Mr. Speaker, I just want to make an announcement in regard to the business for next week. As hon. members know, the Votes of the Minister of Health and of Coloured Relations and Rehoboth Affairs will be discussed today. On Monday we shall dispose first of the Second Bantu Laws Amendment Bill and then proceed with the various Votes until all of them have been disposed of; I hope that this will be the case by next Thursday. On Thursday and Friday we shall proceed with the Third Reading of the Appropriation Bill, which we shall then dispose of on the following Monday. After that we shall proceed with the legislation appearing on the Order Paper.

Sir, in addition I just want to give informal notice now of my intention to give formal notice on Monday that we shall start with morning sittings as from Saturday, the 26th, and that we shall try to finish by the end of the month. If we could have the hearty co-operation of hon. members, this should in fact be possible.

Mr. Chairman, in the few minutes at my disposal under this Vote, I wish to deal with a most important matter that has arisen between the doctors on the one hand and the medical aid schemes on the other. It is with regret that I feel it is necessary to deal with such a matter here this morning. It appears that the South African Medical Association, which is the recognized mouth-piece of the doctors, on the one hand and the medical aid schemes on the other hand, have found that they have great differences of opinion with regard to the workings of the medical aid schemes. I must point out that the South African Medical Association is a voluntary organization. It probably consists of 80% of the practising doctors in the country. If that is correct, then about 20% of the medical practitioners are not controlled by this body. Sir, when I talk about “control”, I refer to the voluntary control that this body exercises over doctors. The Medical Association has found it necessary, because of the differences of opinion which have occurred, to canvass its members to see whether or not it is possible for them to contract out of the medical aid schemes en masse. Whether this action is due to the unsatisfactory remuneration of the doctors, as they see it, or whether it is due to the conditions of service, or whether it is due to the unsatisfactory or inefficient working of the schemes, or a combination of all these things, I am not in a position to say. But I do say that if the doctors do contract out en masse, it could possibly lead to a chaotic state of affairs, and we must do everything in our power to avoid this. I do not think it is impossible for people who are sensible and not hard-headed, to come together afresh and to start negotiations anew. I would like them to sit down and take their time about ironing out their differences. I do not think that there are any differences at all between the doctors and the medical aid schemes that cannot be ironed out. If the doctors feel that their remuneration is too low or that their conditions of service are unsatisfactory, then there are ways and means of settling these things. If the only issue is the fees paid to the doctors, then we must face the fact that one of two things must happen: Either the contributor, if he is unable to contribute more, must get less for his money or he must be asked to contribute more. If the contributor finds that because of the prevailing circumstances it is uneconomic and in some cases almost impossible for him to contribute more, then we have to look for funds elsewhere, and where could this come from except from the Government? If the Government does not do this and does not help, then they will be failing in their duty. Sir, for years we on this side of the House have been saying, I think quite rightly, that we have to have a revision of the whole of the medical aid schemes as they operate at the moment. They have been in operation for some time. We who have been practising have got certain complaints. On the other hand we hear complaints that the doctors do not come when they are called to attend patients because they are too busy. We have complaints from doctors that they are not prepared to work for the remuneration that they are receiving; they say that their remuneration is too low, and that the time that is taken for their accounts to be paid is too long. We have had complaints about personality clashes. Well, this cannot go on if medical schemes are expected to work satisfactorily. I say to the hon. the Minister that we should rather have another look at the whole set-up and see whether or not we can do something to alleviate the position. I know that we on our side of the House would be prepared to go along to try to solve the problem if there are problems which are difficult to solve. But on the other hand I want to say to the hon. the Minister that he must now give serious consideration to the proposals I have made over and over again in this House, that the Government must take some part in helping these medical aid schemes to work effectively. How can they best do this? They can do this by helping with Financial contributions towards it, and let us now start to think along the lines of a nation-wide medical aid scheme to which three parties will contribute: Firstly, the contributor, the worker; secondly, the employer who would like to see his workers come to work in a healthy state, and who are in many cases doing this now; and, thirdly, the contributions from the Government.

Why the Government?

Then let us say the State. I want to point out to hon. members that this very thing is happening now, here in Parliament.

But this is a special case.

Sir, for parliamentarians there is a special case. Why should there be a special case for parliamentarians? The whole matter is one of principle. I say to the Minister that we must look at this again and see whether it will not work. I am sure that it will, and if it works for us I am sure it can work for the rest of the country as well. I do not believe that raising the remuneration of doctors alone will solve the problem. It can only solve the problem today. Tomorrow it will start again. When we dealt with the matter of remuneration during the debate on medical schemes I warned that the period between the review of the tariffs by the body that was going to be set up, was too long. I warned the then Minister, Dr. Carel de Wet. I think the Medical Association also did not see the dangers of this long period in between reviews. Now that it has come about, and with the continual escalation in costs, it means virtually that there must be a remuneration commission sitting continually to keep reviewing the matter. If we do not settle this problem, we are going to land ourselves in plenty of trouble. The whole of the health services of this country can easily break down. I see it happening already. I see people writing to the newspapers about these things and I see in the Press that the Medical Association is seeking assistance. Everyone who belongs to this seems to be dissatisfied. There must be a fault somewhere. I ask the Minister to see to it that we get together and, as I say, we from our side will help because we do not want to see any disaster happening. I leave it at that.

In the few minutes left to me I want to say to the hon. the Minister that I am dissatisfied with the way venereal diseases are being handled today in our country. Since we have been using contraceptives, and especially oral contraceptives, I have seen a continual rise in the rate of venereal disease and I think it is time that the Department of Health got together a body to see how best we could warn the public against the dangers which are facing them every day. [Time expired.]

I am not going to react to what the hon. member for Rosettenville said because he spoke about the sentiments prevalent between doctors and the department, and I should prefer to take up another line. Firstly, I want to pay tribute to a former member of this House, the late Dr. Aubrey Radford, who, at the age of 78 years, was still a sitting member of this House, someone who, to me, was the personification of that which is noble in the medical profession. Due to the attitude he adopted, I never saw him as a politician. In the speeches he made here, too, he always had that refinement we find in the description “a gentleman and a surgeon”, for he was a person of high integrity. That is why I think it is fitting that we pay tribute to him, and I want to express the hope that the person who succeeded him in his constituency will also look up to him as a fine example.

Secondly, I should like to congratulate the Department of Health on having presented us, for the first time in a long while, with as comprehensive and detailed a report as the one that was tabled here. We know it is not yet complete, but if we peruse that report carefully, we can clearly see the extent to which the health services and the responsibilities of the State have expanded. To me there is one aspect which runs consistently throughout the report, and that is the question of health education. Sir, I honestly believe that many of the catastrophes and set-backs which have befallen the individual, the community, peoples and even continents, would have been far less severe if the available health knowledge of the time had been applied. Many children still die as a result of contagious diseases because we do not succeed in educating the whole population in health matters. It is tragic that we still have to see in the report that a disease such as diphtheria is still fatal in some cases. I want to tell you, from personal experience, what happened when I was still a general practitioner. During a diphtheria epidemic a small child was brought to see me. I had to perform an operation on him to open up an air passage, but the small boy died the next morning. I went to speak to the mother and because one naturally inquires about the background, I asked her whether the boy had not been inoculated against diphtheria. Her reply was, “Oh, doctor, Johnny was not feeling too well on that day, and so we forgot about it.” The bitter grief of that mother is something we cannot regard as something trivial. In this morning’s newspaper we read another report that, after the wife of the President of America had been operated on, the wife of the Vice-President of America also had to undergo an operation for cancer yesterday. This makes headlines throughout the country and throughout the world, but it is because these are the wives of a President and a Vice-President. Now, one should like to know, if this happens in their case—and we hope that in their case it was in a very early stage—how many of our women are not susceptible to that condition? The degree of success which may be achieved by research, medical science and surgery is considerable. There is an 80% chance of a cure if such a condition is detected at a sufficiently early stage. It is so easy to make representations once again to the public and to every woman in this country. It takes a doctor half a minute to find out whether or not a small lump is concealed somewhere. One so often finds cases of people who come in too late. Then they say that they did in fact know about it. It is never anything serious. A typical expression in the medical world is “it is not serious”, until it is too late, for cancer is a disease which spreads unobtrusively and perniciously. That is why, in lay terms, we speak of cancer as one of those things which destroys without one’s noticing it. Health education goes further. On one occasion Tolstoy, with a piece of bread in his hand, said the following, “What am I to do with this? Should we eat it on our own? Should we share it? Should we give it away? Should we sell it, or should we use it to win the favours of the underprivileged?” What I can gather from that, is that that piece of bread indicates that one of the most essential aspects of our health education is nutrition. How many of us know what to eat and how much to eat? Nutrition education is a multi-disciplinary task. The State cannot undertake it alone. The State would never be able to succeed in achieving any marked degree of success in convincing the public to eat the right kinds of food unless everybody—the Church, the schools, the local authorities—makes use of every opportunity to educate the public in connection with the foods they should eat. Health education goes further in many other spheres too. It is of no avail our having a medical research institute which conducts research into certain foodstuffs and makes certain recommendations if we do not apply those recommendations in practice. We also have the instance of the genetic investigations which will certainly be able to contribute a great deal to our having fewer cases of mental deviation in this country and encountering fewer cases of physical deviation. Every married couple can make sure that their genetic or chromosome composition is not such that there might possibly be a hereditary defect in their children. We have these services which may be used. If we use them, we shall succeed in keeping our hospitals empty. Then it would not be necessary to be concerned about the fact that we have too few doctors. Our motto should be that prevention is better than cure.

I want to conclude by saying that health education covers a very wide field. We have our industrial development in respect of which the department deals with air pollution. Pollution inside the factory and pollution outside the factory fall under different pieces of legislation. So, in turn, it falls under other legislation if it takes place in the mining industry or under other circumstances. We cannot afford this; health knows no limits and no bounds; it goes beyond these things and affects mankind as a whole.

Mr. Chairman, we on this side of the House should like to associate ourselves with the tribute paid by the hon. member for Brentwood on the occasion of the decease of Dr. Aubrey Radford. We appreciate very highly the hon. member for Brentwood having brought up this matter here this morning. We should like to extend our sincere sympathy to the family of the late Dr. Radford. We should also like to endorse the hon. member for Brentwood’s argument on health guidance. I can tell him that we on this side of the House feel just as strongly about it as he.

†The hon. member for Rosettenville said this morning that it was high time that a contribution by the State was made towards medical aid. He was asked during his speech by the hon. member for Caledon why it was necessary. I do not believe that the hon. member for Caledon is still asking why it is necessary, because I think everyone in this House realizes that this has become essential. Unless medical services are to break down completely and para-medical services are to break down completely, we must have a contribution by the State. All I want to say on the matter …

Why do you not set it out?

The hon. member for Caledon must first listen. All I want to say is that a contribution can be made immediately. It can be done completely painlessly. It should start with free hospital services throughout the country. If the Government would make this contribution at this stage, it would at least lessen the burden on the patient. We on this side of the House have said that free hospital services would be a way of alleviating pain and suffering and also the burden on the pockets of the patients. We believe that this is something which can be done immediately. Despite what the hon. member for Caledon says, it is only in this House that it can be decided whether that is to be the policy or not because it is this House which votes the money for hospital services run by the provincial councils.

I should like to pass on to another matter. A very disturbing practice has crept into dispensing in this country. It has become evident that at least in two places, in Port Elizabeth and at Krugersdorp, dispensing will be done by medical men. We know that medical men should under certain circumstances be allowed to dispense, e.g. when no pharmacies are available. Where pharmacies are available, however, it seems to be quite wrong that medical men should organize themselves into dispensing chemists. That is exactly what is happening. I have a case here where two doctors in Port Elizabeth have decided to supply medicines to patients who have previously obtained their prescriptions through the normal pharmaceutical channels. One of these doctors when interviewed said that it was their intention to develop a practice which would provide an improved service to their patients as it was ascertained that his patients were not completely satisfied with the pharmaceutical services which were presently offered. It is a most extraordinary statement because, as we all know, pharmacies do not only work during business hours; they also arrange for pharmaceutical products to be available to the general public after hours. In many cases pharmacies are open from 11 p.m. to 8 a.m. to supply after-hour service. Local pharmacists are on call in exactly the same way as the medical profession. This doctor who was interviewed, said that they would select their drugs as they now do and not according to their bulk purchases. He said that they would dispense at a price lower than that charged by the pharmacies. In this particular case the doctor had calculated that by large-scale purchasing of one particular antibiotic and repacking it into a consumer quantity, he Would gross 89% on his costs. The repackaging would be done by the doctors in their spare time, according to him. This is a most extraordinary statement to make because I did not know that doctors had any spare time. He expressed amazement that the pharmacists on the average purchased these drugs in packs of 20 and not in packs of 500 as he was going to do. He said that the dispensing would be undertaken solely by practitioners and that they would observe the requirements of the Act, but he was not pleased with the fact that it was necessary to keep a prescription book as demanded by the Act. There is a lot more in this connection, but my time is very short. That is in regard to the doctors who started a pharmaceutical firm in Port Elizabeth. But this is not all. There is another pharmaceutical firm at Krugersdorp. This pharmaceutical firm comprises medical doctors. There are altogether five doctors in this firm and they sent out a circular letter. It was stated in this letter that its purpose was “to introduce our company to your profession.” These doctors, I may say, had formed themselves into a limited company. They call themselves Clinical Ethicals Limited. The letter goes on to say—

This is an extraordinary statement. Then follows a list of all the drugs that are available. I do not think it is necessary for me to say what is going to happen in this regard. Can you imagine these medical practitioners going into the pharmacy business and doing this on a big scale? Look what they are going to do. They have the opportunity now of visiting the patient, of diagnosing what is wrong with the patient, then of prescribing to the patient, and then thereafter, of dispensing for the patient. Can you understand what is going to happen? Only those lines that are popular with these pharmaceutical companies of doctors are going to be stocked by them. In other words, to reverse that argument, they are only going to prescribe those items which they have in stock. How is this going to influence the practice of medicine throughout the country? The cheek of calling their company Clinical Ethicals I think is the most unethical thing that has been done by these doctors.

Are they wholesalers or retailers?

They are retailers. I know that the hon. the Minister has already given this mater some thought and I would like to quote from what the hon. the Minister said during his Second Reading speech on the Medical, Dental and Supplementary Health Service Professions Bill (Hansard, col. 2794)—

[Time expired.]

Mr. Chariman, both the hon. member for Wynberg and the hon. member for Rosettenville referred to the relation between the medical profession and the State, and also made a few remarks about the operation of the medical scheme. I, too, should like to deal with this subject. Although I agree with these two hon. members in certain respects, I also have serious reservations about certain standpoints they advanced, especially as far as a State contribution to the medical schemes is concerned. If we in South Africa should ever allow our health services to be modelled on a national basis, we should have to bear in mind the fact that we shall inherit all the evils of such a system as well. As far as I am concerned I feel that this would open the door to socialism, a philosophy towards which we in South Africa are not striving.

Sir, I have the privilege of being a member of an honoured profession, a profession which enjoys high standing on account of the professional standards which have been built up over the years and on account of the maintenance of an irreproachable professional code of self-discipline. However, I was rudely disillusioned recently when I discovered on a visit to London that the medical profession has lowered itself to the level of a political pressure group and is prepared to resort to strikes with the concomitant result of loss of life and the suffering of patients, something which, in my opinion, is in direct contravention of the Hipocratic Oath which every one of us takes. However, we here in South Africa are in fact still fortunate that our medical profession has maintained its status and professional integrity within reasonable bounds. It has therefore been possible for the profession to be able to enjoy a considerable degree of autonomy within the framework of the official structure of the State. It is clear, however, from leading articles which have recently appeared in the journal of the Medical Association, that there is a large degree of confusion among certain members of the profession about the concept “the autonomy of the profession”. Just as the sovereignty of the State is not an absolute concept, so the autonomy of a profession or of a university is not an absolute concept either. The sovereignty of the State, for example, is restricted by its relations with other countries, by particular boundaries, economic strength, and so on. There are indeed particular spheres in which the medical profession, through the agency of the Medical Council and the Medical Association, and even individuals, has a measure of autonomy in respect of particular tasks, interests or delegated powers. But this autonomy, too, can never be absolute, because the profession still functions within the framework of the official structure of the State, and from the nature of the case has its own responsibilities towards society in general.

That is why I want to make a plea here, in the first place, to the Medical Association, to have the standing of the medical profession preserved, not to have our beloved profession used as a political pressure group and to have preserved intact the high standard of impartial action which the Medical Council has built up and maintained over the years and which has inspired high respect and confidence into the State and the public in general. The medical code of ethics, as contained in the Hippocratic Oath, should be placed first so that the interests of the public in general and society will enjoy priority above self-interest.

According to recent reports there is some dissatisfaction, as the hon. member for Rosettenville rightly said, about the question of the medical schemes and their operation. I believe that this dissatisfaction may be eliminated by means of adjustments. In the same way it would be possible to eliminate the dissatisfaction about the composition of the Medical Council. I believe that we shall be able to iron out these problems by means of the necessary consultation.

However, I should also like to address a few words on this matter to the hon. the Minister and his department. As fax as possible the autonomy of the medical profession should remain intact within its own position of authority. I also believe that the hon. the Minister will always, as the past has shown, have a willing ear to listen to people when problems are being experienced, and that it will not be necessary for the medical profession to come along with threats of contracting out, and so on. The profession should always be consulted by its association as far as the drafting of legislation is concerned. This is what has happened in the past, and I believe that in the future, too, the hon. the Minister will have proper consultations with the Medical Association and the profession before legislation is introduced.

We do not want to allow the fine relation which has existed up to the present to be disrupted. There should be regular liaison and dialogue with the Medical Council and also with the Medical Association, as is in fact happening at present. We may not allow the medical profession to degenerate through its association into a trade union or a pressure group from which irresponsible action will flow. Certain European countries are at this very moment suffering as a result of the irresponsible action taken by trade unions. The public of South Africa will suffer if there is no unanimity, or if the balance is disturbed between professional interests on the one hand and the responsibility of the State on the other.

Nor may we allow the State to yield to the pressure which is being exerted on it to start thinking along the lines of establishing a national health scheme. I am speaking as a doctor who has worked under the national health scheme in England. Such a scheme is, on account of the evils which are associated with it, neither in the interests of the public nor in the interests of the medical profession. The State’s task is, in the first place, the regulation of health services, but the execution of professional duties must, as far as possible, be left in the hands of the profession.

We in South Africa are really fortunate that our physicians have been acting very responsibly virtually throughout and we respect them for that. The hon. the Minister and his department have always displayed a sympathetic attitude towards the profession, especially in the light of the fact that both the hon. the Minister and the Secretary for Health are members of this honoured profession. From the nature of the case, therefore, they have to have the interests of this profession at heart. However, we must also take into consideration the fact that the hon. the Minister and his department must, at the same time, take the broad interests of the country into consideration as well, and for that reason a balance must be sought between professional interests and broader public interests. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I hope the hon. member for Newcastle will not take it amiss if I do not reply to him during the course of my speech because there is a very important matter which I should like to discuss with the hon. the Minister. I refer to the chronic shortage of district surgeons. It is a shocking shortage. From the answers which the hon. the Minister gave in reply to questions of my colleague, the hon. member for Rosettenville, today, we heard that there were 89 vacancies for full-time district surgeons. At the moment there are only 47 full-time district surgeons in employment. This is a terrible imbalance, in the sense that there are 47 persons in service while there are 89 vacancies. This is shocking, to say the least. There is something wrong here. There are 300 part-time district surgeons in employment, 295 of whom are White; there are no Coloureds; there are four Indians and one Bantu. This also is a shocking imbalance. There is something wrong. I want to refer to the Government Gazette. No. 4427 dated 11 October which records 35 vacancies for part-time district surgeons: eight in the Transvaal, six in the Orange Free State, 21 in the Cape and none in Natal. This is a vast improvement. Let me add that I have taken Government Gazettes at random and I have found that on 16 February 1973 there was a shortage of 59 part-time district surgeons. On 30 May 1973 there was a shortage of 52, on 7 September a shortage of 45 and on 1 March 1974 a shortage of 43. There has been however, an improvement in bringing the shortage down to 35 part-time district surgeons at present. I maintain, however, that this is an unhealthy state of affairs and that these shortages are due to nothing else than to lack of planning over the past 25 years. Sir, this is a serious matter. There is lack of planning somewhere. Obviously the remuneration of part-time district surgeons is so inadequate that the profession does not attract the medical practitioners in the platteland districts. This does not only apply to the platteland. I found in the latest Government Gazette dated 11 October that Brakpan, Meyerton, Orkney and Vanderbijlpark too are without part-time district surgeons.

They are all sitting in Parliament.

In the Orange Free State, Sasolburg and Theunissen, amongst others, are without part-time district surgeons. Here in the Cape one finds that Simonstown, Sutherland, Uitenhage and Ceres do not have part-time district surgeons. The hon. the Minister of Transport is the member for Ceres and he does not even have a part-time district surgeon! Unless these part-time district surgeons are properly remunerated for their services, there will be reluctance on their part to give their full enthusiasm to their work. In many instances, if not in most, medical practitioners refuse to accept these posts because of the scanty remuneration. Greater and greater demands are being made on those district surgeons who are in service. A tremendous responsibility is placed on their shoulders, and I feel terribly sorry for them. What do the departments of Police and Justice alone, not require from district surgeons? Medical attention must be given to policemen of all races and also to their wives and dependants. This also is the case with the Prisons Department. District surgeons have to conduct post mortems and give evidence in court. So much time is wasted, and don’t I know it! District surgeons have to examine patients in cases of alleged rape, they have to examine mental patients and intoxicated persons at all hours of the night and day. This is a terrific strain. The Department of the Interior calls upon district surgeons to perform vaccinations and inoculations of persons who wish to travel abroad. The Department of Labour calls upon district surgeons to examine apprentices; the Department of Social Welfare and Pensions asks district surgeons to examine old-age pensioners and military pensioners, to say nothing of the Department of Health itself which has multitudinous duties, which the hon. the Minister is too well aware of himself. There is no need for me to go into this. What is the result, Mr. Chairman? There is too much work for too few district surgeons, whether they be full-time or part-time, and it is obvious that they cannot give of their best. They are overworked and, I would say, underpaid. I suppose the remedy is to upgrade salaries and allowances to attract the dedicated and vigorous younger doctors to make a career in this department and, secondly, to employ more registered trained nurses. Whether they are male or female does not matter.

Mr. Chairman, I might as well ask the hon. member who has just sat down: “Is there a doctor in the house?”

Too many.

I think his speech shows great lack of planning on his part. I thought he would argue with the Minister about weight-watchers or something like that.

*Sir, hon. members speak so readily of the collapse of medical services, but when they do so they are speaking of the doctors only. I think we should view this matter in a somewhat broader perspective. I should like to make eight statements here in order to indicate from what angle, in my opinion, we should view this problem. On the one hand there are the people who make use of medical services; there are the Government and the State institutions that have to make the facilities available, and on the other hand, there are the people who have to render the services, i.e. the doctors, nurses, and so on. I think the matter does not concern doctors only. Sir, how can we ease this problem? I should like to view the matter from eight angles. In the first instance, we must exercise control over the run-away horse, i.e. over-population. In other words, we should give more attention to family planning, which I shall come back to in a moment. In the second instance, I think there should be a continuous survey of the service needs of all the population groups, due regard being had to their economic conditions. In the third instance, I think there should be a shifting of the focus from an expensive hospital-centred service to a more simple clinic service. In the fourth instance, I think that more effective use should be made of our scarce professional manpower by delegating medical functions to a larger extent to supplementary staff as members of the medical service team. In the fifth instance, there should be the education of especially our Bantu people in their homelands, in order to teach them to make use of the greater benefits of preventive medicine. In the sixth instance we shall, in order to narrow the gap between the demand for medical services and the supply of medical services in the homelands, have to give attention to the training of more Black medical students in the first place and, in the second place, the training of medical assistants. In the seventh instance, we shall have to give attention to the more effective distribution of professional manpower throughout the country among all sections of the population. In the eighth instance, we shall have to work in the direction of gradually eliminating the overlapping which arises as a result of divided control over medical services. It is easy to say that we should train more doctors—just by way of examining one of the points I have mentioned. But let us look at the circumstances prevailing in South Africa. As far as the White population group is concerned, the number of doctors, per million of the population, who are trained annually in South Africa, is already the highest in the world. The annual figure for South Africa will probably be 130 plus in 1975. In the U.S.A. it is 40, in Canada 50, in the Netherlands 41, and in the United Kingdom 56. You see, Sir, excessive demands for services are already being made on the White group. The medical profession is making much more than its fair demand on that professional pool of manpower, from which other services have to be supplied as well. We have been on the horns of a dilemma. It is easy to say we should train more non-Whites. It sounds easy, but up to 1960, 26 Bantu matriculated annually with mathematics as a subject, Bantu who do qualify for possible medical training, but from those Bantu other professional directions have to be catered for as well. But this Government’s positive policy of education for the non-White races has resulted in that number having increased to 181 in 1970. In other words, 181 passed mathematics at matriculation level. From these 181 candidates, other professions have to be catered for as well. This year, for the first time, we reached the position where the number of applications for training as Bantu doctors exceeds the availability of facilities at the University of Natal. The Government has been planning for some time and has a very large specializing hospital at Ga Rankuwa, to the north of Pretoria, where a medical faculty exclusively for Bantu might possibly be established in the future. It is very easy to say we should establish a medical faculty there now; it is easy for hon. members to speak of a “lack of planning”, but one has to find the staff to provide the necessary training, and that is not so easy. These are not people one can buy off the peg at a trading store. One has to train them, and it takes years, and then one still finds the type of thing happening, as happened recently at the University of Natal. When they had the opportunity of appointing a Bantu gynaecologist in a Bantu faculty, a Black man with 13 years’ experience, they did not do so, but some other “lightier”, with only 1½ years’ experience, was appointed. This is what happened in terms of the plea hon. members so often raise: Let us give the universities control over everything. But where could one possibly find the staff to man these universities? I repeat, this problem is not an easy one.

