as Chairman, presented the Report of the Select Committee on the Constitution, as follows—

J. C. HEUNIS, Chairman.

Committee Rooms,
House of Assembly.
16 February 1981.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition made a vehement attack on me during the no-confidence debate. I have read the report of his speech in Hansard, and I notice that he did not reply to a single one of my arguments.

[Inaudible.]

Order!

He did not reply specifically to the charge I made against the hon. member for Bryanston concerning the letter he wrote to the New York Times. This was the letter which appeared in the 8 January 1981 edition of the newspaper, in which the hon. member grossly maligned South Africa. [Interjections.]

It was the hon. member for Sandton.

I beg your pardon, I meant the hon. member for Sandton.

Are your so-called facts always so wrong?

Oh, shut up now.

Yes, put a lid on it.

I do not think we must be too harsh in our treatment of the hon. member for Bryanston. His unhappiness flows basically from the fact that he has discovered himself. [Interjections.]

Order!

Before I come to the hon. member for Sandton, I first want to address the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. He compared me to a whole number of things in his speech that day. Some of his comparisons were quite flattering, I must say, especially coming from him. Others were perhaps not so flattering. I remember that he compared me quite specifically to a bull. He referred to the film The Raging Bull and said that I reminded him of a boxer who appeared in that film. The hon. leader also said that I behaved like a bull which had no more china shops to charge at, that I had smashed them all. Of course, I do not in the least mind being compared to a bull. It is much better to be a bull than a boisterous, objectionable young ox. [Interjections.] What strikes me, however, is that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition seems to have quite a lot of time for going to the cinema. I must admit that I was not acquainted with that specific film. I do not get to see many films. However, I see that he had to go far afield to find a film with which he could compare me. I have no problems. I can choose a local film in which I can see all the characters in the official Opposition. It is the film called Beautiful People. [Interjections.] They all appear in that film . . . No, not quite all of them. Some of the characters in Beautiful People would not like me to make such an unqualified statement. [Interjections.] Be that as it may, there is one thing about the hon. the Leader of the Opposition which I cannot understand. That is that he devoted such a large part of his speech—and therefore of the time of this House as well—to discussing an appointment or appointments which he alleged I would not grant him. He got quite furious about it. Hon. members will remember that, the way he carried on like a windmill on a dry borehole in a whirlwind. [Interjections.] It was clear that he was furious about it.

However, he cannot get away with his version. I am actually sorry to have to take up even more of the time of this House in this connection. However, it must be done in order that the events may be placed on record. The facts of the matter are as he initially stated them. The first time he spoke, on 26 January, he implied that he accepted that my work schedule did not allow it. Then, however, because I did not seem to regard it as important enough to react to, the hon. leader considered that in some sinister way, which only he knows about, I was to blame. It is true that I, or my office, indicated to him that it would be possible to meet at the time of our meeting here for the election of the Vice State President early in October 1980, which occasion most hon. members were present. However, I can specifically remember that he was told that this could only be done if time allowed. Obviously I did not know what my time schedule would be, for the simple reason that there was to be a Cabinet meeting as well. The new Cabinet had to be sworn in. There was also to be a prior meeting of the caucus. After that we elected the Vice State President. This was followed by a dinner. The next morning the new Cabinet was sworn in, and afterwards there was a Cabinet meeting. Was I supposed to tell the hon. the Prime Minister that I could not attend the Cabinet meeting because I had an appointment with the hon. the Leader of the Opposition? Was I supposed to do that?

Is he right in his head?

Then something happened in a neighbouring State—my diary confirms this.

You spend too much time in TV make-up rooms.

As a result, I had to leave urgently. What is important now, however? At the end of August, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Information set aside two days for the provision of background information and the reading of papers to all parliamentarians who went overseas on parliamentary tours, as well as to those whom I had specially invited to go to the UN. I summoned the ambassador at the UN. He also read a paper. I inconvenienced my department and myself. Three or four of the hon. members of the Opposition attended those background information sessions. We invited more of them to New York than their pro rata numbers in this House justified. That was my first mistake. We invited more of them specifically in order to make them feel that they were moving with South Africa; so that they would find themselves in the hostile atmosphere of the attacks against us and that this might open their eyes. [Interjections.] As far as I know, the former member for Bezuidenhout was still a member of the PFP in August. He subsequently ceased to be one, but for the sake of decency we included him as well. After all, one cannot exclude a man once he has been invited just because he has changed his party. In fact, it was a recommendation in the case of Mr. Basson that he should be invited. On 1 November, this group had already arrived in New York, but in October, I had to accompany the hon. the Prime Minister to Taiwan. In October, too, the UN negotiators were here. In October and November we had several talks with Transkei, Bophuthatswana and Venda and with other African countries, appointments and meetings that had been arranged long before. The hon. leader went abroad on two occasions. While he was abroad, I did not pester him to come to see me. I knew he was busy. In New York, however, a whole day’s background information was supplied to them by my office there. Appointments were arranged for them with several ambassadors, as well as with Mr. Ahtisaari and Dr. Waldheim and with a general of the former UN force in Sinai. Everything possible was done to orientate them in connection with South West Africa. That is what the hon. leader is complaining about. He said—

This is from me—

That is his charge. But, Sir, the Geneva talks ended on 14 January this year. I was here in the Cape, and I am coming to that.

When the hon. leader had returned from overseas in December 1980 the hon. the Prime Minister summoned me to Cape Town for a very serious meeting in connection with South West Africa. It was originally to have taken place on the 9th, but the people the hon. the Prime Minister wanted here were unable to come on the 9th. Then it was arranged for the 10th. To help the hon. leader, my office arranged with his secretary—and she confirms this—for a meeting on the 9th, depending on whether my appointment with the hon. the Prime Minister would be over in time. Then it was moved to the 10th, and my office phoned his office again to notify the hon. leader that the meeting had now been moved to the 10th, depending on whether the work with the hon. the Prime Minister was completed. By lunchtime—we were to have met each other immediately afterwards—Gen. Malan and I had to return urgently to Pretoria by air because of an unexpected occurrence. What did we do then? Once again we phoned the hon. leader’s office to inform them that this attempt of ours to meet him in Cape Town, for the sake of convenience, had not succeeded, but we asked them to phone us again so that when we returned to Cape Town towards the middle of December, to stay here until the session began, we could arrange a meeting.

The fact that this is true is proved by his secretary. She admitted to my private secretary that she had in fact phoned Pretoria, but that she could not get hold of us for the simple reason that we were in the Cape. We attended two meetings at George in December. We also had to do all the preparatory work for the Geneva Conference from my office in Cape Town, to which my office staff had been moved, because only some of my staff were in Pretoria. I am still waiting for his office to phone my office to arrange a meeting. However, he rises in this House and accuses me. He rises in this House and he places before us an innocent matter of arrangements between offices, where the people who made the arrangements— including my private secretary and his secretary—are not present in this House. This just shows us the petty concerns to which the hon. the Deader of the Opposition is devoting his attention. It shows us that he has no political arguments left and must now seize upon innocent arrangements for an appointment, while he should actually take the blame for the fact that it was not kept, and he wastes the time of this House by talking about it, and then he blames other people. [Interjections.] That is what is happening now. A senior member of the PFP approached me in the lobby the other day and asked me whether I would see a friend of his from a European country, and I had an hour-long interview with him. This reflects my attitude to availability. Now the hon. the Leader of the Opposition asks what my attitude towards the Opposition is. Here it is. There is the record. I do not have to make any wild allegations. Why does he? He now thinks that they can be as irresponsible as they like about South West, but when they get a hiding, he is quick to squeal and say that I did not want to find time for an appointment with him so that he could get the correct information. That is what is at the back of their minds. Those are the tactics they caucus about, instead of putting South Africa’s interests first.

However, this is not all. Why did he not react to the conduct of the hon. member for Sandton? He said here that I was indulging in smear politics; that I charged into this House like a bull. He pretended that I was the only one who thought so; that I was the only one who considered it so abominable that the hon. member for Sandton should have written in a foreign newspaper—

Is that not correct?

I say it is not true in South Africa and it is less true in the New York Times because it is not the full story and an American audience is less acquainted with our circumstances. A member of the South African Parliament should not write in the New York Times a sentence like that. The new American administration had at that time not even yet come into power. It was going to be installed on 20 January. My missions were endeavouring to the best of their ability to influence Governments positively abroad, particularly the new American administration. They indicated to them the new initiatives which the Government had taken during the past year and they also drew attention to the economic achievements of our country, in contrast to the situation in the rest of Africa and how it was necessary that we should look globally at the Soviet threat. At that time the hon. member wrote to the New York Times to tell them this type of thing—

But is that not true?

But why did he not explain to them that this was a matter which had never been put to the vote because it is not for all people in the country to decide on the issue? As I said earlier, why should the rest of the country decide on the Transkei’s future? Who gives that hon. member the right to be so arrogant to say that he will decide for the Xhosas; they cannot decide themselves? Where does this come from?

But you want to decide for them. [Interjections.]

It should be clearly borne in mind that this was addressed to an American audience. [Interjections.]

Would Andries allow the Transvaal to secede . . .

He then continued . . . [Interjections.]

Order! I want to point out to hon. members on both sides of the House that I am not going to allow as many interjections as I did yesterday. Hon. members will have ample opportunity to participate in the debate and to debate the issues which are being raised. A debate by means of continual interjections will not be allowed. The hon. the Minister may proceed.

Sir, the problem with that hon. member is that . . .

Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. the Minister a question?

Later, Sir.

The problem with that hon. member is that he does not know what he thinks unless he hears what he says. This is his big problem. Therefore he should restructure his mental processes.

I am, however, still busy with the letter which the hon. member for Sandton wrote. He said—

He is talking about the concept of independence for the homelands—

What does he imply with that? What about the Ciskei? Who endorsed the procedure to be followed there when it was mooted that the Ciskei should become independent? The Ciskei citizens endorsed that. Does the hon. member allege that the result and the vote in favour of independence were faked? Does he allege that that took place under duress? Of course he does not.

It was Hobson’s choice.

But this is what he told an American audience. He also wrote—

Of course they had little to say in the matter. Why should they have a say? Why should all Blacks vote in the issue regarding the future of kwaZulu or the future of Gazankulu or the future of Bophuthatswana?

Why should we have democracy at all?

They do not even know what the Black leaders in those countries want, but they arrogate themselves the right to write this kind of thing to the Americans. Remember this comes from a member of Parliament in South Africa—

I say it is totally untrue . . .

What about the people in Soweto?

The Bophuthatswana Government governs the people where they live in Bophuthatswana and so does the Government of Venda for the people of Venda. The same applies to Lesotho and Swaziland. [Interjections.]

Order! Hon. members of the Opposition will have the opportunity to reply after the hon. the Minister has resumed his seat. They must avail themselves of that opportunity and stop interjecting.

Thank you, Sir. This is being done intentionally, in order to take up my time. They get hurt and they cannot take it like a man.

Mr. Speaker, on a point of clarification: Are you forbidding interjections altogether?

I am not forbidding interjections altogether; the rules do. All I say is that interjections must be few and far between; not in the form of a continuous argument.

His letter states further—

Take note of the words “apportioned”—

Surely that is not true.

Mr. Speaker, may I put a question?

No, later. The hon. member has had his field-day with The New York Times; now he is going to get it. The Americans do not know that the Karoo represents almost half of the area inhabited by White South Africans, nor do they know that the Blacks own some of the best agricultural land in the country, land that is situated in some of the best climatic regions in South Africa. He is a member of Parliament and should therefore be aware of these facts.

Let us assume that the hon. member for Yeoville is the ambassador for South Africa in Washington.

He will never be your ambassador.

On 8 January he woke up, glanced through the newspaper and attended a reception during the day where an American Senator asked him: “Do you agree with this letter written by one of your MPs? Do you think that that letter has South Africa’s interests at heart?” I have a reaction here which I had no intention of quoting, but in view of the hon. Leader of the Opposition’s attitude towards me I am going to read it now. This is the unsolicited opinion of the South African ambassador in Washington, an English-speaking South African who is not a member of the NP. He sent me this reaction on 8 January—

It was impertinent of him to say that.

Order! The hon. member for Bryanston will not be allowed to make any more interjections.

The South African ambassador continues—

Disgraceful!

This is the reaction not of a raging bull, but of a loyal English-speaking South African in the United States serving the interests of all South Africans.

I wonder when the official Opposition will realize that the Black leaders in the country have rejected them with disdain. Many of the Coloured leaders think they are a nuisance; the Whites will never support them and the Asians do not trust them. That is the long and the short of it.

*They are a small group, one could almost say expatriates, who try to dish up to South Africa fanciful stories and all kinds of dreams and ideals which are far removed from reality. If only they would open their eyes, they would encounter the same problems we are confronted with. At their national conventions they would have to contend with the same problems we are faced with today, i.e. the problems of land claims and the problem of the demands which the private sector make before it is willing to invest funds in Black controlled areas. They would have the same problems with regard to the great question of communal ownership of land. They would have the same problems which the hon. member for Constantia outlined here in connection with Africa, namely that Africa is in the grip of dictators. He said, among other things, that he was afraid that we would not be able to ensure indefinitely that it will be possible to maintain a democracy in South West Africa. I am inclined to agree with him on that point. We shall not be able to guarantee it indefinitely, but we should at least try for the sake of the moderate parties that want to achieve this.

It would be quite interesting to learn how, in terms of their policy, the Opposition would prevent the pattern which is developing in Africa from affecting South Africa as well. What is that factor which distinguishes South Africa from the rest of Africa? In Africa today there are 63 million unemployed, representing 45% of the total labour force. From birth, throughout their adult lives, 300 million people drink poisoned water, and an equally large number suffer from a protein deficiency. Nowhere in Africa does a railway line, a harbour, a clinic or a hospital function properly. The supply of power and energy is sporadic and cannot be relied upon. This does not mean that one begrudges Africa these facilities and development, but can the official Opposition not understand that we should openly admit, Black towards White, that factor which distinguishes the pattern in the rest of Africa from that in South Africa, and that we should face up to certain realities in this connection? Day after day, certain actions, certain sacrifices, are demanded of the Whites only. Cannot the Black leaders, too, be told in a responsible way: “If you want to develop differently in Africa, let our elected leaders meet in an orderly fashion.” I say this because the national convention of the PFP will never get off the ground. They will never be able to agree on who is to attend it. If Transkei does not even want to recognize the Ciskei, if the Minister of Co-operation and Development and I cannot even get those leaders together, what hope have they? What has to be admitted are the basic realities of Africa, without a paternalistic or colonialistic mentality. We must be frank with one another. Only on that basis of complementing one another and recognizing one another’s basic rights will South Africa be able to grow towards the glory which I believe it deserves and which I believe it is moving towards.

Flying over this country—let us get some perspective now, after all the complaints about this country and the abuse showered on it—what does one see? It is a cultivated land. The roads, the railway lines, the harbours, clinics, hospitals, schools and towns are there and are being properly administered. There are petrol, power and electricity, and food, and there is security in the country as well. Basically, all is well with this country, compared with the rest of the world. Where else is safety to be found? Is is safe in Europe today, with the Polish crisis building up? Is it all that safe in America, threatened by a Russian superiority in arms? Has Pres. Reagan himself not said that his country is in an economic mess and that it will take him four years to catch up with the Russians? Ours is a safe country. Why do we not tell one another for a change that we have everything we need to make further constructive progress? Why do the Whites, Blacks, Coloureds and Asiatics not tell one another that we need one another, but on certain conditions and in a balanced way, without threatening one another? Then we can take the technology we have, the minerals such as gold, coal, manganese, the iron ore and the uranium, and to these we can add tolerance and recognition of one another’s rights. Then we can help this country to achieve the greatness that should be its true destiny. This is what our attitude should be, instead of the boycott mentality, the destructive mentality, the negativism one finds among the Opposition. As if it were not enough in South Africa alone, they proclaim it as far afield as the New York Times, to incite Americans against us with their boycott mentality, because they see that their destructive politics is not succeeding in South Africa.

Mr. Speaker, I neither have the time nor the inclination to respond in detail to what the hon. the Minister has said. Let me, however, just make one or two things very clear. [Interjections.]

Order!

Firstly, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition never once alleged that the hon. the Minister was not a busy man. In fact, he acknowledged that the hon. the Minister and other hon. Ministers were very busy people. That he actually stated. So that is not at issue. What is at issue is that the Opposition has to have an opportunity to try to respond to the developments that are taking place, not only inside South Africa, but also outside South Africa, in particular in respect of the burning issue of South West Africa/Namibia. What happened here was that the hon. member for Constantia spoke—I believe that any objective person in this House would acknowledge this—with responsibility, with moderation and with sensitivity about a situation which is very sensitive, i.e. South West Africa. As a result of having stated that, neither the hon. Leader of the Opposition nor our official spokesman was afforded an opportunity to meet the hon. the Minister to deal with this, gently as they can. But then the hon. the Minister comes along and, in a tremendous tirade, attacks the hon. member for Constantia and this party for daring to discuss this matter across the floor of the House. That was the only issue, and that is why the hon. the Leader of the Opposition quite rightly had to tell the hon. the Minister that no position, of anyone in this House, gives him the right to act like a raging bull. [Interjections.] And we have had enough bull today, Sir.

This brings me to the hon. the Minister’s statement that the Blacks have rejected the official Opposition. In the light of that, I should like him to tell us if the Blacks have accepted the policy of apartheid. We have 32 years history of rejection by the majority of the people in this country of the policies of the Government. It is not the party, my party, that is in power when people take to the streets, when there are boycotts of schools and when people die in the streets. It is that hon. Minister’s party. We are not prepared to lie about it. [Interjections.] No, Sir. On two occasions the hon. the Minister has refused to answer questions from this side. He merely kept on saying: “Later, later”, like the hon. the Minister of Finance who said: “We give now and you will pay later.”

