Mr. Speaker, with your permission I should like to make the following statement:

Since the Post Office Budget will only be introduced on 16 March, and in view of the announcement last week by the hon. the Minister of State Administration and of Statistics of salary improvements in the Public Service, I take pleasure in announcing that the Post Office staff will receive salary adjustments from 1 April 1982. The details will shortly be conveyed to the staff by circular and I believe they will enjoy widespread general acceptance.

In the proposed tariff increases I announced earlier this year in order to give ample notice to commerce and industry, specific account was taken of the need for a general salary improvement in the coming financial year.

I should like to avail myself of this opportunity to convey my appreciation to the staff associations—I spoke to the management of the largest staff association yesterday—for their responsible conduct in the process of negotiating for salary improvements under difficult financial circumstances, and to the staff in general for their dedication and continued preparedness to work long hours in the country’s interests.

Mr. Speaker, I welcome the hon. the Minister’s announcement, but I should like to ask him what average increase employees of the Post Office will receive.

Mr. Speaker, I hope the hon. member will bear with me, but I should like to point out to him that there will be an appropriate stage at which this matter will be discussed. However, at this stage I can inform him that there are very sound reasons why I would not like to announce the average percentage in the House. We can discuss these reasons at another stage. I can also inform the hon. member that the management of the department’s Staff Association who had discussions with me yesterday, once again asked me, even pleaded with me, not to make known the average percentage of the increase.

The House proceeded to the consideration of private members’ business.

Mr. Speaker, I move—

This motion lends itself to a relatively wide-ranging discussion of the training of and training facilities for workers in the Republic of South Africa. Hon. members will note that this motion also refers to the training of non-citizens in South Africa and the training facilities available to them. However, this does not mean that I am asking that all training facilities be open to all or that we should now simply allow all our facilities to be swamped by non-citizens.

Actually, this motion casts the spotlight on an actual situation which exists at present. After all, it is the stated policy of this party that it commits itself—and its congresses have agreed to this—Jo the endeavour to bring about a constellation of States in Southern Africa. It would not be possible to try to base such a confederal system on the economy alone, while at the same time ignoring the labour situation. While the labour situation forms part of this concept, it is essential that training and training facilities should also form part of it.

The motion is therefore merely an effort to ask the Government to continue on its present path, viz. to create facilities to make training opportunities as accessible as possible to those workers who seek better and additional training. This idea of a broader structure of training is not a totally new principle. This motion is merely a request that the existing situation be developed with greater zeal and enthusiasm and perhaps on a better-planned scale. Why do I say that this is an existing practice? When one goes to the national Black States or to the homelands, one encounters a striking phenomenon and that is: Who trains their policemen? Who trains the people for their present services? Who is training the embryo of their Defence Force? It is then that one is proud of a place like Hammanskraal, where our policemen do training for Ciskei, Transkei, Venda and Bophuthatswana, or even Baviaanspoort, where our prison officers are trained for all those States. It is not my fault that these training centres happen to be situated in the Roodeplaat constituency, but one has to raise these matters from time to time. It is perhaps more basic training that is provided here, but perhaps I could also just refer to the more sophisticated and refined training which takes place, and here I just want to mention three bodies: The Roodeplaat research station, Onderstepoort and the Derdepoort radio station. Sophisticated training facilities for all these Southern African States are provided here. I am prepared to invite those hon. members who do not know how these things are done, to attend the next passing out parade at Hammanskraal. It is certainly worthwhile to see what those officers achieve in a period of six months with regard to the training and discipline of those people who come there from throughout Southern Africa.

So far I have only been referring to State bodies, but there are private entrepreneurs, too, that create training facilities and provide training in the international sphere. One cannot refer to these matters without immediately calling to mind the mining industry in South Africa. What the mining industry achieves in regard to training and retraining is phenomenal. Even the Oppen-heimer group, which is strongly represented in this House, can be proud of what is being done at the mines. The mines attract workers from all parts of Southern Africa, from various States, from various homelands and from various Black national States. At those training centres one finds people that have never seen a robot, that have never seen a lift, that have never seen a crane, but within two to three months one finds not only that they know what they are, but also that they are capable of handling them. Therefore I say that those people are really achieving something phenomenal.

I should like to state clearly that this motion is not intended to express criticism of those bodies which do provide training. Those bodies are prepared to plough money, time and profits back into training and training facilities. I also want hon. members to take cognizance of the fact that the State has accepted the challenge of taking on the lion’s share of the task of the training of officials, workers and employees. One need only refer to the S.A. Transport Services, the Department of Posts and Telecommunications, the Provincial Administrations and the Department of Manpower, and also corporations such as Escom, Sasol and Iscor, all of them bodies which train artisans and technicians year in and year out. Last year there were approximately 30 000 apprentices at one stage of training, while approximately 12 000 new apprentices entered into contracts. Of these, the S.A. Transport Services alone have taken almost 2 000. And now one asks oneself whether these Government bodies will not become overstaffed at some stage. Unfortunately this does not occur, because the moment these people are trained, qualified or semi-qualified, there are those who poach some of them. A former colleague of ours in this House, Mr. Jood Henning, proposed on one occasion that we give serious consideration to imposing a levy on those employers who have artisans or technicians in their employ, but who do not themselves provide training. This is perhaps an idea to which the hon. the Minister and the Manpower Board should give very serious consideration. The public and private sectors must co-operate with regard to this task, although the private sector is so quick to say: “Keep out of our way; do not interfere; you are spending too much money.” It is the express standpoint of the Government that we believe in private initiative. The Government believes in the stimulation of private initiative. However, what happens in practice? The moment one calls for tenders for the construction of a new road, or bridge, or similar major project, the private initiative load their tenders in order to buy the services of artisans, technicians and other professional people. This occurs because the private sector does not have full control over the situation. The private sector will have to regulate its affairs if it wants to share in development. If the public and private sectors want to co-operate in the process of development, then in the fat years they must together make provision for the lean years. The two sectors must not prey upon one another, but should rather supplement one another; then we should fare better.

There are 168 hours in a week. Driving through Goodwood recently, I tried to count all the churches, but there were too many. When I thought about this, it came as a shock to realize that the churches stand empty 165 out of 168 hours every week. What has this to do with a motion about training? A country like South Africa, which does not have unlimited reserves, must give very serious consideration to the utilization of its training facilities. We cannot afford a situation where a facility such as an expensive laboratory or an expensive building is utilized only 30% or 50% of the time. I know that I am now on sensitive ground. However, I want to request the hon. the Minister, the Director-General and other advisers to carry out an in-depth investigation into methods of utilizing the existing facilities in the most productive possible way without generating emotion or causing friction or labour unrest. Since we possess limited facilities we shall have to investigate methods—even in times such as these when we are on the threshold of a downward phase of the business cycle—of making timeous provision for future skills so that when an upswing occurs in the economy, the necessary artisans and technicians will be available.

We can talk about training and retraining in this House until we are blue in the face, but if the worker in South Africa, the ordinary employee, is not going to be prepared to make use of the facilities we make available, we are not going to get anywhere. It is pointless our building technikons and training schools if we cannot get the worker to attend them. Therefore in my opinion, a heavy responsibility rests on their trade unions of South Africa, in the secondary interests of their members, to forget about half-hour strikes, and rather encourage their members to improve their qualifications. Particularly in these modern times, the trade unions should rather accept that secondary obligation to ensure that these people do not only want to take, but will also be prepared to improve their qualifications.

This is very important, since our trade union movement is at the stage when it is entering a situation when one will have more and more trade unions which will perhaps be unsophisticated to a greater degree. I therefore think it is essential that that important obligation resting on the trade union leaders should be met.

I am convinced that we in South Africa can built a fine and prosperous Republic of South Africa to the extent that we progress and also that we can build a prosperous Southern African continent, but on this condition: We shall all have to be prepared to work harder and, in addition, improve our academic and training qualifications.

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great respect to the hon. member for Roodeplaat, and in the nature of the matter I find nothing in what he said to disagree with. I share his appreciation for what is being done about training by the Government departments, for example the South African Transport Services and the Postal Services.

I want to associate myself in particular with the point he made concerning the utilization of under-utilized buildings in South Africa. In fact, this matter was broached this morning, too, in one of the questions about school buildings standing empty. I am quite sure that we shall indeed have to give our earnest attention to this particular problem which the hon. member also singled out.

In the course of the debate this morning the hon. member for Walmer will deal with the issue of the increasing demands made by our economy in respect of skilled manpower.

The motion of the hon. member for Roodeplaat stands on two legs. In the first he expresses appreciation for what has been done in this field by the Government. It is true that the Government has taken many positive steps to meet the need for trained manpower in recent years. Major progress has indeed been made in this regard with reference to the recommendations of the Wiehahn Commission, the Riekert Commission, the National Manpower Commission and due to the work of the HSRC, the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council and similar bodies. It is certainly true that the bodies in question have made a considerable contribution towards acquainting South Africa with the need for training facilities for manpower and the needs of the economy. However, on this occasion I wish to emphasize more strongly that as far as manpower training is concerned, one man in particular deserves the appreciation of this House and of the entire country for his zeal in this regard. I refer to the hon. the Minister of Manpower.

Hear, hear!

However sound the reports of commissions may be, and however effectively they point out all the needs, if there is no one in the political field who has the will and the courage to grasp the nettle and effect the changes recommended by the commissions, their work is totally meaningless. In terms of my own analysis of what has happened over the past years, I am convinced that the hon. the Minister has done valuable work. That is not to say that everything he has done has necessarily gained my approval, or that there are not many things which ought still to be done, but in terms of the role he plays in politics, I am of the opinion that in the future, particularly with a view to future economic development, the country will surely profoundly appreciate the work he has done in recent years. I do not wish to elaborate on that further at this point, but shall merely repeat that I have great appreciation for the leadership displayed in this regard by the hon. the Minister.

Taking our future needs into account, it is very clear that there is an acute lack of proper training facilities for manpower in South Africa. Everyone concedes that the population increase alone during the next 20 to 40 years will require a tremendous expansion of employment opportunities in South Africa. I think it is conceded that we shall have to create at least a thousand employment opportunities per day for the next few decades.

Then, too, one calls to mind the demands that will be made on us due to the need for housing. According to the findings of the Viljoen Committee, 186 000 houses will have to be provided in the next few years for Blacks alone. Therefore, when we take cognizance of the demands which housing will make on semi-skilled and skilled labour, we realize what a tremendous task awaits us in this regard. Apart from that, there is an increasing degree of urbanization. It is widely recognized that before the end of the decade we shall probably be saddled with a total urban population of at least 18 million. Urbanization of these dimensions necessarily sets enormous demands, not only because these people, as city dwellers, have to be afforded opportunities for proper training, but also in terms of the larger needs that will be created by the presence of that urban population. The increasing demands of our consumer market should also be taken into account. Once again, in view of the tremendous growth that will occur among Blacks in the consumer market—and has indeed already occurred—this means that if we are fully to meet the demands of that consumer market we shall have to create sufficient training facilities so that our commerce, our industries and so on, can adequately provide for the needs of that consumer market, not only within South Africa but also in Southern Africa.

If we also consider the tremendous demands which social needs are going to make on us—whether in the field of education, health, social welfare or whatever—this means simply that we shall have to maintain a high economic growth rate in South Africa. If we want to maintain that high economic growth rate in South Africa, then this in turn necessitates our having to consider the large-scale training of people in this connection. Here I am not even referring to our needs as far as world trade are concerned, for example our balance of payments and other similar factors. I believe we all realize—the Government has indeed realized this—that our population is simply incapable—as far as numbers, too, are concerned—of meeting the requirements of growth in this country. This applies both to the State administration and to private life. We also realize that only by taking special steps, specifically with regard to the training of people of colour in our country, can we hope to maintain that growth rate, to create the necessary job opportunities and to meet the demands of the existing social needs. Indeed, an imbalance has developed—and this is conceded—in all spheres of life in South Africa in this connection. In the latest report of the Manpower Commission—Manpower 2000—this is very clearly stated. Even in the field of high-level manpower there is a total imbalance. I refer to page 2 of the report, on which Prof. Jan Sadie is quoted. It is apparent from this that the proportion of high-level manpower, as distributed among the four categories, is 28:10:5:1. Indeed, the report indicates that by the year 2000 the position will in fact deteriorate and that the relative figures will then be 45:26:5:1. The report goes on to indicate that those ratios in fact reflect a distorted relationship when we compare them with the position in every other developing country. The report puts it as follows, and I quote—

It goes on in this vein, but I am not going to quote any more from it.

However, it is conceded that an imbalance has indeed occurred in South Africa in this connection. Due to our unwillingness or our neglect—I want to let these two terms suffice for the time being—we have indeed neglected to take the necessary steps to meet the labour needs of South Africa in the past. In this regard it is obvious that the major need is the training of Blacks. In its report the Retief Commission furnished several interesting and very valuable facts. I just want to mention a few. Let us, for example, consider his recommendation on page 127 of the report. There it is stated that in South Africa there is an increasing demand for Black people who have undergone tertiary education. He adds that the White population group simply cannot continue to meet the need for a well-trained and economically active population. This is a basic finding which in my opinion is generally recognized today. I also refer to page 128 of the report of the “Komitee van Ondersoek na Universiteitsen Verwante Naskoolse Onderwys van Swartes in Blankegebied”, which states the following with reference to the various branches of industry—

Then, when we consider that job distribution among the various race groups, as mentioned in the above mentioned Relief report, one can only be shocked at the disproportion among the various groups in this regard.

On page 134 the commission states that in the year 1990 there will probably be a demand for at least 3,6 million skilled workers and that it is probable that only about 1½ million of the 2,26 economically active Whites will be available in this category. The other 2,1 million posts will have to be filled by people of colour. We could continue in this vein. I think it is generally conceded that there is a disproportion. Although I have conveyed my appreciation for the progress made over the past few years I just want to add that there is a question that must be asked when we seek to analyse this matter, and that question is: Why has this imbalance occurred and why is there an acute backlog at the moment as far as trained manpower is concerned?

What I am now going to say, I do not say by way of reproach, because in fact I want to make a different point in this connection. The point is simply that this side of the House, economists, academics and businessmen have in the past pointed out to the Government time and again that there must be a change in its approach and policy with regard to this matter. Let us now be honest with one another. For years those representations fell upon deaf ears. It is of course understandable why this was so because we were faced with a situation in which the approach to this problem was to a large extent determined by ideological considerations. Let us be honest and recognize that this was indeed so. Initially the approach adopted by many of us was that the Whites should do all the work and that we could not involve the Blacks in the economy, because they would threaten not only the economic, but also the political position of the Whites. For years we have been saddled with the problem that there has been a refusal to provide proper training facilities in the places where the Blacks have been concentrated and where training facilities should have been provided. Due to those ideological considerations, facilities were created in the Black areas. For years we refused to recognize the performance of the Blacks in the urban areas. Hon. members will recall that only three to four years ago reference was made in this House to the Black urban dwellers as “temporary sojourners”. It is due to all these factors as inherent aspects of the point of view and policy that these deficiencies occurred. And when I say this, I do not say it out of bitterness. What I do want to touch on in this connection is my own disappointment as to what I have experienced in this House, because one comes here with the hope that one will be able to participate in fruitful discussions, that there will be real receptiveness to positive statements and that when the obvious needs of the country demand it, we shall not in the first instance be led by purely party-political considerations. In this regard, since we often speak of the need to change the Westminster system, I do wish to ask whether the time has not come for us in this House to consider whether some other system cannot be found by means of which a more fruitful kind of debate can be conducted or contribution made by the Government and the Opposition. It was a really disappointing experience for me to find when I entered this House that due to the caucus system, due to the party-political system we have and due to other problems to do with those factors, the capacity to make effective contributions in this kind of atmosphere is really something exceptional. I do not know whether we should consider making greater use of the American committee system instead of our present system. I mention this precisely because this problem provides a typical example of changes which have been insisted on for years by this side of the House but which were time and again simply rejected by the majority party as unnecessary or undesirable. Therefore, while I express my appreciation for the steps taken by the Government, it is very clear that there are tremendous needs to be satisfied.

As far as the second leg of the motion of the hon. member for Roodeplaat is concerned, I concede the point immediately that South Africa ought clearly to continue with the training of people in the Black national States and in the independent areas. In all honesty, I wish to say that the use of the word “sub-continent” by the hon. member for Roodeplaat in this connection strikes me as somewhat odd. While independent territories have been created from our former homelands. I do not believe that the new conception has meant that because they are independent, they now constitute, together with us, a new sub-continent. Surely that is ridiculous. Moreover, as far as we are concerned, we have always recognized the fact that those territories certainly are and ought to remain part of the RSA.

You are missing the point. I am speaking about the wider context.

Once again the hon. member for Roodeplaat referred here to a confederal system. I must honestly say that I am getting a little tired of the use of this vague concept of a confederal system. Moreover, when one asks what the economic or political implications of a confederal system are, one does not get a reply. It is clear that we do not need a confederal system to grant economic aid to the people in the Black States and independent territories.

In this connection there are two points which I want to state clearly. We are so fond of saying that South Africa’s problems are ascribable to the fact that we have here a Third World together with a First World and that South Africa is a microcosm of the conflict between the Third World and the First World. This also applies to the North/South dichotomy. In all humility I want to say that although there is a certain degree of truth for South Africa in that dichotomy, it is not, in fact, entirely applicable. Nowhere in the dichotomy between the Third World and the First World do we find that, as in South Africa, the people of the Third World comprise an integral part of the society and the economy of the First World and that their contribution to the resources of the First World is in fact substantial. I do not believe that that distinction that is drawn in South Africa, is in all respects apposite.

In fact, this also applies to the whole problem of South Africa’s economic contribution—it relates to the whole issue of labour—to the development of the Black national States and the so-called independent States. One often hears it said: “See what a big contribution we make, e.g. per capita, in comparison with that of the UN and other bodies, to other states of the Third World.” That does not hold water, because in the first place those people are entitled to the aid South Africa can give them and, secondly, our ability to help them is, inter alia, due to the fact that those people themselves, through their work contribute financially and in this way enable us to do those things. Generally speaking, this does not apply to involvement of the Third World in the industrial countries of the First World.

In general, therefore, I can only say that I associate myself with the motion both in the appreciation I have conveyed and in the appeal we want to make to the Government to promote to an increasing extent and more rapidly than in the past—and also in terms of a total approach, as is evident from the report of the Relief Commission, the De Lange Commission and the report of the Manpower Commission—a total approach for training in all spheres to enable us to meet the manpower needs of our country.

Mr. Speaker, right at the outset I want to say that with regard to the first part of the speech by the hon. member who has just resumed his seat, I agree with him wholeheartedly. He made me think that the hon. the Minister of Manpower had achieved even greater success than I could have foreseen in my wildest expectations. One is grateful for the fact that there was a positive note at the beginning of his speech but it is typical of the Opposition that over the years they have always held hurled the reproach and accusation that this Government has been neglectful and remiss—those were the words he used—as regards setting to work in good time to train the people of colour in South Africa. That hon. member—who was surely with his predecessors in spirit but not physically—knows that the statements he makes are untrue. The hon. learned member who has just resumed his seat ought also to know that one cannot make of illiterates productive artisans and technicians. These people have to be provided with basic qualification requirements to make them truly trainable.