I should like to deal with the salaries of district surgeons, which the hon. member for Umbilo mentioned. This is an old, stereotyped suggestion which is being made in that regard. All they say is: Pay him a bigger salary.

It is important.

It is important, but it is as important, as the hon. member for Rosettenville said, for the doctors in private practice to receive more as well.

He did not say so.

Of course! That is what he meant.

No, he said the State had to contribute.

But then the doctor receives more in any case. Really, the hon. member should not be so slow to understand. Why should the State contribute? The State has to contribute so that the doctor may have a higher income!

I shall speak to him privately.

Will you tell him privately?

*Another matter I should like to touch on—I obviously cannot touch on all the eight points I wanted to deal with—is the question of the training of health assistants or the use of health assistants. It seems to me as though the group of people whose services may be utilized more effectively than has been the case up to the present, is the group we have had very much to say about in this House, the pharmacists. A pharmacist undergoes a five-year period of training. He subsequently spends 90% or 95 % of his working hours behind a counter, counting pills. No man needs five years’ training in order to be able to count pills. Those people have a very sound professional training.

What about the Epsom salts he dispenses?

The Epsom salt water he only needs to pour. That man has a sound professional training and I want to plead with the hon. the Minister that a commission of inquiry be appointed, if necessary, so as to ascertain in what way these people may be integrated with our health services to better effect. Their training is not utilized properly. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I was somewhat surprised that the hon. member who has just sat down dealt with the difficulties facing the government in regard to the teaching facilities and opportunities for Black students. He spoke about the matriculation results. However, it was he himself who last year gave the House some information to the effect that in 1960 there were just on 1 000 Bantu pupils in matric. Twelve years later the figure had grown to over 4 000.

May I ask the hon. member a question? Have they all got mathematics?

The point that I want to make is that the State should well have been aware of the necessity for more matriculants and the necessity for more doctors. It is almost childish to talk about our output of doctors each year in relation to other countries, and then deal only, as the hon. member did, with Whites where the Whites represent only 3½ to 4 million people and there are nearly 18 million people making up the non-White races in this country. Surely it must be self-evident to any State Department how necessary it is to provide this vital and important service to the community? I think a large number of problems which hon. members have mentioned today arise as a result of the fact that the actual amount on the Estimates which is allocated to Health is somewhat niggardly in comparison with the overall amount budgeted to maintain the affairs of the State. It amounts to, 0023% of the total Budget. I think that in this respect the hon. the Minister should perhaps make greater efforts to ensure that much more money is made available for health requirements in future. When I speak of, 0023% I am referring to the total estimates for Health in so far as the Republic is concerned. I am aware of the fact that certain health services in the homelands will be financed from funds allocated to those homelands. However, these sums are hopelessly inadequate to meet the problems of the day.

With regard to the homelands, I particularly want to refer to the incidence of tuberculosis. We find, for instance, that there were 55 000 new notifications for the calendar year 1973 of whom 46 800 were Africans. That immediately illustrates the tremendous problems with which the State has to deal and which the hon. member for Fauresmith last year described rather nebulously as “a disease which we are unable to control”. He said that the hon. the Minister had said on another occasion that it is a mysterious disease and that is why it is so difficult to control, although I find it hard to believe that the hon. the Minister would have made such a foolish statement. I want to say that the homelands are virtually the main source of the unfortunate continued strength of this particular disease in our country. It is our number one killer and it is our number one infectious disease. Out of the R90 odd million for this year the State has only allocated R19 million for this purpose. This shows an increase of less than R1 million over last year. I believe the State should allocate very much more to the campaign against tuberculosis. I feel that the overall budget should be increased in order to accommodate the additional requirements to combat TB. Arising out of what the hon. member for Fauresmith said, I want to say that I agree with him that it is necessary to provide additional medical aides for this type of work particularly if you have to provide a service for such a large and vast community where there is such a complete inadequacy of technically trained people at this stage. I think that the State is very fortunate that an organization such as the S.A. National Tuberculosis Association, Santa, has come to the aid of the country and is playing such a vital and important part in the affairs of our community. It might interest members to know that at this stage Santa has been able to establish 370 associations in the homeland areas of the Transkei and the Ciskei each of which will comprise at least 20 to 30 persons—this is a very conservative figure—giving us an overall figure of 10 000 people who will be able to spread educational matter and who will be able to give assistance in the discovery of cases. They will be able to assist in giving the BCG injections which will be required as well as in regard to other facilities which are necessary to assist in the prophylactic treatment of tuberculosis. If we are able eventually to overtake this particular disease in the homelands, we shall be rendering a service not only to the Black community, but to the whole community of South Africa because tuberculosis unfortunately knows no barrier. It is something to which everyone is susceptible and to which everyone is exposed. Therefore, rendering that service renders a service to the entire country. In that sense I believe that where the State is fortunate enough to have a private agency which is public in the sense that it depends on public funds, the wonderful co-operation which already exists should be extended even more, and the services used very much more than has been the case in the past. Santa for instance has been able to illustrate to the State Health Department by means of pilot schemes which is established at its own expense—initially at Ga Rankuwa, Daveyton and other areas in the homelands and at Sebokeng and Krugersdorp which are areas adjacent to local authorities and even in platteland areas such as Ficksburg—that it can create a form of machinery whereby it can do a complete detailed search for new contacts and also provide a method whereby immunization can take place on a very much wider and broader field than we have experienced hitherto. It is pleasing to know that the State has welcomed the service which it has rendered, but I believe that we should even do much more. We should not only encourage it; we should help also to promote it to a very much greater extent than we have hitherto. This will enable us also to overtake the other difficult problem in regard to the re-introduction of people, in whom the disease has been arrested or has been laid dormant, into a normal social existence and into the labour market. The latter factor is another very serious set-back in the life of the average Black worker who finds himself afflicted with the disease and has to leave employment immediately. There are many methods which can be used, particularly if we make use of the wonderful service which has now been established through the South African National Tuberculosis Association. I would like to say that there are other fields—I am dealing specifically with tuberculosis because I place so much importance on it—like the establishment of crèches and daycare centres where pre-school children infected with tubercle bacilli and require prophylactic treatment could be treated and looked after and which could play an important part in the march to victory in regard to this particular disease. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank the hon. member for his constructive contribution in respect of a disease which most decidedly gets the attention it deserves in this country, although we may certainly give it more attention. I particularly appreciate his friendly and constructive reference to the contribution made by Santa. This is an organization which is of great help to the department in combating this evil, which is in point of fact a very difficult one to combat.

This morning I should like to draw the attention of this Committee to the situation in respect of industrial health in our country. If we look at the picture of industrial health in this country, we see that it is by no means a favourable one. There are many reasons for this, but in particular it may perhaps be ascribed to the fact that there are too many departments and bodies which accept responsibility for this problem at present. In the second place there is obviously a lack of co-ordination between the various bodies, and in the third place there is of course, also a lack of properly trained staff to carry out this function efficiently. It is fact that more and more workers today are becoming increasingly aware of the detrimental health conditions under which they have to perform their daily tasks. We pride ourselves on the fact that we have very effective and enlightened labour legislation. In fact, our labour legislation can indeed serve as a model for the rest of the world. As a result of our effective industrial legislation, we do have relative labour peace, for which we are very grateful, but this labour peace is in danger of being seriously disrupted if we do not give attention to health and the prevention of accidents and unhealthy working conditions in particular industries. There are signs that the labour force is becoming aware of the health problems they are facing. They are becoming aware of the fact that they are working under unfavourable conditions and that not enough is being done, in many instances nothing at all, to guarantee their health, and that they are not being trained to cope with the dangers facing them. People are becoming unhappy about the effect which their work situations have on their health. We have already had one serious outbreak of labour unrest in this country, at the time of the strikes in Durban last year. Although wage claims played a major role in that labour unrest, there were also many clear indications that the people who revolted did not only revolt against the wage structure, but that their working conditions too, especially as far as their health was concerned, had affected them adversely. Sir, we should take very thorough cognizance of that. Working conditions should at all times afford optimal safety to the worker. This is the only basis, Sir, on which we can really build a happy and satisfied labour force. We must take into consideration the fact that 628 000 workers are working in our mines and industries, of whom 595 000 are Bantu. In agriculture and in forestry there are 1,75 million workers, of whom only a small handful are Whites. In the factories there are 1,25 million workers, of whom only 250 000 are Whites. Sir, you will see that the vast majority of our labour force consists of people who have not yet been trained, as the White has been trained, in dealing with matters concerning his own health. They are people who still think naively on certain matters, but who are becoming aware of the dangers facing them on account of their labour situation. Health promotion and protection is an important part of working conditions, to which all industrial, developing countries devote very intensive attention. It is strange that we in South Africa, as the industrial colossus, as the leader on the continent of Africa, have allowed ourselves to develop a real backlog in this sphere. It is a fact that it will be very difficult for us to make up this backlog, in the light of the tremendous rate at which our industrial development is taking place at present. Active steps are, therefore, imperative in order to combat the manifold health problems in our industries and other professions, as is already the case in connection with other preventive measures. It is interesting to note that we in the industries have to contend with health hazards which are actually man-made and artificially created by ourselves. This being so, these are in fact the easiest illnesses to prevent and treat. By making arrangements merely to minimize those health hazards, we would be rendering these workers a major service.

If we look at the condition in certain of our industries, for example—I just want to mention a few on the basis of a report which has come into my possession—we find shocking conditions prevailing there. I read here in a report which was drawn up by the National Research Institute for Occupational Diseases that shocking conditions are prevailing, for example, in our lead industry and in our battery factories. It was found, for example, that in a particular battery factory a Bantu woman who had contracted lead poisoning, was summarily dismissed from service after that institute had made arrangement for her to be admitted to hospital. This is the type of attitude we still encounter. These people, when they become ill as a result of the work they are doing, are summarily dismissed. There is no machinery to prevent this or even to discover these cases. If they are not discovered by chance, they pass by unnoticed. I referred to a Bantu women. Now, it is strange that, in terms of legislation, no woman is allowed to work in lead factories or in factories where lead is the predominant element. This is the type of situation which arises. The fact is that the Department of Labour, which is charged with the task of inspecting factories, and so on, is performing a gigantic task. I do not want to point a finger at them. They are, however, being crippled due to a lack of properly trained staff. There is no health motivation among these people, and they are not health-orientated. That is why this job is not being performed effectively. I want to quote another example, which is also dealt with in the same report. The factory concerned has closed down in the meanwhile. That factory, in Durban, simply discharged the asbestos dust, which had accumulated in the factory, out of the factory into the atmosphere. The question is quite rightly posed in the report whether the relatively high percentage of bronchial cancer in Durban should not be ascribed to this type of thing. When there are properly orientated health inspectors to investigate cases of this kind, this type of situation will not arise. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, it is unfortunate that the hon. member who has just sat down did not have more time because he was dealing with a very, very important subject. One would wish that for such an important subject the hon. member could have had more time to develop his theme. However, I hope very much that he will pass his remaining notes on to the hon. the Minister.

There are only two aspects to which I want to refer arising out of the report which has been presented to us by the department. I have to refer to these aspects in the form of questions because I do not have time to deal with them specifically.

I refer in the first place to paragraph 82, pages 39 and 40, where we have statistics about hospitals and numbers of beds, etc. It seems to me very strange and at the same time disturbing that particularly in the psychiatric sections of our hospitals we had more patients than we had beds as at 31 December 1973. If one had time one could mention hospital after hospital seeking to treat and to deal with psychiatric patients who are in mental distress: Alexandra, Fort Napier, Komani, Oranje, Sterkfontein, Tower, and so many others to which the report refers. I should like to have some information from the hon. the Minister as to what he is doing to rectify this very serious situation. In paragraph 141 on page 47 we read these words—

Family planning is, of course, of tremendous importance and I only wish that we could take this statement at its face value. However, when one contrasts this with a speech made recently by Chief Gatsha Buthelezi and reports in The Cape Times of 30 September, one realizes, as he makes it very clear indeed, that at least the Zulu people find it almost impossible to accept this whole concept of family planning and that for only one major reason. I quote from his statement as it appeared in The Cape Times—

To put it in another way. Prof. Seftel in his inaugural speech at Wits University last year, put it this way—

I should like to hear from the hon. the Minister whether in fact this whole programme of family planning which is so important in South Africa is receiving the kind of reception that is referred to in the report.

I want to go on to the whole question of the serious shortage of doctors which faces our country, a fact on which many, many people have commented on many occasions. I hope that the hon. member for Fauresmith will watch his blood pressure because he will probably be very upset by some of the statistics which I am going to present during the course of my speech. Although the White group comprises 17% of the total population, almost 86% of all medical students are White. Africans, who comprise over 70% of the population, have only 3,4% of the total number of medical students. There is another way to put this, bringing it right down to earth. Let me again quote Prof. Seftel—

This suggests that our priorities are all wrong, when we are thinking in terms of the health needs and medical requirements in South Africa. The number of African graduates has actually increased, very marginally, but nevertheless the number has actually increased over the last few years. However, when one looks at the training of doctors in over-all terms, referring to figures from 1950 to the present moment, one sees something very startling indeed. In 1950 0,75 African doctors were trained per one million people. In 1960 that figure rose to 1,20, while in 1970, 0,65 African doctors were trained per one million Africans, once again only at the University of Natal. In between 1964 and 1972 only 268 African doctors, 197 Coloured doctors and 524 Asian doctors were trained in South Africa. This whole question of the shortage of doctors has reached very serious and urgent proportions. I hope we shall hear something more about this from the hon. the Minister when he replies to the matter in this debate. When I look at the figures that were given to me for 1972-’73, I feel that there must be some mistake in the information furnished to me in answer to questions I have put in this House, at least I hope that there has been some mistake. In 1972 there was a total of 579 medical graduates (vide Hansard, 1973, col. 651).

According to the information given during this session by the hon. the Minister, and I refer now to cols. 33 and 34, there was a total of 441 medical graduates. If these figures are accurate, there has actually been a decrease of 117 White, 15 Coloured and 11 Asian medical graduates and an increase of about five African medical graduates, giving an overall decrease of 138 medical graduates between 1972 and 1973. That is according to information given by the hon. the Minister himself in reply to questions I have put in this House. If that information is correct, it reflects a very serious situation indeed. I believe, however, that this information is not correct, because I have checked the figures with some of the medical schools in this country. The two sets of figures simply do not tally. I should like to hear something about this from the hon. the Minister. There have been many commissions. As far back as 1966 there was a special commission investigating the whole position of the shortage of doctors. All kinds of plans were proposed. In 1971 the hon. the Minister suggested that there was going to be a doubling in the intake of medical graduates at the University of Stellenbosch, the University of the Witwatersrand, the University of Cape Town, etc.

When one looks at the figures of today, one finds that that simply is not happening. Sir, the hon. member for Fauresmith has reminded us of the complexities of the problem and the very real need that exists. One is mindful of this, but I want to suggest that there are some ways of meeting the present situation, and I want to suggest them very quickly in the last minute or two I have. There are six steps which I would ask hon. members to look at very seriously. Firstly, if we really want to face the situation, let us listen again to Dr. Bozzoli and throw open the Witwatersrand University to all our graduates rather than restricting it to only one group. Let us do the same thing in the case of the University of Cape Town. Secondly, let us stress the teaching of mathematics for Black people in this country. In 1972 there were only 495 Africans who had passed in mathematics. Thirdly, let us once and for all scrap this whole question of salary apartheid, which is driving African doctors who are qualified to look for jobs outside of South Africa in countries where the rate for the job is applicable. Sir, let us also scrap this whole health colour bar, which makes it impossible for a professionally trained doctor to give instructions to a matron or to a sister or to a nurse simply because their colour happens to be different. Then. Sir, a comprehensive scheme of health centres in the rural areas to develop the whole question of community medicine is absolutely essential. The last thing I want to say is that we have simply got to pump in more money into the health services in this country.

Where must the money come from?

Sir, we must reestablish our priorities because the health of the country is vital and important. We need new medical schools. In Pietermaritzburg, for example, there are enormous opportunities to have a medical school for all students. Let us have additional medical schools so that we can promote health services instead of making health a real hazard in South Africa.

Mr. Chairman, I am very sorry that the hon. member for Pinelands used this debate for political purposes. This debate has been conducted so far on a very high level.

I am concerned with the health of our people.

Sir, if that hon. member was concerned about the health of our people, he would be more responsible in his approach in this House to this question of health. The hon. member says he is concerned about the health of our people, but I want to say to him that if what we have just heard from him is his approach, then he is not interested in the health of our people.

Answer the question I raised.

Sir, I will answer those questions in my own time, not when the hon. member for Pinelands tells me to do so.

I answered them beforehand.

Sir, the hon. member for Fauresmith answered all those questions, but I want to deal with a few statements made here by the hon. member for Pinelands. The hon. member mentioned the question of family planning. Sir, to drag family planning into the political arena is a shame. Family planning has to do with the interests of family life and with the socio-economic problems that we have to deal with. I think it was highly irresponsible on the part of the hon. member to refer here to a statement made by a Bantu chief with regard to the mortality rate amongst the Bantu. It is highly irresponsible to suggest that a Bantu child in South Africa only lives to the age of five years. [Interjection.] The hon. member asked what was the good of family planning if the mortality age amongst the Bantu was five years. Did he not say that? Of course he said it. Sir, do you see the irresponsibility of such a statement? I want to state categorically here today that the medical treatment received by people of all colours and creeds in this country is comparable with the medical treatment received by people in the rest of the world.

It is better.

That is not so.

Sir, this is absolutely correct. There is no other State in Africa that looks after its people as well as this Government looks after our non-Whites in this country. Our health services in this country compare favourably with those in any country in the world. I assume that the hon. member for Pinelands is a sociologist, but I think it is a pity that he saw fit to use this debate to make cheap political attacks on a Government that has the interests of the people of this country at heart.

May I ask the hon. member a question?

Yes.

Mr. Chairman, I was quoting the remarks of the professor of African medicine in his inaugural address at the Witwatersrand University; it was a direct quotation from his address.

Does the hon. member wish to put a question?

Yes, Sir, I will put the question now: Does the hon. member accept the figures which I quoted and which show that there is a vast disparity between the number of doctors for Whites and the number of doctors for Blacks?

Sir, I know the hon. member was quoting, but why could he not confirm the statistics with the Secretary for Health? If he had gone to the Secretary for Health he would have found out that the statement which he quoted here is a lot of rubbish. The hon. member quoted those figures here for political reasons. I want to say to him that he must not toy with the health of the people of South Africa to achieve his political ends. Let him rather try to use whatever he has between his ears to promote the development of health services in this country. He will then be making a worthwhile contribution.

*I should like to confine myself to the profession I had been practising before I was elected to this hon. House.

†Dental health is an integral part of the general health of our community. I think it has been proved over and over that dental health should receive priority because it is very interesting to note that the first diagnosis of many sicknesses is often found in the mouth. Take a simple sickness like measles, although it is not so simple if one looks at its complications. The first symptom of measles is spots in the mouth. A septic focus in the mouth can cause many ailments, can cause sinus infections and blindness. Dental health, Sir, is of great importance to the public in general. We have to deal with this problem in South Africa, that with a population of over 20 million there are plus-minus 1 800 practising dentists in South Africa. Of these 1 800 dentists, 70% are in private practice, and with this 70% in private practice, only 15% of the community can receive professional services—only 15% of the population of South Africa! I should like to know what the manpower loss is per year due to mouth ailments.

*Since there is an acute shortage of dentists, I believe it is absolutely essential that we pay attention to the factual position today, where the dentist concentrates on treatment and not on the other aspects which are of equally great importance, such as preventive guidance, educational guidance, and so on. Today the dentist simply has to concentrate on the treatment of teeth.

†He has to concentrate on extractions conservation prosthetics and orthodontics. The dentist has no time to put it across that in his profession the old saying that prevention is better than cure also applies. In this profession there are means and methods to develop the dental health of our people to a large extent. I should like to congratulate the Dental Association with their dental health week. I think it was a great success.

*I think it promoted dental health among our people that this dental health week was held and that publicity was given to it. In future it is going to be necessary to use all mediums available to us to bring home to our people the importance of dental health services. I want to make an earnest request to the hon. the Minister, that he should consider the establishment of a national council for dental health. The establishment of such a council is, in my humble opinion, absolutely essential in order to take care of the health of our people. Such a council will not be peculiar to the Republic. Many countries throughout the world have already established this kind of council. What is basically important, is that such a council should be under the control of the Department of Health, and for such a council to concentrate on the educational aspects of dental health and on the preventive measures which can be taken.

†When one thinks about fluoridation today, one realizes that one can prevent dental caries to a large extent. One can do this by the application of fluoride, by means of the different toothpastes one uses and by means of mouth hygiene. By these means, one can prevent a large number of the destructive illnesses which affect the mouth. I feel that it is absolutely essential for us to work along these lines.

*It is important that we involve the community in this. With the establishment of a council such as this, we should, involve the whole community, the whole population. If this is not done, we shall find that this will not have the required effect. I want to put it this way, that if we could afford one generation of young children the required education with regard to oral hygiene, and could take the necessary preventive measures for them, the required dental and hygienic measures, we would find that, after one generation, we would have wiped out the tremendous backlog we are experiencing today. What we find today, is that most of the time of dentists in the Republic of South Africa is spent on restorative work. If they were able to save this time, they could use it for further education. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Rustenburg dealt mainly with the question of dental health. As a former member of the dental profession, he obviously speaks with authority. Prior to coming to this House, one may have been a little fearful of him as a dentist but, now that we are here, we have learnt not to fear the hon. member for Rustenburg as far as his contributions to this House are concerned.

Especially when he shows his teeth.

When he shows his teeth, and we manage to extract some constructive suggestions from him, we are always pleased to do so.

One of the aspects that was discussed this morning was the shortage of doctors. I do not intend to deal with this matter in any detail. I should, however, like to put certain questions to the hon. the Minister in connection with the question of the staffing of Bantu hospitals which is provided for in this Vote we are discussing. We know that the Department of Health is responsible for the running and staffing of these Bantu hospitals.

In the constituency which I represent there is a very large non-White hospital, the King Edward VII Hospital. This hospital is subjected to tremendous pressure. As far as additions to this hospital are concerned, they have been restricted as the hospital falls in a White area. This has resulted in tremendous build-up of patients and it has become absolutely essential for a hospital to be established in the neighbouring Bantu areas. The hon. the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development has already announced in this House that it is the intention to build a new hospital in the Umlazi area. I understand that building operations are to commence next month and that the hospital will be completed in 1978. A total of 1400 beds are to be provided at this hospital. The question that I should like to put to the hon. the Minister is whether he is satisfied that there will be sufficient staff available to run this hospital once it is completed in 1978. Obviously, the next hospital to be built will be in the Kwa Mashu area and staff will have to be found to run this hospital as well. It is therefore of paramount importance to ensure that there is a sufficient number of doctors who qualify to meet these ever-increasing needs.

The other matter I wish to raise with the hon. the Minister is the question of family planning and the part that is being played by his department in this very important field. As far as U.N. is concerned, 1774 has been termed the World Population Year. When one reads various reports available on this subject, one realizes that the population explosion has become a world-wide problem. It is a problem which is being dealt with by various countries on a regional as well as a local basis. In the main, however, this is a world-wide problem. If one looks at the figures of projected increases in population one realizes the tremendous problems that beset the world as far as this population explosion is concerned.

First of all, I should like to ask the hon. the Minister whether South Africa was represented at the World Population Year Conference which was held at Budapest in August, as this was a vitally important conference at which the entire problem was to be discussed on a world basis. Coming back to our own position in South Africa, we find that we are also faced with a rapidly increasing population. We know that a projection of population figures shows that there will be an increase of some 26 million in the population of this country by the year 2000, so that by that year our population will be nearing the 50 million mark. This also brings about the problems of a shortage of food. From various reports we know that starvation and famine are unfortunately rife in various parts of the world. It brings about other social problems such as shortage of housing and it leads to the overburdening of the welfare services that have to be provided within a community. We know too that there is the problem of unwanted children and unwanted pregnancies. We know that the problem of unwanted children often results in neglect and deprivation in the economic and emotional spheres. We know to that delinquency often develops because of the abuse of alcohol and drugs. This often leads to crime. If one studies surveys on criminology one finds that this is the type of background which often leads to crime. In recent times we have had the incidence of the battered baby where young children are ill-treated. All these things show the necessity to have a coordinated plan of action in regard to family planning services in South Africa. We know from the Estimates that a sum of R1 900 000 has been allocated to family planning services under subhead K “Medical Poor Relief”. This shows an increase over last year’s figure. We also have to take into account that the amount of R90 000 which was previously shown under subhead P as contribution to the Family Planning Association of South Africa is now included in this amount. I think that the hon. the Minister should give an indication as to what is available and what his plans in this regard are. To carry out a family planning programme demands not only considerable finance, but also a well co-ordinated information and education system to advise the population and to overcome old customs and traditions. At present we have various levels of government which are undertaking family planning services. If one looks at the position of the local authorities one finds that this is a development which is taking place on an increasing scale. We must also remember that they too are subject to difficulties in regard to suitably trained staff. When one looks at the last report of the Durban City Medical Officer of Health one will see that the attendance at family planning clinics is steadily increasing, and that they do claim to be able to assist in the educational aspect. Specialized staff, however, have to be provided for the family planning clinics because they play an essential part in the successful implementation of family planning services. If the various methods of contraception that are advocated by the family planning clinics are found to be satisfactory, this fact will gain the confidence of the community. Where there are failures, this represents a 100% failure as far as the person attending the clinic is concerned, and does in turn have an adverse effect on the work done by the family planning clinic.

