Arising out of the reply, does this mean that heads of Departments have to search the newspapers for information for which the Minister is responsible to this House?

Order!

Last night when the House adjourned we were dealing with the amendment moved to this particular Clause 2, by this side in an endeavour to make certain that untrained members of the Defence Force, particularly the trainee section, would not be called upon to carry out police duties as set out in paragraph (d) of sub-section (2) of the clause. The hon. the Minister had made it clear that it was his desire to obtain authority to use the Citizen Force personnel for military police duties, a duty which has hitherto been confined to members of the Permanent Force. We also made it clear that we did not have the slightest objection to the use of Citizen Force members for this purpose under the new defence set-up. But the Bill contains no provision limiting the service to that particular duty. The Bill makes it quite clear in sub-section (2) that the South African Defence Force or any portion of member thereof may at all times be employed on such police duties as may be prescribed, and then in sub-section (4) says—

It then goes on to say that he shall have the benefit of all the indemnities to which a member of the South African Police Force would in like circumstances be entitled. We adopt the attitude that while we are quire prepared to accept the Minister’s assurance and undertaking that he as Minister is only interested in using these men as military police, the Bill which we are discussing—and after all it is the Bill on which we have to make our decision— does not impose any limitation but provides for the full scope of ordinary civil police duties. It is not restricted to military police duties; it covers the full range of police duties. We have put our views to the Minister across the floor of the House, pointing out that we feel that those duties should not be imposed, under the present system of defence training, upon the new trainee who has just been called up, who in many cases is of immature years, without experience and without training. We moved an amendment with a view to limiting the use of members of the Defence Force, other than members of the Permanent Force, on police duties, unless they have completed a minimum of six months of military training. We felt that that was the minimum security that we were justified in accepting, and we asked the Minister to give that request his most careful consideration to see whether he could meet us in that respect. I do not propose to deal with this matter at great length. The Minister has had the opportunity overnight of considering our amendment, and I am living in hopes that he may find it possible to accept our amendment, if not precisely in the form in which it is worded here, then in some other form which would give a similar limitation.

The hon. the Minister will recall that last night I indicated that there was another aspect of this clause which I felt should be discussed in Committee, because there are other matters which affect the Defence Force as a whole and which fundamentally arise from this clause. I think the Minister will agree with me that this clause fundamentally affects the entire structure of our Defence Force and the way in which it can now be used for the immediate defence of our country, as opposed to the situation that prevailed in the past. The words of subsection (2) are significant because it is stated here that “the South African Defence Force or any portion or member thereof may at all times be employed…”. When we consider Clause 17, where the force will be in a state of perpetual mobilization for immediate use, I think other aspects arise under this clause, particularly as far as the training of the Defence Force as a whole is concerned. Under the Act as it now stands, the Minister can use the Permanent Force immediately without resorting to general mobilization, but when it comes to the use of the Citizen Forces and of the Commandos in respect of internal disorder then he can use them immediately but he is not able to use them for the purpose of national defence unless certain steps have been taken. Under the old conditions there was merely a liability for service, but the Minister first had to take certain steps before members of the Citizen Force and of the Commandos could be called up, but as this clause is worded, read in conjunction with Clause 17, it means in fact that your entire Defence Force is in a perpetual state of I readiness and can be used immediately. I think the Minister will agree with me that that is so. If that is so, if these three arms—the Permanent Force, the Citizen Force and the Commandos—can now be used together, then the degree of training that members of the force have received is a matter which cannot be treated lightly. This clause in fact means that the Minister will be able at any time to use almost 90,000 men for the defence of the Republic—something like 10,000 in the Permanent Force, or slightly less, and at least 10,000 in the Active Citizen Force and approximately 70,000 in the Commandos, if one can accept the paper strength of the Commandos as being correct. The Minister can use them immediately for defence purposes. If that is so, then the question of the use of these respective arms of our Defence Forces and the degree of training which they have received are very pertinent questions. We have no doubt about the training of the Permanent Force, and under the new system under which a ballotee is trained for nine months continually to begin with and then receives subsequent periods of training, I do not think there can be any doubt that they will be capable and trained men whose services can be used effectively in the service of their country. But then we come to the third arm which consists of the bulk of our Defence Forces, men who under the amendments made to the Defence Act in 1961 are also in a sense ballotees. I refer here to the Commandos. In 1961 it was provided for the first time that escapees from the ballot may now be drafted to the Commandos. In a sense therefore they are also ballotees because in terms of the Act they are compelled to serve in the Commandos. The Commandos, as we know, are at present largely made up of volunteers, and I would like to ask the Minister in view of these fundamental changes to give very serious consideration to the acceptance of our amendment. I think the matter becomes even more significant in the light of the threats which are now being made against our country at Addis Ababa. The question of ensuring that adequate training is given to our Defence Forces is even more important now in the light of these latest developments. I think the Commandos have always been looked upon, in time of war at any rate, as supplying the necessary internal security needs, but that means that these men must be trained. I think before the Minister asks us to agree to these wide provisions and to this fundamental change in the whole structure of our Defence Force he should give us some indication as to what he has in mind with regard to the training of the bulk of our Defence Forces, namely the Commandos. I think the time is past when we can leave it to men to decide whether it pleases them to turn up for training or not. I noticed a report in the newspapers the other day that a commanding officer had complained that only about half of his Commando turned up for week-end bivouacs and that he could take no disciplinary measures. That position is quite unsatisfactory, and I suggest to the Minister that when he asks us to agree to such a fundamental change in the whole defence structure of our forces he should give us some indication as to what he has in mind and particularly with regard to the training of the bulk of our manpower.

That has nothing to do with this Bill.

It has everything to do with the Bill when we are asked to recognize that the Commandos may at any time be used for the purposes set out in this clause in paragraphs (a), (b), (c) and (d). Under the Act as it now stands it has never been possible to use the Commandos in this way; the Minister ought to know his Act. The provisions of Section 90 of the Act are perfectly clear. The procedures are perfectly clear; mobilization first has to take place and all sort of things have to happen, but under this clause, together with the powers granted under Clause 17, the Minister can use these powers immediately without resorting to mobilization. They may at any time, in terms of this clause, be called out in defence of the country, and if that is the obligation that is placed upon the Commandos, the Citizen Force and the Permanent Force then they have the right, as men prepared to defend South Africa, to claim that they should at least be given the minimum training. I think the Minister should tell us at this stage, because it is most relevant to this provision, what steps he intends taking and what he envisages with regard to the training of our manpower. Let me emphasize again that the Defence Forces, in terms of this clause, are not separately considered as the Permanent Force, as Commandos and as Citizen Forces; they are considered as a whole, and if considered as a whole it brings into the net all 90,000 men whose names are registered in the Minister’s Department and at least a part of them has received insufficient military training and they are entitled to receive at least a minimum of training. Sir, we are all aware of the threats which have been made against us, and I think everyone will welcome these provisions which introduce a fundamental change in our defence structure, but then I think the onus rests on the Minister to tell us what he envisages with regard to adequate training for our men in the various arms of our Defence Force.

This morning I once again gave all the attention possible to this whole matter, but after having once again reconsidered the matter, I am more convinced than ever before that I dare not give in. I shall reply to the hon. member for Simonstown (Mr. Gay) in a moment. I shall first reply to the hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant). He says the entire structure of our Defence Force is now being altered in consequence of this clause which provides that our Citizen Force and our Commandos also may perform such police duties as may be prescribed. I cannot see how that alters the structure of our Defence Force at all. The hon. member also asked what I was going to do about the training of our Commandos. I doubt whether you, Mr. Chairman, will permit me to reply to that, but I shall continue until you stop me.

Order! The hon. member for Turffontein went too far. After studying the clause, it is clear to me that it does not concern the question of training at all.

I now come to the hon. member for Simonstown. It is very clear to me that his concern is that he is afraid that, as we are now able to use members of the Citizen Force and the Commandos to perform police duties, it may lead to difficulties if we were to use untrained people to perform police duties, because those people will be undisciplined. There is no thought of doing that. At the present time we have the Provost Regiment Voortrekkerhoogte for instance. That regiment has been in existence since 1960. So all the members of that Regiment who trained in it during 1960, 1961 and 1962 are people who have received three months’ Citizen Force training. Therefore all those people whom we have been training for this very kind of work, and who will be grouped into various divisions when it becomes necessary, cannot be used by us because not one of them has had six months’ training. It will virtually lead to disbanding that whole regiment, except for the small group who received training last year. I should like to point out that the possibility does exist that a person who is untrained will be used here and there on special occasions. I accept that such a possibility may arise in an emergency. But that self-same position exists in the police at the present time. The hon. member for Turffontein told me recently that I should remember that the police are now trained for a year, and here I do not even want to agree that people should have had six months’ training. I know the police are now trained for a year, but Section 34 of the Police Act says specifically—

Here there are people who have not had a single day’s training and the police may even use them in terms of their Act in certain circumstances. The police may appoint an ordinary person to perform police duties, a man who has not had a single day’s training. I should like to put this question to the hon. members for Turffontein and Simonstown: Supposing Commando members guard a certain place. That will be one of the duties they will perform in wartime. Suppose someone wants to break in there or do mischief. A member of the Commando may not arrest that person under the Act as it stands now. Surely we cannot permit that. All he can do is to shoot that person; he has no alternative but to shoot that man, because he cannot arrest him. No, we cannot go so far. It is. very clear that we want to use trained people. We train them, but we cannot accept this amendment at all, because then we shall not be able to use three-quarters of the people in the regiment we have trained for this purpose. Furthermore, if in a state of emergency we have to have someone arrested or transported, we cannot do so, or if in an emergency we have to post people as guards in a street, with instructions not to permit members of the public to enter that street, and they nevertheless do so, we shall be unable to arrest those people unless we have this power. We want these powers because we want to use these people on such occasions. I am really sorry that in this case I am unable to meet hon. members of the Opposition. We have misunderstood one another on this point right from the beginning, and I think that as a result of that we have set a conflict in motion which is now just dragging on while in fact there is nothing to it. I wish to repeat that we want to train these people; we are training them in the same way as we are training the police; but there may be occasions where we may even require the services of a man who has not been trained. If a person has to be arrested where these people are on guard, I really and truly cannot send a man for six hours on horse-back to go and look for somebody who is trained before the man may be arrested. We must have the power to arrest that man.

Mr. Chairman, may I take a point of order? You will note, Sir, that sub-section (2) of this clause provides—

The South African Defence Force is defined in Section 5 of the original Act as follows—

Sir, you will note that paragraphs (a), (b), (c> and (d) relate to different functions to be fulfilled by the South African Defence Force, which includes the Commandos, and I would submit that one can hardly discuss the function of any one of these forces or the question of service in defence of the Republic without considering the question of the training of these people.

Order! I have considered that very carefully and that is why I allowed the hon. member a certain amount of latitude. I am however perfectly satisfied that this clause has nothing to do with training and for that reason I am not prepared to allow a discussion on it.

I am merely attempting to help the Minister.

Amendment put and the Committee divided:

Tellers: H. J. Bronkhorst and A. Hopewell.

Tellers: D. J. Potgieter and P. S. van der Merwe.

Amendment accordingly negatived.

Clause, as printed, put and agreed to.

On Clause 3,

Clause 3 deals with the conditions of service of men who are called up and who are in employment when they are called up. It deals with the duties and the responsibilities of the employers towards their employees. If I may say so, under this amendment, employers are not called upon now to make the same sacrifices on behalf of the Defence Force as they were in the past. I am not going to criticize the content of the clause to that extent. The hon. the Minister is not only the Minister of Defence calling up men for service, he in turn is a member of a body of employers, and the body of employers of which he is a member is the Government of South Africa.

I should like to ask on what conditions do our Government, through the hon. the Minister of the Interior, release men for service if they volunteer for service? The hon. the Minister will remember that I spoke about employees in the Railway Service but I am now speaking generally of employees in the service of the Government. Supposing a young civil servant accepts a commission in the Active Citizen Force and then goes to college for a course, as he would be required to do, does the Government release him on pay? That is the point I want to come to: Does the Government release him on pay? Because the Railway Administration does not. The Railway Administration treats its employees in a most unpatriotic manner when compared with other great employers in the country. The Railway Administration is a law unto itself. They are part of the Government and still not of the Government. Therefore, I should like to know what the position is in regard to other employees in the Civil Service? I am sorry the hon. the Minister of the Interior is not here because I assume they will be released through his office. I want to know whether a young officer who has been a civil servant and who is called up will receive pay while he is absent. I want to quote the following in regard to the Railways—

That has now been cancelled. I am speaking especially about officers because that is the comparison I am making with the Railways. These young men are selected after they have served their compulsory service because they were senior N.C.O.s or warrant officers. They are invited to accept commissions. They are treated in a manner by the Railways which I regard as most undesirable and I should like to know what is done by the rest of the Civil Service.

There are times when you raise matters in this House about which you feel particularly strongly. I want to raise the matter in regard to this clause which amends Section 4 of the original Act dealing with the duties of employers but which gives some concession to ballotees who may be prejudiced by their military training. I want to appeal to the hon. the Minister to reconsider the period of four months that is provided for in this clause; this being a period considered to be in his favour when it comes to the questions of promotion and remuneration. I do not want to discuss the details. I made the appeal once before during the second reading. I hope the hon. member for Pretoria (West) (Mr. van der Walt) and other members on the Government benches will also make this plea, namely that the Minister extends this period of four months. The Minister’s attitude is that he cannot do this because this is a question of national safety, that it is a matter of the man having taken his chance at the ballot box. But if that is so, surely the responsibility should not only rest on the man who goes to serve but a measure of responsibility should also be placed on the shoulders of the man for whom that soldier will work when he returns from his period of service, in other words, his employer. The advantages are all in favour of the employer; there are very few advantages to the ballotee. This is a concession. It must be realized that throughout their life, in regard to their normal promotion, in their advances for pay and in regard to their seniority, these men will be prejudiced in comparison with the chap who sits next to him simply because their names were drawn out of the ballot box. [Interjections.] If that hon. member who is so concerned about cinemas and films and sex and so on were more concerned about the interests of the fighting men of South Africa he would not make such stupid interjections.

Sir, I repeat my plea to the hon. the Minister. I am not going to advocate a period here but I think the period of four months as laid down by this clause is too short. It constitutes too great a prejudice to these men who are called upon to serve their country. They have no choice about the matter; their names are drawn in the ballot box. I know there are hon. members on the Government benches who feel as strongly as I do about this matter. I am not going to move an amendment, Sir, but I would again ask the Minister to give deep consideration to this matter. If he feels that he can do something about it I want to ask him to do something about it in the Other Place. I know all his arguments against it. I admit there is some merit in them, but the counter-argument I have put to the Minister is that if a sacrifice has to be made do not let it be made all on one side. Let the employer also make a sacrifice for the defence needs of the country by having to give these men, when they come out of their time of service, an equal opportunity with the man whose name was drawn in this ballot box. I hope my hon. friend, the member for Pretoria (West) who has made such a strong plea about this in the past, will support me in my plea to the Minister to-day.

I cannot fully agree with what the hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant) is asking, because I think it is unreasonable. In regard to the apprentices he has accused me of now pleading for something I was unwilling to plead for under the Apprenticeship Act, but I should like to explain that there is a very great difference. An apprentice is undergoing training for which he is paid. I do not want to go further into that, Mr. Chairman; you will not permit me to do so. I wish to do to-day what I did in my second-reading speech. I do not wish to urge that the people should have leave, sick leave and salary. But I feel very strongly about one thing which I should like to bring to the Minister’s notice, namely the date of the salary increase. The man who goes for his military training loses nine months’ salary save for what the Department pays him. In most cases, private employers do not pay salaries to ballotees. Now this legislation also penalizes him in respect of his incremental date. In other words, the man who makes the sacrifice of going to camp as a ballotee is not penalized for one year only in respect of his salary, his leave and his sick leave, but he may be penalized for four or five or six years in respect of his incremental dates, and he may be put back four months as against his colleagues who were not balloted. I feel that this last point, namely his incremental date, is too great a sacrifice to demand from the man who is called up to go and work for nine months at a reduced wage in many instances. I am not asking that the employer should pay him; I am not asking that he should give the man his full leave and sick leave, because I must say I think that going to camp is better than any leave for a man. The physical development they undergo as ballotees in the camps is better than their sick leave and better than their ordinary leave. So I am not going to ask for that. Nor am I asking that the people should be paid in full. But I ask that the incremental date be recognized as the incremental date to which that man is entitled. I plead most earnestly for that. I hope that if the Minister does not see his way clear to doing so to-day, he will consider making some concession in this regard in the Other Place. I feel that we are asking the man to make this sacrifice for the period he is in camp, that he has to sacrifice his leave, his salary and his sick leave, but we also ask him to surrender, when he returns from camp, four months for a number of years as regards his incremental date which also affects his salary. I feel this sacrifice is much too great. I should’ like to appeal to the Minister, if he does not see his way clear to-day, to consider introducing an amendment in the Other Place.

Mr. Chairman, I will not keep the House long, but I should like to reply to the hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant). He referred to sacrifices here. I wish to put my point of view very clearly. I do not regard the ballotee who proceeds to camp for military training, as making any sacrifice. I regard it as a privilege he receives, a privilege whereby he is enabled to receive training to perform an essential service for his fatherland. I want to persuade those people to get that idea out of their heads. We are not concerned with a sacrifice here. We are dealing with a privilege. I wish I were young enough to share that privilege. Those hon. members think they are now buttering up those young ballotees. They do not know what is going on. Those people keenly desire to receive training. Hon. members opposite gain no political advantage by championing the cause of those people at their youthful age and by saying it is a terrible sacrifice they are making. It is not a sacrifice. It is a privilege and I regret one thing in my life, namely that I did not have the opportunity to receive such a thorough training.

He had the opportunity.

I wish to add that no school can really provide the discipline those young men receive in the camps; nor can the community provide it for them. Instead of saying it is a sacrifice, the training and the general disciplining those young men undergo is a great advantage. I do not think it is fitting that hon. members opposite should now try to catch a few votes by pleading for those people and pretending it is such a terrible sacrifice. It is a distortion of the actual facts. It is a privilege and I wish to emphasize that. Our young men regard it as a privilege.

The hon. member for Kensington (Mr. Moore) has asked how the people who go back for further training are treated. I may just say that all officers and non-commissioned officers who enrol for extended service are paid their full salaries plus their allowances by the Public Service.

The hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant) urges that more than four months’ recognition should be given. Let me say this now—I am also saying this to the hon. member for Pretoria (West) (Mr. van der Walt)— that this period was decided upon in collaboration with the Department of Labour. I have no knowledge of labour matters, and for that reason these boards fall under the Department of Labour. Defence has no knowledge of it. I must admit that the matter raised by the Hon. member for Pretoria (West) has now also stirred my heart. I shall have that matter discussed properly with Labour and the labour organizations. However, that cannot be done Before this legislation reaches the Other Place. But it is something I shall cause to be properly investigated during the recess. Perhaps the people will have to suffer this year if we change it later on.

However, I cannot concede the point regarding this period of four months. We are simply going to render the young ballotees a disservice if we make this period too long. If we make the period too long, those men will not find employment. The employer is going to discriminate against him when he applies for work. If he cannot prove that he was not drawn as a ballotee he is not going to find employment if that period is made too long. And then nothing can be done to that employer because he is not discriminating against a person in his employ; he discriminates against someone who is not in his employ. If a person loses four months in this way, I think he can do so for the sake of his fatherland. We have heard all the threats. Two years ago I referred to it, and certain hon. members scoffed at me. We have now heard these threats again; they are there and we cannot ignore them. We must prepare our country. I trust the time is not far off when we shall train every young man for military service. It cannot be done at present as yet, but we are working in that direction. We are increasing the number every year. We want to train every young man, whether he has flat feet or not. I cannot agree to an extension of the period but I shall discuss the matters raised by the hon. member for Pretoria (West) with Labour.

Why do you not make room for him?

At this stage I do not have room for good Members of Parliament, otherwise I would have made room for him.

I am sorry that the hon. the Minister of Labour is not here to-day to assist the hon. the Minister with this matter which he says is a matter for Labour. I am afraid I do not quite agree with the Minister there. This is an amendment to Section 4 of the Defence Act. When Section 4 of the Defence Act was inserted there was no consultation with Labour. This refers to the duties of employers. It tells employers they cannot penalize a man because he is doing service. The employer commits an offence if he fails to provide facilities for a man to serve. There was no consultation with the Department of Labour; it was a defence need. I have said nothing about the Apprenticeship Act. That position was discussed when that legislation was before the House at the time when I made my plea to the Minister in regard to apprentices. We are dealing here with the position of all ballotees. It is quite obvious that under the existing system, when a man is called up the moment he leaves school, he is not going to be prejudiced because he has not started any work yet. So he cannot be prejudiced in any way in regard to his future. But many men come in who were formerly exempted. What is their position? Many men were exempted so as to enable them to finish their studies. As I understand the situation this provision in included in the Act to protect to some extent the interests of those men. Must he be prejudiced for the rest of his life?

He had the advantage of being exempted.

He was exempted in the national interest. It was not an advantage to him to be exempted. The Exemption Boards do not say “I am going to give you the advantage of being exempted just because you want to be exempted”. He was exempted in the national interest. He was exempted from undergoing training immediately because it was considered necessary that that citizen should first perform other training. Perhaps he had to go to university or perforce he had to undergo some other specialized training. Does the Minister want to deny him that in the national interest? Then I am amazed at the Minister for making such an observation. It was not his fault; his application was duly weighed and considered and he was granted exemption in the national interest.

He asked for it.

