of administrative action such as this. [Interjections.] My hon. friend for Parktown is furious, but he has been exposed. I sympathize with him. However, there is one thing he cannot get away from. The court has ruled that the banning be upheld. They cannot get away from that. That is what they want; that is their policy. Why are they criticizing their own policy and the consequences of their own policy?

May I ask a question?

No, the hon. member may speak after me. We have only ten minutes each.

My hon. friend, the hon. member for Bezuidenhout, in his turn, made a great fuss about the issuing of passports, particularly about the requirement for certain people to pay a deposit if they want to travel abroad on a South African passport. In confirmation of his argument he read out what some Owambo body had to say about this. One does not want to belittle this, for it is important. But the hon. member should have taken the trouble of ascertaining, and he should have told the House, what knowledge that particular Owambo body has of the refusal of passports or of the requirement of a deposit in the case of members of other races who apply for a passport. I can understand that the Owambo people may feel that they are the only ones who are being asked to pay deposits, but are they right? Do they have reason for this? How can the hon. member for Bezuidenhout, without having any knowledge of the refusal in cases where deposits are in fact required, make such a generalization on the grounds of the fact that the Owambo people feel that they are being wronged in this matter? I do not know why our hon. friends on the Opposition side have to go about criticizing the Government in this manner.

We learnt it from you.

The Government is not perfect; there must be cases where legitimate and reasonable criticism would be justified. Why must they indicate in this way their inability to criticize the Government on merit and why must they then make such stupid blunders as were made in the case of my friend, the hon. member for Parktown, and my friend, the hon. member for Bezuidenhout? We in South Africa are very fortunate in having the standard of administration that we do have in the Department of the Interior. This I have said from the other side of the House as well as from this side of the House. I am on record as having said that we want honest elections in this country and that we may depend on the officials of the Department of the Interior to administer the Electoral Act in such a way as to ensure that there are no irregularities. It is one of our greatest sources of pride in South Africa that we do have men of quality for administering these Acts.

Mr. Chairman, the Department of the Interior has very complicated, very responsible and very difficult work to do. Its work covers a wide and comprehensive spectrum. It has to deal with matters ranging from the Government Printer and citizenship to something of such minor importance—but still of great importance to the person concerned—as a change of surname, of which there were 30 cases last year. In practically every case where the Department of the Interior has to give a decision, that decision is urgent and that decision affects great and important matters which may involve the happiness of the citizen, more so than in the case of any other department. To the man who applies to the Minister for permission to marry in conflict with the provisions of the Act, for which reason he has to obtain the Minister’s consent, the Minister’s decision is the most important decision he has awaited in his life. For the man who has to go overseas suddenly and who urgently needs a passport or a special travel document, this is at that moment the most important matter in his life; and one could mention many other examples. Officials of the department quite frequently have to perform semi-judicial functions, but they do not give themselves out to be judges; they are not exposed to the publicity of a court of law and Sir, what surprises me is how few specific cases of real injury—I am not referring now to these loose generalizations we have had from that side during this debate—the Opposition has been able to bring against the Department of the Interior, its Minister and its Deputy Minister. I think that this is something of which we may be proud.

Sir, now we come to policy. The first matter of policy concerning which strong criticism was expressed by my hon. esteemed friend, the hon. member for Green Point, and by the hon. member for Bezuidenhout, was the question of race classification. [Interjections.] I think it is a pity that South Africa is compelled by circumstances to enforce a race classification law. I wish it had been different, and I wish that either the United Party or the Progressive Party had advocated a policy which would have enabled race classification to be abolished, but neither of them does. The Progressive Party offers the people constitutional guarantees; on what grounds? That a right of veto would be exercised in the Senate by a minority race if necessary, if there should be any attempt to change the Bill of Rights. In other words, the Senate will have to be elected on a racial basis on separate voters’ lists, so they, too, will have to ascertain who is White and who is non-White. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I think it is time I entered the debate and replied to the matters raised up to this stage, for then I would not have to make such a long speech at the end of this debate.

Sir, I want to start by saying that the Department of the Interior deals pre-eminently with people and with the lives and the feelings and the emotions of people. It is not a material department which deals with stones or with water or with dams or with trees. It deals with the lives of people from morning till night. The deeply human story of circumstances which are developing in our country is in fact implied in every decision, in every file that is placed on my desk. As a result of that, and because I know what the problem is in this department, we are handling these problems in as humane and sympathetic a way as is possible in practice. The attitude adopted by me and by my departmental officials is that we are leaning over backwards to act in a humanitarian way in handling these matters.

