I move—

I see that a distinction is made in the recommendations. In some cases it is recommended to write down the debt and the interest, in others that the capital and interest must all be paid, but that will make the people bankrupt. Take, e.g., the Doom River Syndicate. In the good days of ostrich farming the people thought to make a fortune. A dam was built which has never yet been full. Whose fault was that? Did the engineers not go to see whether the place was suitable for a dam, whether the rainfall was adequate? The last Government is to blame as they built political dams. Were they built because the people agreed with their views? Were they built without enquiry? The people are now in trouble. The dams are empty, they have had years of drought and cannot pay the interest. They are not given a chance, and they have now just to become poor whites. The policy of the Government as I understand it at any rate is to keep people on the land. We have not a single law on the statute book to try to keep on the land the middle man who has been hit by the drought. It is true that the Minister is doing all in his power. He distributes seed-wheat and other things through loans from the Land Bank. In many cases, however, that is not enough to keep people on the land. The position now is that, after people are ruined, completely finished, the Government assists in keeping them on the land. They were then under the pernicious influence of the town, and did not have the same love for the land as before. We must stop the stream to the towns. The middle man is having a hard time and the Government must do something special for him. It is a very good thing that they are being given £300 or £400, and they thank the Government and say that it has done more than any previous Government, but that it does not go far enough. Here we have a scheme on which a number of people have been ruined, not through the Government’s fault, but through the bad negligent work of the engineers in the public service who draw public money. Now we have me Irrigation Commission which does not blame the engineers who wasted the taxpayers’ money, but suggests that the people living at the schemes shall be ruined. One of the greatest men has said, “I would rather make mistakes than do nothing.” Here we have the great men, the engineers, and they have made blunders. Before sixpence is spent on the schemes, an enquiry is made by engineers, the rainfall and the locality are studied, as well as the probabilities of success. I see nothing about that in the report however, nor do I see it stated in the report that the engineers have done bad work.

They say that the weather conditions changed.

No, I think we must follow another system. It is easy if a man merely makes mistakes and other people have to pay for them. I am not satisfied with that. The poor people have been plunged into misery and I want to help them. Let the Government allow them to keep a piece of ground, and take the rest and do with it what it pleases, but why first drive the man off the land, and then after five or six years want to put him back on it again? It seems to me a great thing in the report that it does not mention who is responsible for the mistakes made. The chairman of the commission is himself an engineer, and will not say that the other engineers were a curse to the country, and did bad work The engineers drew fat salaries and I should yet like to see the day when an engineer who does bad work will lose a part of his salary. They get fat salaries which they do not earn. The man with the biggest salary was the greatest curse to South Africa. They live somewhere else, or they have retired and draw fat pensions, but the people suffer distress as the result of their mistakes. We must get another batch of engineers, people who can do proper work, and we must have people over them who can judge whether they are doing bad work.

I hope it will not be said to-day that I know nothing about farming matters or irrigation; but I suppose nothing more important can be moved in and considered by this House than irrigation schemes. This report, although not long, is most important. I move as an amendment—

I hope the Minister will accept that, as it will give every hon. member an opportunity of discussing this very fully.

I second that.

It will be accepted.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Motion, as amended, put and agreed to.

House in Committee:

The Chairman read the report [S.C. 1—’28].

On recommendation No. (2),

In connection with recommendation No. 2, the McGregor irrigation scheme, I want to express my disappointment that a writing down has not been recommended here. In this case we have furrow dams which are entirely useless to the people, and of which two cannot be used at all because they hold no water. I therefore move—

I think that this matter should have the committee’s attention again, and that an opportunity should be given to the people to give evidence before the select committee, because if the motion is passed as drawn, then it will not solve the difficulties at all, then we shall again within a short while have to take action in connection with the matter. The people below the dam are very poor and have gone back very much as a result of the two years’ drought, and I think the scheme requires the further attention of the committee.

I think that the House will have to pass the recommendation unless we are going to regard the schemes as charitable ones. It repeatedly happens that people want irrigation works very badly in their constituencies and they are then described as very good, but as soon as they are completed the people run to the Government for writings-off. The lower Seekoe scheme has been properly examined by the Irrigation Commission which recommended that there was not sufficient water for both sides of the spruit, and in order to get more water the people on the left bank should be cut off, which means that about £2,700 is written off which will result in the people on the right bank having sufficient water, and the scheme paying. We take up the position that if there is not sufficient water, and the soil is good we cannot be expected to write off any more.

I want to ask the Minister not to be so hard on these people. As for the people on the left side, all the debt has been written off and they completely escape obligations in connection with the scheme, but what proof has the Minister that there will be enough water on the right side for all the farmers? Why is not a certain percentage written off the right side as well?

Motion put and negatived.

Recommendation, as printed, put and agreed to.

On recommendation No. (3),

Will the Minister be good enough to inform the committee who introduced the matter, the amount which has been expended, who was at the back, and why it failed?

This is one of the old schemes authorized under the previous Government, which sanctioned the loan. A board was formed and spent about £1,200 on stamps for registration fees alone. Afterwards the Government found that it had not the money available to proceed with the scheme, with the result that it was held up. From the evidence of the chairman, it is quite clear that even if the Government had advanced the scheme, it would not have been a success, as the place selected for the dam should have been much lower down the river. The select committee thought it was only right, after Government first granting and then withdrawing the loan, and after the board had been put to expense from which it derived no benefit, that it was the duty of the Government to write off the whole amount.

I understand well enough that it is not this Government that did it, and I can realize that hon. members opposite feel sore because the sins of the late Government are now coming to light. This Government now has to pay for the mistakes made by the engineers under that Government. They selected wrong spots for the dams, and they did not properly enquire whether there was an adequate rainfall. They built political dams. The hon. members of the Opposition do not have to pay, nor the man who made the mistake, but the people who have to make a living on the irrigation scheme, and who cannot do so; my fellow farmers who have been ruined have to pay for the faults of incompetent engineers. There is a farming member opposite who is laughing when I say that, but he is not laughing about me, but about the farmer who has to suffer, and I can now understand why he is sitting on the same side as free traders.

The hon. member must confine himself to the subject.

Great blunders have been made here by a man who drew a large salary. That man is still in the service, or has retired with a big pension.

Shoot him.

Yes, that man ought to be shot, but it will do no good. It reminds me of a seller who went into a shop and borrowed £100 and when he returned later he said to the shopkeeper: “I feel so bad that I could shoot myself.” And the shopkeeper replied: “I wish that you had shot yourself before you borrowed £100 from me.” If I mistake not the man who is responsible for the blunders is one who draws a big salary. One of the former Ministers went about and advised the people to buy ground, and just as it was recommended that the people could not buy enough ground, so later it was also said that dams could not be built fast enough. What will save South Africa is not great irrigation schemes, but the small schemes of £800 or £1,000, they need not be so large.

It is always delightful to hear the hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert), who seems to utilize every possible opportunity, without any ground whatsoever, to attack the old South African party. I understand that the promoters of the scheme painted very lurid pictures of its probable success, but I think we can let the matter drop, as the amount at issue is very small and it is only another of these schemes which have unfortunately failed. Notwithstanding these failures, the country should go in for irrigation. I support irrigation schemes, but they should be established on a sound basis.

The estimated cost of the scheme was £595,000, but the cost to the country of abandoning it is only £4,950. As the commission reported that the place selected for the erection of the dam is not suitable, it is better to write off £4,950 rather than to waste over half a million.

When the hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert) occasionally arises in his wrath and gives us a real avalanche of words, my memory goes back to one of the first political meetings I ever attended in this country. Feeling then ran very high, and there was a very estimable chairman who, becoming excited, struck the table and shouted “Vriende, nou praat ek, of ek bars.” That is really why the House is so sympathetic towards the hon. member for Namaqualand, because if he is not allowed to give expression to his feelings, something more alarming may take place. The hon. member for Von Brandis (Mr. Nathan) may feel satisfied with regard to the sheme. The Bloemfontein Municipality offered to subscribe £100,000 towards the construction of the dam on condition that it received a certain amount of water, but on further investigations the late Government found it would have been exceedingly unfortunate to grant the loan. I hope the hon. member for Namaqualand will be as equally convinced on the next item as he will be on this.

Now I see where the shoe pinches. An hon. member was a Minister once and built political dams. I can imagine that my words do not please him, but he must understand that I feel for the poor people, and little children who are the sufferers, and he must understand that the people are bitter. For party purposes the people were flattered. And this is not the only dam which is a curse. Still I am astonished that the Opposition still regularly have the impudence in this House to accuse the Government of wasting money. They forget to add that this Government must pay off the debt incurred by them, and that it must pay for the blunders made under their administration and for the dead liability which they allowed to accumulate. Hon. members must therefore clearly understand that there are people who feel bitter about it. Hon. members opposite are the greatest offenders. It is not their children who are suffering, but the children of the unfortunate people on the schemes, who have to walk about barefooted and hungry because other people have made mistakes.

I am sorry that the hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert) talks in that way. We must expect mistakes to be made in connection with such an important matter. We have had many failures, but what is the good of always harking back to see what mistakes were made by previous Governments. How many millions have not been spent on the main line to Johannesburg? But what is the use always to reflect on the old Cape Government, and old Union Governments. It is surely our duty to look to the future. Let us get on with the business. Nor must we forget that these things took place with the approval of Parliament, that unanimous voice of all sides of Parliament was in favour of the policy of building irrigation works. In connection with the Modder River irrigation scheme a dam was never built; it was preliminary expenditure to see whether there was any good ground which could be developed. Every member from the Free State will certainly concur in our having to write it off. The object was to supply more water to Bloemfontein, and at the same time to see if it were not possible to find some good irrigable land on which settlers could be placed. The idea was to put 40 to 60 morgen of land under water to give people an opportunity there. We decided about this matter after long consideration and came to the conclusion that it would be a good thing to write off the amount. We have here to do with people who have got into debt without ever having had any water.

I do not think the hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert) understands what happened here at all. My constituents want this particular clause passed, no matter to what political party they belong, and nine-tenths of them belong to my hon. friend’s party, and they are very anxious indeed for this to be carried through. The hon. member does not know this scheme was undertaken at a time when everybody wanted a scheme, and when the cost was gone into the farmers rightly decided to give up this scheme. I advised them to that effect. The riparian owners would have been ruined.

They would have spent half-a-million of money.

They would have spent more than half-a-million of money, men who have been there since the time of the Voortrekkers, who have held that land through all the worst times and the good times. We told them to give up the scheme. It has nothing to do with the Bloemfontein Town Council. They have an enormous amount of water, but they were prepared to take water from the scheme so as to help the farmers. That is all finished now.

The hon. member misunderstands me. I am not opposed to the writing off. On the contrary I want to assist the people and am sorry for them.

Why then do you talk in that way?

The big schemes were built with ulterior motives and great blunders were made, and all the time small schemes would have sufficed there, works, from which the people could have had some benefit, while now great damage and loss are being suffered, and everybody is being injured by them. I just want to point out how people went to work in the past and that we must avoid those methods in future.

And now?

No, I do not believe that this House would now lightly pass anything which the Government proposes. Things went too easily in the past, and schemes were undertaken which never should have been. Hon. members opposite are so hypocritical now, and are running away from their own children.

I do not know whether it is possible to make the hon. gentleman wise in anything. Now there is no dam on the Modder River. The farmers along the Modder River and the municipality of Bloemfontein entered into a scheme for the purpose of forming an irrigation district for finding out whether it was possible to construct a conservation dam on the Modder River, which, as my hon. friend has said, would have cost about £500,000, for the purpose of irrigating a large tract along the river and supplying a quantity of water to Bloemfontein. There never was any dam made. There were investigations into the whole scheme, and after the fullest consideration it was considered advisable that the scheme should be dropped, and that this money should not be expended. I am not responsible for the initiation of the scheme at all, but I am really beginning to think that I have been rather hard upon my hon. friend and that he is looking for information, and that is the reason why he is opposed to this Vote. The Irrigation Board had to contract a certain amount of debt, a very small amount of money, but that debt will be jointly and Severally upon all the farms that came under the scheme. As the department considered and the people considered that it was not advisable to go on with the scheme in the future, it was thought necessary and advisable to wipe off this small debt. It cannot be done without coming to Parliament. I gathered the hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert) now wants all the farmers on the Modder River adjoining or some short distance from Bloemfontein to Have this charge scheduled upon them for the irrigable area which would have come under the dam.

No.

That is what I gathered the hon. member wanted. The committee say that this money should be written off because there is no possibility of going on with the scheme.

I am not against the writing off, but it ought not to be necessary to write off £4,000 in connection with the examination of land. It is the costly engineers who cost so much.

You know nothing about it.

The hon. member knows more about medicines by which people are sent to a wrong place. Are we then to forget all the blunders and are the engineers who made the mistakes to go unpunished? In this case, the engineer has cost the country £4,000, and very possibly more, quite possibly more than the weight of his body in gold. Now the champions opposite, who said that the work must be constructed, come to defend the engineers here.

The hon. member must confine himself to the subject.

I only say that the engineers are the people responsible for the heavy losses. May not the tax payer say anything then?

If the hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert) were a little better informed, he would have adopted another attitude from the start. In connection with this work an application was made by a number of riparian owners to have it surveyed. The survey was done on their behalf, and the municipality of Bloemfontein. A deputation from Bloemfontein and of the farmers there gave evidence before the select committee. Subsequently difficulties arose among the riparian owners, because it was then decided not to proceed with the work. There was, however, a delegation, and the Director of Irrigation also gave evidence. I know about it because I was a member of the select committee.

But the select committee selected the wrong place for the dam. It is true that the people asked for an irrigation scheme in this area and they thought it would be a good thing. The hon. member for Colesberg (Mr. G. A. Louw) is a farmer, but if he knows nothing about irrigation, then he very poorly represents his irrigators. I never said that a dam was not possible in that area. It is the engineers who selected a wrong spot. It is they who have caused the damage.

Recommendation put and agreed to.

On recommendation No. (5),

I would like to have some information in regard to this item. I cannot find what the amount is that the Kakamas Settlement owes, whether it is £24,000 or £20,000.

The original cost?

No, what they owe at the present time. They have paid some of it off.

You will find it in the irrigation report, page 13.

The loan outstanding on the 30th June, 1925, was £148,503. The commission is satisfied that this is one of the schemes that has been a considerable success, and that there was some damage done by the flood in 1925. What the commission felt was that we do not want to write anything off here, and the only thing we have done is, we have said that we will put £18,000 aside, which they have to pay as interest on the loan, and that £15,000 should be used as a fund to improve the properties or for experiments that might be required under that settlement.

May I just point out that there is a misunderstanding. The Minister read out that on the 30th June, 1925, the debt amounted to £148,000. That is a misunderstanding. It is the whole general debt on the labour colony. But the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) wants to know how much the Government loans that are still outstanding amount to. The latter amounts, I think, are £23,000.

The hon. member is right.

I hope that the Committee will treat this matter favourably. I do not say that the Kakamas settlement has been a success financially, but, socially, it has certainly been a tremendous success. I remember I was there in 1901 with the hon. member for Standerton (Gen. Smuts). We raided the place then, but there was practically nothing to be got out of it, and if a similar operation were to be carried on now, it would certainly be more successful, because of the progress of the place during the last 25 years. I hope that there will be no objection to passing this proposal because the settlement, although it has not been a financial success, has been a tremendous factor in that part of the world in improving the lot of the poor man.

I think if there is any scheme that redounds to the credit of the Dutch Reformed Church it is the settlement at Kakamas. I know of cases myself in the great droughts that have passed over the north-western district where men have practically lost their all, but have been able to rehabilitate themselves at Kakamas. The advances the Government have made towards that scheme have been very beneficially used indeed. I think the only trouble is that it is not used as a jumping off place for people to go into the interior and get grants of land for the purpose of development so that other people could come in and go through the same schooling as they have had at Kakamas. Many men who have come to Kakamas have absolutely rehabilitated themselves. Some are quite comfortably off. If my hon. friend went there now he would see an enormous difference from what he saw on his raiding expedition. It would not be found to be a barren place now but plentifully supplied for men and animals. I would like my hon. friend to see if some scheme can be developed. There are large portions of undeveloped land in the north-western districts where, if boreholes were put down, these people might be persuaded to go and leave their holdings at Kakamas for other people to get the same training there. I do not think there has been anything more beneficial in the north-western districts than Kakamas. I do not say it is a complete success, but that it has given a large number of people, who would otherwise have been poor whites to-day, another chance in life there can be no doubt. Any money in reason the Government spends there will be supported by this side of the House.