[Inaudible.]

The hon. the Minister must accept the fact that his Government is in power now and that this country is the country to which the hon. the Prime Minister referred when he said “Adapt or die”. If everything is so good, why is everything so bad? That is what I should like to know. The hon. the Minister has just told us how marvellous everything is; yet the hon. the Prime Minister has told us that we are in trouble unless we resolve the internal disputes in our country. Sir, we will continue to charge the Government until that dispute is resolved.

Sir, I should, however, like to discuss the budget, not the long tirade we heard here from the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs. The hon. member for Sandton will be taking part in this debate and if he wishes to respond to the hon. the Minister he can do so.

Do you agree with the letter?

He can do so in his own time. I should like to say just one thing on a matter of principle, and that is that we in these benches do not believe in telling one story to South Africa and another story to people outside our country. We will say what we believe is true, here and everywhere . . .

Do you stand by the hon. member for Sandton?

… and if hon. members do not like that . . .

Order! The hon. member for Pretoria Central must stop making interjections now.

The last point I should like to make on this principle in response to the hon. the Minister is that I believe—and I am choosing my words—that the ambassador to Washington who wrote what we are told was an unsolicited letter, should be reprimanded by the hon. the Minister and not praised. If he had anything at all to say about what the hon. member for Sandton had written to the New York Times, it was his duty to write to the hon. member. As far as I know, the hon. member for Sandton has received no correspondence whatsoever from the ambassador in Washington.

Did the hon. member for Sandton write to me before he wrote to the New York Times?

Not at all. We would never ask permission from the hon. the Minister. We write any letters we like, and we shall continue to do so. [Interjections.] For that ambassador to call into question the patriotic loyalty of the hon. member for Sandton is damned impertinence. It is a disgrace. [Interjections.]

Order!

It is not the ambassador’s duty. Sir, I suppose if I called the hon. the Minister a “damn fool”, you would rule me out of order. Therefore I will not do so.

I should like to come back to this debate . . .

Order! The hon. member must withdraw the whole sentence.

The whole sentence? Which sentence, Sir? [Interjections.]

Order! I ruled that the hon. member must withdraw the sentence starting with the words “I suppose”. He knows what he said.

I shall withdraw the sentence, Sir. But if I withdraw it, it means that the hon. the Minister is a damn fool.

Order! The hon. member is now trifling with the Chair.

I will not do that, Sir. I withdraw the sentence unconditionally.

I should like to address a few remarks to the hon. the Minister of Finance. In the first place, the hon. the Minister, not surprisingly, identified inflation as the most vexing problem facing the South African economy. He also stressed that one of the surest ways of combating inflation was to increase the nation’s productivity significantly. We have no quarrel with that.

I want to stress that there is a direct link between productivity and education and access to education. An investment in education clearly leads to higher real economic growth and higher average real wages. For a long time now the writing has been on the wall that the Government has over many years sorely neglected the total educational needs of South Africa.

The Government is so blind in its paranoia with regard to opposition—it cannot seem to understand that there is a need for opposition in South Africa—that it mistakes the clear message on the wall for some graffiti scrawled by the PFP and others. The harsh fact—and I should like the hon. the Minister to respond to this—is that the real expenditure on education showed an increase of only 28% during the 1970’s whereas the number of pupils increased by 51% during the same period. The only conclusion one can draw is that real expenditure per pupil declined considerably. Expenditure on education, as a percentage of the total budget, declined from 19% to about 15%. I want to warn the hon. the Minister and the Government that a nation that neglects the education of today’s child has already betrayed the citizens of tomorrow.

It is fashionable to talk of a shortage of skilled manpower, but it is an uncomfortable truth that for years the Opposition has warned the Government that the only potential source of skilled manpower outside the White skills is not only domestic, i.e. not from overseas, but is also Black. The tragedy is that the educational level of the majority of Blacks is insufficient to support skilled work, and the neglect of basic education is one of the prime causes of this shortage. Despite the improvement of the teacher to pupil ratio among Blacks, this ratio is still far too high for a modern country with incredible resources. It was 48:1 in 1979 in comparison with 20:1 in the case of Whites, 29:1 in the case of Coloureds and 26:1 in the case of Asians. In 1978 80% of all Black teachers possessed only a Junior Certificate or lower school qualifications. Only 2,4% of Black teachers were graduates. Among White teachers there is undeniably a serious deterioration in the qualifications of teachers, particularly in the sciences. An alarmingly large number of teachers are not adequately qualified for our own time and needs.

I want to say to the Government that we have witnessed a serious under-investment in education as a process of human capital formation, and that this has led to a critical undersupply of skilled manpower from domestic sources and inflation of the real cost of skilled manpower.

Does the education expenditure you refer to include salaries?

Yes, that is right. Those are the figures I quoted. In fact, I want to deal further with that now. It cannot be disputed that an inadequate educational foundation influences not only the trainability of people but also the cost to train them, their productivity and their earning power.

In the mini-budget the hon. the Minister has announced what he regards as substantial increases for teachers. The salaries of White teachers, as deflated by the consumer price index, increased at an average rate of about 5% per annum during the period 1960-1973, but after 1973 teachers’ salaries declined at the rate of 4,2% per annum until 1979, the result of which was to leave the average teacher of 1979 with less purchasing power than a colleague of more than a decade ago. Is it then any wonder that there has been an enormous outcry by the teachers? Even an increase of 20% on average will not take teachers back to what they were earning in 1973 in real terms.

This increase, I submit, merely keeps pace with the ravages of the 1980 inflation figure. No wonder teachers are furious, demoralized and demotivated. No wonder recruitment has suffered in recent months and resignations increased. It would appear that it is only the Government who could not see the writing on the wall. Now, in what I can only describe as a transparent election gimmick, it offers the teachers a belated increase. The Government will discover that it cannot play fast and loose with the teaching profession. As far as the teachers are concerned they do not accept—already these statements are coming through—that even this proposal is going to meet their needs. If we continue to rail against inflation, identify that as a major problem, and even suggest as a cure increased productivity without realizing that a sound investment in education from the basic level right through is necessary, we shall not get the productivity. Therefore the proposal and the answer to the problem of inflation which the hon. the Minister of Finance is proposing is simply not available to South Africa at this moment in time. The problem is that we have not invested in education. If one looks where the major source of the future skills must lie in South Africa, we see, and I am sure we do not quarrel on this one, that, what I would call the Black reservoir of potential skill, is excluded entirely, and even though one sees that we are moving towards parity with regard to Coloured, White and Asian teachers in certain categories, Black teachers are excluded entirely. How on earth are we going to build a future in South Africa in five, 10 or 20 years’ time when we shall not be able to increase productivity because of a lack of sound investment in education? No, I believe that the teachers of South Africa, whether they are White or Black, believe that this hon. Minister should be put in the corner with a dunce cap on his head, because he has failed to understand the critical message of our time, i.e. that one dare not and cannot neglect the education of the future of South Africa.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Pinelands, to whom we have just been listening, is one of the real leaders of the official Opposition. He is the person who once said of Nelson Mandela that he was one of the most significant leaders in South Africa and that his presence at the negotiations on the future of the country was indispensable.

Does he still agree?

I shall come back to that party later in my argument, but at this stage I just wish to indicate how important the speeches are which that hon. member makes in this House. It is because he is actually one of the most important leaders in that party. However, he did not display great wisdom here today. Is he not aware of the enormous programme which the Government has initiated for Black education in this country? Is there a country in Africa which can equal this and can do what we are doing for Black education in this country, for the upliftment of the Black people in our efforts to equip the Black man with skills so that he can find a niche for himself in this country’s economy, so that he can help us to make this country a major and strong industrial country? All the hon. member need do is to undertake a little research and he will find all these things.

I want to come now to the hon. member for Yeoville, who said a great many absurd things in this debate yesterday. He said here that the hon. the Minister was underestimating the intelligence of the people.

That is right.

I want to tell that hon. member that it is in fact they who have always underestimated the intelligence of the people. That is why they are sitting where they are sitting. After the election they will still be sitting there, perhaps with even fewer members than they now have, precisely because they underestimate the intelligence of the people. It is because they underestimate the intelligence of the people that they experienced such a utter fiasco in Simonstown. In their ranks they must be careful of Harry the prophet. After each of his prophesies they were worse off than before. To continue now in biblical terms, they will find that they have a false prophet in their midst. The best thing the hon. member for Yeoville ever achieved in his party was to drive the hon. member for Orange Grove to Durban. The hon. member for Yeoville tried to imply that the Government was buying votes. He said in this House yesterday that the Government was buying votes by means of the concessions which were being made. I wish to put it to him that it is not true. The NP need not buy votes. The people of South Africa vote for the NP because the principles and the course adopted by the NP are sound. That is why the people have for 33 years placed their confidence overwhelmingly in this Government. Now the hon. member for Yeoville is alleging that the Government’s slogan for the election ought to be: “Vote now, pay later.”

It is true, is it not?

It is because it is so true that you find it so uncomfortable.

The voters’ slogan for the PFP is: “Vote for the Progs and South Africa will pay the price.” There is a very funny thing happening in this House.

Yes, it is the speech you are making.

The Opposition, which is always so full of bravado, suddenly has an opportunity of lifting the Government from the cushions. However, we hear no festive sounds of rejoicing from their side. All we hear is a dirge. The announcement of the election struck the Opposition like a bomb. It reminded of what the hon. leader of the NRP said on some previous occasion: “The Prime Minister caught us with our pants down.” [Interjections.]

Where did I say that?

It was on one occasion in Pretoria. [Interjections.] Instead of rejoicing at the opportunity of dealing with the NP at the polls, they are now in sackcloth and ashes. They remind me of the fox terrier who chased after the wagon every day, and the day he caught the wagon, did not know what to do with it. Believe me, the Opposition does not know what to do with the forthcoming election. They do not want the election, because they know that they will not be able to show any progress. On the contrary, their position could become even weaker. [Interjections.]

Sitting in this House are three political parties for which the electorate can vote. The crucial question which every voter has to ask himself is to which one he should entrust his future, to which one he should entrust the future of South Africa.

Let us begin with the NRP. They are the scant remains of the once mighty SAP United Party. The NRP is the most harmless of all the Opposition parties. However, it is also a party which has become completely irrelevant in our politics. [Interjections.] The NRP has existed four years, and in these four years they have still not shown any new approach to the political problems of South Africa. They are totally irrelevant. I see that the NRP is going to put up a candidate to oppose me in the Bloemfontein North constituency. [Interjections.] They were very quick to get a lead on the PFP, after they had thrown in the towel in the 1977 election in Bloemfontein North. The hon. the leader of the NRP will remember that. [Interjections.] The NRP is welcome in my constituency. I wish to point out to them, however, that they will have to beat the tambourins to bring life into the skeletons there. A staunch, dyed-in-the-wool UP supporter told me the other day: “I do not know this party, the NRP. I shall prefer to sit on General Smuts’s coffin and weep.”

The dynamism of the Nationalist Party!

Mr. Speaker, I shall not be put off by the hon. member for Yeoville. We have in this House an official Opposition for which there will also be little pleasure in this election. The only pleasure for them in this election is that it will cause the smouldering tribal fight between their left and right wings to abate a little. The game which the official Opposition is playing is just like that of the Herstigtes—they are playing with fire. I wish to accuse the PFP and the Herstigtes in the same breath of creating an unhealthy climate of extremism and radicalism in this country.

Mr. Japie Basson, who helped to establish the PFP and who until very recently, only last session in fact, was still sitting among them, has damning things to say about them. I wish to quote to this House what he wrote about them in January in a publication called Eastern Echo. He said—

Here we have a damning statement from a person who until recently was seated in their midst, a statement indicating that they were heading for Black domination; they were heading for a Nelson Mandela take-over in this country and were at that early stage already accepting that this would be the case. For this reason the voters will deal with that party on 29 April, and just as the voters rejected the Herstigtes, with their unrealistic “baasskap” dream of blatant White domination and failure to recognize the rights of other ethnic groups, so, too, they will reject the PFP. What the Herstigtes had in mind was the perfect recipe for a pressure pot explosion in this country. If the HNP were to succeed, South Africa’s destiny is one of revolution, violence and bloodshed. I wish to ask the voters to reject radicalism and extremism on 29 April and to give the NP a mandate to work out internally, in an orderly and evolutionary way, a peaceful future for all the people of our country. I wish to ask the voters to support the dynamic leadership of our esteemed Prime Minister in this connection, so that he can succeed in leading South Africa into the future with courage and faith.

Mr. Speaker, in the few minutes remaining to me, I should like to deal with a local matter in my constituency. [Interjections.] Hon. members may laugh if they wish; we have little time. We have to do it. I should like to discuss the plight of the aged in my constituency. I wish to tell you that there is profound unrest and concern among the elderly people in my constituency because flat rentals have soared during the past year. These people are literally being ousted from their homes, without having anywhere else to go. I wish to thank the hon. the Minister for what he has already done to obviate the problem. Our senior citizens, men and women, are the aristocracy of our nation. These are fine people—proud, independent people. They are the people who helped to build this country. But now that they are old and economically inactive, they are trapped in a cruel situation. They cannot afford to remain on in the flats in which they have been living for years because those flats have become too expensive for them, but there is no other place for them to go.

Yes, that is true.

I am pleased the hon. member agrees with me. Ours is an honest party which speaks frankly about such things.

That is the price for a NP Government. [Interjections.]

Institutions for the aged in Bloemfontein are full and all of them have waiting lists, some up to five years. A random survey carried out in my constituency showed that many elderly persons find themselves in dire straits. I wish to point out a few examples. One pensioner has an income of R105 per month, but pays R76 for his flat. He therefore has only R29 per month left for food and clothing. Another pensioner has a monthly income of R192 and pays R140 per month in rental. There are some of these people who are in difficult circumstances. One’s heart bleeds for them. The cruellest of all is that they cannot complain about the high rentals for then they run the risk of being evicted from their homes. In our Christian community these people have a claim to our love, care and an open hand for them. We owe it to them.

I ask the hon. the Minister for a thorough investigation to be instituted without delay into this situation which presents itself particularly in my constituency, and also in the rest of Bloemfontein. I think this is also the case in other parts of the country.

Everywhere in South Africa.

Where possible, these people should be provided with economic housing. Welfare organizations could also help to establish old-age homes for these people so that they can spend their remaining years in peace.

Mr. Speaker, I should like to congratulate the hon. member for Bloemfontein North on his speaking on behalf of his constituency and his constituents and making a plea on their behalf for the first time since he became a member of this House. This was the effect of the announcement that the NRP would oppose him in his constituency during the election. The last time he was opposed only by a Prog who received half of our votes, but this time he will get to know what fighting an election means.

†For the rest the contribution of that hon. member as the chief information officer of his party showed a tremendous lack of information.

I want, however, to return to the mini budget. One of the things which this mini budget does not disclose is what the expected surplus is going to be when the year end comes. This, of course, we shall not hear. We shall hear the globular amounts, the vast amounts which have been voted for this and that and the other. Those amounts will be held up in isolation as a record—the most money ever spent in the form of increases in the salaries of public servants etc. What we are not told, however, is that at the same time it will be a record—this is equally true and I challenge the hon. the Minister to deny it—surplus in the history of the country. He is sitting there with the money and when he talks of records, he must talk of the record income he has had, the money he has available to spend. I want to tell the hon. the Minister, his party and his sycophantic Press which has splashed the tremendous increases that what counts ultimately is what one takes home in one’s pay-packet. The salary increases may sound like vote-catching, but when the deductions have been made and the public servants themselves find that they are in a higher income tax group, when they have to pay higher deductions for pensions and for other benefits, it is what is left that matters. The last time there were actual examples that pay increases meant less money in the envelope that the man took home. Fortunately, 1 April falls before the election and people will be able to work out for themselves what is in the envelope and how much has been taken by the hon. the Minister in extra taxation. They will also be able to work out how much has been deducted in respect of increased pension contributions, etc.

What extra taxation?

Because they are in a higher income bracket. What matters is the final or net amount a man takes home, and then one has to compare that with the rate of inflation. We now have a magnificent 12% increase, a tremendous increase, but on the other hand there is a 16% inflation rate. To start with, the Public Service will already be 16% behind when they start the year. Now they will be getting an increase of 12%. That puts them 4% behind. By the end of next year they will again be 20% behind.

People will not be bluffed again with figures and statistics. They have learnt their lesson. It is as expected. Everybody thought that the Government would hand out money as a bribe for a blank cheque to do as the Government wants with the future of South Africa—and to fight the total onslaught.

There have been elections before. There was an election in 1977 when this Government received a mandate to “fight the world” and a mandate for a draft constitution. That was three years ago. Now let us look at those two mandates. The first one, a mandate for a draft constitution, has landed in the rubbish-bin. It is in the discard box and the Government has gone back to the drawing board through the President’s Council.

And they still do not know what to do.

The Government has gone back to the drawing board to look afresh for a new constitution. So much for that mandate.

And you agreed with that.

Yes, because that draft constitution was totally hopeless, so useless that we would never have been able to achieve anything with it, and only when we came forward with new proposals was any direction indicated in the search for a new constitutional dispensation.