Sir, in his half-hour speech the hon. member for Green Point actually touched upon four matters only.

Important matters.

I shall start with the question of deposits. I want to start with the second example he mentioned, namely the example of the Amabatha group which went overseas as a group in order to perform on stage in London and elsewhere, and who were asked by us to deposit a certain amount of money as a guarantee. One acts in accordance with the experience one has gained before. This department is responsible, as is any other department, for ensuring that public money is not wasted. When any person is granted a passport of the Republic of South Africa enabling him to travel abroad on it, that passport contains an appeal made in the name of the State President to everybody abroad for the bearer of it to be helped and treated with accommodation and provided with the necessary as far as is possible in practice. Now, we have had this experience before, not with this group, but with other groups going abroad, i.e. in cases where we did not demand a guarantee or a deposit. While one of these groups was abroad, four or five of its members broke away and remained behind; they did not come back, and eventually they caused embarrassment and problems, and in the end we had to bring those people back to South Africa at the expense of the State.

What year was that?

I repeat that it was not this group. I say we had such cases in the past. I shall give you the details tomorrow, if necessary.

What does it matter when it was?

Yes, what does it matter? The fact of the matter is, therefore, that we cannot run the risk of having something of that nature happen again, for that would mean that we would be wasting the taxpayers’ money by bringing those people back at their expense. That is why that condition was laid down for this specific group. For the benefit of the hon. member I want to add that we do not demand cash in all cases. If we can get a guarantee to our satisfaction, we are content, but we must protect the taxpayers. We must protect the State against having to use the taxpayers’ money to handle such matters.

The second case dealt with by the hon. member was that of the woman Lucy Mvubelo, who has also been abroad, four times already. I want to put it to the hon. member like this. The request that she leave a deposit with the Department of the Interior—and you can take my word for this—has nothing to do with politics. If this were the case, I would not hide behind a deposit in order to make it difficult for her to go abroad. I would then have had the courage of my convictions, as I have in many other cases, and would have refused her a passport. The fact that the passport is issued and the deposit condition is laid down has nothing to do with politics. The connotation the hon. member wants to attach to it, i.e. that politics were at stake, is wrong. I want to tell him at once that this is not true. Secondly, if a person should object, if a person should object to us and say that he finds it difficult to pay the deposit, then we can enter into negotiations and perhaps accept a guarantee. But the four times she went abroad, she did not raise objections. So far she has complied with the requirements every time, without any problems. She has never complained personally. It is only the hon. member who is complaining. I want to say, in the third place, that a person can also give a guarantee instead of the cash. The hon. member wanted to know from me why we did not simply ask whether she was in possession of a return ticket, for that ought to satisfy us; then we would not have to worry further about a deposit. But, surely, the hon. member is not as uniformed as that. A passport is issued and is valid for five years. In those five years a person can go abroad and come back as often as he pleases. One return ticket means absolutely nothing to us, because the person concerned may leave again for countries abroad the very next morning, and then we would not know whether she has a return ticket. Therefore it is nonsense, surely, to say that I should require a return ticket. Surely it has no significance in this sense. After all, the hon. member is more experienced in these matters than to talk that way. Now, in connection with the case he mentioned here, I specifically do not want to go into this aspect any further because I do not want to create any embarrassment for the person concerned. If the hon. member should force me to do this, I would have to do so against my will, but I think that this would cause her embarrassment and that she would prefer this not to be discussed.

But you as Minister praised her.

Of course, and I am still praising her.

But why do you then penalize her?

I am not penalizing her in any way. I am only taking the necessary precautionary measures to prevent the possibility of the taxpayers’ money being wasted. I am also saying that, out of respect for this particular lady, I do not wish to state the reasons why this is being done. If the hon. member insists, however, I shall state them to him in private, but I do not want to do so in public as I have too much respect for her.

Do you do it in every case?

The hon. member talks nonsense “in every case”. [Interjections.] How can the hon. member say I do it in every case?

No, he did not say that; he put a question.