I should now like to refer to the family planning situation at provincial hospitals. The departments of obstetrics at these hospitals have in recent times appointed persons to assist in family planning services. I refer particularly to the King Edward VII hospital which has a very large number of obstetrical patients. In 1973 there were over 25 000 confinements at this hospital alone. I think the important aspect here is the availability of training for the specialized task of instruction and the carrying out of new methods and devices in the field of birth control such as the IUD system and other systems which are now becoming more common and which are being used particularly among the more unsophisticated sections of the community. Here, for example, at the King Edward day hospital where they have family planning activities taking place, it is required that nurses undergo a certain amount of in-training. I understand that there is a training course which is provided in Pretoria to assist these people. This means the creation of new posts for registered nurses to assist with family planning activities in these obstetric units that are in existence in the various obstetric departments of our provincial hospitals. This is really based on three levels of government. There is the part played by the state department, the part played by the provincial administration and the provincial hospitals and the part which is played by the health clinics of the local authorities. This means that there has to be co-ordination of these efforts. We also have the welfare organizations and family planning associations, which in the private sphere are also endeavouring to bring about a more satisfactory situation as far as family planning services are concerned. They also assist in the education of people to accept family planning as a part of life. This matter requires the co-ordination of the various spheres of government as well as the professional assistance of trained people to undertake this very important task at the various family planning clinics. I think that the hon. the Minister is probably fully aware of the situation as far as the population explosion is concerned. I do hope that the hon. the Minister can give us some indication today of an increased plan of action so as to ensure that an effective service is provided for the benefit of the community as a whole.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Umbilo will pardon me if I do not follow up what he said in his speech. He made, and by this time I have become accustomed to it in this House, a nicely balanced and positive speech, even if one does not agree with every small point. I, too, intended making a nicely balanced speech, but I unfortunately cannot say the same about the speech made by the hon. member for Wynberg.

Why not?

I shall tell the hon. member why not. The hon. member for Wynberg referred to a certain Krugers-dorp firm and mentioned it by name, i.e. Clinical Ethicals. He also quoted what appeared in various newspapers less than a month ago. Of course, hon. members in this House also read newspapers, and hon. members who read the newspapers know that my name was mentioned very prominently and that the handsomest photo I have ever had in a newspaper appeared in this report in connection with Clinical Ethicals.

I read the circular.

I said you had also quoted what was in the newspapers. I am not saying you quoted it from the newspapers. The hon. member should listen; that would also help. The implication is that the Minister of Health and the department shut their eyes to this type of misdeed, and that is why it is now being discussed in his debate.

I said it was unethical.

Then they allow unethical things. This matter came up for discussion and that is why I am obliged to reply to the hon. member on that. I do not think Parliament or the public Press is the ethical and right place for professional people to settle their differences. That is why I have not gone to the Press up to now and have not reacted vehemently to these banner newspaper reports. I do not think it is ethical. But I think one reaches a point where one is compelled to reply and I have reached that point.

It is a medical scientifically proven fact that if one coughs, the air leaves one’s lungs at a speed of 60 to 70 miles. It is also a fact that a cough is a symptom of a disease. Coughing is often accompanied by the expectoration of unpleasant matter. The speech of the hon. member for Wynberg was fast. It was like wind, and it was accompanied by unpleasantness.

He did not cough; he did something else.

I want to make a few remarks about this specific firm. The hon. member for Wynberg spoke about Clinical Ethicals as a “pharmacy business”. In reply to a question from this side of the House he said, “They are retailers”. This hon. member completely lost his head about a matter he knows nothing about, and then he still added his own untrue—for it is not true—little tails. It is not a “pharmacy business”, nor is it a “retailer”.

Why is it not a “retailer”?

This hon. member does not know what a “retailer” is. It is a retail firm which sells articles.

Yes, but that is what they do. They are retailers.

Order! The hon. member must not make so many interjections.

Sir, I want to repeat: This member does not know what he is talking about, and he is proving it more and more. This pharmaceutical firm is not a retail firm.

The hon. member did not say what some newspapers had said. One newspaper said that, when I was not here in Parliament, I acted as a partner to a firm in Krugersdorp. Of course that is not true. I resigned from that firm as far back as 31 December last year, and I am not associated with any partnership. I have more right to speak in public than does Prof. Chris Barnard, for he is still working at a hospital and I am not.

Let me mention a few facts about Clinical Ethicals. I did not write that letter. I am not responsible for it. The purpose of that letter was twofold. This firm deals with certain products about which it decides itself, products which are made by pharmaceutical manufacturing companies. Then certain pharmacists thought that one of these pharmaceutical companies had sold shares to the doctors, and that the doctors were now prescribing those remedies. That is not so. Then this company felt unhappy about it. The main reason why this letter was written was to make it clear to the pharmacists that the doctors had not taken out any shares in that firm Clinical Ethicals. That is why they said, “We have no tie-up whatsoever”. Of course, that is not altogether true. What was actually meant, was that there was no financial arrangement between the two in the sense that the one held shares in the other. The other reason why the letter was written is that pharmacists practise substitution. This letter was not addressed to the public Press or to laymen; it was written to pharmacists and pharmaceutical companies. It was a business letter. I have said it before in this House and I say it again: substitution does indeed take place. This applies to many different concerns. Sir, I may just give you one quick example. I want to mention the names of the products. Butazolidine, butuna and butrex are all the same product which is manufactured by different firms. Basically these three products all have the same chemical formula. But butrex sells at 95 cents per 20 pills at the pharmacy, while butazolidine sells at R1-85. If, for example, I should prescribe butazolidine and the pharmacist should supply butrex while charging the price of butazolidine, he gets Rl-85 instead of 95 cents. Substitution of this kind is not something which occurs very generally, and not all pharmacists are criminal offenders, but I have said before that not all pharmacists are angels, as is the case with doctors too. So there are problems in connection with substitution. It has already happened that a man has phoned me and said that his wife was sick. I replied that he should give her another two of the black and red capsules. He then said, “But she has no black and red capsules”. I replied that I had prescribed such capsules earlier on that afternoon. He then pointed out to me that she had pink pills only. Because the pharmacist had not supplied his wife with that specific product, but with something having more or less the same ingredients, the man most probably thought I was crazy and did not know what I was doing. Therefore, substitution is a real problem. That is why that letter was written. Unfortunately there were certain statements in the letter which were not true. For instance, the letter referred to a court decision which in reality was a decision of the Medical Council. The writer of the letter was somewhat confused. There was also a reference to a company which was allegedly “solely owned by doctors”. However, the company is not “solely owned by doctors”. Two of the directors are not doctors, and there are shareholders who are not doctors either. In the letter there was also a reference to me as a member of Parliament. It is a simple fact that I am a member of Parliament and I said the other day that someone could even send me wine “care of Parliament”. Nor do I like the idea that the writer mentioned my name and said “care of Parliament” and I do not resent the hon. member for Wynberg not liking it either. However, this is not unparliamentary or unethical. I believe it would have been more ethical if the hon. member had come to me and asked me what the true facts of the matter were instead of telling a story which was not true.

But he is a character assassin.

He could easily have inquired from me. The other day we chatted over a cup of coffee. The other day I also went up to him and cracked a joke with him. He could have asked me what the true facts of the matter were.

I want to know whether it is ethical if a large pharmaceutical company—unfortunately I could not obtain the necessary documents this morning—says in a certain report that in spite of inflation it has made a bigger profit. Do you know why? Because the patients cannot develop a buyer’s resistance to the medicine. Because the patient is ill, he buys a certain pill. This is what the company said and I want to know whether it is ethical. The main objective of the company to which I belong is to reduce the costs of medicines, and in certain instances we have already succeeded in doing so and we shall achieve even greater success. So I have nothing on my conscience. If I can bring down the costs of medicine—they can be greatly reduced—I shall do so, and if I have to make use of the House in order to do so, I shall do so too. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank hon. members on both sides of the House for their contributions to this debate. Since this was not going to be a lengthy debate, I first waited to hear what hon. members’ views on matters would be, what representations they would make and what suggestions they would put forward to see whether I could not react to them in such a way that we might also obtain in this respect that measure of co-operation which would be fitting in the sphere with which we are dealing here.

†In the first place I want to refer to the hon. member for Rosettenville, who has been a member of this House for many years. He has always been the member who introduced the discussion of the Health Vote. I always make notes of what he says and I also noted with particular interest what he said this morning. He was perturbed about the relations between the department as such and the medical profession—perhaps to a lesser extent—and mainly about the relations between the medical schemes and the medical profession. I must confess that I am also perturbed about the relations in the latter case. However, I can inform the hon. member that negotiations are at present being conducted with a view to getting these people together. It has been indicated to me that they will try to resolve all their differences, or as many as possible, behind closed doors. I welcome that development, because it will be better for them to agree to disagree on perhaps a few points and to seek those areas on which they can find one another. All of them should be imbued with a spirit of aiding the health of all the inhabitants of our country.

He is also a little bit worried about the Medical Schemes Act and all the criticism levelled at the Act over the past few years. Since I took office as Minister of Health two years ago, I have had experience of the practical implementation of the Act and the effects this has given rise to. I myself do not feel happy either about some of the provisions, even about some of the principles, embodied in this Act. Early in the year I gave the Medical Association my personal undertaking that I would look at the Act after this session of Parliament. That is what the department is doing at the moment. The department is investigating all the aspects of that Act. It is investigating possible impediments to the smooth functioning of the Act and various points of friction which could possibly be eliminated. The department is investigating the financial aspect, which the hon. member mentioned.

The question of Government aid is something which has been raised very often in the past. That poses a problem for us because the granting of Government aid entails our going to the public and asking for more money. One of the hon. members, however, has pointed to the fact that we are slowly creeping towards socialism. That being the case, where does the autonomy of the medical profession come in? The problem consequently has certain aspects which are not all that easy to solve at this juncture.

*Dr. Reinach, chairman of the Central Council for Medical Schemes, sent word that he was engaged in going into all these aspects. I can give the hon. member the assurance that this Act was submitted to all interested bodies, and that all the amendments and the suggestions that may come from those persons will be considered thoroughly in the course of the next few weeks and months. It is our aim, if it is at all possible, to give attention next year to amending the Medical Schemes Act, at which stage it will then have gone through a trial period of five years. As everybody knows, a remuneration commission is appointed every three years. This commission has to report to me in regard to the fees which may be charged by medical practitioners who have contracted in. The hon. member also mentioned that so many of the members had contracted out. I do not wish to go into the objections raised by the Medical Association. At a meeting of the federal council of this Association all their people were advised to contract out. This is an unfortunate turn of events—that I must say. Since then fewer of those people have contracted out than we thought would be the case. Therefore there are still many of them who have an interest in this impartial commission of which Mr. Justice Erasmus is the chairman and which investigates the question of medical fees every three years. There is no longer a preferential tariff as used to be the case. At present it is a tariff based on a realistic calculation of what the medical practitioner’s work is worth. It is difficult to arrive at such a figure, but we must have specific rules somewhere, somewhere we must give up part of our autonomy for the privilege of having our accounts paid regularly. I therefore wish to announce for general information that the remuneration commission appointed under section 30 of the Medical Schemes Act, 1965, completed its work on 30 June 1974 and submitted a report to me. The following recommendations were made—

1. (a) That the items in the tariff of fees for dental surgery—
   1. (i) with the exception of maxillofacial and oral surgery from item 906 to 979, be raised by 12% to the nearest five cents;
   2. (ii) in respect of maxillo-facial and oral surgery (except consultations) excluded above, be raised by 16% to the nearest five cents;
2. (b) that the items in the tariff of fees for medical fees be raised by the percentage mentioned after each discipline, rounded off to the nearest five cents—

In terms of the provisions of the Act the Minister is obliged to amend the tariff of fees as recommended by the commission, and has no discretionary powers. The necessary steps for the amendment of the tariff of fees are being taken now, and the tariff will be amended as soon as possible by notice in the Gazette. The amended tariff of fees comes into operation on 1 January 1975.

The necessary steps are also being taken to publish the report of the commission.

I should like to express my thanks and appreciation in this way to the members of the commission for the task performed by them.

*The hon. member also expressed some ideas with regard to the increase in venereal diseases. Of course, we are always a little worried about venereal diseases, because these are diseases which are hidden behind so many cloaks. There is a certain stigma attached to these diseases and people do not always come forward for treatment. One of the problems is that this disease is not a certifiable disease, and it is not easy to make it a certifiable disease. But every effort is being made to tackle this problem on as comprehensive a basis as possible and to get as many people as possible to come forward for treatment. They are treated at all levels of government, from Central Government and provincial government levels down to the level of district surgeons and private practitioners, and in all instances the Government is always willing to supply these services free or to subsidize them. As far as prevention is concerned—this is an important matter—the department is once again looking into its present preventive campaign, and I think we can expect improvements in this field also. For quite a long time people were not really worried about venereal diseases because of the availability of very potent antibiotics, but venereal diseases are coming to the fore again because of the resistance developed by bacteria against these antibiotics, and that is why I think that we will have to make a renewed effort to try to stamp out venereal disease.

*Then there is the hon. member for Brentwood. I want to identify myself with the sentiments and the sympathy he expressed and the tribute he paid in respect of Dr. Aubrey Radford. I, too, enjoyed the privilege of sitting here during those years when he was still here, i.e. from 1966 to 1970. His disposition, the dignity which attached to him and his wide knowledge and great age were things which always struck me, and I take pleasure in paying tribute to his memory.

The hon. member for Brentwood, who unfortunately had to leave, also spoke about health education as a matter which was getting to be so extremely important in the world in which things around us are moving so rapidly and technology is making such rapid strides that we are totally confused by it and that even as regards their own health, people never know where they stand and do not have the time either. They imagine that with all our technological knowledge at present we can succeed in making man live for ever. I want to say that as far as that is concerned, the department is by no means adopting an attitude of indifference. We are very well-equipped, in the first place, as regards nutrition education, the correct foods to eat, and to undertake the correct kind of planning in respect of the education of the general public, and this applies to all the people of South Africa, all 22 million of them, without distinction of persons. As far as nutrition education is concerned, we already have a very extensive structure with a fairly well-staffed administration contacting the individual and the group on all levels, through mass media and through person-to-person education, through people who have had the right training and are already providing this nutrition education throughout South Africa. This is also done through brochures and the Press and the radio and all the means of communication he mentioned. Of course, we are also doing this in the homelands, if I may add this. We also have a programme for nutrition and other education for the years ahead, and we set specific targets. Perhaps we do not have quite enough personnel, but the personnel we have at the moment consists of 23 posts. These are spread all over the country, in our regional offices and in our head office. He referred to our genetics programme and the importance of people having to know the dangers of the hereditariness of diseases so that one may take precautionary measures in the case of diseases which are hereditary, i.e. congenital diseases. Do you know that one out of every 14 babies born today suffers from some handicap or other, physically or mentally? Actually, it is alarming to know this, i.e. that there are so many babies who have intellectual or mental deviations. That was why the department launched a national programme for combating genetic deviations as far back as July 1971, and why research is being done continuously. Therefore, this is also a whole facet of administration, this continuous research and the compilation of a register which will help us to know what is going on and what we should recommend to people with regard to genetic diseases.

The hon. member also stated his problem with regard to the overlapping of legislation and of services, and so did the hon. member for Fauresmith, with whom I shall deal later on. The idea of a comprehensive community medicine, a community health service, outside the hospitals in the rural areas, is something which has become very popular over the past two years and which, whereas it may have existed to a lesser extent earlier on, has been initiated and given shape to by this department in such a manner that it is already becoming a characteristic and is being accepted by way of the establishment of chairs of community medicine at the universities. We have already established three of them. In other words, in this respect, too, we are developing a new form of health service where there used to be tremendous shortcomings as a result of the disintegration of medical services.

†The hon. member for Wynberg had some doubts about dispensing by doctors who own pharmaceutical firms or companies owned by doctors exclusively, and even manufacturing companies. I do not know whether he mentioned all that; I just deduce it from what he said. I should just like to comment on that. I think that hon. members do perhaps have a very clear idea of my feelings in regard to the matter; I think that I have made my views clear in the past during the discussion of various measures that have been passed through this House. However, since this matter has been raised again, I want to reiterate that I am of the opinion that a medical practitioner has an irrefutable right to dispense medicine for use by a patient being treated by him. I do not think that there is anyone who will disagree with that. Moreover, I do not think any pharmacist would disagree with that. In recent years, however, there have been developments that have given cause for some concern. Certain doctors dispense medicines on a large scale in competition with pharmacists, sometimes within a stone’s throw of those pharmacies. Companies have been formed which have been owned exclusively by doctors to manufacture and sell medicines for profit. In my opinion—and here I am trying to be fair; I am not referring to any hon. member in this House; each case has to be judged on merit—these developments, as they have been put to me and according to the information I have been given thus far, are undesirable and could be regarded as being unethical. I think we must all realize that the medical, dental and pharmaceutical professions are brother professions. They should not compete with each other. Each should, so to speak, stay in his own home, in his own factory. They should not practise in competition with each other; they should stand side by side and aid each other. We must make optimum use of the manpower we have in this country. All these people are scientists; pharmacists are scientists. We spend a great deal of money every year in producing graduates in pharmacy. We have at the moment. I think, about 1 600 pharmaceutical students and about 4 000 registered pharmacists.

About 270 students take up pharmacy each year.

Yes. As I say, the question of the availability of manpower is an important one. These professions must aid one another. We invest this money in the training of pharmacists but where do they go once they have qualified? This problem was raised particularly by the hon. member for Fauresmith. Where must these graduates go? Must they spend their lives selling tablets or other commodities? I think I have made my view clear that we must restore the pharmacist to the rightful position which he occupied previously. If then there are developments which we feel are not healthy and which may tend to harm the relationships that exist among these three professions, we must do our utmost to try to prevent them. As I say, the establishing particularly of manufacturing concerns by doctors can lead to malpractices. A man’s profit motive, his personal gain, may conflict with his duty as a professional man. In the circumstances, I have asked the Medical Council to investigate the matter and to report to me in this regard in due course.

*The hon. member for Newcastle also referred to medical schemes. In this regard he was of the opinion that a contribution on the part of the State was unnecessary. I have already dealt with this aspect. The hon. member will therefore forgive me if I do not go into it again. I think I have already stated my standpoint. This is the position. We do not wish to follow a course along which the medical profession will eventually degenerate into a trade union. There are professions and professions, such as our legal profession, the architectural profession, the teaching profession and the medical profession. These are professions which we do not wish to see as trade unions. We do not want people to exert pressure which the public may interpret as being mere profit-seeking. The hon. member for Newcastle said that we had to preserve the prestige of the medical profession, and on that score I am in full agreement with him. The tendency of the profession towards becoming a trade union is one of the problems giving rise to friction between the profession and the authorities having to regulate these services. The services rendered by the profession should not be rendered in such a way that it is made impossible for our people to retain their health. One can solve the problems between the medical schemes and the Medical Association by way of civilized negotiation. We could come together in order to eliminate the minor misunderstandings which will crop up. In respect of the hon. member’s statement that we should preserve the autonomy of the profession, I just want to say that as far as I am concerned, the autonomy of the profession has never been in jeopardy. Various views are held on autonomy. I believe that only Parliament should have full autonomy, even though that is a relative term, perhaps even for states, at this particular stage in world history.

Nevertheless, Parliament is the autonomous body in this country, and because what the hon. member has said now is actually a reference to differences with the Medical Associations, differences which are specifically concerned with the concept of autonomy, I think that I should react to what appeared in the Press this week. This appeared not only in articles in the Sunday Press, but also in the daily press yesterday, articles according to which the chairman of the Medical Association, not the Medical Council, gave a factual version of what had happened prior to the Medical, Dental and Supplementary Health Service Professions Bill having been passed. He gave a factual version of what had happened, but at the same time he made deductions in respect of which I think he was on the wrong track. I want to advise him to go and read the Second Reading speech I made at the time of the introduction of that legislation. In a friendly manner and as one colleague to another, I want to advise him to do this. He should just read up carefully what I had to say about autonomy, and then he should note that I related this to the demands made by the representatives of a profession with regard to the representation on a council which, as a statutory council, they want to be so autonomous that it would not be possible for the State to have any control over it. In our times things are slightly different. Perhaps these things will never happen in practice, but the State must reserve to itself the final say, even if it is with the qualification that it has to consult, and that has in fact been written into the legislation. Consequently I cannot change the council, which consists of members of the Medical Association for probably as much as 90%, in such a way that nominees representing an interest group will exercise control over a statutory council which will be under an obligation to the public of South Africa as well as to the profession as such. They have to prescribe sound training standards and also carry out other functions which are very important. Then there has also been an editorial in the S.A. Medical Journal to which I must refer. Allusions are being made to my having expressed two opinions on autonomy which supposedly differ from each other. What I said I said in two sentences, but this journal quoted it in a way which did not indicate the connection between the two. In the one sentence I said the council was not fully autonomous, whereas I said in the other that appeal from a decision by a committee could not, in matters relating to training, be referred to the Minister because the council was autonomous—in other words, within the Act. But this autonomy is not full autonomy. It is very easy to quote matters out of context and then to create the impression that they are not logical. I do not intend dealing with this gentleman any further.

Business suspended at 12.45 p.m. and resumed at 2.20 p.m.

Afternoon Sitting

At the time of the adjournment I was replying to the speech made by the hon. member for Newcastle. I had told him that it was my endeavour that there should be good cooperation in the profession which he and I had served for many years and would still be serving in the future in the circumstances in which we found ourselves at present, in which our loyalties and duty had, however, become broader than just the single loyalty to our profession. My door will always be open for official and meaningful co-operation and discussions, but circumstances and, from the nature of the case, the matter itself may nevertheless lead to my having to decide at times—because somebody must decide—whether such consultation or discussions will serve any useful purpose. He need therefore have no fear that on the part of the department or on my part there will be the slightest evidence of an indication, or an approach, through which these relations which have been good all these years will be clouded by an attitude amounting to our simply wanting to ride roughshod over everybody—I find this English idiom to be so descriptive—and to say “I have spoken”. This is simply not the position. This is not in our nature, nor will this be the case in the future.

The hon. member for Umlazi spoke about the problems with district surgeons in our country. This is true. The shortage of district surgeons who are employees or part-time employees of the State is something which we find alarming.

†The hon. member attributed this to various reasons, amongst them salaries. He also mentioned bad planning. I can tell the hon. member that you can do family planning, but it is very difficult to plan for district surgeons as such. He mentioned salaries. I can assure him that the department is well aware of the fact that these differences which exist between us in regard to salaries have come a long way, but we are very sympathetic, and we should be because the solution of the problem depends on whether we can be ad idem with them on the point as to whether the services they render to us are well paid for. But I can assure the hon. member that the department has submitted proposals time and again, but lately perhaps a little more intensively on our part, to the Public Service Commission for the betterment of the remuneration of full-time doctors, and full-time doctors as such are linked to part-time district surgeons. I can assure him that in many instances the remuneration of part-time district surgeons over the last few years—and I practised 26 years ago—is so much better in all respects, for instance as regards the allocation of medicines, salaries, etc., that the inevitable conclusion to be drawn from these demographic tendencies is that we do not find young people, qualified people, willing to settle in the country any more. We have perhaps also a little difficulty in the towns, but in the towns we mostly have enough district surgeons. The proposals that have been submitted to the department have been found acceptable and these are being forwarded to the Minister of the Interior. I expect a very positive answer, because I know that at the moment we can at least tell these people that as far as remuneration is concerned, they need not worry too much about the future. There is a growing shortage of all professional people in South Africa, mostly in the engineering and scientific trades, but in many other trades and professions there is a shortage. We must take that into account. The figures he mentioned are factually correct and I have no fault to find with that. He mentioned the lack of planning and certain medicines that can be applied to see that this matter is set right. I can tell him that we have a comprehensive programme to involve all types of medical auxiliary services, including the nursing profession, in a comprehensive medical scheme that has been in operation for the past two or three years. That scheme, which is something new, will definitely ease the burden on men qualified to do certain specific work for which they have studied for six to eight years or more, and we have decided that we can use our time and our manpower better to train people for perhaps fewer years to try to help our well qualified people and to aid them in providing a good medical service for all the people in the country.

*Then the hon. member for Fauresmith made a very interesting statement on how the problem of limited manpower could be solved. I listened to it attentively. He referred to family planning and a survey of needs, etc. I should like to tell the hon. member, if he will not take this amiss of me—my time is somewhat limited—that we are actually engaged in implementing most of these matters which he raised. There are, for instance, family planning, to which I shall perhaps return later on, a continuous survey of needs, the shift of the emphasis away from expensive hospitalization to clinics and day centres and the outpatient services, services which have developed tremendously of late. We co-operate with the local authorities and the provinces in appointing district nurses, along with district surgeons, to render a comprehensive service, i.e. instead of our rendering three or four services side by side with one another. The training of more Black medical students is receiving the attention of the Government. Oh, perhaps I may as well say now that the Government has given very urgent attention to this matter and has already taken decisions relating to principles, and what I may add at this stage is that the planning for a medical school for Coloureds in the Western Cape is in progress. As regards the question of delegation, this is being done already. I agree very emphatically with his statement that the disintegration, the divided control of medicine, should be eliminated, because we are in the process of a kind of integrated service in which one can, through decentralization, enable all our existing Government structures and Government bodies to perform their normal functions. This is the reason for existence or, as they say in French, the raison d’être, for any Government institution—in fact, for any governing institution. It has to meet a need, and we are in the process of seeing to that. He need therefore have no concern in that respect. Then he also reacted to the hon. member for Umlazi as regards problems which arise, problems which arise in any case, as a result of the rapid development of our country. We are doing everything in our power in this respect to solve these problems. The prospects are good. Over the last number of years the number of non-White students passing matric with mathematics as a subject and gaining exemption has shown a tremendous increase. Over the past seven or eight years this number has increased as much as three times over, and this is where we can therefore obtain an escalating new supply of students who are capable of taking the purely medical and engineering courses. Of course, I agree with him on the pharmacists, and I do not wish to enlarge upon it any further.