I now wish to quote him something—not something that I or this side of the House say but something said by two authoritative American academics who carried out a very thorough study of Africa and South Africa—

This is evidence furnished by objective observers in South Africa. If they had taken the really relevant date of 1948, when this Government came to power, these comparative figures would have been far more dramatic. I wish to repeat the statement that one cannot make of total illiterates, trained artisans and technicians. One has to begin at the beginning, and this is exactly what this Government has done. Surely it is general knowledge that a dramatic campaign of academic schooling of the Black people has been carried out over the past 30 years and that their numbers have increased from a mere few hundred thousand to more than 4 million. We have now reached the stage at which these people possess the qualifications enabling them to be trained, and we have now begun to do so. What the member wants is surely contradicted by other examples. For example, I call to mind the philosophy of President Abraham Lincoln who said that one could not permanently help people by doing more for them than what they were capable of doing for themselves. Surely this is a basic truth that one cannot overlook. If one wants to help people to help themselves one must train them, improve their skill and in this way enable them to help themselves.

The member also referred to the First and Third Worlds. Surely it is precisely the dilemma of the Third World of today that they have to try—and without success—to train their people, without the necessary basic qualifications, up to a level of skill at which they can be truly productive.

I also found it interesting—this aspect which is now being ridden to death—that there is a longing on the part of the Opposition to make greater contributions to the governing of South Africa. They never learn that one has to begin with the basics. One has to be in a position in which one can make contributions. One cannot theorize oneself into such a position, because one will get no further; the basic requirement, after all, is that one has to win the confidence of the voters.

I want to say a final word about the hon. member’s criticism of the confederal context which the hon. member for Roodeplaat discussed. He maintains it is a vague concept. Is it not vague to the Opposition because it does not imply Black majority rule, because it is just there that the difference lies between the confederal concept and the federal concept which they advocate? But I shall leave the hon. member at that.

I have already mentioned that there are basic facts which one dare not overlook. One of these is that one cannot permanently help people by doing more for them than what they are capable of doing for themselves.

In the light of that basic fact let us consider the circumstances surrounding us, viz. Africa and particularly Southern Africa. The hon. member said that we should have to provide more assistance to our national Black States and to the neighbouring States surrounding us, and I agree with him as far as that is concerned, but then we must determine beyond all doubt what the basic needs of these people and these countries are. That there are indeed needs is clearly reflected by statistical data at our disposal, inter alia, by the fact that there are plus minus 64 million unemployed people in Africa today, comprising 45% of the total work force. This is not only disturbing, but indeed shocking.

But let us look nearer home in Southern Africa, viz. South Africa, Lesotho, Botswana, Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mozambique, Angola. Although South Africa has 47% of the population of this region, the RSA provides 70% of the total gross national product and the RSA is responsible for 75% and 72% respectively of the imports and exports of this region. This implies beyond the shadow of a doubt that there is an acute lack of development and massive unemployment in Africa and in Southern Africa as well, although the situation here is far better because many of their people find job opportunity and a livelihood in South Africa and also because our infrastructure, for example our transport system, is responsible for the fact that the economies of these countries is still kept going. There is no doubt whatsoever on this score. The transport network of South Africa is the main artery which is still keeping South Africa going. The above implies, as the hon. member rightly said, that there is a tremendous need for development in Southern Africa and in the rest of Africa. The only factor which can help them in this emergency is trained people. Things can be rectified only by training people to play a productive and creative role in their economy. That need for training can only really be met by South Africa. The reason for this is obvious. We know South Africa and its problems, at the agricultural level and in all the other sectors of their economy. We know its people, their shortcomings, but also their potential. However, what is more important is that we do, after all, have a common interest in the development of Africa because together with them we are committed by fate to this conti nent. I do not say this out of megalomania or a sense of superiority, but because we do indeed need one another. After all, we are the natural workshop of Southern Africa and they are the natural market and sales area of South Africa.

Let us reduce the above to a few essential facts. Africa, and Southern Africa in particular, is the key provider of raw materials and minerals for the free world. But that is not so important. The most important fact is that this causes one to realize that Southern Africa has all the ingredients necessary to become a mighty industrial complex in this part of the continent. After all, we have all the minerals, including the most strategic ones. What is still more important, however, is that South Africa possesses more than 25% of the known uranium reserves in the world. This should be seen together with the fact that we are dependent for a mere 20% of our energy needs on imported oil. Due to our unique coal refinement process it will be possible before long to reduce that percentage to 10% or even less. This, together with the fact that since the oil shock of 1973 the world is still suffering from oily hallucinations, gives one an absolute recipe for unstoppable development and prosperity in South Africa if it is correctly used.

I wish to go further by saying that Southern Africa also has the necessary food which at present is for the most part produced in South Africa but what is important is that South Africa has an enormous unexploited production potential as far as food is concerned, and here I am speaking more specifically of the countries to the north of South Africa. If the potential is correctly used it could make of Southern Africa one of the biggest granaries in the world. Southern Africa also possesses significant hydro-electrical potential, and in view of the enormous escalation in energy costs on the one hand, and the low maintenance costs of hydro-electric power on the other, this potential is going to become increasingly important in the future. Southern Africa also has the human potential in terms of numbers, but as has already been indicated there is an acute and inhibiting shortage of trained people, in technological skills.

And it is here that the great challenge lies in respect of training for South Africa, initially in South Africa and our national States but in due course in the whole of Southern Africa to the extent that the constellation of Southern African States becomes a reality.

And I have no doubt that this will indeed occur because the increasing commercial traffic between the RSA and Southern Africa in spite of hysterical ideological noises indicates that economic realities are compelling the countries of Southern Africa to come together.

And this brings me to the essence of this motion. The Government has already accepted the challenge in respect of training. A training revolution is taking place in South Africa today. There is no doubt whatsoever about that. The vehicles for the successful implementation of the revolution already exist. They comprise the initiation, channelling and eventual co-ordination of training. As was correctly remarked earlier, the State cannot do all this alone. The Training Board, the Manpower Board, the Manpower Commission and Manpower 2000 are among the most important components of the infrastructure for this training process. The Manpower 2000 project has been so successful in creating a consciousness among the private sector in particular of the need for training that it has given this movement a dimension which compels informed observers to describe it from time to time as incredible.

I wish to make the statement that South Africa is fulfilling its calling in Southern Africa. And this brings me to an old truth, and that is that we in South Africa will not be able to sleep peacefully if our neighbours have no food to eat. But this brings me to a new truth and that is that we as White Africans—let us call ourselves that—neither can nor wish to escape the responsibility of being the guardian of the non-White Africans who inhabit this continent together with us. We are prepared to share our skills and our bread with them in an openhanded spirit so that we as well as they will have enough food to eat.

However, in this process there is an important task of education which we shall have to perform and hon. members who know Africa and its people will understand this. We shall have to bring home to the people of Southern Africa that training does not imply that only white-collar workers are created but that the essence of training is specifically that skills one acquires due to one’s intellectual powers must be such that they can be successfully paired with one’s own manual skills, because there is another basic truth as described in the Bible, viz. that a man diligent in his business shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men.

The hon. member for Sasolburg had his finger on the pulse when he said that famine and unemployment would be key factors in the maintenance of peace and prosperity in Southern Africa as well as on the rest of the African continent.

I thank the hon. member for Roodeplaat for the motion he introduced and the speech he delivered on that motion. Man’s ability to work, to earn a wage and to provide for the needs of his family is undoubtedly one of the most important factors affecting the standard of living of each individual.

†At the outset I want to say that I think we should return to an important point that was raised by the hon. member for Roodeplaat, viz.: Whose responsibility is it and what is the relationship between the State and private enterprise in ensuring the fulfilment of that particular directive? We in the NRP see the function of the State as one of anticipating the needs of the population and the economy, of encouraging private enterprise to undertake its training function and, of course, where necessary, of creating the infrastructure. However, we believe that the key responsibility of the State is to anticipate and to encourage private enterprise to fulfil the training needs of the country. The private enterprise sector consists of the action men, the ones at the interface, the coal face. The task of private enterprise is actually to implement the training programme. One can ask oneself: What is the present position at the moment in South Africa? Where do we stand in terms of the quantity of training and the quality of training? As far as the quantity of training is concerned, one could, of course, spend a great deal of time detailing specific institutions, vocational training, academic training—all the component parts that make up this complicated matrix of training in South Africa. I should therefore like to focus attention just briefly on the present position. What is the position regarding the self-sufficiency of labour across the total population spectrum, has the Government performed its task well to date and what are its priorities going to be for the future?

An examination of recent statistics—and, unfortunately, for a full year the available statistics only go up to 1980—reveals the following picture for the two-year period 1979 and 1980. The quantitative aspect of employment indicates a growth rate of 6% per annum—the number of people employed in the different sectors, excluding agriculture, increased by 6% per annum—whilst for the same period 1979/1980, total wages increased by 21%; this is the total wage bill in respect of commerce, mining and manufacturing, excluding agriculture but including the Public Service. However, the average wage per capita only increased by 12,6%. These three figures tell us the whole story of what is happening. This is the instrument which measures the amount of sufficiency and efficiency of training in South Africa. As I say, there was a 6% growth in the number of people employed, a 21% growth in salaries paid, gross salaries, and an increase of 12,6% obtained by the individual employee. This tells us something very interesting. In the first instance it tells us that the number of jobs we are creating is insufficient to meet the population growth. In the second instance, it tells us that inflation is ravaging our economy in South Africa and that real earnings per capita have in fact fallen slightly below the inflation rate. However, the horrific aspect of this picture is the massive increase in total wages paid—21,4%. This is in terms of rand value. However, for the same period, the economy or the GDP in rand value grew by 32%. What this tells us is that industry is mechanizing and, if industry is mechanizing at this rate in order to achieve that kind of output, we are heading for serious trouble in the future in terms of providing sufficient jobs. The hon. member Prof. Olivier mentioned earlier that we have at the moment to provide at least 1 000 jobs per day. Within a period of 20 years, because of population growth, we are going to have to find at least double that number of jobs per day in order to keep pace with population growth. This is where the hon. the Minister and the Government must be in a position to anticipate the needs of the population as well as the economy, and to strike a happy balance between those two. Mechanization alone is not going to meet the problem in South Africa. It may increase productivity due to the ravages of inflation on the producer, but will it fulfil the social aspirations of the population as a whole?

Here I should like to focus attention in particular on the impediments to fulfilling this request stated in the motion, the request that the Government should strive unceasingly towards achieving the best training and retraining of all workers. Implicit in this request is the provision of job opportunities. I should like to spend some time dealing with the impediments to the fulfilment of the stated objective in the motion. In the first instance let me say that the macro economic development will have to be a growth rate of at least 5,5% per annum if we are to be able to supply sufficient jobs just for the increase in the population. The growth rate itself will determine of course what opportunities or potential there could be.

We heard from the hon. the Minister of Finance the other day that the anticipated growth rate of the South African economy for the coming year is going to be less than that; it is going to be something in the region of just over 4%. Where are we going to find all the jobs for all the people? What are trade unions going to do about employment opportunities? Our trade union and industrial relations problems are in a large measure going to influence the success of the companies to expand and to provide job opportunities. Here in particular is a great challenge to provide industrial relations training for the people who for the first time are moving into the hazardous business or trade union movement and industrial relations. We should like to see the Government spend specific amount of energy and concentrated energy and money on trying to cope with the problem of training management and employee organization officers in the field of industrial relations.

We have to look at the shortages of skilled workers. The immediate shortage of skilled workers obviously influences the number of people that one can train. One skilled worker has four unskilled assistants; one skilled worker is required to train three or four apprentices. If we suddenly suffer a shortage of skilled workers, then of course it is going to be impossible to train the up and coming apprentices to the full extent which is required in South Africa. Perhaps more important than that are the consequences of educational drag in South Africa, a direct result, to a very large extent, of Government attitudes towards Black education in South Africa over the past 30 years. That educational drag is a very important impediment to further training in South Africa. The average Black adult in South Africa has four years’ formal school training; with the increasing mechanization and the increased technological development, how is it going to be possible to train a man with four years’ formal education to become a highly skilled worker, let alone a manager in a high-technology society? The educational drag is history, but the De Lange report indicates that there is hope for the future in this direction. It is nevertheless a very serious impediment to proper training in the industrial field in South Africa. I have on past occasions badgered and I shall continue to badger the hon. the Minister to pay specific attention to adult literacy training.

I have heard what the hon. the Minister of Education and Training is doing. He is providing some infrastructure, but he will have to pay more attention to the problem than just providing some infrastructure. I believe it is the responsibility of the hon. the Minister of Manpower to become deeply involved in producing sufficient infrastructure, facilities and incentives for greater adult literacy training in South Africa.

I now come to some other key impediments in the South African economy: The political structure which is an impediment to better productivity, better training and better job opportunities.

That, Sir, is the free mobility of labour. One can talk for ages about the free mobility of labour in South Africa and its effect on the individual and the economy. This is obviously quite a complicated matter, because the moment one talks about free mobility of labour where a man can offer his services at the best price that the employer is prepared to pay, then one gets genuine motivation on the part of the employee to work harder and to maximize his potential. But if a man is geographically bound to work in one area, I do not believe that we can make the best use of his potential. As soon as one considers free mobility of labour, one has to look at the influx laws, at the housing requirements and at the whole urbanization pattern and the problems that go with this, for this has a serious effect on the motivation of people to achieve their maximum potential.

We also have to look at the better utilization of female labour in South Africa. We have to look at adult training and adult retraining programmes in order to make the best use of our limited resources of skilled workers in South Africa. However, what in the final analysis is really going to provide additional momentum to the flywheel of prosperity in South Africa is going to be the achievement of a state of equal opportunity employment in this country. Many companies in South Africa have been encouraged by organizations, such as the South African Foundation, chambers of commerce, chambers of industries and various other non-Government bodies to adopt a practice of equal opportunity employment. That simply means that one employs on merit. The man or woman who can best do a job is offered the best wage and is given the opportunity. In this regard I believe the Government has a key role to play in setting the pace for the future. I say today that the Government is not an equal opportunity employer, and therein lies a challenge not only for the hon. the Minister of Manpower, but for the whole Cabinet and in particular the Minister of State Administration. That hon. Minister is in a magnificent position to provide equal opportunity on merit employment without detracting from the exploitation of the full potential of the White worker in South Africa. If we look at some of the figures that are available, we see that the Government Service plays a very important role in providing job opportunities and therefore training in South Africa. In 1979 the State, excluding one or two State bodies, employed 1 122 000 people, slightly over 10% of the total economically active in South Africa. That number only increased by 1,8% in 1980, to 1 143 000 people. This is, however, a very important employment sector in the South African economy. The Government has many different departments that can make excellent use of those people who do not have the formal education to be trained as artisans for instance but who may be able to be trained in semi-skilled jobs in State services. I should like to make a particular appeal to the hon. the Minister of Manpower to see what he can do to provide equal opportunity on merit within the Civil Service.

In order to put the Civil Service in perspective, I should just like to make a brief examination of what has happened in the rest of the employment sectors in South Africa. We note that the mining industry’s employment in 1979-’80 went up by 9%, whilst gross wages went up by 24%. The construction sector increased employment opportunities by 7%, whilst their gross wages went up by 22%. The manufacturing sector employed 10% more people at the end of 1980 than in 1979, whilst their total wage bill went up by 23%, and employment opportunities in commerce went up by 3%, whilst their total wage bill went up 7%. In comparison the Civil Service wage bill went up by 21% and its employment opportunity by 1,8%. What is interesting to note in this sector is where the locus of training lies. I should like to congratulate the hon. the Minister of Manpower on the initiative which he took in seeing to it that in-service training centres were available to members of all race groups, because that was a very important step in providing adequate training for skilled and semi-skilled workers in South Africa. I should like to put it to the hon. the Minister that that sort of direction, that sort of initiative, is what we require in South Africa. The mining industry has now had one of the major training impediments removed from it by the withdrawal of certain job reservation statutes. Again we should like to say to the hon. the Minister: “Congratulations. Well done”.

In South Africa there are in fact now virtually no job reservation statutes which present impediments to equal opportunity advancement. I believe that we have achieved a milestone in industrial relations by the removal of both job reservation impediments. In the construction industry, for instance, there are no further impediments. The Black Building Workers’ Act has been amended and we now have a magnificent opportunity in that sector of the industry of exercising equal opportunity employment practice. The manufacturing industry has complained for years about a shortage of skilled engineering artisans. Here again an important impediment has been removed, and in terms of the Wiehahn and Riekert Commissions’ recommendations, which we have put into practice, it is now possible to train any member of any race group for just about any engineering journeyman’s position. We do have trouble with certain trade unions, for instance, in the motor industry, where the craft union will as yet still not allow full intrusion of members of other race groups into their particular occupation. Right across the board, however, we find that the legislative impediments have been removed as far as labour and manpower are concerned, and for that South Africa has much to be grateful for. There are, however, still some other impediments which need to be looked at.

I should like to come back to where I originally began with my speech by saying to the hon. the Minister of Manpower that the responsibility of the State is to anticipate the requirements of both the population and the economy and to encourage others to do the right thing. Of course, the Government should practise what it preaches, and should also provide the infrastructure for better training.

If we want an evolutionary development in South Africa and not a revolutionary development, we must then undoubtedly look to that key factor which is so important for peace and prosperity in any country, let alone the developing countries. That is to give a man the opportunity of maximizing his potential and of developing the degree of self sufficiency which he has because that, in final analysis, is what gives a man dignity and self respect. If we could develop and maintain those two characteristics, I believe, we have a golden future ahead of us.

Mr. Speaker, I do not have much about to cross swords with the hon. member for Durban North. Regarding his accusation that the Government is not up to date as far as equal opportunities for all workers is concerned— and he tried to indicate this on the basis of certain figures—one could probably argue and speculate about what those figures actually indicate when one does an in-depth analysis.

Our country and its people—and we and even hon. members of the PFP take note of this with much appreciation—have shown phenomenal progress over the past few years with regard, in the first place, to the planning and implementation of machinery and instruments, arid in the second, to the acceptance of far-reaching legislation to make the positive training and retraining of the manpower of the Republic of South Africa ultimately possible. In the discussion of, and the planning for, the training and retraining of our manpower, there are at present a few problem areas which must always be kept in mind when judging the success or otherwise of the training schemes and planning in that regard.

In the first place, one must keep in mind that the South African manpower in fact consists of two large groups, namely, people of the so-called Third World, with their distinctive characteristics, desires and abilities, and people of the so-called First World, again with their special characteristics and abilities. This fact is strikingly borne out by figures. Of the total 1,9 million male Black workers in urban areas in 1970, 39,9% had no educational qualifications, while the educational qualifications of 82% were nil or below a std. VI qualification. In contrast, only 1,1% of White employees had no educational qualifications. Only 1,6% of the male Black workers in the urban areas had a std. X certificate or higher qualification, while 40,5% of the White workers could produce a std. X certificate or higher qualification. This is according to figures provided by Van der Merwe in his book Human researches and development in South Africa.

If we bear in mind that in 1970, 70,3% of the total work force was Black, with the low educational standard mentioned, we see the problems of training and retraining coming clearly to the fore. The low level of education must necessarily lead to lower productivity, but as far as training is concerned, it means increased training costs, since longer and more training periods are needed. As a result of this low level of education, we further have the phenomenon in our industries that the system of so-called screening in some cases and, “creaming” in others is applied in the training of workers. This means that only those with the highest educational qualifications are chosen for training because they train more easily, while they are not necessarily the people with the aptitude and ability to be trained.

It must, however, be emphasized at this stage that the school attendance figure among Blacks has increased tremendously over the past few years and that the number of pupils who passed std. VIII and std. X has more than doubled. The education profile of the Black work force must, in other words, continue to improve in years to come.

The second problem area which we have to deal with in the process of manpower training, concerns the fact that we must admit that the school lays the foundation on which further in-service training, or training for a specific task, must be built. In fact, I should like to assert that the school in all its phases—nursery, pre-primary, primary and secondary—is none other than an institution for manpower training. The training in and for the work situation is necessarily built on the quality, the nature and the degree of education of the individual, with a view to the further development of his aptitude and abilities. Here it is especially the nature of the level of education of the worker which creates major problems. Education in South Africa has up to now necessarily been academic by nature. Almost 80% of all White pupils at school are involved in this academic education, while according to Prof. Van der Stoep of Pretoria, 98% of Black pupils are involved in academic education. This educational list rightly asserts—I quote from Die Burger of 10 February 1982—

The requirement of the times we live in, is that our education must be more differentiated and career-orientated, i.e. more technical by nature.