†But let us look at the other mandate, the mandate to fight the world. At this moment in time, with a new Government in power in Britain and also in America, I suggest to the hon. the Prime Minister that for South Africa this is the worst possible time to go out and fight the world. It is the worst possible time for a back-into-the-laager, apartheid-lives-again form of election. It is the finest recipe for destroying the goodwill which is growing towards South Africa as expressed, for instance, by the American Government only today. But by the end of an apartheid-lives-again election, let-us-get-back-into-the-laager, backs-to-the-wall, total onslaught election, that goodwill will have disappeared like the morning mist. What then are we going to vote for in this election? Of course there is a Marxist onslaught, a total onslaught. Everybody is agreed on that. What is more, it is not new. The hon. the Prime Minister has been saying for years, and we have all agreed with him, that there is a total onslaught against South Africa. He started saying this back in the days of Oudtshoorn by-elections and he has continued to say it while he was Minister of Defence. He has used different words and phrases but the attack against South Africa has been the basic approach he has adopted. Throughout it has been a question of the threat to South Africa, the danger, the total onslaught. We all agree about that, so what are we arguing about? There is no argument because I agree with the hon. the Prime Minister. I also agree with him that we must fight back with total resistance in South Africa. So who is arguing about that? There is no argument about it. We do not need elections to confirm the obvious. It is true that there is a discordant note and I am going to refer to it. The only discordant note came from the PFP. A resolution moved at its Transvaal Congress by the hon. member for Yeoville flatly condemned terrorist violence, but that party’s congress refused to pass it as it stood. It amended the resolution to condemn all forms of violence, including institutional violence. In fact, it was not prepared flatly to condemn terrorist violence. Now we have seen the fruits of that. The party’s members are resigning because it is moving to the right! Because it supported the defence of South Africa, its members opt to get out. So as I say, there is that one discordant note.

South Africa is entitled to know what the total strategy really means and also what the meaning is of the 12-point plan, on the strength of which the Government is going to the country. There is one safe bet, if anyone wants to take it, and that is that South Africa will not be told before the election. When the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Information and the hon. the Minister of State Administration fight shoulder to shoulder on the same platform, for the same strategy, for the same 12-point plan, there is something very fishy in the State of Denmark. [Interjections.] Because I regard them both as honest, what I become suspicious about is the honesty of the plan which they are both able to support. There is an old song—I shall not try to sing it—which asks: Where have all the young men gone?

To the NP.

Where are all the young knights in shining armour who were going to change the NP from within? Where are all those who joined the NP to change it from within?

Where is the ladies’ hairdresser?

Let me tell hon. members where they are. They are all back in the laager. One only has to ask the retiring hon. member for Pinetown why he is retiring? They went in with dreams of changing the NP but now they have the choice either of going back into the laager or of being left out in the cold, cold snow.

Party unity.

There is, however, another difference between the last election and this one. Only after the 1977 election did the real reason for the election come to the fore, and that was the Information scandal that was covered up. This time the reasons are beginning to appear already. Only last week we read that on one day 55 Greytown Nats quit the party. On the same day it was stated that 32 Nats had quit in an election row in Uitenhage. Now we are beginning to see what this election is all about.

Did they join you?

That, however, is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what is happening to the Government. Let me say that they did not join us because they do not think our way. That is the pity of it as far as South Africa is concerned because the hon. the Prime Minister had a golden opportunity to consolidate the moderates of South Africa behind a new deal for this country.

We are doing so every day.

He threw that opportunity overboard, however, and instead put the interests of his own political party before the interests of South Africa. I want to forecast now that this election will solve nothing. He will come back with the same mixture as before.

Why do you not unite them?

That is what we are busy doing. [Interjections.] All we have, however, is the squandering of millions of rand of taxpayers’ money, a Government that is stalling and further, nothing. The hon. the Prime Minister will have to go back to the people because he will solve nothing with this election. Now the hon. the Prime Minister has asked why we do not unite the people. The official Opposition has made it clear that they cannot grow; that it does not have a single seat in the Transvaal which it expects to win except for those it holds at the moment. Therefore the official Opposition has to export its surplus MP to Natal and sacrifice him on a wasted effort—a lost cause.

How many MPs do you have in the Transvaal?

The official Opposition has no surplus seat it can win in Cape Town and, because there is a surplus MP there, it has to fight a nomination contest. The Opposition can come and waste its efforts in Natal if they wish to do so. The official Opposition cannot grow and that places a heavy responsibility on the NRP, the responsibility to keep opposition alive in South Africa. The NRP controls the only arm of government in South Africa that is not controlled by the NP. [Interjections.]

Order!

The NRP is the one and only bulwark between this country and a one-party State at all levels of secondary and primary government. We are the one stumbling-block in South Africa to a one-party government. Therefore our duty and our objective in this election is to expand our base to offer a real and acceptable choice to the people of South Africa. The NRP is the only party that can win seats back from the Government and that is the reason why the hon. member for Klip River became so hysterical last night. Instead of indulging in cheap politicking, the hon. member would have been better employed if he had followed his former leader, Mr. Henry Torlage, to where he really belongs.

Do you stand by Warwick Webber?

I remember the adoration with which he used to gaze with puppy love eyes at his hero, Dr. Albert Hertzog, until the moment of truth arrived. I remember the hon. member’s tremendous keenness to be a member of the little group that used to surround Dr. Hertzog at all times wherever he went.

Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. member a question?

No, the hon. member would not answer my questions. [Interjections.]

What did you tell me in Dundee some years ago?

Order!

The real reason why the NP is so desperate, is that the success of the Natal Provincial Administration in creating inter-racial co-operation and understanding is the one thing that proves and demonstrates the fact that our policy can and does work. It is visible, tangible evidence of the failure of this Government to create interracial harmony and of the success that can be achieved when it is handled by a NRP administration in Natal.

Why are you getting so cross?

And Natal having reached an agreement between the Whites, the Coloureds and the Indians, the Government of the hon. the Minister who has just interjected vetoed the agreement and did not allow us to go ahead with it. They are afraid that we will show up the emptiness and the failures of their policy even more.

I want to tell the hon. member for Klip River that the NRP’s attitude towards this election is on public record. We will fight the election in our own right, under our own identity, with our own philosophy and our own policy. I repeat that at the same time we are not fighting to win. [Interjections.] We are fighting to win, but not as spoilers. [Interjections.] I will repeat it both ways. We are not fighting to win as spoilers; we are fighting to win.

As losers! [Interjections.]

Order!

The leader of Natal made an offer to the official Opposition to test their sincerity. That offer was rejected. I want to say that, despite their attitude, I have asked the leaders of the NRP in all the provinces . . .

You can go on your knees and thank us for our attitude.

… to look carefully at all marginal seats and not to fight simply as spoilers, simply as wreckers, simply out of spite, but to fight in seats where we can win. We will use our own discretion, and the electorate will have to be the judge, as they will judge the official Opposition for contesting seats like Queenstown and King William’s Town where they can only lose their deposits and which they are contesting simply out of spite or as wreckers.

I want to turn to the issues before the electorate. The primary challenge to South Africa is security—real security, not back-to-the-wall security. I agree with the hon. the Minister of Defence—and I want to congratulate him on his maiden speech—that we have a military deterrent, and a jolly good one. We are proud of it. However, I know that he will agree with me that in the end real security will not come only from the barrels of guns in the hands of our sons defending ever longer borders, longer because they are made so by the Government deliberately carving up our country. Real security can only come through all our peoples wanting to fight for, and not against, a way of life because they all want to defend and preserve it.

For this South Africa needs a new blueprint for the future, which plans for: Community self-government and local option; a corporate federation of White, Coloured, Asian and non-homeland Blacks; a proper confederation linking this to the self-governing homelands and others who may want to join; a commitment to a private enterprise economy and respect for human dignity and rights, for a free society under the protection of independent courts. All this and more stands on record. What is more, we are going into this election without any hang-ups. We are not shackled by outmoded policies that have failed like the NP Government is. We are not grovelling in shame and penance for the Whites’ wrongs of the past. We are not trying to atone for the misdeeds of history. But we are dedicated to building what is right for today and for tomorrow. In fighting for the needs of people, we are not ashamed to fight as well for the interests of White voters in the same way as leaders of other communities fight for the interest of their communities. What matters is that, in the way one fights when fighting for the interests of one group, one does not deny or try to limit in any way the equal rights and needs of any other community, its God-given right to enjoy the rich fruits of South Africa’s potential. We must not claim for ourselves what we deny or refuse to others. That is why we are going to go on fighting for people and their problems.

Government is not only about race, politics and constitutions. It should also be service to people, caring about their hardships, their welfare and their needs. South Africa’s strongest weapon against Marxism is higher standards of living for all. When history records the sins of this Government, surely its greatest sin will be that it has not promoted the private enterprise system as the counter to Marxism and African socialism. There should be no poverty in this rich land of ours.

Let me give some examples. The cost of living can be checked. People can have red meat on their tables while the farmers still make a decent living. Petrol can be sold at under 40c per litre and it can be sold over week-ends. Of the price of petrol, 29c per litre goes to the Government. One could have better and cheaper transport if it were not for the dilly-dallying over the years. There need be no fear of illness with a new approach to medical security. But then one needs a Government that cares. Only then do these things become possible. Having a home of one’s own does not have to be a dream. There could be tax-free bond repayments to assist one to own one’s own home. The Government has a responsibility to assist people against the crippling increase in rents. Private enterprise cannot subsidize the needy for ever but neither should it be allowed to exploit them. We should not have had debacles like the Sectional Titles Amendment Bill.

Now we get belated relief for those who serve South Africa, those who teach our children, who nurse us, who protect us from crime and who work in every field of public service. But this relief is, in its very extent, evidence of the Government’s contemptuous neglect over the years and it has only been the dedication of these people that has kept them going and enabled them to make the sacrifices they have made. I say to the hon. the Minister of Defence that those who defend our borders deserve to be credited with 90 days in respect of their commitment for every 90 days they spend on the border, not 30 days. I say to the hon. the Minister of Defence that those who defend our borders deserve to get their pay when it is due and not months and months afterwards. Those who serve on the borders deserve equal pay for every human life. The Government should be able to give transport concessions and make rail or air or other transport arrangements to enable boys to get home for long week-ends and short leave when they do not get official free transport. These are things that should be done, things that are deserved and that are possible. Who is talking about them in the Government ranks? “Tjoepstil!” Zip! What about our senior citizens with this magnificent increase of R13 per month, R13 against an inflation rate of 16%. How are they going to meet the shortfall? They have no cushion to fall back on, no annual increment in pay. They have nothing except what the Government gives them and this means that they can only meet their commitments by eating less or by buying no more clothes.

What about the bonus?

Yes, I shall come to the bonus. When we interjected: Why October?, the hon. the Minister asked if we wanted it twice a year.

And you said four times.

I say to him: Yes, twice a year and four times a year because the pensions on which people are expected to live are a disgrace. They are an absolute disgrace. In a country as rich as ours with its coffers overflowing with money all the hon. the Minister gives them is an extra measly R5 a month, R5 a month which does not even cover a quarter of the rent increases alone over the six months, let alone the cost of food which has gone up by between 26% and 30%. Yet the hon. the Minister brags about R5 a month. He knows what it costs to eat, or he should know, and he expects people to live on R127 a month, including the increase. I say it is a disgrace.

How much should it be?

Our senior citizens are entitled to enjoy a decent standard of living and quality of life.

How much?

I would say that we should give them a minimum of R200 per month, and South Africa can afford it. These are the people who have served South Africa. If we were the Government there would be a contributory pension scheme with no means test, with no limitation, because that is what is needed. It would be a scheme which would give protection to everyone when the time came to enjoy their old age. They would be able to enjoy it as a right and not as charity dished out by the Government. One cannot eat statistics and averages. One cannot take an average and say that it applies to old-age pensioners. The hon. the Minister should know it does not. Their basic costs are rent and food, plus transport to get to hospitals for treatment.

One can go on in this way. One thinks about agriculture. What about the abandoned border farms that are a terrorist’s dream and that hon. Minister’s nightmare? The farmers have been neglected because of the lack of long-term planning. Nationalist policy seems to be to price the consumer out of the market and the farmer off the land.

No, Vause, that is going too far.

The time has come for the Government to return to the people, the Government of the people, for the people and by the people, not by political bosses, not by a political machine obsessed with power but by a government dedicated to serving people. South Africa needs a new vision, a new blueprint for real security, the blueprint of this party, the NRP, with its instruments for restoring mutual trust in human relations, a party determined to eradicate poverty and want and to create a common dedication to a common destiny among all the peoples of this country.

I conclude by saying we need less government not more authoritarianism. Our ancestors came here in order to be free. They gave their lifeblood to be free. Let this be the spirit of the new republic which is coming: Freedom from fear; freedom from foreign interference; freedom from poverty; freedom from violence and conflict— marching together to meet a new dawn of hope in the new republic for which this party will fight in this election and in the years thereafter.

Mr. Speaker, it is not yet clear to me whether the hon. member for Durban Point is going to enter the coming election with a view to winning or to losing. He was not very clear on that point. [Interjections.]

To win, not to spoil.

In other words, to win by losing. [Interjections.]

In the beginning of his speech the hon. member for Durban Point had me very worried. I thought he had begun in a most despirited manner, and I said to myself that the burden of this election was weighing down very heavily on his ample shoulders. I am delighted to observe that the hon. member did gain some momentum during the course of his speech, until, eventually, something of the old ebullient bonhomie that has endeared him to us so much over the years, was evident again. The hon. member is always at his best when making his most grandiose claims. [Interjections.] He claimed that the one bulwark against a one-party Government in South Africa was the NRP.

The only other arm of central or provincial government which is acceptable. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, I am sure that that view is not shared by all the members of the NRP, particularly not by the leader of the NRP in Natal, Mr. Warwick Webber. [Interjections.] The hon. member for Klip River referred to a statement by Mr. Warwick Webber in The Natal Mercury a couple of days ago. He quoted certain paragraphs from that statement in The Natal Mercury of 10 February, in which the leader of the NRP in Natal intimated that he was receiving his instructions from Inkatha.

Oh, what a lot of tripe.

Oh yes.

That is utter nonsense.

Of course he intimated that. He said so very clearly.

[Inaudible.]

I shall read it to the hon. member for Umhlanga—

Inkatha is telling the NRP where to fight and against whom to fight, and also with whom it should come to an agreement.

How silly can you get?

Of course, Inkatha is giving the NRP instructions. I am not going to refer now to these instructions, however. I want to point out the real gem in this statement by Mr. Warwick Webber. Mr. Webber mentioned several reasons why there should be an agreement between the NRP and the PFP and then has this remarkable observation to make—

What a contrast to the optimism expressed by the hon. leader of the NRP in this House today!

We have a voice indeed, a very strong voice here. [Interjections.]

He said the NRP should have a voice. What a despondent, gloomy, defeatist attitude! It is not the rank and file of the NRP saying this. They said that long ago. This is the leader of the NRP in Natal saying the NRP should have a voice in Parliament. Or is it that the Natal leader, Mr. Warwick Webber, in contrast to his leader, the hon. member for Durban Point, has seen the writing on the wall? This is the leader of a party saying: “Ye who enter into this election, abandon all hope.” [Interjections.] The thin voice that they still have in Parliament will soon be silenced, according to Mr. Warwick Webber. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, I want to deal with the speech made by the chief lieutenant of the hon. member for Durban Point, the hon. member for Durban Central whom I do not see in his seat.

He is in Durban.

Oh, he is electioneering in Durban.

He is busy digging your grave!

I sincerely trust that the hon. member will be back in time to reply to what I am about to say to him now. If he does not have the opportunity during this debate, he will have an opportunity during the Third Reading debate to do so and I sincerely trust that he will avail himself of the opportunity to do so.

Did you ask him to be here? Did you display the courtesy to ask him? No!

Mr. Speaker, I am asking him courteously to be here to reply to me during the Third Reading debate. This is what the hon. member for Durban Central had to say during the no-confidence debate. He said—

Not, of course, a very elegant word “double-crossed”; it is not true either—

The hon. member for Durban Point says that the sectional titles scheme is a debacle and should never have been placed on the Statute Book.

The amendment was a debacle.

The hon. member for Durban Central went on to say—

Mr. Speaker, I submit that the hon. member for Durban Central did not present one iota of evidence to substantiate this sweeping statement. I say it is unwarranted, it is untrue and it is damaging to the good name of South Africa.

The evidence was by virtue of the Bill that was introduced. You produced the evidence; he did not have to.

I am not referring to the Bill. I am referring to his speech in the no-confidence debate. He did not produce any evidence against the Bill either. I shall produce evidence and the hon. member can then refute that evidence during the Third Reading debate.

Mr. Speaker, I believe that in the field of housing we have a proud record that is second to none. We can hold our heads high in respect of what we have done for the people of South Africa of all races. The hon. member for Durban Central has singled out two categories of people whom, as he says, we have “double-crossed”—those who have purchased dwellings under the Sectional Titles Act and our senior citizens.

*I want to talk about sectional titles. After the hon. member for Durban Central delivered this speech, I had enquiries made at various Deeds Offices as to how many sectional titles had been registered since 1973. From 1973 until 31 January this year, 1 611 schemes were registered with 37 612 units. That 37 000 does not represent that number of flats that had been sold; there are many people who bought more than one flat and there have also been re-sales; however, it represents many thousands of sales over this period. I can just say in parentheses that I have always been under the impression that there was an explosion last year as a result of the tremendous publicity that was given to sectional titles in the Press last year. This was really not the case. In actual fact, last year there were almost a thousand registrations fewer than in 1979. Nevertheless, thousands of people were put in a position to procure their own dwelling. No matter what the hon. member for Durban Point may say, there is nothing wrong with sectional titles. What is in fact wrong, is that there are a few unscrupulous people who abused this and at the earliest opportunity this Government came to this House and blocked up those loopholes in the Sectional Titles Act.

And made a bigger mess of it than before.

Sir, it is not possible to establish how many of those 37 000 flats that were sold under sectional title . . .

Order! The hon. member for Yeoville must withdraw those words.

Which words, Sir?

That the Government made a bigger mess of the Sectional Titles Act than before. In terms of Standing Order No. 127 a member may not reflect upon any decision of this House.

I withdraw it, Sir.

The hon. the Deputy Minister may proceed.

I am sorry I did not hear that because I would have liked to react to it. Unfortunately I cannot do so now, because he has withdrawn it.