†Mr. Chairman, I always like to listen to the hon. member for Jeppe because his interest in the treatment and prevention of tuberculosis is infectious, not in a bad sense.

Contagious.

He is perturbed that not enough money is being spent on certain health services. Sir, I do not propose to go into the matter more deeply now, but I can tell him that as far as tuberculosis is concerned, the treatment nowadays is vastly different from the treatment even two or three years ago.

*As he knows—and he understands Afrikaans very well—we are in a position at present to make an infectious tuberculosis patient uninfectious through treatment within a month. Then he can once again associate with members of the public and he can receive out-patient services, and in this regard our financial obligations have increased tremendously. These people’s services can therefore be utilized profitably in the community once again, and this is extremely important. I do not wish to go into this matter any further, except just to tell him once again that I have great appreciation for the campaign launched over the past year by Santa—the South African National Tuberculosis Association—which is rendering supplementary services in this regard—in an attempt to collect R3 million for the control of tuberculosis, and that I was honoured to be able to take part in it.

The hon. member for Cradock spoke about industrial health. This aspect of industrial health is something which is near to my heart, and because this is the case I have been giving special attention to it lately. In a moment I shall make an announcement in this regard. I think it will be a good reply to the hon. member for Cradock. I am very pleased that he raised this matter, because it is something to which too little attention was given in the past. Sir, we have far more than 1 million workers and far more than half of them are non-Whites. Sometimes these people do not even know to what extent their working conditions influence them. It is our duty as scientists and as a scientific department to give attention to environmental health and to take congizance of the rightful demands which may arise from the circumstances under which these workers have to live; to analyse the position expertly and then to take steps as the Government. For that reason the Cabinet has decided to appoint a commission of inquiry to investigate this matter urgently. We cannot start immediately, for these people are not available at the moment. Although it is urgent that something be done, it is not so urgent that they need to commence their work immediately since something is after all being done, but we appreciate that what we are doing at the moment is not satisfactory. The commission’s terms of reference are to inquire into and report on—

1. (1) the nature, incidence, extent and effects of occupational diseases in the Republic of South Africa and the territory of South-West Africa;
2. (2) the extent to which existing statutory measures as well as existing facilities with regard to the effective protection of industrial and other productive workers may be falling short or may be overlapping;
3. (3) the need for and the availability of the various categories of trained persons who may be necessary to ensure a full-fledged preventive and promotive health service for workers, to exercise effective control over working conditions which may be injurious to health, to establish health services as well as advisory services in industry and to provide industries with guidance;
4. (4) the measures which ought to be taken for the adequate safeguarding of the public against dangers other than general environmental pollution arising from industrial activities (including agriculture); and
5. (5) any other related matters which the commission may deem necessary for the purposes of its inquiry.

The composition of the commission is as follows: The chairman is Mr. Justice R. P. B. Erasmus of the Supreme Court of the Orange Free State. The members are Professor A. Strating, M.B., Ch.B., D.P.H., D. T.M. and H., M.D. (Head of Preventive and Promotive Medicine, University of Pretoria); Dr. P. P. Roets, M.Sc. (Physiology), D.Sc. (Industrial Hygiene) (Head of Industrial Hygiene—Iscor); Dr. B. C. Jansen, D.V.Sc. (Pretoria), D.Sc. (Potchefstroom), Ph.D. (Stellenbosch) (Chief Director, Veterinary Research Institute).

As a result of certain practical problems this commission will only be able to commence its work on 1 April 1975. I am pleased that the members of the commission have agreed to serve. Sir, so much for the hon. member for Cradock.

The hon. member for Pinelands—I am sure that he can understand Afrikaans well—raised certain problems today. In the first place, he mentioned the shortage of beds in psychiatric hospitals. I share that concern with him.

†I think we have approximately 28 000 psychiatric patients at the moment. We have approximately 20 000 beds of our own. Nearly 7 000 beds have to be provided by means of hiring. In other words, we have to obtain beds from private concerns. I have gone into this question of psychiatric hospitals and institutions all over the country since I assumed office, and I must say that I was not happy about the position. I therefore asked for an investigation into the whole question of psychiatric hospitals, including the available accommodation and facilities, the personnel and the patients themselves. Arising from this the Cabinet early this year approved additional capital for this purpose. I may say that it is a fair amount; some R75 million is to be spent over a period of years in order to make up the backlog. I may say that we are not embarking on a crash programme. This will take years. We do not have the manpower and it is simply physically impossible to make up the backlog over a period of less than ten or 15 years. Nevertheless, we are on the move. We are busy trying to rectify a position which has gone backwards over the years because of the general attitude towards the psychiatric patient, or mentally ill patient, as he was known some years ago. Now there is a new approach; we have new methods of treating these people and of accepting them as part of the community.

A great deal can be done through a system of treatment for out-patients in order to alleviate the plight of these people. I think we have progressed significantly since the passing of the Mental Health Act. I was going to refer to the Mental Disorders Act, but that terminology is no longer used in terms of the new concept to which I have referred. We are now approaching the whole problem of the mentally ill person on a comprehensive basis, in terms of which a mentally ill person is treated as a person, and we are progressing favourably towards a solution of some of these problems. Where suitable accommodation can be obtained, we hire the necessary beds. As I have said, we have about 7 000 hired beds at the moment. But I regard this state of affairs as temporary. The hon. member will be able to deduce from what I have already said that at the moment I am faced with a position about which I cannot yet satisfy myself but that I am satisfied that we have progressed far over the last few years.

The hon. member was also perturbed about the fact that we do not have enough medical practitioners for psychiatric treatment. I think he also referred to the position as far as general medical practitioners are concerned. I am not sure whether the hon. member was referring to medical practitioners in general or only to medical practitioners in the field of psychiatric treatment.

I was referring to medical practitioners in general.

Yes, I do recall now that the hon. member referred to medical schools. I cannot remember the hon. member having put any questions to the Department of Health as far as this matter is concerned. In fact, this matter falls under the Minister of National Education. I feel, therefore, that he should approach the hon. the Minister of National Education in this regard.

*In any case, I do not want to say that we are not concerned about it and that we are not giving any attention to it. I can assure hon. members that as far as this matter is concerned, the Department of Health is always consulted, that we are asked for advice and that, in fact, we are also the department which gives advice in this regard. As far as that is concerned, therefore, we are not entirely out of the picture.

The hon. member for Rustenburg asked for the establishment of a national council for dental health. As far as dental services are concerned, I can tell him that a request for a national dental health service was received a long time ago. This matter was also entrusted to the Schumann Commission at the time. They recommended that this service should fall under the provincial administrations. Those findings were not announced before 1971, and in the meantime we appointed a commission of inquiry into dental services. They felt that it should fall under the Central Government, so that the necessary control, co-ordination and authority could be exercised with a minimum of overlapping, which is one of our major problems. We have already implemented quite a number of the recommendations made by that commission. In 1973 we appointed a new director of dental services. He set to work and has already established a national dental service. Therefore, as far as that matter is concerned, he has started with a comprehensive task. This is actually health policy, and implicitly embodied in it there are also certain proposals on what has to be done. I think that within the foreseeable future further negotiations will be conducted in this respect, and the hon. member’s request will receive due attention.

†The hon. member for Umbilo was worried about the staff position at hospitals, in particular the new hospital at Umlazi. I can tell him that whenever we plan for a new hospital, we are also worried about the staff; I want to be perfectly honest with him. Time and again, however, we have been able, as we went along, to find the necessary staff before a new hospital has been commissioned. It is true that we cannot start off with a full complement of staff, but I am quite sure that we are tackling this problem, including the question of training, in the correct way. I may say that I was not passing the buck when I was replying to the hon. member for Pinelands. We have taken note of the position and we are at the moment involved in an investigation into the whole question of training and producing enough medical practitioners. Once a hospital starts functioning, the required staff are usually drawn. If the facilities are there, these people are attracted.

*The hon. member also referred to the question of family planning. I am referring now to family planning as such. We must bear in mind that family planning is not population control or population planning. Family planning is concerned with the family, with its own conditions, its economic conditions, its sociological conditions and its own problems. That is where the start has to be made. The success of family planning depends on person-to-person contact, and all health clinics, from the Central Government’s clinics down to the private clinics, are fully capable of implementing family planning. The department established a comprehensive family planning service at the end of last year, and all bodies are involved in it at this stage. I may point out to the hon. member that at this stage there are 147 medical practitioners and 364 nurses who are employed in our family planning services on either a full-time or a part-time basis. There are 126 nurses rendering services on farms in their areas. One should also have regard to the increase in family planning. The hon. member for Pinelands was also interested in this. In 1973 there were almost 270 000 persons who had accepted it, and this estimate was approximately 15% too low. We also afforded protection to women, not by putting up a fence between the women and the men, but in fact in another way. Whereas in January we afforded protection to only 76 000 women, the number was 164 000 in December. Consequently it is clear that women are coming to us to an increasing extent. Next I come to the number of woman-months during which women are afforded protection, and in this respect I am perhaps getting rather technical.

However, I hope that hon. members will forgive me for it. As far as the Bantu are concerned, this number came to 1 077 000 in 1973. In the case of Coloureds it was 412 000, in the case of Indians 111 779 and in the case of Whites 103 013. I want to point out that personal guidance is provided, and in this regard 84 field workers and 14 liaison officers have already been employed. We have obtained the co-operation of the homelands governments. I am only going to mention the two leading ones. The hon. member for Pinelands also expressed his doubts with reference to an article which Chief Buthelezi had written on family planning. As far as I am concerned, Chief Buthelezi wrote this article in a very judicious manner. I do not think that he wrote it in order to condemn family planning. On the contrary, he pointed out the possible problems in accepting it. The problems indicated by him are the problems with which we, too, have to deal. We hang family planning on the peg of socio-economic problems, of general health problems. As far as this is concerned, I am not discouraged as a result of articles of that nature. To tell the truth, we are obtaining splendid co-operation from the Government of Bophuthatswana, and apart from other governments, we are also obtaining the co-operation of the Government of KwaZulu. I do not wish to mention all the governments by name. The KwaZulu Government even agreed to our making a film with a Zulu signature tune in order that family planning may be promoted further there.

†The hon. member for Umbilo also referred to the Budapest congress. This congress degenerated into a political squabble. That was what we had expected. Taking the timing of the congress into consideration we had decided that it would not be proper for us to attend. We came to that conclusion as a result of the way in which the congress was constituted and the way in which it later developed proved that we were perfectly correct.

As far as family planning is concerned, I want to point out that the Treasury has made available as much money as we can spend. The Treasury regards family planning as top priority. We were allocated about Rl,9 million for the previous year, but the amount might just as well have been doubled or even trebled because in terms of a Cabinet decision family planning is to be accorded top priority. If it is approached in a very judicious manner, it must be accorded high priority.

What plan does the department have for spending increased expenditure? I must say that R1,9 million is a small amount if it is compared to the extent of the problem.

The amount that can be spent depends on the available manpower. The hon. member need not worry about that. If he wants details about that programme, he can easily obtain them from my department. I envisage that no restriction will be placed on our efforts to increase family planning in a scientific manner. We should also take into account the various social and other prejudices of people. We must not forget that we have a heterogeneous population and that is an important aspect. There should be no restriction on our progress.

*I may just say that we have a target in this regard. Within the course of five years we want to involve 50% of all risky women in the family planning scheme. We should like to achieve a population-growth figure of 1,5% for everybody. I cannot go into everything today, but this is a comprehensive matter which is receiving proper attention. I want to invite hon. members to come and look at our exhibits, as well as at the special attempts being made to give reasonable and proper attention to this very important facet of health care.

The hon. member for Krugersdorp raised a personal matter. I thank him for his contribution and his explanation. As I said at the beginning, a fundamental approach does not have anything to do with persons. Every case is being judged on its own merits, and I think we may as well leave it at that for the moment.

Finally, I should very much like to make an announcement. Two years ago I appointed a commission which had to inquire into private hospitals as well as the unattached operation units. Actually, this commission was basically motivated by the fact that medical expenses were too high and that we were not sure whether things were going well at all private hospitals. This commission sat for two years, and only a week or two ago, after very hard and thorough work, it submitted a report to me, which I am studying at the moment. There is a possibility that I shall still table it during this session. Whenever commissions are appointed, they are expected to complete their work within a reasonable period of time. The Government will give its attention to this report. In conclusion, I should just like to thank all hon. members who took part in this debate. The hon. member for Pinelands, who was the only speaker on the Progressive Party side, made a good contribution. All the other members’ contributions were good, too, whether we differ with one another or not. Fortunately this is one of my portfolios in regard to which I need not think of politics, and as a scientist I enjoy it. I think all of us have made a contribution towards bringing about greater clarity and telling the public outside what is being done to keep our people at least healthy, in order that they may not only live better from day to day, but also think better. Furthermore, I should also like to extend my sincere thanks to my officials for their contributions behind the scenes.

Votes agreed to.

Revenue Vote No. 39, Loan Vote G and S.W.A. Vote No. 22.—“Coloured Relations and Rehoboth Affairs”:

Mr. Chairman, may I ask the privilege of the half hour? I regard this as possibly the most important Vote of the Budget this session, because of the situation which is arising from the frustration, the desperation and from the unhappiness of the Coloured people. The Government has denied them effective participation in the political processes and that is a situation which is now leading to resentment, frustration, possible conflict and even catastrophe. In fact, there are many amongst the Coloureds who recall bitterly that in the past radical improvements have only been made in response to crises of threatened violence. They ask whether this is the only basis on which they can now proceed. They warn that the Government is moving from crisis to crisis and that the time will soon come when they will not be able to avoid the crises arising. They ask in all reasonableness if it would not be wise for the Government to anticipate such events and make the necessary changes while there is still time to do so. In short, the position is ugly, the problem is difficult and it may in certain vital respects hold the key to the whole problem of race relations in this country. The political frustration of the Coloured people is easy to understand. It stems from their deprivation in the past of the parliamentary, provincial and municipal rights which they enjoyed and the replacement thereof by other rights which they have come to reject with ever-increasing dislike. For them the Coloured Representative Council has failed as a means to satisfy the real aspirations of the Coloured people. Whatever intrinsic merits it may have had and whatever constitutional changes may now be contemplated, whatever hopes may be held out for the future, the hard fact is that it has been rejected by an overwhelming majority of the Coloured people as being powerless to give them what they want in their lives. They realize, as indeed we on this side of the House do, that you cannot have two sovereign Parliaments in one State and they see no movement to resolve that dilemma. They believe that the CRC will always be a subordinate body which will be impotent to redress their wrongs and to remedy their disabilities—in other words, a symbol of their frustrations. It seems to me that the Government has reached the end of the cul-de-sac in so far as this policy is concerned. Even at municipal level, progress as far as the Coloured people are concerned is minimal. They see the whole set-up as an ineffective instrument to give them a better life and to give them that socio-economic justice they demand. I am afraid that we are long past the stage where we can argue as to whether the despair and condemnation of the Coloureds is justified. It has become a hard political reality which exists whether we like it or not. If the political frustration of the Coloureds is understandable, their desperation and unhappiness at the discrimination visited on them in the social sphere in the land of their birth, the only country they know as home, is all too apparent. That discrimination is reflected in hotels, cinemas and restaurants which are open to Black and Brown foreigners but which are denied to them who are born South Africans. It is reflected in public amenities which are always inferior to those available to the Whites, in separate entrances and queues in Government places, and in a host of hardships and humiliations which are generally described as petty apartheid. Whatever they do, they seldom escape the constant reminders of their inferior status. It is a tragedy of our time that in spite of the good intentions so frequently expressed by the Government, the Government itself is the main author and constant guardian of these discriminatory standards. Let me just ask one question. Who is it that accepts open commerce in the banks and in the supermarkets but insists on signs and separate entrances in post offices and in Government departments? The cornerstones of Government policy in this regard seem to be the Group Areas Act, the statutory race classification and the Immorality Act. I cannot deal with these in detail and I do not propose to, but there is no doubt that one of the major grievances of the Coloured people and one to which they constantly come back is the unfair implementation of the Group Areas Act. They see this Act as the main instrument of their misfortune. They ascribe much of the harshness of their lives and the frustration of their highest hopes and aspirations to the Group Areas Act. They were moved from their traditional places by the sea, by the vineyards and by the mountains where they grew up, places they had occupied for generations, and this is a source of grievance. What has turned that grievance into a festering resentment is that they were moved without consultation, they were moved without their consent and without any real material compensation or improvement in their state and situation. I know that their original circumstances in many cases were not too good, they were unsatisfactory, but then they say that at least they occupied those areas voluntarily. Now they have been compelled to move to areas they dislike and very often to communities with which they have little in common, where they are deprived of their traditional recreations, distant from their work and served by inadequate and expensive transport. The amenities which they shared in the past with their White neighbours have been replaced by rudimentary and inadequate services in the areas to which they have been moved and in which they now live. If the housing was poor, and it was in many cases, they claim that was at least preferable to the harsh little boxes or the widespread homelessness in the group areas. Those who have succeeded in raising their own standards and acquiring means to greater comfort, for better environment, are unable to find good land on which to build their own private homes. It is incredible, Sir, that while these conditions persist there has been no halt in the obstinate and relentless implementation of the group areas laws, not even a slackening off until the present consequences of the vast replacement of people have been absorbed and remedied.

Now, Sir, I come to race classification and most particularly to the arbitrary and rigid manner in which it is applied. I think we all agree it is a reality of our plural society, and has been throughout many, many years, that there will be and always has been a perceptible, if small, movement across the colour line. It is a genetic fact that children of mixed races or mixed relationships may be of dissimilar colour, some fair and some dark. They seek to find a place in society among those they most resemble and where they can find their greatest happiness. But, Sir, it seems to be the relentless task of race classification as applied today to hunt down the stragglers from the flock, to identify them with permanent labels, and to return them to environments which have become alien to them. I have spoken about clause 16 of the Immorality Act before. Today I only want to remark that it is hated less for the restraints that it imposes on sexual conduct than it is for its more insidious implications, because they believe it is seen as a living reminder of the fundamental repugnance of the White for the Brown, for whom the White are largely responsible. Surely, Sir, against this background it does not require much imagination to realize how these constant reminders of an inferior status must frustrate people, people who are seeking a place in the sun for themselves and their families. Their extreme bitterness today, is estranging them not only from the Afrikaner whom they identify largely with the Nationalist Party, with the Government, but from the White man himself, and that bitterness is having a ripple effect which is affecting other facets of their lives.

Then, Sir, there is discrimination in the economic sphere, discrimination which typifies the spirit underlying job reservation. Here again, it is the Government that is and has been the greatest sinner. At a time when equal pay for equal work and responsibility is increasingly recognized in private industry, who is it but the Government that rigidly applies different salaries for the same work? Who is it but the Government that denies the existence of job reservation in respect of Coloureds but applies it in the Civil Service? Who is it but the Government which mouths promises about reducing the wage gap, but has increased it beyond all measure in the years in which it has been in office?

Hear, hear!

Who is it but the Government who is responsible for the inferior educational and training facilities available to the Coloured people? It is small wonder that the percentage of poverty-stricken Coloureds is so much higher than among Whites. It is small wonder that there are so many who are not only poverty-stricken, but unable or unwilling to improve their own position. These are some of the things—it is not an exhaustive list—that have turned the social and economic problems of a section of the population that should be closest to us into what is, I believe, the burning political issue of the day. It is a situation which, to my mind, is of such extreme urgency, that to suggest that its resolution can wait until the report of the Theron Commission is published in perhaps 18 months’ time, is to be utterly unrealistic. The question now is this: Can this political problem be solved quickly by political means? Are there any immediate political measures that we can now take which will quickly defuse this problem, or at least convince the Coloured people that those measures will provide the machinery whereby they can help themselves and bring about their own redemption? We on this side of the House see the solution as a federal arrangement, the main facets of which have been outlined so often that I need not speak about them this afternoon.

Nevertheless, I should like to draw attention to the fact that in terms of this arrangement, the aims and aspirations of the Coloureds can be identified with those of the Whites. Our federal policy will give them full citizenship and autonomy within their own community. In addition, it will give freedom for White and Coloured communities to develop greater co-operation in all matters of common interest. If it is the ultimate wish of both communities to merge their interests to a degree that is agreed upon by both communities, we will arrange to share one legislative assembly. I believe that is the direction in which we should be working. I believe that is the solution which would be of more benefit to the Coloureds than any outlined to date, and that we should work towards that end. We on this side of the House are not in power, and history has proved that we have small chance of persuading this Government in the immediate future to accept our proposals. In the long term, of course, it is inevitable that they will do so. The question, therefore, is whether there is anything that can be done within the limits of the Government’s own philosophies and policies. I believe that if the Government insists on rejecting the federal idea and maintaining a unitary form of government, its only solution will be to provide direct representation for the Coloured people in this Parliament. So sincerely do I believe that, that I want to say here and now again what I have said before: If the Government decides to take that step, even if it does not coincide with the federal arrangement we would like to see, we on this side of the House will support such a move.

Do you believe it will be a mistake?

I believe the federal answer is the better one; but if the Government insists on a unitary system, I believe that is the only effective answer there is. However, I have gone further in this House. I have indicated to the Government that the position has, in my opinion, become so serious that if they are able to find a consensus with the Coloured people and we are satisfied that such a consensus is in the interests of South Africa, we will not oppose it, even if it is contrary to our expressed policy.

Why did you not inform us?

I had a Press statement published in every newspaper in the country the day before the hon. the Prime Minister was to hold an interview with the Coloured people. What have we had from the Government? We have had talk of a statutory liaison committee between Parliament and the Coloured Representative Council which would only have liaison and advisory powers. It solves nothing. There has also been talk of a statutory standing committee consisting of members of the Cabinet and the Executive of the Coloured Representative Council. For that committee to make any contribution at all towards resolving the existing problem with which the Government is faced, namely the impossibility of having two sovereign Parliaments within one State, it would have to have statutory powers binding on this Parliament and on the Coloured Representative Council. Now that sort of development, after some initial confusion, does not find favour with the Government. Let me tell the Government, however, that whatever sort of consensus they are looking for, a sine quo non for any agreement within the limits of their policy, would be a change in the system of election of the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council to make it fully elected. It should be given real executive power. Its own powers should be meaningfully extended so as to make it less subject to the overriding controls of the State President, the Minister and the Cabinet of this Parliament. There will also have to be involvement of the Coloureds in local government, i.e. at municipal level, in a meaningful way. This should perhaps take place in the manner suggested by the Slater Commission, which envisaged metropolitan boards for various municipal and local government areas, on which all races would serve. That is a sort of federal concept at local government level. Clearly, too, there will have to be participation by the Coloureds in the day-to-day administration of Government services which affect them, i.e. in the civil service, in statutory bodies taking decisions about them and, more meaningfully, in services such as the Police and the Defence Force. Nothing suggested so far, however, has given us any real indication of what the Government believes is the ultimate place of the Coloureds in our society. Only a little more than a month ago the hon. member for Moorreesburg referred to Whites and Coloureds not as a “nasie in wording” but as “partners in the South African society”. It is true that he referred to the Coloureds as junior partners. Many thousands of people in South Africa would support his point of view though they may argue as to whether the Coloureds should be junior or equal partners. The hon. the Prime Minister, however, does not agree with the hon. member for Moorreesburg about the word “partnership”. The hon. the Prime Minister talks about “buurskap”. There is a marked difference in meaning between those two words. [Interjections.] I was not speaking to the hon. the Minister of the Interior. He is an extremist and as such is right outside this argument. I was talking about the difference between “buurskap” and “partnership”. Partnership means the right to participation in, and responsibility for, a common undertaking. “Buurskap” on the other hand means a certain degree of friendship between people without their necessarily being involved in any common undertaking. I do not want to take this matter any further. I think this matter is too serious to be a debating point. Instead. I should like to quote the Minister of Defence, who spoke a week ago at Kimberley and said—

I should like to vary that just slightly and say—

This seems to indicate a step forward, but it is still too vague to mean anything to the Coloured people. What I want to try to impress upon the Minister and on the Government this afternoon is that time is running out and none of these generalizations are acceptable to the Coloured people. They want realistic answers now; they believe that their future can only be assured by the granting to them of what they call “full citizenship”. If what is called “full citizenship” is not acceptable to the Government at the present time, then what axe we going to do? I believe that the position can only be saved by socio-economic steps which will be seen to be steps on the road to full citizenship and which will be meaningfull enough to gain time for a fuller consensus on political matters based on consultation.

What should those steps be? In the economic field, I believe the bare minimum should be that all bars to equal economic opportunity should be progressively removed. This would mean an end to job reservation in so far as it applies to the Coloureds; it would mean equal pay for equal work and responsibility; it would mean the closing of the wage gap; it would mean the abolition of the traditional discriminatory job policies. In all these matters the Government should be giving a lead. It should be made clear that all skilled technical and professional jobs are open to the Coloured people subject only to the process of collective bargaining and the safeguard against exploitation of either White or non-White of the principle of the rate for the job. Facilities for the training of Coloureds for all such avenues of employment should be made increasingly available. From this it follows that if there are members of one race group who want to use the professional services of individuals or groups belonging to another race group in a private capacity, there should be no legal hindrance placed in their way. In addition, membership of any professional organization or society should not be prohibited to the Coloured people on the grounds of race and should be regarded as a matter for the domestic control of the organization or society concerned. In the economic sphere it has already been indicated that there is comparatively speaking a high percentage of Coloured people who are poverty-stricken and unable or unwilling to improve their own position. We believe that this problem can only be tackled by a national commitment for the improvement of their socio-economic position by way of a co-ordinated, integrated programme which will lead, inter alia, to better education facilities and far greater opportunities for training. Such an advance would also lay the foundation for better housing and better living conditions and, where necessary, compensatory education for those living under conditions at the moment which make compensatory education necessary.