This conclusion follows what Dr. Wouter de Vos Malan, former Superintendent General of Education in the Cape Province, stated as long ago as 1946 at a SATU congress in Stellenbosch.

The time in which it was necessary to use the slogan “Secondary Education for All” is passing over into a time in which a new slogan will be needed, namely “The Right Type of Education for Each”.

This was said as far back as 1946. In order to cater for the needs of the country’s industries and activities, it is imperative that the nature of education at school must change.

Here, however, the problem arises that Black pupils, for reasons which are of no consequence now, are averse to technical training. This is not a new phenomenon, however. As long ago as the 1850’s, Sir George Grey, Governor of the Cape Colony, granted a sum of money to promote technical education at the then Black mission schools. It was a total failure due to a lack of interest among the pupils. It is interesting that Dr. J. Stewart of the Lovedale College tells in his “valedictory address” of 1880 that the Black students conducted a debate on the subject: “Should the education of Native young men be chiefly industrial?” and that “On that occasion the majority voted in favour of education without industrial training”. Already in those years the said Dr. Stewart expresses himself strongly in favour of vocational education or “industrial tuition”, as it was then known, saying—

It is pleasing to be able to state that all the education departments are making a concerted and praiseworthy effort, in the light of changing circumstances in the country, to lay the education foundations in such a way, that the process of post-school training and retraining is facilitated to a large extent. In the light of the compelling need for manpower training in order to increase productivity, ensure growth and create job opportunities, it is, however, imperative that there be the greatest measure of co-ordination among the Departments of Manpower, National Education, Education and Training and in addition Internal Affairs, with regard to Coloured and Indian education. I wish to advocate that the National Training Council must and will play a major and decisive role in this regard as co-ordinator of the above-mentioned departments. South Africa can no longer afford education to be regarded as irrelevant in respect of the needs of our times. I wish to plead for a co-ordinated campaign of vocational guidance and for an intensive co-ordinated campaign of information, so that the change-over from school to post-school training can take place easily and with the least possible trouble and expense. Only by way of such collective action will we avent the situation arising in South Africa about which Mark Blaug, in World Population and Development says the following—

If we bear in mind that in 1981 the number of Black matriculation candidates was 49 918 and that this figure will grow to at least 65 000 in 1982, we realize that this is a real danger which is confronting us.

Finally, I wish to plead that in all our programmes of post-school training and retraining, in all the adjustments which we make in the nature of our education at school, it be borne in mind what the South African Teacher’s Union stated in a submission to the Commission of Enquiry into Technical and Professional Education in 1945—

The findings of the said commission link up with this beautifully—

1. (a) a greater sense of culture;
2. (b) a truer sense of real human values;
3. (c) a better chance of discovering the pupils’ abilities;
4. (d) a higher degree of technical knowledge and occupation proficiency; and
5. (e) more effective guidance in bridging the gap between school and work.

May we take into consideration these basic, urgent needs in all our training and retraining efforts.

Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt of the validity of the point raised by the hon. member for Kimberley North when he said that subsequent training is greatly facilitated if education has cleared the way for it.

Let me say at the outset of my speech that this is a sycophantic type of motion before the House, but it is nonetheless a pity that it is couched in terms that the official Opposition cannot possibly endorse, because there have been significant advances in the field of manpower training.

Let us consider for a moment the motion that is before the House. It falls into two parts. Firstly, we are asked to thank “the Government for its endeavours to create training opportunities for all workers in the Republic of South Africa” and secondly, to request “the Government to strive unceasingly towards achieving the best training and retraining of all the workers of South and Southern Africa in order to establish a contented and self-sufficient sub-continent”.

In respect of the first part of the motion hon. members on that side of the House are as aware as we are that there is no area where this Government has been so derelict than in the precise area covered by this motion. Why then thank the Government? One thanks people for endeavours, not necessarily because they have been successful—which those of the Government have manifestly not been—but also because they were self-sacrificing, well-executed or farsighted. I ask: Has this Government’s record been any of these things in the field of training? The further we go back, the more impossible does it become to subscribe to the belief that the Government—“endeavoured to create training opportunities for all workers in the Republic.” Indeed it has spent much of its time and money actively denying the bulk of the population training opportunities through measures like job reservation. Have we so soon forgotten that it was an offence for a Black man to be seen handling a spanner in a workshop? I remember very clearly when work was started on the Pretoria eastern bypass, the fuss, the bother and the storm that broke around our heads because we were using a Black to try to set out a culvert. Hon. members must not tell me that that was not so. Let us now consider only the last 10 years. The economic development programme for the period 1972 to 1977 stated—

The EDP for the 1974 to 1979 period stated—

Therefore I think that we can accept that for good reasons that is the type of real growth in the GDP that everyone was aiming at. It was necessary, if a large proportion of the 250 000 young Blacks coming annually onto the labour market were not to remain unemployed. A growth rate of 5% per annum would require an annual increase in the skilled labour component of the work force of 3,2%. What was happening to our production of skilled labour during this period? During the period 1972 to 1979 the total number of students of all races at technikons, technical colleges, technical institutions and those doing trade and vocational training moved up from 82 000 to 86 000. In other words, it was virtually static. The National Manpower Commission reports that in 1972 there were 11 363 registered apprentices. By 1979 this number had dropped to 10 500. The same report indicates that the number of apprentices attaining artisan status dropped from 8 800 in 1972 to 7 790 in 1980. Is this the proud achievement to which the hon. member for Roodeplaat wants us to pay tribute today? If a 5% growth rate in the GDP requires certain inputs, one of the most critical is an increase in the supply of skilled labour. Over the period 1970 to 1978 this grew at 1,8% per annum in the non-agricultural sector, against the requirement of nearly double this figure. Must we now record obsequious thanks to those, to quote Churchill, “who once were half awake and now are half ready”? We obviously cannot thank the Government because its endeavours have been successful and we cannot thank them by any stretch of the imagination because they were self-sacrificing. In that period the difference between the amounts spent on educating a White child and a Black child grew from R240 per annum to R460 per annum. Education and training are so intimately connected that they cannot be considered in isolation. Nor can the efforts of the Government in the field of training be considered to be efficient. The statistics that I have just given prove that quite clearly.

What about far-sightedness? Can the Government be said to have been far-sighted? The economic development programme from 1972 to 1977 seems to have adopted an almost cavalier disregard of the problem of ensuring an adequate skilled labour supply for the economy. The plan advocated a 5,75% growth rate and stated that this—

The actual growth rate achieved in the decade of 1970 to 1980 was 3,8%. God alone knows what would have happened if it had attained the projected growth rate. [Interjections.] I ask the serious-minded members on the other side of the House who worry like we do about the sterility of debate in the House, to remember that we on this side of the House did not propose this motion. The Government’s failure in the field of training is easily catalogued and easily substantiated, but the debate moves quickly from this area to a consideration of the reasons behind the failure. Why is it that intelligent people who obviously have the interest of their country at heart, fail in an area so critical to the economy and consequently also to the ability of our society to withstand the forces hostile to it, both beyond and inside our borders? I believe that all successful management of affairs must start with a viable policy. It does not matter how dedicated, loyal or efficient people are, if they are striving to implement a policy which cannot work, they will get into a deeper and deeper mess.

If one looks back at the decade, the minimum requirement in skilled labour was at 3,2% per annum increase each year. Whites, including immigrants, could provide only 47% of this requirement, other racial groups 10% and the remaining 43% was just not produced. During this time job reservation was very much a fact of life. Consequently, what rationale could there be for the establishment of expensive institutions of technical training? By the nature of things, civil servants are, like all employees, trained and forced to carry out the policies of those who control them. It would have made no logic for them to have pleaded for institutions like this when the policy of the Government at the time was specifically not to provide them.

Now, belatedly, we have come face to face with reality and we acknowledge that South Africa must maintain a growth rate of at least 5% per annum if large-scale unemployment and eventual political unrest are to be avoided. The truth that is dawning on us is that million Whites cannot supply the skilled labour, high-level manpower, entrepreneurs, civil servants or even politicians for a population that will be 40 million by the year 2000. We on this side of the House are not unsympathetic to the difficulties and problems that face any Government that is trying to sort out the type of situation we find ourselves in.

We are grateful that there have been valuable initiatives. That these have taken place over the last two years, nobody can dispute. I hope that these factors indicate that the great ice age is at last beginning to thaw. It is a great comfort to read in the report of the Manpower Commission for 1980 that—

This is really encouraging. Nobody can deny that legislation that was piloted through this House in a most impressive fashion by the hon. the Minister of Manpower last session was a move in the right direction. However, I do feel that this Government has so recently and so incompletely moved in the right direction in the field of training that it is almost unseemly for the hon. member for Roodeplaat to be calling for public acclaim for its record.

In this field I particularly want to mention the rebates and the incentives that are given to private enterprise for the training of workers. We have reached the situation now where if a private company does not take advantage of these opportunities, it is being derelict. There are tremendous opportunities that are available in this regard and it would be completely inexcusable not to make use of them.

In the second part of the motion, we are asked to support a request that the Government strive unceasingly towards achieving the best training and retraining of all the workers of South Africa and Southern Africa in order to establish a contented and self-sufficient labour force. This is so innocuous a statement that if this motion had contained only this provision we could probably quite easily have supported it. We would love to see the country striving in the direction suggested but would add a word or two of warning. The first word of warning could not be better put than by the hon. the Prime Minister himself who stated at the Good Hope Conference that—

The point is that when Blacks are trained to take their place in the economy, each according to his ability, we still have less than half a solution. We will have taught him what must be done but have we given him the motivation to do it? This motivation comes from the demand side of the economy. He wants a stake in the economy which initially he gets through his freehold house, he wants a place to spend his money, a respected position in his own country—the country where he works and not some Black municipality or township—he wants citizenship of that country and he wants participation in the decision-making processes of that country. These ambitions of the Blacks are not sinister. They are not part of the total onslaught. However, unless our total strategy involves the satisfaction of these ambitions they will become the most dangerous aspect of that total onslaught.

What does that have to do with the motion before you?

Mr. Speaker, if that hon. member cannot see the relationship between training and what I have just said, then he is beyond help. [Interjections.] Prof. De Lange has stated—

One could amplify this by saying that without a high economic growth rate and a non-discriminatory society, education is a disaster.

Mr. Speaker, we obviously cannot support this motion.

Mr. Speaker, although I listened very attentively to the hon. member for Walmer, I found very little that I could listen to. I have to restrain myself, but I think I should say that I have been put off my lunch completely! [Interjections.]

In regard to what the hon. member for Walmer had to say about training, one asks oneself whether he has ever endeavoured to undertake any training in his own organization. Surely the hon. member knows that training should be well motivated, well controlled and well planned. Over-training or bad-training can result in just about the most dangerous situation that any country or company could experience because false expectations are thereby created. By creating false expectations one comes face to face with the position of possibly causing grave industrial unrest. This Government has slowly but surely moved ahead in the training field, sometimes with big steps, as we have seen in the past. However, it has borne one thing in mind: That is that it must not create instability and industrial unrest in our country.

*I heard someone say that if one gives a man a fish he will return the next day and expect another. If one teaches that man how to catch a fish one is teaching him how to provide for himself in future and one need never give him a fish again. It is against the background of this story and scenario that I should like to participate—it is a great privilege for me—in the discussion of the motion of the hon. member for Roodeplaat.

In our country at present there is no shortage of people who are only too willing simply to take the fish when it is presented to them on a platter, but unfortunately there is a great shortage of people in our country who have learned to catch that fish themselves. We heard from previous speakers of the laudable efforts that the Government had made and was still making to make training programmes and facilities available to all workers of the RSA in every way possible. To that we must add the many major organizations that are also contributing their share in this regard.

While these laudable efforts are being made there are factors which are very negative and in many cases neutralize these good-efforts. I wish to isolate only three of these factors today and elucidate them further.

The first factor I wish to discuss is that group of employers and private organizations who do not themselves undertake any training of workers, White, Black or Coloured. I want to describe these people as economic and training saboteurs in our country. They are a group of people who sit back calmly and without turning a hair, skim off the cream of our trained workers who become available on our labour market. Their motivation is simply that they would rather use the funds that they would have spent on training to augment the salaries they pay their workers. In a specific case one individual told me that he preferred to use the few thousand rands that he would have had to spend on training an artisan to buy a motor vehicle and then pay that artisan a salary equivalent to what he would have earned elsewhere and he also gives him the motor vehicle. These are absolutely selfish people and they are economic saboteurs.

It is interesting to note—it is after all true—that in their view they are eventually reimbursed for the costs involved in purchasing and maintaining that motor vehicle in the form of tax concessions. Consequently such a person has no motivation to provide training for his workers himself.

These people boast that they have the advantage that when they buy such a worker, the worker is immediately 100% effective and that they do not therefore have to waste time with a semi- or partly trained worker. I say that these people are sly opportunists, selfish creatures who are sabotaging our country economically!

The unfortunate results of the actions of such organizations are that some other organizations, that try to help themselves by according a very high priority to training, eventually begin to wonder whether in the end is really worthwhile launching one’s own training programme.

There is one organization that knows only too well what it means to train people and then lose them. That organization is our own Public Service. Now I shall probably hear from those Opposition benches that we have to look at the salaries of the Public Servants. That is quite true, but I say that we should not bluff ourselves by saying that a massive increase is necessary to prevent the exodus from becoming greater. Let us be practical and realistic and admit once and for all that the private sector, however much we paid our Public Servants more than they are getting at the moment, would still see to it that they keep ahead of us as far as the salaries they pay are concerned. Because of the shortage of trained manpower a situation of labour inflation has arisen and the situation will only improve when more trained people are available. An improvement will by no means be brought about by excessive salary increases. Until such time as sufficient trained workers are available I am afraid that the labour vultures will continue to prey on the Government sector even until they have devoured the last of its entrails. In my opinion we have to start thinking seriously about the possibility of allowing private firms and the Public Service, if it is their wish, to enter into a contractual agreement with artisans and other professional people whom they have trained so that they have to remain in their employ for a number of years, as in the case of a scholarship student who has to work a few years for an organization that has seen him through university.

The second factor I wish to refer to is much more subtle. This is a factor which arises from practical rather than any other considerations, viz. the decline in training and the curtailment of training programmes during recessionary or levelling off periods in the economy. When times get hard, or when levelling off develops in the economy, most firms first of all look to their training efforts as a possible area for making cutbacks. When this problem is considered in the short term many companies unfortunately make the fatal mistake of immediately reducing their training programmes or curtailing them completely. Quite the opposite is what should actually happen, for surely history teaches us that after such a levelling-off phase the economy always returns to normal; in fact, there is often a subsequent upswing in the economy. It is in these very periods of levelling off that that training ought to be carefully and positively scrutinized and that those organizations ought to prepare themselves for the upswing that lies ahead. This is in fact the time when they should pay special attention to training workers in order to have sufficient trained people available when the upswing starts. We all know what argument is used during such periods of economic upswing, viz. that people cannot be spared to undergo training. Let us therefore allow some of our workers to be trained in periods when there is levelling off in the economy.

I should like to make an earnest appeal to our friends in the private sector not to allow motivations such as these to influence their planning for the future. They and the country as a whole, cannot afford it, not even in the current levelling-off phase. We shall need every available trained worker in future and if we take into consideration of what inestimable value it would be to us, it is a minor price to pay now, during the current poorer economic situation, to strengthen our training programme.

Business suspended at 12h45 and resumed at 14h15.

Afternoon Sitting

Mr. Speaker, just before business was suspended I pointed out that there were three factors which restricted the Government and private organizations in their efforts to create training facilities for all workers. The first was the many people who do not offer training in their various undertakings themselves and then batten on the State and other organizations. The second factor was the decline, and even total stagnation, of training during levelling-off periods in the economy.

This brings me to the third factor. We know that at the time of the previous election, and even now, an emotional outcry arose at what the Government was supposedly doing for people of colour, also as far as training was concerned, and how this would ostensibly endanger the future of the Whites. We know that we will never be able to satisfy everyone. However, those people must awake from their dream world once and for all. Or does this mean that training will be reserved only for people with white skins? Are these groups of people in our country afraid to compete with people of colour? What has become of those people who, in the course of history, even took on the mighty British Empire? Or have they perhaps fallen into such a false delusion of security that they can no longer understand the realities facing our country? Can such people not understand that we, as a handful of Whites, have no hope of increasing the strength and prosperity of this country, for their benefit too, unless we develop the potential of all our human resources in our country on a planned basis? Is it not possible for them to understand that there may be people of colour who also possess ten talents, as opposed to the one or two talents that I may possess? Is it also impossible for them to accept that in the hierarchy of a modern society a person with 10 talents may hold a more specialized position than a person who perhaps possesses only one talent, regardless of his race or colour?

For how long do these people think will our country be able to survive if we should look at our labour resources with such blinkers on? Fortunately this Government has the foresight to realize that we can write finis to our country and our nation if we do not provide training for all people. The handful of Whites in our country simply cannot continue to distribute fishes. No, all people have to be taught to catch their fish themselves. In any event I want to know what those few Whites who carry on in that way are afraid of. Why are they so afraid? Why are they not also prepared to seize with both hands the opportunity that the various retraining programmes in the Government as well as the private sector offers them? We are offering them the opportunity, but we really cannot force them to make use of it. Knowledge and technical skills become obsolete as our scientific knowledge increases. One simply has to keep up, or one will literally go under. One has to learn more, or one falls behind.

We simply have to demand from all Whites today that they participate in retraining programmes, and I wish to make an appeal to those people who join us in seizing these retraining opportunities that exist with both hands and co-operate with us, not only for our own future, but also for their future in this country. I request them to stop shouting and gesticulating from the sidelines and levelling emotional reprimands at the Government, but co-operate instead.

When I see the beautiful monuments to training which this Government has created in South Africa, it is with pleasure that I strongly support this motion of the hon. member for Roodeplaat.

Mr. Speaker, I think we will all agree that South Africa’s ability to create prosperity for all its people, in spite of all the opposition this country is experiencing, and its ability to bring about security for all its people—and this security also means that every person will feel he has a livelihood, that he has a place to work and that he is able to care for his family—is connected to the fact that the frustrations of millions of people who would otherwise have to be satisfied with their lot, are being removed. I also think that a country’s ability in this respect, in an era such as that in which South Africa finds itself at present, depends on the proper utilization of its particular opportunities. By particular opportunities I actually mean the opportunity to be able to convert so many resources to the advantage of this country. Today South Africa has so many opportunities to occupy a special position, not only in Africa but in the world as a whole, and, in the times in which we are living, to lead the way in so many fields. That ability depends of course on the best utilization and development of its most important resource, namely its human material, which must be developed to the highest levels so that the business and industrial sector, the professional sector and the economic sector all come into their own. I think this is an important goal, that can only be achieved if two conditions are met.

The first condition is that it also takes into account the economic and other goals of the country, and the second condition is that it must take into account the financial means at South Africa’s disposal. With this as my point of departure, I want to say at once that I have the greatest appreciation for and I want to express my thanks for this motion introduced here today by the hon. member for Roodeplaat. I also want to express my thanks for the discussion that followed and for the very good contributions made by both sides of this House. I want to express my thanks for the things that were said in those contributions. Unfortunately I must exclude the contribution of the hon. member for Walmer, but I shall not say anything further about him in this debate, because I have a few other things I want to say. However, I assure him I shall deal fittingly with his contribution on another occasion. That hon. member may as well listen to what I have to say, for he will then realize how wide of the mark he is, and how alien he is in the present day South African set-up.