Oh, is it a question? No, of course we do not do it in every case. I did not think the hon. member was putting a question. If he would raise his tone of voice at the end of a question, I would know when he was putting a question. The way he said it, I thought it was a statement he was making. I do not want to go into detail, for if I do so I shall create embarrassment for those concerned in the matter. There are certain cases where we do require it and there are also cases where we do not. It has nothing to do with race, colour or politics.

What is the reason?

If the hon. member is so dense that he still does not know what the reason is, he will never know. [Interjections.]

The next matter which the hon. member for Green Point touched upon was the banning of the film Land Apart and also the decision in regard to Portrait of an Assassin.

After Marais’s performance tonight I do not blame you for banning it. [Interjections.]

I want to tell the hon. member for Durban Point that one of the few highlights in the film is the performance by the hon. member for Turffontein. In fact, that is perhaps the only highlight. [Interjections.] In respect of the judging of films there is only one point I want to stress. I should like to identify and analyse the general trend discernible in the ranks of the Opposition in this regard. I have not been receiving any complaints or objections of any nature in regard to films that have been passed. I have not heard of any objection being raised when films banned by the Publications Board are nevertheless released later on. A fuss is made about the few in respect of which the banning is upheld by the Minister or Deputy Minister. Am I to infer from that that the Opposition is in favour of our having no censorship of films and of all films having to be shown?

Now you are talking nonsense.

The hon. member cannot merely raise objections in one direction. When ever we ban a film, he objects. I have never heard him thank us for having banned a film.

I should like to know the actual reason for banning these films.

I am coming to the reasons in a moment; right now I am debating the broad principle of what the Opposition wants done about films. Not once have I heard any criticism because we released a film which had been banned by the Publications Board. Whenever we release a film that was banned by the Publications Board, there is nothing but loud applause. If the Opposition want to be honest and objective, they should also say sometimes: “No, we do not agree. The hon. the Minister should not have passed this film; he should have upheld the ban on it.”

That film I have not seen yet.

Of course not. The hon. member has not seen it yet, and it is the worst of the lot.

That is the reason why I put the question.

The hon. member has not seen it yet, but he is nevertheless prepared to comment on it.

I asked what the reason for the banning was.

I am coming to that specific argument now. Before dealing with the film Land Apart I want to say at once that it serves no purpose when the hon. member for Green Point mentions the names of the people who appeared in the film—Adv. De Villiers, Prof. De Klerk, Dirk Richard, Ronald Woods, the Prime Minister, Dr. Verwoerd, I myself, etc. That serves no purpose at all, because a film can have the best stars in the world and yet contain a lot of pornography. [Interjections.] If the hon. members are through with their silliness, I shall proceed with my argument.

Are you standing up now?

The fact remains that the persons appearing in a film do not necessarily determine its content. The script, the spirit behind the presentation and a whole series of other things are contributory factors in determining it. One could have the best film stars in the world acting in a film and yet make a mess of it, depending on the script and the content. Surely this is logical; surely there can be no argument about this? Let me say at once that the point at issue is not what the person said or did not say; it is the general presentation. I just want to say— and this is my full reply; I am not going into the matter in greater detail now—that as the existing Act reads—the new dispensation does not obtain as yet—the film is referred to the Publications Board, which may then give the decision on it. When they have given the decision and an appeal is made from that decision, the appeal is referred to the Minister. The Minister himself, or the Deputy Minister to whom the Minister may delegate his powers, judges the film and acts in terms of the Act, as laid down in the publications legislation of 1963. After I had seen the film in question, it was my considered opinion that the general presentation, the manner of presentation, the script, the manner in which the various races were depicted in the film and the overall impression left by the film, could to my mind lead to the peace and good order being disturbed, to the general welfare being prejudiced, and to relations among population groups in the Republic being prejudiced, and that it gave an objectionable representation of the polemic or international politics. This was my considered opinion after I had seen that film. This has nothing to do with the trend taken or not taken by that film. I want to mention an example to the hon. member. The point is by no means whether the film is biased politically in some direction or other. A film was made last year, a film which we screened at the various party congresses and in which our Prime Minister appeared. Unfortunately I cannot remember the name of the film now, but it was also made by Richard Kershaw, the BBC commentator who was here. That film was very markedly negative in its approach to South Africa. He had people of every calibre, inter alia, the Prime Minister, in that film. The film was negatively biased against South Africa, but the presentation was not such that either we or the Publications Board took exception to it on the ground of the provisions of the present Act.

To what do you take exception?