Of course he asks for it. He puts his reasons before the Exemption Board and the Exemption Board weighs them on their merits. If the Exemption Board considers that his reasons are such that they do not justify the exemption, they will never grant it. I submit to the hon. Minister that it is not a vast problem here. It is an issue affecting a small number of persons because in the long run, as the present system operates, those classes of persons, who are exempted will get less and less, and I plead again with the Minister to reconsider the position. I am not discussing the apprenticeship provisions as laid down in (2)ter. I am discussing (b) (i) where it reads “have the right to reckon in respect of any one unbroken period of such training more than four months of the absence from his employment occasioned by such training as employment in the determination of such increased remuneration…” Here you have a chap who let us say is in the Civil Service; he got exemption, he resumes employment in the Civil Service* but now for the rest of his life in regard to the others that he works with, he is prejudiced in his remuneration, in his seniority and in his promotion, merely because he conformed to the law of the land and having been balloted for he served his country. But where does the State suffer? The State is making no sacrifice in that regard as an employer. It can happen in regard to any big corporation or company, and the Minister in his reply to the second reading said that if there is to be made a sacrifice they must realize that it is made in the national interest. All I ask is let the sacrifice be a two-sided one, and not a one-sided one. Why should the soldier make all the sacrifices and the employer make none?

What about the four months?

What is four months out of the nine? I am putting a reasonable request to the Minister that before he takes the Bill to the Other Place—if he likes he can consult with the Minister of Labour—he should again consider this matter. If he consults the Department of Labour, he will find that they have had many requests, as the hon. member for Pretoria (West) (Mr. van der Walt) well knows. I plead with the Minister not to close his mind to this matter. It affects many men, and I repeat that if a man is prepared to make the sacrifice of serving his country—the hon. member for Ventersdorp does not know what a sacrifice is—he should be taken into consideration. I want to remind the hon. member for Ventersdorp (Mr. Greyling) that he had the opportunity in his life to make that sacrifice but he did not do so. He stayed at home because he thought that would be more to his advantage.

That is not true.

The hon. member now talks glibly about the advantages of discipline, etc. If all these things are true, then he would probably be a better Member of Parliament than he is to-day if he had had that training. He is the last man to talk about sacrifices. I hope the hon. Minister will once more consult his Department to see whether it is not possible to give a greater relaxation as the period laid down in this clause.

Clause put and agreed to.

On Clause 10,

The establishment of these Air Commandos is welcomed by everybody, I think by the public as well as by the pilots concerned. The asset we have in our private aviation and our private aircraft is an asset that will and will have to be used during time of war, and it is as well that in peacetime we should link these people up with the people with whom they will have to co-operate and that they should receive training. Another important point here of course is that this training, this joining of the Air Commandos by the people in peacetime, is on a voluntary basis. In wartime they will be compelled in the national interest to come and do their work as they did during the last war too, and the sooner they qualify themselves for that the better it will be for all concerned in the end.

I have seen the circular issued by the Minister’s Department in this connection and forwarded to private pilots, and I should like to offer a few points of criticism. I hope the Minister will accept it in the spirit in which I am making it. It is a very good document, but I should like to make a few suggestions. In this document emphasis is laid on light aircraft. Now at present one has the same problem in respect of aircraft that one has in respect of motor-cars, namely to know where to draw the line. What is light and what is heavy?

I thought you old chaps who were concerned with it knew about it.

The point I should like to make is that the Minister should not draw that line too soon. I do not want him to exclude from this scheme everything that seems to be heavy, because one of the objects of the Air Commandos is the transport of personnel, equipment and casualties, and in this respect the heavier type of aircraft is more useful and more important. So I hope the emphasis will not be laid too heavily on the lighter types.

The next point I should like to raise is in regard to the pilots themselves, of course, and in the first place I should like to remark that I notice that all the pilots should be younger than 50 years. I think that is a great pity. The older pilots are people who have much flying experience, civil flying experience, and in many cases they are the people who have military experience. They could be of great importance to the Minister with their experience, their skill, and what is more, they are more levelheaded than many of the younger men. Young pilots have a way of being a little bit wild, and these people could exert a sobering influence upon them. I am not saying the Minister should take people on crutches as pilots but he has a very good standard to use as a criterion and that is the commercial licence. The commercial licence for pilots at the present time requires them to pass a very stringent medical test, and when a man has reached the age of 60 years, and he is still able to pass that test, he can still render very good service. I know, for instance, pilots of more than 60 years of age who are still flying all types of aircraft and who are able to do any kind of civil work, and who are eminently suitable for this kind of work. I do hope the Minister is not going to eliminate them because they are older than 50 years. If they are physically fit enough to pass that stringent test they are required to pass by the Department of Civil Aviation, I am convinced that they can still render outstanding services to the Minister. These elderly people are the very people who own their private aircraft to-day, the aircraft the Minister also wants. Many of the young men who fly have to hire aircraft from commercial firms or from clubs, etc. The result will be that many more pilots will be available for this work than the number of available aircraft, whereas if we have these older men with their own aircraft, the problem will be solved to some extent.

My final point in this regard is that I notice they are going to be bilingual units. I am very pleased about that. In this respect I also wish to ask the Minister not to be too strict as regards the bilingualism. If a person is not quite fluently bilingual, yet is a good pilot, give him a chance.

Yes.

The hon. member now wants a definition of light aircraft, and he: says we require some of the heavier types. However, he has not indicated where he himself would really draw the line. He refers to heavier aircraft without defining them himself. But I believe we may accept with safety that the light aircraft the hon. the Minister has in mind in this legislation extends to a twin-motored aircraft capable of carrying about six passengers, and of which there are quite a number in South Africa. The majority of these are in commercial use and not in private use. They are capable of taking six passengers with a maximum freight load of approximately 2,000 lbs. If we go beyond that class of aircraft, we find there is virtually a gap in South Africa, and that there are only a few aircraft between that type and until you come to the Dakota type, DC.3 and further on. There are a few of them in South Africa and they are mainly in the service of large companies, great organizations in South Africa, and they are used in the employ of their directors, etc. So there really is no problem for the hon. Minister in making a choice. The line draws itself. The private aircraft contemplated for this purpose falls into a clearly defined category. The type above that in any event was, I believe, never contemplated when provision was made for Air Commandos.

A word about the age of pilots. I want to object when the hon. member says that the young men are reckless pilots.

No, I did not say that.

I think the hon. member said that they are inclined to be wild.

No.

All right, we shall accept that the hon. member did not say what he said. If I were to take myself, the hon. member may think I am young and I shall then have to take the risk that he may call me wild, but the kind of training these people are going to receive and the type of work the Department is contemplating for them, is work that will be exacting. It will be work that will require a fast reaction time, and if the hon. member as an ex-pilot will be honest, he will admit that a man’s reaction time as a pilot deteriorates every day, and when one has reached the age of 40 years, our civil aviation regulations already provide that one has to subject oneself to an annual medical test, and the hon. member really has no argument as to why people of 50 years and older should have to do this somewhat exacting work and perform these somewhat exhausting duties. The hon. member will, as a pilot, once again agree with me that to take night training, to take a course in instrument flying, if it is not a daily practice with one; is particularly exacting. To take people who use aircraft for their business—which I do not think was contemplated in this provision—and to incorporate them into the scheme cannot bring us any additional benefits. The more successful pilot is the young man, the man full of vigour, the man with a capacity for training and the one who can improve his knowledge through training with the Air Commandos. I also believe that at this stage there is no room in the structure of the Air Commandos for these people in an administrative capacity. To that I would add that the Air Commando may well develop into a further operational role in circumstances we cannot foresee now, where there will yet be room for the more experienced pilot, perhaps on the ground, where we could to a very large extent make use of his flying knowledge. I do not think the hon. the Minister will hesitate for one moment to make use of the knowledge of those people and also to make provision in the regulations for employing those people in an administrative capacity or in the hundred-and-one branches there may be when such an Air Commando’s operational role is extended.

This Clause 10 deals with compensation in regard to the use of private aircraft for Commando purposes. Now there are a few issues which I would like to place before the hon. Minister because I think they are pertinent to the issue of compensation and the organization of the Air Commandos. What are the facts? We have registered in South Africa something like 675 aircraft. Those were the figures for 1962. That is the total figure, commercial and privately owned, and of the 675 let us write off 75 as commercial aircraft and twin-engined aircraft as mentioned by the hon. member for Bethal-Middelburg (Mr. J. W. Rail). That will leave a minimum say of 600 privately owned aircraft which can be used for these Air Commandos.

I will not need so many.

I am glad to hear that. But there are other issues in regard to these private aircraft. There are complaints made about the manner in which they have been serviced and the renewal of certificates. It is known that over 50 per cent of the 600 are more than ten years old, and that is one of the reasons why quite a number have not taken out licences, because of the expense of putting them into service. Private owners have had difficulties about it. These are practical issues in regard to the availability of aircraft, and I raise it for this reason that if there are large numbers that are out of commission at the present time and that can be brought into commission by men who are prepared to play their part in an Air Commando, then the Minister should indicate the nature of the compensation of the use of these aircraft that his Department is likely to need. If a number of these aircraft have not been relicensed by the private owners and they are prepared to play their part in Air Commandos, will, the Minister’s Department; for example be prepared to meet the cost of putting these aircraft again into operation?

No.

You see, Sir, there are a lot of issues that revolve around the matter. The Minister I think at one time indicated that he would pay the men whilst in the air at the rate of R6 per hour, or something like that, a”Very small amount. My information is that it represents hardly anything in covering the cost, because if the men are going into training—and I believe they have to complete a minimum of ten hours—it is not only the time that they are in the air for which they are paid R6, but they have also to meet capital cost and cost of servicing the aircraft, in keeping the aircraft in a state of preparedness because what on earth is the use of an Air Commando if the aircraft when they are called upon to be used for training, the owner turns round and says “I am sorry, my aircraft is pot in a state to fly, is not ready to fly; I have not been able to put it into commission, it is due for service”? What is the use of that? Then the whole scheme will collapse if everything depends on the owner of the aircraft and he is in a position that he cannot do anything about it. If the hon. Minister refers to the Department of Transport, he will find out that over 50 per cent of the aircraft are more than ten years old. The hon. member said just now that the number is less than 600. Will 500 be a reasonable estimate?

Still less.

Even less than that? Take 400 as a reasonable estimate; 50 per cent of 400 is 200. Then you have a maximum of 200 privately owned aircraft that can form the Commandos, and if those 200 aircraft are not in commission and are not ready for service, then the Department of Defence can invite them for training, but what can the Minister do if the owner of the aircraft turns around and says “I am sorry, my aircraft is not fit to fly”? These are practical issues, and that is why I think it is so important that when you are dealing with a clause which provides for compensation, subject to such conditions as the Minister may lay down, adequate compensation should be offered and the compensation paid by the Department should be adequate if these men are prepared to contribute their private aircraft and maintain them in a condition to fly. I hope the hon. Minister will be in the position to make a statement on the nature of compensation to be paid across the floor of the House or at some other time in order to see that we have an efficient system of Air Commandos.

I did not wish to cross swords with the hon. member for Bethal-Middelburg (Mr. J. W. Rail) he is quite correct when he says that the young men are the people who are capable of being trained better and of doing the work better. I am pleading for the older men because they have already completed their training. They do not require any more training for this type of work. They are doing it almost every day now. Let us look at the services required from them: Reconnaissance, communication flights, light transport, evacuation of casualties, etc. These people can do that type of work. They have their own aircraft with radios, and they can establish communications if necessary. They do not require any more training. I think they will be a great asset to the Minister and that they are still capable of rendering sterling services.

The hon. member for North-East Rand (Brig. Bronkhorst) has made certain suggestions. The first is that the aircraft should not be too small, that we should not draw the line too closely. I agree with him in that regard. We shall need fairly large ones and I accept the position to be as stated by the hon. member for Bethal-Middelburg that the biggest aircraft in private hands to-day are small aircraft. But we shall go into that. The second plea of the hon. member for North-East Rand has cheered and gratified me. It is a long time since last I heard a man pleading for the old people, but to-day we had one. But I myself am a little nervous about using a man of over 50 for this type of work. It is true that these are probably the people who own the best aircraft. I have no experience of flying, but I have heard that a man’s powers of observation, his reactions, drop rapidly after just over 30 years of age. Now it seems to me to be stretching the point a bit too far to use a man of 50.

May I point out to the hon. the Minister that in the S.A. Airways, which need not take second place to any service in the world, they retain the pilots till the age of 53 or even 55 years.

I accept that is so, but that is an entirely different kind of flying. But we can go into the matter and if there is anything that can be done for an old man, I shall always gladly do it. The hon. member for Turffontein now pleads in regard to remuneration. Permit me to tell the hon. member that this R6 the men are receiving _is not received only during the period of training, during those hours when they are being trained at a bivouac, but they receive the R6 during their ordinary private flying hours, when they do their own work. The man would be flying in any event, and because he is a member of the Air Commando he receives R6 an hour, with a minimum of 18 hours if he flies that long; if he flies for less than 18 hours, he receives nothing. But for all his flying time between 18 and 24 hours, for his private work, he received R6 per hour. The man is receiving a very considerable contribution. When engaged on his private work, he receives it because he has become a member of the Air Commando. And this is the beginning of the Air Commando system. We shall see what is necessary in due course. I may just say that as far as I have now been able to ascertain, the rush is so great that we shall have a surplus, and we are most certainly not going to repair at Government expense those aircraft which cannot be used now, in order to incorporate them in the Air Commandos.

Clause put and agreed to.

On Clause 11,

I dealt with this particular clause at the second reading, and I pointed out that it was much more difficult to deal with this clause in detail at this stage than was the case with regard to Clause 10. Under Clause 10 the hon. Minister and the Department of Defence can lay conditions under which a young man can be trained as a pilot, a member of an air crew or of the ground staff, and he will get so much per flying hour, etc., and people could under that insure their aircraft and they would be flying under civil aviation regulations. But as soon as an aircraft comes under Air Commando conditions, in other words, they are called up for service as are other personnel, this proviso in Clause 11 comes into operation. I intimated then to the hon. Minister that when we reached the Committee Stage I would deal in some detail with this clause to see what protection the aeroclubs would have in relation to their aircraft and personnel, because the proviso says—

Will the hon. Minister tell us at what stage these people will cease to be flying as private fliers? If they go on Air Commando at what stage do they stop being aircraft flying privately and at what stage do they stop flying under civil aviation regulations, and come under South African Air Force regulations? I pointed out that the whole of their insurance, both as to life, injury and aircraft, would be covered by insurance companies only while they are under Civil Air Board regulations. In other words, if they break the regulations and crash and someone is killed, that pilot, who is the servant of the company concerned, breaks the regulations and they will not pay out. Having been chairman of an aeroclub, and also chairman of a private flying company, I know a little about this side of things and how very careful you have to be on that side. We trained people for the Air Force before the last war but we did that on a so-much-per-hour basis. But the moment our aircraft were taken over by the Defence Force, from the time they took off from our aerodrome (they took over some five aircraft of ours with our whole personnel, ground staff, pilots, the lot), they came under the Defence Force. I want to know from the hon. Minister: Under the Air Commando system will they then fly as defence aircraft, or are they then still looked upon in view of this proviso as still flying privately, paid for at so much per hour? Then, of course, you will have to make provision for your refuelling, servicing and all the rest, but that could have a very big repercussion in relation to loss of life and injury. Mr. Chairman, people are going to be flown by these private aircraft, whether they are owned by private individuals, by commercial companies or aeroclubs. If a Defence Force officer in the course of duty, especially if he is called out for security purposes, and he is told to fly over certain positions low, because there is no airfield, and his engine gives out (most of our privately owned aircraft are single-engine aircraft), and there is a crash with loss of life, who is going to be responsible? The private insurance companies cannot carry the risk. I am sure they will not carry it, but what will be the position of officers of the Defence Force, other than those of the Air Commando, who may be flown, like gunner officers who want to look over the territory, and they fly low and a crash occurs? Perhaps in coming back and running out of fuel, especially with the tremendous wind-storms we get especially on the High Veld, they may have to force-land and crash, and not only is the aircraft damaged and life lost but you also damage valuable livestock. I cannot see how the Minister can say that the State will not be liable for any such damage to property or the injury suffered. I think that by now the Minister must have something in view on this point, because I think it is most important that that should be cleared up before any Air Commando is established, because on this will depend whether it will be a success or not.

I cannot foresee that during the training of the Air Commando any flying contrary to the civil aviation regulations will be undertaken. As it is at the moment, the civil aviation regulations lay down that one should not fly below 500 feet, and they lay down various conditions in regard to cloud and visibility, and one cannot fly below 1,000 feet above built-up areas. I cannot see how, even used operationally, these aircraft can fly contrary to the civil aviation regulations. The hon. member is aware, too, that when there is an instructor with a pilot undertaking training he is allowed to fly below the altitude of 500 feet, if the aircraft is registered in the training category. If flying from an airfield licensed for night-flying, and again accompanied by an instructor, that is also allowed by the civil aviation regulations. I cannot see how an aircraft used in an Air Commando can be expected to operate in any role which entails going beyond the provisions of the civil aviation regulations. It is different, of course, if the aircraft is used in another role altogether, if it is used in a military role, which is not foreseen at the moment.

Clause 11 does not say that the Air Commandos’ aircraft will be used for training only. They are Air Commandos, for operational use as well.

Clause 11 very clearly provides that a special allowance will be paid to an officer of an Air Commando for the partial defrayment of the cost of his private flying. When Clause 10 was under discussion, the hon. Minister said that the remuneration was being paid to the pilot while he was doing private flying in his own time. Now Clause 11 provides exactly the same. It says that there will be defrayment of the cost of his private flying, provided that the Government will not be liable for any damage to life or property or livestock in connection with such private flying. I interpret this to mean that this amount of R6 an hour is being paid to the pilot while he is doing private flying and at the same time he is a member of the Air Commando. I cannot foresee how under any circumstances, even during the course of the 23 hours’ training, any pilot in the Air Commando can fly contrary to the civil regulations. I interpret this as not going beyond the regulations laid down by the Department of Transport, and I cannot see how it will in any way affect the insurance of an aircraft or the regulations under which it is flown.

I should like to point out that this clause deals exclusively with the allowances to be paid in respect of private flying and compensation, and nothing else, and I should like hon. members to confine themselves to that.

As I see it, Clause 11, as well as Clause 10, are the two clauses on which the success of the Air Commandos will depend. If we encourage people to use their private aircraft, we will make a success of it, and we are just as anxious as the Minister is to see the Air Commandos become a success.

My point in rising is to ask the Minister this. The points raised by both the previous; speakers mainly concern what are teething troubles in the establishment of the Air Commandos. Provision is made in both this clause and Clause 10 for the allowances, etc., to be paid, to be decided in consultation between Secretary for Defence and the Treasury. I want to ask the Minister that when drawing up these allowances he should envisage these teething troubles and provide for them in his scale of allowances. Aircraft to-day are far too valuable for the ordinary private individual to allow his plane to be used in training for military service if he is going to be debarred from any compensation in case of an accident. The plane will be used under conditions which are not quite the same as those under which the pilot usually flies. I ask the Minister to give that fact careful attention, because if we are going to establish the Air Commandos we must be generous in compensating these people on whose support we must depend. The State cannot regard this use of their private planes as a bonus offering to the individuals concerned, and I ask the Minister and his advisers to give that aspect careful consideration, and, if anything, to err on the side of leniency rather than to be too parismonious. This is a new venture and we must break new ground if we want to make a success of it.

Clause put and agreed to.

On Clause 13,

I propose the amendment as printed—

You will notice that we say there that the various labour organizations will be represented. It has been pointed out by the Department of Labour that this will make the board unduly clumsy, and hence this clause. All that happens now is that it is laid down in the law that employers and employees must be represented on the board, but it will depend on the Minister of Labour in consultation with the Minister of Defence who will be appointed and from which bodies, in order to represent the employers and the employees on that board. Consequently all bodies cannot claim representation on that board.

The hon. the Minister has made out a clear case. There was obviously a flaw in the original drafting, and we are prepared to accept his amendment.

I wish to raise another point with the Minister, because I think it may avoid some difficulty in future in regard to a possible clash of interest between the Manpower Board and the Exemption Board. If the Minister looks at sub-paragraph (ii), it says that the Manpower Board may determine from time to time which categories or portions of categories of persons employed in or practising any particular profession, industry or trade should be exempted from military service. In other words, the board may determine that a group of apprentices in the engineering trade should be exempted. They may say that 50 per cent of them should be exempted, What will be the position of the exemption boards? Because exemption boards may receive applications from individual citizens for exemption from military service, and it will be more than likely that a number of these applications for exemption may fall in the category which is being exempted by the Manpower Board. The last thing we want is that decisions of the Manpower Board should be used as an escape route from the ballot. I think we must avoid that. If we apply the ballot system, all men must be equal in the draw, and no privileges should be granted. The only privileges which can be considered are the needs of the State. I think therefore it would be, a mistake that if you get certain applications made to the Exemption Board for exemptions which may also fall in the category exempted by the Manpower Board, the Exemption Board should not give those exemptions merely because they fall in the category exempted by the Manpower Board.

Order! The hon. member should confine himself to the functions and powers of the board. He is now dealing with exemptions.

Sub-paragraph (ii) says which categories should be exempted from military service, and I want to make the point that the exemptions granted by the Exemption Board…

Order! The hon. member cannot discuss the Exemption Board.

I do not want to discuss it. I just want to say that persons should not shield behind the category of persons exempted by the Manpower Board, because we do not want to give the impression to the men who are balloted that certain categories of their colleagues have managed to get ah escape route through the Exemption Board merely because the Manpower Board decided that 50 per cent of the men in that trade should be exempted. I hope the Minister will bear this point in mind.

I will go into the matter.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Clause, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Clause 15,

I move the amendment standing in my name—

Order: I am afraid I am unable to accept the amendment as it seeks to extend the provisions of the Bill to classes of persons not contemplated by the Bill as read a second time.

Clause, as printed, put and agreed to.

Remaining Clauses and Title of the Bill put and agreed to.

House Resumed:

Bill reported with an amendment.