What about social change? I believe that the removal of social discrimination or discrimination in the social sphere is seen by the Coloured people as an essential step towards full citizenship, and there is much that the Government could do to give a lead in this sphere. I believe that it could commence by removing many of the statutory forms of discrimination and steadfastly attacking and dismembering petty apartheid. It will also mean steps to allow for the provision of better and adequate public amenities. The objective should be that in respect of all public controlled amenities such as beaches, public transport, etc., the policy should be to provide as nearly as possible equal and parallel facilities for the various race groups where they are present in any significant numbers, plus open amenities which would be available to everyone. That is the area of choice. Where it is not possible or practical to provide parallel facilities there should be elasticity where the presence of mixed groups is likely to be commonly acceptable such as in the case of cultural institutions of a high standard like the Nico Malan theatre. There are also public amenities that are provided by private persons or companies, namely, hotels, cinemas, restaurants and so forth. We believe that these should be available to the various groups at the option of the owners. The owner must be in a position to grant or refuse admission to who ever he pleases. In other words, in the sphere of amenities, the guideline should be the maximum freedom of choice and the minimum degree of compulsion against the background of our present customs and traditions.

Then, Sir, there is the whole administration of the Group Areas Act, which will have to be revised. Apart from insisting that there should be no removals without adequate accommodation, that there should be adequate compensation paid to those moving and that there should be no interference with the traditional livelihood of those concerned, it is now clear that there will have to be proper consultation between the groups in the demarcation of statutory residential areas; that case work should be done to ensure that people find themselves in communities with which they have something in common; that there should be no removal in areas where large sections of the population are still without homes or are inadequately housed. Sir, the determination of the race to which an individual belongs, I believe, should be based on the old test of appearance and acceptance, and the test of descent as at present applied should be done away. The Immorality Act, in so far as section 16 is concerned, will without question have to be repealed, and the sooner the better. I am very sure that there is much else that could be done; I am sure that there is much else that should be done. I have indicated this afternoon what I believe to be the bare minimum which will have a chance to restore better relations between White and better relations between White and Coloured in South Africa. It is not possible at this stage to over-emphasize the urgency of immediate action by the Government, or the necessity of giving a clear indication of the direction in which it is going, a direction which will have to give hope for the future and a new enthusiasm for cooperation between White and Brown. We believe, Sir, that the only course is a clear commitment to the direction of ultimate full citizenship.

Mr. Chairman, I want to begin by congratulating the hon. the Leader of the Opposition very cordially. I want to congratulate him on succeeding today for the first time this session in getting the ranks of the Old Guard and the Young Turks together again behind him.

Are you again playing politics? What does this have to do with the debate?

It has quite a lot to do with this debate. During this session we have become used to at least having the one group here while the other was caucusing, but it was striking today that they sat together nicely here while the hon. the Leader of the Opposition was speaking.

Where is your caucus? Only your homelanders are in the House.

Sir, if one puts a kitten among the pigeons and hon. members on that side make that much noise, it is clear that they are being hurt. Sir, when one listens to the hon. the Leader of the Opposition and hears what great importance he attaches to this matter, it would seem as though his action here today is nothing less than a conciliatory offer to his own divided ranks behind him.

Mr. Chairman, I want to add that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition chose his time very badly. As you know, a commission of inquiry was appointed which is engaged in a thorough inquiry into all aspects of the development of the Coloured population group. Since the appointment of that commission, United Party congresses have met, and it is very interesting that on those occasions this matter of the development of the political life of the Coloured population was not of very great earnest to them. On the contrary, they continued in the same old way to …

Quarrel amongst themselves.

… talk about the federation policy, which is just as obscure today as it was before, and in addition they tried to patch up the quarrels among themselves and to keep the team going. What is more, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition again today left so many back doors open in his general statements, that he will subsequently be able to head in any direction if it seems to him that things are becoming too hot for him to handle. Sir, I want to draw your attention to the fact that although he made the suggestion that the political life of the Coloured population should be bound up with that of the Whites in one Parliament, he stated the proviso: Provided that the two communities, the White population and the Coloured population, accept it. Surely the hon. the Leader of the Opposition has received many answers to this question over the years. It was one of the major issues in this Parliament, and in the political history of South Africa, this question of the intertwining of the political rights of the Coloureds and the Whites. It is a question which has been discussed in this Parliament for so many years. It is this sort of matter which sometimes even had members now sitting on that side, sitting on this side, and then on that side again, so far-reaching and so serious was this political struggle. Now, if the hon. the Leader of the Opposition states today that we could proceed with this matter, providing that the two communities agree to it, he has repeatedly had an answer from the White community in advance, i.e. that he should venture cautiously along that road. That is why I am saying that the hon. member chose his time very badly and that, in view of the history of this matter, he has not interpreted the answers he has received over the years very well.

But what is more, a Coloured Persons’ Representative Council election is imminent. What does the hon. the Leader of the Opposition now want to achieve by raking up this matter again today, as though it were a matter which has, within a few months’ time, become such a vital issue. What else does he want to achieve except to create tremendous confusion among the Coloured community?

Improper interference.

What can he achieve, except to cause those people to wonder whether they should proceed with their election? What is more, the persons who bear the responsibility as members of the executive are similarly in a very uncertain position in view of the positions they hold and the responsibilities they bear. This is the result when the hon. the Leader of the Opposition comes forward with a suggestion today that we should go back and once again merge the political structures of White and Coloureds to be able to achieve something. That is why I am saying the hon. the Leader of the Opposition chose his opportunity badly. He should now listen and he will hear and read in the next few months that it is not only the interests of the Coloured population which are at issue: the opinion of the White population of South Africa, how we are going to arrange this matter, is also at issue. Therefore I want to repeat in all earnest that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition could have waited with this matter until the commission in question, which has been appointed and conducting its investigating over a wide field and also in loco, brings out its report. Surely that would be the opportunity to discuss this matter again. [Interjections.] Sir, I shall tell you what the hon. the Leader of the Opposition’s problem is. He is afraid that the hon. member for Sea Point is going to steal a march on him. What is more, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition has seen during the past years that the National Party Government is geared to change. As South Africa progresses and its various population groups grow and develop, the National Party Government is prepared to make adjustments and to make arrangements in accordance with the responsibility which the various population groups are able to accept. In other words, I want to tell the hon. the Leader of the Opposition that he jumped into the fray here today because he is afraid that this Government will perhaps do things for which he would like to take the credit. In saying this I do not want to endorse anything he said, but involuntarily one does get the impression that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition has decided that he cannot wait for this commission’s report, because there will then perhaps be nothing left for him to do. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition and his party would do well to study and consider the whole political situation in South Africa all over again from the start. In view of what is happening in the world, he will surely agree with me that matters such as good order in society, peaceful development, progress and political rights based on inherent growth in the life of a specific population group, and its economic and social development, are all matters of importance. We cannot simply go off half-cocked and try to be popular by off-loading political rights on a population group. As a matter of fact, it was one of the problems of the past that when the Coloureds formed an integral part of the political battle of the White parties, they were used as a political football. I do not believe that I am doing the hon. the Leader of the Opposition an injustice if I say that his party excelled in that. They made a special study of it. [Interjections.] They used the Coloured population on a large scale to strengthen their party, to win seats and to win an election. While they were busy with this, the slum conditions of District Six never really gave anyone cause for concern. It was only during the time of the National Party that the slum conditions of District Six, Windermere and the Cape Flats began to cause people concern.

You are now again talking about the time before the rinderpest. [Interjections.]

Order!

It is precisely because the Government provided proper housing in so many places, education facilities and even a university for the Coloured population that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition is able to point to certain places and points where evils still do exist. Evils still do exist, but they exist only because the Government has not yet, with the available manpower and funds, been able to clear up those things that came about as a result of and under the régime of integration. What else is it? The worst slum conditions existing today, were not created during the time of the National Party; they are what is left over from the days when the United Party was in power. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I have listened to the hon. member for Piketberg but I do not think that he has made a serious contribution to the debate. He did not make it clear whether he is a “tuislander, branderryer of ’n voorstander van junior of senior vennootskap”. However, it would seem to me as if the “tuis-landers” on the opposite side have won. [Interjections.]

The one point that my hon, leader made was that it is quite clear that we are not making the debate on the future of our Coloured citizens into a political football match. We are trying to take the debate out of such a situation. We are trying to deal with this situation with statemanship. I rise to support the hon. the Leader of the Opposition in the urgent plea which he made to bring about a better understanding, a better relationship between the Coloured and White citizens of South Africa. That is our approach to this matter. It is my sincere hope that the initiative taken by my hon. leader will not be in vain. We have made it quite clear and we shall continue in this debate to make it quite clear that the stakes are too high and too urgent to try and make political gain out of this issue. I hope that this debate will be conducted in this spirit. If we can succeed in that and take positive actions as a result of this debate, then the exercise would have been worth while. However, I feel that the hon. member’s contribution to this debate was a little futile [Interjections.] In this regard our federal policy has been stated often enough and there is no reason for us to change our views. However, there is one cardinal facet of our federal policy which is important, viz. consultation at all levels. We welcome therefore the talks which have taken place between the Government …

So you kicked them out of your planning …

You will have plenty of time to make your speech [Interjections.]

Order!

We welcome the talks which have taken place between the Government and the Coloured leaders and trust that they will continue and continue in a spirit in which all parties concerned approach the matter in an open-minded fashion. One thing is sure; we cannot continue talking indefinitely. These talks will have to produce results otherwise they too will be a futile exercise. If with these talks the Government can reach mutual agreement with Coloured leaders on the essential steps that must be taken to remove the impasse with which we are faced and to diffuse the tension, the Government can count on our support—I want hon. members to listen—I repeat, the Government can count on our support even if these measures are not necessarily in line with the policy of this side of the House. The frustrations of the Coloured people have been demonstrated in recent weeks by the no-confidence vote in the CRC and the rejection of the CRC by the two major Coloured political parties, and not only by the rejection of the CRC but also by the rejection of the Government’s policy of separate development. As my hon. leader said, this rejection is a hard political fact which we all have to take into account. We might well ask ourselves why there has been this rejection. The answer is a simple one: As an instrument of government, the CRC has been unable to fulfil the real and justifiable aspirations of the Coloured citizens of South Africa. They want a very simple thing, namely to be full citizens of this country, the land of their birth, and this is the direction in which we should be moving and moving very quickly, as my hon. leader outlined. Not only has the CRC been rejected by the politicians—and this makes the matter even more serious—but it has also been rejected by the great majority of Coloured people, namely the professional people, business people, artisans and people in all walks of life. They never really accepted the CRC as an alternative to their rights on the common roll, especially when after the first election the Government took the unusual step of nominating members to that council, many of whom were defeated candidates. Now, as the result of the many disabilities to which the Coloured people are subjected, they see the CRC as a symbol of their frustration and inability to right their wrongs. Out of these circumstances and against this background arise the urgent demands for direct representation in this House. That is what is happening among the Coloured people. They are demanding to have representation in this hon. House because the instrument of government they have had up to this point has not fulfilled their aspirations. If the Government continues to reject our federal proposals and continues to accept a unitary system of government and, at the same time, is determined to make the CRC work, it will have to institute far-reaching changes to give the CRC a real share in the decision-making processes in all matters that directly affect the Coloured people. This is a challenge to the Government. In this regard the speech made by the hon. the Minister of Defence is of great interest. He made it at a youth conference of the Nationalist Party in Kimberley. I have a newspaper cutting here in which this speech is quoted. He said—

This is an indication of a new direction which we on this side of the House welcome. In the past the Government’s policy has been more and more separation, and here the hon. the Minister of Defence says “die tyd het nou aangebreek vir beter skakeling”. We agree with the hon. the Minister that there has to be a greater measure of liaison and closer co-operation among the various bodies that represent the different race groups. If this liaison body is to be effective, it has to be given real and meaningful powers. The liaison which the hon. the Prime Minister and other hon. members on the Government side have hinted at is that there may be a Coloured person as Minister of Coloured Affairs. They suggested a Cabinet committee which might consist of the members of the Executive Committee of the CRC and members of the Cabinet. There has been talk of a statutory consultative committee. I want to suggest to the hon. the Minister, who has the power to take the necessary steps, that if that “skakeling”, that liaison, is to be really effective, he should give serious consideration to enabling the CRC to elect members who will represent our Coloured citizens in this House. This form of liaison might also well be extended to lower levels of government.

That is not your policy.

It may be extended down to the level of management committees, and if the management committees can elect members to represent the Coloured townships or Coloured areas in the town councils or city councils or any metropolitan board, it will be effective liaison and an effective link which will give real power to the management committees which at this stage have merely an advisory capacity. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, one thing became very clear to me this afternoon, and that is that the United Party felt and decided in their caucus that they had to change their policy in respect of the Coloureds. I believe it was insisted upon in their caucus that they change the policy in such a way that the Coloureds are to obtain representation in this Parliament. They could not come back, however, for they had that policy in 1972. At that time they changed that policy and now, two years later, they cannot revert to it again.

Now you are making petty politics.

If we relate the motion and the amendment which were adopted earlier this year by the Coloured Persons Representative Council, as well as the speeches subsequently made by Coloured politicians, to the policy of each one of the three parties which are represented in this House, one thing is very clear to me and that is that that motion, that amendment and those speeches rejected each one of the policies of those parties. The Coloureds insist on unconditional and unqualified representation with the Whites in one Parliament. This is what is being requested on the part of the Coloureds. Not one of the White political parties which are represented in this House complies with that requirement. I want to leave the Opposition parties at that, for it is the National Party which governs this country and it is the task of the Government to ensure that everyone living in the country is treated justly and fairly. I believe that this should be the treatment which agrees with the Christian conscience and which affords everyone in the country the opportunity to realize himself to the full. That is why this side of the House advances the standpoint of separate development, and it is the basis of the policy of separate development that every population group should be able to decide on its own destiny, that every population group should have the right to have an exclusive say in its own matters and that every population group should have the right to retain its identity as a group or as a people.

Are you a homelander?

No, I am not a homelander; I am Nationalist to the core. That is why the policy of this party in respect of the Coloureds is very clear, and that is that the White man has an exclusive say in those matters which affect the White man’s interests. Then there is the gradual development of the Coloured in order to grant him autonomy over his own affairs. Where there are common interests, the liaison machinery envisaged by the hon. the Prime Minister and his Cabinet council after consultations were held, will be put into operation. What I have just delineated, is separate political development for the Coloureds. This is accompanied by separate development in other spheres as well. There is the Brown businessman in his own residential area. Do hon. members want to argue it away? There are the Brown people occupying high posts in Coloured education. Do hon. members want to argue this away? There are separate denominations. Do hon. members want to argue that away? There are separate rural areas in which the Brown man may practise agriculture. Do hon. members want to argue that away? There are separate residential areas for the Coloureds throughout the Republic of South Africa. These are not things which came into being yesterday or today. The things I have mentioned have come into being over the years. Many of these things have a proud record. I say with a deep sense of gratitude that the D.R. Mission Church, which has been in existence for almost a century, has a proud record, i.e. it is the work of Coloureds, Brown people, who have built their own church. Can we cancel this out? Can we talk it away? And now Brown politicians are asking for an end to this road of separate development.

Mr. Chairman, I believe the time has come for us to speak to each other very honestly. It is as the hon. member for Piketberg has said; we cannot push aside the White man’s will for separate development in this country as if it were a minor and fleeting obstacle.

Hear, hear!

It is not something of that kind. The White man’s will to exist cannot be cried down by fiery speeches and motions on the part of the Coloureds, nor by speeches on the part of the Whites who are heading in the direction of integration. I want you all, especially the Opposition, to take cognizance of the fact, that the Brown people’s will to continue existing and to preserve and develop that which is their own cannot be eliminated. I want to ask whether sufficient regard is being had to the Coloured’s will. I want to ask who is responsible for the Coloured having developed in this way over the years. [Interjections.] If we are going to do this, the price the Coloured will have to pay is not too high for him. Then that price has already been determined. I want to ask who is going to come off worst. Is it not going to be the Brown man himself? [Interjections.] To me the well-being and happiness of the Coloureds are to be found in the further extension and development of that which is already their own. The Coloured is in the process of coming into his own in the economy and in the business world. The Coloured Development Corporation made an amount of R6,2 million available to 354 Coloured enterprises between 1962 and 1972. This is what should be developed further. This is separate development, to be able to build up one’s own economy.

There is Coloured education. There is a tremendous shortage of teaching staff in schools for Coloureds. Surely this is a challenge to the Coloureds to come forward and produce their own people to man those posts. There is a staff shortage at the University of the Western Cape. Surely there are opportunities and challenges. There are as many as 1 900 Coloured schools with half a million pupils. Do we just want to argue this away and do away with it?

The Coloured can develop his own sport. This afternoon I want to ask, and I am asking this with sadness, where the Coloureds were at the multi-national meetings which have already taken place in this country. Where were the Coloureds when the double wicket cricket championship took place? Where were they at the recent Rapport cycling tour? Are there not people in the ranks of the Coloureds who are dishonest towards their own people and are denying them these things? Then the Coloureds also have their own residential areas, their own rural areas. There are 2 million morgen which already belong to the Coloureds and on which millions of rand have already been spent for the purposes of developing the land. That is why I believe that in the Coloured’s own residential areas, whether rural or urban, there should also be the creation of his own machinery of government, a full-fledged government of his own from the municipal sphere right up to the Parliament he already has. What remains—and matters of common interest will remain because we shall be interdependent—must be managed by the Cabinet council. Content and status may be given to this council. It is the management of these common interests which may serve to stimulate the relation between White and Brown and which may be the basis on which White and Brown may live alongside one another in their separate areas. This can contribute to their helping one another. This afternoon I am thinking of defence, for example. One of the Coloured leaders said that he would not let his son die on the border for South Africa. This afternoon I want to tell him in this House: I am prepared to let my three sons die on the border for White, Brown and Black in South Africa. I issue a challenge to that leader; I do not think he is more cowardly than I am.

We shall also be able to supplement one another economically. We need each other, not so? The White man needs the Coloured and the Coloured the White. This afternoon I want to say: Whoever wants to keep the Coloured subservient in the country is an advocate of integration, for the process of integration is the process under which the Coloured will suffer most. Is the Coloured willing to surrender in this process what he has created over the years? The people who, however, want to afford him the opportunity of being himself, of holding his own and of developing, are those people who want to give him that area where he may govern himself and decide on his own destiny.

There has never been any suggestion that we as Whites want to drive the Coloured to the Black man. The Black people take such a pride in their own identity that they will not accept the Brown man. We want him to be himself. That is why we are telling him: Here is our hand; we want to help you to be yourself. Sir, good neighbourliness with specific boundary-lines—this is what we want to achieve, so that every neighbour, in his own sphere, in his own domain, may do as he wishes and, where we need one another, we may unite against our common enemy.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Oudtshoorn told us that it is important to bear in mind that the Whites also have a will to exist. Furthermore, the hon. member said there were tremendous challenges, challenges the Coloured people ought to accept. Surely, there ought to be no difference of opinion whatsoever in this House on that point, i.e. that the Whites also have the right and the will to exist. After all, this matter has often been finally decided upon in the past. What is more, this side of the House has admitted again and again that every group in South Africa has the right to maintain its own identity and control its own, intimate affairs. What is therefore irrelevant here is whether the Whites will go under in this process. Neither is it the wish or the policy of this side that, in this process of allowing justice to be done to the Coloured people, the Whites should lose their identity or for the Whites to go under in this process. What we ought to discuss here today, however, and what was quite rightly stated by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition in his speech, is the fact that the Government, through the Coloured Persons Representative Council, established a body for the Coloured people for a specific purpose, a limited purpose, a body which could never be the final answer to what would be the political destiny of the Coloured people in South Africa. It is because Coloured belonging both to the Federal Party and the Labour Party realize this that a motion of no-confidence in separate development and in that body was adopted. They do not see this Coloured Persons Representative Council as the final political dispensation of the Coloured persons in South Africa. There is no need for the hon. member therefore to come along with the argument that the Whites also have a will in this respect. This everyone recognizes. The Coloured person of South Africa accepts the challenge held out to him in regard to his education, his own university and so on.

What more does he want?

I shall tell the hon. member what the Coloured people in South Africa want, i.e. if we do have a common destiny, and this the hon. member for Oudtshoorn concedes, not so?

Yes.

If we have a common destiny, there is only one thing the Coloured people desire. It makes no difference whether one applies this under a unitary system or whether one applies this under a federal system—the Coloured people want to work out, together with the Whites, the destiny of both groups in this country. Hon. members on that side simply do not want to appreciate this. We would no longer be able to tell those people from day to day what they should do, where they should live, how they should decide and what their future should be. Unless hon. members on that side of the House appreciate this, we would not be able to develop sound and healthy relations in South Africa. The hon. member for Piketberg really surprised me. He, of all people, wanted to know whether the United Party had abandoned its entire policy. He said the hon. the Leader of the Opposition had chosen the wrong time and, toy discussing the representation of Coloured people in this Parliament, merely wanted to raise old controversies.

Is that not your policy now?

I shall come to that point of the hon. member for Turffontein. I am now dealing with the hon. member for Piketberg. Was it not he and the hon. member for Moorreesburg who suggested a few years ago that Coloured people should sit in the Senate? The hon. member for Piketberg wants to know why we are now interested in restoring the representation of the Coloured people in this House. The hon. member for Turffontein should know as well as I do—this was made quite clear by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition—that if one is not prepared to accept a federal system in South Africa and if the Government persists with its unitary system, there will be no other solution than that the Coloured people be given representation in this House. One cannot have two Parliaments within the same body politic next to one another at a sovereign level. If the hon. member for Turffontein is going to participate in this debate, he should tell us how he is able to reconcile those two things. These are the matters this Parliament should be discussing today.

I now want to come to my own contribution to this debate.

Oh dear!

I think we have reached the stage where we can consider what progress has been made among the Coloured people in recent times as well as those spheres in which progress are still going to be made in future. From all quarters an appeal is made to this Parliament, and to hon. members opposite in particular, to shake off their indecisiveness as to the future place the Coloured people should have in our political life. This situation has become even more urgent on account of recent developments on the continent of Africa. A greater say on the part of non-Whites in their own affairs and the abandonment by Portugal of its position in Angola and Mozambique have once more focused attention on our attitude towards the Coloured people. Sir, it is not even necessary either to point out the imminent danger of increased terrorism around us. The takeover by Black nationalism in Angola and in Mozambique in the near future gave new impetus to these developments. That is why we find today that certain non-White leaders express themselves in stronger terms in a militant way, and in this way South Africa and the White legislature are to a certain extent being held to ransom.

There are thousands of Coloured people who are watching this situation and still have to decide which side they are going to support. For that reason the wise person in this House will do everything he possibly can to diffuse the situation, as was said here by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition; he would try arrive at the greatest possible measure of unity in the political thinking of Whites and of Coloureds. Against this background it is quite clear that the positive aspect of independent development for the Coloured people—and there is a positive aspect and that positive aspect is communal development—will have to gain far greater impetus; that there should be equal treatment to a far greater extent and that there should be greater opportunities for economic progress among them. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, it would be a very difficult task to furnish hon. members of the United Party with replies to their speeches. It is quite clear that not only did the Leader of the Opposition come to this House today with a policy they have never had before, but also that the policy of the party has changed between the time the hon. the Leader of the Opposition finished his speech and the hon. member for Newton Park began his speech, and I want to predict that when the hon. member for Bezuidenhout rises to speak, we shall find that they have changed their policy again.

Sir, I want to confine myself to the subject under discussion, and not waste my time furnishing replies to what hon. members of the Opposition have said here. Sir, we in South Africa are engaged in a gigantic task of emancipation. In order to be able to fulfil this task in a meaningful way, I think it is essential that both parties, the guardian and those who are being emancipated, would have to apply to themselves the golden rule of “do unto others as you want others to do unto you”, or to put it the other way around, “do not do unto others what you do not want others to do unto you”. Sir, in that spirit I want to try in the short time available to me to put myself in the place of both these parties in order to try and arrive at working norms. In the first place, I want to say that the White guardian, the White people, the White Parliament here and the Government itself should seriously ask themselves this question: Had we been in the place of the Brown people, what would we have expected of our guardians?

Sir, the first thing I would have expected of them, would have been sympathy and responsibility. I just want to say now that I have known the Leader of this party for many years. I have never come across a person acting with more sympathy and greater responsibility than the hon. the Prime Minister does when expressing himself in regard to the various peoples of South Africa. This also applies in the case of the Coloured people.

The second thing I would expect of them, is for them to recognize my human dignity. This is the task and the call of this White Parliament, this White people and this Government, to guide the Coloured people along and to help them to make a decent living, to try and promote their human dignity in general and to see to it that this human dignity will never be disparaged through any action, word or deed. The third thing I would have expected had I found myself in the position of the Coloured person, would be opportunities, opportunities for spiritual development and opportunities for intellectual development. And what do I mean by that? I mean education facilities and university facilities and opportunities to prepare myself for the life we are living. I would have expected opportunities for economic development. I would have expected opportunities for social development. These are the tasks I think this Government should strive to fulfil, and which, I want to say immediately, I think it has exerted itself to fulfil throughout all these years. But I have not come here to make excuses.

What I am doing here is to make an honest endeavour to arrive at some basis. We have made progress as far as emancipation is concerned. They who are under guardianship, and who are in the process of being emancipated, expect that progress should be made. I think they expect to be consulted on the future, and that they should not only form the subject of discussion as to what the future holds for them, but that they themselves should be consulted on the future, because only then would we be able to achieve anything. But then we should also bear in mind that the guardian would expect something in return. It is not only those who are being emancipated who have certain expectations and reservations; they who are engaged in the process of emancipating the other race would also have certain expectations and demands, and unless one appreciates the attitude of both of them, one would come to a dead end and would not achieve anything in life.