Surely I have just said what I take exception to. Am I now to spell it out word for word?

Please.

I am not prepared to spell it out word for word. It was my considered opinion that it would violate these four points that are stated in the legislation, and for that reason I upheld the ban. I am not going to comment on it any further, because the position is very clear.

I want to correct the hon. member at once because he is linking up the standpoint I am taking up now with my views and my attitude in respect of the new system. He says that I want to condemn the new system in advance because, under the new system, full reasons will be given for a decision. I just want to tell the hon. member that the new system does not apply yet, and that I am acting in terms of the old Act. Surely it is absurd to argue with me now because I do not want to furnish reasons to his liking. The new Act completely removes the appeal to the Minister. It does not leave the appeal in the hands of the Minister any more, but in the hands of the appeal board, which will then furnish full reasons. The hon. member did debate the Bill in this House a few weeks ago, not so? I want to refute his argument at once and deny most strongly that the attitude I adopt here should be advanced as a reason why the system should be brought into discredit even before it has been put into operation.

Mr. Chairman, may I ask the hon. the Minister a question? The reasons the hon. the Minister gave me when I asked for full reasons by way of a question in this House were not the reasons that could be expected from a board. The Minister could at least tell me what portion of the film is objectionable and whether they are going to cut sections out of it.

It is bloody nonsense.

Who says “bloody nonsense”?

That is not nice.

Mr. Chairman, I withdraw the word “bloody”. [Interjections.]

Surely the hon. member himself is not as uninformed as that. The new legislation gives a definition of each of the factors, as is the case in the present Act. The new definition merely gives a broad description, in general terms, of what is undesirable. That is why the committee, the directorate and the appeal board will have to furnish their reasons under the new legislation. It does not contain descriptions of the nature of the ones found in the present Act. For that reason that hon. member should not condemn it in advance. I repeat that I am still working in terms of the old legislation at present. The new legislation has not been promulgated yet, and therefore he cannot ask me to give reasons. I want to tell hon. members that I am not prepared to say more than I have said. He wanted to know which portions of the Act would be involved, and I told him that the presentation, the over-all impression and quite a number of things I mentioned here contravened the provisions of the Act in my considered opinion.

Your considered opinions as a politician?

No, not as a politician at all. If this were my opinion as a politician, I would have banned the Kershaw film as well.

(Inaudible.)

Because people differ in opinion. The hon. member need not concern himself about that.

Now I want to come to the question of race classification, which the Opposition once again raked up here tonight in a joint effort. In the first place, it is interesting to note that race classification has tonight become the main theme of this debate. The last time we had anything to do with the race classification legislation was in 1967. Since then we have not effected any amendment to that legislation. Seven years have therefore passed since that legislation was last touched by Parliament. For seven years, therefore, we have not discussed hat legislation here, partly because it concerns such a deeply human matter. Now it suits the Opposition well to raise that matter once again here tonight, to drag it into this debate and to debate it fully, which is of course their right. There is a first question which I want to put very pointedly. I do at least want to obtain clarity from the Opposition tonight as to what their standpoint is in regard to this matter. If I know that, I shall be able to debate further. The hon. member for Green Point gave me the impression—he must tell me if I am doing him an injustice —that he was not happy with race classification as it was based on descent, and that he would prefer it to be based on appearance and acceptance. Did I understand him correctly?

That is basically correct.

Does the hon. member therefore stand on the principle that there must in fact be race classification …

There must be registration.

I am asking whether there should be race classification on the basis of appearance and acceptance or whether there should be no race classification at all.

Not on the basis of appearance.

I must have an answer, otherwise I cannot react.

It is bound up with our federal policy.

Does the Opposition want race classification or not? I want to know this. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout will answer me.

There will not be any race classification. [Interjections.]

The hon. member for Bezuidenhout is therefore saying that there will not be any race classification. The hon. member for Durban North said, if I took him down correctly when he spoke: “We want appearance and acceptance to be the norms.”

Yes.

They talk about appearance and acceptance, but then they say that there is not going to be any race classification. How can one have both? How can the hon. member for Bezuidenhout say that there is going to be no race classification, but the hon. member for Durban North says that it is going to be applied on the basis of appearance and acceptance? Surely, both cannot be correct. I want to ask the hon. member for Durban North whether or not there is going to be race classification.

I have already said that this Act of yours is not necessary.