I move—

This amendment mainly relates to the legal provisions which apply to the appointment of auditors to co-operative societies and companies. Section 43 of the Co-operative Societies Act merely provides that a co-operative society shall at every annual general meeting appoint an auditor for the current financial year. The meeting may reappoint the same person or another person. So consequently the serving auditor is always uncertain whether he will be reappointed, particularly when he has fallen into disfavour with the manager of the co-operative or the members of the directorate for some reason. It is suspected that there have already been instances where co-operatives have replaced their serving auditors because the auditor concerned has reported unfavourably on some aspect, and this has reflected on the management of the co-operative. As the Act reads at present, it would be comparatively easy, with some degree of unilateral organization, to have a serving auditor replaced at an annual general meeting. The proposed amendment therefore provides that a resolution to replace a serving auditor will be invalid unless written notice thereof is given not later than on the last day of the financial year to the board of the society or company concerned, and the auditor as well as the members of the co-operative society have been informed thereof.

The Public Accountants and Auditors Act, 1951 (Act No. 51 of 1951) inter alia provides for the registration of public accountants and auditors and the Bill amends sub-section (1) of Section 43 of the Co-operative Societies Act to provide that a co-operative shall appoint an accountant and auditor who is registered under Act No. 51 of 1951 and is in public practice.

Save in the case of the first auditor of a co-operative society or where a casual vacancy arises, in which case an auditor may be appointed by the directors, it is proposed that an auditor of a co-operative society shall be appointed by the members of the co-operative society. The auditor acts as the watchdog of the members, and therefore it is desirable that the members should make the appointment.

To provide for instances where the members of the co-operative society or the directors thereof fail to appoint an auditor for some reason or other, it is provided in the Bill that such appointment may be made by the Registrar of Co-operative Societies. The procedure followed in the appointment or reappointment of an auditor of a co-operative is set forth more clearly in the proposed subsections (9) and (10). In terms of these subsections it is provided that the auditor concerned and the members of the co-operative society must be informed beforehand of the intention to appoint someone else as auditor of the society or company.

As regards the remuneration of the auditor, provision is made in the proposed sub-section (12) and this amends the existing sub-section (8) to this extent that it is provided that the remuneration shall be paid out of the funds of the society or company instead of out of the income as the relevant sub-section now reads. This is done with a view to greater clarity because as the Act reads now, the impression may be created that the remuneration of the auditor may only be paid if the cooperative society has earned an income.

The proposed amendment also obliges the auditor to forward to the Registrar of Cooperative Societies a copy of any report he drafts in the exercise of his official functions as auditor of the co-operative society. Under present circumstances the auditors sometimes hesitate to do so because some of them afraid it may offend the directorate or the management particularly when an interim report is submitted which, as the Act reads now, must be lodged with the Registrar by the Cooperative only at the end of the year.

In this Bill the specific right is now granted to an auditor to attend at his own expense any general meeting of a co-operative society and to make a statement at that meeting in relation to any books, documents, accounts or balance sheet he has examined or report he has submitted, or to make representations in connection with any matter affecting his appointment or his remuneration. As the position is now, an auditor of a co-operative society may attend the general meetings only at the invitation of the directors, and he may make only such statements and give such explanations as the chairman may call for; and in such cases the attendance is at the expense of the co-operative society.

If co-operative societies were to be compelled under all circumstances to bear the expense when an auditor attends a members’ meeting, it implies firstly that the auditor is placed under an obligation to attend such meetings, which may embarrass him if two or more co-operatives of which he is the auditor were to meet at the same time in different towns or localities. Furthermore it would subject the co-operatives which hold a series of meetings, that is to say, various meetings at different places on different days, to comparatively large extra liabilities in respect of the auditor when regard is had to the fact that sometimes as many as 20 or more such meetings are held and the auditor has to be remunerated at professional fees. Distant small co-operatives, for instance the non-White cooperatives in their own areas, may find it impossible to bear this additional liability.

Although it is intended to give the auditor every opportunity to enlighten or address the members, the problem arises that an auditor does not view the importance of his information in the same light as the members of the co-operative society, and members may hold the view that hearing the auditor further is a waste of time. Therefore it is indicated in sub-section (16) that the statement he wishes to make should be within the limits which members may determine at the meeting. It is not intended that the auditor’s mouth should be shut, yet on the other hand it is a members’ meeting and members ought not to be deprived of their democratic right to control the meeting. The idea of restraining a possibly irresponsible auditor by means of adjournment of the meeting is not regarded as in the interests of the co-operative society. Since the Bill was read a first time, the Accountants’ and Auditors’ Council has proposed a small amendment to sub-clause (16), and I am prepared to move it at the Committee Stage.

Mr. Speaker, the amendments contained in this Bill were drafted after consultation with the Co-operative Societies Council as the representative of agricultural co-operative societies, the Co-operative Societies Chamber as representative of commercial co-operative societies and the Council of Accountants and Auditors as representative of the auditors’ profession, and are intended to give greater protection to the auditor of a co-operative society or company, and to enable him to perform his functions more efficiently.

When amendments were made to the Cooperative Societies Act last year, representations were made from both sides of the House and also in the Other Place, that this safeguard should be introduced into the Act, to protect the auditors in such cases, and pursuant to those requests I am now introducing this amendment Bill.

We on this side of the House support this measure. We think it is a good measure; we think it is very necessary and that it will be much better that the auditor should be a little more independent. As the hon. the Minister has said already, he must never feel when he submits a report not altogether favourable to the directors, that there is any possibility that he may not be re-appointed. We think it is a very good thing that he should be more independent so that he may criticize whenever he thinks it is necessary to do so. The directors of co-operative societies are not always businessmen, and so it is a good thing that a watchful eye should be kept on them. We on this side are in full agreement with this legislation and we shall therefore support it.

I think we welcome this Bill, generally speaking, because it eliminates some shortcomings in the Co-operative Societies Act. In the first place I welcome the provision that when other auditors are to be appointed, the members of such a co-operative shall nominate the new auditor before the last day of the financial year. It is frequently found that members propose a change of auditors, and then it occurs months after the end of the financial year, with the result that the auditors then are placed in an extremely difficult position when the old auditors have already been doing the audit of that co-operative society for months. This Bill now provides that a change of auditors may be proposed but that it shall be done before the last day of the financial year. I think that is an improvement and that it completely clears up the whole position. The appointment of auditors of course is intended to safeguard the interests of members.

There is only one difficulty I should like to bring to the Minister’s notice, and that is in connection with the remuneration of the auditor. It is provided now that the remuneration of the auditors should be fixed by the members. I think that is correct, because it will place the directors in a difficult position if they have to fix the remuneration of the auditor, but at the same time we know what happens at general meetings. One of the members may rise in the meeting and propose, quite injudiciously, without any idea how much work the audit involves, a certain amount as auditor’s remuneration. The proposed amount may be too little or it may be too much, and therefore I should like to ask the hon. the Minister whether he will consider providing that the fees shall be fixed by the general meeting on the recommendation of the board of directors, or that there shall be an appeal to the Registrar of Co-operative Societies who could then fix the fees whenever there is a dispute as to the amount. That will then be a way out when the fees, as proposed at the general meeting, are too much or too little. The hon. the Minister may perhaps tell me that if the fees are too low, the auditors simply will not accept it, but then the directors will be in the position that they cannot nominate other auditors. Therefore I should like to suggest that the Minister should consider making provision for a right of appeal to the Registrar so that an injudicious proposal adopted at a general meeting may be rectified. Furthermore, I think this Bill is necessary to protect the interests of the members, and to see to it that justice is done to them. As the Minister has already said, auditors will have the right to attend meetings and to make statements there. I have already said that it serves to protect members. I welcome the provision that they should do so at their own expense, for otherwise the directors are again placed in the difficult position that they have to approve the travelling expenses. So it is better that the auditor should attend meetings at his own expense. Mr. Chairman, we welcome this change in so far as it affects auditors. We think it is a good step in the right direction.

There is one aspect of Clause 1 on which I would like clarification from the hon. the Minister. Sub-section 1 provides that the auditor who could be appointed must be one who is registered under the Public Accountants and Auditors Act. In other words, he is a professional auditor belonging to a professional organization and is recognized as such. But sub-section (3) provides that all appointments of auditors under this section shall be subject to the approval of the Registrar who may confirm or reject any such appointment without assigning any reason therefor. This seems to be a somewhat unusual provision. Here we are getting either (a) the directors for a short term or (b) the members themselves at an annual general meeting, appointing a professional man, a man whose status is recognized by virtue of membership of a professional society, and yet at the same time you say that the Registrar may reject that appointment if he so wishes. I do not know of any cases where the appointment of a qualified professional man is subject to the control of any Government Department or official. Compare the position here with the position under the Companies Act. Under the Companies Act there is no proviso that an auditor appointed at the general meeting of the company shall be subject to the approval of the Registrar of Companies. Here you are dealing with a profession, a very honourable profession, if I may say so, and I would like the Minister to tell us why he is providing in this clause for the Registrar to have the right to decide whether an auditor is acceptable or not.

In reply to the hon. member for Christiana (Mr. Wentzel) I should just like to tell him that if his request, namely, that members should not fix the fees of the auditors at the general meeting, were acceded to, it would to some extent frustrate the object of this amendment Bill. The fact of the matter is that when an auditor’s fees are fixed, it will of course normally be on the recommendation of the board of Directors to the members’ meeting, but on the other hand it may very easily happen, when a board of directors cannot get along with an auditor, that they may fix his fees at such a low figure that the auditor will not be prepared to work for that fee. Then the same object is achieved which the Bill seeks to prevent. Of course, I am accepting that there will be mutual consultation between the directors and the members when there is good co-operation, and where these circumstances do not arise.

Now I come to the hon. member for Parktown (Mr. Emdin). The Registrar of Co-operative Societies of course has much greater control over co-operatives and a much greater obligation to co-operative societies than the ordinary Registrar of Companies has in respect of companies. The Registrar of Co-operative Societies has to see to it that the provisions of the Co-operative Societies Act are carried out, and there may be many other reasons, apart from his opinion that an auditor is incompetent, why he thinks that the auditor is not a suitable person or that he is not able to do the audit of that co-operative society. There may be various co-operatives who have the same auditor. The Registrar may be convinced that such an auditor will not be able to audit the books timeously. So the Registrar of Co-operative Societies must therefore retain the power to refuse, although he will seldom if ever exercise that power. But there also are instances where auditors of co-operatives have acted, and where it actually was found that the work was not done properly, and that other co-operatives then again wish to appoint those auditors. In such a case also the Registrar may use his discretion and say that he is not prepared to approve that auditor, because the balance sheet and the accounts must when all is said and done be lodged with him and he has to approve them. It is the most important reason for this provision.

Motion put and agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

I move—

As from 1 March last year a scheme was introduced in terms of the Marketing Act for the regulation of the marketing of fresh milk and fresh cream on the Witwatersrand and in Pretoria and Bloemfontein. A similar scheme which was already in operation in Cape Town was incorporated in this scheme.

The main object of this scheme was to achieve orderliness in the marketing of fresh milk and fresh cream in these four areas and to promote stability, and particularly price stability, in this branch of our agriculture. The scheme affects milk and cream destined for human consumption in that form, or for the manufacture of ice cream. It distinguishes between industrial milk used, e.g., for butter and cheese production, which is controlled in terms of the dairy scheme which falls under the control of the old, established Dairy Products Board, and fresh milk which is daily used by consumers in the cities, which is controlled in terms of the Milk Scheme by the Milk Board.

The Milk Scheme also covers sterilized milk and cream and pasteurized milk and cream. Fresh milk is pasteurized on a large scale and sold as pasteurized milk. Because sterilized milk and cream may possibly be regarded as products different from fresh milk and fresh cream, the Act was amended last year, with retrospective effect, to provide that the words “milk” and “cream” also include sterilized milk and cream. Pasteurized milk was, however, regarded as still being synonymous with milk and no amendment was made to the Act to provide that milk and cream also include pasteurized milk and cream.

In the main the validity of the Milk Scheme was, however, attacked, inter alia, on the grounds that the scheme also had reference to pasteurized milk which, it was alleged, was no longer milk in its natural form. In view of the fact that the pasteurization of fresh milk is done on a very wide scale (in Pretoria, for example, practically 100 per cent of the milk is pasteurized), a fresh milk scheme must necessarily also apply to pasteurized milk. Consequently an amendment of the Marketing Act is proposed which will include pasteurized milk and cream in the words “milk” and “cream” respectively. The amendment is also made retrospective to 18 June 1951, the first date on which provisions were inserted in the Act specifically providing for fresh milk schemes. It is necessary, inter alia, to prevent the present Milk Scheme from possibly being declared invalid on the ground that it also refers to pasteurized milk.

Although sterilized milk has already been included in the Act with retrospective effect, the present Milk Scheme has also been attacked on the grounds that certain proclamations which have reference to the scheme were not affected by the legislation which was given retrospective effect. Consequently provision is now being made that it should be considered that all the relevant proclamations, notices and actions also refer to sterilized and pasteurized milk and cream.

Another matter for which provision is made in the Bill refers to the registration or producers. Hitherto the Milk Scheme has been applied by means of a system in terms of which all fresh milk producers and the distributors should be registered with the Milk Board before they may deliver or distribute milk in the controlled areas. The board runs a pool and the net proceeds of all sales are then distributed among the producers concerned.

In regard to the requirement that producers should first register with the board before they are allowed to distribute fresh milk or fresh cream in the controlled areas, the board must practically automatically grant applications for registration, because there is no provision in the Marketing Act in terms of which it can refuse to register a producer on the grounds e.g. that there is already a sufficient number of registered producers. The principle of limiting the number of primary producers (farmers) in any branch of agriculture is not as yet, contained in the Marketing Act, nor is it the intention to introduce it into that Act.

In practice, there is on the whole a fairly constant short-term demand for fresh milk. All supplies in excess of this quantity must be diverted into other channels, e.g. to cheese factories, condensed milk factories, etc., and at appreciably lower prices than those obtainable in the fresh milk market. At the moment producers can at any time of the year enter the industry, and that creates problems for the Milk Board in its attempts more effectively to regulate the distribution of milk. For this reason the Milk Board has made representations to me to clothe it with the powers, if necessary, to register producers only once a year. The board will then at least have greater certainty as to the quantities of milk which will be delivered during the year and will be able to regulate its sales programme more effectively than is the case when during the year new producers apply for registration every time it suits them.

After consultation with the National Marketing Council, I have decided to accede to the request of the Milk Board and to ask this House to approve this necessary provision in the Marketing Act. The proposed amendment which I am submitting to the House is that the Milk Board should be given the power, with my approval, to allow all applications for registration as producers to stand over for consideration on a date to be determined by the board. At least one such date should be fixed in each calendar year, and all applications on hand on that date must be considered. The board will therefore be able to withhold registration from a producer, who has applied for registration and qualifies for it, for a maximum period of 12 months.

The proposed power is aimed at promoting stability in the fresh milk industry. Its object is not to limit the number of people concerned in the fresh milk industry, but to ensure that they join in an orderly fashion and at specified times. It will assist in the marketing of fresh milk being done on an organized basis and in the best interests of the industry.

Then there is one further amendment which is proposed, namely that the scheme will be able to provide that only producers of the product concerned may be appointed as the representatives of producers in the control board concerned. This is also done in view of the litigation against the Milk Scheme. That scheme contains such a provision and it was attacked because it was alleged that it was illegal in view of the fact that the Marketing Act has no such provision. It was also alleged that this provision prevents a director or official of a company which is a producer from being appointed as a member of the board.

The object of the provision is clear, namely that only milk producers, and no other persons, may represent milk producers on the board. This is not a principle foreign to the Marketing Act, which already requires that nobody may be appointed to represent the producers of slaughter stock unless he is a bona fide farmer. The proposed provision will apply to any scheme, but is not obligatory as in the case of slaughter stock, seeing that it simply provides that a scheme may provide that only producers may be appointed as producers’ representatives. Where in practice this is not considered necessary, such a provision will not be included in the scheme. This proposed amendment is also made retrospective to 29 June 1956 the date on which the Cape Town Milk Scheme, which also contained such a provision, came into operation. It is particularly necessary to make the legislation retrospective, because the validity of the present Milk Scheme as a scheme was also attacked on this ground.

To sum up, it may be said that the proposed amendments are intended on the one hand to save the Milk Scheme from possibly being declared null and void by the court, and on the other hand to increase the efficacy of the scheme. It is a scheme in regard to which numerous producers have been exerting their energies over a long period and which hitherto has in general shown such good results that this scheme can be described as a successful institution for the promotion of the fresh milk industry in the areas concerned.

This legislation has the support of this side as well. It is a simple measure which does away with most of the defects in the old Act. It contains nothing extraordinary and this side of the House will support it.

We greatly welcome this change. I speak on behalf of all the fresh milk producers when I say that this change is definitely an improvement. I want to say immediately that we producers are sick and tired because, every time the Minister has come with good intentions to protect the interests of the producers, of placing the production of fresh milk on a sound basis and of arranging the distribution thereof as well as possible for the benefit of both the producer and the consumer, the distributors have always come forward and prejudiced the case of the producer in the courts on the strength of technical legal points in order to promote their own interests. We have become sick and tired of that and I hope the hon. the Minister has now succeeded, through his legal advisers, to close once and for all every possible loophole through which these self-interest-seekers have crawled in the past. We as producers have suffered thousands of pounds damage. This measure which is an improvement on the existing Act is a guarantee that we shall realize the real price for our milk. I think the public ought to know this and I think this is the opportunity for stating it. There was a time before this scheme came into operation when the fresh milk producers, who worked under the old quota system, had to deliver milk under uncontrolled conditions, to the distributors on the market for which we received only surplus prices while that milk was sold at the full price. In that way we producers lost thousands and thousands of pounds. We have been struggling for practically 20 years for this scheme and our main enemies were those people who abused the fact that the producer could not accompany his milk to the market and could not himself supervise the weights and the fact that the producer could not determine, when he received a card in his can that 10 or 20 or 30 gallons milk was sour, whether that was so. We simply had to accept it. Where we have been struggling all these years to get such a scheme in order to place the marketing of our milk on a sound, and orderly basis those people have consistently opposed us. I think we have now reached the end of this court case story, the end of these self-interest-seekers. This scheme has brought about stability. Never before, I can almost say over the past two centuries, have the fresh milk producers in the Transvaal been as satisfied as they are to-day as far as the marketing of their product is concerned. We have stability to-day and we are at least being treated honestly. I must honestly say that there is a new spirit amongst the fresh milk producers—and there are many of them. I think there are roundabout 1,000 or 1,200 fresh milk producers who deliver milk in the controlled areas of Johannesburg and Pretoria. This orderliness, this stability, this assurance of honest treatment, will result in our being able, as time goes by, to conduct our fresh milk production operations on a more scientific basis.

And then we shall again have a surplus.

No, not necessarily a surplus. What we will achieve will be to bring down our production costs per gallon of milk as low as possible. The stable basis on which marketing will in future take place is creating that opportunity for us. On behalf of the fresh milk producers I wish to pay tribute to the hon. the Minister to-day for his determined attitude in coming forward with this amendment in order to protect our interests as well as the interests of the consumer. We thank him for that.

Motion put and agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

May I have the privilege of the half-hour please, Sir? I am participating in this debate particularly, because I believe the time has come when this Government, particularly this hon. Minister, have indicated, I think mainly for political and for propaganda purposes, that they are no longer prepared to accept as a fact what the Tomlinson Commission accepted, the Tomlinson Commission of which this hon. Minister was a member, that there would always be a large number of Natives permanently settled in our urban areas. The Tomlinson Commission estimated that by the year 2000, if everything possible and impossible which it had recommended, had been done, that figure would be round about 6,000,000 Natives. They would probably be increasing faster than the White population of the Republic of that time. The Minister accepted that when he was a member of that Commission. The Prime Minister, in his capacity as Minister of Native Affairs at that time, accepted that as well when he indicated in 1955 that the time-table which would satisfy him would be that in 50 years time there would be equal numbers of Europeans and Natives permanently settled outside the reserves. Of course the Natives permanently settled outside the reserves are probably growing in numbers as fast, if not faster, than the Whites, remain a thorn in the side of the party propagandists. It seems to me that they have now made up their minds that they are going to do away with them. They are going to do away with them physically in some cases and if not physically then by eviction in other cases. With the co-operation of this Minister they tackled that task. As I say, I believe it has been tackled chiefly because of their difficulty in meeting the propaganda which is made as a result of that acceptance and I believe it is being done for political and propaganda purposes. This Minister has tackled it both legislatively and administratively. It is tragic that it should be this Minister who is spearheading that movement because one feels with his experience and his background as a member of the Tomlinson Commission he ought to know a great deal better. It is for that reason, Sir, that I am going to move at this stage at once—

I know that I cannot speak of the legislation but I can speak of administrative action as to what the Minister is doing through his Department. I want to give just three examples of the sort of thing that is happening in pursuance of this fantasy that there are going to be no more Natives permanently settled outside of the reserves.