I quite agree with the right hon. member. I have visited this scheme myself and if there is one scheme in the Union that is going to be a success it is surely Kakamas. In fact, it is already a success. I think the money spent there is money spent in the right direction. These people have tried to stand on their own feet. The church has helped them, and if we could get more schemes assisted in that way it would be of benefit to the country in general. The amount I mentioned to the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) £148,503 in 1925 of course was the general debt which they owe to the church, and not to the Government. The amount owing to the Government is approximately £23,000.

I am glad that there is a recommendation for the Kakamas scheme to be written down. It is one of the outstanding schemes in the country, but it was not built by engineers, but by a farmer. He told the people that if they worked so much in a day they would have the preference, and seven out of eight made good; but the other schemes were muddled by engineers. Is the Minister aware that there are a further 600 morgen below the Kakamas scheme which are irrigable? The people as well as the church time and again besought the previous Government for money, but it was always refused, so that there are now 600 morgen which can be irrigated. Another 100 families can be put on the land there. They kept this scheme back because there was no political capital to be made out of it. It is the only outstanding success in the Country, but it was not built by engineers, because if they had built it then it would to-day also have been a curse on the country.

There are possibly members in the House who are not so well acquainted with the matter and would possibly be confused by the fact that although it is such a success it is still recommended that certain instalments be written off for five years. I hope, however, that the House sees that there are conditions attached to that. The money is intended for improving the place itself. I want to say a few words as to how it can be done. There are about 100 erven where people live on an island, and all produce, and everything they need must be taken to and from the mainland by pont, which is very inconvenient. Now they intend to build a causeway costing about £6,000. It is an improvement to enable the people on the island to make better use of their erven and to transport their produce more cheaply. So there are other similar improvements. The water furrows are only being provided with little embankments of two to three feet, and if this were only to conserve water higher up against the time when the water is running low before the big rains come in the Transvaal, then they will be able at times when the river is not running to keep the water furrow full. What the hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert) said, namely, that the previous Government had refused to grant loans is not quite right. He is indeed partly right, but I can state accurately what took place. Under the old Labour Colony Act of the Cape Colony the church had the right to claim two-thirds of their expenditure on water works in labour colonies from the Government. The church regarded it as a debt of the Government, but when they came to the Government and sent in the bill, the Government did not pay it, and sought all kinds of evasions. They said the Government is still owing about £8,000 or £10,000, please let them have that as well. The Government refused and looked for a way out. The ground was given to the church 20 years ago and was then worth about 1s. a morgen. Then they took the price five years ago, and the Government put up the price, which was 15 to 20 times as much. We felt at the time that it was not a nice way for the State to evade its duty. That is the correct explanation of the position on that irrigation scheme.

I understand that there are still 600 morgen which can be irrigated, and that the Kakamas people asked for money for the development of that area. I do not now know whether it was that two-thirds, but with the money they asked for they could have irrigated 600 morgen.

Recommendation put and agreed to.

On recommendation No. (6),

I move—

This recommendation has my full support, but I also want to make a few remarks because it is a very hard case. The Louws, and other farmers in this district, with the best in the world, made a start, and as appears from the Fourie report it was a complete failure, and the scheme cannot possibly be saved. It must be hushed up. In select committee it was proposed to call up the bond on this scheme, but I want to make a proposal here which escaped my attention in the select committee. There we felt the deepest sympathy with the farmers, but we also thought of the tax-payer. If we give up the scheme and call up the bond the ground is not only being taken away, but all the people possess in movable or immovable property will be included, and I therefore want to move—

I think that that is fair, and that the taxpayer will also think so. The scheme is hopeless, but I still think that it was not the intention of the select committee to ruin those unfortunate people further. The intention merely was to abandon the scheme. When we look at the reports we find that £29,000 was mentioned as the amount which the people themselves invested in it, and they will lose this amount as well. I do not know how they are off financially, but if that takes place it means absolute ruin for those people. I have not the Afrikaans report here, but the English report reads as follows. [Extract read.] And then the Fourie report goes further. The final summing up of the Van Reenen Commission is as follows. [Quotation read.] It is therefore clear that the scheme is hopeless and I cannot see any other way open. Hon. members possibly know that, according to law, there is recourse on immovable property and also upon other possessions. I therefore move my amendment.

I support the amendment. I agree with the mover of it that we were quite in agreement in the select committee with reference to the different schemes, but everyone who is acquainted with the position of those people has no doubt that they have put all they possessed into the irrigation scheme. Their capital debt to the Government is almost £22,000, besides arrear interest of £8,000, which makes a total of £30,000. What I am concerned about is that proper financial control never existed in connection with the scheme. The money was paid out—and I say this with all respect for the people—that I do not believe that the people knew how the money was spent. I do not want to criticize the scheme nor the situation of it, but if the experts who build a dam know that it is always treacherous and leaking and will always run out, then they would never have built it. The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) will agree that, after the recent rains, the people have an opportunity of getting straight and of paying part of the interest, and we decided unanimously in the select Committee to come to their assistance. If Doom River were to be sold by auction to-day, it would not fetch more than £10,000; and the debt on the scheme is £57,000; I therefore hope the Government will not go to extremes, and will accept the motion of the hon. member. I hope the people at Doom River will not have to pay the money at once, but, as in the case of Captain Williams under scheme 8, will be given nine months’ time. I wish the three schemes to be treated in the same way.

Is that not a misapprehension?

I do not think so. I believe the hon. member was not here when the matter was debated. I made a proposal at the time for a further alteration, but it was objected to, and I therefore could not move it. I hope that, together with the motion of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central), his proposal to give the Doom River scheme a nine months’ extension, just as in the case of Capt. G. C. Williams, and other schemes will be accepted. It is a very important matter. The people thought it a good scheme, but beyond their losing everything they put into it, there is still a second bond of £12,000. There is no chance of their ever getting a penny back. I therefore move—

I hope the Minister will be reasonable and accept the two amendments. When the Government granted the loan the Department thought that the great appreciation in the value of the land would be sufficient guarantee, but it now appears that that is not the case. It is very hard for the people to give up their movable property as well. I think that it was formerly thought that the land would be the only security. Now the movable property can also be taken as security. The second amendment is also fair. It is difficult for the people to decide immediately what to do, and we must give them a chance of making arrangements.

If the committee accepts the motion of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz) then the effect of it will be in the interests of Louw Bros., because when we look at the figures we see that the debt to the Government is just as large as the other separate debts. They borrowed the money to build a dam and if we accept the motion of the hon. member then the Government is merely deferring its claims in favour of the other creditors. They will come immediately and demand their share, with the result that the Government will not assist those people. The position of the irrigation works is hopeless and even if the Government forewent its rights of claiming their movable property, that would not assist the people at all. I cannot see therefore why we should pass the motion. I have much sympathy for those people, but it is not an improvement, it makes the position worse because the other creditors will get the greatest part of the spoil, and get the fattest portion, while the Government gets nothing.

I also sympathize with the people, because I know some of them personally and I know they are progressive farmers. When the dam was built the ground was sufficient security, but its value has dropped. It may be that the people have other debts, but if the Government does not take the movable property then the other people will also have no opportunity of taking it. If the Government accepts the amendments they will be doing a good thing. We must try to save the people.

It seems to me, now that the matter has been further discussed, I should withdraw my previous motion and move—

I think the members of the select committee would welcome such a proposal, for the point which has been raised during the debate missed the select committee. I do not, however, think we should reconsider our chief recommendation, for we were unanimous in arriving at it.

I am sorry that the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz) put forward this motion. This position about Doom River is very clear. A commission, the Fourie Commission, was appointed and made a full report about the matter. Let me quote what they say in conclusion in par. 86. [Quotation read.] It is clear from the commission’s report that the scheme was a total failure, and if the Government writes off £30,000 it will still not be possible for the people to continue in consequence of the other creditors under the second mortgage. I now want to explain another matter. The hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) said that the people put £29,700 into the scheme, but if he looks at par. 82 he will find that they only put in £4,680, and the rest was used for other purposes, to buy the ground, etc. I feel that we must not refer the scheme back to the select committee; if it really must be altered, then the House must consider whether we are dealing with charity schemes. If that is the case we can refer it back, but even then we shall not save the people. I do not see what use it is to refer this portion of the report back to a select committee. The House can decide what to do in the matter. Ever since I have held my office the people on this scheme have been struggling. They cannot sell the ground. If they could, they would be able to start somewhere else. The hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert) said that they suffered by ostrich feathers becoming unpopular. The scheme was never intended for ostrich farming, but for grain. We do not want to import the ostrich argument from Oudtshoorn to Calvinia. I am sorry that I cannot agree with the motion of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central). The hon. member for Graaff-Reinet (Mr. I. P. van Heerden) said that he feels so sorry for the people. Why should we leave them there three months longer, seeing it is useless, and we have spent the taxpayers’ money? Last year we intended to abandon the scheme, but I wanted to give the people a chance because they assured me that there was an English syndicate which would certainly buy the ground, but nothing came of it. What is the use, therefore, of saying that we must continue the scheme and refer the report back to the committee? The select committee cannot go further than they have gone in this recommendation. The Fourie Commission made an enquiry, and so has the permanent commission, and they have all concluded that the scheme is hopeless and it is only a waste of time to continue it.

I am sorry that the Minister clearly has not followed what I meant. I agree with him that the scheme is hopeless, and I do not intend giving the scheme another chance. We all agree that it must be abandoned. I agree that we must reckon with the taxpayers, but we must also think about the human side of the matter. My attitude is that we must abandon the scheme, but must not ruin the people further.

Rut why then must it be referred back to the select committee?

If the House will allow, I will withdraw my motion, and again move my original amendment. It is not my intention to resuscitate the scheme. We all agree that that is not possible, but we must remember flesh and blood, the human side of the matter. I, therefore, move my original amendment, and hope the Minister will now accept it. It is intended to bear the human side of the matter in mind.

I have no objection to the amendment. The object is not to ruin the people. We have a mortgage over the ground, and if we leave them the movable property it will possibly be easier for them to start again.

I thought that the motion of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz) was a very good one, but I had previously asked the Minister if he approved of it, and he answered “Yes.” What the hon. member for Wit-watersberg (Lt.-Col. N. J. Pretorius) said has confused me a little, and I should like to be clear on the matter. If the Government accepts the amendment of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) and does not claim their movable property, then we are only protecting that to give the other creditors a better chance of getting in their outstandings. Say that we call up the first bond, then the other debt continues. If we call it up the second bondholder will get no chance, but if we cancel it, then he can ruin the people.

Well, there is some truth in what the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) says, but I think I can give the assurance that if the Government assists the people the other bondholders will also be fair. I do not believe that the danger the hon. member mentions will be realized in practice.

I believe there is a great deal of truth in what the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) said. The Government says it will not sell the movable property to cover its claims, but suppose the people have a few oxen and milch cows, then the other creditors who are owed £11,000, say: “The Government has taken the ground, now we shall take the stock.” I am very glad that the hon. member for Gordonia mentioned the matter. I should not like to assist the other creditors. We want to assist the people, and to protect those who have put their all into the scheme.

I do not wish to delay the committee, but merely to say that the Government has the first bond on the ground, and I only feel sorry for the people who have taken a second bond on it. If we call up the bond, we, of course, have the first preference. It is clear to me that the Government will not recover the full £30,000, even if the stock and movable property are included. Now the objection of the hon. member for Gordonia (Mr. J. H. Conradie) is that the second bondholder will call up the second mortgage. Then the responsibility of throwing the women and children into misfortune rests upon them. Do not let the Government expose itself to that charge, and do not let us take from the people their little stock and their few fowls.

Cannot the Government make it impossible for the second bondholder to do so?

We are not going to do it. Let us just call up our bond and confine ourselves to that without taking the movable property. Let us sell the ground which is mortgaged to us, and go no further. The poor second bondholder is the man who will suffer badly. They are often people who badly need the money.

Amendment proposed by Mr. I. P. van Heerden put and negatived.

Amendment proposed by Col. D. Reitz put and agreed to.

Motion, as amended, put and agreed to.

On recommendation No. (7),

I move—

I see that Mrs. Chatwin is only getting six months’ extension. I should like to see her put on the same footing as Captain Williams, who is dealt with in the next recommendation; and gets nine months’ extension. Her case is just as hopeless as that of the Doom River Syndicate, but I have also the warmest sympathy for her because the Chatwin family have also put thousands and thousands of pounds into the scheme and her position is hopeless to-day. Perhaps it is not quite the same thing, because in any event they still have water, but there is no doubt they have lost much money. I think we ought to give Mrs. Chatwin a little more opportunity to fulfil her obligations and, therefore, I move—

This is one of those schemes on which, I think the Minister knows, I hold very strong views. An irrigation commission was appointed some years ago for the purpose of inspecting schemes on which money had been advanced by the State, and that commission, I think, did extremely good work. In my opinion the Government of the day and the country were greatly indebted to the commission for what it did. The one idea of the commission, which I thought they had imbibed as an instruction from the State when they embarked upon their undertaking, was to do everything they possibly could within reason to keep people upon the land, instead of driving them off the land and ruining them. When the Fourie Commission came to an end, the Government appointed a permanent irrigation commission, of which Mr. van Renen, an engineer of considerable experience, was chairman. The Fourie commission went into Mrs. Chatwin’s case, and the van Renen commission went into her case also, and they made recommendations to the Government. This case is an extremely hard one. The Chatwins embarked on this scheme full of the idea which everybody had at the time, that it could be made a very successful venture. I think the first amount of the loan was in the neighbourhood of £6,000 or £7,000. Owing to unforseen circumstances and misfortune, the dam breached, I believe, once or twice. A certain portion of the foundation of the dam was of rather faulty structure, and I think the dam breached a couple of times. On each occasion after the breach of the dam, after the department had gone into the scheme, it was decided to advance more money, with the result that at the present moment I think the loan advanced by the State is in the vicinity of £14,000 and the interest is something like £3,000, making a total debt of about £17,000. I will not read the report of the Fourie commission, but I will read parts of the report of the present commission. They go into the history of this scheme, which I have somewhat roughly sketched. The commission state the history of the case so far as breaches of the dam are concerned, and the steps which have been taken from time to time to restore the embankment and mention that in August or September, 1923, the embankment was again repaired under the supervision of an engineer of the Irrigation Department, and that the total amount of the loan was £14,000. The commission point but that on February 22nd, 1924. Mr. Chatwin allotted land on his farm on the share system to 14 white families. The idea was when the dam was constructed, and it fortunately is constructed, that they would be able to put a certain number of people in settlement under the scheme—

I am reading the report of the existing Irrigation Commission which has been appointed solely and entirely for the purpose of going into these schemes, to advise the Government and to see whether it is possible without unduly calling on the taxpayers to save people and keep them on the land—

Now I come to the suggestions of the Irrigation commission. Mr. Chatwin made certain proposals as to writing off a portion of the loan. I was one of those who held that to write off a fair amount of the loan would have been fair and reasonable. What does the Irrigation Commission recommend?—