The hon. member for Roodeplaat referred to what is already being done by way of training at all levels. The hon. member for Sasolburg made an excellent contribution on South Africa’s realization of the value of interdependence in the labour field and its contribution to that relationship. The hon. member for Kimberley North made an equally excellent contribution on the standards of the times. In his turn the hon. member for Stilfontein put his finger on certain defects, and in thanking him I want to associate myself with what he said, and I want to say that perhaps I shall also make certain observations in this regard during the course of this debate. In my opinion the hon. member Prof. Olivier and the hon. member for Durban North both tried very fairly and correctly to set out the actual situation.

However, I want to tell all members—including the two hon. members on the Opposition side—that I find it interesting that today we were able to speak so much more sensibly about these things than we were able to do two or three years ago, because during the past two years we have succeeded in learning so much more, we have been able to undertake so much more research and we have been able to gain so much more knowledge. Today we know that the position is so much better than it was two or three years ago, and that is why it is so much easier to arrange these matters and to make essential decisions.

In passing I should like to refer to a remark by the hon. member for Durban North. He spoke about the question of anticipation. The fact of the matter is that every two years manpower surveys are made and updated. The entire private sector is collaborating in this regard. The mere fact that the hon. member Prof. Olivier could quote authoritative figures here, is in fact an indication that we anticipate things and keep information up to date. Therefore we have reached the position where, if we want to act, we know what is involved. That is all I have to say about the remarks made by hon. members during this debate.

It is easy for us to say that we want to develop on the road ahead. Of course this is important. However, we must accept that there must be a policy in respect of certain things. Particularly in the times which the entire world is experiencing at present, no government will be able to prepare its manpower to perform a task unless it has certain goals in certain areas.

The first goal—this virtually goes without saying—is that the Government should have a policy that takes into account the needs of the times. It is no use having a policy based on a certain ideology or conditions that prevailed in the past. We must have a policy that is geared to the needs of today. If the policy is not realistic in the present time, things can go wrong. There was a time when, as regards policy, we thought somewhat different about the future, because we did not believe South Africa would develop to such an extent. However, at this juncture, the policy must take this into account.

The second important component of the policy we possess, if I may put it like that, and of our planning in the future, will have to be a framework within which we can act. I want to allege that this framework has been created during the past few years, a framework within which we can therefore operate and which takes into account the requirements of the present circumstances, and those we foresee will develop.

However, we must also have the policy instruments to implement what we want to do. I want to submit that we have recently created these instruments. We created a training development board and made it part of the national training legislation. In this way we did three things: The Government accepted the responsibility of assisting with training and to take the assistance it was already giving a step further; in the second place the necessary stimulus was given in this regard; and in the third place we are already engaged, in co-operation with other states in Southern Africa, both the independent states as well as those on their way to becoming independent, in building the necessary structures, and making contact in regard to training against the entire background of the realization of our interdependence in the sphere of labour as well. This has all taken place recently.

Since this has taken place, I think this would be an opportune moment for me to try to sketch in a few words what I believe the crux of the policy should be. I think one could say that the crux of the policy is to improve the skills, knowledge and ability of every worker in South Africa—I have said “every worker” and this could at the same time serve as a reply to the hon. members who raised this matter—to the highest possible level, bearing in mind his aptitude and interests.

In the past we had too many people who were incorrectly placed. We suffered a great loss in productivity because the wrong people were doing the wrong things in this country. I am therefore talking about selection of people so that they will do what they are supposed to do. This in itself is a tremendous task. It must also be carried out against the background of the economic needs and the capacity of the country. This is in fact the crux of our policy.

It must also be made clear that there has to be certain guidelines. It is no use merely having a policy. For a policy to succeed, the private sector, which is actually the main component in this regard, will have to have a sound understanding of it. The guidelines must be very clearly understood. If this does not happen we shall eventually be at cross-purposes when implementing what we have in mind.

I just want to summarize the few guidelines that have already been referred to. The first guideline is that training should be meaningful and productive.

Hon. members will ask me why I say this. I am saying this specifically because in the past we have training that was not meaningful. It did not fit in with the laws of economy either. This is a great failing in many parts of the world, and South Africa was also very much at fault in this specific regard in the past.

In the second place there is a guideline for the entire country: If we accept our responsibility for training we must remember that this cannot take place meaningfully unless employers and employees in South Africa also accept it and also do their bit. This is the reply to the remarks made by hon. members in this regard. What we have accomplished recently has been the co-operation of employers and employees on the large scale seen during the past year or two, as the hon. member Prof. Olivier mentioned, and in which regard I agree with him. Recently the private sector has climbed in, and without their contributions this specific development could not have taken place. I want to add to this that we must also remember that the golden rule also applies to training, namely that it cannot be brought about by coercion. We cannot compel people to cause themselves to be trained in certain fields. In other words, there must be co-operation.

In the fourth place the burden will have to be borne by everyone involved. While I am on the subject of distributing the burden I also want to reply to some other remarks that were made and say that it is not the responsibility of a government to carry the burden for training on its own. For many years we in South Africa have been saying that it is the responsibility of the State to develop people to the highest level by means of its education and training. However, once someone has chosen his profession and he enters the private sector, that major spectrum of training, including in-service training, is the responsibility of the private sector. I must add that in the past the private sector did not contribute its share. We tell each other this, we accept this from each other, and we also admit it among ourselves. This is one of the reasons why we lagged behind in this process of training in general. I therefore feel that these are the guidelines we can follow.

We can also take cognizance of legislation in this regard with great satisfaction, co-ordinating and consolidating legislation that has brought us a long way towards our goal and that the instrument to implement it, namely the National Training Board, is an excellent instrument for this purpose. The National Training Board is charged, in the first place, with advising the Government on everything that is happening in this field. Secondly it has been charged with accepting and maintaining certain executive responsibilities. The National Training Board has also been charged with examining the capabilities of the country. For this reason practical implementation is dependent on the National Training Board examining the utilization of people, buildings, equipment, funds and everything involved in this. What is more, the National Training Board must also shoulder the responsibility of examining the standardization of training in this country. In the past things went wrong; nothing was coordinated. This body must, in other words, ensure that places of training will be established and standardization of training will be maintained at a specific rate and will serve the best interests of the country. In the rapidly developing world in which we live and particularly with the rapid development in the field of technology, it is essential to ensure that the training methods applicable in South Africa keep pace with the requirements. What is more, the board is charged with ensuring that the knowledge arising from this, is rapidly, meaningfully and successfully transmitted.

In reply to what the hon. members also had to say in this connection, I want to tell the hon. member for Durban North, with reference to what he said, that we realize this full well and that we are in fact doing this. The fact of the matter is that we have made a great deal of progress in this field. Let me point out to hon. members what the State itself is doing in this regard. We have already discussed this here, and I shall only refer to it briefly.

The State has accepted the responsibility of training people who are older than the age at which apprentices usually commence their training. They are people who perhaps only discovered late in life what they really wanted to do. The hon. member for Walmer apparently does not really know what is going on, because he spoke a great deal of nonsense today. I should like to point out certain facts to the hon. member. Several years ago the Government decided to establish institutes for the training of White adults. There are such institutes at Westlake, in Kimberley and on the Witwatersrand. In spite of all the trouble the department took to establish the institutes, however, it could not find enough people to fill the institutes. Consequently two of the institutes had to be closed down. When I became the Minister of Labour I was requested to close down the institute at Westlake as well. At that stage this institute was almost empty. Yet through the necessary co-operation the private sector, and the contribution of the Manpower 2000 project, the institute at Westlake is now not only full, but is in fact overcrowded. At present we even have to consider buying extra apparatus and equipment in order to increase the capacity of the institution. We cannot wait four or five years longer. In the meantime two further institutions have been established. Consequently there has been a complete reversal of the trend. Whereas we had already closed down two institutions and almost a third, we trained 348 apprentices last year. This year we will train about 500 and the goal is to train 1 000 apprentices within the foreseeable future. A great deal has therefore already been done in this field.

A great deal has also been achieved in the field of the in-service training centre. We took over this programme in August 1980, in other words 18 months ago, and the eight in-training service centres have produced between 6 000 and 7 000 trained Black workers. Last year they produced 17 000 workers. At present we are well on the way to doubling this figure. We are also planning to establish satellite centres. Consequently there is tremendous development in this field. Two years ago there were 50 private in-service training centres as against 220 today. These centres offer almost 3 300 different courses. In this country at present 300 000 Blacks are involved in crash training programmes. Many of us do not realize how rapidly things are happening. Things are happening more rapidly than even we originally foresaw. There is strong momentum in this field. This is the responsibility which the State accepts. Therefore the hon. member for Walmer should not make such ridiculous statements in this House. One would think the hon. member was not living in South Africa.

There are possibilities for accelerating the training even further. This can be done by offering further incentives. There is already a whole series of incentives. I do not wish to go into this in detail, but merely wish to say that tax incentives have been offered, and business men are taking advantage of them on a large scale. It is an important fact that there are concessions in respect of people being trained by the private sector. This is a very important contribution. The Government is also training unemployed people and is making large amounts available for this purpose. The Government is also continuing to appoint advisers itself to help people with their own training programmes. These are all signs that we are not static in this field. Things are moving.

Having said this, I return to the question of the Act itself. In my opinion the fact that for the first time we have legislation that regiments or delimitates and indicates how we should proceed in future, has brought us a long way. I am very grateful that the Training Board now represents the entire spectrum of interested parties, the State and the private sector. When I speak of the private sector, I include both employers and employees. The Training Board is charged, as I have already mentioned, with providing advice and even with taking the initiative. For example, the Training Board was told that it had to investigate all practical circumstances and establish whether it was still advisable for us to spend millions of rands every year on building large new structures such as colleges and training centres. We have to spend large sums of money, but also have to wait a few years before there is any return. Should we not perhaps do things the other way round? Should we not rather seek out unutilized capacity in South Africa, for then all that might be needed to rectify the situation would be a few tins of paint. The following is an example of this: In Kasselsvlei we established a training centre for adult Coloureds. Instead of building a place which would have taken four or five years to construct and cost a few million rands, we used a factory and I have been informed that it was possible to convert the entire factory into a training centre for R160 000.

The Training Board was charged, in collaboration with the mining industry, various Government departments and industries in South Africa, with ascertaining what could be converted into facilities so that we could create new capacity overnight. I am in favour of our not making training in this country so expensive. I believe a great deal of our training and education is too expensive for people to be able to afford it. If we can get this kind of co-operation, the rate of progress will be accelerated and everyone will be able to contribute. In this way we shall be able to do these things meaningfully and at a feu greater rate than in the past.

There is another factor which also crops up in South Africa, namely the factor of development and of venturing into new fields. I am going to give an example of such a field, and this is where the electronic industry enters the picture. A few years ago no one in South Africa needed to train a single person in this industry, but overnight a need arose. I am referring to this example because I want to react to the arguments of the hon. member Prof. Olivier that we should have done many of these things long ago. I agree with him to a certain extent, but now one has the problem that in a rapidly developing South Africa things suddenly have to be done that have never been done before and there are no people available. It is of no avail asking why a previous Government did not train people. The previous Government did not train the people because there was no need for such people. In this regard I am thinking of the welding needed at the new Sasol. Specialized welding has to be done there for which we have never trained welders. It was only when we began to erect the new Sasol that we found we needed such people. Once the new Sasol has been built, it is more than likely that we shall only need such people again when the fourth Sasol is built.

It is therefore difficult always to know how one must keep abreast of developments. No other country has experienced the development we have gone through. Other industrial countries developed from a wide background over a long period; South Africa did not. Overnight we have been forced into directions we never foresaw. In part this is because we are in the position that we can be cut off from our supplies. Therefore, when we speak of preparation, we must remember that it is sometimes difficult to keep abreast. What we must do is to keep up.

I am returning to what the hon. member for Stilfontein said when I say that on this occasion I also want to express my disappointment concerning a few matters. We do not always get the help we expect from the private sector. I can give an example in this regard. We are training people at Westlake. The State trains them for a year and after they are trained the private sector must also help for a year or two so that they can receive the practical training. The undertaking at which that person receives his practical training, can retain that person in its service or make him available for another undertaking. They are also paid for the time that they are being trained there. Do hon. members realize what problems we are experiencing? We are training them, but a large number of employers do not want to take them further. We must literally beg them to make facilities available. In my opinion, this is selfish and not in the spirit in which we should try to do these things, and I shall discuss this with the private sector at a more appropriate time because it is not fair for them to act in this way.

I now want to touch on a second matter in connection with the training of people and preparation for the future. We are offering tax deductions for this, but a large section of the private sector is misusing these deductions. They are not interested in what the training involves, but they are interested in the tax deduction. There are several examples of this. For example, training costs are loaded to a considerable extent. When we introduced this incentive, training costs in the private sector rose overnight almost, by as much as 200% in many cases. If we are to be honest in our dealings with one another, not only the State, but others must also do their duty. If others point a finger at us in this connection, I can point one back. I feel at liberty to say this here in the House because I have discussed this with businessmen and we are taking the matter further. We cannot allow certain people to misuse the incentives offered by the State to fill their own pockets, instead of using the money to train their workmen. If we therefore accept responsibility and see eye to eye in this regard, I feel we shall make progress.

In connection with what the hon. member for Sasolburg, who discussed co-operation and interdependence had to say I want to point out that there is a basis of co-operation between South Africa and quite a number of our neighbouring States. We feel that technology and training are export products of South Africa and a contribution we will be able to make in future. In our opinion we have the knowledge and we can share that knowledge. If we are able to make a contribution in this field, we shall probably be creating an easy springboard to enable neighbouring States to get off the ground. They may have everything, but if they do not have the necessary knowledge, they will not be able to get their projects off the ground. In addition there are multilateral agreements and a multilateral committee on which not only South Africa, but quite a number of our neighbouring countries are involved. In addition this committee also has specialized committees to deal with matters at tertiary and university level and also at training level, and we trust we shall be able to make a contribution in future. In addition agreements have recently been arrived at to the effect that the in-service training of apprentices trained in other countries will be recognized for tax concessions. In this way we are trying to get things done, and I feel that the discussions now under way and those that will follow in the near future, will take these activities further. I hope that we shall soon be able to reach an agreement so that we in Southern Africa shall be able to co-operate with each other on more levels and shall be able to help each other in future.

We have made great progress as a result of what has already been done, and what must still be done will take us even further. But then the private sector should not merely complain and kick up a fuss, but should also do something. I feel myself at liberty to believe that they will in fact do something. There is great appreciation for a large number of prominent organizations in the private sector that are contributing their share, and here I am referring to those the hon. member for Stilfontein also mentioned.

I think we shall understand each other better against this background, and in the light and the spirit of today’s discussion, we intend to do a great deal more in this connection in future. The platform this House affords us, gives us the opportunity to report back from time to time and to submit plans of intended progress on the road ahead.

In my opinion this was a good and fruitful discussion and I thank hon. members for their contribution.

Mr. Speaker, with thanks and appreciation to the hon. the Minister for his clear exposition which followed this private motion, and with appreciation to the hon. members on both sides of the House who took part I wish to say that at one stage I wanted to put a question to the hon. the Minister. I wanted to ask the hon. the Minister if he could give me a good Afrikaans translation for the word savage. However, I restrained myself.

With these few words, with the leave of the House I withdraw the motion.

With leave, motion withdrawn.

Mr. Speaker, I move the motion standing in my name on the Order Paper, as follows—

1. (1) there is adequate protection for the public against abuse, harassment and exploitation;
2. (2) there is special protection and assistance for the aged, the infirm and others in need;
3. (3) the cost of providing such protection and assistance is borne by the State; and
4. (4) there are appropriate incentives to encourage the private sector to build more accommodation for the middle and lower income group residents in our cities.

Therefore, Sir, this motion calls for an inquiry and focuses that inquiry upon these four areas. The reason for my moving this motion is because I believe that once again this House must consider the plight of tens of thousands of people living in the flat-lands of our city who for a variety of reasons are living in a state of insecurity and of personal concern. Secondly, I want to say that the problems of today, as we perceive them, are going to mushroom into a housing crisis of dramatic proportions within the next few years unless this Government takes positive, constructive and corrective measures in this regard.

Who are these people in the main? What is the profile of these people who we are discussing? Many of these people are senior citizens, many of them are pensioners and many have retired from active employment. Many of them are widows or widowers, divorcees or other people whose insecurity is aggravated by a sense of loneliness. Others again are ill or handicapped and others again are just run-of-the-mill city South Africans often battling to make ends meet financially and who want no more than security and shelter for themselves and their families. These are the people we are talking about— the ordinary South Africans living in the built-up areas of the cities of South Africa.

One also asks oneself: What is the nature of the concern of these people in this field? Their primary concern, Sir, is to have a place where they can live with a sense of security. It is more than just having a shelter or a roof over their heads. It must be somewhere where they can keep their personal belongings. Even more than this, there must be this basic sense of security: They want a place with which they can identify. There is a fundamental difference between a house and a home. They want a home, a place with which they can identify, because a home for each individual is the centre of his world. This is what they are looking for in the crowded complexes of our cities in South Africa. None of us in this House, especially the Government, should at any time under-estimate the emotional content and the psychological importance of this to each individual—to have this small piece of territory which they perceive as their home. This emotional and psychological importance becomes greater as people become older because, if they do not have the supportive presence of a family, or for some other reason, they become physically or financially insecure. Therefore, this sense of insecurity starts pervading this older generation of people, people who do not have a family supporting them or whose financial position is insecure.

What causes this anxiety at the present time in the flat-land areas of South Africa among the middle to lower income group and more particularly among the older, lonelier people? The sense of security of these people is affected in two ways. The first of these is simply the non-availability of suitable accommodation—the simple fact that there is not a flat available for them.

There is a lack of accommodation. One can go into the figures, but the hon. the Minister knows already. For reasons that can be pointed out the number of dwelling units available for this type of person in the cities of South Africa has dropped at a staggering rate over the past few years, and there are just not enough units of accommodation. People simply cannot find a place to live. Secondly, it is not within their means. There is accommodation but people find that when they knock on a door and ask for that accommodation it is beyond their means and they cannot afford it. Thirdly, it is not related to their financial circumstances. One can have a flat if one buys it. One can have a flat if one can buy it for R20 000, R30 000, R40 000, and even as much as R60 000. The older person, the individual person who does not have access to capital, however, does not want that kind of accommodation. That person wants accommodation which he can rent, and not that kind of expensive accommodation.

We are talking about people in the main who have a problem because of a lack of suitable accommodation. Secondly, there may be accommodation provided in terms of the Housing Act or other legislation, but which is not appropriately located. One cannot simply ignore the question of the location of accommodation. In the urban areas there are people who have lived all their lives in a particular environment, in a particular community. They have become part of the church or the school or whatever other social institutions there are in that particular area. It is not easy to tell people that there is accommodation for them but that they have to go and find it a long way away from the community of which they have become a part. So the question of the location of accommodation, together with other factors such as transport, shopping and other amenities, accommodation which takes into account the state of health of the individual, becomes a very important factor in affecting such an individual’s sense of security.

Then there are also those who at this moment have accommodation. They at least have accommodation but many of them, for a variety of reasons, feel threatened. They feel threatened that they are going to lose their existing accommodation. They feel that there is an element of harassment. They feel that they are not welcome in the particular block of flats in which they may be living. There may be a measure of legalistic protection for them but nevertheless they may not know how long this is going to last, and they fear the future. Even people who are not economically or physically strong have to contend now with a sense of insecurity. They have accommodation but they do not know how long it is going to last.