The first example I want to deal with is the projected removal of the Bantu from the Western Cape. I am not quite sure who lays claim to the paternity of this idea, whether it is the hon. member for Malmesbury (Mr. van Staden) and the hon. member for Mooresburg (Mr. P. S. Marais) or the hon. the Minister of his Deputy or perhaps the Prime Minister himself. Be that as it may, Sir, it would appear that the Western Cape has been singled out for special treatment, special treatment in terms of a decree whereby it would seem that all the Natives are to be removed from the Western Cape and are to be replaced ultimately by Coloured labour. What we are entitled to ask first of all is just what area is envisaged for this purpose? I have never seen it accurately defined. What is meant by the Western Cape? The hon. the Minister originally, and I quote from a speech he made in 1956, seemed to think the Western Cape was everything west of the great Kei River. Since then, probably as the difficulties involved made some impression, the line seems to have moved further west and the area involved has become a little smaller. We have never been clear as to whether Port Elizabeth is to be included or is to be excluded. It seems now possible that Port Elizabeth is to be excluded so the line must be further west of that. Of course, when the difficulties experienced by the Knysna industrialists have been brought to the attention of the Department perhaps it will even go further west than that, because timber-milling without Bantu labour is becoming a very real problem as industrialists in the George and Knysna areas will tell the Minister. I think it is quite clear that the duty of the hon. the Minister is clearly that he must tell us exactly where that line is going to run. He must tell us what he means when he speaks of the Western Cape. He must tell us exactly in what areas provision has to be made in accordance with this policy if it is ever to be carried out. I think he has also got to tell us just why this step is to be taken. Originally the idea was said to be that it would protect the Coloured people from Bantu competition in the field of labour. Then we had an original idea from the Minister’s colleague, the hon. Minister of Community Development, who said it would help to prevent miscegenation between Coloureds and Natives. Now we hear other voices. Now we hear voices based on arguments that this is simply the one area to which the Native has never had any claim; this is the one area from which he must be excluded. It seems as though the whole foundation of their argument is fear and the hope that if the rest of South Africa is in trouble with the Native people then at least the Western Cape will be free. They seem to regard the Western Cape as the stronghold of White civilization which could be relied upon to hang out even if there was trouble in the rest of South Africa. That is the logical conclusion of their argument. I think the Minister knows I think the hon. the Prime Minister knows; I think most people with any commonsense know—that the destiny of the Western Cape is bound up inextricably with the destiny of the rest of South Africa whether we happen to like it or not.

Why then this projected removal? Is it perhaps because it is intended to demonstrate to the rest of the country that full separate development is after all possible regardless of the consequences? You see, Sir, one fact does stand out and that is that this projected removal will be a test in microcosm as to whether the Minister’s overall policy is a practical proposition. Already it has been said by industrialists and commercial men that the difficulties are so great that the only way to solve this problem is to postpone it. Now what are those difficulties and how is the Minister going to meet them? The first of those difficulties, I think, is that if this scheme is to be carried out it would be to attempt a sociological and economic revolution in fact; an attempt in fact to say that at least 140,000 Natives (65,000 men and 75,000 women) are to be moved from the areas in which they are at the present time. That is if we define the Western Cape as the greater Cape Peninsula. But if we take the Western Cape as the area west and southwest, including Humansdorp, then, according to research done at the Stellenbosch University, it seems that the figure would be 252,000 Bantu of whom 160,000 odd are men and 92,000 are women. It would seem that of those roughly 100.000 are in rural areas and 150,000 in urban areas. I mention those figures because by any standard this tremendous uprootal, even over a number of years, will decree that that number of people are no longer to make their living in their present occupations; no longer to live in the areas where many of them were born and that there is going to be attempted to set in reverse the process that integrated them into the economic life of the area in which they are at the present time and to re-employ them in areas which at the present time apparently have no attraction for them from the economic point of view. I believe they can only be re-employed in other areas, if at all, at extraordinary costs. I believe that at the present time there is absolutely no guarantee whatsoever that employment can be created for them or that it will ever prove to be sound employment, economically speaking. They will have to be rehoused; they will have to be resettled; they will have to be established in the areas to which they are going to be moved. They have family ties; they have community bonds like anyone else here. Who knows. Sir, what future Berlin wall is going to divide members of the same family if this policy is carried out? Who knows what frustrations it is going to cause? I think we can rest assured that there will be human tragedies in plenty because when there has been a marriage between a Native and a Coloured some children over the age of 18 may be classified one way and some the other. We already know that hundreds of Natives—the hon. the Minister is usually very proud of this—have been endorsed out of the Peninsula and the Western Cape at the present time every month. They seem to be going to places where they have no hope of making a living. That is the information I have from the areas to which they are going. We know of the complaints of many of the people in the Eastern Province and Border areas about people coming there and squatting on the farms because they have been endorsed out of the western areas and have no employment to go to.

I do not attach too much importance to the Government’s promises to provide work before the people are moved. I know the hon. the Minister of Finance, whom I am glad to see here, said—

I wonder what this means in costs; I wonder what it means in the artificial creation of jobs where natural economic forces have not created them already? I have been talking about costs so I want to give just one example of what it costs to create jobs for people. I want to look at the Swaziland position as reviewed in articles in Optima of March 1962. Swaziland, although a British High Commissioned Territory, is an instructive case in point—

That means an investment, Sir, of R5,400 for the creation of each job for each African male. Let me direct the attention of the hon. the Minister of what is happening in South Africa as a whole in respect of population trends. In 1920 the proportion of the non-White population living in the White cities was approximately 14 per cent. By 1960 it had risen to approximately 37 per cent. The sharpest increases were over the years 1940 to 1950 and from 1950 to 1960. If these trends continue there may well be as many as 45 per cent by the year 1970 in South Africa’s so-called White cities.

Why “so-called?”

I say “so-called” because we call them White cities but in almost every case there are more Blacks in them than Whites. That is why I call them “so-called” White cities. At the same time there has been a very considerable drop in the number of males on the land in the reserves. It was believed to be about 40 per cent in 1920; the figure is now estimated by some to be as low as 3 per cent. I cannot vouch for that figure but I know it has been used on many occasions. How then does the hon.Minister of Finance hope, and clearly the hon. Minister of Bantu Administration hopes with him, that the Natives of the Western Cape will be sucked back into the reserves? Where is the work for them? We know that despite what has been happening in the first quarter of this year there was actually more recruiting in the Transkei for Natives for employment in the Western Cape than in either of the two previous years over the same period. The hon. member for Heilbron (Mr. Froneman) was recently chairman of a commission which reported that unemployment amongst the Native people amounted to over 500,000. By any standard that is a high percentage of the population. I do not quite see how with these problems this task can be tackled at the present time with any hope of success.

But then comes the second problem, the second difficulty. Perhaps the word “difficulty” is an understatement here. Who is going to do the work which the Bantu are doing at the present time in the Western Cape? In Cape Town and the immediately surrounding Boland areas there are something like 65,000 Bantu in employment; probably 35,000 are in industry, 2,000 in the docks, 2,000 in garages, 8.000 in shops and stores, 2,000 doing milk delivery, between 3,000 and 4,000 on the railways, about 1,500 in Government and provincial employ and about 11,000 in miscellaneous and unskilled labour. The Central Government employs roughly 5,000—3,000 to 5,000 on the railways and 1,500 in Government and Provincial Departments. What are they doing to set an example? The hon. Minister of Transport squarely met his difficulties. He told these people that one of the troubles was that Natives earned higher wages here than in the rest of the country and that they did not want to be transferred elsewhere on the railways. He told us that he could not get Coloureds to do the sort of jobs which the Natives were doing. That is bearing out the finding of commerce and industry throughout this area who have been faced with those very difficulties. What is interesting, Sir, is that if the Government is having these difficulties then what about other industrialists and other employers? Above all, what about the farming community? The figure for them must be roundabout a 100,000 Natives in rural areas in this area. Where is their labour to come from? We know what is happening on the West Coast already. The hon. Minister is trying to persuade people there to get rid of their Native labour in their factories. Those factories are now competing with the farmers for labour. The wages they are paying are higher than those that the farmers can pay at present prices. What is the future going to hold out for the farming community in the Western Cape if we proceed with this policy? You see, Sir, it is all very well to talk of Coloureds replacing the Bantu. The best figure for Coloured unemployed in the area is between 3,000 and 4,000 to do the work of 65,000 Native males. I know there are many who say that the rate of increase in the case of the Coloured population is in fact so high that they will make up this number very quickly. If that is so all I can say is that manifestly the Coloured population has not kept pace up-to-date with the industrial expansion of the Western Cape. If, in the next few years it has not only got to keep pace with but to overtake that expansion, it can only happen if the industrial expansion is slower, proportionately speaking, than it has been over the last 20 years. This points only in one direction and that is that this policy is going to create uncertainties and problems which are steadily going to corrode the prosperity and the development and the well-being of the Western Cape. Added to that, Sir, is the undeniable fact that light industries will tend to move to areas where large bodies of labour with substantial spending power are concentrated. There seems very little likelihood of those being directed to the Western Cape under policies of this kind. This matter was raised by the Cape Chamber of Industries who thought it necessary to make a statement on the far-reaching economic implications. I want to refer to only two comments in that whole statement. The first was—

Indeed, that has been the picture throughout South Africa. Our modern White economy does not find it possible to advance without greater supplies of Black labour. I have no doubt, Sir, that if this policy is going to be carried out, it is going to have serious repercussions on the development of the Western Cape. One asks oneself why? I have no doubt, Sir, when all the commissions appointed by the hon. the Prime Minister and other Ministers have reported that we are going to find ourselves in the position that the Native, who until now has been permanently settled in the Western Cape, is going to have his permanency undermined and he will be removed but we will still be dependent on a large force of migrant Native labour because we cannot get on without them in this area. That brings me to the second comment of the Cape Chamber of Industries—

So much, Sir, of what this hon. Minister is doing is both illogical and short-sighted. He seems to a large extent to be oblivious of the state of affairs of the urban Native in South Africa. He does not seem to appreciate his frustrations; he does not seem to appreciate the hardships to which he is submitted as a result of the administration of the Minister. I wonder whether he noticed an article by Dr. Retief of the Department of Criminology of the University of South Africa? He said this—

I think the hon. the Minister seems to fail to realize that this drift from country to town is a world-wide phenomenon and it is a phenomenon which is lent impetus here because of the absolute poverty of the inhabitants of the reserve at the present time and because of their inability to support themselves on the economy of the reserves as it exists at the present time. I think the question we want to ask the Minister is whether he can afford to keep so large a section of our population in a position of uncertainty, in a position of impermanency where they are virtually regarded as having their homes elsewhere and their work here in our urban areas. I wonder whether the time has not come for him to consider certain changes in his administration, I realize, Sir, that I am in danger of being very near to pleading for legislation but I think the suggestions I am going to make, while of a pattern of changes for which I can plead on another occasion, do not require changes in legislation. I wonder whether the Minister should not consider the application of influx control not to individual urban areas but to large urban complexes so that there will be a greater opportunity of exchange of labour between jobs, of movement of labour from one job to another and a greater opportunity for families to find employment within the same area where they all have rights. It would certainly give greater mobility to labour in the event of the movement of factories. It will certainly give them a greater opportunity to find jobs of the kind they are seeking. To-day there is altogether too much difficulty in respect of the position of wives and male children over 18 years old. This whole pass system seems to be designed to be applicable to the lowest, the most poorly-qualified type of Native labour or employee. It is not a system, with all respect, that fits the educated, the advanced, the more civilized man. But he gets no bonus for being civilized; he gets no bonus for being a responsible member of society. I wonder whether the Minister should not consider once again the introduction of exemption passes to give a greater sense of stability to those classes of people? This feeling of impermanency amongst them is borne out only too fully when you look at the recent circular issued in respect of the rights of Native traders in the Bantu urban areas in our big industrial complexes. I know this matter has been discussed in this House before. But it seems to me that there are certain questions which the hon. the Minister should still answer us in this regard. The whole theory seems to be that it is the general, and therefore the over-riding policy, not to allow, without good reason, an increase in the number of Bantu residents in White areas who are not employees. Then it goes on to put all sorts of limitations upon them; it prevents them from carrying on more than one business in any area or in different areas; it prevents them from going in for businesses like drycleaners, garages and petrol filling stations, despite the fact that in one complex there are 25 square miles without Bantu-owned dry-cleaning businesses. The whole concept seems to be that those to whom trading rights have been allocated may in future be allowed no sense of permanency. They are not even allowed to erect their own buildings for the businesses they want to establish.

But I want to hurry on to my last example. My last example of the spirit of impermanency which is being created to-day is the use to-day of a policy of the establishment of border industries, to cover, as Professor Tomlinson and the Minister envisaged at the time the report was given out, those who would have to be removed from the land in agriculture in order to rehabilitate the soil and allow the farms to be built up; now it is also to cover the natural increase in the reserve; it is intended to cover those who are to be sent back from the other portions of South Africa to the reserves. And what a poor job has been made of it so far! Instead of sticking to the timetable of the Tomlinson Commission they have in ten years not found sufficient jobs for one-third of one year’s quota. The reason is expense. The hon. the Minister knows it. Time does not allow me to take that further. The other reason is that we do not yet know where the boundaries of those Bantustans are going to be. Every representation to the hon. the Minister and his Department leads to new and more peculiar maps. One has been given some idea of what is happening in the Transkei. We still do not know about the Ciskei. What is happening in the Transvaal where 26 per cent of the land is going to be given away? What is happening in Natal where the figure is over 32 per cent?

Table your questions.

The hon. gentleman says: “Table your questions.” We have been to this Minister time and again for permission to photostat his maps. Can we have those maps, Mr. Chairman? Has the Minister got maps that we can photostat and show the world at large exactly where those boundaries are? No, Sir, he has not. That uncertainty is continuing; that uncertainty exists and it is for those reasons particularly that I move this reduction in the hon. Minister’s salary.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition has apparently availed himself of this opportunity of trying to criticize the policy of the Minister and the present Government but he must remember that all the criticism which he has levelled today and on other occasions against this Government and more particularly against this Minister is noticed by us; at the same time we wonder what the hon. the Leader of the Opposition himself has to offer in the place of the policy which the Minister is now carrying out? Time will not allow me Sir, to deal with his last question, namely, where the boundaries are. I think the Minister and other members on this side have repeatedly replied to that. If we pose this counter-question: What will you do if we immediately accept the released areas as the boundaries for the future? Then they are as silent as the grave; we get no reply from them; then they are not prepared to say that they will accept those as the boundaries. It does not avail the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, therefore, to conclude his speech with that question because that has been answered repeatedly, whereas they are not prepared to reply to the question I have just asked. What is the reply to that question? There they sit, Sir, and they cannot answer it; they dare not answer it. But if they do not want to answer that question the hon. the Leader of the Opposition must not conclude his speech with that question because that is a question which does not apply as far as the policy of this Government is concerned, it refers to the 1936 Act. But they do not want to know anything about that. On the contrary, they are betraying their own past and their own careers and everything they have done under the 1936 Act.

Let me touch on a few of the questions raised by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition in the time at my disposal. I really did not expect the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, with his intelligence, to ask what the meaning was of the word “terugsuig” (suck back); the sucking back of the Bantu from the White areas to the Bantu homelands. He finds it a wonderful word and he wants to know what it means. Surely he ought to understand that when you talk about sucking back—it is a mechanical term—there has to be an opening; not, as the hon. member tried to make_ us believe, that there would not be an opening. The process of sucking can only take place when there is an opening, when there is emptiness. Only then can the process of sucking take place.

May I ask a question?

I hope hon. members will appreciate that the Leader of the Opposition had half an hour but that I only have a few minutes and in those few minutes I want to deal with a few of the points raised by him. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition should remember that whereas it is the policy of the present Government to suck back to their homelands all the Bantu who are resident in the White areas that is a policy which will stretch over years. When we say that we realize that there will be Bantu in the White areas for a considerable time to perform the necessary labour. What do hon. members opposite insist on? They insist upon our creating an additional attraction for the Bantu in the White areas. You must, for example, allow them to own property in the heart of the White area. That is an additional attraction to draw the Bantu from their homelands to the White man’s country. That is what the hon. the Leader of the Opposition is doing and that is what he is actually suggesting in his race federation policy which we have often discussed. Having created that additional attraction he pleads for the abolition of job reservation. What does that mean? If you have to abolish job reservation, with its consequences as envisaged by the hon. gentlemen in his race federation policy, what will be the result? The hon. the Leader of the Opposition concluded his speech in the no confidence motion with the clear statement that it did not only mean representation in Parliament but also in the administration of the country. That means that on a federal basis you will have to have at least three Bantu for every White man in offices. [Laughter.] The hon. member for Yeoville laughs, but hon. gentlemen, do not know what they are talking about. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition spoke about the administration of the country not only about representation in Parliament. If you want to apply race federation in the administration as well what else does it mean than three Bantu to every White man in the administrative offices, three Bantu to every White man in the police offices, three Bantu to every White man in the Defence Force, if you carry it through to its logical conclusion?

He did not say that.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition stated it clearly. He did not say only in Parliament but in administrative capacities as well. What does that mean? The hon. gentleman should not use words to which he wants to attach another meaning to-morrow or the day after when those words get him into difficulty. What does race federation in administrative capacities mean other than the position as outlined by me? What else can it mean? Or you must really be talking with your tongue in your cheek. Did the hon. the Leader of the Opposition speak with his tongue in his cheek when he said that or not? When the Leader of the Opposition criticizes the Minister by saying that the process should be hastened, namely, that there should be an additional attraction to draw even more Bantu to the White areas contrary to our policy, and that, over and above that, you must create openings in your administration, in your Police Force and in your Defence Force and in your trades as such, I say that is proof positive that the Leader of the Opposition is prepared with that policy of his to hand the whole of South Africa over to the Black man. Because if you want to be honest with the Black man and you promise him all those things as they have been promised to him under the race federation plan of the Leader of the Opposition, it can lead to nothing else, if it is carried out honestly, but that you must give them pro rata representation in the administration, in all the key positions, in all trades, in the army, and in the Police Force. Otherwise you are not being honest. You cannot shield behind the so-called high qualification for the franchise because the Leader of the Opposition says that job reservation must be abolished. What does that mean? That means that the trades will not remain in the hands of the White man at all. And when you have to hand over your trades in South Africa, apart from your administrative position, apart from your police and your civil service, to the Bantu, you may perhaps temporarily, by giving them an unfair form of federation, have minority representation here but when you deal with hard economic facts and you promise the Bantu that job reservation will be abolished and you tell him that he can now work in the mines, that the lathe is there for him to operate and that all the trades are open to him as they are for the White man, he will do to the White man what he did to the Coloured here in the Cape Province, here in the Cape Peninsula, where he has ousted all the Coloureds from their work. [Time limit.]

Since we last discussed this hon. Minister’s Vote a year ago, we have heard a lot of this suction process, sucking the Natives out of the White Republic to the Bantustans. But we have also had some facts, facts which have become available, facts as revealed by the census, which show that if there has been a suction, it has been a suction in reverse. The suction that has taken place is away from the Bantustan areas to the White areas. I should like to give the hon. member for Krugersdorp some figures to show that his suction is going wrong, that it is not operating in the direction he wants it to operate. If we look at the 1960 census, we see that the number of Bantu in our urban areas has increased from 1951 to 1960 from 2,300,000 to 3,400,000, in other words, 1,100.000 under the so-called apartheid Government have been sucked into the White area, into the White cities. That is the suction that has taken place. And if we also look at the Metropolitan area, and we take the Witwatersrand where the hon. member himself comes from, we find that in the same period the number of Bantu have increased by 276,000 and the number of Whites by 112,000. Is that going to keep our cities White? Is that how it is going to happen under apartheid? Is that how we are sending the Natives back from the White area to the Black areas? Mr. Chairman, in the same period in which the Native population in our urban areas increased by 1,100,000, the Whites have increased by 500,000. And then we hear day after day that apartheid will keep the Republic White! But the Natives are increasing twice as fast as the Whites under apartheid. And what are these Bantu doing who came to the cities? I suggest to the hon. member that he should go and read this report on Bantu industry divisions, age groups and age occupation groups to see what has happened to these Bantu who have gone to our big cities. You find that comparatively speaking the most rapid increase has been in our industries, the most vital part of future economic development; the future generator and governor of our economic development is industrial development. What is happening? The number of Natives in industry has increased in this period by nearly 100,000, from 227,000 to 320,000. In commerce in the same period they have increased from 100,000 to 157,000. If we look at the proportions, we see that the Bantu in industry have increased by 41 per cent and the Whites by 26 per cent. That is what is happening. The suction that is taking place is that the White economy is sucking the Natives from the rural areas and from the Bantustans to the big cities.

Are these millions of Natives in our cities temporary sojourners as the whole policy of the Minister implies? The whole policy of apartheid is based on that, that they are temporary sojourners. Let us look at some of the facts. The Minister will recollect that eight or nine years ago, he signed a report, the famous Tomlinson Report. Let us see what the Tomlinson Report says about how temporary or permanent the Natives are in those urban areas. On page 28, paragraph 24, the Tomlinson Commission says—

So we find that the Minister himself accepted in 1954 that out of a total Bantu population of 2,300,000 in the cities no less than 1,500,000 could be regarded as permanent. Now his whole policy is based on the supposition that these people are not permanent. And that was not only the finding of the Minister. More recently, last year, we had a finding by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research. They made a sample survey on the Witwatersrand. What did they find? They found on the sample that they took there, excluding mine Natives, that at least 50 per cent of the Natives on the Witwatersrand could be regarded as permanently urbanized, and they further found that 70 per cent never resorted to rural work and never reverted to rural work again. They found that only 10 per cent were really migrant workers. Despite these facts, we find that the Minister’s policies are developing more and more towards the basis that all the Natives in our big cities are so-called migrant workers, and that they can have no permanent rights of any sort at all! What a fiction!

You have said all that before.