That is the report of the Irrigation Commission. I would sooner have seen a fair amount of the loan written off, but as the commission point out that the object is to keep people on the land, they consider that would have been a fair suggestion. I am sorry that the Government and the select committee did not adopt that report, because if we adopt the recommendation that Mrs. Chatwin be given nine months to meet the obligation, you will turn these people away from the land, and there will be no opportunity of carrying out what the original intention was. But if the recommendation of the commission were carried out, there would be a possibility of their at least retaining something out of the wreck. I want to say one word of warning to the commission; I feel it very much. The commission made their report after the fullest investigation. The department wrote a letter to the commission, in which they were not prepared to adopt the commission’s report, and I cannot understand how the commission, having fully gone into this question and having arrived at definite conclusions, should have departed from those conclusions because the Government were not prepared to accept them. I believe the commission is doing very good work—I have great respect for its chairman—but when it comes to a decision, that decision is for Parliament, and they should not go back on that decision and make any other recommendation. I am perfectly certain that, if the report of the commission had been adopted, there would be a possibility at least of the Chatwins securing something, but if the report of the select committee is adopted, I feel perfectly certain they are going to be ruined. In this committee and previous committees, wherever money is owed jointly and severally in irrigation loans, we have written off certain amounts. Why should you treat people who only have a portion of their all in an irrigation district on a better basis than you treat people who have everything they possess in the scheme? Why should the bona fide irrigationist, who has been unfortunate, be treated worse than a body of people joined together in an irrigation district? I would appeal to the Minister to let this and the following one go back to the select committee, so that we can go into it again and consider it in a more sympathetic manner. I move—

I am glad that the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) has taken up the matter. I also got the impression from the evidence that the select committee started with the idea that if we have to do with individuals so much consideration is not given to it as in the case of a body of people. I think they regarded it in that way. Where there is a body of five or six people of whom a few can make a success of it on account of the circumstance that water is available, while the rest, because the soil is bad or situated at a distance, cannot make a success of it, the committee started, I think, with the idea that as regards the people who had not been successful writing down could take place, while the other people would then get the balance of the scheme. There we have not to do with individual persons, but yet there is an individual writing down. I have the honour of serving on the Select Committee on Crown Lands, and there we have the same difficulty. Some people are successful on settlements, and others are not. I must say that in that connection the Minister of Lands is taking up the correct position. He says that if a person who is not a success on a settlement on Government ground, because it later turns out that the price paid was too high, and the man cannot bear the burdens, an attempt must be made to keep him on the land. Then the Minister takes the view that the State is going to lose, and that he would in that case prefer the person who had been so working there and had put his little money into it, should have the benefit of the loss which the State must suffer rather than that someone else should be put on it. The case of Mrs. Chatwin amounts to the same thing. She put her money into it and her husband’s money is also in it, and as the Government is making a loss she ought to have the benefit of it, and not someone else, because as I understand she will sell, or if the ground is granted to someone else it will never occur that the Government will get back all its money. In such a case the commission should, I think, adopt the attitude that such an individual should receive the same consideration as a body. I am sorry that the hon. member for Pietersburg (Mr. J. F. Tom Naudé) is not here to-night. When I spoke to him he said that if there was one case that ought to be treated sympathetically it was this one, because he says that the people not only came to make a living for themselves in the district, but were ready to assist the farmers and especially the less privileged farmers to go ahead. I thought the hon. member would be here to advocate this case himself, and I am sorry that he had to leave suddenly, but am glad I know his attitude, and I hope the Minister will accept the motion of the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt). The Minister says the position is difficult, and it is, it has long been clear, that the irrigation works are for the most part a failure. Let us not enlarge too much on who is to blame. It is a fact. The Minister has taken a new course and appointed a permanent commission. I think he has acted wisely and the commission will share the responsibility with him. I think it was sensible of him to introduce the report early, because he now knows the attitude of the House. I hope it will now give him a lead, and encourage him to continue. I trust that this recommendation will be referred back to the select committee for further enquiry, and particularly that the view will be taken that individual persons must be treated in the same Way as a body of persons.

I am sorry I cannot agree with either of the hon. members who have just spoken, and I think it would be a mistake to refer this back to the select committee. The right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) has asked why, in certain cases, the write-off is granted, and why not in others. The answer is that the Irrigation Finance Committee and the Special Irrigation Committee were appointed to clear up the whole irrigation situation in South Africa, which, admittedly, is unsatisfactory, and unless we give them a clear hand, they will never do their work. The fact of the matter is that, although, on the face of it, in places they agreed to a write-off, and in places they have refused; it seems hard, but all these cases differ, and the committee must be allowed to treat each one on its own merits. I admit that Mrs. Chatwin’s case is very hard. The committee went into it very carefully, but I do not see what else they could do. The same relief might be granted to Mrs. Chatwin as was granted in the previous instance, that of Doom River, and I move—

I do not think my hon. friend understood me. I spoke strongly for the Fourie Commission and the present committee. But what I ask the committee is—what is the good of appointing two commissions, which you ask to go and investigate these cases on the spot, and to make recommendations, if you are prepared generally not to accept them? I can recommend, the commission being careful to make recommendations, the House being prepared to go one better. Here the commission makes recommendations which will secure the Government a large amount of the money they have left, and leave a portion of the land to the people who have done so much to develop it. The position these people are in now is that, with the amendment, in nine months the bond will be called up, and most probably the property will be sold. The Government will lose nothing, and the Government may make some money out of it if it is administered very well, but these people will lose everything they have got.

I cannot quite understand the argument of the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt). As soon as the debt of the country is increased a little by this Government he protests strongly. If, however, we accept the motion he suggests, we shall simply be increasing the unreproductive debt of the country. Now the hon. member asks why we have not accepted the report of the committee. I will answer that. The Minister of Lands was asked if he would be prepared to take over seven-tenths of the ground and to pay the full amount, and then to use the ground for settlement. His Land Board went into the matter and decided that it was much too dear. The proposal was to divide the ground into three parts and to use it for settlements, but the Land Board found that was not possible. The cost of keeping the dam in order, from which, according to the report, Mrs. Chatwin would be entirely excluded, would be fairly high. If we were to agree to the report we should be giving a present of about £17,000 and three-sevenths of the farm and of the dam, free of taxation for the future, to Mrs. Chatwin. Now I ask the hon. member if I can answer for that to the taxpayer and to new settlements which we shall have to tax for the dam on account of the fact that the owner has not made a success of them. If we follow that policy, then I ask with what right we can refuse to allow the drought-stricken districts which have suffered loss in consequence of something over which they had no control to write off the cost of their fences. If we exempt a private individual like Mrs. Chatwin, who had a loss on account of shortage of water—not a co-operative system—from debt on a loan for which security was given, I do not see how we can refuse to write off amounts to the people who have borrowed money for fencing and have been ruined by drought. I am sorry for the Chat-wins. I know Mr. Chatwin well personally, and if I have an opportunity of assisting Mrs. Chatwin I should like to do so, but the question is whether we are to write off the taxpayers’ money which was borrowed and for which we have a pledge. With regard to board schemes, we have to deal with another matter. There we are concerned with a large number of persons who are jointly and severally liable, and there we are entitled in certain cases to write off. I wonder what the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) thinks of the motion of the hon. member for Fort Beaufort. Though I feel sorry for Mrs. Chatwin, I am sorry I cannot accept the motion. I am, however, prepared to accept that of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz) under which Mrs. Chatwin will be dealt with in the same way as the Doom River Syndicate. I think it is fair that only the land which is mortgaged to us should be soid.

The amendment will not help him in any way. I could understand the Minister’s argument if he said he was not going to abate the security. The House has written a great deal off irrigation loans. Last year we wrote £90,000 off the Calitzdorp scheme.

That is a board scheme.

There are a certain number of owners who have 400 morgen under the dam, and there are a certain number of new owners who thought they would like to bring their land under an irrigation scheme. The land under the canal is hypothecated to the Government for rates. You reduce the capital cost of the dam because you want to make it possible for the farmers to make a success of their irrigation holdings. What is the difference in the case of a man who, in good faith, went in for irrigation, but who, through a combination of unfortunate circumstances, finds that unless he receives some relief from the State he will be absolutely ruined? A better way is to take over a large proportion of his land, allowing him to retain as much as he can work himself, and, in this way, the State will not eventually lose very much. If, on the other hand, you call up the bond, you will kill the man on the spot. That was not the idea when the Irrigation Commission was appointed. No doubt the Minister has read the admirable report of the Secretary for Irrigation, in which he points out that the Italian Government is so convinced of the advantages of irrigation that it subsidizes schemes to the extent of 35 to 40 per cent. on the ground that they are of indirect benefit to the State. We have been following exactly the same policy in regard to land settlement. Why should you adopt one policy in the case of an individual, and another policy in the case of combined irrigators? To refuse to give relief to a man who has put his all into an irrigation scheme is not sympathetic, and will not assist in forming homes on the veld. The Government will lose very little. I have no interest in Mr. and Mrs. Chatwin, but they have been very hardly treated. Give them an opportunity of rehabilitating themselves. It is not as if the House has never before given people an opportunity of rehabilitating themselves. It has been done time without number, and it has been done in the case of a Cabinet Minister in regard to charges for motor-car hire. I am pleading for the poor, unfortunate individual who has lost everything he possessed, but if Government came to his assistance, he would lose very little indeed. The Minister of Lands put an admirable clause into one of his land settlement Bills, with the object of seeing that irrigation settlement should be acquired by people living on them and also by farmers for the purpose of growing crops which would be of enormous benefit in the event of drought.

The hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) talks in connection with this matter just like an advocate, but I think he is slightly wrong when he says that we ought to accept the recommendations of the committees. What use does Parliament serve if we are merely to do what the committees say? I am surely responsible to my electors for the money which is spent, but the committee has no responsibility. It is not business to merely write off everything. In connection with the iron and steel industry, we heard a great deal from the hon. member for Fort Beaufort about the money needed for it, but here the hon. member wants to write off money indiscriminately.

I really cannot understand the attitude of the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt). What is the attitude he has taken up on the select committee? He was on that committee, why did not he propose it?

I was entirely opposed to it. You said you would not accept it, and I said I would bring it up in the House.

Is he making electioneering propaganda to-day? It seems like it. The attitude of the Government is not to turn people away from the farms, but it is surely not the attitude of the Government and this Parliament to have our schemes based on charity. As far as the board’s schemes are concerned, the select committee had considered that you have to do with a lot of people, and not with an individual. They are jointly responsible. We wanted to put those schemes on a good footing, and that is why we have been reducing the board schemes and writing off as far as possible, but if we are going to do the same with reference to private schemes, what right will this Parliament have to refuse when the drought-stricken areas come forward and say the Government now has to write off all the fencing loans granted to them, because it is not through their own fault that they are in such a difficult position as they are to-day? If we lay down a principle that we are going to write! down private schemes, I do not know where it will end. It will simply mean that as long as I am Minister I am not going to grant a single loan for private people to build dams, because it will be quite clear to me that we intend giving those people a present—that in a year or two or five years’ time they will come and ask for it to be written off. That is a policy it is impossible for me to support. I ask why he promised Mr. Chatwin in those days, and did not write off when his Government was in power? Why tell Mr. Chatwin: “Yes, we will consider your case sympathetically,” and not deal with the case. Why should Mr. Chatwin have to wait and wait, and then this Government be asked to deal with the case? He had a chance to write that amount off, and he should not come to this Government to-day for it to be written off. I feel sorry for Mrs. Chatwin. I feel we have not to deal here with an individual, but with taxpayers’ money, and for that reason I am afraid I cannot do that.

Motion by Sir Thomas Smartt put and negatived.

Amendments proposed by Mr. I. P. van Heerden and Col. D. Reitz put and agreed to.

Motion, as amended, put and agreed to.

On Recommendation No. (8),

I move—

I hope the Minister will be a little long suffering in this matter, because I think it will be fair for this matter to be treated differently from the others. This is another case where an individual is concerned, but I do not think that this one is so hopeless. In the report of the Fourie Commission it is also suggested that if there is any hope for a man he should be assisted. They say that an owner or settler to-day, separately or as member of a body of persons, must be fairly treated if there is a hope of his making a living on the land. The idea also prevails there that we must try to keep the people on the land. If we refer to the Fourie Report in connection with this scheme, then we see that they report quite favourably and recommend a subdivision of the farm. [Quotation from the report read.] We see that in the report the Fourie Commission, after going fully into the matter, came to the decision that the owner should get certain consideration, and that one-third should be given to him. Further, we see that they already held the view that ground below irrigation schemes should be so regulated that farmers could obtain some of the ground under the Land Settlement Act without having to live there so that they can grow lucerne there in time of drought. When the Fourie Commission made that recommendation, such a thing was not yet possible, but by the Act of the Minister of Lands it has become possible for a farmer to have a piece of ground below an irrigation scheme where he can grow fodder in time of drought without exactly being compelled to live there. When we see what happened recently during the drought in the Karroo, we see that this scheme is just extraordinarily suited to the district of Hanover, where the farmers will be able to obtain such ground. I think the Minister of Agriculture should earnestly consider the matter.

Captain Williams can sell the ground if he has the opportunity.

The present chairman of the permanent irrigation commission also sat on the Fourie Commission, but when he saw that the Government could not accept the proposal of one-third he still recommended that the Government should assist Captain Williams and give him one-sixth of the veld, one-sixth of the lucerne, and one-sixth of the other things, together with the buildings, and should then release him from his liability. That was recommended after the Government had rejected the first proposal. Subsequently there was a third proposal. The Minister wrote to Captain Williams that he would give him six months, and that during that time he was to try and sell, and the Government would then write off 25 per cent. of the money he owed. Unfortunately, no rain fell during the six months and the dam was dry, so that the ground was not sold. It is disappointing to me, therefore, that when the irrigation commissions have made the recommendations and the Minister himself has proposed to write off 25 per cent., if the ground is sold, that we now find the Minister simply says that the arrears must be paid within nine months, otherwise the bond will be called up. I want to make it clear that when I read the evidence of the select committee, it seems to me that the Secretary of Irrigation gave evidence as if he wanted to bring the commission under a wrong impression—I will not say intentionally, but the fact is there. The secretary quotes from correspondence which took place between the Secretary of Irrigation, Mr. Kanthack, and Captain Williams which commenced in 1912. [Correspondence read.] I heard that hon. members got the impression that Captain Williams took no notice of the warning by Mr. Kanthack, but that is not the case. After he received the letter from Mr. Kanthack, he asked for a further survey. That was done, and then Captain Williams got a full report and diagram by a certain Mr. Campbell, and for that he had to wait for two years, and only then did he tackle the matter. I just want to remove the impression that he went to work carelessly. It is the same thing with this scheme as with many others. In those days everyone in the Cape Province thought that if he did not speak about irrigation or go in for irrigation, he counted for nothing. The Department of Irrigation inherited that spirit, and schemes were recommended which certainly would never be recommended to-day after the experience we have had. That was the position, and therefore I think that the Minister, when there is a chance of development, should make that development possible. We find in the Fourie report that is the case. If the bond is called up and the scheme comes into the market, I do not think it will realize £32,000, the amount which Captain Williams owes the Government. Besides the £32,000, he also put private money into it. There was, inter alia, the agreement that for every £4 the Government lent he would invest £1. Besides the £32,000 of the Government, there is a further £32,000 of his own money in it, and if the bond is called up and the farm sold, Captain Williams, besides the £32,000 due to the Government, will also lose the further money which he has put into it. I consider that it would be unfair towards a person who thought he was doing a good thing by the country. I do not think we ought to ruin him in this way, and I want to ask the Minister if he is not prepared to refer the recommendation back to the select committee.

I cannot agree to it.

I am sorry, but then I still hope the Minister will go as far as in the other cases, and will only allow to be sold what was given as security, the property which is specially mentioned in the bond. I move—

Has this resolution been formally moved?

Not yet.

Well, I hope the Minister will agree in this case to the same principle as we passed in the other two. That is, to make only the irrigation scheme itself executable. I understand from Capt. Williams that there are other properties. I would move, formally, the same amendment as I moved in the two previous cases, that only the irrigation scheme itself be executable under the bond. Is only the irrigation scheme bonded?

As far as I know, yes.