One can also ask why it is, in a society which claims that it is committed to free enterprise, that housing should not simply be allowed to be regulated by the ordinary market forces of supply and demand. This is what one hears very often from the so-called big lobbyists—let the ordinary forces of supply and demand regulate the housing situation and there will be no problem. We believe that the market forces should be the dominant regulatory forces in the field of economic housing. Having said that, however, let me add two absolutely fundamental provisos. That is that, market forces or not, the State has a direct responsibility to assist and protect the aged, the infirm and the economically weak. That is a responsibility which transcends economic theories or market forces.

Secondly, even in a free market force society the State has a responsibility to protect all sectors of the community from exploitation and harassment. Those are serious and important qualifications against the background of a general belief in the value of the free market system.

Why then is it especially necessary, in respect of multi-unit housing, to have special protections, special mechanisms, so that the State can fulfil its responsibility? The fact is that multi-unit housing in the cities provides for a high proportion of people who are aged or infirm or otherwise physically weak. That is the very nature of people who would tend to gravitate to the flatlands of the cities in these circumstances. One can go to the flatlands, especially the older flat-lands, to find the older people, the widowers, divorcees, the lonely people. These are the places where they tend to go in their particular circumstances. So it becomes especially important that flat-lands should be seen as places which give succour and support to this sector of our community.

Furthermore, a greater proportion of letting units occurs in a multi-unit type of building than is the case in the single residential unit type of building. In single residential unit types of building each man is the king of his own castle. He owns his own home. That is the nature of single unit residences—a low proportion of letting and a high proportion of personal ownership. When one goes into a flat-land it is the reverse. A considerable number of people are not kings in their own castle. They have a relationship with a landlord and they are subject to this relationship, which means that they lack a certain degree of independence. Therefore their insecurity is greater. Thirdly the fact is that in very many instances the relevant economic bargaining power of the small tenant and the big company owning the block of flats is heavily loaded in favour of the company and against the individual tenant. That is simply the reality of the situation. The owner normally has financial resources. He has agents and he can get legal advice. Let us take, for example, a simple rent board hearing. Let us presuppose costs of R100 in getting legal advice. In the case of the individual tenant it will be after-tax income that he is spending. What it would cost the individual tenant, in reality, would be closer to R130 or R140 of his after-tax income to pay for that. The company, however, uses its pre-tax income and records it as an expense. So in fact it only costs the company R58 in pre-tax income. That is the actual situation. I am not complaining. I am simply pointing out the problem. I am just pointing to the fact that there is this imbalance in bargaining power.

There is, however, a further imbalance. For the individual to lose his flat by eviction means that he is losing a home. The company that loses the tenant, however, simply has a flat empty and loses one month’s rental. That is the difference. For the individual it is a traumatic experience of insecurity, as opposed to a momentary experience of financial loss on the part of the company. I think we have to accept that there is this imbalance and that it causes tensions and problems. In other countries there have also been attempts to overcome these problems.

There are three pieces of legislation, the Rents Act, the Sectional Titles Act and the Share Blocks Control Act that attempt, in one way or another, to provide certain protection and assistance, by way of certain regulatory processes, for people living in the flatlands of South Africa. I want to look at these three Acts to see to what extent they are effective and to what extent they provide what we believe to be the necessary and desirable goals.

Let me refer, first of all, to the Share Blocks Control Act. I want to say very little about the workings of this Act. It has been in operation for some time. In a sense it provided a reasonable and workable stop-gap prior to the introduction of sectional title. Although it is still there, and is still being used, in the main share-block schemes have their snags. There is, however, a shift away from the share-block system towards the sectional title scheme. I think that some of the problems of operating share-blocks have been ironed out and that there has been legislation to cover the loopholes and to give people more financial security.

Let me now move to the Sectional Titles Act. We on this side of the House favour the concept of sectional title. We are, in fact, totally committed to the concept of home-ownership. We believe that home-ownership should be developed and extended as rapidly as possible to all sections of the community. We are not carping about sectional title. We believe that the concept of bringing home-ownership to individuals in the flatlands was and is an important concept and we support it as a matter of principle because we believe that it gives people security of tenure. It gives them the best protection they can get against the ravages of inflation and allows individuals in the flatlands, as well as those in the suburbs, to build up capital against the declining value of the rand. Even in an endeavour to take an objective view, I find myself having to criticize the Government by saying that the Government has not been mindful of the social and human problems that were bound to result from a too rapid swing from rented accommodation to sectional title accommodation. The hon. the Deputy Minister has, in the short period during which he has held this portfolio, learned of the problems that have arisen because the Government was not aware—or did not want to be aware—of the problems of a too rapid shift from rented accommodation to sectional title accommodation. I want to deal with this, because one cannot divorce the conversion to sectional title from rent control and its partial abolition.

Let us now look at rent control. It is a legacy of the Rents Act of 1950 which, in turn, was a legacy from the War Measures Act of 1940. It goes back a long time. We have said, time and time again, that we accept that it bristles with anomalies. One can find so many anomalies that one could spend a whole afternoon talking solely about the anomalies in this Act. While this was accepted for 40 years as a system, while for 40 years people understood this as a certain means of operating in the flatland areas, the Government once again ignored the inevitable social and personal dislocation which would result from a too rapid decontrol or from removing certain elements of control and retaining others. So the Government failed to provide an alternative form of protection or assistance. When it abolished rent control it did not say what it was going to do to deal with the damaging side-effects and to give the assistance which had been available to people under rent control.

Finally, the Government failed to give incentives to the private sector to come back into the flat-building field. The flats in the cities were not built by the Government. They were built by private enterprise. We have to ask ourselves why flats are not being built today. Why are virtually the only flats being built in the cities those being built on the basis of sectional title? Flow many flats are being built in the cities of South Africa today for the individual whose circumstances require that he should live in rented property? As the hon. the Deputy Minister will know, there are very, very few indeed being built.

These, then, have been the problems. There was a rush into the field of sectional titles. The Government encouraged it and got rid of rent control. Thank goodness, last year it grasped the situation, followed the advice of the Opposition and reimposed an element of control over sectional-title development. The hon. the Minister actually went so far as to reverse his policy of decontrol. This is a good thing in the sense that it has taken the pot off the boil. It has, however, added to the general confusion. I think the hon. the Deputy Minister must tell us whether at the moment the Government is committed to decontrol or whether it is committed not to decontrol. The Government, through the hon. the Minister, has said: “We stand committed to the principle of decontrol, but we are not going to apply it”. I think this actually amounts to having the worst of both worlds, because it creates an element of uncertainty both as far as the tenant is concerned and as far as the landlord is concerned.

Having said all that, let us look at what protection, if one wants to use that word, there is available to people under the present Rents Act. The present Rents Act does not give protection to the general public against harassment or exploitation. It is not an Act geared to the general public. It is limited to a certain number of people. So there is no protection for the general public against exploitation and harassment. Secondly, the legislation does not give special protection or assistance to the ailing or the needy unless these people happen to be living in rent-controlled property and continue to occupy it. For the people who do not live in the 4% of apartments that are covered by rent control there is no protection. There is no protection for the general public and there is now no direct assistance or protection for the aged and the weaker people in the community. That is the situation. Rent control only applies to tenants who live in flats built before 21 October 1949.

1966.

No, it only applies to people who live in flats built prior to 21 October 1949 or to those people who up to 1966 lived in flats which were decontrolled and who qualified for assistance and continued to live there. For the rest, for the people coming on to the market now—we have been dealing with the past situation— rent control these days does not apply.

Must it be extended?

I am talking of the realities. I am arguing the case of what elements of protection and assistance should be extended. I am pointing to the defects in the present system.

The Government, therefore, gives protection and financial assistance in the form of controlled rentals to many people who do not need it while it denies protection and financial assistance to many people who need it desperately. The qualification for living in a rent-controlled property has nothing to do with one’s circumstances. It happens to depend on whether one is there. So the Government is in fact giving protection and assistance to many people who do not need it and it is denying it to people who do desperately need it.

That is the first point. Secondly, by allowing rent control to continue with regard to people with incomes of less than R650 per couple or R360 per individual, the Government admits that these people are deserving of protection. They admit that they are deserving of assistance. Yet, if one does not happen to be living in one of those flats one receives neither protection nor assistance. Therefore one can say that this category of people who live in those flats must be helped, but if exactly the same category of people are not lucky enough to be living in one of those flats, there is no assistance for them. There is therefore a tremendous void as far as the assistance of individuals is concerned.

The next question is: How long is protection in the form of rent control going to last? I pose this question because people put it to me daily by asking me just how secure they can feel. We believe that the Government must be quite crisp and clear with regard to what it has in mind. People ask me daily what is going to happen when rent control is finally lifted. They ask: Where are we going to go? Is there going to be a roof over our heads? Equally the landlord is asking whether he is still going to continue suffering certain restrictions. He asks whether he is still going to have to carry the can for the Government by giving assistance. How long is this going to last? This ambiguity as far as the Government is concerned, the commitment to the principle of getting rid of rent control, but at the same time saying in practice that they are not going to do it, is also part of the problem today.

Let us look at one of the other immediate consequences of the decontrol that has been put into effect over the past couple of years. It is an unusual one. In rent-controlled premises it is not necessary to extend a lease in order to have security of tenure; in other words, one cannot be evicted even if one’s lease expires so the tendency is for people not to extend their leases. The result is that when rent control is lifted there is no lease to give the tenant any protection. People ask whether they cannot stay on in terms of their lease. Their lease has lapsed and with the abolition of rent control that lapsed lease falls away altogether and that individual has no protection or security of tenure. Just imagine an elderly person living in a flat—he has been living there for 15 or 20 years—and rent control is lifted. He has no more protection and not even the normal protection of a lease because these leases tend not to operate.

I have been dealing with the question of lack of security of tenure and the other form of insecurity is the physical inability of a tenant to pay his rental. In this respect I think the hon. the Deputy Minister must realize that this goes far beyond the older people. It goes far beyond the people who fall into the R650 income bracket who qualify for assistance. It goes right into the middle income group, people who are earning R1 000 to R1 200 per month. These people, in the circumstances obtaining in the cities today, are just battling to make ends meet. They are terrified of the future when there can be a further increase in rentals. This is felt by all kinds of people. The hon. the Deputy Minister will know that over the past few years rentals have increased by 40%, 50%, 60%, 70% and 80%.

By 100%.

Or even by 100%, as the hon. member for Hillbrow says. I received a letter from the local rent board last week which says that we have to accept that the pattern of rentals for Cape Town has increased by a further 25% from 1 January. On top of everything that has happened over the past few years the rent board officials accept that the new pattern in the City of Cape Town is that rentals will have increased by 25% from 1 January 1982. Incomes are not increasing accordingly. Therefore there is a very, very serious problem. One asks: Why has this happened? It has happened partly because of inflation and it has certainly happened because of the rise in mortgage bond interest rates. It has gone up as a result of municipal rates, electricity and water tariffs and service rates. But it has also gone up and the hon. the Deputy Minister knows this because it is in the report of his department—because too many units for letting have been taken off the market and put into sectional title and none of these units have been replaced. No units for letting have replaced the units which have been taken off the market. The effect of this sudden removal from this group of people who normally occupy units which are for letting, taking this away, has created a tremendous demand pressure. This demand pressure has caused rentals to increase.

The first reason is therefore the reduction in the number of letting units. The second is the reality that when one has a block of flats owned collectively or as a unit, it has a certain capital value. Let us put this at a figure of R1 million. However, when one breaks them up into small units and sells them to individuals, practice has shown that the original R1 million capital becomes R2 million to R2,5 million. This is where the property speculators have been making their money. They have been taking units which have been let at a base of, say, R1 million and converting them into units for resale at a base of R2,5 million. The effect of this has been that the capital base on which a building has to be financed has increased from R1 million to R2,5 million. In order to make a profit the new owner is required to gear his rentals to the new capital structure.

We believe there are three essential aspects. It is essential that the Government have authority to step in whenever there is evidence of exploitation or abuse, either at the present time or in the future when abnormal market circumstances prevail. When the hon. the Minister asks whether we want to abolish control we say, no, but the present restrictive control is not working properly. There must be a mechanism which allows the Minister to step in in abnormal circumstances, such as those now prevailing, when he is satisfied that there is exploitation. That should not merely be limited to old rent-controlled properties. Exploitation is exploitation wherever it occurs, therefore the mechanism for preventing exploitation should be there.

Secondly, where the Government does not have the capital resources to house people who qualify for assistance under the Housing Act, it has no alternative but to subsidize the accommodation of these people in the same way as it would were they living in subsidized Government accommodation. If the Government says they are entitled to assistance but it has not got the capital to construct these places, then the Government has to provide the bridging finance to ensure that they have a roof over their heads.

Finally, the Government has to introduce incentives of some kind or another to bring the private sector back into the housing market. We can talk about controls or no controls, sectional title or no sectional title, but these will not succeed until we can see that the number of letting units that are being taken off the market are replaced by new stock. As more and more people demand this type of unit, more new stock will have to be built. The most important single task in this area of housing at the moment is for the Government to design the incentives which will make it possible for the private sector to become involved in the housing field again. This is nothing new or novel. The headlines on the front page of Die Burger of 22 August 1981 read—

The report reads—

Further on the report even anticipated that there were going to be announced on 15 September. Mr. Speaker, 15 September has come and gone and no announcement was made. The Government must bring the private sector back into the house-building, and especially the flat-building, field. The Government must realize as a result of the Viljoen Commission on black housing that the private sector does not invest money to make a loss. It is not their function. The hon. the Minister knows that right at this moment, given the price of land and of building and given the cost of money, it is not possible for the private sector to build flats in the cities of South Africa and let them to people at rentals which they can afford if their salaries are less than R1 000 or R1 200 a month. It is just not possible. In these circumstances, the Government must make it possible, either by subsidizing the rentals of the individual who is in need or by providing incentives by way of tax deductions or depreciation allowances or low interest rate loans. There was an inquiry some years ago under the Director-General of the Department, Mr. Louis Fouche. We realize that that inquiry took place. However, it reported in 1977 and much has happened since then. The capital structure of the property market has changed. The social problems arising out of decontrol and sectional title have come to the fore. I believe that this Government has sensed that there is a new order of priorities as far as the cities are concerned and because of this, because the present system is not working, because the Government is not providing the necessary protection against harassment and exploitation and because the Government is using the present system to evade its responsibility, the position is deteriorating. The responsibility for assisting people in need is that of the Government, and as long as the Government continues to pass this responsibility on to a small section of the private sector, the private sector as a whole will not become involved in housing.

Therefore, Sir, I put it to the hon. the Deputy Minister and to this House: We hope that the hon. the Deputy Minister will take a fresh look not only at the problems which we know are there but at ways and means of finding a new way out that will give people in the cities a new sense of security and will bring back onto the market enough houses and sufficient rented accommodation to enable people in the lower and middle income group to live and sleep with a sense of security.

Mr. Speaker, the motion that the House is discussing here this afternoon, is an important one and was presented in a responsible fashion by the hon. member for Sea Point. The circumstances in and surrounding the letting sector in the economy were the subject of weighty debates in this House last year, specifically with reference to the Rents Act and the Sectional Titles Act as well as the question of rent control as such. I think the hon. member for Sea Point presented the very thorny matter in a responsible fashion here this afternoon and tried to offer a solution for the problems that exist in the letting sector. I too shall try to continue on the same level.

Before I react to the speech of the hon. member for Sea Point, you will allow me briefly to sketch the background against which this motion must be judged. The background against which this motion must be judged, is the fact that since 1948 this Government has followed a dynamic, healthy housing strategy. That housing strategy is contained in the Housing Act, the Community Development Act, the Sectional Titles Act and other legislation that regulates the housing situation in South Africa. Therefore, the point that I want to make as a background to the motion, is that this Government and this side of the House has never been ashamed of its achievements in the housing sphere. I may just mention that over the past 23 years a sum of R1 830 million has been spent on erecting 650 000 dwelling units. It has happened in the past that with regard to the housing of the White sector in particular, matters were well under control but due to changed circumstances there is a shortage of White housing and we can expect the housing strategy of the Government to change in accordance with the changed conditions.

To come back to the speech of the hon. member for Sea Point, I want to tell him that I agree with him. I agree with the hon. member for Sea Point that it is true that malpractices, harassment and exploitation is taking place in the letting sector. I agree that it is an emotional and traumatic experience for elderly people and for widows and pensioners to lose their security of accommodation. I agree that it is true that rental has recently increased to such an extent that it exceeds the normal income of those who qualify for national housing. It is also true that tenants have been evicted unfairly and contrary to the rent control measures. I cannot but agree with the hon. member for Sea Point on all these points.

However, where this side of the House and myself differ radically with the hon. member for Sea Point, is with regard to his argument that it is the action or the lack of action on the part of the Government that has given rise to this state of affairs. I say that this is not the case. The cause of the current housing situation is due to complex factors such as a lack of capital, high rates of interest, immigration and urbanization. These are the basic causes for the demand exceeding the supply.

However, this side of the House and myself differ with the hon. member for Sea Point not only with regard to the causes, but also with regard to the solution to the problem. He alleges that special protective measures should be introduced in order to solve this problem, because he says in his motion that there should be adequate protection for the public.

Against exploitation.

Yes, and I am coming to that. Even with regard to the question of protection against exploitation this side of the House differs with the hon. member. This is something that we can debate.

I differ with the hon. member with regard to the protective measures that he is recommending because in the nature of things protection is contrary to the idea of a free market economy; we cannot escape this. I also differ with the hon. member because there are sufficient protective measures in terms of the current legal provisions. What protective measures do we have in terms of the Rents Act? There are the following protective measures: dwelling units that were built prior to October 1949, are subject to rent control and such units cannot be transformed into sectional title units. With regard to dwelling units that were erected between 1949 and 1966, as the hon. member pointed out, there is protection for those who qualify for protection on the basis of their income. Such units cannot be turned into sectional title units either. Therefore there is a protective mechanism. I also differ with the hon. member because all tenants enjoy the protection that is possible in terms of the Rents Act, because should a tenant feel that he is being exploitated in the sense that there is an unfair increase in his rent, he can appeal against his rent to the Rent Board. Furthermore, the fact that the hon. the Minister said that should it come to his attention that exploitation is taking place, he would not hesitate to put the dwelling units concerned under rent control once again, also serves as a protective measure. I am therefore alleging that there is sufficient protection in terms of the Rents Act and the Sectional Titles Act.

I do not want to go into the Sectional Titles Act in detail now, but I can point out that a register cannot be opened for a sectional title unit before the local authority has given its permission and the necessary registration has taken place at the Deeds Office. Therefore, there is protection here too. Where does the problem lie now?

On the one hand I agree with the hon. member for Sea Point that exploitation is in fact taking place. On the other hand I submit that the Government has introduced sufficient protective measures.

The central question is therefore where the shortcircuit in the rental market is. I believe it is due to the fact that owners, agents and converters are deliberately circumventing the protective measures that the Government has established, in order to force tenants out of their flats. I shall explain how this is being done. Rentals of rent-controlled units are increased sporadically. Units are sold under the pretext of a sectional title register having been opened, whereas in reality this is not the case. In my opinion the latest trick deserves the attention of the House, and I have an example of it here. It is an agreement with regard to a flat unit, and since it was built in 1963, the owner has to apply to the local authority for converting it into a sectional title unit. Now we have the following trick. They force the tenants to sign away their right to protection. I have here an agreement which is nothing but a deed of sale because the price and conditions are all stipulated in it. A sectional title register has not yet been opened, but nevertheless the tenant is now expected to endorse the following provision—

It is against this type of action that the Government has introduced special measures. Converters and heartless owners exploit the tenants for financial gain. I feel that this type of action borders on the criminal; unfortunately just on the wrong side of the border.

That last one is illegal.