What is the first thing we would expect? We would expect a growing sense of responsibility on the part of those people we are emancipating, i.e. the Coloured people. Secondly, we expect of them to use the opportunities afforded to them for their development and for them to grab these opportunities with initiative and enterprise. I think this is a very reasonable request or expectation. In the third place, we expect of them to develop an identity of their own. I know this is a difficult task, but we expect this because the guardian has an identity of his own he does not want to share with any other nation in the world. We as Afrikaners in South Africa know only too well what we are talking about, because we have not always been the governing group in this country. For that reason we can appreciate that we are going to ask the Brown people for no more than what we have asked for ourselves. We are satisfied to assist him in developing an identity of his own. We are more than satisfied; we are prepared to help him in achieving this. However, we ask him not to claim our achievements and our identity as his own. If they want to do this, they would be doomed to failure and would never be able to become a self-respecting community and people.

My time is running out fast, but in the few minutes I still have available, I want to deal with matters in a realistic way. We have heard many theories, but let us consider which development possibilities this side is referring to. I have already made reference in a previous debate to the 10 000 morgen of the most fertile irrigation land in South Africa situated in the rural Coloured areas of, for example, the Richtersveld, in the curve of the Orange River. I challenge anyone to gainsay me in this respect. That land is situated on the banks of the Orange River, which is in permanent flow now. Those 10 000 morgen should be subdivided into small holdings of five morgen each. Not many years ago some of my own people were being rehabilitated on the banks of the Orange River in the vicinity of Kakamas on small holdings of some four morgen. I am really proud of that section of my people. The same opportunity should be afforded the Coloured population. I expect the Coloured population to approach our Government through the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council. Those two bodies should come together and decide in which way this area could be developed most rapidly. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, as he usually does, the hon. member delivered a very friendly speech. It would have been a fine speech had it been made in 1954 and not in 1974, because in his speech there is no evidence of any appreciation of the urgency of the situation as it affects the Coloured people. It may indeed be said that they expect us to be more sympathetic towards them, to show greater regard for their feelings on human dignity and their needs for spiritual, economic and social development. However, the crux of the matter is not these spheres of development, but in which way we shall succeed in affording them the opportunity to be full citizens of the country of their birth. This is the problem facing us today, whether we are on this side of the House, whether we are sitting in these benches or whether we are sitting on the other side.

†It is was in this spirit that I listened to the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. I think he did impart an element of urgency into the discussion. He did emphasize the need for change and yet, with all respect. I do think that in a sense he missed the bus, he and his colleague, the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central. I do not believe the essence of the problem lies in more and better consultation, but in joint decision-making with Coloured people at all levels of government in South Africa. I do not believe it lies in autonomy for the Coloured people within their own community; it lies in full citizenship for Coloured people within a shared South Africa. I do not believe the question of whether the Coloured people should be represented in this House should depend on the Nationalist Party’s rejection of the United Party’s policy. The Coloured people should be represented in the Parliament of South Africa, in the statutory bodies of South Africa wherever the Coloured people live and are to be found. It should not be dependent upon the Nationalist Party’s rejecting the policy of the United Party. I think the hon. Leader of the Opposition should admit that he made a ghastly mistake when two years ago he said that there would be an all-White sovereign Parliament which would be the regulator of his federal system. Let us get away from the concept of an all-White sovereign Parliament regulating anything and let us realize that the days of all-White political institutions are gone and that we are now dealing with a shared South Africa and a shared political structure. [Interjections.] I do hope that this is going to emerge. I do hope that under the pressure of events the United Party is going to abandon its policy of last year and return to its policy of four or five or six years before. [Interjections.] I want to deal particularly with the question of the Coloured Representative Council, because the National Party is confronted with a very real dilemma. Does the CRC provide the viable base on which to build the future political rights of the Coloured people? When one looks at the history of the relationship between the Government and the CRC it is one of the most distressing chapters in the history of White-Coloured relations. Seen in perspective it is one of the most inglorious chapters in the history of the National Party. It is a history of callousness, of cynicism, of insensitivity towards a subject people, to say nothing of grave errors of political judgment and of crass political stupidity. This has been the history of Government CRC relationships over the past six years. The legislative and administrative steps involving the CRC have to be seen against the background of Coloured suspicion and Coloured mistrust of the motives of White South Africans. This was latent in South Africa for decades, but it welled to the fore in the 1950s because of the numerous Acts of rejection. They were listed today by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. I am talking about the Group Areas Act, the Immorality Act and the Race Classification Act. These were all Acts which brought to the fore the mistrust of the Coloured people. The Government was insensitive to this and did not appreciate that this was the mood of the Coloured people. They showed callous disregard for the wounded feelings of Brown South Africans. They removed the Coloured representatives from this House. It is of course correct, as the hon. the Prime Minister said, that this was not an adequate form of representation, but it provided the focal point for the growth of representation, and provided the area of joint decision-making. It could have been extended to the northern provinces; it could have been extended to women; it could have been extended to allow Coloured people to represent Coloured people. Instead this was abandoned in favour of a scheme which the Government at that stage said would be a better scheme; it would be a scheme which would create more opportunities for the Coloured people, more freedom for them and a greater sense of responsibility. And so the Coloured representatives were removed on the basis of this new experiment. But from the time this experiment commenced the Government seemed to show disregard for the feelings of the Coloured people and the stature of this body. I think it is as well to know that the CRC is dead.

Is this a history lesson or a speech?

Whether the hon. member on my right likes it or not he should realize that it is dead. It is not going to be resurrected. This council was first of all packed with 20 people representing the Government-supporting party, 14 of whom were actually defeated at the polls. The chairman of the executive of the council was a person who came third in the election in his own constituency. And so all was set for a show-down. If one examines the records of the requests from the CRC and the reports that were produced each year right up to last year, one sees that the Government just ignored these requests. Time and time again they just brushed them aside with smooth words, high-sounding phrases and out and out rejections. As the CRC continued this council became more and more angry, more and more vociferous, moving towards a head-on collision with the Government. Then, last year, on two occations the leaders of the two main parties came under attack. Mr. Sonny Leon had his passport withdrawn by this Government while Mr. Tom Swartz was the target of disparaging remarks by the hon. the Minister of the Interior after he had addressed a United Party congress. The Coloured Representative Council virtually ceased to exist since that time. One therefore has the situation that the CRC ceases to exist both as a fact of government in South Africa and as a basis for the future political development of the Coloured people. If the Government was going to create such great opportunities for development through this council, they have broken down. I believe that Mr. Tom Swartz, a man who in all good faith was prepared to head an executive committee and take all the risks involved, has been humiliated by this Government. I believe the Government’s record in relation to Mr. Tom Swartz is nothing less than a disgrace. They let down a man, who, while he might have been misguided, was prepared to do his best in a way he thought was best for the Coloured people themselves. The Federal Party, which once upon a time supported separate development, but equal separate development, has now rejected the whole philosophy of apartheid and of separate development. The Labour Party is becoming more and more militant and more and more aggressive towards both the Government and the White people of South Africa. The Coloured people are less and less in the mood to compromise, less and less in the mood to negotiate, but perhaps more and more realizing that when they have to deal with this Government the only way is the way of confrontation. The decline and demise of the Coloured Representative Council is now permeating through to the management committee system. Even this system is showing signs of collapsing. The fact is that the Coloured Representative Council no longer provides the basis for the future political development of the Coloured people. Theoretical discussions about homelands, semantic discussions about separate or parallel development may serve to provide the ammunition for people who are arguing amongst each other within the National Party, but they are irrelevant as far as the future of the Coloured people is concerned. As far as the Coloured people are concerned we have to accept that they are going to be full citizens in a shared South Africa. This means full shared social, economic and political opportunity

Rather throw open the Sea Point swimming bath to them.

Yes, the hon. gentleman could come and swim in the swimming bath with his Coloured friends. Full citizenship, full equal representation of Coloured people in this House and in other houses which they share with White people in South Africa is an absolute sine qua non as far as their future political representation is concerned.

Mr. Chairman, may I ask the hon. member a question? What is the qualified franchise for Coloureds?

Exactly the same as for Whites.

We believe that whether it be on the basis of a qualified franchise or a universal franchise or a separate roll [Interjections.] … what is important is that they should have the same qualifications, the same opportunities and the same rights as the White people in a shared South Africa.

Mr. Chairman, it has become fashionable at this time to make all kinds of glib statements about the Coloureds. In this debate as well we have had to listen to a good quota of statements of this kind from the opposite side of the House. I do not intend following up on what the hon. members on the opposite side had to say in this regard. What I believe is necessary and would be a good thing is to emphasize and place in their correct perspective a few basic facts in regard to the Coloureds, who form the subject of this debate.

In general, “the Coloured person” or “the Coloureds” are referred to as though they were a homogeneous people or ethnic group. The fact of the matter is, however, that not only are the Coloured heterogeneous in appearance, but are in fact heterogeneous in ethnic descent. With the designation “Coloureds” a variety of ethnic groups is in reality being indicated. Thus there are in the first place the Griquas, who are a dwindling community situated for the most part in the North Western and North Eastern Cape. Then there are approximately 150 000 Cape Malays, descendants of Moslems from the Dutch East Indies who have remained loyal to their faith and who are to a large extent concentrated in the Cape Peninsula. There are, in addition, persons of mixed White/non-White descent, as well as persons of mixed Coloured/Bantu descent.

Apart from the difference in ethnic descent, there are among the Coloureds considerable differences in respect of politics, educational and socio-economic development as well. All Coloureds are definitely no longer on the level—and I want to emphasize that I am stating this in parentheses—of “outa Moos” and “aia Siena”, as we came to know them previously, particularly in the rural areas. But at the same time it would be absurd to wish to imply that almost every second Coloured is a potential Dr. Van der Ross, an Adam Small or a Sydney Petersen. There are in fact Coloureds who have achieved and are maintaining a high level of spiritual and moral development and material welfare. However, it is also true that the vast bulk of the Coloureds are on a far lower spiritual, cultural and moral level. Unfortunately it is also true that the more developed members of the Coloured community are all too frequently more interested in agitating for integrationist measures than in the upliftment of their own people.

Unlike the case of the various Bantu peoples, the Coloureds do not yet possess the accepted characteristics of a separate people or nation. They have no traditional homeland or own territory, within the boundaries of which an individual separate nationality can be established. They are, on the contrary, settled firmly with the Whites in those areas of the Republic of South Africa which could be regarded as being the heartland of White South Africa. They are very closely integrated into the economy of the Republic, and their destinies are inseparably linked to those of the Whites. They have no language and culture of their own, but comprise to a large extent part of the Afrikaans language and cultural community. As far as their religion is concerned, we find that approximately 90% of the Coloureds are Christians, while the Malays, as has already been mentioned are Moslems. I am mentioning these facts because any attempt to plan and to establish an acceptable and workable dispensation for the Coloureds which does not take these basic facts into account is doomed in advance to failure, however many glib statements and ideas may be made and thought out in this regard.

It is essential that any dispensation which is planned or proposed for the Coloureds will be acceptable to them. If it is not accepted by them, it cannot after all, be forced upon them or enforced with any hope of successful application. In view of this it is essential that in the dispensation which is planned and proposed for the Coloureds, cognizance should be taken of their just aspirations, needs and desires. However, it is equally essential that the proposed dispensation will also be acceptable to the White voters. Therefore, thorough consideration should be given to the interests and opinions of the Whites in this regard. To make up to the Coloureds only while disregarding the interests, sentiments and views of the Whites, as hon. members on the opposite side have consistently been doing throughout this Session, can only mar relations and do irreparable harm.

Over the years the Coloureds have already been stirred up to such an extent against the Afrikaners in general and this Government in particular that, in spite of their cultural, historic and other ties with the Afrikaner, they are prejudiced against the Afrikaners in the political sphere, and are displaying a measure of reluctance in co-operating with them in this sphere. During this session as well hon. members on the opposite side have, in season and out, raised a hue and cry over the political rights of the Coloureds, and have bandied concepts such as “sovereignty”, “self-determination”, etc., about. However, they have contributed nothing to the real promotion of the interests of the Coloureds, or to the creation of the essential infrastructure on which those political rights should be based. It is therefore clear that, if a better dispensation for the Coloureds is to be devised and applied in this country, it is only this National Party Government which is able to and will do this.

In the first and last place, it is not policies and statutory provisions which are going to determine the place of the Coloureds in this country, but attitudes, the attitudes not only of the Whites to the Coloureds, but also those of the Coloureds to the Whites. Bantu and Indians. We on our part should not, in my opinion think of the Coloureds in terms of a problem, and speak of a “Coloured problem”. At the same time, however, our actions should not be motivated by any false guilt feeling. On their part the Coloureds should display a greater willingness to co-operate with rather than to confront the Government. They should demonstrate their willingness and ability to exercise the rights which they already have in a responsible manner and to utilize the political and other machinery which has been placed at their disposal in a meaningful manner.

I believe that with unity of mind and unity of energies, a wonderful dispensation can be established for the Coloureds, on the basis of the guidelines stated on a certain occasion by the hon. the Prime Minister: In the first place, that the identity of the Whites shall be maintained; in the second place, that only the Whites themselves will determine their future in South Africa; in the third place, that the same rights which are claimed for the Whites in this regard will in due course be granted to the Coloureds as well; and in the fourth place, that peace, tranquillity and order in this country shall not be disrupted. But then the attitude adopted on both sides should be the correct one. For laws form only the skeleton of a democratic community. The people are the flesh and blood. But most important of all is the spirit and the attitude displayed. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I listened with great interest to the speech made by the hon. member for Mossel Bay. I want to tell you that I was impressed by his earnestness in this regard, as well as by his well-balanced approach. Basically, he made four statements which, it seems to me, could be of the utmost importance in this debate. The first was that no arrangement will be a valid one in South Africa if it does not meet with the approval of the Coloured population. He followed this up with a second statement, namely that any such arrangement would obviously have to meet with the approval of the White population as well. He made a third statement, namely that the suggestion that the Coloureds have an individual, separate, distinguishable identity, is simply not true, and arising out of that, that our destinies in South Africa were inseparably linked to one another. He elaborated on that. Unfortunately he did not, in the last four points which he stated here, really do justice to the logic of his own basic statements. Although it is true to say that we should continue to preserve the identity of he Whites, that only the Whites should be allowed to decide on their own future, that they do not in this regard want to share the responsibility with anyone, that we grant the Coloureds that same right, and that peace and tranquillity should be maintained in order to achieve these things, he did not arrive at the basic problem, namely how we can maintain that linking of common destinies to which he referred. How we can maintain this if we do not have the machinery by means of which Whites and Coloureds jointly, are not only able to deliberate but are able to exercise authority, as the leader of this Party said, in regard to matters of common interest he failed to tell us. That is what is at issue here.

I want to say at once that I found it appalling as newcomer to keep on discovering here that we are still hurling reproaches at one another over what the position was 20 to 30 years ago, or what people had said 20 to 30 years ago. We are not living 20 years in the past. We are living in another era. The rate at which circumstances in South Africa are changing makes it essential that we should adopt a realistic policy in view of the present circumstances. Two things are very clear. The one is that the political machine which we created for the Coloureds in the form of the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council has not succeeded in satisfying the Coloureds. It is not my desire here to score points off anyone. Yet it is very clear that that Council failed hopelessly as a political instrument to give expression to the aspirations of the Coloured population.

What is your alternative?

Let us begin by asking in what respect that Council failed. The reply is because of its constitution, because of the authority and powers which it did not have …

Because of incitement by the Whites.

… but particularly because it could not assure the Coloureds of justice and fairness, as the hon. Leader of the Opposition indicated. In view of the facts which the hon. member for Mossel Bay stated here, it is not possible for any Coloured Persons’ Council, as a separate instrument, ever to achieve those objects for the Coloureds. If it were possible to give those Coloureds a sovereign parliament in a separate geographic area, then it would be a different matter, but the basic characteristics of such separation, as the hon. member indicated, do not exist in South Africa. The possibility of a separate Parliament which can further the interests of the Coloureds in all spheres as a sovereign political institution is quite unimaginable.

What is the alternative?

Now we must seek an alternative.

Let us hear now.

Do hon. members know what I would do if I were the Government? I am not trying to evade the question. Let us be honest now. I believe that the federal structure in South Africa is going to be the inevitable method by means of which we are going to reconcile the political interests and aspirations of people with one another. I believe this. If we want to bring about a policy in South Africa in terms of which justice has to be done and the rule of law applied to every population group, without the possibility of domination of the one by the other, it is my honest conviction that the federal policy is the only solution.

What about the “baasskap Parliament? ” [Interjections.]

I believe that the facts of the situation, the facts which the hon. member for Mossel Bay and I have mentioned here, are going to force us in that direction. I see no other alternative for South Africa. If the Government of the day does not see its way clear to accepting such a policy within the framework of its ideology, it should nevertheless accept the responsibility, in the times in which we are living, of allowing the Coloureds, as far as possible, to give expression to their feelings, their frustrations and their aspirations. That is what I am asking. I just want to say that none of the alternatives which have so far been voiced from the opposite side, come anywhere near complying with those requirements. Sir, merely to create a consultative liaison body between our executive authority and the executive authority of the Coloured Persons’ Council and to hope that one will in that way be able, without that liaison body possessing any real powers, to meet the political needs of the Coloureds and what goes with it, is in my opinion futile wishful thinking. Sir, the only possibility, if we do not want to accept a federal policy is to create a body which could then, in its resolutions, bind this Parliament as well in respect of those matters which are common to the interests of both Coloureds as well as Whites. We accept that it is essential, in respect of the individual and preferable interests of the Coloureds and those of the Whites, that each group should have the highest possible degree of autonomy to manage those affairs which are inseparable from itself. On the other hand, we have no objection either to all possible authority and powers being allotted to the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council if these other matters, which made its functioning completely impossible, were eliminated. But, Sir, this is only one component of the answer, and one component of the solution which we shall have to seek in this matter. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I could not help gaining the impression that for the last two minutes of his speech, the hon. member who has just resumed his seat was waiting for the bell. We have been listening here to a typical tea-room argument. One frequently hears this type of discussion in the Lobby and in the tearoom, when we argue round and round a point without getting anywhere. Sir, it is not my intention to carry on theorizing where the hon. member for Edenvale left off. Since we have now heard the theoretician. I should like to go into the practical aspects of this Vote. Sir, it has become clear to me that even today there are more Coloureds who are interested in the improvement of their economic position than there are Coloureds who are interested in politics. There is a top layer of Coloureds today who are very interested in politics and in the political future of the Coloureds, but there are a very large number of them who do not yet take any interest whatsoever in politics. Sir, the National Party has proved that it is interested in the future of the Coloureds. The National Party has protected the Coloureds against the competition of the Bantu, and one wonders what the socio-economic position of the Coloureds would have been today if it had not been for the policy of the National Party over the past few years. Today I should like to discuss more specifically the role of our local labour committees. It is perhaps a good thing for one to glance for just a moment at the background to these committees. Sir, in 1962 a statement was issued by the National Party. At the time the hon. Minister P. W. Botha was Minister of Coloured Affairs, and a statement was issued which read as follows (translation)—

To put this into effect, certain steps were announced. Firstly, a Standing Cabinet Committee for the Western Cape was appointed. An interdepartmental committee with a full-time secretary was appointed, and a public committee of eminent persons from the Western Cape who were associated with various economic interests and organizations, was appointed. This executive committee received a function. The function of the committee was in the first place to submit proposals to the interdepartmental committee in regard to the most effective steps to carry out the policy of the National Party. In the second place, the committee had to make recommendations in regard to the gradual replacement of Bantu labour and to furnish the public, employers and employees with advice and information. In the third place, it had to be of assistance in the establishment of local committees in each magisterial district. It is these local committees which I now want to spend a little time discussing.

The objective of these committees was as follows: Firstly, to ensure the moral upliftment of Coloured failures in the magisterial district where they were then operating so as to make them full-fledged and responsible members of their community; secondly, to cause preference to be given to the available Coloured labour; and thirdly, to establish incentives which would persuade the Coloured worker to offer his labour, and also to develop qualities such as stability, reliability, higher productivity and responsibility. The functions of these labour committees have developed in the operation of these committees over a number of years, and I want to state here today that very good work has been done in various spheres. Promotional work had to be done among our people in respect of the upliftment and the training of our Coloureds. I say that we have today, to a very large extent already, realized the initial functions of these committees. But these committees were given a further objective as well, namely liaison with Coloured leaders and organizations, in order to decide on joint action to overcome labour and related problems. With this we have also made a start already. I want to tell you, Sir, that in my constituency the local labour committee consulted with the advisory committee of the town council which existed at that time, and we told these people: We want to discuss matters with you and negotiate on such matters as the negative approach to work which exists among some of your people, and we want to discuss with you the abuse of pensions which exists, and the unemployment which exists, and in addition we should also like to hear what you have to say to us in regard to steps which can be tried out by employers to persuade the Coloured worker to offer his services. We should like to hear from you what deficiencies exist, according to you, on the part of the employers which are prejudicing the labour situation and which are preventing the Coloured worker from coming forward to offer his services. We want to hear your proposals. Sir, this meeting took place, with very good results. Now I feel that as far as the future of these committees is concerned, since it is no longer necessary to convince the Whites that they should train their people that they should pay them good salaries, and that they should provide their people with social services, we should now move in this direction of liaison, and more liaison. There should be more meetings of this type where we can consult with similar committees such as these labour committees of the Coloureds, and exchange opinions. The hon. member for Namakwaland said that we do not want to talk about these people, but talk with them. The National Party is honest in its policy. It is honestly concerned about the progress and the welfare of the Coloureds, and for that reason we want to talk to them and listen to their ideas and thoughts as well. I feel that we could make an appeal to the hon. the Minister to adopt such a course in the further development of these committees. What I should very much like to see is the appointment of a permanent representative on these committees in the form of a secretary from the department. It is one of the problems experienced in regard to these committees that there is not always an active and energetic secretary. Our experience has been that when a member of the staff of the Department of Coloured Affairs acted as secretary to a committee, business proceeded smoothly and everything went well. It does not seem to me as though I will be able to touch upon the matters which I wanted to touch upon in the time which is left to me. However, I want to return briefly to these labour committees. [Times expired.]

Mr. Chairman, when the National Party came into power in 1948, it was the declared policy of the party that the Coloureds should be represented in this Parliament by one Senator and three members of the House of Assembly. That was the policy on which the party was voted into office. The three members of the House of Assembly would not be elected directly, but through the Coloured Council. It was only 22 years later that the Government abolished the representation of Coloureds in this Parliament, and with that threw overboard the principle of representation of the Coloureds in Parliament. This may perhaps have satisfied the negative apartheid spirit of that time, but I believe that time will show that that step was one of the greatest political blunders the Government party ever made. There are various reasons for this, but I want to mention only two. The first is that it seriously undermined the credibility of the Government’s policy of separate development, or “separate sovereignties” for all South Africa’s peoples, as it is called, for wherever the Government has to explain the policy of separate sovereignties today in its full consequences, the explanations founder time and again on the question: “What about the Coloured population?” Immediately the Government is in a quandary and this makes its entire approach sound and appear spurious and suspect. There is no one who thinks or who will ever think that there can be a different destiny for the Brown man in South Africa than that of the Whites.

Another reason why I believe that the abandonment of the principle of the representation of Coloureds in this Parliament was a political blunder for the National Party, is the fact that the National Party has since that time not floundered about so helplessly, remained so uncertain and voiced so many conflicting opinions in regard to anything else as it has in regard to the question of what political future it foresees for the Coloureds. It was, in addition, that step which gave rise to the laughable idea of an artificial homeland for the Coloureds, somewhere along the dry West Coast of this country.

How serious the quandary for the governing party is as a result of this step which it took appears from the following. A week or two ago the hon. the Minister of Defence addressed a conference of young people in Kimberley and he then encouraged them to seek what he called a “unique solution” to the position of the Coloured population. I do not think that any reasonable person would object to a unique solution, provided that it was indeed a solution which would be generally accepted, and particularly by the Coloured community. What is interesting about this situation is that this was not the first time that the hon. the Minister of Defence had spoken of searching for a unique solution. Nine or ten years ago he was himself Minister of Coloured Affairs, and the principle mental effort in regard to the future of the Coloureds was then his responsibility. What was the guidance which he then gave? In September 1965 he said the following before the Congress of the National Party in the Cape, referring specifically to the Coloured community (translation)—

That was nine years ago. There is nothing wrong with the hon. the Minister of Defence, who is also the Cape leader of his party, seeking a unique solution to the position of the Coloureds. Nor is there anything wrong with his asking his party to help him seek for one. What is significant, however, is that after nine years he is seeking as much as he was at the beginning, and is even making up to the children of Kimberley to ask them, after all these years, to help him seek the unique solution. The hon. the Minister and hon. members on the opposite side will discover one thing, namely that all their searching for a unique solution will be in vain, for the simple reason that they will have to choose between two traditional solutions. The two traditional solutions between which they will have to choose are, firstly, that of baasskap, and included under that is everything which denies the Coloureds the principle of representation on those authoritative bodies or body where decisions affecting their lives and future, together with those of the Whites, are taken. By that I mean of course a body such as this Parliament. The Government can create just as many liaison bodies as it likes, and no one will oppose it, but as long as the liaison bodies remain part of the system where the final and binding decisions on everything affecting the real interests of the Coloureds will remain the responsibility of the Whites, so long will those bodies as well continue to fall into the category of the baasskap approach. As all of us know and ought to realize today, baasskap at its best can only be a temporary “solution”. The only alternative, in fact the only course which will indeed be a solution, is that of collaboration and co-operation, and not separate development which has set the Coloureds on a road to nowhere. Co-operative development must be the direction, and in the political sphere this entails the recognition of the basic principle of citizenship, namely that the Coloured community will receive participation, I am emphasizing the word “participation” in bodies, even the highest, where binding and enforceable decisions are taken which affect their weal and woe to exactly the same extent as that of the Whites.