My object is to save Capt. Williams such other assets as he may have. I happen to know that Capt. Williams’ great anxiety is that he will be made insolvent. I fully agree with the recommendation made by the select committee, but I do not want to go further than that and I do not want to see this House push a man into insolvency. It is a very hard case, and I feel desperately sorry for him, but I do realize that Capt. Williams will never make good on that land. I wish we could know with more certainty what properties are specifically bonded under the bond. If Capt. Williams has property outside the irrigation area, then I would like to see that exempted. He put the case to me very tragically and pathetically, that he would be driven into the insolvency court if any other assets he may possess were made executable. My intention, in this amendment, is that it should only affect the farm in which the irrigation is established, and once the Government has levied execution on Krugerspoort that no other assets be attached. In other words, that he be not made insolvent. Perhaps the Minister would find out from the Director of Irrigation exactly how that bond stands. I move—

But I move that in the absence of more detailed information of what properties are bonded, under the mortgage. The Minister might be able to find that out from the Director of Irrigation.

It seems to me that we are now engaged in enquiring if we cannot get away from the previous motions that were passed. The former proposal was that only the ground which was bonded should be sold, whether there is a dam on it or not, but all the farms which are bonded to the Government for payment of the debt will have to be sold. It seems to me that the motion means that only that farm on which the dam is shall be taken. I cannot accept a different motion from those we have passed in previous cases. If the farm Krugerspoort as well as other farms is bonded as security for the scheme, then the bond over them will be called up and they will be sold. I do not know whether the farm mentioned is bonded, but if it is it will also be sold.

I do not suppose there is any use in my appealing to the Minister in this case, which is almost a sadder case than the other. Capt. Williams paid, I understand, £14,000 for that farm, and over and above that he put a good deal of his money into the farm. On this case we did vote. He spent £14,000 on the farm, and he then put a certain amount of his money into the construction of the dam. He borrowed £24,000 odd from the Government, and that, with accrued interest, makes between £32,000 and £33,000. In this case the commission also reported. The commission reported on these lines: that a certain portion of the land should be given to Capt. Williams and a certain portion of irrigable ground, and they pointed out, in this case, that it met particularly the Bill of the Minister of Lands, because the ground under this dam would be most suitable for the farmers in the district to buy for the purpose of conserving fodder for their stock, which I think is an admirable provision. If anything has shown us that, it is the late droughts, and I think it is that which actuated my hon. friend to put that clause in the Bill. You would be able to sell a large portion of that land, which the Government is retaining, to surrounding farmers. It is surrounded by farmers who would be only too anxious to acquire it. Here, I believe, there is really a case in which, if the Government were sympathetic, you would not lose much money and you would allow Capt. Williams to retain a certain interest in his property. I acknowledge, if the Government is not prepared to accept this, that it is some step forward to assure Capt. Williams that you are not, under the bond, going to sell more than is individually hypothecated to the State. That is, if it does not bring it up to the £33,000, you are not going to sell any other property which Capt. Williams possesses. That is a small concession, but I would like to see the Minister go a great deal further in this case. I feel very strongly on this case. I have no personal interest of any sort, either in Capt. Williams or Mrs. Chatwin, but they have tried to do a great deal of work, and you are going to bring the direst distress upon people who have spent their all. Capt. Williams has spent something like £20,000, hard cash, of his own money in trying to develop the resources of this country. Here it is possible to make a concession that will allow him to keep a small portion of that land. This is one of the cases which falls absolutely under the Minister of Lands’ proposal of small irrigation plots to be held by farmers for growing crops to tide them over drought periods. This is a place where he would lose little money, and it would be an enormous assistance for the man to retain some portion of his farm. It is a very fruitful part of the country, and if ever there was a case in which, really, some consideration should be given by the State, it is this case. I move—

I would very much like to support the appeal of the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) that this matter be referred back to the select committee. I would like to emphasize for the Minister of Agriculture that you have to treat every case on its merits. It is not right to lay down a hard rule that you can write off in the case of a board, but not in the case of an individual. The report shows that this case is a very hard one indeed. I do not see on what basis or principle a distinction can be drawn between a write off in a case where an individual has spent money on the land putting down irrigation works, and a case where a board has done so. When a board has put up irrigation works, the dam is there, and the country has the benefit of it. But so also with an individual. In a country like this every man who, or body or board which, puts up irrigation works deserves consideration from the State. It is good policy in either ease for the State to write off where the circumstances are such that the case is a hard one, because, after all, the State has one more great asset for the development of the country. It is a different thing from the point in the comparison the hon. member made—with regard to fencing.

In what way?

As far as dams are concerned, your water is a national asset for a large number of people, who will benefit from the use of that water. In the case of fencing, the benefit is more particularly or almost entirely personal.

You are referring to the one-man scheme.

I will come to that in a moment. After all, the object of this particular scheme here was to benefit a large number of people, and with the concurrence of the Irrigation Department this was carried out to induce settlers to come. That the settlers have not come is beside the point. There is no doubt, taking the case on its own merits, the Fourie Commission and the permanent commission have reported favourably to the point of view of Capt. Williams, who thought it was a scheme which would serve the purpose of attracting settlers, and not a one-man scheme. He spent £14,000 or more of his own money on the land, and £8,000 of his own money (or more) on irrigation development, and £25,000 he had to borrow. I agree with the evidence given by the hon. member for Colesberg (Mr. G. A. Louw) before the select committee, that when one man puts his money into a scheme like that, he deserves encouragement for his courage. [Fourie commission report, para. 92, read.] The commission found that he deserves encouragement for the undertaking of the work. It was only found afterwards by experience that everybody was wrong. I hope the Minister will go on the merits of this particular case, and see whether the merits are not such as to justify the recommendation that there should be a write off. With regard to what he said about the taxpayers’ money, we do not want to give the taxpayers’ money away, but as we have accepted in regard to irrigation schemes the principle of writing off time and again, we say that this is a case in which this should be done, owing to the courage, enterprise and energy shown by Capt. Williams in this matter. The Minister, when he accepts the amendment limiting the liability of Capt. Williams to the property that has been mortgaged, is in effect giving away taxpayers’ money. He is quite right in going so far; but we ask him to let the matter go back to the committee to see whether something more can be done.

I thought hon. members would now let the matter rest after I had agreed to the motion of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz) to sell only the ground registered under the bond. I fancy I recollect that Capt. Williams has more land in the country, but the other people dealt with in previous recommendations possess nothing as far as I know. Now it is said we must treat this case differently, but the object with which the scheme was commenced was to attract a large number of settlers there and to make money out of it. Now that it has failed, the State has to come and write it down, and make it advantageous for men to remain on the scheme. I fear I cannot go so far. If members insist on it, there will be members who will even be opposed to the proposal of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) to sacrifice the taxpayers’ money. Capt. Williams undertook the business with open eyes, and knew what the position was. Subsequently, when it appeared that the scheme did not pay, it was proposed that the Minister of Lands should take over a part of the ground, but it was carefully examined by his board and it was found that the price was absolutely too high. The Minister of Lands was not prepared to take over seven-tenths and to give the rest, with the dam, etc., to Capt. Williams free of any water rates. Now hon. members come and want to refer it back to the select committee. The matter was fully investigated, and we cannot agree to the proposal of hon. members. It would be very easy business to construct irrigation works, and subsequently, when they went wrong, to saddle the State with the full amount and give back seven-tenths of the ground. I must firmly decline to adopt such an irrigation policy.

I just want to express my surprise at the amendment moved by the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt). I do not think a man in his position should put forward such a motion. When he was in office he did nothing. The proposal of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz) is fair and the Minister has accepted it, but the other principle is inacceptable. Then persons will speculate and raise large sums and reckon on the greatest part of the debt being written off. That would be irresponsible towards the taxpayer, and we must be very careful.

As the Minister is not prepared to go further, there is no good taking up time in pressing my amendment, which I will withdraw. I feel very strongly on the matter, but the majority of the committee is against me. The Minister has, however, made one concession.

With leave of committee, motion by Sir Thomas Smartt withdrawn.

I am very glad, because I consider such a proposal as a motion of no confidence in the select committee. I heartily support the motion of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central) (Col. D. Reitz). I cannot understand how the hon. member for Rondebosch (Mr. Close) can say that we cannot compare this kind of loan with fencing loans. Someone comes to the Government and borrows £38,000 for an irrigation scheme. What is the difference from a farmer who borrows money for jackal-proof fencing? Capt. Williams’ scheme ended in failure, but on the other hand many farmers who went for loans for jackal-proof wire also failed. The position is the same, and if we write off the one we must do the same for the other. The loans are in any case granted on business principles. I am sorry for Capt. Williams, and I give my hearty support to the proposal of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth (Central). I cannot, however, understand bow it is possible that Capt. Williams cannot meet his obligations. I know the scheme, there are hundreds of morgen of lucerne. I can only think that the management is bad, but we cannot blame the Irrigation Department for the failure. If anything can be done on a sound basis to save the position, I will heartily support it.

Amendment proposed by Col. D. Reitz put and agreed to.

Motion, as amended, put and agreed to.

On recommendation No. (9),

I move—

1. (i) that no instalments be demanded on the original loan after the fourteenth instalment which became payable on the 1st July, 1924;
2. (ii) that the unpaid capital of the original loan together with the accumulated interest up to 31st December) 1927, be consolidated in a new loan, redeemable over 40 years in equal half-yearly payments, the first of which to be due on the 1st July, 1928;
3. (iii) that the existing differential rate on the land under the lower and upper furrows, in the ratio two to one, remain in force;
4. (iv) that the existing schedule of the Irrigation District be altered as from the 1st January, 1927, by the reduction of the irrigable land on Kaffirskraal as already requested by the Department of Lands;
5. (v) that for purposes of calculation as in paragraph (vii), the land under the main furrow be rated at £2 per morgen, and the land under the upper furrow at £1 per morgen;
6. (vi) that arrear rates on Government land be paid before transfer be given after sale of the said ground;
7. (vii) that such portion of the debt which cannot be covered by rates computed in the above manner be written off;
8. (viii) that redemption and interest on the £3,000 irrigation loan granted in 1926 for betterment of the dam be paid in full. The redemption period of this loan should terminate simultaneously with the other consolidated debts.

I want to express my appreciation of this recommendation. I am sorry that the committee was obliged to make it, but I can give the assurance that it was not the fault of the people. I am particularly taken up with pars. (II) and (IV). I wish to bring to the Minister’s notice that the people on the farm Koffiekraal below it have many difficulties. I wish to move an amendment—

I move this because the people cannot sow on account of the drought and will therefore not be able to pay their instalments on the 1st July next. If we put off the date, they will be able to pay.

Agreed to.

Motion, as amended, put and agreed to.

There is a further recommendation.

It is not a recommendation.

I would like to say a few words about it.

It cannot be discussed. Recommendations, as amended, to be reported.

House Resumed:

Report (as follows) considered—

1. (1) Buffelsfontein Irrigation Scheme, Ladismith, Cape.—The committee concurs in the recommendation of the Irrigation Commission that the whole of the loan and all outstanding interest be written off.
2. (2) McGregor Irrigation Scheme.—The committee concurs in the recommendation of the Irrigation Commission that—
   1. (i) the whole debt be capitalized in two loans of £1,907 2s. 11d. and £4,737 2s. on the 31st December, 1927, redeemable in twenty years and that the first instalment hereon become due on the 1st July, 1928; and
   2. (ii) the differential rating be legalized.
3. (3) Upper Modder River Irrigation Project.— The committee recommends that the whole of the capital and interest be written off.
4. (4) Lower Seacow Irrigation Scheme.—The committee recommends—
   1. (i) that the boundaries of the irrigation district be altered by Act of Parliament so as to exclude the land on the left bank from the schedule of irrigable areas;
   2. (ii) that if this land is removed from the schedule the pro rata share of the debt, including the capital and accumulated interest, which rests on the left bank be written off; and
   3. (iii) that the remainder of the debt remain as a burden on the land retained on the schedule, but that the choice be given to the owners thereof (to be decided by the board) whether the whole debt should be consolidated and the redemption period increased or whether they would continue on the present arrangements; provided that the redemption period be increased for not longer than 30 years from the 31st December, 1927.
5. (5) Kakamas Labour Colony Irrigation Scheme.—The committee recommends that the ten instalments payable in respect of the Government loan for the five years following on the due date of the last instalment paid, be written off on the following conditions:
   1. (i) Amounts equal to these payments be paid into a fund by the “Kommissie” of the Labour Colony every six months;
   2. (ii) this fund shall be available for renewals of and improvements to the existing works approved by the Minister, but should the amount of the fund at any time be more than the probable expenditure for such purposes for the twelve months following, the money may be invested in advances to colonists or in such other manner as the “Kommissie” thinks fit;
   3. (iii) annually, until the balance of the existing Government debt is paid off, the “Kommissie” shall prepare a statement showing the amount of the fund and the manner in which it is invested, and such statement shall be submitted to the Government before the 31st August every year;
   4. (iv) shop profits as far as necessary may be used for renewals of and improve ments to the existing works, for ordinary expenditure on the scheme, for redemption of loans and for communal purposes.
6. (6) Doorn River Syndicate Irrigation Scheme.—The committee recommends that the arrear instalments due by the syndicate on the scheme be demanded and that if the syndicate is unable to pay the amount that the necessary steps be taken to call up the bond: Provided that there shall be no recourse on any other property than that mortgage in chief under the bond.
7. (7) Mrs. Chatwin’s Irrigation Scheme.—The committee recommends that Mrs. Chat-win be given nine months’ time, from date of notification, in which to pay the interest due to the Government and that if not paid up at the end of that period the necessary steps be taken to call up the bond: Provided that there shall be no recourse on any other property than that mortgaged in chief under the bond.
8. (8) Capt. G. G. Williams’ Irrigation Scheme.—The committee recommends that the overdue instalments be demanded and if not paid within nine months from the 1st March, 1928, the necessary steps be taken to call up the bond: Provided that there shall be no recourse on any other property than that mortgaged in chief under the bond.
9. (9) Klerksdorp Irrigation Scheme.—The committee recommends—
   1. (i) that no instalments be demanded on the original loan after the fourteenth instalment which became payable on the 1st July, 1924;
   2. (ii) that the unpaid capital of the original loan together with the accumulated interest up to 31st December, 1927, be consolidated in a new loan, redeemable over 40 years in equal half-yearly payments, the first of which to be due on the 1st January, 1929;
   3. (iii) that the existing differential rate on the land under the lower and upper furrows, in the ratio two to one, remain in force;
   4. (iv) that the existing schedule of the Irrigation District be altered as from the 1st January, 1927, by the reduction of the irrigable land on Kaffirskraal as already requested by the Department of Lands;
   5. (v) that for purposes of calculation as in paragraph (vii), the land under the main furrow be rated at £2 per morgen, and the land under the upper furrow at £1 per morgen;
   6. (vi) that arrear rates on Government land be paid before transfer be given after sale of the said ground;
   7. (vii) that such portion of the debt which cannot be covered by rates computed in the above manner be written off;
   8. (viii) that redemption and interest on the £3,000 irrigation loan granted in 1926 for betterment of the dam be paid in full. The redemption period of this loan should terminate simultaneously with the other consolidated debts.

Report adopted.

I think we need some explanation with regard to No. 9. We do not know what the balance is that has been written off and there are certain cancellations, and so forth.

Under the previous Government, about eight or ten years ago, the Phthisis Board in Johannesburg, unfortunately, started settlements for phthisis sufferers. I think it was a wrong policy, although it is no use going into this matter now, but these people are physically unfit to be farmers. They were settled on the land, and in 1926 they were transferred to my department. They complained at once that the price of land was too high. I found that was correct, and the valuation was reduced, but they were not satisfied. They were full of grievances, not against my department, but against the Phthisis Board. They brought the matter to my notice, and I said I could not investigate matters of six, seven or eight years ago, but my colleague, the Minister of Mines and Industries, could give them a commission of enquiry. The commission was appointed. My department was also represented and the Mines Department, but then they withdrew the charges against the Phthisis Board. The commissioner made certain recommendations, and to my mind, there was a great deal in what he said. He said the people were not fitted to be settlers, they were physically broken, and we had to meet them in a liberal way to satisfy them. He recommended that the land should be written down to £5 a morgen. That recommendation could hardly be accepted, because it would cause dissatisfaction. Every settler would want his land written down to the same extent. We worked out a new proposal that these people should be lessees and pay 1 per cent. as long as they lived and as long as their widows lived, but should they die or their widows remarry, the leases terminated, and we revert to the old conditions.