Unfortunately facts seem to make no impression upon hon. members there and so we have to keep on repeating them. Because despite these facts, the hon. Minister bases his policy on the illusion that these people are not permanently there. The whole policy of the Government is based on the presumption that these Africans in our big cities are citizens-to-be of states-to-be. They do not regard them as what they are in reality, namely people living permanently in our big cities. And what has happened between 1950 and 1960 will happen between 1960 and 1970, and I will tell the hon. Minister why. He knows as well as I do that all economic growth is dependent on capital formation and having people of the ability and skill to put that capital to economic investment and economic production. What is the position in South Africa? The Minister knows as well as I do that at present our capital formation is of the order of R1,1000,000,000 a year; he knows as well as I do that all that capital formation is in the hands of the White people, and that only a fraction, probably not more than R20,000,000, is in the hands of the Bantu. In other words, the White man will control for generations to come here where the economic development will take place, and surely the White man is going to see to it that the economic development takes place in so-called White areas. He is not going to go to the Bantu areas. But as I have said before, economic development is not only dependent on capital, it is also dependent on human resources. To have economic development one must have skilled people, technically skilled to expand industries, to establish new industries. Now it is very difficult of course to make an assessment of what the relative skills of the Bantu are and of the Whites are in this respect, but there is surely one test—if the Minister has a better one, he can tell me— and that is to see how many of the different population groups are at the universities. What do we find if we look at that? We find in our universities in South Africa 40,000 White students. By contrast, in the Minister’s Bantu colleges there are at present some 500 students, and if we include the Native students in all the other universities, very largely the University of South Africa, we find that altogether there are probably about 1,800 Natives at the universities to-day in South Africa compared with 40,000 Whites. Surely the Minister will see from that too that economic leadership for generations to come must remain in the hands of the White people. That makes it inevitable that the economic development must take place in the White areas, because economic leadership is in the hands of the White people and capital is in the hands of the White people very largely. Therefore despite all the wishful thinking on the other side of the House, the development that we have seen between 1950 and 1960 will continue between 1960 and 1970 and will continue between 1970 and 1980. [Time limit.]

For generations our economy has been such that the Bantu have come to the urban areas. The hon. member for Jeppes is very surprised that that process has not been reversed in the short period of 15 years. If you travel at 100 miles per hour you first have to stop your car before you can put it into reverse gear otherwise you ruin your whole car. Where things have been bungled for all these generations he cannot expect the Government to put them right within the space of 15 years. We are, however, well on the way. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition has moved that the Minister’s salary be reduced by R5,000. Mr. Chairman, had the Rules of the House allowed it I would not only have moved the total reduction of the salary of the Leader of the Opposition but I would have moved that he be fined for his reckless attitude towards the White man in South Africa. He has referred to the removal of the Bantu from the Western Cape. I do not know why he is so surprised at that because the policy is not only to remove the Bantu from the Western Cape but eventually from the entire White part of the Republic of South Africa. He spoke about the “human tragedies” that would occur. Of course there will be cases of hardship. Throughout the world, particularly in a community such as ours, you find cases of “human tragedies”. But we have to choose between those “human tragedies” and the “human tragedies” which are beginning to develop as far as the White people in the rest of Africa are concerned. What about the tragedy of the White man in Kenya? What about the tragedy of the White man in Northern Rhodesia? And what, if they get their way, about the tragedy of the White man in Southern Rhodesia? But they do not take that into consideration. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition wants to apply precisely the same policy which destroyed the White man in the rest of Africa and I shall prove that to him. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition joked about what the Minister of Finance said that there had to be suction power in the Bantu homelands. He asks what will it cost? What will it cost to erect those factories; what will it cost to bring about that development there? What did the suction power cost to suck the Bantu to the cities? What did it cost? Did anybody ask what it would cost at that time? This whole cost argument is the biggest lot of nonsense in the world, Sir. What did it cost to develop our country? What did it cost to develop Cape Town? What did it cost to develop the Railways? Had we asked that question 100 years ago and had we not gone forward, had the Voortrekkers asked what it would cost to do all those things and what it would cost to build the railways, nothing would have happened. But you start your development and development leads to development, riches lead to riches, and there are areas which will have to develop as the rest of South Africa has developed and they will have to go through exactly the same process. To stare yourself blind against the costs is not only to be shortsighted but it indicates that you do not realize at all what is happening in the country and it indicates that you do not realize at all what is happening economically in South Africa. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition asked who was supposed to do the work of the Bantu to be removed from the Western Cape. In the first place he wants to create the impression that those people are going to be taken by the scruff of their necks and sent back to the Transkei and other areas in their thousands. This process will take place in an orderly manner. The Prime Minister and the Minister of Bantu Administration gave the assurance that the removal of the Bantu from the Western Cape, as from the rest of the White Republic, would take place in an orderly manner without it doing any damage to the economy of the country, without it doing any damage to the economy of the Western Cape.

Who is going to do the work?

Who does the work in England? Who does the work in Italy? Who does the work in other countries in the world?

Carel de Wet.

Yes and if the hon. member followed the example of Carel de Wet he would be of some value. Who does the work? We shall simply have to choose in our country. It is going to be a slow and difficult process; it is going to be a long process of adaptation. We shall, however, have to face the fact that we shall have to do our own work. The fact that the English have to do their own work has not harmed them in the least and it has not harmed the Italians in the least. What does the hon. the Leader of the Opposition want? I want to rub it in because the time has arrived for us to examine the alternative closely. What is his alternative? Give the industries in the Western Cape—let us confine ourselves to the Western Cape— give agriculture in the Western Cape as much Black labour as they want to have. But he goes further. He says that apart from the political consequences, we should give as much Black labour to the industries in the Western Cape as they want. Then he goes further and he says: “Do not only give them Black labour but let the wives and children of that Black labour come here as well.” Will he deny that? They are the people who object to migrant labour. His pattern for the Western Cape is as follows: Flood it with Black labour as much as you can. Give them all the labour they require, all the Black labour they want to have and let the wives and children come as well. That is their policy for the whole of South Africa. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition is not in the least concerned about what the political consequences of that will be to South Africa. His entire pattern is just this: Let us make money and be merry, let us go Black, let Cape Town go as Black as it can, to-morrow we die and it does not matter what the political consequences are. As the hon. member for Krugersdorp has said, he is pleading for the abolition of job reservation. In other words White labour should compete with Black labour in the open market. Destroy the White labourer’s position. Destroy the Coloured labourer’s position. As long as you can attract cheap labour, do so; bring in the Blacks in their millions, irrespective of the consequences. Does the hon. the Leader of the Opposition deny that that is his policy? That is the alternative. Then he goes further and he refuses to face up to the political consequences. He makes it very clear, however, that in principle he has no objection to granting political rights to an increasing extent to those people and he has no objection in principle to giving them representation in this House through their own people. I accuse the Leader of the Opposition of this that it is inherent in his policy that Black people must sit in this Parliament. He cannot get away from that because he says they should have eight White representatives: “But if the pressure gets stronger I am quite prepared to consider giving them Black representation.” In that case he will hold a referendum on the matter. But he lacks the courage to tell us what his attitude will be. Not one of them has the courage to tell us what their attitude will be. As the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark has explained if you think about holding a referendum you are thinking of the possibility of getting Black people here. That is why he is in reality saying that it is his policy ultimately to have Black people in this House. And then? Where is it going to stop? Are you going to stop where Southern Rhodesia is trying to stop and cannot? Are you going to stop where Northern Rhodesia has stopped? There is no difference whatsoever between his policy and the policy of Sir Edgar Whitehead in Southern Rhodesia.

Nonsense!

If that is nonsense, let the hon. the Leader of the Opposition answer this simple question: Is it possible under the policy of the United Party that Black people will come into this House within, say, the next ten years? Do you see, Sir, no reply. They want us to discuss these things seriously with them but they lack the courage to answer such a simple question as that. That proves that it is correct, because had it not been correct, they would have jumped up in their seats and said “Nonsense; that is not so”. I say it is inherent in their policy and that is why, the moment you accept the policy of allowing Black people to sit here, there is no difference between that policy and the policy of Southern Rhodesia. [Time limit.]

The hon. member has started the old stupid story that under a United Party Government the country will go all Black. We have just had it from the Leader of the Opposition that despite the Nationalists coming into power in 1948, the rate at which the Bantu have streamed to the cities has been as fast as ever before. In the period in which the hon. member was in the United Party, from 1940 to 1950, the number of Natives in our cities increased between 6 per cent and 7 per cent per year and since he has joined the Nationalist Party there has been no difference at all. The hon. member says we always talk about the cost of establishing and developing the Bantustans, and he asked what the cost was of developing our White economy in the Republic. We have told him already that it is R1,000,000,000 a year, but that happens to be capital formed by the Whites. Does he now imply that the Government will take more than half of that away and invest it in the Bantu states? Where else will it come from? The Minister must realize that if his Bantustan policy is to be practicable, the scale of economic development and its rate will have to be bigger in the Black areas than in the White Republic, for the simple reason that the increase in the number of Natives is far faster than in the case of the Whites, yet all the capital and technical skills are in the hands of the Whites. By 1970 we will find that the rate of increase was just as fast as it was in 1950 or 1960. Despite this rapid flow of Bantu into the White areas and the vast build-up of the Native labour force, we find from the latest census reports that even this rapid growth in the White economy has not been fast enough to provide employment for all the Bantu because we find in Report No. 5 of the Population Census for 1960 that the number of Bantu unemployed between 1951 and 1960 increased from 118,000 to 334,000. It nearly trebled. Now the hon. member says they must all find work in the Bantustans, but there is not even enough work for them in the White areas, so how can they find it in the Black areas? Is it not highly irresponsible for Ministers to run round to-day, when unemployment is so serious amongst the Bantu, and urge people to get rid of their Bantu servants? But we find from the same census report that the number of Bantu women who are unemployed has increased from 6,000 in 1951 to 132,000 in 1960. But this is now the time for Ministers to run around and tell people that they must not employ Bantu. Surely the Minister is irresponsible. This is the time to tell people to employ them, and what is more, the Minister should have a policy for dealing with this position. The census shows that unemployment amongst the Bantu has trebled between 1951 and 1960. I hope the Minister will tell us whether he has any schemes in mind for providing large-scale employment for Bantu in public works. Surely it should be possible to build public roads and sportsfields, and he should have special camps to train adolescents who are unemployed. No, this idea of telling the White people at this stage not to employ Bantu servants is not only irresponsible but stupid, because the whole basis of our economy is the specialization of labour. If the Minister can do his job efficiently, he should specialize in that, and if another man can wash cups and floors he should specialize in that. If the Minister is a better cup-washer than a Minister, then he had better resign as Minister. The fact of the matter is that it is irresponsible at this stage to urge people to get rid of their Native servants, because there is already unemployment. We should try to create employment, and I hope the Minister will tell us what schemes he has in mind to combat this growing unemployment. Surely the trebling of unemployment in nine years is very serious, and it shows the complete impracticability of the Bantustan policy. Where will people find work if they cannot find it in the White economy, in an integrated economy, and under the economic leadership of the White man? There are simply not enough jobs being created for the Bantu. Surely the Minister does not want to turn South Africa into a country of unemployed people. The simple fact of the matter is that even with the most rapid economic development and an integrated economy, we cannot create enough jobs for the Bantu because they are increasing fantastically fast. If the Minister looks at the increase between 1951 and 1960, he will find that they increased by 27 per cent or 3 per cent a year. In our whole economy the unskilled people are increasing much faster than the skilled people. We are not even creating enough jobs in an integrated economy, and surely it is folly to create two economies. The Government has so many plans. They try to plan almost every human activity, but has the Minister ever thought of working out a family limitation policy for the Bantu? It seems to me that that is the only answer, the way things are going to-day, not only with the Bantu but also with the other races. Surely the Minister should seriously consider that for many years the Bantustans will be undeveloped areas, and in all undeveloped areas in the world the people are being urged to limit their families. Has the Minister done anything about that? I should like to hear it, because that would be far more practical than many of the schemes the Government has.

The speech which the hon. member for Jeppes (Dr. Cronje) has just made is one which he has probably made on six previous occasions in this House. He reminds me very much of an old gramophone record. He comes along over and over again with the same figures. In the speech which he made here last year I can show him precisely the same figures which he mentioned here this afternoon, but he simply refuses to learn and to understand what is really going on. He thinks that he makes an impression by mentioning a number of figures, but he makes no impression.

He says that the census proves that over these ten years there has been an increase of 1,100,000 iii the number of Bantu iii the White cities. That is correct, but he does not tell us that the same statistics indicate that there has been an increase of 42 per cent in the number of Bantu in the Native areas. That is one factor which he never mentions. Does he want us to put a stop to this growth and introduce birth control?

Now we come to the next point. He talks about the “rapid increase in our industries” and he mentions an increase of 100,000 in the number of people employed in industries on the Rand alone. That is true, and we do not deny it; but has the number of industries not increased? Are we not experiencing an enormous industrial expansion in South Africa, an expansion which is unprecedented in the history of the world?

Nonsense!

Are we to stop the whole industrial machine and refuse to allow Bantu who want employment to come and work here? They do not remain here permanently because they remain migrant labourers. Does the hon. member think that he proves anything by mentioning these figures? He proves nothing. He also came here with the story about the Tomlinson Report, but he did not quote that report fully because the report goes very much further and says that there are some people who contend that this is something permanent while others say it is not, and they then lay down a yardstick to test whether it is permanent or not. But the hon. member only quoted the report half-way. He talks about a capital investment of R1,000,000,000 per annum which is being made in the White areas, and he says that this cannot take place in the Bantu areas, but in saying that he overlooks the fact that border industries are being established. He has not told us how much capital is going to be invested in border industries in which employment will be given to the Bantu. He creates the impression that this whole investment is being made in the interests of the Whites only, but it is also being made in the interests of the Bantu in the border industries.

Then we come to the question of the boundaries which the Leader of the Opposition raised here. This is not the first time that he has come along with this story about the boundaries; this is probably the seventh time that he has grumbled here about the boundaries. It seems to me that he shows great ignorance in raising this question of the boundaries of the Bantu areas here time after time. There are various members of his own party here who serve on the Bantu Affairs Select Committee. They know that every year on that committee they have to go into a whole series of proclamations in which certain areas are proclaimed, and yet they do not know that in those proclamations the boundaries of every Bantu authority, whether it be a tribal authority or a territorial authority or a regional authority, are laid down in specific terms. I can only infer that those members of the committee are not doing their work because they do not seem to have enlightened the United Party in this connection. The boundaries of those authorities are laid down from beacon to beacon in these proclamations. But that does not mean to say that the Trust areas have not been demarcated as well. Which areas are Bantu areas to-day? They are the scheduled areas and the released areas. If hon. members opposite still stand by the 1936 Act they will know that these scheduled and released areas are still short of the quota which was laid down in 1936 and that additional land still has to be bought. Do they still stand by the 1936 Act? If they still stand by it, then they cannot hold it against us if we purchase additional land.

But not for Bantustans.

They now come along with the story that they do not want to purchase land for Bantustans. What is a Bantu area? Because they have now suddenly given the Bantu areas a different name, “Bantustan”, they refuse to carry out their word of honour. After all, a Bantustan or Bantu area is the area occupied by the Bantu. No, that story holds no water. It is dishonest and it is political fraud on their part. If they stand by the 1936 Act but say that they are not going to purchase land for Bantustans, then they are committing nothing but fraud. Under the 1936 Act we are obliged to purchase that land for the Bantu, and this side of the House adopts the attitude that we are going to purchase the full quota of land, not a morgen more and not a morgen less. That is what the Government has always said, and that is what it is doing. It is nonsense to grumble about boundaries. It is true that we cannot determine in advance where the boundaries are going to be; we still do not know where we can purchase the additional land because in buying land we must also take the Whites into consideration. Hon. members opposite know that if the 1936 Act is implemented we cannot say at this stage where the boundaries will be for all time to come. Moreover, it is foolish to talk at this stage about laying down for all time to come the boundaries of the Bantu areas and the boundaries of the White area. We are trying to consolidate the Bantu areas as much as possible so as not to have one piece here and another piece there. It is very unfortunate that the Beaumont Commission in 1913 did not tackle this matter very systematically; it released pieces of land all over the place, which was not the best way to tackle this matter. We are trying now to consolidate those pieces of land but it is a lengthy process. [Time limit.]

I do not think I have ever seen the hon. member for Heilbron (Mr. Froneman) in so much trouble. They are running as fast as they can from the implications of Bantustans and the boundaries. The hon. member spent some considerable time dealing with boundaries, and what has he said? He said that the boundaries are proclaimed and that we have scheduled and released areas, and the favourite reply of Government members when they are questioned in the country as to where the boundaries are to be is: Refer to the scheduled and the released areas. The hon. member knows that the released areas do not mean a thing when it comes to buying land for Bantu purposes. If they want to establish a Bantustan, they are not worried about the released areas. If they think that there is a suitable area to establish an industry on the border and there is no reserve alongside, what do they do? They move the boundaries of the reserves to that spot.

And if that is done, do you not know where the boundary is?

Yes, but the boundary may be shifted at any time. The hon. member for Heilbron says that in terms of the 1936 Act we have to buy additional land because there is not enough land in the released areas. What we want to know is where they will buy that /and? He himself admits that they go beyond the released areas, and we want to know where they are going to buy it. Because when the 1936 Act was passed there was no idea of establishing free Bantu states. The hon. member asks whether we are prepared to stand by the 1936 Act. He knows what our differences are with the Progressive Party on that point, and that we passed a resolution at our Union Congress because we are not going to buy land for independent Bantustans, although we are not opposed to buying land for Bantu occupation, provided it is not bought to become a separate independent state. And the Government is not only having trouble with the White people about the boundaries; they are already having trouble with the new Government of the Transkei. The Transkeian Territorial Authorities passed a resolution asking the Government to buy land for the Transkei, and the reply was given to them “that the only ‘motification that the Transkei can produce for getting additional land was the rapid growth of the Bantu population in the Transkei, but the population of the whole world was increasing rapidly whilst the land remained the same, and it is obvious that no country or nation can claim additional land merely because their population increases”. They went on to say that the districts referred to by the Transkeian Territorial Authority i.e., Maclear and Elliot and certain parts of Matatiele and Mount Fletcher, are already fully populated and the mere annexation of such populated land to the Transkei would therefore not solve this problem. They went on to point out that better soil conservation and farming methods should be applied. And “in terms of its policy the Government is precluded from acquiring White-owned land outside the scheduled and released areas, unless all bodies representing White interests in the area concerned recommend accordingly; White-owned land in those areas is being bought by the Government as Parliament makes funds available”. Referring to the question of White-owned farms in Matatiele and Mount Fletcher, the Department pointed out that these farms were situated outside the scheduled and released areas and said that the Government could not acquire this land without a recommendation from all bodies representing White interests in the district. I want to ask the hon. member for Heilbron this: If the Government cannot buy land outside the released areas unless it gets the approval of all the White interests, how will the Government get that extra land?

We will get it, because they are not all United Party supporters.

How is this Government going to comply with the 1936 Act. It is no use running away by telling us that the boundaries are fixed by proclamation and by the released and the scheduled areas. The hon. member knows that they have to find additional land for the Transkei. It is useless telling the Transkei people that they must house all their population there. They know it cannot be done unless industries are started there, and under Government policy industries cannot be started in the Transkei because White capital is needed to do it.

The hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee) has pointed out that the Black population of the Republic has increased because of the industrial growth, and the hon. member for Heilbron said the rate of this growth was unknown in the history of the world. That, of course, is nonsense. The speed of industrial growth was much greater before the Nationalists came into power. [Interjections.] The Ministers are continually telling the country that we are on the brink of great industrial development, but we stay on the brink. But if there is to be industrial growth there will have to be more integration and more Bantu will have to come into the White industries. Even if the Government manages to establish sufficient border industries to absorb the increase in the Bantu population, we will still have integration because we will still have the Bantu working in White factories, across the border admittedly, but what is the difference between a Bantu working in a White industry in East London or one working in an industry in Cape Town? The problem the Government has is not the Bantu living in the reserves: it is the Bantu in the urban areas. [Interjections.] I am facing up to the fact that the problem is there and no matter what you do or how you

I am now quoting official figures from Landbounuus, but let us assume it is 24½c. In the meantime the Minister tells us that cheese became so scarce during this year that they had to import and the policy he and his Department are pursuing is talk you are not going to get rid of the Bantu population in the White areas. Ask the Minister what he knew when he wrote the Tomlinson Report? He himself pointed out that you could never get rid of the Black population in the cities, and nothing has happened yet to prove that this Government‘s policy can be carried out.

The hon. member for Heilbron says the hon. member for Jeppes makes the same speech every year. He does not make the same speech, but the same type of speech, although his facts are different, because every year the facts become worse and worse, and the facts he quoted to-day were only published on the 20th of this month. Every year the position gets worse and the White areas, so-called, become Blacker. I asked a question of the Minister the other day about the Bantu recruited on direct requisition from the Transkei for the Western Province. This is people directly coming to work, and not people who come back after their leave, and I find that for the first three months of 1963 the figure was almost three times as much as that for the whole of 1961. [Time limit.]

I want to discuss this question of the removal of the Bantu from the Western Cape. It is not only the Western Cape which is going to be affected by this problem but also the Eastern Cape, from which we get the bulk of our Bantu labour. The Eastern Cape will have to take those people back again. They will be sent back not to the White cities but to the reserves and the rural areas. One asks oneself immediately how those people who come here from that area for the very reason that they could not make an adequate living there, can possibly be sent back and what means of livelihood there is for them there. I was not surprised at all to read a little while ago, when a conference of the Cape Municipal Association was held in Kimberley, that a motion had been moved there by Mr. Robbie de Lange, the mayor of East London. We all know Mr. de Lange; he was a Nationalist Party candidate. Let me quote from the Burger of 24 April 1963—

When business was suspended I was pointing out that there are great disadvantages attached to the Government’s policy to remove the Bantu from the Western Cape, disadvantages not only for this part of the province but also for that part of the province to which they will have to return, namely the Eastern Cape. I also referred to what had been said earlier this year at a Municipal Congress at Kimberley. The Burger of 24 April 1963 contained the following report—

But he went on to say the following—

Sir, is it not strange that while the Government is removing the Bantu from the Western Cape, the people of the Eastern Cape are asking that legislation should be introduced to control the infiltration of Bantu. And this request comes from Nationalists! They are asking for legislation because they know that if the 250,000 Bantu men, women and children who live on this side of the Eiselen line have to be moved it is going to create additional problems for the people of the Eastern Cape. There are not enough factories in the Eastern Cape and there has not been sufficient development and economic progress to make it possible for the Eastern Cape to absorb those people. It is precisely because there has been insufficient development there that the Bantu have had to shift to the Western Cape. If these Bantu are going to be removed to the Eastern Cape on a large scale therefore, we are only going to create a bigger problem in the Eastern Cape because that area is incapable of absorbing so many people.