The hon. member should not side-track me from my argument. I just want to obtain clarity on whether or not there is going to be race classification in terms of their policy.

No.

The Young Turks say “no”; what do the Old Guard say?

There will be a register.

A register?

Yes, certainly. [Interjections.]

How do I decide on the basis of that register …

May I put a question to the hon. the Minister? Could the Minister just explain to us why there is no race classification in South-West Africa? That is, to be specific, the system we want to apply.

I shall reply to that in a moment. At the moment it is being applied there in that way for totally different reasons.

Order! Hon. members should kindly refrain from all making interjections at the same time.

I want to know from the Opposition whether there is going to be race classification. The hon. members for Bezuidenhout and Yeoville say No, but the hon. member for Durban North says that appearance and acceptance must be the norm. Then, surely, there is in fact going to be race classification?

What about South-West Africa? [Interjections.]

Order! If hon. members do not assist in preserving order, I am going to forbid all further interjections.

Mr. Chairman, may I put a question to the hon. the Minister? Does the hon. the Minister need race classification to make him decide whether he is White or not? [Interjections.]

Order!

The hon. member is not going to get away with that. The fact remains … [Interjections.] Just give me a chance to speak, please. My question is this: If there is no race classification, and now I must apparently accept that there is not going to be any, how is the Opposition going to decide for the purposes of that register, to which the hon. member for Durban North has just referred, who …

Mr. Chairman, may I put a question to the hon. the Minister? If the Opposition do not want to recognize race classification, why then do they recognize group areas? [Interjections.]

Order! I forbid any further interjections tonight. I will not allow any further interjections.

Mr. Chairman, may I ask a question? Does the hon. the Minister concede that there are different nations, as he calls them, in South-West Africa, and, if so, does he concede that these nations are there and are identifiable despite the fact that the Population Registration Act does not apply to them?

On the South-West Africa question I shall speak very clearly. I know this is the only defence the Opposition have—they ring up South-West every time. In South-West Africa the position is not nearly as complex as it is in South Africa. There is no doubt about that.

[Inaudible.]

Order! I have warned hon. members that I will not tolerate any further interjections.

I am sorry, Mr. Chairman.

I want a very clear answer to my question, which I now want to put again. If there is going to be no race classification, then I ask the Opposition in all honesty how they are going to decide in the general application of their policy, their race federation, who the Coloured person is who has to represent this or that group if there is no classification to indicate who are Coloureds and who are Bantu? In terms of their race federation the Coloureds are getting two communal councils, each of which will elect three representatives to the umbrella federal council.

Mr. Chairman, may I put a question to the hon. the Minister? Could the hon. the Minister cast his thoughts back to the days when the Bantu in South Africa had parliamentary representation and the Coloureds were on a separate voters’ roll, and explain how, also under the old National Party Government, this was possible then, before race classification had been introduced?

The argument simply remains valid. The hon. member cannot get away from this argument. Coloureds are being accepted as Coloureds, and with 90% of the cases there are no problems. It is the 10% of borderline cases that give rise to the problems and tales of heartbreak. It is not even 10%; it is much less. And that is why I ask hon. members, in all love, how they are going to bring about separate schools for Whites and Coloureds if they do not have classifications to tell them who are Whites and who are Coloureds? How are they going to have separate residential areas for Whites and non-Whites if they do not have race classification?

Mr. Chairman, on a point of order, will the Chair please order the Minister not to ask questions if we are not allowed to answer them? He keeps on putting questions to us and we are not allowed to reply.

Please, that is a rhetorical question!

Order! I want hon. members to lend the Chair their co-operation in preserving order in this House.

The hon. members are not going to get away with this argument as easily as that. Their policy is essentially a policy of race federation. How is one therefore going to have a race federation without classifying people according to races?

It’s easy.

The concepts acceptance and appearance are therefore the determining factors, without race classification. Acceptance by whom? If two or three people come along and say that they accept a particular person as a White person, am I then to accept him as such if five or six other persons also come along and say that they do not accept him? How does one solve the problem? It is easy to become emotional and to tell me tales of heartbreak. However, I want to say at once that we have the greatest sympathy with these cases. The biggest and most difficult decisions I have taken in my life were in fact in connection with related matters, but this specific matter of reclassification has been entrusted to the Secretary. However, in most cases one hears the saddest tales of heartbreak that could possibly be told. We handle these cases with the greatest sympathy and humaneness, but hon. members opposite cannot get away from the argument that in their system—it does not matter what they do—they will also have to have a form of race classification irrespective of What it will be based on and irrespective of what norms will be applied.