I hope the House will accept these recommendations. We are dealing here, not with the ordinary settler, but with men who have been broken on the wheel of the mining industry. It would be very undesirable if we created a precedent which could be followed by other settlers, but we are dealing with sick men, and have treated them on a different basis from the ordinary settler. The committee took a great deal of trouble about it, and we went to great pains in sifting the whole matter. It came up before me originally, and the present Minister has taken a great deal of trouble about it, too, and I think, taking all in all, we are giving them a very fair deal without, at the same time, establishing a precedent which would open the flood gates for other settlers. I hope, therefore, that the committee will accept this.

Recommendation put and agreed to.

Remaining recommendations having been agreed to,

House Resumed:

Resolutions reported, considered and adopted and transmitted to the Senate for concurrence.

When this Bill was last under discussion it was pointed out that the application of the Factories Act had been very much extended by the officials, considerably more than had been intended by Parliament at that time. For instance, I gave a specific case where, in a village near by, forage was brought in, chopped and then packed. That has been classified as a factory.

I would like to reply to the representations made from the other side on this point. The right hon. the member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) asked me to obtain the law advisers’ opinion as to whether a farmer who manufactures produce for animal consumption or any other purpose, comes under the definition of “factory,” whereas the farmer who manufactures produce for human consumption is exempt. I find that the point made by the hon. member over there is correct. The Act, as it stands, provides that any farmer who produces any commodity manufactured from his own products and who employs three or more persons or has machinery, and who sells these products for human consumption, is exempt, but if they are sold for animal consumption or any other purpose he comes under the Act, and his place is treated as a factory. It always has been like that. There has not been any variation in the administration, but I admit it seems illogical. We are prepared to concede that point. I have considered this and the Government is quite prepared to meet the farming community in that regard, and put them all on the same footing making them all exempt whether they manufacture for animal consumption or anything else. Now I am in this difficulty, that under the Speaker’s ruling we cannot introduce an amendment of this nature into this amending Bill. I have to do one of two things. I have to draw up a small amending Bill dealing with this point—which I am prepared to do—or I have to discharge the order for the second reading and committee stage, and refer this present Bill to a select committee and have the whole business over again, which I am not prepared to do. I have drawn up a small Bill with the Speaker’s advice and ruling, and I am prepared to introduce that to-morrow or the next day.

Better re commit this Bill.

But look at all the procedure.

We cannot go on with two parallel Bills at the same time.

Mr. Speaker says that is quite in order.

Yes, but the practical difficulties.

There are no practical difficulties in the way. It is with the advice of the Speaker that I am taking this course.

It is an unbusinesslike way of doing it.

It is in accordance with the new procedure laid down which follows the House of Commons practice, that is, where no special provision is made in an amending Bill, then no further amendments can be moved, except in connection with the amendments that have been passed at the second reading and when the Bill was introduced, and, therefore, another parallel Bill must be introduced to deal with anything new. It will not deal with any points already dealt with in the amending Bill. There is no reason, Mr. Speaker informs me, why the two Bills should not run concurrently, as they deal with different points. The farming community will be completely exempt from the operations of the Factory Act. I hope that under these circumstances hon. members on the other side will allow this to go through.

It only shows how careful you should be in connection with legislation of this character.

How careful you should have been.

My hon. friend and my hon. friend’s friends did not think I was correct the other evening. Had attention not been called from this side to the matter, the docile followers of the Minister would have voted for this clause, which would have caused them considerable trouble. I am egotistical enough to think that I really deserve a vote of thanks from the hon. member for Frankfort (Mr. Wessels), because I can conceive the position in which he would have been if he had gone back to his constituents; if two or three were gathered together and chopped up lucerne, they would have come under the Factory Act.

Who is responsible for the Factory Act?

1918.

It was legislation since introduced that became so serious with regard to the Act of 1918, if my hon. friend will read it. The object of the Minister is to introduce the Wage Act into this procedure—that the wages under the Wage Act will apply to farmers. My hon. friend is evidently under a misapprehension, and considers that the Act was passed long ago. It was passed with the consent of his hon. friends, owing to the concession which was made. I see the Minister of Lands is becoming anxious, and that he has been becoming anxious for a considerable period of time. He is now realizing into what a position his associates are bringing him. When he was a boy at school he no doubt learned the precept, “Evil communications corrupt good manners.” The communications between my hon. friend, the Minister of Labour and the Minister of Lands, have brought him into a very difficult position; not alone is it “moeilik” but “pynlik” (painful). It was to prevent that pain being of a rather extended character that I raised this question the other evening. The Minister of Labour has realized, not for the first time, what the intention of this Act was, and that a large number of the supporters of the Pact Government will not go that far with the Minister—I have been told on good authority that little gatherings of people have been taking place in this House, and that small numbers of Nationalist members have been gathered together, discussing their condition under the Factory Act, and I have no doubt an old conservative like the Minister of Finance, finding how far he has been led, has also been instrumental in using his pressure on the Minister of Labour to get him into line. I have no doubt that they said, “We have gone far enough, but we have got to the sticking point” this is impossible; we cannot any longer accept this. Quite graciously the Minister of Labour has given way and I congratulate him on beating this masterly retreat. While I am extremely anxious to save the Minister’s face as much as I can, I realize that his position will be painful with a section of his supporters. I do not know, for instance, what the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) will say about this masterly retreat. I do not doubt the Minister’s good intentions, but I fear that if one Bill is passed and something unfortunately happens to the Minister, and the hon. member for Troyeville was asked to join the Cabinet in the Minister’s place, he might refuse to introduce the little Bill to which the Minister of Labour has referred. Does the Minister tell me that no pressure was brought to bear upon him by his supporters?

By both sides.

Little birds have told me that strong representations have been made to the Minister by certain Nationalists. They may be as nervous as I am in accepting this extraordinary twin proposal. I do not know where it will lead us. Perhaps Mr. Chairman can tell us how far the rules of the House allow us to amend the Bill and what steps it is necessary to take to enable us to amend the Bill so as to deal with it in one measure. I am sorry if I have caused my hon. friend any sleepless nights.

Not a bit.

There is a very interesting weekly paper which occasionally has notes about what people say in their sleep. It would provide plenty of good copy if we could know what the Minister of Labour has been saying in his sleep.

I really do not know why the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) spoke. He told us this afternoon of one of his hon. friends who said that if he could not speak quickly he would burst. It looks as if that were the case with him also. What is his difficulty now? Is he not satisfied with the Minister’s concession? What then is the complaint and the grievance? I want to tell him that if he wants the credit for the concession, I have no objection. I do not believe, however, that the concession was made by the Minister on his representations, because the Minister could never take him seriously. We all know that the Act was introduced by the previous Government in 1918.

You were then sitting there.

Oh, no. Now it only appears nicely how the hon. members opposite have wandered. They now say that we sat here in 1918. No, we were then still sitting opposite and the Opposition then sat here. They sat here from 1910. The Act was introduced with the co-operation of hon. members opposite. I remember quite well that we introduced a motion to exempt the farmers from the Act, but that it was then opposed by the hon. members for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), and for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell). They voted against it. The hon. member for Cape Town (Central) was not then such a zealous farmer as he is to-day. It is a fact that the members opposite voted for bringing the farmers under the law as well. I admit that I pressed very much for the alteration which is now proposed. We have always maintained the interests of the farmers, and we have done it again here, and it is not necessary to come and shout in the committee and try and catch votes or bring about an explosion. Hon. members can leave the interests of the farmers to us. We always maintained them and will continue doing so.

The hon. Minister has been in labour and he has now been delivered of a sort of Siamese twin, by the look of things.

An ugly looking twin.

A very ricketty twin into the bargain. Our whole aim in legislation has been to consolidate, but here we have two parallel laws dealing with the same subject. Let us do the thing in the right way by withdrawing this Bill and bringing forward a true Bill. Where are our law courts with parallel Bills being concurrently passed through the House? This is a rotten Bill and it should be withdrawn and redrafted. The right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) has put his finger on the weak spot. We may pass this Bill, but what guarantee have we that the subsequent Bill will follow? In the very perturbed state of the other side of the House, anything may happen.

What are they perturbed about?

After what has been going on in the left wing, surely you cannot say they are not perturbed.

We have listened this afternoon to the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt), and I think it is clear to everybody that he was again making one of his election speeches. It has been clear recently that every speech the hon. member for Fort Beaufort makes is made with a view to the election. I want to say that the hon. member is in a great hurry; he will have quite enough time to make election speeches. Now I want to come to the matter under discussion. When the Factories Bill was before the House, hon. members opposite, who say they look after the farmers’ interests, pointed out that the Bill as it stood would include the farmer. Was the hon. member really honest and serious when he spoke this afternoon. When the Minister said that the Bill was not clear on that point, and that he undertook to amend it, the hon. member was much disappointed. He thought that he would be able to use it as a weapon. If they have sunk so low as to have to use such weapons, then I say they are hopelessly bankrupt. I think that this Government has always stood for the interests of the farmers, and it must put right all the muddle work of the previous Government. I want to ask the hon. member who is responsible for the Bill? It is his own side.

No.

There you have them denying it again. I must say that I would not have expected it from an hon. member in the position of the hon. member for Fort Beaufort. It was introduced in 1918 for the first time, and where were we sitting then? It was the former Government which introduced it. The hon. member for Fort Beaufort says that we, the Nationalist members, exercised pressure on the Minister. What is wrong in that? If I represent the farmers I go to the Minister and ask him to put things right. What is he to put right? The muddled work of the previous Government. The hon. members for Fort Beaufort and for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) themselves said that the farmers would come under the law, and now we come and want to rectify it, and then again they are dissatisfied. I ask: “Are they really honest when they say that they stand for the interests of the farmers.” It is merely vote catching. The hon. member for Fort Beaufort must know that the public outside were long enough neglected by the former Government, and now by the Opposition, and they know that this Government stands for the interests of the farmers. The Minister comes and says that he wants to rectify the mistakes and absolutely exclude the farmers from the application of the Act, and now the Opposition is again dissatisfied. When the original Bill was before the House, the hon. member for Cape Town (Central), and the hon. member for Bezuidenhout said I think, that the Bill included the farmer.

I did not say so.

I accept the word of the hon. member. In any case, the hon. member for Fort Beaufort is put out because the Minister is rectifying the matter, and the hon. member can no longer make use of it against the Nationalist party.

I should have thought the hon. member for Heilbron (Mr. M. L. Malan) would have been deeply grateful to me for the services I have rendered to his party, because a few days ago I pointed out that under the Bill the Minister of Labour has introduced the hon. member and his constituents would have found that if two or three were gathered together to chop up a bale of lucerne and sell it, they would come under the Act; they would be a factory. The Minister of Labour was good enough to tell the committee that the statement I made was correct, that the law advisers gave exactly the same opinion that I, as a layman, ventured to hazard in the House, that if the Bill is not amended every farmer who prepares his forage for the feeding of his animals will come under the provisions of the Factory Bill, and the Minister of Labour said he hoped he would be excused and if we would pass this Bill he would guarantee to introduce another Bill that would not allow it to apply to ordinary farming operations. I am sorry the hon. member for Harrismith (Mr. Cilliers) is not here. He sits behind the Minister of Labour and I am given to understand he brought considerable pressure to bear upon the Minister. The Minister smiles. Is it, or is it not a fact that the hon. member for Harrismith, who really does represent a farming constituency and is a farmer himself, brought pressure to bear upon the Minister? The Minister bashfully smiles.

You are romancing.

I am also informed that the hon. member for Heilbron himself brought considerable pressure to bear upon the Minister.

I said “If I did.”

Will my hon. friend say he did not?

Supposing I did, what then?

If the hon. gentleman won’t say he did, and says supposing he did, I can take it for granted that he did, along with the hon. member for Harrismith and other hon. members. I would not wonder if the hon. member for Frankfort (Mr. Wessels) did. I think the Minister of Labour must have had rather a bad time.

Not a bit of it.

It was my privilege last week several times to call attention to the fact that the Ministerial benches were very vacant, and that at one time there were practically no Ministers in the House. Am I to understand that the rapid comings and goings of Ministers was owing to the fact of the necessity of bringing united pressure upon the Minister of Labour and that if he did not capitulate the Pact would fall to pieces like a house of cards? I would suggest you have been very nearly misled once, don’t be misled again! If the Minister considers it would be necessary to appease not me, but his followers, by introducing another Bill, I would suggest to the committee that the proper thing to do is to have that Bill introduced before this Bill is passed, and let us know what the situation is, or the hon. member for Heilbron may find himself hoist with his own petard, and I do not know what explanation he would have to give to his farming friends when he goes back to the Heilbron district. The Minister has made a mess of the Bill already. He acknowledges that. Is the hon. member for Albert (Mr. Steytler) going to vote for the Bill as it stands? You are going to vote for this Bill on the assurance from the Minister, after his sins have been pointed out to him from this side, that he will introduce another Bill to make it perfectly clear that this Bill does not apply to farming operations. What I say to my hon. friend is this, if you are going to have two Bills it will be much better to withdraw this Bill, report progress and ask leave to sit again and introduce the other Bill, so that we can make perfectly sure that we are not going to make a mistake a second time, because if you pass this Bill and anything happens to prevent the Minister from introducing the Bill to which he refers, or if another caucus of a different character, of the extreme section of the Labour party, should also come and bring extreme pressure upon the Minister you people may find yourselves in queer street.

made an interjection.

Was the hon. member for Riversdale also with the deputation? If he was, they would be overwhelmed with the weight of his argument. Will the Minister introduce his other Bill?

Wait and see.

I am really very nervous about taking this Bill, because accidents do happen; something might happen to the Minister in the interval. We would have put the present Bill on the statute book, and then we would not have the other bill. If the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) or the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg (North) (Mr. Strachan) was in the place of the Minister, we might have other views. Was it only a Nationalist deputation that saw the Minister?

You are too curious altogether.

Did not a Labour deputation take the opposite view? Instead of going down with his colours flying, I understand the Minister has struck his colours.

I am trying to put right what you did wrong.

I am very glad that I have been this simple instrument in pointing these things out, and making even the hon. member for Heilbron (Mr. M. L. Malan), another hon. member on that side, realize that a great mistake was made and they try to get out of that mistake by many phrases, full of fury and passion, signifying nothing. I thought the hon. gentleman would be chivalrous and public-spirited enough to give the thanks of this House to an hon. member for pointing out what the Minister has introduced, and thus saving his constituents from a great calamity.

I am sure this committee would not like to deprive the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) of one more opportunity in order to try to twist the tails of hon. members on this side. When he raised this point the other night, I thought he was serious, and that he seriously had the welfare of the farming community at heart; that he wanted to introduce something in their interests; but after the entertainment we have had, both before and after dinner, I am satisfied that what the right hon. member is more concerned with than the welfare of farmers under the Factory Act, is to try and score a cheap party advantage. I should have thought he would have hung his head in shame and that hon. members on the other side would also have done so, who were responsible for passing an Act which they are now criticising, and asking us to put right in the interests of the farming community. I thought the right hon. gentleman would be the last hon. member to expose a defect for which they themselves were responsible. Before dinner, the right hon. member spoke of the Minister talking in his sleep, in consequence of the representations made by hon. members on this side. No, what perturbs me is not anything I said in my sleep, which I do not do, but the foolish remarks the right hon. member makes, not when he is asleep, but when he is wide awake. [Sir Thomas Smartt left the chamber.] The only serious concern of the right hon. member, who has just left the House, is whether we are bona fide trying to put right a defect in the Act which they (hon. members opposite) passed, and which they discovered only after 10 years. I say that I will not allow this Bill to stand over until the other Bill is introduced. The Bill I intend introducing to-morrow is here, and is a simple little Bill. Hon. members on this side accept the Government’s assurance that we will put this Bill through.

We are not satisfied.

The Bill is quite a simple little one.

Read it.