Over the years the people of the Western Cape have become accustomed to the idea that the Bantu migrate to this area to assist us with our economic development. We have provided them with housing and other amenities; in other words, we have accepted them as a permanent part of the population of the Western Cape.

That is a historical lie.

On a point of order, Mr. Chairman, is the hon. member entitled to say that what the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (West) says is a historical lie?

Order! The hon. member for Ventersdorp cannot use that expression. It is just a different way of saying that the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (West) is not speaking the truth.

In that case I say that the hon. member was not telling a historical truth.

Order! The hon. member must withdraw the term “historical lie”.

I withdraw it.

Whether the hon. member says that it is a historical lie or not.…

Order! The hon. member for Ventersdorp is not allowed to use that expression, and the hon. member cannot repeat it therefore.

It is an absolute historical fact that these people have come to the Western Cape during the past 25 to 30 years to help to develop this part of the country. I can produce one cutting after another from Volkshandel, from Commercial Opinion, from the Burger and the Cape Times— as a matter of fact from every responsible paper in this country—to prove that the Western Cape is very perturbed about the fact that it has always been the Cinderella of South Africa as far as economic development is concerned. A year or two ago businessmen held a congress at Saldanha Bay. What did they say there? The report reads—

Whenever the Chambers of Commerce meet, whether it be at Paarl or at Worcester, they express their concern over the fact that they are not getting their legitimate share of the economic development of this country. The Government, however, proposes to remove the Bantu from the Western Cape in spite of the fact that it knows that the availability of labour is the main pillar on which economic development of any kind rests.

How much labour do you want?

We do not want any reduction in the numbers who have entered this area under Nationalist rule during the past 15 years! If the hon. member for Vereeniging is not concerned about the Western Cape, we in the Western Cape are. But what do we find? While businessmen and farmers are worried, we get a Nationalist M.P., like the hon. member for Malmesbury, who said in 1961 that the establishment of any new factory would be a crime against the Western Cape if that factory had to rely on Bantu labour. At the same time, however, these same members go from place to place and say that the Western Cape is not getting its legitimate share of the economic development of this country.

Hon. members on the other side must choose between on the one hand economic development and making available sufficient labour to the businessman, the industrialist and the farmer, and gradual retrogression on the other. Because if the necessary labour is not available, it is an indisputable fact that this part of the country will suffer economically. I want to quote as my witness none other than Professor Schumann, a prominent economist of this country and the pride of that side of the House. What does Professor Schumann say about economic progress and the availability of an adequate labour force? He says this—

This is what Professor Schumann said in a radio talk which he gave in 1958. These are the facts of the situation, so much so that a year or two ago the farmers of the Winter Rainfall Area met in Stellenbosch and requested the Government to see to it that the Bantu who were indispensable there were not removed.

That is absolutely untrue. I attended that congress myself.

I hope the hon. member will have the decency to withdraw those words after I have quoted to him what the Burger said. On 13 July 1962 the Burger reported as follows with regard to that conference—

And the hon. member for Stellenbosch said he was there! Does the hon. member also deny that the hon. the Minister wrote to the chairman of the Milk Board of the Western Cape, Mr. Truter de Kock, that he need have no fears that the Bantu would be removed from the Western Cape?

That is also untrue. That is not what was stated in that letter.

Every person, every farmer, every industrialist, every businessman who is concerned about the development of the Western Cape is seriously perturbed about the possibility that steps will be taken by the Government to remove the Bantu from the Western Cape. How, without detrimental effects, as the hon. Leader of the Opposition has said, can one remove from this area 120,000 of these people who are economically active in the industrial life of the Western Cape? [Time limit.]

The hon. member who has just sat down has a habit, which he learnt somewhere in a training school of the United Party, of playing with words. He plays with words and by leaving out a word here and there he creates an erroneous impression.

It is an innate habit of his!

The hon. member read out two quotations here.

One a point of order, Mr. Chairman, what the hon. member for Stellenbosch has said amounts to an accusation of deliberate distortion on the part of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (West). I think the hon. member for Stellenbosch should withdraw that.

The member for Stellenbosch may proceed.

I want to refer to the two quotations read out by the hon. member, the first being the resolution which was allegedly passed by the Agricultural Union of the Winter Rainfall Region and the second being the letter which the hon. the Minister allegedly wrote to the chairman of the Milk Board. With regard to the relevant congress of the Agricultural Union of the Winter Rainfall Region, the hon. member put it this way that the congress had resolved to request the Government not to remove the “indispensable Bantu”. In point of fact the congress gave its support to the Government in connection with this policy. That is still the case to-day; they still support it, just as supporters of that side of the House are also helping the Government with the implementation of this policy. In any event, the congress in question specifically gave its support to the Government in this connection but added that where as the result of practical problems… [Interjections.] They cannot all be removed simultaneously. The hon. member for Jeppes (Dr. Cronje) laughs. Coming from an hon. member who is an economist, that surprises me. The Government stated very specifically that it was going to remove the Bantu from the Western Cape gradually. In such a process of gradual removal…

Their numbers are increasing more and more!

… those Bantu who cannot be replaced immediately, have to be kept here longest. What is wrong with that?

Give us figures as to the number of Bantu who have already been removed from the Western Cape.

The same applies to the hon. member’s reference to the letter which the hon. the Minister wrote to the chairman of the Milk Board; in other words, he sought to create an erroneous impression. Nowhere in that letter is it stated that the Bantu will not be removed from the Western Cape. As far as I can remember it was stated in that letter that the Government in implementing its policy would see to it that no inconvenience was caused to the milk producers, amongst others, as a result of the removal of the Bantu from the Western Cape.

But I want to come back to the matter which is really under discussion here. We all know that it is the Government’s policy gradually to replace the Bantu in the Western Cape and we all know that we have an alternative source of labour here that we can use to replace the Bantu. But hon. members opposite come along and fabricate all sorts of objections such as the danger of squatters’ problems in the Eastern Province and things of that kind. The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (West) says that we are faced with a choice between industrial development in the Western Cape with the assistance of the Bantu on the one hand and retrogression without the Bantu on the other. That is how hon. members opposite view this matter. We on this side of the House, however, say that we are fully aware of the fact that if we wish to continue with this policy we are bound to come up against practical problems. But at the same time we say that we are prepared to face those problems and that we are prepared to devise the necessary plans to be able to implement that policy. In other words, we want to make a point of implementing this policy while hon. members on the other side, because they foresee certain problems, capitulate and do not care how many Bantu come to the Western Cape. They do not care either whether colleagues of theirs in this House who live in this part of the country will eventually be able to survive here, nor do they care how many Coloureds are unemployed, and yet they also claim that they seek to promote the interests of the Coloureds.

When one faces these facts and has regard to the large reservoir of Coloured labour here, Coloured labour which at the present time has to go elsewhere to make a living, it is clear that the implementation of such a policy is in fact possible. It will simply require a little effort and a little idealism on our part. But I believe that it will be worthwhile. The difference between the approach of this side of the House and the approach of that side of the House to this matter has been illustrated very clearly in this debate. We on this side of the House want to build up an orderly community for the future—for the White man and the Coloured man in the Western Cape, and for the Bantu in his own areas. On the other side of the House you have a party which does not care how much chaos arises in this country. That is the difference between the two sides of the House. The United Party approaches this matter without idealism; they do not care what becomes of the White man in the future as long as their pockets can be filled. When problems arise they become frightened and capitulate. I want to say this to the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (West): He is at liberty to propagate this sort of policy which he has adumbrated here; he will inspire nobody with it and he will get nobody to support such a policy, because the fact of the matter is that at the present moment people who are supporters of that side of the House—I speak from personal knowledge of this—are already giving their support at local authority level to make a success of the Government’s policy in this connection.

I hope the hon. member who just sat down will forgive me if I do not respond to his arguments. There are, however, a few other speeches made by members on the other side, for instance the hon. member for Heilbron and the hon. member for Vereeniging, to which no reply has as yet been made. Now, there seems to me to be two schools of thought amongst members on the other side in regard to the policy of the National Party towards the African.

The hon. member for Vereeniging evidently visualizes a long-term removal of the African from the so-called White Republic of South Africa, back to the Bantustans. He nods his head; therefore, he agrees that that is what he visualizes, i.e. a long-term removal of the Bantu population and their resettlement in the Bantustans. That this is so was obvious to me when he asked why we could not do our own work, like the Englishman and the Italian did their own work. But the hon. member made one fundamental error. He cannot compare the economies of England and Italy with that of South Africa. England was industrialized gradually, just as the economy of Italy developed historically, with their existing populations and they continue to expand at a normal rate according to their resources. You cannot compare this with the economy of South Africa which is based on 15,000,000 people and which the hon. member now wants to reduce to about 3,500,000.

What is wrong with migratory labour?

The hon. member did not mention migratory labour. He talked about “doing our own work”. But when one is using migratory labour, one is not doing one’s own work…

What are they doing in Europe?

The migratory labour force in Europe is a minute portion of the total labour force of France, Germany and of the other countries. In this country, however, the African labour force represents a vast proportion of the labour being utilized in industry, agriculture and in the mines. The two sets of circumstances are, therefore, completely different.

The hon. member for Vereeniging also talked about the capitalization of the reserves, and asked why the Africans could not do it? He said we did it here, and that they should therefore do it there. Does the hon. member not realize that it is no accident that the industrialization of South Africa took place in the areas where it did take place? It did not develop in Vereeniging because the hon. member was going to be the Member of Parliament for that area, but because of the natural resources there. Industrialization developed in the triangle Johannesburg-Vereeniging-Pretoria because of the natural resources in the area. Similarly, industrialization developed in the Western Cape because of certain natural advantages being offered by this area. Exactly the same applies to the Natal coastal region. It so happens that the basic requirement for industrialization and capital accumulation arising out of development does not exist in the reserves.

Why not?

Because the natural resources are not available there. Industries do not grow out of nothing, but only out of locational factors such as raw material, etc., and on the basis of a market which can afford to consume the products—not a poverty-stricken market like the reserves. There is no transport nor are there power resources in the reserves. In South Africa to-day over R1,000,000,000 is invested in industries while less than 750,000 people are employed by those industries—400,000 non-Whites and about 250,000 Whites.

But I want to come to the difference between the hon. member for Vereeniging and the hon. member for Heilbron who bases his policy on this idea of migratory labour and border industries. Just why people think that by calling people migratory workers and allowing them in their millions will solve any of the problems, I do not know. They are still in our midst, they still want economic and political opportunities and better social amenities. These problems cannot be solved merely by changing the nomenclature, yet leaving those workers still in the White areas. As for the border industries the hon. member for Heilbron must explain to me how he hopes to persuade industrialists to move to the borders in any number and employ these 500,000 workers which the hon. the Prime Minister talked about not so long ago. He said that if we only could employ 500,000 Bantu in border industries we would, in 50 years’ time, be catering for the entire needs of the Bantu population. Where he gets this figure from nobody, of course, knows. He talked vaguely of what the experts said. I should like to see the experts’ analysis of this and submit it to the analysis of other experts. It is of course, absolute nonsense. In the first place, one person does not support five, certainly not amongst the Africans. At least two out of every household have got to work to support themselves. And then the border industries are going to pay lower and not higher wages than those being paid in the existing industrial areas. Consequently, all this engendering of further demands for services such as the services of professionals, tradesmen, etc., cannot exist The payment of lower wages is the only inducement to people to go and establish industries in the border areas, and if we reduce the number of Africans employed in industries in the White areas and move them to border areas, we will be contracting the consumer market of this country instead of expanding it.

Apart, however, from the theories advanced by the hon. member for Heilbron and by the hon. member for Vereeniging, another interesting policy is being advanced for outside consumption. This policy differs, of course, completely from the points of view advanced by those two hon. members. I have here a booklet entitled “The progress of the Bantu peoples towards nationhood”. This is put out for outside consumption. Only in two small paragraphs right at the back of the journal is reference made to migratory labour. For the rest, the entire journal reflects an emphasis on the development of the Bantu, not only in the reserves but mainly in the urban areas of South Africa. There is a lengthy piece about Bantu business enterprises in the Bantu townships of the Witwatersrand having “doubled during the past five years”. It reads—

Then we are invited to meet Mr. Tshabalala. He is not in the reserves; he is one of the big Bantu businessmen in the urban areas. It is said that his daily turnover exceeds R2,000 and that he owns a R120,000 ultra-modern air-conditioned theatre, garages, etc. [Time limit.]

I do not propose to reply to what has been said by the hon. member for Houghton. As I personally see things, I think the hon. member’s time in this House is becoming very short. She has imposed upon herself the task of acting here as the representative of the Bantu, but she is one of the weakest Bantu representatives we have ever had in this House. In all the time that she has been here she has never had a single good word for the White man. She says things in this House, however, which Luthuli is not allowed to say outside—and then she is still paid for saying it! This House affords her a platform for the propagation of her views. That is why I say that the hon. member’s time in this House is becoming short; the nation’s patience with her is becoming exhausted.

The United Party has concentrated its attack on the Government’s policy towards the urban Bantu. Every speaker on the other side who has spoken so far has confined himself to the place, the position, the rights and the privileges of the Bantu in the cities. Sir, I told the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (West) that he was telling a historical untruth. Let me give the Committee the historical facts. I want to indicate how things have developed as far as the urban Bantu is concerned and what our declared policy was in the past and still is to-day. The first fact that I want to state is that the area which is to-day the White area has always been a White area. A second historical fact, if I may use the Transkei and the Ciskei as examples, is that before 1708 there were no Bantu south-west of the Kei River. Another historical fact is that in all the clashes between the White man and the Bantu since 1775—and these clashes extended over a period of 100 years—the White man has not taken one inch of land from the Bantu. The Bantu were simply pushed back into their own territory. The Whites have never committed an act of aggression against the Bantu. That is a noteworthy fact; it is a claim which no colonial power in the world can make. Another fact is that the Whites have always recognized the boundaries of the Bantu areas in the past. A further historical fact is that the areas which are to-day occupied by the Whites were no-man’s-land originally. The areas which were occupied by the Whites, cultivated and made habitable by them, were originally no-man’s-land to which the Bantu had no claim therefore. What right then have hon. members opposite to demand settlement rights and political rights on behalf of the Bantu, rights which are in direct conflict with the historical facts?

Although the Whites have never committed an act of aggression against the Bantu, the party over there with its race federation policy, in pleading for the so-called rights of the Bantu in urban areas, is engaged in a gradual process of aggression against the White man in the White areas of this country. This process of aggression is revealed more and more in the policy of that party. Our policy has always been to say that for the foreseeable future we are going to make use of the Bantu’s labour within the White area but that we want to develop their homelands where they will then be able to exercise their political rights. They can then come and offer their labour to the White man who is more developed and who has more avenues of employment to offer. That is also in accordance with our historical development because the White man has never gone to the Bantu for employment. The Bantu, on the other hand, came to the White man to earn a livelihood in the days when they were murdering one another and dying of pestilence and starvation. They then sought refuge with the White man. That is a historical fact. The Bantu owe much more to the White man today than the White man owes to the Bantu— much more. This policy of ours to develop their homelands where they can then enjoy political and other rights, is based on the fact that their presence in the White area does not entitle them to claim political rights, because that is where the sting lies—in their superior numbers coupled with the question of political rights. We want to bring that idea home to them. We will allow them on our conditions to settle in the White area as people who come here to sell their labour to us, as they have done historically. That is a historical fact which nobody can get away from. Sir, one moment the party over there is reactionary and the next moment it is liberal. I do not know whether time will permit me to do so but I should like to read out to the House a letter which an English-speaking person wrote to the Star. He says—

I want to say here this evening—and I think I may as well say it to all those who sit on that side and also to everyone at Addis Ababa —that morally and historically we as Whites in South Africa are on firm ground in respect of our claims and our determination to maintain our position as Whites in the White area. We have deprived nobody of anything; we have always given; we have deprived nobody of the opportunity to develop; we have progressively promoted development. Let them come with their threats; let them talk about establishing “blood banks”, Mr. Chairman; let them threaten us with war; let them talk about training thousands of guerrillas. Those are all hollow-sounding cries. Our statement that we are going to maintain our position here in the face of all those who stand against us rests on a firm historical and moral basis. [Time limit.]

We have listened to some interesting expressions of opinion this evening. I intend to deal as briefly as I possibly can with some of them. May I start with the hon. member for Krugersdorp (Mr. M. J. van den Berg)? He was quite emphatic that the Bantu had to return to his homelands. When asked where he must return to the hon. member did not know where to begin or where to end. How does he overcome that difficulty, Sir? I have listened to that hon. member outside this House. I know him. He will promise everything, the sun, the moon, the stars, well knowing that those promises can never be fulfilled. He dealt with the question of influx, as did the hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee). But this influx is taking place under this present Government as a faster rate than it ever did under the United Party. [Interjections.] My hon. friend knows that is true. The number of Bantu in the White area is increasing at an alarming rate. The hon. member for Vereeniging said that repatriation should take place as a slow process. He accused us of wanting to allow unbridled entry. Surely the hon. member for Vereeniging knows full well that this party has time and again, inside and outside this House, told the public that we would have influx control in the township areas. And we will carry that policy out. The position is just this as far as this labour is concerned: It is being repatriated out, but it is coming in faster than it is going out. Will the hon. member for Heilbron (Mr. Froneman) deny that? The Natives that were repatriated last year are back here in Cape Town; they are back with the South African Railways, they are back as stevedores; many heavy contracting works are employing Native labour that was repatriated out last year. Nobody can deny that. Can the hon. member deny this fact that the Native will be a far more efficient and a better Native in our midst if he lived a family life than otherwise? Can you imagine what would happen in Cape Town. Sir, if we had 100,000 Native men living in quarters out here?

You have 400,000 on the Rand.

Living in compounds, yes. But what about your locations? I have discussed this mater as freely as I could outside this House. I want to say this to agriculture in respect of the suggestion that farm goals should provide farm labour, that farm goals will not provide the farm labour that is required if this Government carries out its repatriation ideas. What is conflicting is this: Some hon. members on that side of the House want the Bantu to be repatriated completely. They must not even come back as migrant labourers. How will they arrive at that situation?

I now come to the hon. member for Heilbron. He has been very vague about the boundaries of the Bantustan. He is the person who has been entrusted with the recommendations that have been made to the Government for the future boundaries of the Bantustan. He is wedded to the idea that the 1936 Act must be carried out as far as land is concerned but that is about the only part of the 1936 Act he will adhere to. They have discarded everything else in the 1936 Act. I want to ask the hon. member and the hon. the Minister what is happening in respect of Umdanzane? We put a Bill through this House last year. There are some 200 settlers and larger farmers in that area who were scheduled in last year’s Act. Can the hon. the Minister tell me how many farms he has bought? Can he tell me how many have been valued? Can he tell me what arrangements have been made for those people who have to get out to re-establish themselves somewhere else? Does the hon. the Minister realize that those folk on those properties have sold their herds, their machinery and their implements because of the undertaking to take over their farms? What has happened? They are sitting there. And I would ask the hon. the Minister this: Is that his way of depressing the value of that land? If it is, Sir, I say it is shocking, I want to ask the hon. member for Heilbron how much attention he has paid to those White men. He is for ever talking about the Bantu and their accommodation; they have to have this land. What contribution has he made in any debate towards the establishment of the White men who are to be displaced from that land? I want to tell the hon. member that that land which was scheduled last year was not scheduled land before. The areas around Alice are still waiting to be purchased and they have been waiting for the last 15 years. Can the hon. the Minister tell me what is going to happen there?

Do you expect all the land to be bought in one year?

Certainly. I expect it to be bought as soon as possible after it is scheduled, the reason being that that land cannot be bought by anyone else. Can the hon. member imagine what the effect of that is upon those farmers? They got an undertaking from the Government last year that the question of the purchase of that land would be expedited. What has been done about it? Precisely nothing.

Mr. Chairman, I happen to know this much, that valuators have been there and that they have valued that ground at half the price at which it was bought by the present owners. How does the hon. the Minister expect to get established there what he proposes to move from the Western Cape? It is an extremely important matter to the Eastern Cape if they are to absorb any portion of the Natives who are to be repatriated from the Western Cape. There are 300,000 west of the Eiselen line. The Transkei cannot absorb them, nor can the Ciskei. We have one little industry which cost about R2,000,000 that can absorb about 250 Bantu. And you have some 300,000 unemployed Bantu in that area that will have to be absorbed before you can move a single Native from the Western area there. Figures have been given from this side of the House of there being some 500,000 Natives unemployed in South Africa. Does the hon. the Minister realize what this is going to cost the White man of this country? It will cost some R4,500,000,000 to absorb perhaps half of them. I feel that the price which the White man has to pay for this wildcat scheme is out of all proportion to what he would have been prepared to do had apartheid been a practical suggestion. [Time limit.]

I want to confine myself to the hon. member for Houghton (Mrs. Suzman). She and I were elected together in 1953. The hon. member was elected by Whites in a Transvaal constituency. During the 11 years that she has been here I have never heard her utter one word in favour of the Whites or say anything good of them. She has been a member of this House for 11 years and has moved heaven and earth to disturb the relationships between White and non-White. I feel— and I know that there are thousands of people outside of this House who feel the same way —that much of the bad feeling outside between White and non-White…

Order! The hon. member must discuss the Vote and not the hon. member for Houghton.