I say it is not possible to establish how these 37 000 plus flats are being occupied; it would be too difficult from an administrative point of view. Nevertheless, a random sample was taken in Pretoria and the figures in this regard are very informative. In the random sample, in which several hundreds of flats that were sold under the sectional title scheme were involved, it was discovered that 37% of them were purchased by the tenants. People who rented flats bought those same flats under sectional title and remained there. 44% of the flats were released for rental once again. This means that altogether 81% of the people who lived in the flats, were not disturbed; they remained in those flats—37% as owners and 44% as tenants. In 19% of the flats, people moved in from outside, from other flats or houses. Generally these were people who had bought flats under sectional title and settled there themselves. In actual fact this means that there was a mobility of 19% of the occupants of the flats. These were not people who were cast out as a result of this; after all, the 19% that came from other flats or houses left vacancies there that could be filled. The important fact is that 56% of sectional title holders have now had the opportunity of owning their own home.

†The benefits of sectional title, in spite of what the hon. member for Durban Point has said are most obvious, are in the first place that they expand the supply of affordable homes because the price and the deposits are generally comparatively lower. 37 000 new units have checked property prices. I think those prices have risen very steeply—too steeply, in fact—over the past year. Had those 37 000 units not come on the market, prices would have escalated even further. In the second place, owning a sectional title unit is often the only feasible way of acquiring a home in a highly desirable neighbourhood. In the third place, sectional title units fit today’s new and changing life style. In the fourth place, conversions forestalled the possibility of decay and the abandonment of rented housing. In the fifth place, conversions usually involve renovation and rehabilitation and so stimulate construction employment in the local economy and preserve past capital investments. In the sixth place, conversions help to stabilize neighbourhoods by reducing the mobility of occupants and increasing their commitments. In the seventh place, sectional title bodies corporate are emerging as a new and vital type of neighbourhood group, concerned not only with the property in question, but also with wider suburban interests. In the eighth place, through sectional title we are enabling these home-owners to build up an estate so that their children will not be so dependent upon State housing.

*The hon. member for Bloemfontein— unfortunately he is not here at the moment—spoke with a great deal of compassion about people who are finding it very difficult to afford the increased prices of flats. On the occasion of the opening of Parliament, the State President said that he would see to it that pensioners and lower income groups had security of tenure. I want to give the assurance that the Government will keep that promise in an irreproachable manner at all times. The declared policy of the Government is that it wants to phase out rent control. Sir, I do not think there is anyone in this House who does not realize that the market mechanism of supply and demand is much more effective than rent control. But then there must always be the one important proviso. Supply and demand must balance one another out, and I want to give the undertaking here on behalf of the hon. the Minister that until such time as supply and demand has been balanced against one another, the Government will not dream of phasing out rent control any further. In fact, Sir, I cannot foresee any chance of our continuing in terms of proposed legislation later this year to put the Government in a position to phase out rent control by proclamation. This will be kept for later, later when supply and demand have been brought into line with one another.

The hon. members opposite spoke about the widows and orphans who have been subjected to privation as a result of the phasing out of rent control. Sir, the only privation which there really was, was the 10% increase, and a request was made to the public representatives, to the entire public, to bring any cases of abuse to the attention of the Government. Then the Government can take action and impose rent control once again. Thus far it has not been necessary.

But the rents board has already increased rental by 50%.

Sir, I saw those fixed rentals and I think the hon. member must substantiate this. And then the hon. member for Durban Central said that we have cheated the elderly. I have figures here that show that 445 old-age homes have been built in this country since 1936 at a total cost of R149 million. Over the past five years, 271 old-age homes have been built at a cost of R132 million. In other words, over a period of 39 years 174 old-age homes have been built at a cost of R17 million at an average of 4 old-age homes per annum, whilst this Government, which was ostensibly “double-crossing” our aged, has built 274 old-age homes in five years at a cost of R132 million. This is an average of 54 old-age homes per annum. In the space of five years we have therefore spent eight times as much as in the previous 39 years.

†Then the hon. member has the audacity to come here and say we are double-crossing the senior citizens of this country.

The value of money has gone down by one-third since the last election.

But Sir, I am talking about numbers. The hon. member must work out for himself that 274 old age homes at R132 million is almost R500 000 per old age home. These are decent old age homes that we are providing.

What was the value of the rand when you came into power and what is the value of the rand now?

It is statements like these by hon. members that cause the NRP to be completely discredited and the hon. member for Durban Point to go whistling in the dark when he says that they are going to be stronger when they return after this election.

Mr. Speaker, may I be so presumptions as to advise the new hon. Deputy Minister that he should not, even at election time, try to defend the indefensible?

Hear, hear!

He should be like his Minister who said that the Government was wrong and the Opposition was right.

He did not say that.

The hon. the Minister of Community Development did say that. The Government’s action in introducing in this House, last year, an amendment to the Sectional Titles Act, was an action of cynical desertion of the older and less affluent tenants in South Africa.

Has one single person been evicted as a result of that?

The Government reneged on its undertaking, repeatedly given to those people. The Government introduced a Bill in this House which was designed to evict old and less affluent people. The others were, in any case, going to be phased out with rent control in May of this year. The only people who would have been left protected would have been the aged and less affluent people who were deserving of protection under the Rent Control Act. The Government, however, introduced a Bill to see to it that those people were driven out of their flats.

Yes.

I say it was a cynical act, aimed as it was at the older people of South Africa. It was, in fact, an act by which the Government went back on its word, repeatedly given, that those people would be protected. So let us see the matter in perspective and let the hon. the Deputy Minister realize that when one is dealing with houses, with homes, one is not dealing with figures but with people. Let him therefore start talking in terms of people and not in terms of figures, or percentages.

Listening to the speeches of hon. members in this House during the past day or so, one has become aware of the correctness of the charge of the hon. member for Yeoville that this budget is an election budget designed to try to win votes for the Government. Instead of a wave of gratitude for the hand-outs of the hon. the Minister, let me tell the hon. the Minister of Finance that there is deep, deep cynicism among the people of South Africa. There is cynicism because of the fact that there is an election in the offing. They see a Government that has become so smug and self-satisfied that it has lost touch with the man in the street. The only time the Government appears to look after his financial interests is when there is an election in the offing.

Fat little pussy cat!

Let me put this to the hon. the Minister: There was an election 3½ years ago. Does he believe that the Whites of South Africa feel more secure than they did 3½ years ago?

Yes.

Do they really? Does he think that the Blacks, the Coloureds, the Whites and all the other South Africans feel that we are closer to the solution to our problems than we were 3½ years ago? [Interjections.] Of course not! Let me put a further aspect to the hon. the Minister. Does he feel that the aged and less affluent are finding it easier to pay their bills and maintain their standard of living than they did 3½ years ago? Does he believe that the family man is finding it easier to meet his financial commitments to his family than he did 3½ years ago? No, that is not the situation. Even in announcing the budget increases the hon. the Minister was deliberately vague as far as the increases were concerned. I believe that the tax-paying public, especially the various sectors of the Public Service, have a right to know exactly what the pay increases mean. They are entitled to see the schedules of the pay increases so that they can compare figures and see who is getting what and who is paying for what. The public of South Africa is getting tired of hearing the hon. the Minister mouthing platitudes about how bad inflation is but doing nothing effective to combat it. They are tired of hearing the hon. the Minister say how strong South Africa’s economy is when the man in the street knows that it is becoming increasingly more difficult for him to make ends meet. What must the old-age pensioners say, getting their 12% increase in October of this year, when there is a general inflation rate of 15,7%? What about the Black pensioner who is going to get R40 per month on 1 October? What about the retired people living on their incomes from their life’s savings? What do they feel when they know that the value of these savings is being eroded by close on 16% per annum? What about the ordinary South African of modest means, living in a flat, who sees rentals going up by 20%, 30%, 40% or 60% per year? What about the young married couple wanting to build a house and finding that building costs have risen by a staggering 30% in the past year with an indication that they are going to increase still further this year? What of the clerk, the artisan, the teacher, the policeman who wants to buy a house for his family, only to find that property prices have shot up by more than 50%? What about the husband and wife battling to make ends meet and then reading in the newspapers—in fact it was in the papers just the other day—that a chairman of a committee of the President’s Council is going to be paid an extra R600 per month in order to live in his own house? What do they think when they hear of the 12 new ministerial mansions that are going to be built on the Groote Schuur estate? If I have the time, I shall elaborate further on that later in my speech. They see these things as an example of ministerial and Cabinet extravagance at a time when the Government should be setting an example. They see this Cabinet as one with the slogan: “Hallo, Jack, I am all right.”

The hon. the Minister blames the problems of South Africa on the economic boom being experienced in South Africa. That is nonsense. The Government must accept full responsibility for the serious staff shortages in the Public Service and for the staggering rise in the cost of living in South Africa. These problems are the direct consequences of the Government’s inability to do effective forward planning. They should have been planning ahead for boom conditions instead of waiting for boom conditions to overtake them. This situation is also a direct consequence of the Government’s failure over the years to provide proper education and training facilities, of years and years of Government policy of job reservation, pay discrimination, education and training discrimination and employment discrimination. These policies have resulted in staff shortages in South Africa and price rises at a time when hundreds of thousands of our citizens remain untrained and unemployed or underemployed. It is not the Government that is paying the price today, but the pensioner and the family man. It is the ordinary average South African who is paying with his life’s savings and his hard-earned salary for the incompetence and short-sightedness of the Government and its policies.

During the debate on the Sectional Titles Amendment Bill the Opposition put the case of the pensioners and the less affluent people in our cities who are struggling to keep their heads above water in the face of the rising cost of living and the rising cost of accommodation. I want to repeat that this Government has left those people in the lurch. Instead of taking positive action to ensure that there was accommodation for those people at prices they could afford, the Government shrugs its shoulders and passes the buck to the private sector. I want to ask the Deputy Minister what the Government is doing to see to it that there is adequate accommodation at prices which the elderly and the less affluent can afford? But let us leave this sector of the South African population aside for the moment. What of the hundreds and thousands of middle and lower-income group South Africans who are struggling to maintain a decent standard of living for themselves and their families? Those are the people who fall just above the level of assistance under the Housing Act. What of the clerk, the teacher, the artisan or the family man earning R700 or R800 or perhaps R900 per month when he sees that building costs have increased by 30%, rentals by 30% to 60%, . . .

What about the thousand units we built in Pretoria?

. . . and property prices by 50% to 100%? How is someone like that to pay these new rentals? How can he afford to purchase or build a house? And if he cannot own a flat or a house, how will he be able to protect himself against the ravages of inflation and against further rent increases?

These problems are not confined to the White voter. Let me look at the situation which has developed in Mitchell’s Plain. Here the people not in a sub-economic but an economic housing scheme, in a homeownership scheme, are in a parlons financial position. The combined effect of rising prices of basic commodities, the cost and the disruption caused by removals under the Group Areas Act, the high cost of transport for people who are forced to live away from their places of work and the wages which still remain unreasonably low, is that more and more people who purchase their houses simply cannot afford to pay the monthly interest and redemption charges. The hon. the Minister probably has the figures. At the end of January these figures were staggering. I shall quote them to the House. 15 738 houses had been sold in Mitchell’s Plain and there were 6 403 cases of arrears in payments. Almost 41% of the people who own houses there are for financial reasons in arrear with their payments. The amount in arrears amounts to more than R1 045 000. This situation is symptomatic of the problem which has arisen amongst the ordinary South African who is struggling to remain a middle-class citizen of South Africa.

It is clear to us that the Government has no over-all strategy to meet the crisis that is developing in regard to housing. On the one hand this is a crisis of availability and on the other hand a crisis of affordability.

We ask the Government in specific terms what it is doing by way of tax incentives and depreciation allowances to bring the private sector into the house and flat building business once again. What is it doing to make it possible for the ordinary average citizen to own his own house? We believe there should be assisted loans for people who want to purchase houses or flats. We think the Government should start thinking of equity-linked loans in terms of which the Government can lend capital, or part of the capital, at no interest but share in the capital appreciation in due course. We believe it should think of tax deductions for mortgage interest repayments on houses for certain income categories. The Government must realize that home ownership is the single most important counter the family man has to rising costs and the erosion in the value of money. The Government must stop passing the buck or looking the other way. It must do something about this and it must do it soon.

I now want to raise a completely different subject. I raise it not because I have a personal or a religious interest in this matter, but because I have a sense of justice in regard to it. I refer to the question of religious priests, brothers and sisters, primarily of the Catholic Church, who are being denied either old-age pensions or disability pensions on the grounds that they have taken the vow of poverty. I believe this decision by the Cabinet is unfair, unreasonable and uncharitable. Whatever the history of this prohibition may be, I believe that this decision must be reviewed and rescinded right now. I have raised it with the department and I have raised it, by way of a question, with the hon. the Minister in the course of this debate. In terms of section 9(1) of the Social Pensions Act, 1973, we believe the Minister has the power of discretion in this matter. I believe that the hon. the Minister, if only out of a sense of Christian charity, should use his discretion to allow these people to draw pensions in exactly the same way as other people of the same age and in the same financial circumstances draw pensions. If it is said that the law needs to be changed, let the Minister come back to the House and change the law. Let me put it to you, Sir: A drunk, a hobo, a lay about or a ne’er-do-well can draw a pension at the age of 65, or in the case of women at the age of 60, but a person who has spent his or her life serving the community, helping the poor, teaching in the schools, nursing in hospitals and clinics and assisting society and the community at no cost to the State cannot draw any old-age pension. Even if such a person is physically disabled, he or she is not entitled to a disability pension.

The argument raised is that these people share their earnings with other people. Yes, they do share their earnings with other people in their society or order, but should those who have worked all their lives for no personal reward suffer the indignity of having to fall back on others when they are old or ill and unable to contribute to their own upkeep or to fend for themselves? In fact, is it not so that there are many other elderly citizens in South Africa today accommodated in homes for the aged on the basis of them sharing their income, or a large part of their income, with the others in that home in order to make that home economically viable? Is that not happening in any case? Surely the State has the same responsibility towards these people who have served the community as long and as hard as they have, as it has towards any other people in South Africa’s society?

I ask once again: Whatever the history behind this decision, must these people be spurned by the State merely because they have lead a life of service and of prudence? I can give the hon. the Minister and the hon. members on the other side of the House example after example of people of 70, 75, 80 or 85 years of age, half-blinded people, who, when they apply for pensions, are refused and told that, because they took an oath of poverty and even though for all those years they have served society at no expense to the State, they are not entitled to pensions. I say this is iniquitous and archaic and must be changed.

Mr. Speaker, it is my task to say farewell in the House to my hon. friends who are remaining behind as well as to the hon. members of the Opposition. I am grateful that I have had the privilege to serve my party since 1936. I am pleased that I can think of the political struggle that we have had over the years, even during the war years. I think of the last year of the regime of the old United Party. I also think of our budget last year. In the last year of the regime of the old United Party, in 1947, the budget amounted to R325 million. South Africa had to develop and progress on that. Last year we had a budget of R12 000 billion for the development and progress of South Africa. Is it not wonderful to see that the world says that, economically speaking, we are one of the top 15 countries in the world? I say it is not so much due to the excellence of the Government as to the mercy and wisdom that it was given in order to be able to govern South Africa in this way.

I think of 1948, when the NP came into power. At the time the official Opposition conjured up many spectres for the people of South Africa, both here and abroad. A great deal of propaganda was made at the time and terror was struck into the hearts of all our people that the position would become so poor and so bad that all the banks in South Africa would close their doors. I also think of the days when a lady at Strydenburg came to cry on my doorstep and asked me to help prevent the banks in Strydenburg and Hopetown from closing their doors. All these spectres that the old United Party conjured up for our people, are lying like skeletons along the roads of South Africa today.

I am grateful that I had the opportunity of being involved in politics for 15 years and that I could serve South Africa in my modest way through the NP and the Government. I am grateful that I was able to take the oath four times in this House, the oath of loyalty, the demand that I should serve South Africa to the best of my ability “so help me God”. This cannot but make an impression on all of us and leave us with the lasting idea of our loyalty to South Africa. I was privileged to experience this in these times too.

I think of the crises that our farmers and agriculture have experienced over the years. I think of the droughts that we have had so often during the past 15 years when the Government had to be largely responsible for coming to our aid. If this aid had not come from them, our farmers would not have been able to keep their heads above water. I think of the time when the Orange River Irrigation project was not yet in existence and of the shortage of water that our irrigation farmers experienced as a result. I personally was involved in the establishment of more than 800 km of irrigation canals. I also think of the floods that occurred, and in all respects the Government was sympathetic towards us and helped us so that today we are in a much better position than we were 15 years ago.

I also want to convey a word of thanks to the hon. the Minister of Finance in particular for lending an ear to agriculture to our farmers. I am thinking, for instance, of the fact that practically the entire Free State experienced drought and disaster conditions and that large sections of Natal, the whole of the Eastern Cape, the whole of the Karroo, Bushmanland and Namaqualand were subjected to drought. Two-thirds of my constituency is a disaster area. As I said, our hon. the Minister of Finance is a man who lends an ear to agriculture, to the farmers, and he acts in a sympathetic manner by providing us with capital when we are faced with emergency conditions. We thank the hon. the Minister of Finance from the depths of our heart, on behalf of the people of my constituency too and on behalf of the farmers of South Africa. We thank him for the fine way in which he accommodated us, came to our assistance and aided us. It will not go unnoticed.

I also thank the Government for the fact that it has watched over three things in South Africa. One of them is that it looked after all our people, that it created employment opportunities for all those who want to work. We also thank the Government for the fact that it has taken care to provide more than enough food for everyone in South Africa. The third important thing for which I want to thank the Government is that it guaranteed our safety and protected us.