I intend to proceed with the amending Bill before the House. The whole force of the criticism raised during this debate, strangely enough, does not concern my Bill at all, but a portion of the main Act, which I am not touching. In consequence of the representations made from this side, even before they were made from the other side—the hon. member who sits here and his colleague who sits there, made representations—no particular side can claim one advantage over the other in this. All that farmers have pressed is that the farmer should be exempt. This hon. members on this side accept, but on the other side they make party capital out of it. On the advice of the law advisers, this Bill has been drawn up, and cuts the farmers out entirely, whether they are producing food for human consumption or for anything else. If hon. members on the other side are well meant in their criticisms, or that they want to secure the welfare of the farmers, this has been accomplished by the Bill, which I will put through, if necessary, before the final stage of the present Bill is passed.

The right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) has an appointment with the Prime Minister, and that is the reason that he left the Chamber. He is the last man to run away. That is not a question for throwing recriminations across the House—it is a matter of the interpretation of the law. A sensible Minister, knowing the needs and circumstances of the country, would have interpreted the Act of 1918 as it was intended to be interpreted. The Minister knows very well that we, on this side of the House, and many sitting behind him, do not trust his interpretation of the law. We are dealing with Section 2, sub-clause (2), and in the hands of an ordinary sensible Minister there would be no difficulty in its interpretation.

There has been no difference in the administration of this law since it first came into operation.

The Minister is now asking Parliament to amend this law, and while that is being done we have a perfect right to raise any question regarding the clause. Not that it is really causing any difficulty, but in the hands of the Minister of Labour the slightest loophole will be interpreted in the widest sense possible. We are speaking from experience. The Conciliation Act has been applied by the Minister in its widest possible sense. This question has been raised by the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) and the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort, so as not to leave a single loophole for the Minister to wriggle out of the law or to extend it where it was not intended that it should be made applicable. The Minister is bringing in an amended Bill. I presume it deals only with Section 2 of the original Act, but there are other aspects of the Act of 1918 which might be improved. If the Minister, however, brings in a Bill dealing with only one section he will find afterwards, under the new system adopted under Mr. Speaker’s ruling that he may, later on, have to introduce a third Bill. The definition of a factory is not clear to me. A farmer in the Caledon division has erected a cold storage plant costing £10,000 for the storage of fruit. He is afraid, under the Factory Act, to store his neighbours’ fruit for fear that the store will come under the factory law.

He is carrying on a cold storage and is not a farmer if he takes in his neighbours’ fruit.

In that case the Minister will jump down the farmer’s throat and he will be subject to the eight-hour day. Across the mountain, and also in my constituency, there is at Villiersdorp a fruit growers’ co-operative society which intends to erect cold storage at the cost of £6,000 or £7,000. Being a cooperative society it will fall under the Factory Act, and so will be subject to the eight-hour day and inspection, but the big farmer on the other side of the mountain who can afford to erect a large cold store will escape. Is that fair? Let us put the matter on a safe and sound basis, and I ask the Minister not to introduce his little Bill before he has conferred with a small committee from both sides of the House. The matter is very serious. The men of the farmer with the £10,000 cold storage have to work from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. for a month during the fruit season. Once the peaches are ripe you cannot apply the Minister’s views on these things, but you have to carry out operations so as to catch the market and save the fruit. In a month this farmer exported 60,000 cases of peaches to Europe. Can you apply the eight-hour day to an industry of that description?

The hon. member has raised rather an important point, but it is quite evident he does not understand the Act passed by his own Government, or he would not have introduced the bogey he has just raised. Under Section 13 provision is made for the exemption of all seasonal trades and occupations. I have a list of something like 53 factories of the very type described by the hon. member, but they are not interfered with in any shape or form. There is adequate provision in the Act, which has been applied during the last ten years to meet the cases the hon. member has mentioned. There is no necessity to deal with that point in the new Bill.

I always gave the Minister credit for having a good memory. No doubt the great pressure that has been brought to bear upon him from my hon. friends on the opposite side of the House has affected his memory. The hon. Minister says this Act has been administered the same for the last ten years.

The same officers and the same way, yes.

What about my constituents. When Mr. T. M. McKenzie was sawing wattle-wood and the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) and myself, as a deputation, approached the Minister to get exemption? How can the Minister say that the Act has been administered for the last ten years in the same way? Under the regime of the late Government my constituents were never interfered with when cutting mine props. The Act was never interpreted in the way in which the Minister of Labour has interpreted it. I am really surprised at my hon. friends on the opposite side. The Minister of Labour intended to put this Bill through, and if it had not been for the farmers on this side of the House, who pointed out the danger, this Bill would have gone through and become law. Could a more ridiculous anomaly exist than exists to-day under the administration of the Minister of Labour. A farmer owns an engine and plants mealies and wattle-trees. As long as that engine is shelling and grinding mealies for human consumption, he does not come under the provisions of the Factory Act, but if he takes that same engine into his wattle plantation to saw up poles for mining timber, he comes under the provisions of the Factory Act.

I am altering that.

You cannot deny that has been done in my constituency. I resent that the Minister of Labour should say that the Act has been administered for the last ten years as it is to-day. I have given the committee proof that the Minister is mistaken. I think the hon. members on the opposite side should go down on their knees and be thankful that there are wide awake farmers on this side of the House. The whole committee knows that the average income of farmers in South Africa is £100 a year. They would all go bankrupt if they had to work their labourers 48 hours a week. There is not a farmer in this House who works less than 60 hours a week if he is a proper farmer. I look with suspicion upon two Bills. I think it will give our lawyer friends great play in the courts. I think the simplest way is for the Minister to recommit this Bill so that we can amend Section 2 and make it simple so that the farmers, the backbone of the country, will be exempt from the operation of this Act, because this is a young country and the burden the farmer has to bear in every direction should not be added to by an Act of this nature.

I do not know whether I would be in order in proposing a hearty vote of thanks to the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) and the hon. member for Umvoti (Mr. Deane). If the hon. member for Umvoti had only listened to the statement of the hon. Minister he would not have made that stupid speech. The Minister has now promised that he is going to rectify that particular matter and make the farmers more secure. I think the Minister has gone a little too far in paying the slightest attention to anything raised on this side of the House. The hon. Minister should be guided entirely by what was said on that side of the House. It appears to me that some of the speeches now being made should have been made on the second reading. It also appears to me that hon. members have taken a very long time to find out the weaknesses of this Bill. In 1918 when it was passed, the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort was in friendly opposition, and there is no record that he got on his feet as he has done this evening and pressed the Government to protect the farming community. He was quite agreeable that the Bill should go through. The claim that is now being made by the hon. member for Umvoti and the hon. member for Caledon (Mr. Krige) is that, under this particular Minister, things are going to happen under this Bill. Their fears are quite groundless. There is nobody more concerned for protecting and looking after the primary industries of this country than the present Minister for Labour. Speeches have been made only to draw the members to their feet. The hon. member for Fort Beaufort would not have addressed the committee had he not known that he was going to draw out a number of speakers on the other side and protract the discussion and waste a little bit of time. I hope the committee will pass the Bill and accept the assurance given by the Government that if the farming community requires any further protection, the Government will introduce the necessary legislation at a very early date and, in the Minister’s words, the Bill will probably pass through the early stages before the final stage of this Bill is reached.

It is really amusing to see how the members on the other side are trying to cover their retreat. I have always heard that if one makes war and loses then one must discharge a lot of bombs so as to raise the dust, to prevent the enemy from noticing the retreat. This the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) has done, but with all this dust-raising he has put his foot into it, and has opened the eyes of the people to the fact that he and his party in 1918 passed a terribly bad law for the farmers. He has now fired another shot and run away again. It has been said that he has gone away to have an interview with the Prime Minister. If he has done so, then it is finished now, because he is back again. I have never yet heard that it is the custom of the Prime Minister to grant an interview in the public gallery. He not only tried to kick up a lot of dust to cover his retreat, but he also put forward a great many meaningless arguments. I am surprised that he does not himself see that kind of argument just furnishes proof that he and his party lack good arguments for attacking the Government. If they could get a single argument on financial or other grounds to attack the Government, then they would snatch it with both hands, but they have nothing, and they are so bankrupt of arguments that now they can see nothing else than attacking the Government on an Act which they themselves passed. I maintain that if a person is so bankrupt of argument that he must put his own mistakes onto the shoulders of another, it is terribly low. The hon. member for Caledon (Mr. Krige) has tried to find a few more little faults in the Act, but he forgets it is his own Act. Now that Section 2 cannot provide any more faults, he goes and looks through the law to find a few more, and there he actually finds fruit-packing. Does he now for the first time shy at an Act which has been in existence for ten years? Mention has been made here of passing a vote of thanks, but before such a vote is passed in favour of the hon. member for Fort Beaufort, we ought first rather to pass a vote of censure on the S.A. party for having accepted such an Act.

I think if the Minister had accepted the suggestion that we should report progress, he would have got on much faster with his Bill, but it seems to me that he has raised a discussion now which will keep us going till well on to 11 o’clock. The first matter I want to refer to is the speech of the hon. member for Germiston (Mr. Brown), who suddenly seems to have taken a different view of the position altogether. When we raised this point from these benches on the occasion of the committee stage last week, the hon. member got up in his seat and told us we did not know what we were talking about. He said that the farmers were exempted under the Bill and that no further exemptions should be granted. If that is the sort of stuff we have got to listen to from the hon. member, I think we had better ignore him in this debate. It seems to me as a young member of this House the first lesson a man has to learn is always to speak with his book and not chance his arm. I have never seen a greater adept than the Minister of Labour at drawing red herrings across the trail. When the hon. member for Caledon (Mr. Krige) brought up the question of the co-operative societies and the various restrictions imposed on them under this Act, the Minister said “You don’t know the Bill. If you will only look at Section 13 you will find you can get complete exemption.” The Minister does not know his own Act that he is administering. Section 13 applies entirely to hours and nothing else, and those factories which were the subject of the argument of the hon. member for Caledon—

It was the hours he was talking about.

No.

That was red herring number two. It is the general restrictions which make it almost impossible to continue work in those factories if they are brought under the Factories Act. As far as seasonable exemptions are concerned, it is only a matter of hours under Clause 13.

That is the point he raised.

Regarding these bouquets that have been thrown across the floor of the House that this is our Bill are concerned, let us be honest in this matter. This was an agreed Bill. It went to select committee. As far as I can see by looking up the Votes and Proceedings, there was never a division on this Bill. The farming members, if they had not really believed that they were being exempted under this Act, would, whether they were Nationalists or S.A. party, I am firmly convinced, have moved the necessary amendments. It is no use saying that it is our Bill. It is the administration of the Bill that is at fault. The Minister said that there has been no difference in the administration of this Act since he has taken over this Bill. Here I have a wire from Port Elizabeth—

In face of that wire, does the Minister still persist in his statement that there has been no alteration in the administration of this Act?

I do.

This is a factory which has been in existence for many years and all of a sudden it is to be placed under this Act.

What is the name of the factory?

The name is the Sundays River Co-operative Society.

When did it start? How many years has it been in existence?

It has been going for several years. That is all I can tell the hon. member. I am very sorry that the Minister will not give us the context of his Bill. I can assure him it would facilitate the passage of this clause very much. We are not only concerned with the individual farmer; we who represent agriculture in this House are just as much concerned with the small co-operative industries of the farmers as we are with the individual, and we want to know how far the Minister is going in his amendment. There is one other point on which the Minister has also gone very wrong. He says “I have not touched the old Bill at all. I am simply dealing with new matters.” There again, he is off the rails. The Minister has, by his amendment, asked the country and the farmer to accept a 48 hour week, which never existed in the old Bill. Is he going to deny that?

That is not true.

You have just got up and told the House that the law advisers say that the individual farmer who runs machinery for the purpose of crushing food is brought under the law, and then you say it is not true.

I say I did not make that.

Your Bill is substituting a 48 hour week for a 54 hour week, and then the Minister says he is not touching that Act.

But I am exempting the farmer.

Now you are, but you were saying you had not touched the old Bill. Of course you are putting the position on a different footing, and we know, from the tone the Minister took up when we first debated the matter, and the tone his friends on the cross benches took up, that he had no intention of exempting the farmer. It was only when the position was forced by every man in this House who had the interests of the farmers at heart. I hope, when the biggest industry of all in this country is touched, we are going to put aside political matters, and we are going to stand as one in seeing that the matter is put right and that legislation that gives fair play to agriculture is going to be introduced. I am very sorry the Minister will not give us some idea of what his Bill is, because I feel very great difficulty in voting for a 48 hour week until I know we are absolutely exempted and how that exemption is going to take place. May I withdraw the amendment standing in my name? I only moved it to gain time, in order to drive home the position the Minister was creating in agriculture.

With leave of committee, amendments proposed by Mr. Gilson, withdrawn.

From the time that this Government came into power the Opposition has tried to frighten the farmers on the countryside because we are working together with the Labour party. The farmers have been told that now we shall get the legislation of the Labour party, the Australian legislation. And I must say that with the help of their papers they succeeded in the beginning in making the farmers believe this. But to-day they no longer believe it. We now see that a law is being introduced by the Minister of Labour to improve a bad Act which was introduced ten years ago by the S.A. party. That Act of theirs lays down clearly that if I use a lucerne press and I employ three or four labourers on it and I sell lucerne then I come under the Act, and may not allow work for more than eight hours, and I must comply with other similar provisions. This is under the existing law, and now I cannot understand the effrontery of the Opposition in saying that this is our Act, while all along it was their own Act and has already been in existence ten years. I am sure that the farmers no longer believe the Opposition. As soon as we brought this objection to the notice of the Minister he was willing to meet us, because it was not his intention to injure the farmers in any way. Now our farmers can just see that their interests are being looked after by this Government, and our Labour friends they know too. I appreciate the efforts of the Minister of Labour to change the bad Act of the S.A. party, and thereby to help the farmers. As long as the farmers on the countryside take care that we sit on this side of the House they are safe. The danger is on the other side. I still cannot understand how the South African party could ever have introduced such a law and that the few farmers among them remained silent. I cannot understand, for example, how the hon. member for Colesberg (Mr. G. A. Louw) and the hon. member for Aliwal (Mr. Sephton) remained silent. I do not now speak of cheque-book farmers. I do not mean the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger). He is a cheque-book farmer. The real farmer is one who has worked himself up from the beginning; he is the practical farmer. Yet the hon. member for Colesberg is a practical farmer, and I cannot understand how all these years he sat silent and just allowed this Act to go through. Our farmers ought to be thankful to the Minister of Labour for going so far as to exempt the farmers from the application of the Factory Act.

In reply to the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson), I have been trying to find out when this Sundays River Co-operative Society was started.

What does it matter when it was started?

It matters a lot, because the accusation levelled against the Government is that there has been a variation in the administration of the Act, as compared to the previous Government, when it administered it. The chief inspector of factories is the same chief inspector, and he assures me there has been no variation; furthermore, the argument was put forward by the hon. member opposite, in order to prove his statement that this particular society had just been requested to register. What do we find? We find that before the Government took office, under this Act there were 16 registered co-operative society factories, and since this Government has been in power, in spite of the fact that we have passed a Co-operative Societies Act, which has stimulated the organization of co-operative societies, we find that we registered only 19.

The Minister has just said that in recent years no change has been made in the administration of the Act, but what about the Tobacco Co-operative Society at Paarl? I have been a director of the society since its establishment, and for the last three years it has come under the Act. The only machine which we have is a hooter, and electrical hooter.

Hear, hear.

I hope after the following election not to see the hon. member here again, so that he will not be able to interrupt us. I know a good position for him. He can look after rhinoceroses in Natal. The cooperative society only employ women to sort the leaves. They have comfortable seats, they receive an apron and white caps, and the only machine we have is the hooter of the management. How can the Minister then say that the application of the Act has not been altered? It costs our small society, which only packs the farmers’ tobacco, £4,000 a year more because the Act has been applied to it.

Since 1918.

No, the society existed before 1918, but for the last three years the Factory Act has been applied to it, and it costs it £4,000 a year more. What is more, the society finds it hard to obtain this extra amount, and it injures the farmers. The hon. member for Heilbron (Mr. M. L. Malan) says that the Act will not apply to the farmer, and that this is only just election talk. Let the Minister put this right and let him withdraw the Bill until we know what it means. I hope the Minister will be wise enough as to drop the Bill, and when we have properly enquired into it we shall give him all the support he may need.