I want to discuss the Vote, Mr. Chairman. I think that much of the difficulty experienced by the hon. the Minister is due to the bad feeling that is engendered by that hon. member—the bad feeling that the hon. the Minister has to contend with outside. There is no doubt about that. All the members in this House are out of step; South Africa is out of step; the White world is out of step; she alone is right. Not only is she doing herself a disservice but she is doing this country and the White people in South Africa a great disservice.

Order! The hon. member must come back now to the Vote.

Do you know what Vote it is?

The hon. member must not try to be funny. Mr. Chairman, I want to come back to this Vote which is the most important Vote in these Estimates. For 11 years this has been the Vote to which the official Opposition have devoted most of their attention. They have made certain statements this evening that I want to deal with. I believe that the United Party will be doing South Africa a service if they will answer a few simple questions here this evening. The first thing that I want to ask them is this: Are they in favour of the influx of the Bantu into the Western Cape? Are they in favour of the influx of the wives of those Bantu into the Western Cape? The hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. S. J. M. Steyn) who asked me such a stupid question just now may perhaps be able to reply to this when he enters the debate just now. The United Party is always criticizing the fact that the Black man is here in the Western Cape and that efforts are being made by the Government to remove him. Let the hon. member for Yeoville tell us whether it is their policy to allow the Bantu to stream unchecked into the Western Cape. Do they also want to allow the wives of these men to stream in here as well? Is that their policy?

They are always saying that apartheid is not the solution to South Africa’s race problems. As against this, they have a policy of integration, a policy which must of necessity result in the Black man being spread throughout the length and breadth of South Africa. One cannot see it in any other way. The Bantu have now to come to the Western Cape in their thousands and tens of thousands; they have to stream into Johannesburg and into the whole country. That is the policy of integration as we understand it. When we want to restrict the Native to the non-White areas they ask what of the Native in the White areas. The policy of the United Party is that the Bantu must receive certain rights in the White area. They say that he must receive certain political rights there. We on this side of the House say that we dare not give him those rights. That is the fundamental difference between the two sides of the House. After 11 years we have not come very much further than to differ from one another. The United Party is now advocating certain property rights for the Black man here in the White area—not only in the non-White area but in the White area as well. We must see the matter as it is, Mr. Chairman. The Whites have no right to own property in the non-White area.

What about all those little White towns in the Transkei?

Wait a moment; we will not gain anything by shouting at one another across the floor of the House. The hon. member can put his case later. I repeat, Mr. Chairman. that it was said in this House that the Native must be given proprietary rights in the White areas. These are facts. I want to ask the hon. Opposition what their attitude would be if the White farmers were to have the right to-day to purchase land in the Transkei. What then would become of those Natives?

What about the traders there?

I am not talking about the traders now. The hon. member now wants to make an exception of rights that were granted a very long time ago. We are talking about the position as it is to-day. The position is, Mr. Chairman, that the United Party wants to give the Natives two chances as against one chance for the White man. My hon. friend, the hon. member for Ventersdorp (Mr. Greyling), pointed out just now that we have stolen nothing from the Native, and this holds good for that side of the House as well as for this side. We have not taken anything from him by force of arms or by making use of our position of authority. The rights which we Whites in South Africa have, have been obtained in a very honest way. I do not think that there is any country in the world that can say that it came by its rights in the same way as we did no matter where that country may be, and this holds good for Australia. New Zealand or America.

There is another matter that I want to bring to the attention of the hon. the Minister. This is a matter that has often been mentioned outside of this House and also in this House. We have about a million Central African Natives in South Africa, people who, with their Governments, will destroy us to-morrow if they have the opportunity to do so. In the past few days we have noticed reports in the newspapers and have heard reports over the radio in regard to the plans that are being made for the Whites in South Africa. They want to destroy us. Let us face that fact. There are about a million of these foreign Natives in this country. We talk about removing them. Now and again a small group is sent away but the fact is that our mines and various industries are still employing a large number of those Natives. Their number is estimated at about a million. I as a White man want this evening to express my concern in this House at the fact that those one million foreign Natives are here in South Africa. Because Central Africa is such a Utopia and because ours is the country which so oppresses and persecutes the Natives, I think that the time has come for the White Government in this country to take forceful action and remove those Natives from the country. [Time limit.]

I just want to say to the hon. member who has just sat down that he has contradicted himself completely by saying first that this was the most important Vote and then complaining at the same time that I only pleaded the cause of the welfare of the Bantu people in this House. It is because this is the most important Vote and because I realize that quite inextricably the welfare of the whole of South Africa is bound up with a contented African population that I devote so much time in this House to this subject. It is quite obvious that this country is dependent on non-White labour; the entire peaceful expansion of South Africa is dependent on good race relations.

And they are dependent on us.

I agree with the hon. member. There is mutual interdependence. I have always said that. White and Black are completely dependent on each other. Therefore, Sir, anything that reacts to the benefit of the Blacks will ultimately redound to the benefit of the Whites in this country. If their consuming power is developed, if they are given opportunities and if their racial grievances are removed, quite automatically, Sir, that will redound to the benefit of the White community in this country. On the other hand, if racial grievances are built up in this country, if economic opportunities are denied to non-Whites. White South Africa is going to suffer. And White South Africa is already suffering; it is feeling the tension of the situation; it is feeling the cold wind of disapproval blowing over this country from the rest of Africa and from the rest of the civilized world. That is why it is important that we get our race relations straight in South Africa before we can hope to develop a decent and peaceful rate of progress.

After those general remarks, I want to come down to a specific matter. I want to ask the hon. the Minister if he can give me an explanation for the fact that, like his colleague, the Minister of Bantu Education, he is not spending the amount which is voted to him by this House on his Vote of Bantu Administration. The Trust Account is accumulating reserves because of the under-spending of money voted to the hon. the Minister. In this case the amount is not surrendered, as far as I can gather, but the amount is accumulating in the Trust Account. As far as I am concerned, the overall effect is the same and that is that the money is not being spent for the purposes for which it is intended. I want to give the hon. the Minister an example. In the year 1961-2 an amount of R800,000 was voted to the Trust for welfare services for Africans in the Bantu areas. Of that amount only R18.624 was spent. Can the hon. the Minister explain to me why it was impossible to find indigent Africans in the reserves, which are notoriously poverty stricken, and in drought-stricken areas, on whom to spend this money. What is he saving it for? We spend little enough on direct services for Africans in proportion to the population of this country. The total is something like R72,000,000. The hon. the Minister should not find it difficult to find worthy causes on which to spend that money.

I want to point out that when old age pensions and pensions for blind persons and disability pensions were raised they were not raised for Africans. A bloc sum was voted for the purpose of devoting more money to blind, aged and incapacitated Africans. I want to know why this money was not spent especially when you realize that the amounts paid to Africans, as far as these old age, disability and blind pensions are concerned, are the very miserable amounts of R3.52½ per African in the city per month; R3.2½ for the town African and only R2.52½ for the rural African. Even the hon. member for Vereeniging will agree with me that these are very, very low amounts indeed.

It is still very much higher than anywhere else in Africa.

And so they should be. Our national income is a good deal higher than that of any other country in Africa. I repeat to hon. members that it is the industry of the Africans as well as the capital and the brains and the enterprise of the Whites that have built up the economy in this country. Therefore they, too, are entitled to some of the benefits. I do not consider South Africa a backward, underdeveloped African territory, even if hon. members on the other side do.

What about the Protectorates under England?

That is still no argument. South Africa has a huge national income; it purports to be a modern industrial country run on modern lines and, therefore. Sir, it should behave like a modern industrial country run on modern lines. I think these pensions are miserably low: nobody can possibly live on these miserably small pensions and I think the hon. the Minister should certainly not be saying all those thousands of rand. They should be paid out in welfare services. I want to say, too. Sir, that the hon. the Deputy Minister’s attitude, as far as famine relief is concerned, leaves very much to be desired as well. Having denied that any bad conditions exist in the country the Government is apparently now making very small amounts available, judging by the magnitude of the problem with which those people are coping in the Northern Transvaal. What is more, he is offering work to people who are suffering from starvation! Surely the first thing to do is to rescue those people from the condition of starvation and thereafter supply them with regular employment if possible or do something to see that permanent relief is afforded these people. But to state that work is offered at 10c per day, or whatever it is, to people who are suffering from starvation and malnutrition is, of course, palpably absurd. This is what is being done. Sir as the hon. the Deputy Minister himself told us the other day. I should like an explanation from the hon. the Minister about this under-spending of amounts under the Bantu Administration Vote.

There are numerous other subjects I want to deal with. I shall start with one and continue with the others at another stage. I want the Minister to explain to me whether it is his intention to stop Bantu trading on their own accounts in the urban areas. I have this Government publication which talks about the development of Africans in urban areas. It shows us this lucky Mr. Tshabalala with a turnover of R1,000 per day, owning many garages, cinemas and so on. Many other Africans are mentioned in other official publications as being entrepreneurs in their own rights in townships, not in the Bantu areas, but in townships there is, of course, mention of Bantu entrepreneurs in the Bantu areas as well. But I am talking about the emphasis which is laid on the development in the urban townships where the vast majority of the Africans with their great consuming power in fact live, and where the growing middle class referred to in this publication in fact lives. Is the Minister going to carry out the policy announced in this circular that as from now on no new licences are to be issued to such people, and that Mr. Tshabalala for instance, is to be persuaded to move his ventures to the Bantu areas? What feeling does the Minister think is it going to engender in the Africans who have virtually pulled themselves up by their boot-strings and managed to establish themselves as a thriving middle class when they are told that for no reason whatever, except some ideology of the Government, they must now uproot themselves and move to the Bantu areas where they know perfectly well they will not be able to advance themselves in the same way? [Time limit.]

I think the time has come when somebody in this Committee should nut the hon. member for Houghton (Mrs Suzman) in her place. She makes use of the position which she occupies in this Committee and in this House to use this House as a forum on every possible occasion to propagate the things for which she and her party stand.

I was elected for that reason.

She says that she was elected “for that reason”. I shall tell her what the reason is and then she will see that she ought to be ashamed of the fact that she is so loquacious here. She was sitting here recently as a member of a fairly strong Opposition Party which consisted of 13 members. There were 12 of them at first; Prof. Sakkies Fourie then joined them and brought their ranks up to the unlucky number of 13. All they have left to-day is one solitary member who is very loquacious; she is the 13th member to-day, the unlucky number. I want to put a very pertinent question to her this evening and I hope she will be courteous enough to reply to it; I know she is a courteous lady.

On a point of order, is the hon. member entitled to refer to the hon. member for Houghton as “she” and “her”?

The hon. member does not know his own language. I want to ask the hon. member…

On a point of order, Mr. Chairman, may I have your ruling?

Hon. members must refer to other hon. members as “honourable members.”

Mr. Chairman, I referred to the hon. member for Houghton and then asked whether “she” would please reply to my question. The hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant) does not understand Afrikaans; that is why he misunderstood me. In her first speech this evening the hon. member for Houghton referred very sneeringly to “the so-called White Republic of South Africa.” She was born and bred in this so-called White Republic of South Africa; she is a citizen of this Republic. I want to ask her now whether, if she is dissatisfied in this Republic, there is anything which prevents her from relinquishing her citizenship and going to a truly White Republic in some other part of the world. Is there anything which prevents her from leaving this “so-called White Republic” and going to a truly White Republic?

Why should I?

Sir, I shall tell you why I ask that. I ask it because if she goes to another White Republic, where there are no non-Whites, she will have no forum in any Parliament where she can stir up the non-Whites against the Whites. That is the first reason. The second reason is that if she went to a Black Republic like Ghana her White skin would count against her and they would not vote for her there. A Black Republic would reject her; in a White Republic she would not be happy because there are no Natives whom she could stir up, and in this “so-called White Republic of South Africa” she is not at home either. I want to ask the hon. member once again to tell me whether, if she is not happy in South Africa, there is anything that prevents her from going to another republic? If she is not satisfied with the so-called White Republic, does she prefer a Black Republic? A little while ago the hon. member replied in this House to a pertinent question put to her by the hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee) and she then said that she wanted the Black man in South Africa to have the vote.

Yes.

In that case she will get a Black Republic in South Africa. I ask her now whether that is not the reason why she remains here and uses this House as a forum to propagate her cause?

I was elected in the same way as the hon. member and I shall use this forum as long as I continue to be a member.

Yes, but the difference is that I will be re-elected while the hon. member will never see this Parliament again with the propaganda that she makes here. We have proof that within two years their numbers have dropped from 13 members to one solitary member. However, I think I have said enough to the hon. member. I should like also to take the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (West) (Mr. Streicher) to task for a moment. He says that the Bantu have come to the Western Cape to help us. Is he really so naive as to believe that what he said is the truth? They came to us because they could make a better living here than they could in their homelands. He ought to know that. I want to ask the hon. member this: Is there a single service which is being performed by a Bantu in the Western Cape which is not being performed in other parts of the world by a White man and which cannot be performed here by persons other than Bantu? These are the people, Sir, who are pleading that we should bring millions of immigrants into this country! I challenge the hon. member to tell me which work is being done here in the Western Cape by a Bantu which is not being done by Whites in other parts of the world. Is this how he tries to bring more White immigrants to South Africa? Does he want to attract millions of Whites to South Africa by saying to them, “This is Kaffir work; it is not the work of a White man?” Is that his policy? That is what he said; that is what he suggested and he was corrected by the hon. member for Stellenbosch (Mr. Smit). He stated that these people were indispensable. That may be so at the moment, but I ask him again whether he can mention any type of work which is being performed by Bantu in the Western Province which cannot be performed by a White man?

May I ask the hon. member a question? Does he want the Whites in the northern suburbs of Cape Town, for example, to undertake the removal of refuse— work which is being done by Bantu to-day?

If a Jew can do it in Israel, an Afrikaner can also do it in South Africa. Sir, I have issued a challenge to the hon. member, and I want to say to him pertinently that the dirtiest work in Israel is being done by Jewish hands, and I honour the Jewish nation for it. There is no work in South Africa which is more lowly than that same work is in Israel or in any other European country. But the hon. member wants a certain type of work in the northern suburbs, work which according to him is dirty work, to be done by Blacks. Those Blacks would then have to live amongst us permanently of course. I want to ask him then whether his party’s policy is that those people who have to live here permanently are to be given the vote and representation in this House eventually, because after all they will now be permanent residents of the “so-called White Republic of South Africa.” I should like the hon. member to stand up and tell me what he means by talking about a certain type of work in South Africa which is below the dignity of the White man. [Time limit.]

I am afraid the hon. member for Karas (Mr. Von Moltke) has made a very poor contribution to this debate, clean away from Native affairs, and I was wondering whether the hon. member is a citizen of the Republic of South Africa.

The hon. member for Pretoria (District) (Mr. Schoonbee) spoke of an atmosphere of fear. Mr. Chairman, I can assure him that if the Government’s policy is carried out of total separation in this country and that the White areas will be populated by 6,000,000 or 7,000,000 people when this comes about, those people will be the people that will live in fear. The United Party’s policy is one of holding the reins of control firmly in a multiracial state, whereas the Government’s policy, as it used to be, has been changed and now it has collapsed and is breaking up in a mass of fragments. The hon. member for Vereeniging (Mr. B. Coetzee) said that under the United Party’s policy the Black man would eventually sit in Parliament. I say that under the policy of the Nationalist Party of separate Bantustans, a small White population will be surrounded by what the Minister has promised will be independent states in a commonwealth of Southern Africa. I imagine that under those conditions the future existence of the White man will be very much more precarious than it could ever be under the policy of the United Party. The United Party policy is aimed at maintaining White control in this country and we can do it and we will do it.

How are you going to keep Native representation within limits?

That is a ridiculous question. We have had three members in this Parliament representing Natives for many, many years. That gave the Natives a voice in Parliament and they never asked for more representatives in Parliament. Now the hon. member asks how are we going to peg the number of Native Representatives in Parliament. Just the same as it was done in the past, over many, many years. It was quite easy then, and I do not see why it should be more difficult in the future. But this Government is avoiding its responsibility to our subject races. It wants to grant them independence prematurely and that will bring further trouble to our country. You will never be able to shelve that responsibility. If we in this country are not prepared to accept the responsibility for the development and the welfare of our Native people, some other nation will take over that responsibility. Let there be no doubt about that. It is our responsibility, it is our heritage, we are the guardians of these people, and we will never get away from that, and this country has the assets to enable us to develop the country in the interest of all sections. The Government’s policy is not only now a factor in retarding industrial development here in the Western Province, but it threatens the stability of farming conditions, in all spheres of domestic employment, in our hotels, in our homes, everywhere, and in our hospitals as well. I do not need to look for figures. We see this happening around us. I have had farmers coming to me and saying “We will have to close down if the present uncertainty continues as regards the labour on our farms.” There are hotel-keepers who have said “Well, if we are going to have our labour restricted, as the Government threatens, we had better try and get out of the hotel business.” Then the Government will have to take over the hotel business as they have done in Russia. That is what this Government is working towards, a communist policy. If you get rid of the Natives who do the work that they do in this country, then the Government will have to accept the responsibility of development, because private initiative and the individual will not undertake it under such circumstances. People living in the Western Province are living in uncertainty and fear, and fear is the most dangerous thing there can possibly be. Where there is fear there is no security, there is no development, it only leads to retardation and eventually economic depression. That is exactly what will happen. I am not frightened, Mr. Chairman. We in the United Party have never been frightened as regards our policy. It has never been a policy propagated from fear. We are prepared to stand up to our responsibilities, and we say that during our period of Government there were conditions of greater peace in this country that there have been under this Government. This Government can talk about the Natives streaming into White areas. They have never come under less controlled conditions as under the present Government. The Government has gone out of its way— and we agree—to settle these people and to provide proper housing. But after doing that, they say they are going to move them. We want the Minister to tell us and to tell the country, and not to keep it a secret, what his plans are. Tell the country that he will move these people gradually and that he is going to guarantee them employment where he moves them to. The Minister must say what kind of employment he is going to provide for them. At present Natives are moving out of the Western Province, but when I come down by train I find more Natives coming down by train to the Western Province than the number who are leaving. How does this system of the Government work? Can the Minister tell us something about it? And for goodness sake get down to something practical, get down to a practical basis, get out of the air—this Government lives in the air with its policies. You cannot govern a country by dreams and visions and things of that nature. The Minister should come down to a practical policy and if he has a policy that is practical, he should give us the necessary information. We can tell you all you want to know about our policy. Our policy was based on General Hertzog’s 1936 legislation, and it was a good policy. Now you have this position here in the Western Province. I have been talking about it from the employers’ point of view. What about the employees? What about the Natives who have been allowed to keep their wives here in the Cape and who have now to send them away? That Native lives in uncertainty. He does not even know whether he can obtain a permit to allow her to visit him. The migrant Native too who comes down here and who has no intention of bringing his wife, comes here to keep the wolf from the door at his home in the reserve. What security has he got? He is threatened that if he goes back to see his wife or anything of the kind, he may not be allowed to come back. I have been into the Native reserves and I have been shocked to find in every home there is either a son or the father of that home away working in a White area. These are not happy circumstances, but they are working peacefully and happily. But we disturb their state of mind by rumours and threats which this Government is responsible for. Let us have peace. People overseas may not like our policies, but if it is carried out in a more sane and practical way, perhaps they will learn to understand it. But this system of propagating uncertainty and insecurity and fear is an evil which this Government is responsible for, and for all time it will be something which we will have on your shoulders.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition put a number of questions to me to which I would like to reply immediately. The first question was in regard to the report of the Tomlinson Commission in which the statement was made that with the tempo of development envisaged in that report there would still be 6,000,000 Bantu living in the White areas, and he asks what my view of the matter is now. I still maintain that, with the tempo of development indicated there, there will after a certain time still be approximately 6,000,000 Bantu in the White area. But hon. members forget to add that the same commission indicated that with the full development of the Bantu areas the possibilities are tremendous. That important matter is always ignored by hon. members opposite, and they neglect to mention it. The Leader of the Opposition asked me who is really the creator of the policy of removing the Natives from the Western Cape; is it the hon. member for Moorreesburg (Mr. P. S. Marais), or the hon. member for Malmesbury (Mr. Van Staden) who evolved this policy, the object of which is gradually to send the Bantu in the Western Cape back to their own areas. I just want to tell him very clearly that this policy rests on a very important principle of this side of the House, that we grant every national group its own living space, and the White man. who really acts as the guardian of the non-White population groups, has the duty so to regulate and plan affairs that every population group will have its legitimate living space and that it will not be exploited by any other group. That is one of the cornerstones of our approach to our colour policy in general in South Africa. We believe that every Bantu national group should have its own living space in its own area and that it should be protected there, so that the other national groups may also have a place where they can live in future and where they may develop and be properly protected. It is for that reason that the National Party has laid down the policy, not to-day but right from the beginning and particularly since 1948, that it will protect the interests of the Coloureds in the Western Cape. I have with me a copy of the manifesto issued in 1948, which puts the matter as follows—

But the more comprehensive report about the Coloureds and the Bantu put the matter more clearly, viz. that the National Party regards the Western Cape as one of the areas in which the Coloured may seek his future and will have to make his living, and that the Coloureds should be protected there against the Bantu. It is a matter of principle. It is no new thing, but was formulated as long ago as 1948. That is why ever since 1948 we have systematically worked in that direction.

What is our policy precisely in regard to this matter? Our policy was stated very clearly from time to time. In the first place, it was stated very clearly by the hon. the Prime Minister, viz. that the removal of the Bantu from the Western Cape will not take place in such a way as to hamper the development of the Western Cape. It will be a gradual process to ensure that no disruption of any nature will take place in the Western Cape. But at the same time the Prime Minister also stated very clearly, and I also from time to time have stated very clearly, that we should not forget that we also have a duty towards the Bantu in the Western Cape, and it will be one of the things against which I will set myself with all the seriousness at my command if a policy is to be followed to remove the Bantu from the Western Cape and simply to dump them in a Bantu area where they cannot make a living. I do not think any decent person can propagate such a policy. Hence our policy that the Bantu areas should be developed, and to the extent that they develop and opportunities are created for absorbing the Bantu, so that they can make a decent living, to that extent they will be sent there. That is our ideal in respect of the Western Cape.