I want to put it to the hon. the Prime Minister that he must adhere to the policy of separate development. The policy of separate development is not a creation of the NP. It is a policy that has been laid down in the all-wise master-plan of God, in His law of diversity. Diversity is a creation of Almighty God. The master-plan of God is organized in such a way that it brings about diversity in life. There are colours, nations, countries, languages and borders. Today, however, if I may put it like this, we are faced with the satanic onslaught against the Government, an onslaught that is aimed at destroying the master-plan of God. Now I want to allege that it is true that Satan can never destroy the master-plan of God. It is simply a law of God. No matter how he tries to destroy the diversity and the sovereignty of people, no matter how small, the master-plan of God will always prevent it. I believe that we have been called to serve this cause with love and humility and to put it into effect.

As a religious man, I am certain that Satan can never win this struggle. The master-plan of God will ultimately triumph.

Once there was a woman in Spain. Someone asked her in the street what she prayed for most. Her reply was that she prayed that Gen. Franco would never die. We will not pray that a Prime Minister of South Africa will never die. We have borne Prime Ministers to the grave in sorrow in the past. Our future Prime Ministers will be accorded the same privilege. That woman prayed that Gen. Franco would not die. All we will pray for, is that God will give our leaders courage and mercy, and to our present hon. Prime Minister too, to persevere with faith and wisdom in the vocation that rests upon their shoulders.

I also say thank you very much to you, Mr. Speaker, as well as to all hon. members, for all the friendship over the years. I say thank you very much for friendship from my constituency, friendship that I received from my voters. As far as I know, I do not have political enemies in my constituency either. Members of the PFP and the NRP are few and far between in my area. It is my privilege that I can say farewell here in love and friendship before I go home. I still believe that love will triumph over all the bitterness that there may be in our lives. Nor must we allow the love of South Africa to be lost to us. I want to issue a warning to hon. members of the Opposition not to allow their hatred for the NP Government to become greater than their love for South Africa.

As far as the hon. the Prime Minister is concerned, there is one thought that we must always bear in mind and this is to help, to inspire and also to encourage him. We say to him: Courage, Mr. Prime Minister. Be as determined as you are and keep your confidence along the path of South Africa. Once again we say as the deceased Mr. Willie Hofmeyr said: If I look back along the path of South Africa and on the National Government and on our lives, then we have a great deal to be thankful for. If we cast up our eyes, we can have faith and when we look ahead we are filled with courage.

Mr. Speaker, I do not intend to deal directly with the budget of the hon. the Minister of Finance here this afternoon other than to say to him, unlike some of our other colleagues: Congratulations and well done!

I should like to notify you, Mr. Speaker, right at the outset, that I shall not be seeking re-election at the general election on 29 April. This will be the last speech that I will deliver in this House and in the few minutes available to me I feel it necessary to express a few final comments and opinions regarding the future of our country. These observations of mine are based solely on the independent insight that I have gained into the workings of this Parliament and the workings of this Government.

To commence with, and certainly in contrast to many of the prophets of doom, I want to say that I foresee a very bright future for South Africa. I also see a very bright future for all the peoples of South Africa. I am exceptionally optimistic about our future, so much so that I am prepared to put my money where my mouth is, as I have recently done. I have acquired additional farms and I intend to farm them. My optimism is based on the fact that I believe that this Cabinet has adopted a very new and a very positive change of direction as well as a very welcome change of attitude towards race relations among all the peoples of South Africa. The second positive feature and criterion which I consider to have a great influence on my optimism and thinking is the fact that the actual formation of the President’s Council came about. To elaborate on this somewhat, I believe that the formation of the President’s Council is probably the most daring and the most significant political step that any government has ever taken in South Africa. Instead of maligning this body I intend offering it all the encouragement and good wishes that it richly deserves. Even with its shortcomings—and you know very well, Sir, that I felt very strongly that Blacks should in the first place have been included in this body and, in fact, I still do—I nevertheless sincerely believe that this council can and will initiate and design a brand new era for South Africa. One may very well ask why it should succeed when generations in this House have failed to do so. I should like to tell you. Firstly, there are 60 highly intelligent and competent South Africans serving on this council. Secondly, they have been appointed to the council because of a personal and special knowledge and skill thus giving the council a very well balanced and rounded ability. Thirdly, there are members of the various race groups present there. However, what is far more important than that, is the fact that they all share in a common goal and that is individually and collectively to seek and find a new peaceful and just dispensation for all of our people here in South Africa. Fourthly, on this council we have 60 independent South Africans and this, Sir, in my opinion is the most noteworthy and significant feature of this council. These 60 independent members do not owe any allegiance or are in any way tied to any political party or caucus line of thinking. They can thus place South Africa first. The composite findings and recommendations of this council which houses individuals such as Mr. Japie Basson, Mr. Bill Sutton, Mr. Lofty Adams and Dr. Denis Worrall, to name but a few, must surely offer South Africa a much brighter future, a future which most South Africans be they Black, Brown or White will be able to accept and, if need be, fight for. Furthermore, Sir, unlike the President’s Council’s many critics I do believe that this House and this Government cannot and will not ignore or disregard the findings and recommendations of this body. I am convinced that the President’s Council will succeed in finding that compromise, that political solution that South Africa needs for its complex problems.

I believe that the reason why this House has not been able to offer South Africa a concrete and generally acceptable formula lies in the fact that the present party caucus system completely militates against any form of compromise with other parties or groups. It is unfortunately a fact that all political parties inherently place their own self-interests and their own group interests way ahead of those of other groups. What I am talking about is political expediency, which I personally found to be the most frustrating part or facet of South African politics.

When one has to rationalize away what is right and honourable and accept, and even defend, the view of the majority merely because it is expedient and in the interests of the party rather than in the interests of the country, these frustrations become untenable. In a nutshell, I am pleading for the right of each individual member of Parliament to have the right to exercise his democratic vote, to stand up and be able to place on record his own personal conviction and be able to express his own personal opinion, which in turn would also allow his own constituency to view and to consider the standpoint that he has taken and held on their behalf as their own member of Parliament.

I may sound somewhat cynical about our own parliamentary system, but I am not. I am merely critical of the strict party caucus line system which has no doubt frustrated many exceptional men in this House, and Parliament has been the poorer for it. One only needs to think of Dr. Zac de Beer, and now of the hon. member for Pinetown and the hon. member for Heilbron as very good examples of people who feel that they can do better outside the House than sitting here. I believe it is a shame that these hon. members are going to be missed in this House. It makes one think that possibly the President’s Council could take a very good look at this factor as well in its deliberations.

My final comment concerns my view in regard to the coming election. Initially my reaction to it was—and still is—that it is very good news. Firstly, on a selfish note, it lets me out of politics. It will allow me the time to do what I enjoy most, farming, as well as being able to sit back on the sidelines for a while and watch with interest the fluid political situation as it develops in the next few years. Secondly, I believe it is a very positive and welcome step. I feel the hon. the Prime Minister should have his own political platform to operate from and that he certainly will require a full five uninterrupted years in order to lead this country and to do the things this country so desperately needs without having to look over his left or his right shoulder. I for one sincerely hope he obtains the mandate from the electorate that will allow him to lead this country towards the 21st century, complete with peace and happiness. I wish him and the Cabinet a lot of good luck.

To conclude I should like to greet all the staff and other members of the House. To all of the genuine friends I have made in the House during the past three years I say: “May it go well with you.” I am sure I am speaking on behalf of all my colleagues and all hon. members of Parliament when I wish you, Mr. Speaker, and your wife Aletta Godspeed in the future. Mr. Speaker, I say good-bye.

Mr. Speaker, may I avail myself of this opportunity to express admiration for an individualist such as the hon. member who has just resumed his seat. Even though I may not, in political terms, always have been on the same wavelength, I have a great deal of admiration for any individualist. No doubt there may be many things in regard to which the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg South may find himself in an invidious position when it comes to party discipline and party caucus. That is a system that we have inherited, but it is also a system that we in South Africa developed to such an extent that it gave South Africa the political stability we acquired in years gone by. There is therefore not a simple or easy way to get out of this.

If I may crave your indulgence for a few moments, Sir, I should also like very briefly to deal with the comments made by the hon. member for Durban Point. For him too I have had respect over the years. We have been friends for many, many years. Political opponents, yes, but personal friends.

The Utopia he has held out for South Africa today of what might well be, was encouraging in many respects but disappointing in the sense that he sees for himself and his party only the modest role of hoping to become the official Opposition. It must be very discouraging for his supporters.

Not at all. From little acorns come big oaks, very big trees.

The trouble with that hon. member’s party is that from being big trees they have been reduced to being very small seeds lying around, unable to germinate.

Any tree can benefit from a little pruning.

Sir, I do not wish to be diverted from what I have to say. At one stage there was, I believe, in the Roman empire a senator Cato. He invariably concluded his speeches with Delenda est Carthago. Today we have a situation which is not quite comparable and certainly not a parallel, but I think the cry that one can take up in South Africa today must be—I should like to conclude my speech with those words— not Delenda est Carthago, but Delenda est NRP. I shall give the reasons why I say this.

Over the years the old South African Party and the United Party had a great opportunity to bring together all good South Africans into a centre party. They started off well and it was a great party with great leaders but, unfortunately for South Africa and certainly most unfortunately for the United Party and later the NRP, they have been reduced to a party that can only hope or strive to become the official Opposition. What a disastrous point of view!

We have the situation that the NP started off on three great basic principles—South Africa first, “gelykberegtiging”—equal rights —and, call it what you like, separate development. Those three concepts have developed. South Africa first went through certain phases and eventually we experienced the Statute of Westminster which brought about constitutional development in South Africa and today we can claim that South Africa first means in the first instance security for South Africa.

When we deal with the second great basic principle we find that whereas equal rights initially started off as the struggle of the Afrikaner people for recognition of their language and economic position, among others, it developed into what it is today in the true sense of the word, “gelykberegtiging”—equal rights for all South Africans.

In the third instance, “afsonderlike ontwikkeling”—one can call it what one likes— group identity, has given to us in South Africa the security that all minority groups not only desire but need desperately for a secure future. We only have to look to the north of us to understand and to realize what it means to be insecure as a minority group.

There is consequently one political party standing in the way of this great big move towards centralization in the political realignment in South Africa. Of course we accept that there will always be people on the extreme left who are unable to grapple with the problems of South Africa and to understand the challenges of the times. It is certainly understandable that there will also, on the extreme right, be those who find it most unacceptable to agree with or side with the hon. the Prime Minister and his party’s principles, as they have developed and as we interpret them today. Where, however, do the members of the NRP stand? There is no future for them. They have no hope. They have no message for South Africa. [Interjections.]

We are the middle.

At one stage they did occupy the centre position, but where are they today? [Interjections.] They have been dissipated. They no longer enjoy the confidence of the electorate of South Africa, and that is why they are where they find themselves today.

Why are we running Natal?

The hon. member asks why they are running Natal today. I should like to conclude with a comment about that. I believe it was on 5 February that an interview was granted, by the Natal Mercury, to the four members of the Executive Committee of Natal. In an article which appeared on the 6th the senior Exco member, Mr. Frank Martin, and his colleagues attacked the NP of Natal because it had been said that if we were in the majority in the province we would drastically change the life-style of Natal. What, however, is that life-style? It was said, firstly, that Sunday sport would go. May I remind Exco members in Natal that Sunday observance laws are pre-Union laws and that we in Natal would, in no way, change those laws.

Of course you would.

I challenge the hon. member to state that clearly and categorically, and I shall reply to it at a later stage.

What about Sunday tourist shopping?

In conclusion I should like to refer briefly to three other matters raised at that stage. There was the question of Parks Board interference from Pretoria. Those hon. members know that a former leader of the NP in the province of Natal has stated most categorically that in no way will we interfere with the set-up as it exists today.

Another one who has left your party.

Thirdly, there is the question of subsidies for Private schools. I say that the allegation in that regard is untrue and that it is unworthy of those hon. members to draw that in as an election slogan. [Interjections.] The fourth allegation that I refute is that if we ever had a majority in the province we would interfere, in any way, with the beaches of Natal. We certainly believe that the Whites have every right, if they so wish, to retain beaches for themselves, and if not for themselves, then because of the tremendous asset that tourism is to Durban and Natal as a whole.

And the Coloureds?

I have no time to reply to that, but they certainly could have zoning if they wanted it.

Mr. Speaker, I should like to say at the outset that I shall take no questions during the time that I have at my disposal. [Interjections.] The hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Information referred to some of my actions. He was asked to be here, but he is not. He pleads one of those “important meetings” he mentioned earlier which seem, so often, to prevent him from observing the common courtesies of this House.

But surely the hon. the Minister asked to be excused.

Several points come up in regard to the matters he raised, but I can deal only with a few of them. The mistake that this Government makes, not only in the eyes of the world, but also in the eyes of many South Africans, is that it continues to equate NP policy with the broad view of all South Africans. I want to say unequivocally, however, that NP policy is not the broad view of all South Africans. NP policy represents the policy of the majority of the White electorate, less than 20% of the entire population. The Bantustan policy is not my policy, nor is it the policy of the majority of South Africans. It is important for South Africans to know that NP policy and policy statements on constitutional matters are largely discredited in the world outside. They are not believed and they are not respected. The Government is seen abroad for what it is, a racist-orientated Government, pumping out ineffective, bloated propaganda to try and smoke-screen what it is trying to do and is doing to human rights and dignity in this country. I will not be a party to NP propaganda in South Africa and I will not be a party to NP propaganda abroad.

Why write to the New York Times?

It is for that reason that, when the PFP and I myself argue abroad against disinvestment in South Africa and against boycotts against South Africa, the PFP is given a hearing. It has credibility and people listen to us. To call oneself a Nationalist, a supporter of apartheid, or to pretend that NP policy is the solution to the problems of South Africa, is to condemn oneself in the eyes of all rational men, and I refuse to do that. It is a patriotic duty to tell the world that not all South Africans are racists, that not all South Africans belong to a party which subscribes to apartheid and that not all South Africans wish to dominate the majority of the people living in their country. If this is not appreciated, let me say that I stand by the contents and the truth of my letter to the New York Times, the major portion of which the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs has read out. He did, however, leave out two paragraphs which I shall quote to the House now. He left out the following—

That is a true statement—

That should read “the Ciskei”—

That is a true statement—

That is a true statement—

That is a true statement—

That is a true statement—

Sir, the last paragraph reads as follows—

That, Sir, is a true statement.

In a foreign newspaper? Shameful!

Finally I should like to say something about the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs having important meetings which prevent him from observing the courtesies of the House.

[Inaudible.]

He started out well as Minister of Foreign Affairs. He had a good . . .

Order! The hon. member for Pretoria East is making too many interjections. He must withdraw the last one.

Sir, I merely asked whether he was a traitor.

Order! The hon. member for Pretoria East must not trifle with the Chair. He must withdraw the word “traitor” immediately.

I withdraw it, Sir.

When the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs took over his portfolio, he had a good television image, he was great on the hustings and he was very good at cocktail parties, but he has disappointed us lately. He has disappointed us through his facile behaviour in the House, through the hysteria which he has displayed, through his naive protestations, through his huffing and puffing and posturing and through his amateurish display of emotion at times when he should keep his cool. He was particularly disappointing this afternoon through his discourteous behaviour in using a departmental letter in debate. It makes his already transparent inadequacy in the role of chief propagandist, let alone diplomat, even more obvious.

I should now like to deal with another subject.

At a time when South Africa is going into a general election it is right that the political parties set out their position on important issues in this country, and I believe that the administration of justice is such an important issue. In few spheres of South African life are there to be found greater differences of basic philosophy, of attitude and of practical implementation than is evident in the stark contrast between the approach of the PFP to the administration of justice and that of the Government.

The firm conviction of the PFP is that, while the interests of the State must be guarded, it is the ordinary person who is of first importance. We know that, if the individual is secure, if he is secure in his economic life, if he is secure in his political life and if he is secure in his social position, the State, too, axiomatically will in fact be secure. We understand laws which are made to serve people and do not hold that people are placed in our country merely to serve the law. NP ideology, geared as it is to entire groups, disregards individuals and holds that the State comes first. Consequently, as we have often stated in the House before, the PFP subscribes to the classically defined rule, which nonetheless has its modern implementation, known as “the rule of law” which guarantees the equality before the law of all citizens, safeguards people from imprisonment without trial and conviction, and provides the ordinary man with protection against Government excesses.

How does this work out in practice, and what are the real differences? Allow me to state some of them. Interestingly enough, the first aspect has no racial connotation at all, nor does it bear any relationship to the multi-million rand publicity stunt called “the total onslaught”, with which the hon. the Prime Minister is trying to bemuse so many South Africans. It relates instead to the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court. The PFP would restore the former power of the Supreme Court of South Africa to intervene on behalf of people who seek redress. Why? Because we care about the affairs of individual people. That is why. Over past years law after law has been passed removing from citizens the right to appeal on merit against unjust decisions. Any half-baked lawyer will appreciate that a right of review in such circumstances is virtually no right at all. Unfair property rating, refusal of trading licences, the censorship of films and books, disputed town-planning decisions, expropriations by Escom and other semi-Government or Government agencies, refusal of liquor licence applications and many other executive or administrative tribunal decisions cannot be tested in an open court if the individual feels he has been given a raw deal.

These sorts of laws have a three-way effect. Firstly, they erode and diminish the stature of our courts as the guardian of the rights of the citizen against the excesses of any Government. Secondly, law by law they render ordinary men impotent to stand up for themselves against the power of the State. But, thirdly, the tendency to govern by decree, by closed-door executive action, free of impartial court restraint, is becoming more and more an obvious signpost pointing towards a direction of greater centralized power and will in the end result spell out authoritarianism. There will be fewer rights for the ordinary South African, but then perhaps the ordinary citizen in South Africa is not high on the priority list of the Government.