The hon. member for Albert (Mr. Steytler) wants to know why we, as farmers, did not raise objection to the Act at the time. I will tell him. We thought that the Act was necessary, and in the hands of the wise Minister whom we then had there was not the least danger in the Act. We thought that perhaps some day we would no longer be on the Government benches and then the Nationalists would take our place, and that in their hands, too, it would be safe. But we could not think that a Pact would be formed so soon, in which the Labour party would be so strong that the Act would become a danger. I do not believe our hon. friends on the other side know how great a danger it is. Every day they say how well they are getting on with the Labour party and how well the Pact is working, but we know what sometimes happens in the caucus.

From whom?

Yes, sometimes something leaks out.

What have you heard?

I will tell the hon. member what I have heard. The chairman of the Labour congress said that the Pact had introduced legislation which they would not have got for the next fifty years. This morning I read something in the paper which I will read out. It reads [Quotation read]. My hon. friend behind me here, the hon. member for Springs (Mr. Allen) says “Hear, hear.” He is delighted and has reason to be, because the Labour party is being carried on the broad back of the Nationalists, e.g., the back of the hon. member for Riversdale (Mr. Badenhorst). They are being carried to the countryside in order to stand against the South African party and the Nationalist party. I want to warn Nationalist members against this. The hon. member for Heilbron said the other day that we were only wanting to kick up dust for the next election. I do not think there exists any danger of our doing this on our side, for it is really unnecessary for us to do so. After all, the Nationalists do not believe what we say, they only believe what Die Burger and Ons Vaderland say.

The hon. member must confine himself to the clause under discussion.

I only want to tell the hon. member what the Opposition thinks of the matter.

I have already allowed a good deal of latitude, but the hon. member cannot speak about parties.

But I only wanted to show that the Nationalists had swallowed everything. When I was a child I had a young crow and when I put a little bit of bread into his beak, he swallowed it. Then another child came and threw a stone into his beak and the crow swallowed this too. So the Nationalists swallow everything which the Minister of Labour throws into their throats. I want to warn them. It is not necessary now to deliver election speeches, because, after all, they have no effect on the Nationalists on the countryside.

I did not intend to speak, but after the words of the last hon. member I must say something. He has probably already forgotten what the Unionists made them all swallow and are still making them swallow to-day. The hon. member now wants to make out that the Labour party make such a great impression on us and just make us accept everything which they want. But this kind of dust-raising will avail them nothing, because the people outside do not believe such things. For some minutes now he has enlarged on the same point. The hon. member for Albert (Mr. Steytler) asked him how it was that he voted for this law, but he has not answered him. Many good things have been accomplished, and the poor workers, the poor Afrikanders have to-day obtained what for 14 years they did not get under the former Government. They have obtained what is in the interests of the farmers and in the interests of the country in general. The Minister now comes here and wants to put right what was wrong. It is in the interests of hon. members, but now they do not want to trust the Minister. The Minister does this in the name of the Government, and I cannot understand how hon. members can take up such an attitude. They have continuously protested, and now that the Minister wants to put things straight they kick up a row? I think that hon. members opposite had better leave the interests of the farmers to us.

It is nice to hear how much faith the hon. member for Riversdale (Mr. Badenhorst) places in the Minister. I just want to remind him what happened here a few years ago. Then the hon. member delivered the same speech as to-night, and he said that he trusted the Minister, and the Wages Act was passed. Has he forgotten that already? Take Oudtshoorn. The farmers there have themselves developed small factories. The hon. member said trust the Minister and the farmers will be exempted. But the Act has been applied to Oudtshoorn, and the farmers who have these little factories for making roll tobacco and cutting tobacco, come under the Wages Act, and the wages have been fixed. They have protested, but the Minister simply laughed and said that the Act was passed like that and that they come under it. Apparently the hon. member has not yet profited by his mistake. We are willing to help the Minister to make improvements, but we want to know where we are, and not proceed on vague promises. The hon. member has said that he places faith in the Minister.

I put faith in the Government.

Not one Minister has stood up and said that he agrees with the Minister of Labour. They are not involved in the promise of the Minister. The hon. member must just remember what he said from the platform, that if after the 17th of June, 1924, his Leaders worked with the Labour party, he was going to resign. This dust was just thrown up to cover their retreat. The legislation of the Labour party must be covered up by dust clouds.

The hon. member for Albert (Mr. Steytler) made a great show of gratitude towards the Minister of Labour for having excluded farmers from the Bill, but it was only after the Opposition had frightened the Minister into bringing in another Bill—

You didn’t do that. I did.

The Minister knew that the solid phalanx on this side of the House looks after the farmers’ interests and would make him do it. I hope the farmers will take notice of this, and that in the Minister’s own Bill there is no word about the farmers. That shows the mentality and the spirit in which the Minister drafted the Bill. He took precious little thought of the farmer. The Bill which he is going to introduce to-morrow is not the Minister’s Bill at all, but one which he has been bludgeoned into introducing, so that the hon. member’s gratitude to the Minister is misplaced. It is our Bill that the Minister will introduce to-morrow. However, I want to step aside from the rural aspect, and to come to another side of the matter. I have been asked by the manufacturers at Port Elizabeth to bring forward the following points. They state that, under the Bill, there is to be dual control of factories.

The purpose of the Bill is to avoid that.

The Bill does not achieve that. I am sorry because by repealing Section 3 of the old Act you do not avoid it. This Bill establishes under the Labour Department a set of inspectors who will inspect the factory machinery. Under this section you are laying down that factories will be inspected under the Labour Department, but all other machinery such as light, power, municipalities, lifts, agriculture, boilers, boring, drilling, outside of factories, are still going to be inspected by the Mines Department, so that there you have this pernicious system of two sets of inspectors continually interfering and worrying the industries.

I think the hon. member must have in mind some other section.

I dealt with that point. The hon. member was not here.

I must admit I was not here previously. I agree with you, Mr. Chairman, it does not fall under Section 4. I shall take the opportunity on a later occasion to deal with it.

I would like to ask the Minister a few questions. He proposes, I understand, to make provision for cold storage under Section 13, but Section 13 only applies to hours. There are other things as well as hours to be dealt with in connection with cold storage. There is inspection, for instance, and registration. Would it not be far better to deal with cold storage in the same way as we deal with factories? But when they are on farms they ought to be fully provided for. Then there is the matter of places where they saw timber for mine props. Is that going to come out? Why not bring them right out?

They will be under my amending Bill.

Well, if my hon. friend says they are going to be provided for I will accept it. I hope they will be, and then there can be no misunderstanding with regard to them.

The Act was passed in 1918, and then the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) was in opposition but what an opposition? The hon. member had the assurance that the other side were going to see the war through, and the interests of the farmers were then neglected. The farmers in consequence had to suffer. Every farmer who has a lucerne press came under the Act as soon as he had three or more men in his employ, and for that always more than three men were necessary. [No quorum.] The sword of Damocles has always hung over our head and now that the Minister wishes to make an improvement those who declare that they represent the farming interests are opposed to it. Hon. members on the other side want to delay the law and create the impression that they do not want it to come up again, and that the present state of affairs must remain as under the Act of 1918. The Minister has given us the assurance that he will introduce a Bill but hon. members do not want to trust him. But hon. members must admit that they do not represent the farmers. The hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), as a free trader, surely cannot represent the farmers. The few farmers on the other side shelter under the same wing. The farmers of South Africa have clearly shown that they have no faith in hon. members opposite.

Since the Minister has given an assurance that any factories, if I may call them so, that are engaged in sawing timber are going to be excluded, I would like him to give an assurance that these small factories of the co-operative societies are also going to be excluded.

He has given you that assurance long ago.

We do not want him to exclude the big factories in the big towns that are owned by farmers, but we want the little factories in the country to be excluded from this clause. I would like to ask the Minister why South Africa should always want to give a lead in this industrial legislation. I wonder if the House realizes that, during the last two or three years, our labour legislation has been more advanced than that of any other part of the world.

Oh.

Do hon. members know that Great Britain has refused to ratify the 48 hours week convention and yet here, we, a young country, a country in which we should not be oppressed unnecessarily with these restrictions, are getting these advanced laws hung round our necks. I would like the Minister to give us an explanation why he thinks it is necessary that we should be so far in advance of other countries, when the big employing countries of the world are perfectly content to let things remain as they are.

Clause put and agreed to.

On Clause 7,

I take it that the Bill which the Minister is going to introduce is going to exclude farm factories from all these other vexatious restrictions. It is not only going to be the question of hours. I take it the Minister is going to exclude the farmer from the operation of a clause like this. We have our views on the question of the 48-hour week, but I want to be clear, before I register my approval of this clause, that we are not going to be brought under it.

If they are not registered as a factory, they do not come under the Factory Act at all and by excluding the farmers they won’t be registered.

You are not only going to deal with hours in your amendment?

It excludes anything on farms.

The hours come in with the seasonal exemption.

Clause put and agreed to.

Remaining clauses and title having been agreed to.

House Resumed:

Bill reported without amendment; third reading on 4th April.

I think that South Africa can congratulate itself upon possessing in the principal Act one of the most useful pieces of machinery that is known throughout the world at present for the settlement and prevention of disputes. While at Geneva last year, some of us were present when the whole of the wage-fixing machinery of the world was under review, and it was conspicuous what a large percentage of the laws which have been passed for the purpose of preventing and settling disputes had found their way to the legislative scrap heap, and what a small percentage of those laws framed throughout the world had fulfilled the task which they set out to perform. We, therefore, can congratulate ourselves in this country on the statement which the Minister gave us, when he introduced this Bill, as to the tremendous strides which have been made in setting up machinery of this character. I think the most optimistic amongst us, when this Act was passed in 1924, hardly thought that it would be welcomed in the way it has been welcomed by both sides, the employers and the employees of this country. After the events of 1922, when the trade unions had been crushed, when there had been great bloodshed amongst the population of this country, when the country was aghast and people were shy about investing money in industries here, that was the time when we set about setting up this machinery. I think that to-day there is more contentment amongst the workers in industry, and investors feel more safe about the investment of their capital in industry in this country. Most of the principal industries are now covered by this Act, by the voluntary machinery set up under this Act, but I am sorry to say that there is one black spot. The principal industry for which this machinery was set up was the mining industry of the Transvaal. This is, generally speaking, the seat of most of our troubles in South Africa and I am sorry that the industry still remains outside the Act. Every other important industry is taking advantage of the opportunities under the Act to set up machinery for the settlement of their disputes, but there is no industrial council for the mining industry. There is, I believe, just a bare suggestion at the present time that one or more conciliation boards may be set up in future. I do hope the good sense of both parties will prevail and that they will try to set up an industrial council and manage affairs in their own industry, not only in the interests of the men, but in the interests of the employees and South Africa generally. There are, of course, always people, who when any machinery is set up or any Bill passed for the betterment of conditions, immediately set about looking for flaws in it with a view to evading its provisions and I am glad to see that these amendments the Minister has put forward have a tendency to tighten up the law in certain directions and prevent evasions of the Act. I may say that a good many of these amendments were matters of long discussion in this House at the time the Bill went through, and their presence is not due to any omission on our part at that time to point out these flaws and induce the House to put them right. The things we pointed out as weaknesses of the Act have proved to be such. The question of the application of this Act has been raised during this debate. I want to say at once that as far as myself and my friends are concerned we have never been in favour of any limitation of the application of this Act. We have never been in favour of the exclusion of pass-carrying natives, the mine natives or the Indians of this country from this Act, but I may say at once that a condition of the passing of this Act in 1924 laid down by the South African party was that the definition of “employee” should exempt these classes of persons, and it was by no desire on our part that they were omitted. That definition creates tremendous difficulties and dangers in regard to the working of the Act and, if I see aright, will create greater difficulties in the future. With the present mixed population in our industries it is pretty obvious that no successful industrial agreement can be negotiated when large numbers of the employees in any works or factory or undertaking have to be exempted from the agreement.

You don’t admit them to the machinery for making the agreements.

They are exempted under the Act—how can they be part? You cannot negotiate under this Bill for any of these persons. You cannot make a wage agreement for them. They are right outside the limits of the Act altogether, and I say that is going to lead to tremendous difficulties in the future. But let me say at once that this Act does not prevent a body of natives from forming a trade union. There is nothing in this Act or any other Act that I am aware of that prevents any set of persons from forming a trade union. Nor does this Act at all infringe the principle of freedom of association for all lawful purposes. We are left in the same position as we have always been, that a trade union could be formed, it could function but it had no legal entity under the Act. It was not a corporate body in the eyes of the law. It could exist and make agreements, but before this Act was passed agreements could not be registered and have the force of law behind them. But of what value is the right of association without the right to withhold your labour. What is the use of having the right to associate when Section 4 of the Native Labourers Act and various provisions of other Acts prevent workmen from striking or committing any breach of contract or service with a penalty of going to jail. The 1924 Act gave trade unions, subject to certain conditions—and I think it should be conditional—a corporate existence, in other words, they secured recognition under the laws of this country. That privilege has been denied to many natives, but not to all. Any body of natives who are not pass-carrying natives, who are not employed on the mines, or who are not employed on the mines, or who are not Indians on the plantations of Natal can form a trade union, and register their union and negotiate a wage agreement under the 1924 Act, but these three bodies of natives are excluded. We have always claimed that because the natives are brought under certain different laws to the whites, and because of the complications that naturally arise, it would be far better to repeal those provisions of the Masters and Servants Act and other Acts which cause this differentiation, and allow the natives to come under this law and allow agreements to be negotiated through their unions. It would be far better to let the natives fall under the same laws as whites with regard to wage fixing and determining their conditions of labour than to try and keep them down by means of obsolete laws that exist in various parts of the country. You are going to have great difficulty in the future in carrying out that idea of the past. It is a curious thing that the natives, many of them just emerging from barbarism, should have adopted as their model in forming a union one of the most extreme and revolutionary types of union that exists in the world. I refer to the syndicalist union. It is open to all irrespective of any occupation, is of the I.W.W. type, a general workers’ union, which has no particular interest in any particular industry, trade or undertaking, but caters for all workers and, generally speaking, in other countries relies for its power on class war propaganda and the general strike. The native, however, does not indulge in class war propaganda; probably because he does not understand what the class war is. But the organisers of the I.C.U., if I read the reports of their speeches correctly, appear to have substituted race war propaganda, which is a very dangerous form indeed. I submit that if the natives want to play the white man’s game in forming unions they have to learn the rules as we know them and conform to the laws as we know them. They will have to form Unions that can be registered and recognized under this Act. If any white persons were to form a union on lines identical with the I.C.U., of which Mr. Kadalie is the secretary, they would not be recognized under this law. In that connection our federation of trade unions, which represents many industries, cannot be registered under this law at the present time. The federation of employers, whose status covers more than one industry, also cannot be registered. It is recognized that when your organization goes beyond one industry or undertaking you aim at something political—some big move—a strike of all workers, or a lock-out of all employees. Rightly or wrongly, that is held to be not in the interests of the State, and the State at present says that such bodies shall not be recognized under this law. Speaking of trade unions, as I understand them in this country, with a few exceptions, they are quite prepared to absorb half-castes and coloured men, and do so.

And the natives?

Certainly not. There is no white trade union in this country, or employers’ organization, which admits natives.

Why not?

Ask the employers. You know more about their point of view.

How does it square with labour principles?

It squares all right. We are not going to create problems by admitting to our unions a class of people who are backward, people who are just emerging from barbarism, and do not understand trade unions. They will have to go through the mill, the same as others have had to do. You cannot bring these people all at once into the system under which the white people live. There is nothing now to prevent the natives forming their own unions, and why should we bring them into ours? There is nothing to prevent the natives building up their own parallel unions, as in America.

Will they be recognized?

What is to prevent them being recognized?

Can they get registered as trade unions?