But now hon. members should not, on the other hand, make the mistake of saying that it is our policy at this stage just to unload the Bantu from the Western Cape on to the Eastern Cape. That is not the intention at all. We should not forget that in the Western Cape people are working who come from the Ciskei, and to the extent that opportunities are created in the Ciskei, particularly also by the border development, to that extent we will try to let these people go there very judiciously. But there are also many people here from the Transkei, and far be it from us to say that we will simply dump those Bantu in the Transkei and tell them to look after themselves. No Christian party and no decent person could have such a policy. It conflicts with any feeling of decency.

But you are doing it now.

All the stories being spread that we are going to treat the Bantu in such a harsh way are so much nonsense and mischief sown to make the Bantu inimical towards us. I realize very well that it will perhaps take a reasonably long time, although it may perhaps be accomplished much sooner than most people realize. Now the question is asked: Yes, but can we have enough labour if the Bantu is not available; can we replace him by other labour? My reply is very definitely in the affirmative, for this reason: I want to say that as the result of the wrong policy which was formerly followed, we have committed a very great injustice towards the Coloureds in the Cape. The result was that a large percentage of the Coloureds stopped learning how to work. This is one of the important tasks we have to tackle, because a large percentage of the Coloureds is unemployed to-day. It is quite absurd to think that the people registered in the labour bureaux include all those who are unemployed. I say that the percentage of Coloureds who are unemployed in the Western Cape is much greater than many people think. Remember that there was a time when a large proportion of them simply lived on liquor smuggling. That time is now past. One of our important tasks for the future will therefore be to teach those Coloureds to work again and to help to rehabilitate them. It should not be forgotten that to a large extent we are responsible for that position. Why? One phenomenon I notice on the part of the Leader of the Opposition is that he approaches the whole position of the Western Cape in the Esau spirit. He is prepared to sell the Western Cape for a mess of pottage. We think that is wrong, and even though there may be times when one finds things difficult, one does not have the right to sell one’s heritage, because we owe it not only to the White population but also to the Coloured population of the Western Cape to take steps. The tendency was, and one still finds it on a large scale to-day, to see how much cheap Bantu labour one could get. Hence the great influx of Bantu from other areas to the Western Cape, and that policy was not fair towards the Coloured population in the Western Cape. It was an injustice to the Coloured population.

We also had this other phenomenon, that to the extent that the Bantu ousted the Coloured from his employment, the Coloureds started going to other areas, which was not fair towards the Coloureds in the Western Cape. Let us therefore have clarity on the matter, viz. that it is not the Government’s policy to allow this removal to take place in such a way that it will lead to disruption here in any sphere, economically, socially, or in any other sphere. It is in no way the policy of the Government to remove the Bantu here and just to leave them to their own devices without taking care of them. Proper opportunities will be created for them when they are removed here. But at the same time we say that a heavy onus rests on us to do our duty towards the Coloured population of the Western Cape, and that is to provide them with living room here and to protect them against infiltration not only by the Bantu but by any other national group from elsewhere: I think it is a moral duty which rests on the White man of South Africa to-day.

The Leader of the Opposition asked me where the borders of the Western Cape are now. I have a map here, and if necessary I can show it to him, but briefly the borders will be such that more or less the following will be the border districts: Humansdorp, Pearston, Middelburg, Colesberg, Hopetown, Prieska, Kenhardt and Namaqualand. The hon. the Leader asks what will happen to the farmers there. Here I want to give the same assurance that I gave to Mr. De Kock, and which the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (West) (Mr. Streicher) seems to have misconstrued. I did not write to Mr. De Kock saying that he could rest assured that the Bantu would always remain here. I only gave him the assurance that he and his fellow farmers could rest assured that this Government would look after their interests, and until such time as there are Coloureds who can do that work and do it equally as well, he need not be afraid that the Bantu will be removed. That is a duty we have towards the farmers, and it also applies to the other areas.

I quite admit that in this area there are approximately 250,000 Bantu. That seems a large number to remove, but the fact is that they are not as firmly established as some people here profess. On the contrary, I say that those people are anxiously awaiting the establishment of opportunities in their own areas for them to return there. I say that in all responsibility and in the light of all the contacts I have with them. These people are anxious to go back, if only they can have the same opportunities there that they have here. But what is more, hardly a day passes without some of these people returning without our even placing them in employment there, where they are much happier than they are here in Cape Town. The Leader of the Opposition’s attitude (I will return in a moment to a few of the fundamental matters which have become clear) is this: Allow this labour to flow in unrestricted. I myself saw what Cape Town looked like when we came into power, and I was shocked to see what was going on here. There was not a place or bush on the mountain where they were not living. There was not a shrub under which a Native with a Coloured woman was not to be found. They lived in the bushes. I visited Cook’s Bush, and when I left there I gave my friends the assurance that I did not know of a single farmer who treated his animals as badly as those people in Cook’s Bush were treated. It was shocking. That is what the whole of the Western Cape looked like as the result of the policy followed by the previous Government, and to-day the Leader of the Opposition propounds the same policy. There a situation was created which bred the germs for the Poqo movement. It was this Government which created order out of chaos. Then it was also said to be impossible. But this Government applied control. Now I readily admit that quite a number of Natives entered the larger cities, but one thing no one can deny, and that is that we have stabilized the position in the Western Cape, and particularly in the Peninsula, so that the increase has been restricted. If we had not stabilized it and this influx had continued, what would the Western Cape have looked like today? One would have had murder and manslaughter here on a large scale. It was the actions of this Government and its policy which saved the Western Cape, and particularly Cape Town, from a blood-bath. Matters would have developed in that direction if this Government had not taken action. I admit again that there was a large measure of inflow recently to the urban areas. Nobody denies that. But we do not forget that the stream would increase as industries developed here. But if we continue with the development of the Bantu areas, the day will arrive when the stream can be turned back, and then the return flow will become increasingly faster. But I shall come back to that when I deal in a moment with what the hon. member for Jeppes (Dr. Cronje) said.

Now the Leader of the Opposition says that sociologically this will lead to a great disruption with these people, but I want to deny it. My standpoint is that those people are not rooted here. They were driven here because they could earn better wages here. The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (West) said that they really came here to develop the Western Cape. The hon. member lives in a dream world. They came here because they could obtain better wages here. They came here because of the bright lights of Cape Town. Of course they helped to develop the area by means of their labour, but they did not come here specially to develop the Western Cape. But I repeat that these people have not taken root here. Even those who were born here have not taken root here. Most of them still have a hankering to return to their own homelands. It will therefore not be a mass uprooting, but rather a mass resettlement of these people. Nor will it be a mass resettlement, but it will be a gradual process which will be handled judiciously.

The Leader of the Opposition said that he had a second difficulty, namely the economic development of the Western Cape. He says that without Bantu labour the Western Cape cannot be developed properly. I repeat that this Esau spirit is a very dangerous thing. Sooner or later it leads to trouble. It is not a good thing to abandon a principle just for the sake of a slight economic advantage. I say that if one just considers the increase in the Coloured population and how many families have already been disrupted because they cannot continue living here as the result of this cheap labour, then I say that we are indirectly committing a crime against the Coloured. If one has regard to their increase and the great duty which rests upon us to rehabilitate those masses who have never learnt how to work, we need not fear that in the future there will be any shortage of labour in the Western Cape. On the contrary, in ten to 15 years’ time the problem will be to develop fast enough to provide enough employment for the Coloureds. I therefore differ from the hon. member there. That is not a problem for the future, but what will create a problem is if we allow the Bantu to come in here in unlimited numbers and to commit an injustice towards the Coloureds.

The hon. the leader says he has another difficulty. He says this policy creates a great amount of uncertainty in regard to economic development, uncertainty on the part of the White entrepreneur, and uncertainty on the part of the Bantu. There we have that difference again. His policy creates uncertainty, because what certainty have the Coloureds for the future if the Bantu are allowed to enter indiscriminately? And what certainty has the White man if one allows that? Nothing. In other words, his policy is calculated to create the greatest possible measure of uncertainty.

The hon. member for Albany (Mr. Bowker) said that they will see to it that everything is kept in order, but that is easier said than done. One’s policy must guarantee certainty for the future, and the policy of the National Party, in spite of all the accusations which are based on fear, remains a guarantee of certainty for every national group in South Africa. The Leader of the Opposition stated a further proposition with which I quite agree. He said that there was a tendency in the world to-day for there to be an influx of people to the cities. That is correct, but that is just where his policy in my opinion does not rest on a moral basis, and where my party’s policy does rest on a moral basis. These people stream to the cities, but it should be to cities of their own. [Laughter.] What do we see to-day? We see them streaming to the White cities as an appendage of those White cities. In other words, they do not become full inhabitants of those cities who play a role in the development of that city as is the case in the world to-day. No, that policy views the Bantu homeland as nothing else but a reservoir of cheap labour. [Laughter.] And it sees the Bantu residential areas merely as places where the workers have to live, with a little shop here and there, and so on. But if one wants to have the right development, one should do what we are doing to-day. There is an inflow of Bantu to the cities, but one must guide it in such a way that they will systematically develop their own cities. I want to mention examples and the first one is in the Transkei. Instead of there being a number of White towns, the process should have been just the other way around. It should have been a number of Bantu towns. Nobody is more aware than I am that the Whites there have rendered a service, but the development has been wrong. Therefore one’s policy should be to develop cities in the Bantu areas, as the National Party is doing to-day. I frankly admit that some of those cities are near the White areas, but they are still within their own areas. I want to mention an example, and I want to invite hon. members to look at Umlazi. When I made a speech in Zululand three years ago and said that a city would develop there, a Bantu town as large as Durban, the English language Press ridiculed it. They said it was a pipe-dream, but what is the position to-day. The hon. member for Drakensberg said the Minister was again floating around on a cloud up in the sky, but to-day a city is developing there, and the same newspapers which scoffed so much now admit that a town is developing there which will one day be much bigger than Durban. What does one find there? One finds that the Bantu are settled in their own area, and they develop their town and they develop tertiary industries. I want to invite hon. members to go and see what splendid co-operation we have there. There are a few Bantu doctors there and they have told me that never again will they live in a Bantu residential area in the White areas. There is peace and happiness to-day. They have developed tertiary industries, and that is the only policy which can offer a solution for the problem with which we are faced to-day. But then they should not be residential areas where only a number of workers live: they must be full-fledged towns which develop to the full in the Bantu area. It is in that respect that the policy of the United Party is lacking in ethical principles for the development of the Bantu.

The Leader of the Opposition reproached me for having spoken about trade in the Bantu residential areas, but we have repeatedly stated our policy in that regard. We have said that in the Bantu towns no White man and no Indian would be given trading rights, but only the Bantu. And we train them to make a success of that business as far as possible, with the result that in recent years 90 per cent of the trading licences have been issued to Bantu, whereas formerly it was only 50 per cent or 60 per cent. We say that in the Bantu residential areas in the White area we grant them those businesses which provide for their everyday needs. We are not prepared to have competition between White and Bantu traders in the Bantu residential areas. We are criticized because we will not allow large O.K. Bazaars to open up in Langa and in the Western Areas of Johannesburg, which employ 300 workers, and large garages.

Why not?

It is against our principles. We cannot allow it, because then what will happen to the White trader?

Then why do you boast of Tshabalala?

He is simply a person who complies with our requirements. There are many other Bantu shopkeepers who are very rich. That is why we say that we must encourage these people to establish large shops in their own towns. It should not be forgotten that those trading businesses are one of the greatest stimulants for the development of tertiary industries, and therefore such Bantu can render a great service to their own people. But again I say it is not the idea to force them. It has correctly been said that the magnet must lie in the Bantu areas. That is the policy of this party. The magnet should not be only in the White areas, but possibilities must be created in the Bantu areas.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition spoke about the exemption passes for certain Bantu which should be reintroduced, but we have had experience of that. It was the subject of very serious abuses. Every criminal who wanted an exemption pass in those days simply went to the nearest attorney and paid him £40 for which he got a beautiful certificate saying what a decent man he was, and some of the greatest rogues on the Rand received exemptions. There was a black market on a tremendous scale, but the hon. member wants us to reintroduce it. No, we must be very careful. I want to admit—and here I agree with him—that in the larger cities they should be allowed a greater measure of freedom of movement. Those are matters to which we should devote attention, and we shall certainly do so, but I want to warn hon. members seriously against the large-scale misuse that was made of the exemption pass. We learnt a very unsavoury lesson there.

Now I want to tell the hon. the Leader there. I am glad he made this speech, because it lifted the curtain somewhat in regard to his policy. A few important principles were revealed. The first was that he is quite prepared to leave the White man in the Western Cape to the mercy of cheap labour, no matter where it comes from. That is a dangerous principle. But, secondly, he is prepared to expose the Coloured man in the Cape to the competition of cheap labour by the Bantu. I want to say that one of the reasons why the living standard of the Coloured in the Cape is not higher is just because of this large-scale influx of Bantu labour, and nobody can deny it. If there is a flood of cheap labour, one’s standard of living cannot rise. It is his policy to expose the Coloureds to the competition of the cheaper labour of the Bantu.

But in the third place, his policy lacks an ethical principle, viz. that he is quite prepared to let the Western Cape be used as a magnet to attract the best labour from the Bantu areas, without that labour being used to develop the Bantu areas themselves. To me it has always been unethical to allow the best services of the finest sons and daughters of the Bantu to be attracted to the White areas. One cannot develop those areas with just old people and cripples and women. One should try to retain some of the best brains there. It is in this respect that the policy of the National Party comes so prominently to the fore. We want to see the best of the Bantu young people remaining in their homelands to assist their people and to become the entrepreneurs to develop those areas.

The hon. member for Jeppes (Dr. Cronje) referred to the great influx of Bantu to the White areas. I want to repeat that this side of the House predicted that this would still take place for years. We have predicted that the years from 1976 to 1980 will be the turning point. Then we will begin to see an increasing return flow. We frankly admitted it. In the light of the development which took place in recent years, that is the natural process. But this process cannot be allowed to continue unrestricted. Hence our efforts to develop the Bantu areas. Then the hon. member said that all the capital formation is just amongst the Whites and the Bantu can amass only a small amount of capital, but is that a reason for allowing this process to continue unrestricted? Have we no duty towards the Bantu at least to make it possible for them to start capital formation in their own areas, and how else can it be done other than by developing those areas and by getting some of their best sons and daughters to undertake that task? The hon. member says there are 40,000 White students at the universities and only about 500 Bantu. That is correct, but I want to remind him that there was a time when there were only about ten Afrikaners at the universities here, but what is the position to-day? A start was made. It is here that our policy confers a benefit on the Bantu. Those Bantu universities which were so bitterly opposed by that side of the House to-day turn out men and women whom we can use to build up their own people. That is the value of those universities. I visited a Bantu doctor at one of the Bantu towns and he told me: “To-day for the first time my life has meaning, because I can devote the knowledge and the capital I have acquired to the service of my own Zulu nation.” That is why we guide the process in that direction, because one can only develop those areas when those potentialities are created there. It is our task to assist those people to amass capital in the service of their own people.

The hon. member asked why there were so many unemployed, but that matter is somewhat exaggerated. Many cases can be traced where the person applies at the labour bureau for work in the towns, but when one investigates how many cattle he has one finds that he has 300 or 400 head of cattle. Therefore he is not really an unemployed man. It is surprising how many of this type of person there are. Therefore the position is being exaggerated. But I want to give the hon. member the assurance that when there is unemployment we render assistance. There we have splendid cooperation with the Bantu Authorities. We are now making use of them, together with our officials, in creating opportunities for employment in the Transkei. Therefore serious attention is being devoted to this matter and excellent results are being achieved. Only the day before yesterday I received a letter from one of the chiefs in the Northern Transvaal, in which he thanked me very nicely for what we had done there to create employment for the people, as the result of which they could care for their families. The hon. member for Jeppes asked what we have done in regard to birth control among the Bantu. I want to tell him he is on dangerous ground now. If he knows the Bantu, he will not talk about that matter in this way. Unfortunately, or fortunately, the approach of the Bantu to this subject differs completely from that of the White man. Nothing is as welcome among the Bantu as a child If one talks to him about birth control, he is immediately inimical. I saw in Pretoria that one of them went to the beer-hall and told the people to be careful because the White people had put something in the beer which would have the effect that they would not be able to have any more children, and for a whole week no Bantu drank a drop of beer there. I have much sympathy with the view of the hon. member, but it is a difficult problem and it will take a long time yet before we can apply birth control among the Bantu.

The hon. member for Transkeian Territories (Mr. Hughes) also pointed out the necessity for industrial development to assist the Bantu in obtaining employment. I agree with him. Hence our border industry, but that is not enough. I am of the opinion that in the Transkei we shall in the near future have to start building up industries. I feel very strongly in that regard and this matter is receiving our attention.

By Whites?

With White capital?

No, by the Bantu. It is obvious that in the beginning it will have to be done under the guidance of our officials, but it will not be done in the way in which hon. members want to do it. They want to allow the Whites to go in there to exploit the Bantu, and that will not be allowed. We will assist the Bantu to develop his areas. The hon. member pointed out that the border development also results in a measure of integration. Quite correct, it is a measure of economic integration, but the important thing it that one does not have integration there in the narrower meaning of the word; through co-operation one assists in the development of the Bantu.

The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (West) (Mr. Streicher) referred to the danger to the Eastern Cape if all the Bantu from the Western Cape were sent there. That will not take place. We should remember that here we have Basutos and Zulus and various other races, and all of them will not be sent back there, but it will be done judiciously.

The hon. member for King William’s Town (Mr. Warren) put a few questions to me. He asked what about the people at Undanzani. I think they are in safe hands. The hon. member will derive no political advantage by trying to incite them. The position is simply this. There we have a good example of how we cooperate in solving these problems. The people there were consulted and the overwhelming majority of them were prepared to sell. The municipality was consulted and they were prepared to sell. There are therefore no difficulties there. Now the position naturally is that all the valuations have to be done by the Land Board, which falls under the Minister of Lands and not under me. I know many of the farmers are dissatisfied with the valuations, but in the past, where there was dissatisfaction, we settled the matter by getting into contact with these people. Some of them are quite satisfied to sell at the prices at which the land was valued. There are some who do not see their way clear to selling, and those matters are being investigated, so that the hon. member need not be concerned.

The hon. member for Houghton (Mrs. Suzman) put a few questions. She is very fond, just lately, of taking that ugly black brush and continually painting it over the face of South Africa. I wonder how much love she can have for South Africa when she can do that. Would it not be better, if certain things are wrong, to assist to remedy them, and to save South Africa the dishonour of undeservedly being blackened in the eyes of the world? I cannot understand what goes on in the heart of that hon. member which makes it possible for her to vilify her own fatherland in this way. To her there is nothing nicer than to blacken South Africa. That is not nice at all. I am not one of those people who say that everything is going well, but when things go wrong I am always glad to have it brought to my notice by the hon. member so that we can remedy it, and she knows that we have remedied more than one thing already. Now she very facilely says that there are people who are underfed and who suffer from famine. Surely that is not true. [Interjections.] I challenge anyone to show me the people who suffer from famine in that way. We have the Bantu Authorities all over the country, and we have our officials, and my instructions to them are that if there is any case where the people do not get enough to eat they must immediately see to it that they are fed, but they have to work for that food. Even though we only tackle the cleaning up of a land, they have to work and the women can also earn money. The old people and the children receive food gratis, but the others have to work. Why say now that such a state of affairs exists? Last year we heard the stories about Sekukuniland. I went there myself and asked where the place was where all this difficulty arose, and do you know which place is was, Sir? It was the place where the Bantu always had their lands. Then they said they did not know it was old lands, and when they saw the grazing everybody was surprised to see how good it was, but South Africa had to be vilified. No, I want to assure the hon. member that those people are being cared for. She asked about the amount of R800,000 which was not fully spent. That is right; it has not yet been spent fully, but we are continually busy with new schemes to provide for the aged and the needy in their own areas, and in this way we are rendering a social service to the Bantu. A large amount has already been spent. But do not forget that for this work planning is required and it takes quite a while to provide the basic services. One cannot just spend money to-morrow which one has received to-day. Everything first has to be planned in co-operation with the Bantu, and that takes time. This amount was specially set aside to ensure that the aged and the sick and the lame would be properly cared for in hospitals. We entered into agreements with various hospitals to ensure that the cripples would be properly cared for there. Every penny is spent in the interest of the Bantu.

The hon. member for Albany (Mr. Bowker) made a few general statements and voiced the view that their policy was the correct one and he said that we are proceeding at too fast a pace with these people because they have no sense of responsibility. Well, at this stage we must keep our word of honour which we gave to the Bantu. We cannot always remain the guardians of the Bantu. We must at least give them the opportunity to develop a sense of responsibility, and that is what we are doing. I think I have now replied to the main points raised.

Mr. Chairman, during this debate we witnessed a peculiar spectacle. One wonders whether one was with Alice in Wonderland. One got the impression that this was the great retreat of the Nationalist Party in regard to their Bantu policy. Listening to the hon. the Minister, I think he realized that it was time he restated the policy of his party. Personal remarks were made here, and we even heard threats that the hon. member for Houghton (Mrs. Suzman) would be here only for a very short time. I and this side of the House are sorry that that remark was made. We on this side will always protect the rights of any individual in this House who was elected democratically. I think it is wrong that a member of this House should be threatened in this way. The Minister referred again to the reservoir of cheap labour we were trying to build up in the Western Cape. The Minister must know that the wages of the Bantu are controlled by the Government, and in the Western Cape we pay probably higher wages than anywhere else in the Republic. To come back to the removal of the Bantu from the Western Cape, the policy of removing the Bantu is an ideological one.