As in this Parliament?

Yes, can the hon. member not hear?

But say it then.

I have said it. The principle which has to apply is that in bodies in which binding and enforceable decisions are taken in regard to them, the Coloureds must have participation. If that principle is accepted, there can be consultation in regard to its application and the best method of doing so. Regardless of whether we move in the direction of a federation or a confederation in South Africa or remain a unitary state, that principle has to be accepted, regardless of whatever system we introduce here. In other spheres, this entails the elimination of discrimination and an eventual system of open, free and voluntary association and communication between the White man and the Brown man. We hear such a great deal about identity, as we did again here today. Take the instrument forms of open communication which have developed for generations between the Afrikaner and the English-speaking South African. Would anyone tell me today that any of the two White groups, which have been living in that intimate association, have lost their identity? The Afrikaner least of all has lost his identity. The co-operation between Afrikaans and English-speaking people did not detract from the existence, and the right to exist, of separate and individual schools, churches, cultural bodies, business bodies, clubs or whatever hon. members may care to mention. This has not been enforced by any government. This was individual choice within an open community where a specific cultural group freely chose to preserve its identity in its own manner. Why did the identity of the Afrikaner, in that intimate association, which developed for generations, not go under? On the contrary, it grew stronger. The English-speaking person is not a threat to the Afrikaner and the Afrikaner is not a threat to the English-speaking person, but suddenly they see among two groups which are even further removed from one another a threat to the identity.

What about the identity of the Coloureds?

I know that there are hon. members on that side of the House who will say “never this” or “never that”, when it comes to the Coloureds. They are welcome to say that. After all, we heard time and again in this House that there would “never be television”. Where is the Minister of the Interior today?

He never said that.

Yes, it was said: “There will never be television” and “There will never be mixed sport as long as the National Party is governing”. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I am not a member of the Coloured group of the National Party. I would not have participated in the discussion, but I want to convey my thanks to the Whips of the National Party for having afforded me this opportunity now of participating in this debate. I have been experiencing something today which means a very great deal to me personally, and this is the only personal note I shall sound here today. I am experiencing today the complete justification of my decision to leave the United Party on the opposite side and join the National Party.

Hear, hear!

Nothing made this clearer to me than the conduct of the hon. member of Bezuidenhout who has just resumed his seat. He showed that the United Party is like a weather-vane the policy of which is determined by the direction in which the wind is blowing at that moment. He showed me something which could best be compared with the animal kingdom. It is that the United Party is a political cheetah, for I have just …

I always thought it was a two-faced jackal.

No. A few days ago I read about the problem which nature conservationists have in ensuring the survival of the cheetah. The greatest problem they have is that the mother devours her own offspring. We have seen today how the United Party, and particularly the hon. member for Bezuidenhout on behalf of the United Party, devours its own offspring. In order to explain this, I just want to tell hon. members something. I am not disclosing any secrets because the United Party’s standpoint towards the Coloureds is a matter of public history. When the National Party came forward in 1948 with the measures to remove the Coloureds from the common voters’ roll, the United Party, and I with them, fought this to the utmost. In that way we caused one constitutional crisis after another. We had the country up in arms and we had protest marches through the streets of the cities of South Africa.

At that time Japie was here.

Yes, then Japie was sitting on this side. I beg your pardon, I mean the hon. member for Bezuidenhout was sitting on this side. Then, eventually, after court cases and appeal cases the Coloureds were placed on a separate voters’ roll. The United Party then had to adopt an attitude as to whether it would restore them to a common voters’ roll. Under the leadership of Mr. Strauss we were unable to take that decision. We could not agree on that. Then, under the leadership of the present Leader of the Opposition, who is a man, we adopted a standpoint, namely to restore the Coloureds to the voters’ roll as it was prior to 1948. I take my hat off to the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. He had the courage. However, we had to defend that standpoint, and it was then that we discovered that we had been fighting all the time for an untenable, undefendable standpoint. What did we then have to ask the people of South Africa? The people of South Africa, fortunately, had enough sense not to listen to what we had to ask, namely: Allow us to restore a group of male Coloured voters in the Cape to the voters’ roll on a monstrosity such as a qualified franchise. Nowhere in South Africa, however, did we have a dispensation for the Coloured women, nor for the male Coloured voters in the Free State and the Transvaal, where they comprise the second largest group. We then had a slightly watered-down dispensation for Natal. We were placed in an illogical, untenable, ridiculous position. In 1961, at the National Congress of the United Party, I was entrusted with the task of informing those people that we were adhering to an untenable standpoint and that we should adopt a different standpoint. That congress agreed to that unanimously. With this as the main reason, we then came forward with our federal policy. It was a logical answer, whether or not it was acceptable, whether or not it was feasible; it was something which one could defend on a logical basis. The basis of the policy was self-determination, to the greatest possible extent, for every community, but with one central Parliament in which everyone, either through their own people or through others would be represented in a central federal parliament.

Hear, hear!

That was perhaps a mistake, but it was defendable. It was logical and precedents for it existed throughout the world. Two years ago the United Party appointed a commission. I was not a member of it. And can you believe it, like a cheetah, they devoured that offspring. [Laughter.] They said they no longer advocated a central parliament, a parliament in which everyone would have representation. They now advocated a White parliament on the basis of pure baasskap.

[Inaudible.]

This parliament would determine the fortunes of everyone in South Africa. This parliament would, in its discretion, transfer its powers to a federal council. When it eventually came to the real powers, not even the sovereign White parliament would be able to transfer these powers. This would take place after a referendum which would be held among the White voters of South Africa only. In this way they devoured their offspring. [Laughter.] I could not stomach it, and many others could not stomach it either.

It was a new policy.

Today I am constrained to hear from the Leader of the Opposition that the United Party …

Perhaps it was still your own child.

No, it was not my child. I did not serve on that commission. You are forcing me now to reveal that I criticized this in the caucus of the United Party at the first opportunity I had. The Leader of the Opposition said that he had never before heard such a stupid standpoint as mine. This afternoon I am being justified by what is happening at present. [Interjections.] The Leader of the Opposition is now saying that if one does not accept a federal policy, one must allow Coloureds into Parliament. That I can still understand: However, the next speaker on that side was the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central who said that the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council, as part of the federal set-up of the policy of the United Party, should not be given the right…

Under the policy of this Government.

I already have the Hansard of the hon. member here. He must be careful now. I am quoting—

Why not?

There is no reason “why not”, except that it is disloyal to the immediate past of the United Pary. [Interjections.] Sir, that is not all. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout then confirmed this in reply to a question, that he advocated that this Parliament, which has to take meaningful decisions, for the Coloureds as well, should afford the Coloureds representation. I am not criticizing the policy—I shall gladly argue that point with them—but I am criticizing the inconstancy, the changeability, the unreliability, the inconsistence and the lack of principles which characterize that party when it comes to the questions affecting the Coloureds in South Africa. [Interjections.] They can make as much noise as they like. Sir, a guilty conscience is always a noisy thing. Let them make a noise. I have infinitely more confidence in people who adopt an honest, consistent standpoint …

Oh my goodness!

… who say they stand for a White baasskap parliament, a White parliament which will exercise power over every one in South Africa. I prefer people who have the courage to say: “We stand for a White Parliament which will always exercise power over the Whites over South Africa, and we prefer another dispensation for the other peoples of South Africa. We do not expect to exercise power over them for always, and we do not have the vetoing provisions either to make it difficult to do justice to them.” [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I noticed throughout the early part of this afternoon that the hon. member for Turffontein was getting very excited. It appeared to us that he had come out of a long hibernation, and we wondered what it was that stirred him to life. I thought, as I studied him during the afternoon, that maybe his conscience had come to life. The question arises whether—I put the question in a purely zoological sense—in fact such an animal as a chemeleon, a political chameleon, has a political conscience. I am not sure whether it is a political question …

Ask Japie!

We have heard from the hon. member for Turffontein a dissertation on United Party history and policy. This was very interesting. If this truly is how he understood it and still understands it, we forgive him for leaving us. But, in fact, we doubt whether he has ever really understood it, and he certainly does not appear to understand it now. However, in order to remind him what he used to think of that policy not very long ago, I quote:

For once I am delighted to associate myself with the sentiments of that hon. member.

That was before you made the fifth change in your policy.

I shall leave the hon. gentleman at that because I do not think that he made any constructive contribution to this debate. In fact, I listened to a number of speakers representing Piketberg. Oudtshoorn, Namakwaland, Mossel Bay, Malmesbury and Turffontein. I think that some of these hon. members—with the exception of the hon. member for Turffontein—made interesting and constructive contributions to this debate. However, I think it is also fair to say that not one of them brought us any nearer to any kind of Nationalist Party solution of this particular problem. I can say honestly and sincerely that I listened with great attentiveness hoping to hear of some real advance, some new break-through, some new inspiration. I think that if hon. members opposite wish to be entirely honest, they will agree with me that there has not been such a thing this afternoon. We wait hopefully for some news from that quarter of the House.

Surely it is common cause on both sides of this House that we are facing a critical problem? We know that on the manner in which we solve this problem depends the future of our race relations, the good order and progress of South Africa, international goodwill and such questions as the security of our defence system. All these things to a greater or lesser degree are interdependent and depend in part upon our solution to this problem. In response to this we have had over the months and years and again this afternoon, uncertainty, speculation and vacillation. The replies that we have had from that side of the House cause us more concern than relief. If there is truly a belief on that side of the House that this problem can be solved by slogans and clichés, surely then it is time to rethink and to reconsider our position?

In the time available to me I want to put briefly four propositions which have emerged in various forms from what was said by speakers on that side of the House. One solution that seems to have emerged is that one should search for a primarily political solution to this problem. In other words, one would more or less bypass the urgent economic and social requirements of our time, abdicate direct responsibility on the part of the Government of the day to solve those problems and say more or less this: We shall give to the Coloured people certain political powers through their own institutions which will enable them to solve those problems for themselves. It therefore poses this question: Must the Coloured people then acquire sufficient political power either through the CRC or through other supplementary institutions or with them, to gain their own salvation without this Government? If one takes this kind of view, there are two possibilities to be faced. One will have to create institutions for the Coloured people which will be of such a nature that they can hold their own with reactionary White sentiments, overcome conservative White sentiments and overcome White reaction in those areas where Coloured interests should be paramount. Is it possible to create such institutions? Will the White people of South Africa, will the Nationalist Party, tolerate an institution in which the Coloured people can insist on making their own interests paramount? That is the question which the Nationalist Party has got to face if it sees the route to the salvation of the Coloured people through a political institution.

There is another school of thought which seems to emerge, and this is that the Coloured people can make do with inferior, that is to say, subordinate institutions provided you add to this better liaison institutions together with a gradual social and economic progress. Sir, this looks very much like the paternalism that has been going on for many years. If the time were available and if the temper of the people allowed it, maybe we could possibly coast along in this manner, but I believe that both sides of this House would agree that there is not the time and that the temper is not right for this kind of gradualism.

Sir, there is another sentiment which one finds emerging, and I would call it “the game of delay”. It may be that in the minds of some people there is a kind of deliberately planned frustration policy. This I would ascribe to those people who secretly, clandestinely, believe that the whole problem will eventually be solved along the homeland self-development lines. It might be believed by such people that through apartheid measures, through the group areas, through race segregation, economic bribes, despondency and rejection, the Coloured people will then themselves say in despair: “All right, for heaven’s sake, give us a homeland; let us get out of this place; we cannot live with people like you.” They will create an emotion of rejection and in this way the homeland apologists, the homeland advocates, will at last triumph. Sir, is the fourth possibility the true one, that there is really no answer as yet; that in fact what we heard from that side of the House this afternoon is true and that there is really no answer; that they will go on improvising, that they will go on procrastinating, that there will be constant sematic evasions that we will constantly hear of “unieke oplossing”, of “buurskap”, “junior en senior vennote”, “’n nasie in wording”, “parallelle ontwik-keling”, and so forth ad infinitum—smokescreen after smokescreen? Sir, this “pie in the sky” policy is going to solve nothing. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, if, arising out of recent events in the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council, the opinion has taken root in the minds of the public of South Africa that the politics of the Coloured leaders is confusing and if that idea has perhaps taken root among the Coloureds themselves, viz. that their political leaders are in a state of confusion, then I think that this arises out of the chaotic confusion in respect of lines of action which was evident today from the speeches of hon. members of the Opposition, because within half an hour or more we witnessed the United Party’s policy changing for the umpteenth time, as the hon. member for Turffontein also indicated.

Mention the changes.

Sir, not only is it a policy which has changed, but one was given the impression of desperate irrationality, and that is why the hon. member who spoke just before I did, tried to project that image one finds among them on to this side, but, Sir, it is no good; that kind of confusion does not exist on this side. This side knows what it wants and, as the hon. member for Turffontein, who formerly differed from us, said, it projects that image towards the Coloured population as well. What this party undertakes to do, it does. Let us differ on that point, but let us then also ensure, when we make certain statements here, that they are responsible statements. Sir, this afternoon I want to mention the hon. the Leader of the Opposition by name. He made a very irresponsible statement here today, apart from the other statement that he again wants to relate the situation of our Coloureds to the situation of the population of Mozambique, as he did during the Budget debate. I want to tell him once again that this is a far-fetched comparison. I do not think that our Coloureds, in the process of growth and development they are undergoing at this stage, would like their situation to be compared with that of the population in Mozambique.

Sir, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition said here this afternoon that he held the Government responsible for the inferior educational facilities and opportunities available to the Coloured. Sir how one-sidedly can one view a situation? Look at the way the situation with regard to Coloured education has changed, thanks to the dispensation that has applied over the past five years, namely the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council having an Executive of its own, a member of the Executive in charge of education, and an Executive which takes an interest in this matter and is continually giving attention to it. In 1969, in the first year, there were 1 693 primary schools. In this year, 1974, there are 1 792 primary schools. In 1969 the number of teachers at the primary level was 13 351. This year it is 16 743. In 1969 the number of pupils at the primary school level was 438 545; this year it is 530 222. I could continue in this way and could detail for you the same tendency as reflected by these figures, in regard to secondary schools, special schools, technical colleges and training institutions, of which there is a fine concentration here in Bellville South. I think the hon. member’s problem is that when a group of members from this side of the House went to look at it a week or two ago—among the best educational facilities in the country—and when even an hon. member from the Progressive Party accompanied us, he was busy with an emergency caucus of his party. No one was able to come along to see and to appreciate what is being done there. I could continue in this way and mention that the introduction of compulsory education for Coloured children from the age of seven years was approved early this year. It has already been approved that from next year on, eight-year olds will be subject to compulsory education. This bears testimony to enormous progress, and if the hon. the Leader of the Opposition fails to acknowledge this and then, in his political vendetta against the Government, makes a statement such as the one he made here this afternoon, then I should like to quote to the hon. the Leader from the report of the Education Council for Coloured Persons.

What year?

For the year 1973.

A year late again.

Sir, will the hon. Leader give me a chance now to read what I should like to read to him? I hope that he takes note of it. That council, which consists of Coloured educationalists, states—

1. (a) The Council regards the introduction of compulsory education as an historic step forward and regards it as one of the greatest—if not the greatest—step forward in the historical development of education for the Coloured people in this country.
2. (b) The introduction of compulsory education barely ten years after the take over of education from the provincial authorities by the Administration of Coloured Affairs, crowns the lively development of education in this era and also the intensive research which has been done in recent years.

Sir, I want to ask the Leader of the Opposition in all seriousness with what intention he lays this charge against the Government and also against the Coloured Persons’ Representative Council.

After 26 years you ought to be ashamed of yourself.

He states that the position is so bad, but this is the report given by Coloured educational leaders. I want to ask the hon. the Leader of the Opposition to be a little more responsible when discussing these matters, in respect of which we can furnish a great deal of evidence.

And how are they not complaining about the classrooms?

Since the hon. member refers to that now, I agree that the Coloureds do complain about it. However, they sit around a table with us and discuss their needs. We understand their difficulties as far as double-shift classes are concerned. But half a loaf is better than no bread and I want to point out to the hon. member that in the haste to introduce compulsory education, one cannot provide all those facilities overnight. But I also want to tell the hon. member, if he wants to take note of this, that the Cabinet has approved an amount of R21 million, additional to the amount that has already been approved, to be utilized in the planning of school building facilities for Coloureds for the years 1975 to 1978. The Executive spoke to us again recently and said that the need was so great that this amount would have to be increased. This matter will enjoy the earnest attention of the Government. But I do want to tell the hon. member that that Executive, the institution about which hon. members want to give the impression that it has failed and means nothing to its people, co operates with the Government and achieves results of this nature which give rise to the progress I have indicated to hon. members. I could continue …

Please don’t.

Who is the hon. member who said “Please don’t”?

I said it.

I know the hon. member is afraid to hear the truth, but I shall not hesitate to tell him the truth if he is prepared to listen.

Those figures mean absolutely nothing. [Interjections.]

Order!

I could continue and mention the increase in study bursaries. In 1969, 1 246 new study bursaries were granted to Coloureds for a total amount of R290 600. In 1974, 4 355 were granted for a total amount of R1 341 900.

What does that mean?

It means absolutely nothing.

If the hon. member tells me it means nothing …

Tell us about your policy.

If the hon. member tells me it means nothing, I want to ask him what does mean anything.

I do not want to listen to a lot of figures; I want to hear what the policy is.

Why are so many Coloureds dissatisfied.

I could also give the increase in the number of teachers. [Interjections.] Do you see, Mr. Chairman, the hon. members are not interested in this. They do not want to know anything about it. They do not want to see progress; they want to see deterioration because they have been brought under the impression by their own people that there is no progress. They do not want to see progress, but I shall not allow that to stop me from telling the truth. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the debate on the Coloureds is a very important debate for us every year. I am very grateful to have been able to listen to the hon. the Leader of the Opposition and also to the hon. the Leader of the Progressive Party, because in South Africa is important not only to listen to the leader and the members of the governing party, but it is also extremely important for the inhabitants of the whole of South Africa to listen to the leaders of the various White parties. It is also very important for the leader of each political party and of every national group to provide an answer to the population questions of South Africa. In the times that lie ahead we shall have to listen to an ever-increasing extent to what the non-White leaders of parties say about how they see the solution of South Africa’s population questions. Today I want to deal in particular with the hon. the Leader of the Progressive Party and the speech he made. This is extremely important and that is why I am so pleased that the Progressive Party has in fact won seats to enable us to listen to their solution to the questions of South Africa more often. I want to tell the hon. the Leader of the Progressive Party that I have not yet had many answers from him, in the course of this session, to the major questions with which South Africa is struggling. I want to deal with a letter and its reply in Deurbraak of September 1974. A person wrote a letter to Deurbraak and under the heading “What is the future of the Whites under the Progressive policy?” he put certain questions. In replying to these questions I shall come to the question of what the replies would be if a Coloured were to put those questions to the Progressive Party. The author, an Afrikaner, writes (translation)—

Now comes the reply from the Progressive Party through the mouth of the editor, Mr. Van Eck. This is the reply which the Progressive Party furnishes to the Afrikaner and the White, as well as to each race group in South Africa, because there is one thing which we in South Africa cannot reason away, namely that there are not only different individuals, but also different national communities which are so much a reality that one will never be able to reason them away. Here, then, is the reply furnished by the Progressive Party, the great learned, rich party. The heading in Deurbraak is “No guarantees for continued existence”. They go on to say (translation)—

I now want to ask the Leader of the Progressive Party when the day will come when the Progressive Party will tell us on what ethical principles qualified franchise rests. The hon. Leader should not laugh now. He always laughs off everything when one is discussing a serious matter [Interjections.] The Progressive Party must tell us what is the content of qualified franchise, how they would apply it in South Africa and what the moral principles are on which it rests. When, as they foresee it, will all the Coloured people in South Africa have the full franchise? I ask this question because the Progressive Party and the Young Turks of the United Party are an extension of British Imperialism’s attitude of “Equal rights for all civilized men”. This is a historical matter, but the hon. member for Edenvale says that we should not talk about history. Surely one cannot escape from history in South Africa. The hon. members’ opinions grew out of a specific way of thinking and they represent a way of thinking that has been rejected throughout Africa. That is why I am now asking the Progressive Party to reply to this question for the Coloureds, too. When do they foresee every Coloured man and woman having the full franchise here in South Africa? The Progressive Party then goes further and states (translation)—

Let us now analyse this. The majority of voters would not be Brown people, but Black people. Therefore they would have to say to the Coloureds, just as they say to the Afrikaner and the White man, “We can give you no guarantees”. A disputable academic point is whether the Coloureds, in their diversity and their historic depth, have a certain approach to life peculiar to themselves, certain things characteristic of them alone, and whether or not they are also characteristic of that of the White man, does not matter. There are many things in respect of which the Coloureds may be clearly identified. They have a language, a religion, a culture and many other things which are not the same as those of the Venda, the Xhosa or the Zulu. However, this great party with the high degree of morality tells the Coloureds that they cannot give them a guarantee in South Africa, because the majority of the people who will govern South Africa will be Black people. What future do those people have then? Then the hon. the Leader of the Progressive Party states that they have the solution to the population question of South Africa in respect of the Coloureds too! The Progressive Party has no solution for South Africa and its people. They may be living in a dream world, thinking that a certain elect, the rich and the learned, will be able to carve out a niche for themselves in South Africa and enslave the other people to them, as there have been people throughout the history of man who, through their wealth and learnedness, have been placed in a position of power to subject other people to their will. The Progressive Party will enslave not only the White man and the Afrikaner, but also the Coloureds in South Africa, just as it will enslave the Zulu, the Xhosa and the Venda, or whoever. They have no solution to the problem. The majority of voters, that party states, will be the Black people. They then go further and say—

Not only the Whites, but the Coloureds too, will always be a minority group.

But is that not true?

But that is just the problem. The Progressive Party does not have a solution to the population question in South Africa. They acknowledge it. They simply tell the Whites that they are a minority and that they must accept that. Similarly, they tell the Coloureds the same. They simply tell the Venda that they are in a minority and they have to accept that. But who, then, is to govern us? The hon. members of the Progressive Party want a small, select group of people who are prepared to give up their identity, made up from each of the Bantu peoples and a small select group from the Indian population as well as a small group from the Coloured population to form the government of South Africa. This would be determined in accordance with the qualified franchise. Do we not know that problem from our history? One first states that Std. 6 is the qualifying level of education, but when there are too many people in Std. 6 one makes it Std. 8. To begin with, the qualifying salary that must be earned is, say, R1 000, but just as soon as a number of people are earning R1 000, the qualification is shifted upwards. The Progressive Party is not a party to be trusted.

That is absolute nonsense.

The reply of the Progressive Party goes on to say that there would have to be a strong reformed Senate. As far as the group of Afrikaners who clutch feverishly at their identity, and as far as the group of Coloureds who clutch feverishly at their identity are concerned the hon. members do want to comfort them. What is the solution those hon. members offer? Firstly there is a strong reformed Senate which will be able to veto laws coming from the House of Assembly. In order to be elected, a senator would have to indicate support … [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Rissik addressed a number of interesting questions but he did not address them to this side of the House, the official Opposition, but to the Progressive Party. I take it that they will endeavour, in the course of this debate, to furnish the hon. member with a reply. However, I do not want to go any further than the “endeavour”.

I want to return to the subject of this debate. The subject of this debate is the future of more than two million people. They are people who are not blind and who can read, they are not deaf and they can hear, and they are people who participate indirectly in the argumentation of hon. members across the floor of this House. I asked myself a question, which is what my summary of this debate would have been if I had been a Brown man. The hon. member for Namakwaland posed the same question. I would have been rather disappointed. I have no doubt at all that this is what would have passed through the mind of any Brown man.

Here we have two million people whose destinies have for 26 years been in the hands of one Government. What has happened over 26 years, more than a quarter century, could only have happened as a result of the action and the conduct of one Government. This afternoon we find the spectacle—I cannot call it anything else—of hon. members opposite attacking us because of our lack of policy. They attack us because we dare say that they do not have a policy, knowing full well that after 26 years they are still wandering around in the wilderness of ignorant policy-seeking, and still have no answer. What did we hear from the hon. the Deputy Minister? Before the debate I heard a rumour that we could perhaps hear a new note from the Government in this debate. It is not yet too late. However, I listened to the hon. the Deputy Minister and he, too, referred to this side of the House as if we were in a state of irrational, helpless confusion, although his party, in the person of an hon. Minister of the Republic of South Africa, goes to the young children to ask them to help that party find a unique solution. Who is in a state of confusion now? What has been achieved in respect of this problem, after all these things have been said? What did that hon. gentleman achieve in that way in respect of a solution to this burning issue in South Africa. A few months ago this Government came into power once again. In the normal course of events it will remain in power for a further five years.

Thirty-five years.

Whether it is five years or 30 years, have you thought what could happen in the next five years as far as the race and the population set-up of South Africa is concerned? Do you realize that over the next five years you will most probably be required to reply to this burning issue?

During this time your policy will change a few more times.

Sir, what do we have from the hon. members? Nothing whatsoever. They continue to tell us that there are specific points with which the Coloureds are dissatisfied. The hon. member for Moorreesburg said the other day that there is a great debate in progress in the country among the Whites. I want to say that the debate is not only in progress among the Whites. By the way, what did the hon. the Deputy Minister contribute to this debate this afternoon? Precisely nothing. That debate is not in progress among the Whites only.

What about the debate in your own ranks?

That debate is also in progress among the non-Whites. The catalogue of dissatisfaction and frustration which my hon. Leader mentioned here, is not what I say, but it is what they, the Coloureds, say. It is not I that you have to satisfy. You have to satisfy the two million people with your attempt to find a solution to this problem in South Africa. Where do you think you will find the consensus if you do not satisfy them?