Yes, it is illegal and this is the problem. Indeed, every example that I have mentioned is illegal. I feel that this underhand behaviour on the part of converters and owners who are guilty of the most base irregularities, who force elderly people, widows and pensioners out of their dwelling units, is the crux of the current instability in the letting sector of the economy. If there is one message that should be passed on to the public from this debate, it is that there is adequate protection for the tenant in terms of legislation. However, the tenant must take note of this and he must exercise these rights. Tenants must not allow themselves to be terrorized out of their flats.

However, I want to associate myself in a more positive sense to a very important matter that the hon. member for Sea Point mentioned, viz. that in the current situation in the letting market there are nevertheless a few technical deficiencies that, I feel, can be rectified. The hon. member for Sea Point referred to one of these deficiencies and I agree with him. I should like to hear the hon. member for Durban Point’s comment on this, viz. that the right of occupation should be guaranteed for the tenant in some way or other. I do not want to elaborate on this, but just to point out that it can be done by making Chapter 4 of the Rents Act applicable to all controlled and decontrolled premises. I am referring to sections 27 to 32, but particularly section 28(d) that provides that a landlord cannot give a tenant notice unless such landlord requires the premises in their entirety for accommodation or use by himself, by his parent or his child and has given that tenant three months’ written notice. Therefore the right of occupation is being protected both in controlled and decontrolled premises by way of the application of the provisions contained in Chapter 4 of the Rents Act on such premises. This is the first point.

The second point is the following. I feel there is unfair speculation in units that are sold in terms of the sectional titles scheme. This causes an indirect increase in the price of other units in the area surrounding the units concerned. That is why I should like to address a friendly request to the hon. the Minister to ensure that units that are purchased in terms of the sectional titles scheme, are subjected to rent control once again in order to ensure in that way that these units are not used for purposes of speculation and in so doing cause rental to increase unnecessarily, in a market in which a housing shortage exists. Furthermore, I believe that when a dwelling unit is sold in terms of the sectional titles scheme, the tenant should have the first option to purchase. He should be able to retain the option for three months, and should he not make use of the option, he should be given a further three months to vacate the premises. In conclusion, I just want to point out that if developers, owners and converters act in terms of the provisions of the Act—the Rents Act and the Sectional Titles Act—the housing situation will normalize itself. If the right of occupation is entrenched, if units are sold in terms of the sectional titles scheme, if such units are placed under rent control and sufficient time is allowed for finding alternative accommodation in the case of a unit that is sold in terms of the sectional titles scheme, the entire letting sector will stabilize itself and it will not be necessary to carry out a special investigation, as the hon. member for Sea Point is requesting. Nor would it be necessary to take special protective measures in that case.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Bellville had very little to say on which I would differ with him. Just as the hon. member for Sea Point did, he approached the motion calmly and conducted his argument on a high level. As far as possible I, too, want to try to maintain the same calm tone. However, I am afraid that I shall have to disrupt the calm atmosphere sporadically. [Interjections.]

The hon. member for Bellville maintained that the Government had a housing strategy. However, he then went on to talk about all the problems that arose. What kind of a strategy is it then which causes all these problems? [Interjections.] The hon. member went on to discuss protective measures, and after that all the things that are necessary because the protective measures do not work. I shall come back to this subject in the course of my speech.

So far your speech has been pretty weak, Vause. [Interjections.]

I have no quarrel with the objective of the hon. member for Sea Point in respect of this motion or with the problem which he outlined. He is correct. I agree with all the points which he made. This is common knowledge amongst all flat-land MPs who take an interest in their constituencies and who really care. I disagree, however, with the solution he proposed. He called for an inquiry, which, I believe, is wishful thinking. It was precisely the last inquiry that was held which was the cause of so many of the problems, the cause of such a great deal of the present crisis.

The Government’s naïve belief that there was a simplistic solution to the problem has proved to aggravate the whole situation. It seems as though they simply believed that by abolishing rent control a hoard of little angels will be caused to flutter down from heaven and build thousands upon thousands of low-rental flats for the needy people who want them. There has been no rent control on new blocks of flats for over 16 years. Where are all the new low-rental flats? For 16 years every new flat building has been free of rent control. The number of flat buildings that have been placed under rent control since can be counted on one hand. There was no danger therefore, nothing to prevent developers from erecting buildings for 16 years. Nevertheless, they did not build those buildings. To think therefore that by simply removing rent control, even on a phasing-out basis, one could have all those angels coming down to build cheap flats, is just naive and wishful thinking. I accept all the arguments. It is a fact that rent control is unfair to genuine landlords. I think we all accept that. It is also a fact—and I accept it—that rent control is wrong, in principle, in a private-enterprise system. I do not think there is anyone who would argue about that. It is wrong for landlords to be expected to subsidize tenants. I think we all accept that. It is also wrong, however, for tenants to become land-shark bait. When the Government took the easy way out by saying it would phase out rent control, it subjected tens of thousands of people to heartbreak and suffering. That is what this motion is all about. The Government opened the door to the black angels instead of the lovely little white angels who would build the necessary houses, the black angel who is out for a quick fortune, with his smooth-talking sales ability and his insatiable greed for a quick million. We warned of what was going to happen, but the Government said: “Do not worry, there is no problem, because there is plenty of accommodation and there is going to be no shortage. All we have to do is to phase our rent control.” So the process they subjected those tens of thousands to people to exploitation and suffering.

I want to change this Government with the fact that although it introduced—and therefore accepts—a formula for protected tenants, the official policy and the administration devote a minimum effort to implementing the right of the protected tenant and making it work. I have a feeling that very often the official attitude is: Well, if they are suffering, let it go at that, because soonest gone, soonest forgotten. I think that is the attitude, because then there is no longer any perpetual fight with the big brigades of big business.

You are being very irresponsible now.

No, let me take one particular example, that of the protected tenant who qualifies in terms of the means test under the Housing Act and therefore has the right to a protected status. For two years I have fought with the present Minister and his predecessor to have a condition appended to any eviction notice or any notice of an increase of rental, simply a single sentence confirming the tenant’s right to a protected status if he falls within the means test category. I asked for the tenant simply to be advised when his rent goes up or that he is given notice because rent control has been lifted, but if he falls in that category he has the right to submit an application to be classified as a protected tenant. For 2½ years the Government has refused to insist on that footnote to an eviction notice or a notice of an increase in rental. Am I therefore not entitled to say—is it in fact irresponsible to say—that the Government would not even do the minimum, because what I advocated is the minimum, yet it would have given protection and would have ensured that people were not exploited by virtue of their own ignorance?

Do you know of any protected tenants who do not know they are protected?

Yes, thousands. At the risk of instigating a witch hunt—and I fear this might give rise to one—I want to pay tribute to very many officials in the hon. the Minister’s department who have really tried to help these people, but who are frustrated by the official attitude. They are often in despair. I have come across officials who have said they literally weep at the plight of those old people. There are officials who are really trying to help, but I get the growing feeling that that help is coming only from those who are directly concerned. It does not, however, seem to be the official attitude. In a debate last year I quoted case after case—I have no time to repeat them—of tremendous increases in rent. Increases ranging from 60% to 70% and 100% have been allowed by the Rent Board. I have another example here where the rent went up from R74 to R124 in one jump.

Did you appeal to the Rent Control Board?

I am not a tenant and it is a waste of time appealing to the Board. I challenge the hon. the Deputy Minister to say how many appeals have been upheld in the last ten years. The answer will be: “None.” It is a waste of time. It is one of these so-called safeguards that just do not work.

I think the hon. the Minister has some advisers who have a heartless disconcern for the problem. Let me give an example—and I shall name the building. The building is Marlborough Court in my constituency. I have had correspondence about this over many years. It started in 1966. Over the last year I have had various correspondence with the Minister about this. I have here a letter from the Minister dated 24 November 1981 in which he lists a whole string of flats occupied by tenants, others which are being vacated and also those with tenants who qualify for protected tenants status. On 12 December I got a further letter from the Minister in which he said—

They reapplied in 1981 to convert 26 bachelor flats into 12 two-roomed luxury units which were then to be sold. The Minister said in this letter—

That is totally false. They are in the old portion of the building and they are rent controlled. In a letter the same Minister wrote me a month earlier he confirmed by flat numbers that they were rent controlled and that they were in the old portion of the building. Even the numbers were given in that letter. A month later, however, he tells me that they are in the new part of the building and that they are not controlled. Then he goes on in the letter to list other flats which he says are in the old part of the building and which are controlled. This concerned the conversion of flats in the old portion of the building. I do not have the time to develop this matter further, but there are two blatant untruths and three complete evasions of the situation in those letters dealing with Marlborough Court. I helped tenants to fight this matter and it was taken to the Supreme Court on the necessity clause. Later this session I shall take that case further.

Now I move as an amendment to the motion—

What we want is solutions. In the two to three minutes left to me I want to list seven things that can be done. The hon. member for Sea Point listed three, viz. protection, subsidization and incentives. My first point is tax concessions for low-rental accommodation. It is much cheaper to give a tax concession than to erect new buildings. Secondly, all sectional title and share-block schemes should be classified in law as “profit-making” in respect of taxation and not as a “realization of assets”. Any share-block or sectional-title scheme which is registered should by law be regarded as trading and profit-making that is taxable.

Thirdly, the department should buy up old buildings—again, this will be cheaper than building them—and administer them through reputable estate agents. There are plenty of them available who will do the work much better than the department. Fourthly, and this was mentioned by the hon. member for Sea Point, there is the subsidization of protected tenant rentals to ensure a fair return to the landlord. Again, it would be cheaper to subsidize a rental than to build a new building. Fifthly, there is provision for those fantastic organizations which do such wonderful work for the aged. For example, I think of TAFTA in Durban. As the hon. the Deputy Minister knows, four of its buildings are in my constituency. It is an organization which inter alia, buys buildings to accommodate elderly people. In the homes with sections for frail aged I believe that there thould be provision for a percentage of that accommodation to be made available for people above the means test, people who have saved all their lives but who because they have some savings are excluded by the means test. If they are admitted to one of these homes the home loses its subsidy on them. They should be able to make a proportion of their accommodation available, for example, 15% or 20% or whatever it may be, without the penalty of losing the subsidy if the person is above the means test.

Sixthly, I believe there should be adequate control by local authorities, in co-ordination with the department, of the overcrowding of and overcharging on residential accommodation as holiday flats. I have here an article which is headed “Pay more or quit flats” in which it is stated that all the tenants were given notice to get out. During the holiday season the rent goes up from approximately R200 to over R1 000 per month. Something should be done to control the putting of 10 or 15 people into a one or two bedroomed flat. I had to do this one night during the last election and the hon. the Deputy Minister knows the building to which I am referring because I think some of his relatives stay there. I had to fight the election from a flat where for one night we had 11 people staying there! Some owners do this for the whole of the holiday periods and it is unhygienic, it is against the health laws and it is exploitation.

Seventhly, the department should have a section to give advice and legal aid to victims of victimization and people in trouble. At the moment, however, it washes its hands and says that it is a legal problem and that people must find their own lawyers.

My time has run out, but I have tried to put some positive ideas and thoughts instead of just hammering on the problems themselves. I therefore hope that by perhaps being a little more direct I have caused the hon. the Deputy Minister and the department to think a little harder about these problems.

Mr. Speaker, I shall not try to cross swords with the hon. member for Durban Point on this Friday afternoon. He is considerably bigger than I am, and no one will be able to tolerate the inevitable mess. I think I will be replying to some of the arguments advanced by the hon. member for Durban Point, during the course of what I have to say. At the outset, however, I should just like to say that the hon. member for Durban Point must give us an indication of whether he is in fact in favour of the actual phasing out of rent control.

Not in the way it is being done.

The hon. member argued that those who were erecting blocks of flats were not benefiting. However, the hon. member then said in the same breath that rent control was having a restrictive effect on the landowner who intended to erect a block of flats or a multi-unit building. I think the hon. member is really in favour of the phasing out of rent control, as it has in fact taken place.

I would like to mention, in passing, that I did not know that there were Black angels and White angels. The hon. member for Durban Point must not look at the angels through coloured spectacles.

He is a real racist. [Interjections.]

I believe that the hon. the Deputy Minister will reply to the hon. member for Durban Point on the specific proposals which he made. We on this side of the House appreciate the positive way in which the hon. member tried to propose real solutions.

I want to confine myself to the reasons which gave rise to the present situation with regard to housing. What approach should one adopt to the problem of housing, especially with regard to multi-unit buildings? The answer to this question—everyone in the House probably agrees, and I think the hon. member for Sea Point said as much—lies in the supply and demand system in the provision of housing. It is, however, true that there are always certain factors—no one can deny this—regardless of the sphere to which they apply, which have a restrictive effect on the free enterprise system. In this case it is especially true with regard to housing. As far as housing is concerned, the following restrictive factors are present throughout: Firstly, the process of urbanization. Secondly, the increase in building costs and in basic services. Thirdly, the phasing out of rent control over the past few years. Fourthly, the sale of sectional title units. Fifthly, the unscrupulous actions of certain owners. Sixthly, the lack of provision of new housing by the private as well as the public sector.

These are the factors which inhibit the free enterprise system. Unfortunately a combination of all these factors has without doubt contributed over the past years, especially at the end of the seventies and the beginning of this decade, to a detrimental damming up effect in the field of housing. It was an over-concentration of these problems which created a certain situation over the past years which in many ways had serious, detrimental consequences in our metropolitan areas.

It must also be mentioned that the normal economic laws also play a role. In the period 1976 to 1978 we had a relative decline in the demand for housing in South Africa. This meant that many housing units in our urban complexes were standing empty. This was especially true of multi-unit buildings. The economic recovery at the end of the ’seventies, which lasted until approximately 1981, and the ensuing sharp increase in growth, naturally resulted in a sharp increase in the demand for housing which the supply failed to meet. This is a normal economic factor which we cannot ignore.

I should like to say a few words on the subject of urbanization. I want to emphasize the broad spectrum, for I think that this specific question must be assessed in that context. It is unnecessary to give an account here of what has happened during the past few years with regard to urbanization in South Africa. Everyone knows that it has had an exceptional effect on housing, especially in the metropolitan areas. Those negative effects of over-concentration are felt by everyone, regardless of the race group involved. It is in the midst of this that the free enterprise system has failed in certain aspects. This we must also admit as a fact, even if it is the premise that we must allow the free enterprise system to go its own way. Therefore we can argue from the standpoint that it is necessary that the State, i.e. the authorities must engineer the necessary intervention in such a situation, so as to bring about the recovery of the situation to the greatest possible degree. Action in such a case must not be seen as intervention in the free economy system, but as a complement to it in an effort to restore the balance. It is, in other words, not an unwelcome intervention and must not be regarded as such.

In the urbanization process as it has taken place over the past few years, combined with the other factors which I have mentioned, it is unfortunately true—I say with great emphasis “unfortunately true”—that a price must be paid for the over-concentration in our metropolitan areas. I mention this as a fact; I say this with regret; I do not say this with satisfaction. Nor do I say this with reproach; it is mere fact which must be accepted. Housing is part of this price. Therefore it is important that we place this matter in perspective against the background of this whole process of urbanization and the unfortunate price our people in the urban areas are required to pay. On the other hand, we must not lose sight of the fact that the whole process of urbanization has had other advantages. I am referring specifically here to the improvement in the quality of life of our people in general. Most certainly, the whole process of urbanization, also in that area—if we ignore the question of housing for the moment—has had advantages. In this specific regard it has also brought about higher salaries and wages. If we speak of high rentals and the high prices of properties today, then we must also bear in mind that wages and salaries have not lagged behind during the same period. Wages and salaries have also increased drastically over the same few years, and the picture is not after all as unbalanced as it was made out to be here today. If we look at the quarterly report of the Reserve Bank, then it appears that, over the period from 1975 to June 1981, wages and salaries in South Africa, excluding the agricultural sector—i.e. in the non-agricultural sector—increased more than two-fold. That was from 1975 to June 1981. I think this presents a somewhat more balanced picture of the matter in question.

On the question of urbanization, I just want to make this concluding remark in this specific regard. As a whole, the solution does not he in the short-term measures which must now be adopted by the State and the authorities, but in the prevention and reduction of over-concentration in our metropolitan areas. I want to link this to the fact that the authorities have a specific task in this regard, and therefore I want to say that the first task of the authorities in this regard is to perpetuate the process of deconcentration and decentralization so that this alleviation can begin in our metropolitan areas. This is the first and only solution to this specific problem. I think the Government has adequately proved that it is in earnest in this regard with the announcement of the incentive measures by the hon. the Prime Minister at the Good Hope Conference, which come into operation on 1 April, etc. I think it is directly relevant to the subject, for seen in aggregate, we must strive to find a comprehensive solution in the long term. I concede that there are short-term measures which must be implemented, and I think the hon. member for Bellville has adequately demonstrated what steps are being taken by the Government, and that the Government is not indifferent to or unsympathetic towards the short-term consequences for the individual in the present situation. If we were to undertake an investigation now, as the hon. member for Sea Point has requested, and if we were to make a long-term attempt of solving this problem in this field—we have only a few experiences—I want to know what would eventually happen if the economy shows a downward tendency, as we are now experiencing. What is going to happen in a year’s time? Surely a different pattern could then have emerged in the housing situation in South Africa. I venture to predict that this will definitely be the case.

I think the Government is dealing with the situation against the background of the economic cycle—it must continue to be handled this way—which we, in this House, can ultimately do very little about when it comes to predicting or changing it. I think that the Government is doing its best under the circumstances, to afford our people who are in fact having a hard time the necessary shortterm relief.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Johannesburg West quite correctly referred to urbanization and overconcentration in our metropolitan areas. Obviously the economy of the country has something to do with the fact that because of urbanization, there is a shortage of accommodation. It is because of the economy of the country, and particularly because of the increasing inflation rate, that rentals are high, and we have the problem which we are facing today. In the course of my speech I may well in passing touch upon certain other points raised by the hon. member for Johannesburg West.

I am grateful that the hon. member for Sea Point introduced this motion in which he calls for a commission of inquiry into the Rents Act. I want to get a little closer to the very same Act because the motion before the House and the points raised by the hon. member for Johannesburg West can very well be considered by such a commission of inquiry. In its report and recommendations such a commission of inquiry will of necessity have to take notice of an economy which is not stagnant but changes all the time. This, in fact, was the problem with the previous commission of inquiry, but more about that later on in my speech.

I do not disagree with what the hon. member for Durban Point wants. Certainly we need action, very urgent action. We hope that the Government will act immediately where it can.

The hon. member for Bellville said that we have adequate protection under the Rents Act. His statement is true, but, as I shall indicate presently, only few people and certainly not enough people are protected in terms of the Rents Act. That is why we have to put all these various aspects together into one whole so that we can deal with them, and the only way in which we can deal with them, is to have a commission of inquiry.

The motion deals with the Rents Act. Let me remind hon. members that the Rents Act has been in force since 1920 and as such it was never actually repealed. The old Act was incorporated in the 1940 Act and it was consolidated after the Second World War. Since then it was amended from time to time—in fact, there were masses of amendments—to bring it up to date. As the Rents Act exists today it is the shield of the working man, the shield of the pensioner, the shield of the aged and the shield of the young married person. Yet, on the other hand it is the scourge of the landlord, the scourge of the developer, the scourge of the sectional title holder and converter and the scourge of the money-maker. We therefore have to reconcile conflicting interests.

I shall come to the landlords later; first I want to deal with the tenants. The first category are those who still fall under the ambit of the Rents Act; in other words those tenants who occupy units erected prior to 1 October 1949. I put a question on the Question Paper to ascertain how many people they are, and the answer which I received indicates that they number 63 000. I must seriously question that and I should like the hon. the Deputy Minister to tell us exactly how many people are under rent control today. I have examined the Fouché Commission’s report very carefully, and in 1966, according to the figures given in paragraph 142 on page 81, there were 238 000 units under rent control, including 170 000 flats. This involved approximately 400 000 people. According to this report 26% were phased out the first year, 15% in the second year and 18% in the third year. That gives us a total of 59%, leaving 41%, and 41% of 238 000 is 97 580 units under rent control. If this is wrong the hon. the Deputy Minister must please tell me.