Allow me to turn to another aspect. We are living in a changing society and there is no doubt in my mind that the economic revolution that is taking place today will bring in its wake far-reaching political changes—and, regardless of what is said in Parliament, those changes will come rapidly. There will doubtlessly be those who, through conviction or through manipulation from outside, will try to create disorder during such a period of change, such as occurred in Portugal in 1974 or 1975, and, of course, there will always be those forces from outside which will seek to exploit for their own ends the inherent injustices which are in our society. To those people violence is a tool in itself. Change in an atmosphere of disorder can lead only to chaos. Certainly, there will have to be laws to safeguard the State. Let there be no doubt that the PFP would use the law to check subversion, undermining and terrorism, but let me also make it clear that we reject the philosophy that prescribes banning, exiling, restricting and the imprisoning of people without charge, without redress or without hope. No ideology, no philosophy and no political conviction can justify what an eight by eight foot underground cell can do to a young man or woman living in isolation for weeks on end, knowing only loneliness and hard-faced interrogation without ever being able to defend themselves in a non-political court against any charge. This method of silencing outspoken critics, this weapon being used against political opponents, is used at the peril of all of us. It polarizes, it radicalises and alienates whole communities and, finally, it destroys individuals.

The PFP’s administration of justice would allow a free Press, free from the threat of censorship or Government closure, but subject to the normal laws of libel, slander and the accepted code protecting the safety of the whole country. In other words, the Press should be subject, as everyone else is, to the laws and the courts of our land. Newspapers, however, would not have to fear executive government action without any right of redress.

Some months ago I read a report of a speech made by a Coloured man, Mr. Jimmy Atkins, which upset me greatly. He was the assistant editor of the Cape Herald, and I should like to quote a few excerpts very quickly. He wrote the following—

He ends off by saying—

And he ends tragically—

And he left. This is the sort of combustible society that apartheid has created. These are the sort of frustrations that rigid government has spawned. Those people of colour who choose to stay live in frustration or join the forces of upheaval. That is why the PFP, representing the moderates who want to live their lives in South Africa, feel so strongly on these issues that I have mentioned today, and that is why we oppose this Government.

Mr. Speaker, I have listened attentively to the hon. member for Sandton. He started off by accusing the Government of being a racist Government. I dare him to find in any of our writings a policy statement of the NP to support his accusation that we are a racist Government and that we have a racist policy.

What about District Six?

What we do have is a policy of different nations.

Order! Hon. members gave the hon. member for Sandton a proper hearing and I think they should do the same to the hon. member for Pretoria-West.

If I may express this in Afrikaans—as you know it is easier to express in Afrikaans—I can say that we have a “volkerebeleid”, a policy of the existence of different nations, and we consider all nations to be of equal value.

†We have a policy of different, separate, but equal nations. That is our policy. I am really surprised that the hon. member for Sandton has not taken the trouble to study our policy in depth. If he had done so, it would possibly have cleared the cobwebs with which he has surrounded himself. I really cannot understand how a man of his intellectual capacity cannot understand our policy.

We understand it only too well.

When it comes to human dignity, no party in the history of the Western World has a higher regard for human dignity than the National Party. Our policy is to make nations free, and I cannot understand how one can show a higher respect for the dignity of a person than to give him his own free state where he can do as he wishes and where he can live as he pleases. That is the highest form of respect for human dignity. The point was evidently made that the Black states were not self-sufficient in their production of food. That might be so. That may well be the result of still antiquated, outmoded or outdated agricultural methods. Their agricultural methods are not the most up-to-date one can get. If that had been the case the theory would have become true that 25 million people can be fed by one single homeland, provided the agricultural potential of that homeland was utilized to the full.

The hon. member for Sandton also said the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs had performed like a bull in a china shop. He said various other uncomplimentary things about the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

I also said he was a hit-and-run artist.

Yes. I must point out though that the spontaneous applause which followed the speech by the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs today was something I had very seldom witnessed before in my life. [Interjections.] That is exactly what happened when the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs sat down after delivering his speech here this afternoon. There was a spontaneous applause. That, I believe, is the answer to everything said by the hon. member for Sandton. It was very significant indeed. [Interjections.]

Mention was also made of the administration of justice in South Africa. The hon. member for Sandton, however, did not say a single word about the administration of justice. What he did was to criticize the laws of this country. That was what he did. He did not say one thing about the administration of justice in this country, because the administration of justice in South Africa is second to none. What he really did was to criticize the laws made by this Parliament. It is now the duty of the electorate to do something about the things the hon. member said here today. I really doubt very much whether he will be sent back to Parliament. If he does not like our laws he may lump it, but these are the laws which we have to safeguard the ordinary man in the street.

*I wish to make it clear that the NP will continue to serve the best interests of the Whites in South Africa. We now find ourselves on the eve of an election. However, I did not hear one hon. member of the Opposition—and not the hon. member for Sandton either—say that they were pleased about the forthcoming election because they were going to lift the NP from the cushions. What they should have said today was that they were going to take over the reins of government. But they could only do that if they had faith in themselves. [Interjections.] At present the NP has been governing in South Africa for 33 years. In terms of common law prescription takes effect after 33 years. However, we can tell the general public that because they have trusted us for 33 years there is now more prosperity in South Africa than ever before. Despite onslaughts from beyond our borders we are enjoying a more peaceful internal situation than ever before. The NP is the party of the future. The NP is the party which can be trusted. I wish to ask every other political party in South Africa—inside and outside this House—to prove why we should have faith in any of them. What reason do they give us to trust them? Perhaps an hon. member of the PFP could subsequently tell us why we should trust them. Where are their deeds which prove that we can trust them? While we are moving towards an election today, there are certain disquieting signs on our borders. There are four spear-points of attack by Marxism on this country, this country, this country with its minerals, with its strategic Cape sea route, and I just wish to refer to this briefly. The hon. the Prime Minister sketched this extreme threat facing us today clearly in this House. This was during the no-confidence debate this year, in column 228. The question which the voters must consequently answer today is which party has proved that it could be trusted for 33 years and longer with the future of their children and of South Africa. This is the question which the voters will have to answer within the next two months.

On the left-hand side of the political spectrum is the PFP. We need not take much notice of them, except perhaps in one respect. They are the official Opposition.

†Therefore I suggest we take some notice of them by referring to their policies to see what they really do say. I want to say that those people’s policy will lead to absolute chaos in South Africa, and to violence. This statement I shall try to prove from their own written words. Obviously I shall not be able to prove this to their satisfaction, but I think on the balance of probability we shall agree that these people are a danger to the future of South Africa.

You will satisfy yourself.

I may even satisfy some of the hon. member’s supporters too and I shall try to do that.

On page 12 of the booklet Report of the Constitutional Committee one finds the following—

This is important—

What we have here, is that it is said that in a political sense the primordial political loyalty in a society is identified with the ethnic group. This, at any rate, is how I understand it. An ethnic group’s political loyalty is primordially—that means right from the start—to its own ethnic group. I think all of us in this House are in agreement in so far as this is concerned. All of us say—that, in fact, is the policy of the NP—that all loyalty, political wise, is to the ethnic group itself. I think at this point in time the question in South Africa is how strong is this loyalty at present, or has this loyalty been subordinated to a greater loyalty to, say, a proposed PFP federation, or even to the idea of a unitary State.

I think I find the answer to this question in what the hon. the Leader of the Opposition wrote in his book South Africa’s Options—

South Africa is “notable for the intensity of ethnic antagonisms”, but if that is so, then contemporary South Africa, because of the primordial political loyalty of the group to itself, has not changed and the willingness of each and every ethnic group in contemporary South Africa to subordinate itself to a greater whole is wishful thinking. This is what I find in the writings of the hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. member a question?

No, wait a minute. The hon. member can ask his question later; I shall definitely give him an opportunity to do so.

Are you unable to reply to it?

I do not know what his question is; so how can I reply to it?

†The hon. member has insufficient cranial ability.

If what I am saying is true, then the result is also stipulated in this little book. If people should cling to their primordial ethnic loyalty and if they should not be willing to share in a nebulous federation, what will the result be? Let me quote from the booklet Report of the Constitutional Committee—

If this is true, how can modern, contemporary South Africa vote for the PFP?

It is impossible. I want to go further and indicate what Inkatha has to say—

There is no mention at all of the PFP. They are not a factor; not even among the Whites, let alone the Blacks.

*I shall now leave this topic and go on to discuss something far more pleasant, the NP.

Mr. Speaker, may I put something to the hon. member? I take it the hon. member will concede that the Afrikaans-speaking person, according to his definition, is an ethnic entity. If that is the case, how does he explain the large number of English-speaking people who, according to his party, support the NP?

That is a very interesting question. Nor is it the first time that the hon. member has asked that question. I am prepared to discuss and argue the matter with the hon. member, but I cannot do so now, because I only have four minutes at my disposal and I wish to spend them on the policy of the NP, because that is far more important.

The NP’s policy is a simple one. In fact, it is so simple that even a child can understand it. It is not complicated, and it is based on four points. I personally believe in four freedoms The first of these is religious freedom. Do we agree? Do hon. members opposite believe in cultural freedom, i.e. that a person may bring up one’s children according to one’s own culture? We agree. Do we also agree on political freedom? Of course we do. Do we believe in economic freedom? [Interjections.] I challenge hon. members on that side to tell me that they do not agree on these four freedoms, i.e. religious, political, economic and cultural freedom.

These four freedoms stand on three pillars. We cannot maintain these four freedoms if law and order does not, in the first place, prevail in the country. And this Government stands for law and order, something which those people ought to know. In the second place we are opposed to outside intervention in our internal affairs. Whether it is political or military intervention, we are opposed to it. In the third place we are neutral. If something is not in the interest of South Africa, we wish to remain neutral and we do not align ourselves with any of the major powers.

Why am I a Nationalist? Because I believe in the identity of nations and that nations in our country are separate. I believe that there should be vertical separation and that each population group should have its own instruments to be able to develop itself. That is, after all, what we are striving to achieve. We are interdependent, but may develop into a great, over-arching council of states, in which the constituent population groups can co-operate for the development of Southern Africa.

I believe in religious freedom so that people can pray in the light of God’s Word, because our views are based on Christian nationalism. I believe in cultural freedom which will ensure that every nation can raise its children in its own schools and community. I believe in economic freedom with the understanding that we are interdependent on one another.

Finally, I should like to say a few words to the young people of South Africa. The vision of the NP offers a future for all minority groups on this continent. The vision of the NP is exciting. We are going to fulfil our calling on this continent, and our calling is peace and prosperity for all the population groups in the country. And when polling-day arrives, we vote for the NP because we have grown accustomed to trusting it during the past 33 years. We vote for a President’s Council which is going to try to stabilize the relations between non-Black peoples. We vote for the independence of Black nations. We vote for a constellation of States in which we are going to co-operate on matters of common interest. We are going to form a strong bastion. In the economic, political and military spheres we are going to form a bastion. And it is in favour of or in opposition to this vision that South Africa must go to the polls within the next two months.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Pretoria West dealt with the election manifesto of the NP and gave various reasons why that party should be supported on 29 April. Earlier this afternoon the leader of the NRP, the hon. member for Durban Point, gave the reasons why people should vote for the NRP. This is understandable in a debate of this nature just prior to an election.

First of all I should like to reply to a point raised by the hon. member Mr. H. B. Klopper who is unfortunately not in the House at the moment. He spoke about reasons why certain people were told not to vote for the NP and the threat to certain aspects of the Natal way of life if the NP were to come to power. One aspect he mentioned was Sunday sport. We know that this has been a very contentious issue for a number of years. I remember serving on a Select Committee that investigated this matter, and certainly the NP members of that Select Committee voted, to a man, in favour of prohibiting sport on Sundays throughout the country as a whole, thereby seriously affecting the way of life in Natal. I have here an article that appeared in The Daily News on 3 April 1974. That was a long time ago, but it contained some interesting points regarding Sunday sport. Mention is made of what was said by Dr. Koomhof, then Minister of Sport, in reply to a question put to him at an NP rally held at Carletonville, and I quote—

The article continues—

So it appears that there is some justification for people in Natal being concerned about the aspect of Sunday sport.

I should now like to deal with some other matters involving the budget now before the House. There are various matters that the hon. the Minister dealt with in the course of his Second Reading speech. Let me tell the hon. the Minister, however, that I intend to deal with matters concerning pensioners and the situation they are faced with today in these inflationary times when they have become helpless and defenceless, trying hopelessly to cope with the ravages of inflation. Obviously we on this side of the House welcome any relief afforded these people, particularly to meet the situation that has developed with the rapid increase in inflation in recent times. The hon. the Minister made certain announcements in the course of his speech. We welcome the increases he has granted. We welcome the relief granted to enable these people to receive something more from the Government. There are, however, various aspects of the whole question of care of our senior citizens that require urgent attention. We in these benches believe that it is high time a full socio-economic investigation was carried out into the position of our senior citizens in this country.

Hear, hear!

We can see the developments that have taken place. At present, however, we are hindered by the fact that our social pensions and benefits are based on a system devised many years ago, and there has certainly been a considerable change in the industrial outlook since then. We know that there are increasing numbers of people who fall into that category. A division of the HSRC, the Institute for Sociological, Demographic and Criminological Research, undertook a survey which indicated that some 2% of the White population were over the age of 65 in the year 1904. In 1975 the figure had reached nearly 7%, and according to their projections, by the end of the century the figure will be over 10%. So we can see that it will be increasingly problematic to find ways and means of dealing with this whole matter. We therefore do hope that this can be done on a scientific basis in order to ensure that we have a system that can meet the demands of a young industrialized country. The increase in the number of pensioners that has taken place over the years will, in the course of the next few months, be substantially augmented as a result of people retiring from this House, some voluntarily and some involuntarily. The care and the position of our senior citizens is something which is causing grave concern among our welfare organizations and among the public in general as we see a deteriorating situation developing as inflation continues.

The hon. the Minister of Finance announced various increases. These increases will once again be effective as from 1 October and we in turn have once again said that these increases should be effective from 1 April. We believe that the part appropriation presented the hon. the Minister with a golden opportunity to bring the increases for social pensioners into line as from 1 April. The fact that a bonus is to be given is also indicative of the Government’s realization that these people require immediate relief. The relief which is to be granted by way of a bonus and to be followed by an increase effective from 1 October 1981 is going to result in considerable expenditure. The hon. the Minister may quite rightly ask: “Where will the money come from?” First and foremost I believe that the hon. the Minister should have considered making the increase effective as from 1 April instead of making the bonus payable on 1 April. The hon. the Minister indicated that there was the likelihood of another bonus or a similar bonus towards the end of the year. In actual fact, when one takes into account the increases that have been granted to the various race groups, for instance, the extra R13 that has been granted to White old-age pensioners, it will amount to a total of R156 over a period of 12 months, but the increases will now only be effective for a period of six months during the current financial year and will therefore amount to R78. There are to be two bonuses, possibly of the same amount. The first bonus will be R30. Later on in his speech the hon. the Minister indicated that the overall cost could amount to R173 million because he was anticipating, if funds were available, another bonus of R30. This would make a total of R60 granted to old-age pensioners whereas I believe it would not have strained the financial resources of the country if the increase had been made effective from 1 April. I have tried to make some calculations and estimates because one has to take into account the fact that the increases for the Coloured and Indian sectors of the community will be R9 per month and the increases for the Black community will be R7 per month. Once again there is a difference between the total amount in respect of the bonuses granted to them, the total amount in respect of the increases for the six month period and the total amount had the increases been granted for a full 12 months. It would of course have resulted in increased expenditure. The hon. the Minister indicated that the increases would amount to R127 million and that each bonus would cost R23 million. If there were to be two bonuses, it would cost R46 million. This means that there would in fact have been a difference of R16 million if the increase had been granted with effect from 1 April for the various race groups and if all the concessions had also come into effect as from 1 April.

Looking at the overall situation, I believe that when the main budget is announced later this year, there are various reasons why relief should be afforded to this very deserving group of people in this country. If the hon. the Minister is unable to grant such relief in his main budget later this year, he should at least give consideration to a number of relief measures which could be instituted next year. 1982 has been proclaimed The International Year of the Aged and right throughout the world various countries will be investigating ways and means of meeting the challenge of looking after the ever increasing number of aged people within their communities.

I do hope the hon. the Minister will give due consideration to some of the matters I wish to mention here today.

First of all, there is the question of the means test. I believe it is long overdue for further relief to be given in this connection. From 1972 to 1980 the means test remained unaltered. In 1980 various concessions were made and there was a relaxation of the means test. Since that time, however, we have seen a further deterioration in the purchasing power of money and we have seen a tremendous increase in the cost of living and food prices. I believe it is very important that a relaxation of the means test be introduced.

The hon. the Minister did mention that a certain concession is to be made with effect from 1 October 1981. This relates to income derived from earnings. One’s first reaction, obviously, is that it is to be welcomed that it has been realized that there should be a concession in this regard. However, when one looks at the concession a little more closely, one realizes that there is not a great deal in it. As regards earnings from employment for a person who has already reached pensionable age, an amount of R408 per annum, or R34 per month, is to be deducted from such income derived from earnings. We must, however, remember that a concession is already in existence in terms of which women pensioners over 65 years of age have their earnings disregarded and men over 70 years of age have theirs disregarded. We must also bear in mind that the ceiling for the income permitted is extremely low. It is R116 per month for a single person, even if that person has no assets whatsoever. Therefore, a person who is getting a small income from earnings or a small pension, including the allowable income of R34 per month, will now only be allowed R150 per month in which case he will qualify for a minimum basic pension of R35 per month. One can see that these amounts are exceedingly small and that greater relief is required as regards income from earnings.