No!

It seems to me as though the only two members who do not want any race classification of any kind are the hon. member for Bezuidenhout and the hon. member for Yeoville. The hon. member for Green Point and the hon. member for Durban North, however, are in favour of it. In other words, there we see the division clearly again: The Young Turks say Yes and the Old Guard say No. This is one of the things which they can settle at their caucus meeting tomorrow. [Interjections.] No, the hon. member cannot reply, for then he would be in trouble.

Mr. Chairman, on a point of order, could we appeal to you to permit only legitimate answers to questions? Could you revise your ruling in the interests of having a debate which I am quite sure the hon. the Minister would also like to have?

I shall not restrict hon. members unnecessarily. However, hon. members simply do not want to respond when I appeal to them not to make interjections all the time. However, I shall not apply my previous ruling so strictly that hon. members will not be able to reply when questions are put to them.

Now I want to carry on with my standpoint in regard to race classification. I want to make it very clear once again that the Opposition cannot have it both ways. They cannot have their cake and eat it. If they are going to have race classification, with whatever norms they are going to apply, they will have the same tales of heartbreak and borderline cases which we have. If they are not going to have race classification, I want to ask on what basis they are going to carry through their policy—I accept that this is still their policy—in respect of separate schools, residential areas and swimming baths for Whites and Coloureds. How are they going to determine this if they do not have race classification?

How is it done in South-West Africa?

I am saying now for the twentieth time that South-West Africa’s population figure and population composition are not nearly as complicated as those of South Africa. They are not comparable. The peoples over there have their own way of doing things. Here we have people who are trying to be classified as members of other ethnic groups, but such cases are minimal in South-West. The Basters in South-West are proud to be Basters. In fact, they call themselves Basters. In the same way the Whites and the other groups are also proud of their own identities. Here we have people who are trying for something else.

May I ask the hon. the Minister a question? What is so dreadful about a person, who is completely White in appearance and is accepted as White, trying to get into the other group, to use your term, if he is accepted by that group?

The hon. member is interpreting my words quite wrongly. I set no emotional value on this matter. The thing works in both directions. I see the hon. member is looking up at the Press. They have picked it up and he will see it in the papers tomorrow. That was the object of the hon. member’s question. I saw the way the hon. member was looking at the Press gallery. The hon. member wants them to write about it tomorrow. That is the only reason why the hon. member put the question. He only put the question in order to give a negative connotation to this matter. Race classification is under attack from many quarters. Like any other person we, too, wish race classification were not necessary. But in order to maintain South Africa’s present position and good human relationships, in order to carry through our policy and, in addition, to ensure that we have less friction and conflict, it is necessary for us to group people.

In order to apply White supremacy.

No, that is the hon. member’s interpretation of the matter. My argument still holds water: In terms of their policy, which includes geographical federation and race federation, they cannot have a race federation without race classification. I should like to argue this point with the hon. member, but we can take it further tomorrow. Now I want to leave this concept and touch upon a few other things.

I want to deal with the hon. member for Parktown, who also spoke about the concept Land Apart. I want to deal with his standpoint in respect of the book Kennis van die Aand. In this regard I must cross swords with the hon. member. The essence of the attack made by the hon. member for Parktown—and the hon. member for Bezuidenhout agrees with him and has endorsed it in consequence of questions put to him by the hon. the Deputy Minister of Bantu Education—on the book Kennis van die A and was that the people from countries abroad would laugh at South Africa when the English translation of it was read abroad and it was realized that it had been banned in South Africa. I am I interpreting the hon. member correctly?

Yes.

Very well; this is therefore his premise. This book was not banned by the Publications Board alone. It was also banned by the three judges in the Cape Supreme Court, who gave a unanimous verdict. In other words, the hon. member, who waxed so lyrical about the courts a few weeks ago, is immediately prepared now to point a finger and say that South Africa will be presented in a ridiculous light abroad as a result of, inter alia, a decision by the courts.

No.

Yes, what else can I infer from that? My premise is …

It is the Act.

Yes, the Act is there …

They interpret the Act.