Yes, if this law is amended in the way I have suggested. The hon. member did not hear the first half of my speech; that is why he interrupts.

It is so extraordinary for a Labour man to propound what you do.

It would be more extraordinary if you propounded it. The natives will advance, and do practically the same work as the whites do. They will fix wages according to the degree of efficiency reached by them. There is hardly a trade which does not grade its workers according to efficiency. We have all started that way. We are told by Mr. Butler that in the United States of America the efficiency of the black is only, on the average, something like 60 per cent, of the white, and this after many years of contact with the white. Then why should the black obtain the same wages as the white? Obviously, if 60 per cent. is the value of one man, compared with another, that is all he is entitled to demand.

Is that principle applied to the European workers too, or that the inefficient man must get what the other does?

Wages are based on the average efficiency of the whole.

No it is not.

When fixing wages for the white we always bear in mind the average man, and they will do the same thing for the native. That is the system the world over. The hon. gentleman cannot point to me any place in the world where it is not done.

The Labour party.

Even in the Labour party it is done. What a state of chaos there would be if people did not have the common sense to fix wages in this manner. But to return to my subject, the one existing native organization is loose and ill-conceived. It is more political than industrial, and on its present basis the white trade unions may never find contact. Things, however, may change, and the natives may realise the error of their ways. If I understand the white trade unions aright, I am quite sure that if the natives work along the same lines as the whites contact will be established and matters of mutual advantage will be discussed amongst them.

The I.C.U. are registered under the Labour conference in England.

The I.C.U. is federated to the International Federation of Trade Unions and so, too, are Chinese and Japanese. Why should they not be? With regard to the Bill itself, I notice there is a considerable tightening up of section 4. Under the old Act it was illegal to declare a strike, and the Minister now proposes to add after the word “declare” the words “or take part in.” If the amendment is agreed to a man who lets a hall for a meeting of strikers, or falls in behind a procession of strikers, or does one hundred and one little things which are not intended to be illegal under the Act, may be held to be taking part in the strike. We should try to limit the operation of the amendment to those directly participating in a strike, for the amendment may drag in a crowd of people who should not be dragged in. I have very strong sympathy with the amendment contained in section 6 of the Bill. Going round the country I was surprised to see that in a good many cases municipalities had been compelled to build houses intended for natives with white labour. It is a great hardship that the native with his very small earning capacity should be compelled to pay the rent of a building erected by white labour. In these matters the native is just as much entitled to the work he has created by his presence here, as the white is entitled to the work his presence has created. If you are going to enable the native to obtain a habitation at a reasonable rent, you must allow it to be erected by native labour. The Minister makes provision for this in this Bill, but he is going too far as he leaves the door open by which any speculator or investor could start a factory in a location or native area, and there make things which may be consumed outside the location or native area, and thus come into competition with articles manufactured by people who employ whites or pay higher wages.

That is not so. I avoided that. Read the first three lines of Clause 6—the last paragraph.

That does not appear to cover the point I mentioned at all. Of course if you have the opinion of the law advisers—

The law advisers say it meets the point.

We cannot fall out with the law advisers. But I am not so confident that if we pass the clause as printed we shall not find all sorts of attempts made to undercut goods made outside these areas. However, the Minister assures me I am wrong, and I am glad to know it. The definition of “strike” has been amended, and it wanted tightening up, but I think the Minister has tightened it up too much. By the amendment proposed any person who refuses to accept employment when there has been a strike will be guilty of a breach of the law. We are being asked to lay down the principle that at the termination of the strike every person is compelled to return to his work, and in that case a number of unfit, or persons who do not want to return to work for other reasons may be punished. Might I suggest that in one regard the Minister might go just a little further than he does at the present time. At present the Act is confined to an undertaking. That is the largest unit. There might be several industries incorporated in one undertaking. Might I suggest that there is no reason, therefore, to withhold from benefits local authorities who desire to link up with each other and make common agreements with their employees the power to do so. After all, municipalities are co-operative bodies representing the ratepayers, and there seems to be no reason why a number of municipalities desiring to join up for the purpose of making an agreement with their employees should not do so.

I think we can all agree with the hon. member for Jeppes (Mr. Sampson) and the hon. the Minister that the Act which it is now proposed to amend has been a source of benefit to the country. It is quite refreshing to us on this side of the House, after listening to the arguments we heard this afternoon on another Bill, to have such candid admission from the other side of the advantages of any measure which has been passed under the auspices of the South African party. The main object of this Bill, I am sure we can all agree, is one which we should all support. The main object of the Act, as it stands to-day, and the Minister tells us it was his object in introducing this amendment, is to give every possible facility for employers and employees to come together and settle their differences by frank discussion. That we can all support, but I must say I think the existing Act goes quite far enough in the direction of admitting the element of compulsion. There is a certain amount of compulsion provided in the Act as it stands. There is a certain amount of opportunity given to the Minister to do certain things against which there is practically no appeal, and it seems to me that this amending Bill goes still further in that direction. On the whole, although I agree there are some clauses in the Bill which are deserving of support, I am inclined to think it might have been wiser if the Minister had left it alone, and had not brought in a good many, at any rate, of the clauses which are now in the Bill, because I am sure it will emerge from the discussion which we shall probably have in the committee stage, that these clauses, if they are passed in their present form, will almost certainly give rise to a great deal of difficulty. The first matter I will deal with is the proposal in section 3 to delete the proviso contained in section 4 of the principal Act. That matter has been referred to by the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan), but it does seem to me that there is a good deal of harm in this proposal. The Minister has told us some of the reasons why he proposed to do away with the proviso, the proviso being that the Conciliation Board cannot be applied for in the case of individuals, unless a question of principle is involved. The Minister proposes to do away with that and throw the power to call for conciliation boards and invoke the whole of the machinery of this Act open to any individual in any dispute which may arise in connection with discharge, promotion and so forth. I am aware that from the employer’s point of view he gets some quid pro quo because at the present time these individuals in terms of the existing Act can enter into a strike, and if this amendment is passed that right will be taken away from them. Nevertheless they are given power to invoke all the machinery of the Act, and, in my opinion, experience has shown that if that is allowed, it will give rise to a great deal more difficulty than now arises. I can understand the Minister’s views on most of these matters are different from mine. The Minister finds it difficult to resist applications for alterations from his friends but if there is one thing which was brought out most clearly in the events of 1922, it was the disastrous effect produced by the fact that the whole working of the mines could be held up by individual cases. That was fully gone into by a body which, I think, was called the Mining Industry Board. If I remember rightly the present Chief Justice of the Union was a member of that board, and there was also Mr. Brace, a leading Labour authority. If you read through their report, it is easy to see that they held most strongly that any system which gave a union, acting on behalf of one individual, apart from any question of principle, the power to hold up the whole organization of the mines, was a system which ought to be ended. The troubles which arose at that time in the mines of the Witwatersrand were in a very large mea sure due to the fact that the mine managers’ authority was ruined by this system which crept in. They could not maintain discipline and the result was that, instead of proper disciplinary measures being taken against agitators, every trifling grievance was made the excuse for invoking the whole trades union machinery, and the operations of the mines were enormously hampered. It is common knowledge that as soon as that matter was put straight, working costs of the mines went down; the whole system has been more satisfactory, the relations between the men and the employers have been far more cordial, and it seems to me it is running a very great risk to alter that provision and enlarge the scope of the Act to cover all these individual cases. It will be easy to give extracts from the evidence given before the Mining Industry Board, showing from case after case how the contention of the mining companies at that time was fully justified. It seems to me that if we are now going to throw the thing open as the Minister proposes to do and we are going to disregard the whole experience which was gained during that terrible time in 1922, then we are going to take a very great responsibility because we shall, in my opinion, be opening the door to elements of disorder and giving opportunities for unnecessary troubles to arise. Then there is another point which is a matter of some importance, I think. That is the proposal to allow any person to be a member of one of those boards. That seems to me to be contrary to the general principle of conciliation which underlies the Act. The principle of the main Act is surely this, that employers and employees can get together, that they know each other’s points of view, both sides are interested in the particular industry to which they belong and the object is to enable them to settle their differences without the intervention of outside, possibly interested, parties. It is not as if the employees, under the Act as it stands to-day, were deprived of the assistance of the officials of their union, because the Act provides that an official of the union which is concerned in the dispute can be a member of the board. Surely that is enough. What is the object of allowing people to go outside and bring in a man who may be, to all intents and purposes, a professional agitator, or, if that word is obnoxious to some of the hon. members opposite, I will withdraw it, and say a professional negotiator? I see no object in that. I think it is contrary to the main principle of the existing Act, the principle which the Minister himself upholds, and that is that the people concerned in a trade should settle their own differences among themselves. Then I come to Section 7. That amends Section 10 of the principal Act by adding the words “or existing” after the words “agreed upon”. The point of that is this, that the machinery of the Act can at present be invoked in cases relating to agreements entered into between employers and employees as regards the terms of the men’s employment. Now the Minister proposes not merely to make it possible to apply the machinery of the Act in regard to the terms of employment which have been agreed upon, but to apply it also in regard to the conditions which may be existing. It seems to me that there is more in this than would at first appear. In many occupations all kinds of things are provided for by agreement. For instance, on the mines, there is a written agreement which all the employees sign. That applies to many other institutions. But it is obviously impossible to provide for every minute circumstance in a written agreement. The main conditions of labour, that is as regards pay, hours and so forth, are provided for in these agreements and if the employer wishes to alter those, he has to give thirty days’ notice, and the whole machinery of the Act may then, if necessary, be applied, but if that is to apply also to all the minor conditions which may be existing and which, because they are of minor importance, are not specifically provided for in the Act, then we are going to open the door to all kinds of difficulties for people—and there are always people who are anxious to make trouble—to take advantage of the opportunity which is given. I will take for example a case. It is possible in an agreement between the employees and employers that the hours of working are, we will say for the sake of argument, 45 hours per week. The work is from such and such an hour in the morning to such and such an hour in the evening on most days. Well, if it is provided in the terms of the agreement then of course it is considered that these matters are of sufficient importance to embody them in that agreement, and it is quite right if the employer wishes to alter them that he should give 30 days’ notice, and they should not be altered arbitrarily. But there are a great many conditions of minor importance. Supposing, for example, a man is employed on a particular machine. It is proposed to place him at the other end of the mine or building to do work of precisely the same nature and under precisely the same conditions as are embodied in the wage agreement, but, because it is not specifically laid down in the agreement that he may be moved in that way, it is open, so far as I can see, under the Act, for that man to ask for 30 days’ notice of the change and set the whole machinery of the Act in motion. If everyone was reasonable and there was no one anxious to stir up trouble, a provision of that kind might work, but we know, human nature being what it is, there are people who will take the opportunity to raise trouble of that kind. I think it would be very much better to leave the law as it stands. Then there is Clause 10. That gives an official of the Minister’s department certain rights of inspection. I said at the beginning that the element of inquisition in the principal Act is quite sufficient, and it is unnecessary to go further in that direction. It does not seem to be reasonable that an industry should be subject to inquisition such as would be possible in terms of this Act.

How can you find out whether the law is being complied with unless you have powers of inspection?

If there is no complaint, then why stir up trouble? It is not merely the possibility of stirring up trouble which is envisaged by this section. It is that all these matters, these inquisitorial visits, constitute a considerable hardship to the employer. They increase enormously the amount of clerical work he has to do, and it is a common complaint with every sort and kind of industry that the amount of clerical labour imposed upon employers by the various industrial Acts is quite excessive, and this Act, so far as I can see, will increase that and embarrass the employer. If business is put to extra expense, that is to nobody’s advantage. Then I come to what, in some ways, is perhaps the most important matter in the Bill, and that is the provisions relating to natives. I would say if the hon. member for Jeppes (Mr. Sampson) is perfectly logical, the Minister is frankly illogical. The Minister says that for certain purposes he brings natives within the scope of the Act, but broadly speaking it is not the intention to give them—as he phrased it—the full benefit of the Act. The hon. member for Jeppes, for example, says it is quite true there is nothing in this Bill to prevent natives forming a trade union of their own, but the Minister says he is not going to give them the full benefit of the Act, because such a union cannot be registered, and, therefore, it is impossible it can be of any great use. The hon. member for Jeppes said, “Let them form a union,” do away with the Natives’ Regulations Act conditions and put them exactly on an equality with the white man; let them have conciliation boards and do anything they like. That is logical, but whether it is practical is quite another thing. There is the first section which allows the Minister to make an award given applicable to natives. There is a minor point there; as the Bill stands to-day, it seems to me it would imply that the award given a year or two years ago in respect of the Witwatersrand mines does not touch the natives at all. If this Bill were passed in its present wording, it seems quite possible that the award would be effective.

It says “subject to exemption” in the agreement.

That is not a very satisfactory way of dealing with it. The main point is whether the natives are allowed to take full advantage of this Act or not. The practical course is the one now adopted and preserved in the Act as it stands, but the Minister, I think, is taking considerable risk in opening part of the door; if you do so you increase the pressure from people’s feet, who push the door wider open still. Anybody would say, “Why don’t you face the position, you people on this side are frequently standing up for the rights of the natives.” So we do, and I hope we shall continue to do so, but we must proceed slowly in these matters. Here, at the Cape, the conditions are different from those up-country.

What is the specific point you want to reach?

The point is this: If you say that you cannot, and dare not, put the native on a par with the European for this purpose, you must decide at what point you are going to stop. I think that Parliament, in its wisdom, did well in deciding, as it did, in the Conciliation Act in 1924. The Minister is going to open the door to difficulties by saying, because it suits any one or two particular cases, to make an award applicable to natives, he will go so far and no further. I understand that the object of this clause (6) is to prevent employers who have had an award made, simply using pass-carrying natives to whom the Act does not apply, and getting business done at rates below those in the award. I quite admit there is something in that, but I think if you are going, in order to provide for that particular case, to open the door, you are going to risk very great pressure being put upon you to open it still wider. You cannot open it wider. The Minister knows that, as a matter of practical politics, it is impossible to do that. The moment you do that you are going inevitably to increase the demand for higher wages to be paid in the great industries, and more particularly on the mines. The Government agreed before that the native must be left out, because it is common cause that it is impossible to face conditions which would raise to a large extent the standard of native wages on the mines. The Minister of Defence has talked for 20 years or more as to the necessity for doing away with what he calls servile labour, and for stopping the importation of natives from Portuguese East Africa. The Minister, however, is sitting in a Cabinet, which is sending one of its members to Lisbon to make sure that this labour is maintained. I am very glad it is so. We have been told that Australia does not have labour of that kind, but in Australia the carrying out of the white labour policy meant that the gold mines shut down. Australia, however, is big and rich enough to do without the gold mining industry, but this country is not big enough to do without it. The Minister does not go further by making this applicable to the natives, because he knows he dare not do it, for if he did do it, wages would go up to such an extent that a large proportion of the gold mines would be unpayable, and the country cannot do without the revenue it derives from the mines; the only possible remedy would be a reduction of European wages. I hope the Minister, for his own sake, will not be in power should that position ever arise. It is a position none of us want to see. It comes to this: That if you are going to open the door as far as you do in this Bill, you are going, as the hon. member for Jeppes (Mr. Sampson) said, to raise the demands and expectations of the natives, and it would not be long before you had an agitation to open the door still further and give them the whole benefit of the Act. If you apply the policy that one of the Minister’s colleagues is applying in the building trade to the main industries, they cannot live. Although there is something in the point about the employer who gets out of the Act by employing pass-carrying natives, that, on the whole, is a minor evil, and it would be better if some other means could be found of dealing with it. Well, those are some of the objections which I see to some of these clauses. I have no doubt that we shall go further into detail in committee. Some of the clauses are in effect contrary to the main principle which underlies the main Act, with which principle the hon. Minister expresses himself in complete sympathy. The principle of this Act is designed to encourage and effect voluntary agreements between employer and employed, and I think that the native clauses are open to the danger which I suggested. Though there are some other clauses which seem to me perfectly innocuous, I think it would have been better, on the whole, if he had left the matter as it stands to-day.

On the motion of Mr. Jagger, debate adjourned; to be resumed to-morrow.