A further aspect is whether this amount will be deductible when there is a working spouse. In terms of the present concession, 25% of her earnings are taken into account. Will the additional R34 per month also be deducted? The position of the war veteran pensioner is another important aspect. Before turning to that, however, let me say that I believe that, as far as the relaxation of the means test is concerned, it is important to ensure that the means test should also be brought into line for the various race groups. The hon. the Minister did mention the increases that were granted and gave figures to show that the ratio had improved in that regard. However, as far as the means test is concerned, the old ratio still appears to be in existence. Surely with the International Year of the Aged before us, we in this country should try, wherever possible, to move away from racial discrimination. At the moment, as I have said, the means test is still based on the old ratio. I urge that the hon. the Minister and his colleague the hon. the Minister of Health, Welfare and Pensions should give consideration to a relaxation of the means test, not only from the point of view of the Whites, but also for the other race groups. What is required is a final declaration of intent to ensure that discrimination, as far as the means test is concerned, will eventually be phased out.

As regards the war veteran pensioner, the hon. the Minister announced an increase in the additional amount the White war veteran pensioner is paid over and above the basic old-age pension. He mentioned a figure of R15 per month for the Whites, and an increase on a pro rata basis for the other race groups. I would be grateful if the hon. the Minister could give an indication of what that pro rata basis will be. The existing position with regard to war veterans is that the White is getting an extra R10 per month, the Coloured and Indian an extra R5 per month and the Black an extra R2,50 per month. That is in accordance with the old ratio of 4:2:1. I hope that that is not the ratio the hon. the Minister has in mind, because that would mean a very negligible increase for the Coloured and Indian war veterans, and the Black war veteran pensioner would receive an increase of only R1,25 per month.

The whole question of where the additional funds must be obtained is a very fair one for the hon. the Minister to put. We on this side hope that the question of a welfare bonus bond will receive due consideration by the hon. the Minister at the appropriate time. We feel that by this means the public will be able to make a contribution also towards the welfare of the country. We are not a welfare state. We have a system of free enterprise and I think that every hon. member in the House stands by that system.

The position in regard to housing has been dealt with on a number of occasions. An important aspect in this regard is the fear, anxiety and trepidation with which many old people, pensioners, people living on fixed incomes and retired people, regard the future. I believe that an important aspect here would be that the State in assuming responsibility for those who are unable to fend for themselves financially should make more funds available to the welfare organizations for the purchase of existing buildings where the welfare organizations are able to obtain these buildings. Where the Government is able to grant funds, as it has done in the past, I believe that it must be done to a greater degree and that it must make those funds available to ensure that housing and blocks of flats that come up for sale can be purchased by the welfare organizations by means of loans received from the National Housing Commission which are made available at a 1% rate of interest. This would then put them in a financial position of being able to provide that accommodation within the means of the people concerned.

My time is limited and there are still a number of matters I would have liked to have raised as well. However, in view of the fact that this is the last occasion I shall have of taking part in a financial debate, though perhaps I may be able to take part in another debate later in this short session, I want to say that although I believe that the Government has done something for the old people of South Africa, unfortunately that something has become out-dated and the time has now come for a whole new system to be looked at and a basis established for providing a planned programme. Although this budget does give some immediate relief we in this party believe that a planned security for the future, in the longer term, for our senior citizens is essential.

Because of my limited time I am unable to deal with some of the aspects relating to the investigation that was carried out dealing with private pension funds, but one of the terms of reference of that investigation was to consider a contributory pension scheme after it had dealt with the question of the preservation of pension benefits and also the transferability of pension benefits. Therefore the second step should be the introduction of a contributory pension scheme, a scheme under which all persons will be covered and be able to enjoy a degree of security. It would make available greater funds to pay more realistic pensions. It would also mean the eventual abolition of the means test and it could also eliminate the disparity that exists as far as our pension legislation is concerned. It would eliminate the question of race discrimination because a pension would not be based on race but on the degree that a person has made a contribution to such a fund. Therefore the question of planned security for our old people should receive high priority from the Government in its caring for a very deserving section of our population who have served South Africa well.

Mr. Speaker, for every newcomer to this House it is a special experience in the true sense of the word to deliver his maiden speech. On such an occasion one feels an involuntary need arise to express one’s gratitude, firstly towards the Lord to whom all honour and gratitude is due. I also express my gratitude towards those who put the necessary confidence in me to nominate me as a member of this House. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank you, the parliamentary officials as well as my colleagues for the friendly way in which my family and myself have been welcomed here and been made to feel at home. It is my desire to dedicate myself to the orderly development of South Africa, development in the broader sense of the word, and particularly of the central portion thereof, viz. the Orange Free State.

However, today I want to devote myself to economic development and to begin with I want to express a few ideas about the philosophy of development economy. A thesis on this subject was submitted to the University of the Orange Free State by Dr. S. F. Coetzee in 1980, and those who are interested in development, should not fail to make a thorough study of this work. Although it is dangerous to generalize, two opposite poles of ideas on development can be identified on a continuum. The first pole can be described as super capitalism, and represents schools of thought of thinkers like Adam Smith and David Ricardo. In terms of this, no interference by the authorities in the free market mechanism is tolerated, and the private entrepreneur is allowed to use his own initiative without any institution influencing or directing the process of decision-making on the part of the entrepreneur.

Another extreme on this continuum of thoughts can be defined as super socialism. This is represented, inter alia, by the philosophies of Marx and Engels. Although it was not the original aim, Governments that wanted to implement the latter schools of thought, had to intervene completely, as it were, in the free enterprise system in order to bring about the ideals of a redistribution of wealth and the elimination of the profit motive as the dominating incentive for economic development. Both of these extremes of schools of thought aim at complete employment of the labour force and an increased standard of living for all. Today, both of these are considered to be utopian and outmoded throughout the world, and they are not being fully applied anywhere because a radical standpoint never represents the entire truth. The realities of Southern Africa are that economic systems from the First and Third Worlds meet one another in this subcontinent. Although the whole territory experiences the same economic atmosphere, and the separate regions or states are dependant upon one another for further economic growth, it is also true that separate regional economies, each with its own special characteristics, can be identified. Once again the truth here does not lie in the radical standpoint of the unitary or fragmentary approach.

The abovementioned harsh realities of the South African situation make it impossible and undesirable to adhere to super capitalism as a philosophy of economic development when the objectives that we are striving for are an increased standard of living and employment for all. Under the given circumstances, this Government is following the only possible successful policy by encouraging free enterprise and directing economic growth only in so far as it is necessary to bring about geographical decentralization. The central heartland of South Africa, specifically the Free State, can be identified as such an economic development region. It is characterized by lack of development, relative to other regions of the country. When we call to mind a map of South Africa, we notice that economic activities, particularly in the secondary industries, have taken place in a circle surrounding a central area, and are still taking place there. From Brits in the west of the Transvaal, we can draw a broad line of economic growth points, through the Pretoria-Witwatersrand-Vereniging area to the Eastern Transvaal, Richards Bay, Durban, Pinetown, East London, King William’s Town, Port Elizabeth, Uitenhage, the Cape Peninsula, Saldanha and Sishen, and in doing so we practically complete the circle.

As a further illustration of the backward position of the area concerned, it can be mentioned that the economic development of the Free State depends chiefly upon the primary and tertiary sectors, and that the secondary or industrial factor has been relatively poorly developed. These days the Free State produces approximately 40% of the total wheat and maize production of South Africa, and exceptional progress has been made in the agricultural sphere in recent years. Hon. members may do well to take note of the fact that the commodities that I have mentioned here, are staple foodstuffs in South Africa and that it is an inherent characteristic of agriculture as the primary sector, that it grows slowly.

Furthermore the Free State produces roughly 33,3% of the value of diamonds and gold that are produced in South Africa. The mining industry is another primary economic sector. As far as employment is concerned, the relative backwardness is very well illustrated by the ratio of Black workers in agriculture and in the manufacturing industries registered at labour bureaux. For the Free State this ratio is 7:1, whilst for an industrial province like the Transvaal it is exactly the opposite. The lack of development of the secondary economic sectors in the Free State is further emphasized by reports of the Institute for Social and Economic Research at the University of the Orange Free State. According to this, the economic growth of Bloemfontein, like that of practically all other towns in the Free State, depends largely upon an expansion of the tertiary economic sector. The tertiary and services sector, in Bloemfontein for instance, provides almost 75% of all employment opportunities in that city.

The same institute also points out that the labour pressure, unemployment or under employment, if we wish, is already providing cause for concern in the Free State today, and that it will increase even more in the future, particularly amongst the Black people in that area, unless urgent attention is given to the development of the industrial sector. We are grateful to take note of the measures that the Government is taking to make geographical decentralization possible, for economic activities as well. We are studying with interest the concepts contained in the idea that Bloemfontein is being declared a balancing growth point. We are not asking for alms from the State. We are simply asking the Government to grant the people in the Free State the opportunity to share in the prosperity of South Africa by means of hard work, entrepreneurship, courage and the leadership potential that exists there, and to ensure that there will be work and happiness for all.

Mr. Speaker, from this side of the House our heartiest congratulations to the hon. member Dr. Odendaal on his maiden speech. We wish him everything of the best for the future. If he always displays sound judgment by listening carefully to what hon. members on this side of the House are saying, he will go far in political life and the Free State will be able to be proud of his presence in the House. We congratulate him and look forward to his contributions in the future.

†A number of hon. members on the other side have pointed out quite correctly that South Africa is the mineral treasure house of the world, that South Africa has a sound and flourishing economy and that South Africa is one of the world’s favourite investment countries. This is all very true, but why then the crises which are besetting and crippling South Africa on every single front? Why the crippling shortage of skilled workers? Why the massive unemployment? Why the malnutrition and the starvation which is affecting so many in our country?

Why you?

Why, if we are one of the richest countries in the world, did 4 000 teachers resign in the Transvaal alone last year? Why is the system of education throughout South Africa for all races in a state of collapse? Does the Government not realize that if it continues to undermine the education of the young people of this country, it is subverting the country’s economy and it is subverting the security of our society? Why is there a crisis in the medical services of this country? Why are 50% of the posts in the new hospital in Johannesburg not filled?

It is because you people do so much back-biting abroad.

Why is the Government allowing problems in the medical services of the country which are jeopardizing not only the health but also the lives of patients? Why does the Government allow the economy to be undermined by inadequate health services resulting in the unsatisfactory health of our workers and therefore causing a greater loss of man hours? Inferior health services have an adverse effect on the economy of the country. Why is there a shortage in the Police Force? Why is the rate of crime increasing in this country? Why should this be while we are one of the wealthiest countries in the world?

Why was the rate of inflation for poor people 20,1% last year? Why did the Government allow food prices to go up by 30% last year? Does the Government realize that the increase of 30% in food prices—not for them, but for 90% of all South Africans— constitutes nothing but a total calamity? I am referring to the pensioners, the police, the nurses, the unskilled workers and the underprivileged—people who have a day to day struggle just to keep body and soul together. These people are in fact suffering from malnutrition. The average income of Whites, as somebody pointed out the other day, is R750 per month and that of Blacks, R150 per month. The poverty datum line— i.e. the very minimum requirement just to stay alive—is R150. This means, whether the Government is prepared to admit it or not, that the majority of the South African population live below the poverty datum line, and if one lives below the poverty datum line one is slowly and painfully starving to death. This is a fact and the Government must face it.

Why, if we are so wealthy, must our pensioners try to eke out a living on R100 per month? I want to ask the hon. the Minister of Finance whether he is prepared to accept a delay in his increase until October this year, and if he, a well heeled gentleman, is not prepared to accept it, why should the pensioners of South Africa suffer any further?

Why would the pensioners suffer because of that?

No, I am asking the hon. the Minister whether he is prepared to accept a delay in his increase until October?

When did I get my last one?

Last year and it amounted to more than R1 000 per month.

And when did they get theirs?

That hon. Minister and his Cabinet colleagues got an increase of more than R1 000 per month; no wonder nobody can understand starvation . . .

What did you get?

. . . nobody can understand deprivation . . . [Interjections.]

Did you not get an increase?

The hon. the Minister of Finance is the sheriff of Nottingham—he takes from the poor to give to the rich. He has given the rich a champagne budget and the poor a bad news budget. I think the hon. the Minister should be ashamed of what he has done in his budget to the poor people of this country. [Interjections.]

What are the answers? The Nationalists do not know what the answers are, so I am going to help them. I am going to tell them why this is so. Firstly, the NP have become isolated from their people. They can no longer from their plush, air-conditioned offices hear the cries for help. They no longer see the suffering of the poor masses from behind the tinted windows of their luxury limousines, and when they sit in their cigar-smoke filled caucus rooms, they cannot smell the stuffiness of the tiny, ill-furnished and cold rooms in which thousands of poor old-age pensioners have to live a miserable life. [Interjections.]

Fat Nats!

The second reason why the NP do not know what is going on is because they have introduced into South Africa over 33 years their own brand of a Marxist-type economy. The Government believe that it is their responsibility to dictate and regulate the entire South African economy to fit in with their particular ideological requirements. Their philosophy is, if there is anything in the economy that moves or breathes, then control it; they must have a control board for it. The Nationalists have foisted upon South Africa a never-ending epidemic of boards and corporations, councils and commissions, committees and agencies, all of which have been loaded by thankful Nationalist friends and drop-outs from the NP. They have created jobs for pals in order to ensure the submissive compliance with all the requirements of the NP. And what have these bodies achieved? They have resulted in a plethora of mushrooming, bureaucratic empires, each spawning volumes of rules and regulations. They have dispensed disastrous planning, bad management and bureaucratic bungling on an unprecedented scale in the history of this or any other country. They have strangled private enterprise. They have cost the South African taxpayer millions, and today we are seeing the results of this particular system. Inefficiency is the watchword and the mark of the South African economy in terms of what this Government has done to it. And that inefficiency has led to low productivity, a lack of productivity at all levels, and that has led to the economic ills of the society which is resulting in the problems that we are facing today.

Thirdly, the ideology of apartheid has dictated all the thinking and all the actions of this Government and is responsible for all the ills and woes of our country. If one goes back into the history of the NP, one finds that the very foundation of all their thinking, their philosophy and outlook on life is that South Africa is a country for the Whites and that the Blacks are not South Africans. Their philosophy is that the Blacks do not belong here; they do not want them here. They maintain that the Blacks must go back to the so-called homelands and must not be part of the South African economy. What this Government has therefore done deliberately and by design was to see to it that the Black people were poorly educated or not educated at all. They ensured that the Black people were deprived of the “waarheid”, deprived of training and opportunities to improve their skills and to put their talents to the best possible use. The tragic and disastrous consequences of that shortsighted, idiotic and selfish policy are now reporting itself in South Africa. It has resulted in a crippling, disastrous and calamitous shortage of skilled and trained workers, and that has led to inefficiency, low productivity and to the economic ills that beset our country at all sides now.

Dr. Verwoerd said: “We would rather be poor but White,” and this Nationalist generation is now delivering on that promised authority, and this and future generations in South Africa will have to suffer the impoverishment, the lack of security and unhappiness that is the result thereof.

It is true that there is a total onslaught on South Africa and its people, but it is an onslaught by this Nationalist Government on the people of South Africa, an onslaught on the security, health and well-being of the people. There is an onslaught by the Nationalist Government on the happiness, prosperity and even on the lives of the people of this country. It is an onslaught that is the consequence of the ideology of apartheid, carried out with devastating enthusiasm and determination by Nationalist disciples of this evil and destructive policy. I just want to say a bit about the issues facing South Africa in this election. Firstly, for the very first time in the history of South Africa, we are to have a general election with the Government, and particularly the hon. the Prime Minister, afraid to set out, for the public, its political platform for the election. The hon. the Prime Minister is fearful of spelling out to the public what his policies are at the time of this election. The hon. the Prime Minister is also afraid to define what he means by change. We hear about change, and the Government says it is in favour of change and of doing away with hurtful and unnecessary discrimination.

What is your policy for this election?

If the Government, however, is not prepared to define specifically what it means by hurtful an unnecessary discrimination, members of the electorate will not be in a position to judge what they are voting for if they vote for or against the Government.

What is your policy?

By the way, talking about hurtful and unnecessary discrimination: What is necessary discrimination? Do hon. members of the Government not have the guts to stand up and tell the people of South Africa that there are certain discriminatory aspects they regard as necessary and will maintain, giving the reasons why they will maintain them?

Separate residential areas and separate schools.

If they were to do that, we would know where we stood.

You cannot understand it.

From them all one hears about is a constellation of States which apparently has a shortage of stars. America’s JR has more stars in his bed than South Africa’s JR has in his constellation. [Interjections.] What we want to know is what South Africa is going to do about the Population Registration Act.

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: On a previous occasion you gave a ruling about a reference to JR. But the hon. member comes and says: “JR has more stars in his bed . . .

You are so stupid you do not even know what the man was saying.

That hon. member must shut up. I am not talking to him.

Order! The hon. member for Yeoville is not entitled to speak when an hon. member is raising a point of order. Surely he knows that?

Sir, the hon. member for Bryanston says that America’s JR has more stars in his bed than South Africa’s JR has in his constellation of States. Mr. Speaker, I ask for your ruling on what the hon. member is in effect saying and/or inferring by that statement.

Order! On a previous occasion I ruled a reference to JR out of order. I think the hon. member’s reference has the same tenor as the one I ruled out of order. Therefore he must withdraw it.

I withdraw it, Sir. We want to know what the Government is going to do about the Population Registration Act, and also about the legislation involving group areas, immorality, mixed marriages and separate amenities. They dare not go into the election without telling the South African public precisely what their intentions are with regard to those things. What sort of mentality does the hon. the Prime Minister have that he is so petrified that he is unable to tell South Africa what his platform will be? Are the Blacks, Coloureds and Indians lepers? Is that why the hon. the Prime Minister is not prepared, before this election, to say whether or not they will ever be full citizens of this country?