They interpret the Act, but the fact remains that we normally acquiesce in a decision given by the courts. The courts are not being held in contempt or criticized, but their verdict is normally accepted as being final. The courts gave a verdict, but in spite of that the hon. member’s standpoint is that we are going to be made to seem ridiculous abroad as a result of that verdict. The hon. member wants to make a fuss here about the special value he attaches to the courts, but through this charge he has shown that all his voting against the abolition of the appeal to the courts was hypocrisy.

It is not the courts. The courts are doing their duty.

I proceed on the view, and I am adhering to this, that this amounts to criticism of the courts.

I want to touch upon a few other matters that were raised by other hon. members in this House in this regard. The hon. member for Edenvale treated us to a splendid, philosophical argument on all sorts of concepts, such as discrimination, etc. During the debate on the Information Vote I could still have replied to it since it concerns the Department of Information. However, the Department of the Interior is not concerned with those aspects of the Act at all. I cannot reply to him in this debate, but the would be well-advised to talk about it again in the Budget debate. The question of discrimination and all the philosophical concepts he mentioned are not being administered by this department at all. Nor do we have anything to do with the independence of the homelands. Therefore I cannot reply to these things in this debate since it would be out of order to do so.

Is that a reflection on the Chair?

No, I did not say that.

The hon. member for Losberg spoke about the question of citizenship. I want to say that we are prepared—and that is the way the provision reads at the moment —to allow prospective citizens of South Africa who apply for citizenship to acquire their citizenship if they are able to read and, to a reasonable extent, understand only one of the two official languages of the country. Such a person need therefore not know both languages. In this respect, therefore, we are already making a concession. If such a person knows both languages, he can acquire citizenship within a shorter period of time. We have already made that concession. I think the hon. member will understand that, as he himself also said, we do not want to make citizenship cheap. However, this is the position as it is at the moment, and I should like to leave it at that.

The hon. member for Verwoerdburg spoke about the Public Service. Perhaps I should just briefly, in the few minutes that are left, express a few ideas with reference to the speech made by this hon. member. He referred to an overseas visit made by a committee of inquiry last year. A delegation of the Public Service Commission was abroad at the beginning of this year, and they came back and handed over a report to me, a report which I have in my possession. They did a great deal of research, and now I want to mention the steps that are being envisaged as a result of this research. In the first place, it is possible to review the existing classification system. The classification structure has been in existence for more than 50 years, although adjustments were in fact made over the years. This is not a system which was taken over intact from other countries—and I am not referring to race classification now—and we shall therefore be able to apply and examine our system anew. A second recommendation which has resulted from it is the granting of wider powers to the various departments, whereby the departments will be able to have a greater say in a certain sense, as the hon. member said. The third is an idea that machinery for appeal in general should be established so as to inquire into dissatisfaction in particular departments, and that it will be possible to appeal to that body. In general—I want to keep this door open very clearly —the Government has not yet taken a final decision in pursuance of the report of the Public Service Commission as to what exactly the future of the Public Service Commission will be. This has not been decided finally, and I am not in a position to inform hon. members fully on this matter at this stage. Further research is still being done in this regard, and I shall have to give a decision on it in due course.

The hon. member for Bezuidenhout put two questions to me. In connection with his question on the date on which the Publications Board will come into operation, I want to say that at the moment I envisage —the hon. member will understand that a great deal still has to be done before we reach that stage; panels and staff have to be appointed, regulations have to be made and the whole machinery has to be put into operation—that this Act will come into force on 1 April of next year. We hope that we shall be able to put it into operation on that date. That is our target, if we can get all the administrative work done before that date.

Will the present Publications Board stay on in the meantime?

Yes, it will be staying on until then.

The second question which the hon. member put to me was when the automatic registration of voters would take place. It is still our objective—we believe that this ought to be passible—to have this take place two years from now. That will be when more progress has been made in connection with population registration and the issuing of identity documents.