What is your solution?

There you have it. [Interjections.] After 26 years that hon. member finds himself in such a state of ignorance in regard to his own policy that he asks me whether I have a solution. [Interjections.] His party does not have a solution. Let me just say to the hon. member that to hurl questions from all quarters across the floor of the House contributes nothing to this debate. [Interjections.] My hon. Leader said: “I have a policy in which I have full confidence,” but the Government is in power. Precisely because we expect the problems, particularly on the population front, to flare up to such an extent over the next five years that an answer will be required, my hon. Leader said: “I am prepared to put aside my policy, provided the Government is able to find a consensus.”

What policy will he put aside?

Sir, with all due respect, the hon. member for Turffontein is too old and has been in politics too long to ask such an objectionable question.

You must please help me.

My leader said in this House that he is prepared to set aside his policy and if the Government is able to find a consensus with these two million people, he is prepared to offer his assistance to find a solution to those urgent questions.

To carry out your old policy?

Not only did the hon. gentleman subordinate his party and his party interests to the interests of South Africa, not only did he put the interests of South Africa and our population problems first, but he also stated that he was prepared to abandon petty political debating points. He said: “I shall help you.” What is the reply? The reply is precisely nothing. I am saying this afternoon that it is a burning issue, and my hon. friends opposite will not deny that it is a burning issue.

He is Harry all over.

What would become of this country if we find people on the Government benches from among whose number a person like the hon. the Deputy Minister of Coloured Affairs rises to his feet and hopes that he is solving this problem by furnishing us with a lot of figures? Let me tell my hon. friend that I am the last to say that the Government has done nothing in the socio-economic sphere. [Interjections.] Let me add the following for the sake of that hon. gentleman, and he must never forget this: The higher the Coloureds climb up the ladder of socio-economic development, the harder and the more urgently will they knock at the door of political rights. Do not make the mistake …

How will they know what you are offering? You say something different every year.

They do not even know what the Government is offering.

They know.

How can they know?

They rejected it.

What you offer, they rejected. There is no doubt whatsoever about that. That is the position we have now reached. I put it to you again that you are boasting with your socio-economic upliftment, and I wish that I could join you in your boast. I ask you again what reply you find to the burning political issue with which you have been confronted in the case of the Coloureds. I am speaking as an Afrikaner. I am speaking to my fellow-Afrikaners.

[Inaudible.]

Yes, that is correct. I am proud of my past. My political youth was among the most interesting in South Africa.

What about your future?

I am speaking to my fellow Afrikaners. I am asking you in particular, who is aware of the power of politics, how you can allow such a situation to develop? You want to tell me that you have a policy? How can you allow this situation to develop? Surely you know you are heading for a detonating point.

All that will explode is the United Party, and you with it.

No, remember that if the detonating point is reached, it is not only the United Party that will explode, but you as well. The difference is that you will have been responsible for it.

No, you are mistaken.

I say today, in view of the offer made by my Leader … [Time expired.]

Sir, I have appreciation for the note on which the hon. member for Maitland concluded his speech, where he tried to interpret the Afrikaner way of thinking to this side of the House. I think, however, that if he wishes to interpret that way of thinking, he should accept the idiom of this side of the House, or before he accepts it, he should first reflect on it, for then he will really be able to interpret the Afrikaner way of thinking, the Nationalist way of thinking and the meaningful way of thinking in regard to politics in South Africa.

We listened to quite a number of crisis speeches on the opposite side. These were crisis speeches, crisis thinking, etc., as if all and sundry should now flee. There are two things I want to say at once. A responsible Government cannot ignore these things. It has to do the right thing at the right time. If a responsible Government wishes to flee, however, or run with all and sundry, or allow itself to be stampeded, it cannot perform its task in a responsible, moderate and far-sighted way.

Even an Opposition cannot do that.

This is what this side of the House wants to do. The hon. member opposite has now implied that we have no standpoint. I think he was looking in the mirror. He must have been doing that, for it is that side of the House that has no solution, so much so that the Leader of the Opposition intimated that he is prepared to forgo his politics and his policy completely. He will forget about it completely if only we could suggest something acceptable. [Interjections.] One is dealing with an Opposition which does not believe in its own case. [Interjection.] It does not believe in its own case, for it is prepared to exchange it. [Interjections.]

Order!

The policy of the National Party has a definite foundation. Its relations’ policy has a definite foundation, and the first point is the recognition and acceptance of the group basis of the ethnic multiplicity of the South African population. The Progressive Party refers to “the Coloured people” and the United Party refers to “the Coloured people”, but when it comes to the meaningful political effect of the implications of this, they have forgotten it. Then they want to stir up the whole mixture into “one common society”. Surely that is absolute nonsense. Surely one cannot take such a political step in South Africa. [Interjections.] On the one hand one wishes to recognize the various ethnic groups in their existence, but when it comes to the point where one wants to carry the political implications of this further, one wishes to deny it!

The second principle is that the domination of one ethnic group by another, cannot be maintained indefinitely. It is the National Party which says this. We do not require lessons from the United Party or the Progressive Party to teach us that one cannot have eternal domination of one people by another. It is in fact the policy of the National Party which is simultaneously separation-orientated on the one hand and development-orientated on the other, and what this amounts to is that one has to effect separation, so that the one does not dominate the other politically or has to interfere in the social structure of the other. That is the basis of the policy of the National Party. For that very reason efforts are being made to achieve the eventual transfer of an effective say to the non-White peoples.

How?

Let me quote to that hon. member what Prof. Vosloo, I think, of Stellenbosch said (translation)—

Then he goes on to say—

This is what those hon. members want—

Now hon. members want to hold up to us here the enmity of the non-Whites. One can imagine into what a pattern of hostile, cumulative conflict one is going to force South Africa when one does not bring about separation, but brings other minority groups, as the hon. member for Rissik indicated the Coloureds are, under one political umbrella in South Africa. What is Parliament in terms of the federal system but that one is forcing everyone in under that umbrella?

May I ask the hon. member a question?

My time is very limited. The hon. member had 10 minutes.

Do you want two umbrellas?

We are giving the hon. member an umbrella as well! The basis of the policy of the National Party is that we reject the policy based on the idea of a “common society”, or a one man one vote policy with a common voter’s roll. In the ’fifties those hon. members almost fought until the blood flowed, as the hon. member for Turffontein indicated, against the idea that there should be separate voters’ lists. In the ’sixties there was even an hon. member on that side of the House who put his political future at risk if they were not restored to the common voter’s roll. Now they are accepting him.

They kick up a fuss here about race classification. How do they want to compile a Coloured voters’ list without race classification? They cannot. In other words, all that is being said here is mere pious talk. I have said that we do not accept a “common society”, and for the simple reason that it gives rise to intolerable tensions. Those people who want the Coloureds back in Parliament with the Whites, are people who want to cause renewed tension between Whites and Coloureds. We want to say to those people: Stop it, for the Whites feel themselves threatened by it, and the Coloureds will not benefit from it. Through such a situation you are not only creating tensions, but an intense power struggle.

Oh, no!

If the hon. member does not want to believe me now, he can ask an authority on politics such as Prof. A. H. Murray, who will tell him that in a multi-racial set-up matters in the parliamentary dispensation are not simply determined by ordinary parties, but that those parties organize on a racial basis. For what other purpose are hon. members on the opposite side exerting themselves but that the Coloureds should be given a say, not as individuals, but as a group? If they are then to receive that say as a group, and the White wish to maintain their say as a group, surely it leads to a confrontation, to an intense power struggle, and ultimately to chaotic conditions in which each group will eventually lose its ethnic right to self-determination. That is what the National Party is guarding against. For that reason we are advocating this policy of separate development, and for that reason we have created for the Coloureds an opportunity to have their own parliament, which is, however, not yet a full-fledged body and does not yet have all the powers in its hands. However, those hon. members do not want to give it a chance. Let us add to this: If people do not want to use an opportunity which they are being afforded as a particular ethnic group, but wish at the same time to use my opportunity and my political machinery, and wanted to come in under my political blanket, and I say to them that they cannot do so, do those hon. members now want to tell me that such people therefore have the right to hate me? Must I, if I do not want to receive a person in my home, but say I want to build him a house of his own, be hated by that person for that reason? But that is what hon. members on that side are instigating, crisis thinking, alarmist thinking, which this side of the House rejects. We say to our Government that it should proceed with the necessary expedition, but with the necessary wisdom, to do for these people as we are doing. Surely we can tell those hon. members what we are doing for these people in practical politics, with what we are doing in the spheres of education and training. We can mention all these things to them, but this is practical politics. This is the upliftment work. This is sense and the content of citizenship. Sir, I thank you. I just wanted to make this point.

Mr. Chairman, I should imagine that one of the most over worked words we have had from the other side of the House during this debate, and perhaps during the session, has been this word “veelvolkigheid” which is supposed to denote the character of South Africa. It seems that whenever one wants to discriminate against someone, one attributes his main characteristics or personality to the fact that he is a member of a “volk”. Perhaps the hon. member over there will argue that there is an “Afrikanervolk”. But who would think of separating the Afrikanervolk politically from the “Engelse volk” or the non-Afrikaner Whites in South Africa? It is an irrational idea. Sir, there was a time under Daniël Malan and others when there was no thought of separating the “Kleurlingvolk” from the Whites.

*There was a “Kleurlingvolk” in the same sense as there was an “Afrikanervolk”, but there was no thought in those days of dealing with it separately on the constitutional level.

†One tends to find this word used whenever it suits the political arguments of the hon. members opposite.

I want to devote one or two minutes to respond to some comments made by the hon. member for Rissik. He said “daar was geen waarborge vir die voortbestaan van die Blankes nie”. This was in pursuance of a letter written on behalf of the Progressive Party. Sir, I want to ask him whether he has a guarantee for the future of any group in South Africa, a guarantee in absolute terms. Did Paul Kruger have a guarantee for the continued existence of the South African Republic? Did anybody have a guarantee for the Huguenots when they came here? Did anybody have guarantees for the Voortrekkers? No, Sir, there is no such thing in constitutional terms as absolute guarantees, especially in the circumstances of South Africa. Of course there are risks, and one has to minimize the dangers. One has to build up the areas of security, but to use absolute phrases like guarantees is to bluff the public of South Africa. Sir, we believe that we can create an element of security and we can minimize risks, but the ultimate guarantee is the quality and the calibre of the individual South African. If this hon. member is afraid for his future, then he must look at himself; he should look at his own qualities and his own personality and his own ability to triumph in adversity.

The hon. member asked: What about identity? I want to ask him whether he needs the Immorality Act to protect his identity. And if he does not need it for himself, what right has he got to say to other White people that they need it but he does not? Is he so extra special? Is the hon. member so special that he can dictate to others what they need to preserve their identity? Of course the question of individual or group identity is a factor in any society, and not only in South Africa, but there is no need for forced separation, to enforce group identity by constitutional means. If you want to protect the identity of people in the religious sense, then you protect the freedom of religion, and you say that you cannot persecute a religion. But as long as there is freedom for people to be what they want to be, surely you are protecting their identity. As long as the law prevents one from discriminating against individuals, it is up to the individual of any group to protect his identity. One does not protect the identity of people by driving them into separate constitutional groups, by denying opportunities to other people. One protects the identity of people by giving them each an equal opportunity to develop.

An equal opportunity?

Yes, an equal opportunity to develop, and one protects their identity by seeing that they are not discriminated against.

Oh! What about giving them a qualified vote?

We can protect the identity of the Afrikaans language by seeing to it that Afrikaans is not discriminated against. We can protect people’s religion by seeing that that religion is not discriminated against. We can protect the economic rights of people by seeing to it that the economic rights are not subject to discriminatory laws. However, one does not protect people by driving them into separate kraals and treating them differently and separately in a society which they all share. The essential characteristic of the protection of identity is therefore to have a Bill of Rights, an entrenchment in the Constitution which will prevent groups in the society from being discriminated against. Once one has removed the threat of discrimination, it is up to the group and the individual to establish its required identity.

The hon. member also said: “Stemreg is maar net vir rykes en geleerdes.” What absolute nonsense, coming from a member of a political party which will not give a real vote in a sovereign parliament to the Coloured people. The Government is not prepared to give the Coloureds a vote in the sovereign Parliament of South Africa.

At all.

How can one say that the level of free, compulsory education, which we would introduce in South Africa, is the level which only applies to “geleerdes”? We say that the franchise should be extended to those people who can meet the level of free, compulsory education which we will institute for every South African. How can one say that the minimum level is “net vir geleerdes”? We say that people who do semi-skilled work and have a primary education can get the franchise. We say that if a person is literate and has a skilled occupation he can have the franchise. How can one suggest that that is for a privileged élite? What is more, we say that although there will be people, in the intervening period, who will not qualify for the ordinary franchise, they should still be represented in Parliament. We therefore say that everyone should have a vote.

That is universal franchise.

Naturally the dominant factor must be those people who are part of our modem, economic South Africa, part of a modern industrialized South Africa, people who have reached the minimum level of education and the minimum income levels which we would try to institute for every individual in South Africa. The hon. member asks how long it will take. It depends on this Government.

Your Government?

If this Government introduces free compulsory education to the Std. 8 level for Coloured people, when we take over in five or ten years’ time all Coloured people will have the franchise. What is the problem? It is up to this hon. member. If he really wants to see an acceleration of that process, as we do, he must see that there is free, compulsory education for the Coloured people in South Africa.

There is a strange view among hon. members there that one can turn off political rights as one can turn off a tap. Political power, however, is not vested solely in the franchise. The vote in this House is, of course, an important factor, but the lessons of history show that political power is not expressed only in terms of votes. It is expressed in the total numbers of people, in the level of education, in the ability of people to organize, in their moral strength, in their international support and in their economic power. The fact is that the Black people and the Coloured people are growing in real political power in South Africa. The question is not whether they are going to get more political power. The question is merely how they are going to express it. Are we going to allow them to express it with us in the democratic institutions which have been built up in South Africa or are we going to tell the Coloured people that they are untouchables: “Julie is ’n vreemde volk.” Are we going to tell them that they do not belong here? Are we going to force them into the confrontation situation into which they are being pushed as the result of the policy and the treatment of the Coloured Representative Council? No, we say that if there is to be political development in South Africa, then for heaven’s sake face up to the realities of growing Coloured power in South Africa. Let us see that that Coloured power is expressed in the democratic institutions and law-making bodies of South Africa. The ultimate guarantee, if the hon. gentleman on the other side wants it, will not be found in creating separate Coloured “tuislande” as he may wish, or even in creating “oorkoepelende liggame”. It will be found in obtaining the friendship of the Coloured people by saying: “Come into this Parliament with us. Share in this Parliament on an equal basis with us.” This is the best guarantee that we in this House can give to both the Coloured people and the White people of South Africa.

Mr. Chairman, the “growing power” standpoint of the previous speaker and the standpoint of the hon. the Leader of the Opposition have again been clearly illustrated today. Hotels, restaurants, theatres and bioscopes must be thrown open and the Immorality Act must be done away with, all this in terms of an egalitarian process of integration accommodated under the umbrella of a federal policy. That is the alternative. What non-White group in this country has expressed its approval of this federal policy? Whatever policy any party may have, there is a very important aspect underlying any policy, namely that of attitudes. That is why I want to be more positive this afternoon and talk about this important basis of attitudes. Who, today, could dispute the fact that the future of South Africa is also the future of the White and the Coloured? Who could dispute the fact that the road ahead will have to be walked by White and Brown together? We shall have to face the problems of the future in close co-operation with each other. Is this not the reason for this Government displaying a spectacular initiative in appointing the Theron Commission, on which Coloureds are also represented, to investigate this very future with its problems? If, then, we have to walk the road ahead together, and if that road ahead is the same for White and Brown, then it goes without saying that neither colour group, whether White or Brown, can afford not to have a mutual understanding of each other’s thoughts and actions. Then one is not blinded by concepts. Then one seeks a realistic solution and one tests one’s solution against the needs of both Brown and White. One ensures that both groups are satisfied, as far as possible. One ensures that in this process one avoids blatant discrimination, based on colour, with the exclusive aim of injuring. At the same time one takes into account those who seek friction, agitation and confrontation in this process. One attempts to bring about something positive and constructive for each, and for both on a mutual basis. I speak as one of many thousands whose task and calling it is to apply our minds to South Africa’s future and the peace and security of White and Brown in this country. There must always be a spirit of co-operation, mutual assistance and absolute dedication to their native soil. In this process I shall not surrender those things which are my own. In this process—and this is very important—the Coloureds would not, simply because we were seeking a formula to co-operate, surrender the things that are theirs either. After all, White and Brown people certainly have a special pride in being members of their particular colour group. They are proud of their own identity and its maintenance. They are proud to recognize persons in other colour groups in their own right. They appreciate those persons’ right to survive. Is it not in this spirit that in recent years this Government has done more than ever before to uplift the Coloured, educate him, give him power and promote his interests? There has been the establishment of an independent Government department, the establishment of employment opportunities for thousands in Government departments and semi-Government departments. There have been educational opportunities for more than half a million people. They have their own university with their own rector, an imaginative scheme for the uplifting of the Coloured in the social sphere and for the establishment of accommodation. Above all, there is a Coloured Persons’ Representative Council, a milestone along the parallel road of self-realization. Could the White people ever express greater confidence in their Brown South African fellow-countrymen than through these and other exceptional steps, testifying to magnanimity, taken by the Government? There is regular and direct liaison with the person with the highest authority in this House, the Prime Minister personally. There are Coloured observers as representatives of South Africa in the highest assembly in the world. There is the prospect of Coloureds in foreign representative posts to project the image of South Africa. Steps in this regard may not be abused. In this spirit, therefore, it is necessary for many changes and adjustments to take place in the outlook, attitude, and understanding of Brown towards White, but also, of White towards Brown.

Can one imagine anything more objectionable and unpatriotic in the relations between White and Brown in this country than when certain respected, responsible Brown bodies breathe a spirit of anti-nationalism, a spirit of anti-patriotism and a spirit of anti-everything that is White? There are also student representative groups with a gospel of pro-Black/anti-White/anti-South Africa/anti-all countries that want to establish trade relations with South Africa and also anti those countries who want to provide South Africa with weapons for the protection of all colour groups in this country. We also have on our hands a Coloured political party that is constantly engaged in blatant political agitation and in making demands which cannot be acceded to owing to our tradition. They make confrontation their premise and aim instead of positive, constructive action among and for the sake of their own people. In this regard, too, there will have to be a change in attitude on the part of the Brown man.

Against this background it is of the utmost importance that Brown should look after Brown, should in a dynamic way, see to the productive uplifting of the approximately 60% lesser privileged in their own ranks. It is also of the utmost importance for a Coloured to regard it as a challenge, and at the same time, as a great privilege, to serve his own people in the technical, professional, spiritual, administrative and all other spheres. It is also of the utmost importance for the approach of the Brown man at all times to be one of sincere loyalty. He must live for South Africa and also be prepared to die for South Africa if necessary. There will have to be a change in attitude on the part of some of our Brown leaders in this respect too.

Against this background it is also of the utmost importance for the White, in his understanding of the Brown man, to realize yet again that on his shoulders, too, rests a task which involves heavy responsibilities. It is a task in accordance with which the White person, without giving up his principles, but in an attitude of good faith, correctly evaluates the place of the Coloureds as a people. This is a task in accordance with which Whites will have to be prepared to make financial sacrifices and adjustments in order to meet extremely important and essential socioeconomic needs and not to do this in a spirit of subsidization, but in a spirit of upliftment and promotion of productivity and also in a spirit of prevention of social deterioration. This is a task in accordance with which the White person will have to give his wholehearted support and assistance to the Government in respect of the responsible duty gradually to transfer increasing executive powers over their own people to the Coloureds in terms of the policy of the Government, but with the retention at all times of the right of self-determination of the White nation and of each national group in this country. In this regard, too, there will have to be a change in attitude on the part of some Whites in South Africa. To conclude, in this spirit it is all-important that the point of departure of White towards Brown and vice versa must and will at all times be positive. It is of the utmost importance that White and Brown should be prepared to think unselfishly, magnanimously, yes, to think big about our common future. It is extremely important, in this challenging process, for White and Brown to stress the retention of the respective White and Brown group awareness as it is clearly spelt out under Nationalist policy. There must be the greatest pride in the nationhood of each and there must be appreciation of the right of each to continued existence and peaceful co-existence. All this should not be displayed in a spirit of disparagement and contempt, but in a large spirit, in a spirit of conservation of identity and in a spirit of “ons vir jou, Suid-Afrika”.

Mr. Chairman, the way in which hon. members on the other side of the House refer to the problem we are discussing here this afternoon, often creates the impression that they revel in the fact that Brown politicians have sought a confrontation and have insisted on being represented in this House. They want to make a big fuss about that, as if their policy made provision for direct representation in this Parliament. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout can try and hedge and evade the matter with many words if he likes, but their policy does not make provision for the Brown people to be represented in this House either. The problem is far too complicated to be dealt with merely by discussing ultimate political goals. There are so many obvious social-economic matters that deserve immediate attention, and in the few minutes at my disposal I should like to touch on a few of those aspects today.

Prof. Erica Theron, the chairman of the commission of investigation into Coloured affairs, said in a speech reported in Die Burger of 31 May 1974 that we were too quick to talk about the Coloured problem and that there was also a White problem. She went on to say (translation)—

She then goes on to plead for greater compassion and understanding for the Brown people and their problems. In this regard I should like to make a few remarks this afternoon about a matter for which, in my opinion, we do not always have adequate understanding and compassion, namely the problem of poverty among the Coloured or Brown people. Poverty has little to do with income, or rather, with a lack of income. Research has indicated that poverty can develop into a culture, into a subculture and into a specific style of life, so that it would be correct to speak of a culture of poverty, a culture or sub-culture within which aberrant behaviour such as alcoholism, slovenliness, coarse language, work-shyness, etc., could develop until they formed part of that structure, part of that culture. It is a culture of poverty in which, as American scientists describe it, poverty becomes more of a state of mind and in which it would be correct to refer to “pockets of poverty”. What is most important about this problem is that there is not enough understanding of the fact that this culture of poverty perpetuates and maintains itself, that it propagates itself and that in fact it holds captive those people who are part of that culture. This culture of poverty forms an attitude to life and a pattern of life that cannot be changed simply by attempting to cure the symptoms alone. In this connection alone, the unsympathetic and often moralistic way in which people are so quick to refer to the lower strata of the Brown population displays a grave lack of understanding of the social impediments which this culture of poverty brings in its wake and the social retardation arising from it. It is a total oversimplification of a very complex problem to maintain that if there were only sufficient education or employment opportunities, or if housing were to be provided, the Brown people in that category would simply have to put out their hand and hey presto! the problem would be solved overnight. It may be reasonably easy to take the man out of the slum and transfer him to a better neighbourhood. It may be reasonably easy, figuratively speaking, to take a man out of his poverty, but to take the slum and the poverty out of the man is a far more difficult matter. We should guard against passing judgment on and condemning, with no further ado, people who are embedded in this culture, in terms of our bourgeois standards. We shall have to display greater understanding and greater compassion for people who are trapped in this social retardation and this social sub-culture, a sub-culture that perpetuates itself. This is a retardation that is not characterized only by a shortage of food or clothing or housing, but which is also characterized by psychological and personal dispositions, characteristics or natures.

It is an attitude to life that perpetuates and propagates itself, even though many of the apparent causes, e.g. a lack of income or a lack of housing, are eliminated. It is an attitude to life giving rise to conduct which, according to our standards, would be condemned as abnormal, aberrant and even as misconduct. It is an attitude to life in which such conduct would even be upheld by that sub-culture and by the bearers of that sub-culture, as normal and obvious. It is against this background that we must display a sympathetic understanding of the high crime rate, the high rate of alcoholism, the large number of assaults and so on. There is a milieu-lag, a milieu-handicap that is not easily eliminated merely by providing the necessary facilities and opportunities.

Or the fanchise.

Yes, it will not be eliminated by the franchise. This is not merely a little political problem that can be solved simply by deciding that they should have representation here and hey, presto! the problem is solved! It is in this regard that Prof. Erica Theron talks about a self-satisfaction, a self-satisfaction which I also discern among hon. members on the other side of the House, as if they have the answers, yes, all the answers on that side of the House. In reality they are unable to make any constructive contribution to this debate and to the solution of the problems being debated in the House. Prof. Erica Theron spoke about a self-satisfaction among the Whites which she went on to describe as follows (translation)—

In dealing with Brown poverty, therefore, there should not only be a programme of provision; in other words, provision should not only be made for supplying the deficiencies, but there should also be a remedial programme. It would have to be a remedial programme in terms of which the psychological and social causes underlying this culture of poverty would have to be looked at sympathetically. For example, it would be necessary to give specialized attention to these cases in education. There are both internal and external factors causing and perpetuating this poverty. The internal factors are related to a lack of moral norms, overcrowding, with a lack of discipline, with drunkenness and so on. The external factors relate to a social and a political situation. The bearers of the culture of poverty see their situation as the unjust treatment handed out to them by the privileged class—in South Africa, the Whites. This is simply unrelated to the facts in South Africa, but if time permitted, I could also point out to hon. members that it is a phenomenon in other countries that the people who are trapped in poverty and the people who are bearers of the culture of poverty, always blame the privileged class for the situation they find themselves in. This side of the House and the National Party have a deep understanding of the fact that the Brown people may see their situation in South Africa as being socially handicapped. Through its policy, however, the National Party wants to eliminate these impediments or supposed impediments and also to meet the future together with the Brown population in a meaningful and orderly way and in a spirit of co-operation in terms of which the just treatment, politically and socially, would be handed out to the Brown people, which would contribute towards the security and prosperity of the whole of South Africa.

Business interrupted in accordance with Standing Order No. 23.