I have it in writing that they cannot tell you.

These figures appear on page 81. Hon. members can read this for themselves. If there are 97 580 units under rent control, we must reasonably expect that we are talking about at least 150 000 people in South Africa who are subject to rent control.

The figure is 63 000.

These people live with a sword of Damocles hanging over their heads all the time. They live in a state of fear, of uncertainty and with the eternal question: Will the Minister phase out rent control and will I be thrown out into the street?

Then we come to the second group of people who between 1945 and 1966 were subject to rent control. Their buildings were phased out, but in terms of section 19(1)(a) of the Housing Act they are protected because they fall within the economic limits, as correctly mentioned by the hon. member for Sea Point. Those are the people who are today being harassed by their landlords, and I will give you an example of this. They have to prove that they are protected tenants. I have a letter here which I am using as one example. A firm of attorneys in Pretoria wrote the following letter to the tenants of a block of flats, Lorina Court, in Kort Street, Johannesburg—

In other words, the tenants had to sign an affidavit to the following effect: Whether he/she was married or unmarried; whether he/she was a widow or a widower, and had to give a statement containing full particulars of next-of-kin, namely spouse, parents and children. Furthermore, the affidavit required the following information—

1. (a) being my gross monthly salary. I attach hereto as Annexure “B” documentary proof thereof as well as a statement of my employer … as proof thereof.
2. (b) The amount of R … being my monthly proceeds out of investments, in support thereof I attach as Annexure “D” documentary proof thereof.
3. (c) I am a pensioner and receive a monthly pension of R … Attached hereto as Annexure “E” is documentary proof thereof.

My spouse’s gross income is as follows:

1. (a) The amount of R … being my spouse’s gross monthly salary.

The value of the shares and the name of the company has to be given and then there is the following paragraph—

I further attach certified copies of my Income Tax returns for a period of five years hereto, together with my I.R.P.5 certificates as provided by the various employers.

Is this not harassment to make people prove that they are protected tenants in this way? This is the sort of treatment meted out to them. It is because of this sort of thing that I support the motion moved by the hon. member for Sea Point.

It often happens that tenants who are not atle to produce proof of their protection in terms of the law are summarily given notice to vacate their flats. Those tenants who do not enjoy this legal protection are at the complete mercy of the landlords. I have a letter here which is a typical example of the type of harassment of flat dwellers I have just referred to. This is a letter written by a woman who says she was given notice on 1 January 1981 to vacate her flat within two months. Shortly afterwards it appeared that she owed a small amount of R3,74 for electricity, which she paid immediately. A couple of months later the same amount of R3,74 was demanded from her again. She paid the amount a second time. A month later she received another letter notifying her that she was to vacate her flat by 31 May 1981. Judging by the information furnished by this particular woman it appears she was given notice by her landlord because she had complained about certain things. The woman maintains that her complaints were not unfounded at the time. One of her complaints was that the electricity supply to her flat had been cut off for a period of three weeks owing to her account showing arrears of R3,74, which she had by then already paid. For some reason or other her carpets had also been flooded. This is yet another example of the sort of harassment flat tenants have to endure at the hands of their landlords. It is this sort of malpractice on the part of landlords and flat owners that I want to bring to the attention of the hon. the Deputy Minister.

Another type of harassment which flat dwellers have to endure is the outrageous rent increases that they have to face from time to time. Rent increases of 20%, 50%, and even 100% are not uncommon. Here on my desk in front of me I have a bulky file containing letters I have received from flat dwellers in Hillbrow who complain about unreasonable rent increases. All in all these complaints involve at least 45 blocks of flats in Hillbrow. I have been in correspondence with these tenants. I have had meetings with them—even group meetings with them. I have submitted petitions to the hon. the Minister, as he will be able to confirm. I have asked the hon. the Minister for relief for these tenants and I have requested him to take urgent action to protect them. [Interjections.]

Talking about rent increases, we have the sad situation today that irrespective of protection even in terms of the Rents Act, landlords can still submit applications to the Rent Board asking for permission to increase rentals. More often than not such an application is successful, rents are increased accordingly, usually with retrospective effect from the date on which the application was lodged, and when the tenants involved cannot afford to pay the increased rentals they have no other choice but to vacate their flats. These tenants are frantic, Mr. Speaker. They are in despair. They have nowhere else to go. If they are forced out of their flats in this manner it means that they have no roof over their heads. Small wonder that many of them, particularly the elderly ones, become so despondent that some of them even threaten to commit suicide because there is no security left for them.

According to the figures available to me 140 420 units are involved in the category of flats built between 1949 and 1966, on which rent control has been partly phased out over the past three years. Through what the Government has done by depriving people of protection in terms of the Rents Act approximately 296 people in this category alone have been adversely affected. These people are constantly being subjected to the harassment of rent increases which they have to face every year. In no way are they protected against unreasonable rent increases or against harassment by their landlords. They also have no guarantee that they will not be evicted. These people live from day to day as it were. Some of them can think of only one remedy, that is to approach their MP. Others write directly to the hon. the Minister requesting him to reimpose rent control on their flats. The hon. the Minister has the power to do so, and he knows that. In not one instance, however, in spite of all the appeals lodged with him, has the hon. the Minister deemed fit to reimpose rent control on a single building. People are in need of protection but they get no protection at all from the hon. the Minister. They approach him for assistance but the result is absolutely nil, and all they have to face is harassment and possibly even eviction.

I should like to refer now to the question of sectional title, which was also raised by the hon. member for Sea Point. In this respect there is also a dilemma. Whilst they are occupying the flat, the owner may come along and say he has converted to sectional title and is giving the tenant the first opportunity to buy the flat. The person may have brought up a family and, with his children married, may have built up a little nest-egg of R10 000 or R15 000 which he has, let us say, invested in a building society. Must such a person take his whole nest-egg and put the money into a flat, perhaps without an adequate income to pay off the balance, solely because the person has nowhere else to go, or must he simply allow himself to be evicted? That is the dilemma in which sectional title has placed these individuals. Those are the hazards of sectional title.

There is, however, another category of people, those who legitimately purchased under sectional title before the amendment was introduced in this House in 1980. Those people do not yet have sectional title. In the agreements they signed in good faith they were told that unless sectional title was obtained within 12 or 18 months, the agreement would be cancelled, their money would be refunded and that would be the end of the story and they would have to vacate the premises. That is, of course, exactly what the landlord wants. He wants to delay his application. He is only too happy to cancel the deal in terms of that clause in the contract because then he can sell that same flat at two or three times the price for which he originally sold it.

This brings me to share block companies. I warned hon. members in this House about share blocks and pointed out that there were loopholes in the share block scheme. Since there are loopholes, I feel that I must raise the matter again today, in spite of the risks that might be involved. A person can buy a share in a share block company and become the owner of a specific flat. It does not matter whether the flat is occupied by someone else and it does not matter if the flat is under rent control. The person who buys the share then becomes the owner of the flat, and as the owner he becomes the lessor. In terms of section 27 of the Rent Control Act he can, as the lessor, give the tenant notice by stating that he requires the flat for his own occupation or for the occupation of his parents or child. There is no protection just because the building is under rent control, because section 19(1)(a), which gives protection in this very situation, only applies to sectional title. It does not apply to share block schemes. So there is that loophole. Let me give an example here of Cranton Heights, for one. A company bought the building and sold shares to subsidiary companies and other people. They then gave notice to the tenants who had no recourse whatsoever and had to get out. [Interjections.] There are always those who are uninformed, and in spite of what may have been said by way of interjection, the hon. the Deputy Minister must accept that there are people who do not have the faintest idea, and what is more they are dead scared to open their mouths. The hon. the Deputy Minister will know that I have sent petitions to him, but have asked him please not to disclose the names of the tenants, for fear that they would be harassed by the landlord if their names became known.

Let me now briefly turn to the landlord himself, the developer. He, of course, wants to cover extra labour costs and the costs of extra maintenance, electricity tariffs and increased water rates and increases in the caretaker’s salary, as well as the spiralling costs of inflation. Sapoa suggested a 20% increase and the Fouché Commission suggested an increase of 10%. We have to find some balance between the interests of the landlord and those of the tenant. What we must ask ourselves are the following questions: Should the Rent Control Act be abolished? Should rent control be reimposed? Should it be modified? What are the ramifications of the free enterprise system? Can it take care of itself? Is the Rent Control Act capable of meeting the exigencies of today? Is the 8,5% return sufficient? Is the method of determining the value good enough in this day and age? Would tax incentives encourage owners to build? Can rents be subsidized, as is the case in West Germany and France? Can landlords subsidize tenants or must one accept that it is the State’s job to do so? Should there be automatic increases each year equal to the rate of inflation? Are rent boards adequately staffed? Should they not—and here I agree with the hon. member for Sea Point—have a special department to advise people of their rights? The only way to reconcile the irreconcilable is to fall back on a commission of enquiry to have a new look at the situation. Here I must disagree, with due respect, with the hon. member for Durban Point. [Interjections.] The situation we find ourselves in today is as a result of the activities of a commission of enquiry. The situation has changed completely compared with what it was at the time of the commission. I can best illustrate this with the following quotation from the Fouché Commission’s report (paragraph 143, page 85)—

1. (a) a total of 70% of the tenants have already been living in the premises which they occupy at present for five years or more and in a great percentage of cases it is therefore unlikely that most landlords would like to get rid of such stable tenants through rent control having been lifted;

Just listen to that. I read further—

1. (b) as shown, the greater percentage of tenants in rent-controlled dwelling units can claim State financed accommodation …

But there is no State financed accommodation. There are today waiting lists for every institution. I quote further—now listen to this—

1. (c) at a time when the supply meets the demand, as is the case at present, artificial protection after the lifting of rent control is not necessary, since, once the free market mechanism takes over, landlords would have to be very careful not to get a reputation for treating their tenants unsympathetically, which may result in the dwelling units concerned remaining vacant.

Is that not out of date? With the greatest respect in the world, have we not now reached the situation where the only way to resolve this problem is to have a commission of enquiry? This commission from which I have quoted did not, with the greatest respect, foresee the circumstances we are faced with today. What is more, the evidence upon which its recommendations were made was obtained mainly from Sapoa, an organization representing owners. As mentioned in the commission’s report, very few or no submissions were made on behalf of tenants. I want to say now that I hope a new commission will be properly representative of tenants. The commission must consider all these aspects and we must see if we cannot reach a fair result which will take into account the needs of the landlords and encourage them to build. Since 1966, 380 000 units have been built on which there is no rent control. The only reason why the entrepreneurs stopped building was the increase in the rate of interest and the absence of demand. Today there is a demand. The position has changed completely. I strongly support the motion before us. Let us have a commission of enquiry into all aspects mentioned in the motion.

Mr. Speaker, listening to the hon. member for Hillbrow, one must come to the conclusion that the Government is to blame for every callous landlord who tries to evict his tenant and for every clever attorney who tries every possible and impossible means of helping his client to do this. Listening to the hon. members of both Opposition parties, one would also think that the rights are all on the side of the tenants, and not on the side of the landlords as well. Of course, that is the popular standpoint to adopt. There are far more tenants than landlords. Therefore one can understand it. On the part of the hon. member for Durban Point in particular one can understand it. If he had not had the support of thousands and thousands of tenants who have grown old with him in flats in Durban Point, which are still older, he would not have been here. [Interjections.]

However, it is really strange to see the hon. member for Hillbrow in the role of a champion of tenants, while he himself tried to evict a whole group of Whites out of a block of flats and to have them replaced by Indian tenants. It is very strange to see that hon. member in the role of a so-called champion of poor tenants.

Disgraceful!

In the short time available to me, I shall probably not have time to discuss in full all the steps which the Government has taken and is still taking to encourage the private sector to provide more accommodation. I really want to devote myself exclusively to the last subsection of this motion, the one dealing with incentives. I shall try to indicate briefly that the problems to which the motion refers are being investigated continually and that the Government is providing two kinds of incentives, as far as it is within its power to so, to provide as much accommodation as possible for lower and middle income groups in our country by removing obstacles in the way of investors and by providing positive incentive.

As far as the request for an enquiry is concerned, this motion requests a special enquiry into incentives, among other things. Speakers on both sides of the House have already referred in this debate to the very thorough investigation undertaken by the Fouché Commission between 1975 and 1977. Later in my speech I shall refer to several of the matters that were considered by the Fouché Commission. The Fouché Commission pursued the work done by the earlier Niemann Commission, and I think it is important to note that its recommendations resulted, among other things, in the establishment of the Advisory Committee for Housing Affairs, as well as the Housing Policy Board. This board is a high-level body under the chairmanship of the Minister of Community Development, of which the MEC charged with housing affairs in every province is a member.

Hon. members who have studied the 1980 report, the latest report we have received from the Department of Community Development, will be impressed by the large number of housing problems which have already received and are still receiving the attention of these two bodies. I shall refer to some of these later. What is important, however, is that because the whole situation in respect of housing is influenced by fluctuating factors— such as the economy in general—the institution of an ongoing enquiry into housing matters, as has been achieved by the establishment of these two bodies, is much more important than a single enquiry which is specifically concerned with the circumstances of that particular moment only.

Apart from this ongoing investigation, the Government also encourages the private sector to participate in the provision of housing, and it does so by removing obstacles. There are quite a number of these, factors which discourage the private sector from entering the housing field. I want to mention just a few of these. After all, in a free market economy one of the greatest contributions the State can make is not so much to enter the market as an entrepreneur itself, but to create a climate which will make it attractive and profitable for the private entrepreneur to enter a particular field. One of the obstacles in the way of the private entrepreneur is the high price of land, which has also been mentioned here. The high prices of building lots are an important component of the private entrepreneur’s calculation, and this is one of the matters which are receiving the concentrated attention of the Government and the Advisory Committee on Housing Affairs. State-owned land is continually evaluated and made available to the private sectors through, inter alia, the Association of Building Societies. On page 5 of the latest report of the Department of Community Development, reference is made in detail to more than 1000 plots for houses and flats in Pretoria and Cape Town which were made available by the department in 1980 alone at considerably less than market rates.

In the second place, there is the rise in building costs. Rising building costs on the one hand, as against the return he can get on his investment, is probably one of the most powerful deterrents to a potential provider of flat accommodation. In this field, too, the Government is actively taking steps to overcome the problem, through this committee and the Housing Policy Board. A subcommittee of this advisory committee is already investigating alternative methods for the provision of low-cost housing. Arising from the recommendations of the Viljoen Commission, a committee under the chairmanship of the hon. the Deputy Minister of Finance is at present investigating the adaptation of existing financing strategies and the development of new sources of financing for Black housing. The CSIR has been instructed to investigate housing costs, standards and financing. This report is expected to be submitted shortly. Uniform draft building regulations have been drawn up by the Bureau of Standards at the request of the Advisory Committee on Housing Affairs, and this will eliminate a further source of confusion and uncertainty in the private sector.

It is hoped that the position will improve in the future, as is evident from the latest report of the Bureau for Economic Research at the University of Stellenbosch, which expects a growth rate of only about 12% in building costs this year, as against more than 30% on average in 1980 and 1981. The bureau attributes this mainly to the fact that firms will accept a lower profit margin this year. However, these are only a few examples of things which the Government is doing through the Department of Community Development to remove the obstacles in the way of the private entrepreneur.

I want to say a few words about rent control. Because of the rising cost of building and labour, the investor has to increase his rentals if he is to receive a reasonable return on his investment. Therefore rent control must be a deterrent. We have said enough today about phasing out rent control. However, it is important that in spite of the sectional titles legislation which was passed last year, it is still the policy of the Government that rent control must be phased out. Today only 4% of all blocks of flats in our country are subject to rent control.

Apart from removing obstacles, the Government also provides positive incentives to encourage the private entrepreneur to enter this field. In this connection I want to refer firstly to housing utility companies. Hon. members will recall that during the Good Hope Conference the hon. the Prime Minister invited the private sector to contribute to a housing effort by way of utility companies. The State President, too, referred to this method of participation by the private sector in his speech at the opening of Parliament this year. The utility companies contribute to low-cost housing in a variety of ways. The company itself is not operated for gain, and this in itself can keep building costs within bounds. Because no one can be enriched by utility companies, it is easier for the State to render assistance by means of cheap land and financing. Joint loans can be made available to such companies, where two-thirds of the loans are made available at building society rates and one-third at the lower rate of the National Housing Fund. A further example is the legislation which was passed in this House yesterday in respect of the preemptive right of the department, which can largely eliminate property speculators.

Property utility companies in the U.S., Canada and Britain have played a major role in providing housing at a reasonable cost. Here in Cape Town, too, a company called the Garden City Utility Company has provided more than 30 000 houses since its inception in 1919. The best-known suburb developed by this company is probably the very beautiful suburb of Pinelands. Edgemead, Bergvliet and Meadowridge are further examples of such development. I am very pleased—other hon. members from Natal will probably be pleased as well— about the fact that mention has been made during the past week of the establishment of a similar housing utility company in Durban. To begin with, this company will concentrate on the provision of housing for Whites, Indians and Coloureds.

While I am on the subject, I cannot omit to mention in passing that it is a pity that one of our Durban newspapers, the Natal Mercury, was not even deterred by the housing needs of our people in its mischief-making yesterday. This newspaper made it clear in a report that it could not understand how the hon. member for Umbilo could serve on the same board of directors as the person who was called the “chief Natal Boederbonder”. Could you believe it, Mr. Speaker! If this newspaper really has to raise such a matter in connection with housing, why does it not ask the hon. member for Umbilo how he can sit in this Chamber with 140 Nationalists? I think it redounds to the credit of the hon. member for Umbilo that he considered the provision of housing for the people in the Durban area to be more important than this kind of gossip. I am very glad that the chairman of the housing committee of the Durban City Council, Mrs. Lesley Spraque, indicated quite clearly where her priorities lay. She said—

This is one of the ways in which the private sector can make a very positive contribution to this great task.

There are other ways in which the Government provides direct assistance. I just want to mention a few of them briefly. There is the home-ownership scheme, the State-supported savings schemes which were introduced in 1971 and which were so greatly improved in 1978 after the Fouché Commission that they have grown spectacularly since then. According to the report of the commission, there were 11 000 such accounts in the year 1980. My time has almost expired, so I shall not discuss the advantages which these schemes hold for the private investor.

The final point I want to mention here in respect of the active encouragement which the State does give to the private investor is the encouragement given to employers to help provide housing for lower-paid employees. I think one can say in all fairness that it is to a large extent the duty of the employer to take an interest in this, because employers often attract large numbers of medium-and lower-paid workers to the metropolitan areas, where housing is scarce and expensive. Here, too, the State is doing its duty. If the employer himself undertakes to provide housing, he can deduct up to 50% of the building costs, up to a maximum of R4 000, from his taxable income, and consideration is now being given to a proposal that up to 100% should be deductable over a period of five years.

For the provision of housing for non-White employees, the employer will receive even greater assistance from the State, including land on a hire purchase basis for as long as 60 years. It is a pity, though, that only the Cape Chamber of Commerce has availed itself of this on behalf of its members, in respect of 300 houses in Bellair.

Mr. Speaker, I have tried to indicate, in very broad outline, that the State is already doing everything in its power in this field. According to the report of the department, I find myself in the good company of the Economic Advisory Council of the Prime Minister, which has taken cognizance of the commendable achievements of the Department of Community Development in the field of conventional low-cost housing and of the incentives already provided to help the private sector to meet the growing demand. Not only is the State contributing the full share that can be expected of it in this field, therefore; the on-going investigations of all facets of housing are much more important than a special inquiry in this case could be.