The hon. member also took a stand in connection with passports, etc. I have already discussed this topic cursorily in the other debate earlier this evening. The fact that a country has a passport system—it is not only we who have it; every country in the world has it—illustrates more clearly than anything else that that country wants to exercise control over who leaves its shores. If it had not been for that, we could abolish the system. That would have saved my department masses of work as well as a lot of unnecessary criticism. However, the fact that there is a passport system means that the democratic countries of the world, and other countries as well, do consider it necessary to have control of whether its citizens are leaving that country or not. The hon. member should not adopt the attitude that because we refuse certain passports and approve others, we are discriminating on the basis of colour in this regard. He generalized once again by saying that Black people were being refused passports. He also said that the issuing of passports to Black people was being delayed for unnecessarily long periods. That is a wrong and a false generalization, and the hon. member’s attitude in this regard is unjustified. Every application for a passport, irrespective of who it may be from, is judged on merit on the basis of the necessary inquiries that have to be made. The issuing of passports to some Whites is also delayed sometimes, because certain facts have to be checked, and the same applies to the passports of certain non-Whites. We must weigh up the pros and cons in regard to such an application. Since I became Minister of the Interior, my policy in respect of passports and visas has been that we often take a calculated risk in regard to the issuing of a passport or a visa. We are quite often prepared to take a calculated risk. Occasionally there are indications that a risk is involved and that things may go wrong. Hon. members will be astonished to know in respect of how many of these decisions I write a following note to the effect that the case under consideration holds calculated risks but that I approve of the passport being issued. I want to put the matter this way and repeat my standpoint in this regard: Viewed against this background, a passport is a privilege and not a right. If it had been a right, every person would have had it automatically, as is the position in the case of a birth certificate. If it had been a right which every person should have, he would have received it along with his baptismal certificate and his birth certificate. The premise is that a passport is a privilege and not a right. This holds true for every country. If a passport had been a right, all countries would have made them available free of charge and everybody would have had one, without there being any control of any nature. This is why we have passport control. The same applies, to a lesser extent, to visas.

There is one other speech I wish to reply to, namely the speech made by the hon. member for Innesdal. I have only a few minutes left tonight and should like to dispose of this tonight. I shall deal with the question of the salary gap tomorrow. The hon. member for Innesdal drew my attention to the shortage of staff in the Public Service. He made a very neat speech in connection with this matter. I want to concede this at once and also make figures available, not because I want to intimate by those means how bad the position is, but in order to pay tribute by those means, to those officials we do in fact have. They are carrying out a task in spite of the tremendous shortage of staff. In 1973-’74 we appointed 600 people to professional posts, but there were 891 resignations. We therefore had a deterioration of 291 units. We made 644 appointments in technical posts, but there were 745 resignations; consequently the loss came to 101. In clerical posts there were 2 393 appointments and 3 148 resignations, representing a loss of 755.

Every section therefore showed a loss.

Yes. Therefore I want to pay tribute to our public servants who, in spite of the tremendous staff shortage, have been doing such outstanding work in keeping the machine of state going. It is still running on oiled wheels. I want to pay tribute to the staff we do in fact have. We are trying to meet this shortage, and there are four specific aspects in this regard. In the first place, we have the salary improvements which came into operation on 1 July of this year and have already resulted in bringing about a downward trend in the number of resignations. The effect is noticeable already. However, I do not know how long this is going to continue. In the second place, there is a system of accelerated salary advancement in the lower and middle ranks to allow young people joining the Public Service to progress as rapidly as possible. In certain cases they are granted more than one salary increase per year so that their salaries may increase more rapidly. We are trying to retain their services in that way. In the third place, there are proposals in respect of housing measures which are being investigated at the moment. It is our intention to make better housing privileges available to officials in order to accommodate them in this regard as well. In the fourth place, there is an announcement which I shall make tomorrow in connection with the payment of holiday savings bonuses to public servants. I do not have time to do this fully at the moment.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Minister suggested that the particular Act has not been amended since 1967. I suggest he gets his Butterworths brought up to date, because he will find that I was not wrong when I said that the Act had been amended on 10 occasions. The Act has been amended by Act No. 106 of 1969, by Act No. 26 of 1970, by Act No. 29 of 1970 and by Act No. 36 of 1973. I think the hon. the Minister owes the House an apology for saying that the Act has not been amended. [Interjections.]

However, that is the difficulty with this hon. Minister. He makes statements and pronouncements which have no relation to the facts which are available in and obtainable from his department. He made a great show this evening of playing with words. My approach to him was this: In the words of the then Minister, Dr. Dönges, in 1950: “This Bill was introduced in order that the Government could implement the Group Areas Act. It provided classification, not population registration.” The whole basis of the attack by this side of the House in 1950, was that it was called a population registration measure whereas it introduced arbitrary classification.

Business interrupted in accordance with Standing Order No. 23.

House Resumed:

Progress reported and leave granted to sit again.