This brings me to the second issue, the insane proposition that in so-called White South Africa, in which there will be between 20 million and 25 million permanently urbanized, sophisticated, very frustrated and politically aware Blacks by the turn of the century—four out of five matriculants being Black, four out of five skilled workers being Black and the Black community earning more than the White community and also paying more tax than the White community—the Government in all seriousness can propose that these people have only town and city council participation, some undefined voice in a confederal State and that for them there will not be equal citizenship and a sharing of power and that they will not be able to participate in the political processes of the part of the country they live in. Is the Government seriously proposing that as a solution for South Africa? If that is what they are doing, they are declaring war on the Black communities in this country, who will never put up with a proposition of that nature. Finally, the hon. the Prime Minister said: “I shall not help to bring about a split in my party.” If the hon. the Prime Minister uses that as a prerequisite for change, it means there will be no fundamental change, because not even something as inoffensive as the abolition of the Immorality Act can pass that test.

Let us have clarity on one point during the coming elections: The hon. the Prime Minister is not “verlig” and will never bring about meaningful change. The hon. the Prime Minister is a stereotyped, weak, indecisive and traditionalist Nationalist leader, trapped by the obsession and confines of the apartheid ideology. He is held captive by his own lack of courage. This is a great misfortune for South Africa in this time of crisis for our country.

Mr. Speaker, having listened to the highly irresponsible tirade by the hon. member for Bryanston, I regret to say that I cannot associate myself with any part of it, except with his congratulations to the hon. member Dr. Odendaal, on his maiden speech.

Having listened to the hon. member for Bryanston and other members of the shadow Cabinets of the Opposition parties . . .

You are going to vote PFP!

… one is struck by the thought: Why is it that there is so little talent on that side of the House that they can only indulge in tirades, while there is so much talent on this side of the House? Why is it that one cannot find anything remotely resembling Prime Ministerial material on that side of the House, whereas this party has, over many years, never had any difficulty in finding Prime Ministers when the occasion demanded it? How is it that on that side of the House neither party has sufficient members to fill a single Cabinet, whereas on this side of the House there is sufficient talent to have several Cabinets consisting of talented members?

And a couple of trash cans!

I think that kind of remark is even unworthy of a party of so little significance as the NRP as was their criticism of the mini Budget. All they could do was to indulge in cheap sloganeering such as: “Vote now, pay later;” this Government is guilty of “fiscal terrorism” while the hon. the Leader of the NRP accused the Government of trying to bribe the electorate. That kind of criticism could possibly have been expected, but it really is not worthy even of those small and insignificant Opposition parties. They know very well that these increases for the Public Service and the teachers were promised long before it was decided to hold a general election. They know very well that the De Lange investigation was initiated long before a general election was mooted. They know very well that the Commission for Administration was investigating the whole situation long before a general election was mooted. Therefore the kind of cheap electioneering that those parties have been indulging in here impresses nobody, least of all the electorate. That is why those parties remain the size they are.

The hon. member for Durban Point once again waxed lyrical about the way in which he was going to win. This is the type of speech we are accustomed to as a presage to that party’s defeats. That is why, in spite of all the victory speeches, that party is the one that has become the smallest, starting out with ten members and ending up with eight. If that is the way in which they start their victory campaign, I must tell hon. members that they have started very badly in Benoni. On the Friday after the election was announced, the NRP placed an advertisement in the Benoni City Times inviting people to ring them to discuss the early election which they said would be held on 28 April. They could not even get the date right! They went on to say—

—“die Wit man”, Sir—

*There was no talk of the other population groups. It was the White man only. They of all people are now going to give the White man a worthy place at the table of Government! The White man in South Africa already knows that he does have a worthy, powerful and ruling place at the table of Government, and he has no intention to part with that place. Bearing that in mind he is quite prepared to grant other people on this sub-continent—which was never a country and only became one artificially in 1910 as a result of unpopular imperial intervention—the same things which he claims for himself.

What kind of “worthy” place will the NRP afford the White man? In their federal dispensation they want the White man to give up the sovereignty which he now enjoys for an autonomous non-sovereign federal component in the so-called “common area”. This is a very inferior place compared with the worthy place which the White man does have under the NP in South Africa and in fact which all the other peoples, those who became independent and those who are autonomous, have under the NP Government in South Africa.

Did you read the proposals we sent you last year?

By expecting the Whites to relinquish their sovereignty the PFP will only be able to offer the Whites in South Africa an even more inferior place at the table of Government because they make no provision for an ethnic component at all. That is in spite of the fact that their newspapers, the Rand Daily Mail and the Sunday Times, in the light of the Zimbabwian situation, maintained that some ethnic component or other is needed there, too, “because tribal conflict is a fact of life in Africa”.

†This tribal conflict is a fact of life in Africa in any “one man, one vote” powersharing dispensation, simply because Africans are no different from any other people in the world. They are exactly the same when it comes to group identity and the desire to govern oneself. The human race as a whole has shown over many centuries that it is morally incapable of sharing power fairly in a poly-ethnic situation. That is a fact of life which one has to take into account. One cannot try to rule the world as it ought to be; one has to rule it as it is. We are on earth, not in paradise, and all the utopian tirades that come from hon. members like the hon. member for Bryanston will not change that fact of life.

The hon. member for Durban Point and the hon. member for Yeoville may very well agree with this side of the House, and in fact do, that there is a total onslaught against this country. That is, however, not the case with other hon. members on that side of the House. There is a tendency with the other part of the clique in the PFP to try to lampoon and minimize the total onslaught against this country, which is why they use the total onslaught for all kinds of frivolous causes in their speeches and their Press. The Press talks about the total onslaught on the freedom of the Press, knowing full well that that is total nonsense.

Is it?

The hon. member for Constantia in his valedictory speech yesterday referred to a total onslaught on the parliamentary institutions. The hon. member for Orange Grove refers to a total onslaught on the environment in Natal. The hon. member for Sandton pooh-poohed and derided it even further by referring to it this afternoon as the “so-called total onslaught with which the Prime Minister is trying to bemuse the electorate in this country.” I can understand that hon. member’s attitude, having seen what he told the New York Times. Obviously, he does not particularly care whether a Marxist regime takes over in this country and whether the real total onslaught succeeds, even if a Marxist government coming to power in this country would be under the leadership of Nelson Mandela. By their own admission, the hon. members opposite have said they would invite Nelson Mandela to their national convention, Nelson Mandela who is not a political prisoner, as the outside world portrays him without any denials and even with the assistance of that party, but a convicted criminal sentenced to life imprisonment by an independent court of law in this country for acts of sabotage, attempted murder and treason. Therefore the electorate must take note that trying to minimize the total onslaught also endangers the supporters of that party in this country as much as it endangers everybody else in this country, be they Black, White or Brown. There is also a tendency among the parties outside the Government party to confuse the nature of the total onslaught. It is not a Black-White struggle. The Russian communists and Marxists who fight this country are White. The Cubans are Coloureds. The PAC, ANC, Swapo and other clients, satellites and proxies of Moscow are Blacks. Therefore it is essential in this country to create a dispensation in which White, Brown and Black anti-communists will join forces against White, Brown and Black communists.

That is what this election is all about. It is not only about a total onslaught but about the various ways in which people react to this total onslaught. One can react to it with faith or with anxiety. One can react to it with courage or with fear. One can react to it with consistency or with expediency. Talking about expediency and political morality, the PFP which has waxed so voluble this afternoon, of course, neither has any morality to sit in this House any longer nor any moral grounds to contest this election, because not only are Blacks not taking part in the election or sitting in this House but Coloureds and Indians are not taking part in it either. And since they have boycotted the President’s Council, which is an institution established by this Parliament, on the grounds that Blacks are not taking part, if they were consistent and moral in their political approach they would have to boycott all other similar institutions in this country.

Some people react in fear to the total onslaught. The splinter groups outside this Parliament, who are trying to get in, react with fear by expressing hatred for people of other colours and cowering in a corner like beasts at bay. That is a reaction of fear and hatred. By being fearful and hating people of other colours they help to drive those people into the opposing camp, into the Marxist camp, and therefore defeat the total strategy against the total onslaught to the detriment of this country. That course is suicidal. The other parties are equally fearful, i.e. those sitting in this House on the other side, and they react to this fear by capitulating in various ways.

That is why the NRP wants to surrender White sovereignty in this country to some form of federal power-sharing in the common area, although I do not quarrel at all with their confederal concept for the independent States which is the same as ours. The PFP wants to capitulate equally in a situation of universal adult suffrage in a federal dispensation which does not take the ethnic component into account at all. The basis of their philosophy is obviously: “Let us surrender to the Blacks now and they might be kind to us afterwards.” But the experiences of Whites with similar mentalities in Nairobi, Kenya, at the time of the Mau Mau, and in the Congo have shown that to be a very misguided approach because Blacks are realists, Blacks are good politicians, even though they may be poor administrators of their countries, and they see such people who adopt that attitude as people who can no longer be trusted by their own side, and therefore they do not see why they should trust those people either, once they have handed over. Those are the people who are always at the worst end of the stick when the capitulation comes.

This reaction of fear, both on the left and on the extreme right, attests to a lack of faith. Both the English and the Afrikaans-speaking people who came to this country: their whole history has been one of faith. Whether it started with Van Riebeeck or with the 1820 Settlers, they have always had faith in their destiny in this country, and South Africa still needs people of faith as represented by the NP. South Africa does not need people of fear, people of anxiety and people of little faith.

Mr. Speaker, I listened attentively to the hon. member for Benoni and I did my best to note down a few points on which the hon. member had laid special emphasis. However, he covered such a wide field that in the end he did not really make any contribution to the debate. [Interjections.] Of course, I just want to tell the voters of Benoni how pleased we are on this side of the House about the way they helped to remove the face of the hon. member for Benoni from the television screen. Now we no longer have to pay to look at him and listen to him. [Interjections.]

I actually want to talk about food and about agriculture, matters which have already been dealt with at some length during this debate. A sensitivity has been evident in this debate which proves irrefutably that the Government simply no longer knows how to handle the rising food prices. On the one hand, increases have been granted so that public servants may keep the wolf from the door. On the other hand, the hon. the Minister of Agriculture and the hon. the Minister of Industries, Commerce and Tourism have denied that there are any problems in the food industry in South Africa. In addition, they have also denied that there are any anomalies. In their inability to handle these problems, they have resorted to a tirade against the PFP. However, that is certainly not going to help them. Instead of trying to deal with the problems we have been pointing out, hon. members on the Government side have accused the PFP and its spokesmen of hating the farmers, of being unsympathetic towards the farmers, and in this way they have tried to discredit the PFP. However, it is clear why they have done so. For the first time it now seems to them that there are in fact constituencies in which farmers form the majority which are now beginning to be interested in the PFP. They are getting very nervous about these days. [Interjections.]

Why don’t you try in Graaff-Reinet?

Neither the consumers nor the farmers of South Africa will accept the NP any longer. They will now begin to judge the NP by its deeds. Let us consider the situation. [Interjections.] Under the NP regime—I have said this before in this House and I am saying it again—the return on capital invested in agriculture is the lowest of all industries in South Africa. I ask the hon. the Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries whether he wishes to deny that. Does he wish to deny it?

[Inaudible.]

No, but then the hon. the Deputy Minister should listen to me. Does he wish to deny it? [Interjections.] No, he obviously does not wish to deny it.

No, he cannot reply.

I say there are hundreds or perhaps even thousands of farmers who are leaving the land. I want to know whether the hon. the Deputy Minister denies this. Is it true or is it not?

No.

Under the NP regime it is true.

Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. member a question?

No, I do not have time at the moment. Under the NP regime, inputs have gone up more rapidly over the past few years than in any preceding period. Do those hon. members deny this, yes or no?

And the production?

Under the NP Government, the gap between the consumer price and the producer price has become larger than it has ever been since 1940. Does the hon. the Deputy Minister admit this, yes or no?

Who is responsible for that?

Yes, he admits it. They are the Government and they are responsible for it.

Do you want control?

Under this Government, neither the farmer nor the consumer is satisfied today.

Do you want control?

I shall reply to that.

†The public and the producers will agree with me that the single biggest contributor to the outrageous prices that we have to pay today is the massive system of monopolies that spreads like a cancer throughout most important segments of our food industry. In my view that is the major problem.

Are you asking for control?

Order! I cannot allow a discussion like this to be conducted across the floor of the House.

But I am only making my speech, Sir.

Mr. Speaker, may I put a question to the hon. member?

I have very little time. If I have a moment later I shall answer questions. Unless the hon. the Minister of Agriculture and the Minister of Industries, Commerce and Tourism accept what I have just said, they will never ever be able to come to terms and deal with this problem. There is one principle that hon. members on that side of the House must understand, and that is that the free-market system cannot work in an economy that is controlled and dominated by monopolies.

Hear, hear!

That is the key to the solution and those hon. members must please try to understand that.

Where are the monopolies?

Name them.

This Government has legislation empowering it to act against monopolies.

Where is the monopoly?

The Government has not, however, used those powers to do anything about it. In fact, it would appear as if this Government condones the formation of monopolies. One sometimes wonders whether this Government has a vested interest in the maintenance of such monopolies.

Of course it has.

Now wait a minute.

I now want to elaborate on the kind of monopoly I have been referring to. I want to refer specifically to the meat industry, and I know those hon. members are interested in this. I cannot allow this debate to pass without referring to it. The way in which the Meat Board has conducted its affairs in this country has allowed for the formation of massive cartels and monopolies which are exploiting both the prime producer and the consumer. That is the major inefficiency of the particular board I am talking about.

Go and tell that to the commission of inquiry.

The Minister of Industries, Commerce and Tourism, in his speech in this House yesterday, invited us to do so. I am saying it now in front of all the hon. members in the House. The major companies in the meat industry must be investigated. [Interjections.] These hon. members do not understand what we are talking about.

You do not know the head of an ox from its tail.

You are a meat-head, so you should understand.

It is the function of the Competition Board to investigate such organizations. If there is a suspicion of a monopolistic tendency or trend, it is their function and they should undertake such an investigation. In such circumstances the hon. the Minister of Industries, Commerce and Tourism has the right to instruct them to do so. Why has he not yet done so when the consumer organizations and we on this side of the House have asked for an investigation? I am not saying that members of the Meat Board have their hands in the petty cash. I do not believe it is so. I am not saying that they are dishonest people. What I am saying is that the way in which they conduct their affairs and do their job, together with the over-centralization of massive abattoirs which this country can scarcely afford, has led to this situation and that it must be investigated, and investigated at once.

It is being done.

There is no point in having an investigation into the meat industry . . .

Go and read the terms of reference of the Commission.

. . . without also investigating in depth those companies which I allege are monopolies and are acting like monopolies to the detriment of the entire community.

Mr. Speaker, I also wish to thank the hon. the Minister for, and congratulate him—and all those intimately involved—with the proposals he put forward yesterday. I think all of us must agree that they are quite unique in today’s world and a very special achievement.

I want to refer briefly to the heart of our problem in the context of this country. That is, firstly, the complexity of our community and, secondly, inflation, which today is a world-wide phenomenon. Everybody talks about inflation, about coping with inflation, eliminating it and controlling it. The fact of the matter remains that that is a pipe-dream. Inflation cannot be eliminated overnight and will not even be eliminated over a reasonably medium-term period. It is something that will have to be tackled on a global scale with the application of the severest disciplines, unless of course we press the button for a full-scale depression. However, I think there is hardly anyone in the world who would have the guts to do just that. We therefore have to face the reality of the people suffering through inflation.

Sir, I do not think it is right, in the context of morality, that people with fixed incomes, the teachers, policemen, nurses, clerks and civil servants but especially pensioners and those who have practised thrift all their lives and prudently invested, often in Government securities, banks and building societies, should carry the burden and should suffer most. On the other hand, it is also true—one has but to look at the headlines in the newspapers—that most businesses and many professions prosper during times of inflation and will continue to do so. I therefore consider it a duty, a duty on the part of the Government but also on the part of the Opposition, to do something about this very special problem. I believe we should find a formula with built-in features which would automatically alleviate the burden for these special groups of people, and that they should not be having to wait for special handouts such as we are very willing, through the hon. the Minister, to grant them from time to time.

Along this same line of reasoning there is an issue which perhaps we have not looked at boldly enough over a long period of time. You see, Sir, the Government could achieve a better situation with reference to housing in this country practically overnight by saying to business, and especially to big business: “You employ whom you want, where you want and as you want, but we shall prescribe for you minimum accommodation standards.” This is something to which I think consideration should be given as it would alleviate a large number of the problems we have to face today. It would be democratic and fair to all. In the same context, with due respect to both the Government and the Opposition, I do not think it is quite fair that those people who have saved money, have lived thriftily and who invested some of their money a long time ago in housing projects or apartments, should also be instrumental in carrying the burden, or subsidizing, if you wish, the alleviation of the burdens of those people who suffer with them through inflation.

Then we come to the heart of our tax system. Individuals, you and I, Sir, are taxed on gross income with very little reference to obligations and expenditure in earning that income. But businesses are taxed basically on net profits. Those showing a loss, and some of them show losses for years, pay practically no tax at all. I think that is wrong. I think those businesses enjoy the same protection of the State, the same benefits of the infrastructure of society, and many others. They should build into their plans for initiating and developing themselves provisions for that kind of situation. Therefore they should also pay their way as they go along. On top of that, our system is very costly to administer and almost impossible at times to monitor. So the very same principle that the hon. the Minister has applied, and most successfully, in the general sales tax system, could wholly or to some extent, perhaps, be introduced into our general taxation system. This is something which might bring surprising results.

Finally, I want to say that my past three years in this House have been a great and unique experience which I shall always treasure. I wish to thank all hon. members, all the staff and all those others involved for their helpfulness and friendship, and especially, Sir, I want to thank you.

Mr. Speaker, I move—

Agreed to.

Mr. Speaker, I move—

Agreed to.