Mr. Speaker, I am not going to react in any detail to the points that the hon. member for Umlazi raised. I think it is very clear, from the viewpoint of the flat owner and investor as well, that the situation is far from satisfactory at this stage. It is common cause amongst hon. members that there is not nearly sufficient investment in that field. It is for this very reason that I very definitely support the relevant leg of the motion of the hon. member for Sea Point.

A thorough investigation is once again necessary at this stage. It is necessary at this moment for the very reason that the economic climate and the situation with regard to the provision of housing makes it necessary. It is necessary that such an investigation should be properly representative. I feel that this is a complaint that can justifiably be laid at the door of some previous commissions of inquiry. This is a problem that occurs in certain areas in particular, and it is not coincidental that the hon. members of the Opposition who have participated in the debate, all represent constituencies in which large numbers of flats are to be found. It would be a good thing if this fact were borne in mind should such an investigation take place.

The hon. member who spoke just before me, mentioned the Fouché Commission. It is interesting to note that the Fouché Commission made recommendations that led to the amendment of the Sectional Titles Act in 1979. By this time hon. members know that this was one of the things that led to the greatest problems and even to misery in areas occupied by flats. The situation was so serious that a year later the Government came to the House with amendments once again.

But surely you are off the track now.

No, it is quite correct that the Act was amended again and that the situation was restored to the status quo at least partially once again. Now we once again have the position that the report of the commission that was recently appointed, is no longer up to date and that consequently it is no longer of any value in so far as the current situation is concerned. This proves the urgency of and the necessity for a new investigation.

Over the past few years I have received literally hundreds of complaints from residents in my constituency concerning problems that deal with this situation.

How many hundreds?

The complaints concerned rent increases, sectional title development and so on. When I speak about problems, I am expressing myself in moderate terms, because in some cases one could justifiably describe it as “misery”. That is why I support the motion with pleasure.

Without any doubt, these matters call for urgent attention on the part of the Government. In my opinion it is clear that there are several flat owners and agents in South Africa, more specifically in our urban areas, that unfortunately either have no conception of the problems that they sometimes create for their fellow-man or are in fact aware of those problems, but nevertheless continue recklessly to make every cent that there is to be made out of the unstable property market, regardless of the consequences to which something of this kind might lead.

Inflation is so often given as the justification for increasing rental that the fact that many of the tenants who are affected in this way, have no hope of an adjustment of their income to meet inflationary trends, is being overlooked. In this regard I am thinking in particular of pensioners and people with fixed income. Reasons that are no less than ludicrous, are often given for such increases in rental. Often the reasons for increases are exaggerated to such an extent that an actual fact they amount to untruths. Mention is made of increases in maintenance costs, wages, administration costs and other costs that can most probably be justified to a reasonable extent.

†Other cost factors related to speculation are often the primary causes of rent increases, and in this respect I should like to pose a few questions that I think could be fruitfully discussed and considered by an inquiry as the hon. member for Sea Point has proposed.

Firstly, is it right and equitable, in view of the social set-up in the country, that a block of flats should change hands so often that agents’ commission, transfer dues and mortgage costs become major factors in pushing rentals sky high? Is it in fact right and defensible? Secondly, when an investor has made a bad purchase and has paid too much for a particular block of flats, is it right that the negative effects of such a mistake made by the particular investor should automatically be passed on to the tenants of those flats? Thirdly, is it wise that old housing, particularly blocks of flats built years ago when construction costs were low, should be turned into expensive accommodation overnight, for no better reason than that a huge profit is made in a speculative sale under sectional title or in a more conventional manner, and that the agent walks away with a very fat fee? I know of blocks of flats that have been bought and sold within the space of a few months. Many of these flats are in the Sea Point/Green Point area and various other parts of the Peninsula. Profits amounting up to 200% were made within a matter of months through the buying and selling of these properties. The people who have to carry the load, those who are on the receiving end of that sort of problem are the tenants. Is it equitable that such a situation should be tolerated?

There has to be a better way in which to deal with housing. Even in a free enterprise system—given that we have such a system in South Africa—a formula must be found to deal with the situation. There is nothing wrong in housing being bought and sold, but can we afford to let it become a racket, as has already happened in many instances? Blocks of flats should be a reasonable investment, but should not become the object of speculation, as indeed has happened to a great extent. The availability of flats as an important element of the provision of housing, is much too sensitive a matter to be speculated with as one would speculate with shares on the stock exchange.

We are all aware of the standard free enterprise type of reaction to these questions that I have posed, to the criticism that I have levelled, and to the problem as a whole, but it must be appreciated that the average flat tenant, particularly in the lower income group, does not see his flat as an investment. He does not look upon his flat as an element of economics. He does not see it in economic terms. He does not see his flat rental as being decided by market forces.

*There is scarcely any aspect of a flat and the rent that one pays for it to which the tenant gives less attention and in which he is less interested than the market forces that determine his rental. For the tenant, his flat is a home. It is his dwelling, an anchor in his daily existence. It gives him a form of protection that is more important to him than protection in the mere physical sense. It is a place where the family meets, where they receive their guests, and for the good tenant it is an important source of his self respect and pride. This is how the tenant views his flat. If something happens to disturb that outlook of the flat dweller on his flat, it upsets him terribly. It creates in him an uncertainty that practically borders on the type of fear that people experience when they are threatened with physical assault. Eviction from a flat, drastic rent increases, drastic changes of circumstances, by means of which people are forced to depart from their flats, is an experience that leaves people nearly as vulnerable as when they are physically threatened. I myself can testify to this. I should think that I am one of the few hon. members of this House who has been evicted from a flat at some time. [Interjections.] I can testify to the feeling of helpless frustration that it generates in one. [Interjections.] These are circumstances in which one feels absolutely miserable. It is simply indescribable. It is a terrible situation in which one finds oneself. I feel that for elderly people in particular, that feeling must be almost indescribably horrible. Therefore, I cannot but sympathize with people who find themselves in such a situation.

Then there are also the type of letters that are sent to them by agents and speculators. The hon. member for Hillbrow quoted from such letters. Mostly they are letters in which the first option to purchase is given to the tenant himself, when the flat concerned is sold in terms of the sectional titles scheme. In most cases such an option is of no value at all to the tenant. He is in fact being confronted with Hobson’s choice—“You either buy or else” … The “else” is of course that he must vacate his flat. I am afraid that that type of practice is definitely not to the benefit of the tenant of a flat. It offers him no consolation or guarantee at all.

To quote a few practical examples only: A few days ago a letter was addressed to the hon. the Minister at my recommendation, a letter in connection with a flat in my constituency of which the rental has been increased four times in one year. The four increases amount to a total increase of 86%. Something of this kind cannot be justified by any normal cost increase in South Africa. It is simply indefensible. It is cases of this nature that deserve the attention of the hon. House. They also deserve the attention of a team of investigators consisting of experts who can really give us advice, advice that is up to date and that has been brought in line with the demands and circumstances of today. It must also be advice that can lead to the elimination and prevention of problems to which people have been subjected thus far, and are still being subjected today. For these reasons I am pleased to support the motion by the hon. member for Sea Point.

Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank hon. members for their very valuable contributions to this debate. I should like to thank the hon. member for Sea Point in particular for introducing this motion. I can state that the hon. member delivered a very moderate and responsible speech, unlike the hon. member for Hillbrow and the hon. member for Durban Point, who were both given to exaggeration and hyperbole.

Exaggeration? Where do you get that from? Tell me. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, referring to the speech by the hon. member for Durban Point I should at least point out that he made some very positive and constructive suggestions towards the end of his speech. Other hon. members did the same. Unfortunately my time is very limited and I will not be able, therefore, to deal with his suggestions individually. I want to assure the hon. member for Durban Point, however, that I shall refer those suggestions, as well as the suggestions made by the hon. member for Sea Point and all the other hon. members who have taken part in the debate, to the Advisory Committee for Housing Affairs for an in-depth study. Many of those suggestions are already under consideration by the committee.

What I thought to be the most reassuring remark by the hon. member for Sea Point was when he pointed out that the market forces of supply and demand were the dominant forces in the field of housing. That is a truism. It has always been so. It has been so since long before the days of Adam Smith, and it will always be so. Of course, the hon. member mentioned certain provisos, with which I agree. If that is the point of view of the hon. member, I believe, we are sharing common ground, which means that we can in future have fruitful discussions, particularly on the very vexing question of rent control. There are limitations, umpteen limitations in the whole system of rent control but I believe that we can thrash out the problem and find some solution on the basis referred to by the hon. member for Sea Point. I should like to invite the hon. member to come forward with his suggestions because I do not believe that we on this side of the House have a monopoly of wisdom.

Hear, hear! [Interjections.]

Although I have been praising the hon. member up to now, I do want to refer to the fact that in his motion he asks for an inquiry. He did not talk about a commission of inquiry, but the hon. member for Hillbrow and the hon. member for Green Point were more courageous and called the thing by its name and said they wanted a commission of inquiry. I could hardly believe my ears. [Interjections.] Has the hon. member not done his homework? Does he not know what is going on today? He asks for a commission of inquiry into the Rents Act and other Acts. As recently as 1977, a report was published by a commission, a bulky report.

Outdated.

The hon. member says “outdated”. Very well, I shall come presently to his problem about this report being out of date. This was a commission which reported to the State President on all these matters which the hon. member mentioned, and many more. However, the hon. member says it is outdated. Then we must help him. I do not suppose the Viljoen report is outdated, because that appeared only a few weeks ago—in fact, a few days ago. So that report is fresh from the oven. [Interjections.] There is another report which deals with some of these aspects. I also have information here about other inquiries which are being conducted at the moment. There is the Louw inquiry, and I quote the terms of reference of that inquiry—

1. (a) The desirability and possibility of providing housing for the lower income groups on a large scale by making use of non-conventional building methods as well;
2. (b) The supplementary role which can if necessary be played by alternative methods for the provision of housing for the lower income groups; and
3. (c) Other relevant matters relating to alternative building methods.

Of course, there are hon. members who will say that these terms of reference are rather limited. Let us see whether we can find something which is more comprehensive. The hon. the Minister has also appointed a technical committee under the chairmanship of Mr. Justice Strydom, and here is a part of the terms of reference of the Strydom Committee—

Surely the hon. member must have been aware of this inquiry which is still in progress, but in spite of that he asks for a new inquiry. Does he find that this inquiry is not wide enough? Does he believe that it is not comprehensive enough? However, this is not all. There is also the Steyn Committee—here I am referring to the hon. the Deputy Minister of Finance—with the following terms of reference—

1. (a) promote private home ownership, and
2. (b) ensure the maximum participation of the private sector, including the employer.

Even this is not all, however. We also have the statutory bodies that have been established to give attention to this matter continuously. We also have the Advisory Committee for Housing Affairs, with 18 members, including some of our leading figures in the field of housing and from the private as well as the public sector. Only this morning I received two reports on my desk; each of them must have been 5 centimetres thick. These were reports received from pilot committees which had been appointed by that advisory committee, in which consideration is given to, for example, the high cost of housing and township development. There is an engineer’s report which lays down the norms in this connection. It will be discussed by the Advisory Committee on Housing Affairs. Then it will go to a further statutory committee, namely the Housing Policy Board, under the chairmanship of the hon. the Minister of Community Development, on which representatives of the four provinces serve. While we have this plethora of evidence, inquiries and commissions, the hon. member comes along and asks us for yet another commission.

I want to ask the hon. member where in this plethora of inquiries which are in progress—we even have inquiries into inquiries—the hon. member wants to fit in his inquiry. Can he tell us what area, what insignificant aspect, has not yet been covered by these inquiries, which are comprehensive, thorough, expert and scientific? I honestly want to express my amazement at the fact that the hon. member is actually asking for a commission. I think I shall have to give him the opportunity to withdraw his motion. [Interjections.]

I want to ask the hon. member why he is asking for a commission. I find it interesting that the Opposition can be so wonderfully inconsistent when it comes to commissions. Did he consult the hon. member for Houghton, for example, before asking for a commission? The other day, referring to all the commissions we were appointing, the hon. member for Houghton accused us of sheer laziness. She said: “You are too lazy to do your job.” Now, contrary to her standpoint, the hon. member for Sea Point is asking for another commission.

You only appoint commissions when the answer is obvious.

The hon. member for Durban Point is present here. He will recall that on television the other night—he was watching his own performance—the thrust of his attack on the Government was that the Government appointed commissions and then refused to accept the advice of those commissions.

No, that is not so.

Yes, the hon. member said that. The Government appoints commissions, that is why he does not want to ask for a commission today. He said so himself. Today he comes along and accuses us of having in fact accepted the recommendations of the Fouché Commission. He says that we find ourselves in this dilemma today because we accepted the recommendations of the Fouché Commission. The hon. members really must make up their minds about what they want. [Interjections.]

Only last week the hon. member for Sea Point attacked us sharply for not having accepted certain recommendations of the President’s Council. However, he presumes to boycott that body. Now he says here by implication that that body made good recommendations, but that the Government was too weak-kneed to accept those recommendations. Where do those hon. members stand? One should at least be consistent. On the one hand, they reproach us for not accepting the recommendations of commissions, and now I want to bet every cent I have that next time we shall hear from those benches that South Africa will be struck by disaster if we accept the recommendations of two commissions whose reports we have just received.

Can you come back to the Rents Act now?

Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. the Deputy Minister whether he has a solution to the problems we have pointed out today? [Interjections.]

I have just given the hon. member for Hillbrow an exhaustive list of all the inquiries which are being conducted, in order to indicate that there is no need for a further inquiry. There are solutions, too. The real problem with the speeches by hon. members on the other side is that they only come here with long lists of problems.

I want to say with all due respect that I could draw up a much longer list of problems, because I work with these matters every day. However, the solutions were few and far between.

Solve them.

In the first point of this motion, the hon. member asks for “adequate protection for the public against abuse, harassment and exploitation”. Now I just want to ask the hon. member for Sea Point one thing in connection with this point. Can he imagine what administrative machinery would be necessary to give effect to what he is asking for here? What do we have already? We already have six full-time rent boards, 21 part-time rent boards as well as the Rent Control Board.

[Inaudible.]

The hon. member speaks much too softly. I am saying that it is a whole bureaucracy that has been built up. However, this is not all. Every year, the tenants in assisted housing have to be asked whether their income is still within the limits laid down in order to fit into this formula, so that their rent may be adjusted accordingly. In Soweto alone there are 100 000 houses, and in the rest of the country there are hundreds of thousands of these houses. Can the hon. member imagine for a moment what an army of officials one has to obtain this information from tenants and to process it? Now he is actually asking for an expansion of the whole administrative machinery. He is talking about administrative machinery which is necessary for protection against abuse, harassment and exploitation. As far as abuse is concerned, we do not need machinery for the vast majority of those people who are housed in State housing. Over the past five years we have provided 92% of all housing for Black people. The private sector has provided 8%. As far as Coloured housing is concerned, 84% has been provided by the Government sector, and as far as Indians are concerned, the figure is 61%. There is no harassment or exploitation in those houses, and this army of officials that I have mentioned, people who are not directly employed by us, that is true, but who are employed by the local authorities, do not have to investigate harassment and exploitation, because they simply do not occur there. What they investigate is abuse. They must be able to ascertain whether there are people living in houses for which they are actually paying less than they should in terms of the income limit applicable to them. The hon. members talk about the very high rentals that are being paid in some cases. Do hon. members know that the rent in the case of a person whose income is less than R150 per month is 5% of his income? It varies, but the minimum is R2,50 per month. The hon. member for Sea Point should not laugh about it.

That is the Government’s housing. We are not talking about that. We are talking about private flats in the cities.

But I am talking about what the State does. I have just said that 92% of the houses built for Blacks during the past year were built by the State, and the rentals being paid for them vary from R2,50 to R7,50 a month. Therefore I want to ask the hon. member: Does he know of a single place in the whole wide world where people can rent houses at those prices?

That is next Friday’s motion; it has nothing to do with this debate.

All these officials have to do is to go and find out whether there are perhaps people with an income of R300 a month, for example, who are living in a house for which they are paying a maximum of R7,50 a month. We only investigate abuse. When the hon. member speaks about harassment and exploitation, he is referring to the private sector. At least the hon. member admits that there is no exploitation with regard to housing provided by the State, and that includes the bulk of the housing for the Black population. Therefore the hon. member is advocating a further army of officials in addition to the one we already have. The principal task of the rent boards is rent determination. These boards must ensure that people pay fair rentals. However, there are also people who bring cases of harassment and exploitation to the attention of the rent boards. The hon. member for Green Point says he has received hundreds of letters about this from voters. I want to thank the hon. member for being so considerate towards me, because not a single one of those hundreds of letters has found its way to my desk.

He probably tears them up.

No, he solves his problems himself. I told the hon. member for Hillbrow a few days ago that he was losing his grip, for I had not received a letter from him for two days. He is one of my prolific correspondents and a man who works hard in his constituency.

Because of the general election, when a great deal of publicity was given to rent increases, literally hundreds of representations reached us concerning rentals that had been dramatically increased. We had to appoint quite a number of additional officials to investigate the representations, and it was found that in a good 80% of the cases, the complaints were not justified and the rentals compared very favourably with those in adjoining blocks of flats. It is true, of course, that rentals have gone up tremendously. Interest rates have also gone up by several per cent during the past year. There have also been cost increases with regard to labour and muncipal rates. Municipal rates have increased by 50% in Pretoria and by 27% in Cape Town. In hundreds of cases, however, we did in fact succeed in persuading the landlords to lower the rentals considerably.

The recommendations of the Fouché report are just as valid as in the past. The question of supply and demand must be brought into balance, and the irony is that the more control there is, the more one inhibits the supply, and it can actually be counter-productive.

The motion which is before the House also asks for special protection for the aged, the infirm and others in need. But it is in fact being given. Over the past three years we have spent R52,5 million on old age homes for Whites. We have a very proud record as far as the care of our aged is concerned. In fact, statistics which I saw recently indicated that apart from Holland, there is not another country in the world where a larger percentage of pensioners is accommodated in State housing. In a country such as Greece, and in many other countries in the world, there is not a single old age home. The hon. member talks about the poor, the infirm and others in need and he wants to lump them all together. That is impractical. Naturally there are many elderly and infirm people who do in fact need assistance. However, the majority of them are being protected. There is State housing, and there are protected tenants in housing erected before 1966. The norm we apply is not whether they are elderly or infirm, but whether the monthly income is below R360 per month in the case of single persons and R650 per month in the case of married people.

The third leg of the motion deals with the cost of providing such protection and assistance. The hon. member did not say what he actually meant by “assistance”. I take it that the hon. member is thinking of subsidies. Is that correct? Is he saying that we should subsidize houses?

Rentals should be subsidized.

The hon. member should read what the Fouché report writes about that. Of the protected tenants of 1977, a good 50% to 70% qualified for subsidies in terms of their income. At R10 a month, this would mean an expenditure of R15 million to R20 million a year. However, that is not all. There are literally millions of Blacks and Coloureds and Asians who would then also qualify, and that would mean an astronomical amount of hundreds of millions of rands every year. The hon. member for Sea Point and the hon. member for Durban Point did not do their homework before coming here and pleading for subsidies.

The Viljoen Committee recommended it.

Sir, do you know that we are paying R40 million a year in subsidies at the moment? At R10 000 a year it means 4 000 houses which we could have built every year with that money we are spending on subsidies.

My Whip is sitting next to me, Sir. I am a very obedient person. I want to thank the person. I want to thank hon. members once again for their contributions.

Business interrupted in accordance with Standing Order No. 34 and motion and amendment lapsed.

Mr. Speaker, I move—

Agreed to.