laid upon the Table:

as Chairman, presented the First Report of the Committee on Standing Rules and Orders of the House of Assembly, as follows:

1. (7) (a) If a joint sitting of all three Houses is called to meet at the time appointed for the meeting of this House or for the resumption of the business of this House, this House shall meet after the disposal of the business of the joint sitting.
2. (b) If the business of the joint sitting is disposed of after, or at any time within 15 minutes before, the time appointed for the adjournment of this House, this House shall, subject to the provisions of paragraph (a), meet on the next sitting day.

J W GREEFF

Chairman

Committee Rooms Parliament

10 June 1986

Mr Speaker stated that unless notice of objection to the Report was given at the next sitting of the House, the Report would be considered as adopted.

as Chairman, presented the Second Report of the Standing Select Committee on Constitutional Affairs, dated 12 June 1986, as follows:

as Chairman, presented the Second Report of the Standing Select Committee or. Agricultural Economics and Water Affairs, relative to a Report of the Director-General: Water Affairs, dated 10 June 1986, as follows:

1. (a) the “new” purification works which are described in White Paper W.P. N—77 and were completed in 1981;
2. (b) the “old” purification works which were completed in 1966 and were replaced by the works referred to in paragraph (a); and
3. (c) the network of sewage drainage pipelines completed partially in 1964 and partially in 1976,

be sold to the Umgeni Water Board in terms of section 69(1)(b) of the Water Act, 1956, on the following revised conditions:

1. (a) The date of transfer of the works, viz 1 April 1983, remains unchanged.
2. (b) The transfer price is reduced to R5,9 million, based on the purification of a maximum of 4,6 million m3 effluent per annum instead of 10,4 million m3 per annum. The cost involved is repayable—
   1. (i) over a period of 43 years as from the date of transfer;
   2. (ii) at an interest rate of 11,2% per annum (the weighted average interest rate during the construction period);
   3. (iii) in annual instalments as set out in the Annexure hereto, payable annually on 1 April: Provided that additional payments according to the following formula must be made if the quantity of water treated in any one year exceeds the estimated quantity for the year, which payments will be appropriated to recover for the State a portion of the capital absolved:

1. (c) The amount of R6 390 100 absolved is reported in the Annual Report of the Department of Water Affairs.

Mr Chairman, with your permission, I should like to commence by welcoming the hon the Leader of the House back in the House.

Hear, hear!

I am delighted to see him back on his green bench. We do hope he has now fully recovered from the problem he has had with his back.

Hendrik, you are much better than Chris! [Interjections.]

A lot has been happening during his absence, and I hope that since he has returned, perhaps the whole country will return to normal as well.

I would say, Sir, that any further discussion on the Internal Security Amendment Bill would be redundant in view of what has happened since Friday when a state of emergency was declared throughout the country. It hardly seems necessary to go on discussing the details of a measure which obviously does not go as far as the state of emergency goes. Therefore one should hardly discuss it at all at this stage. Be that as it may, however, there is in fact a good reason why we should actually be doing so. That is, that when the state of emergency has been lifted—which, we hope, will be in the not too distant future—this measure will still remain as a permanent part of our legislation. When one considers the damage done to the economy by the proclamation, and the lack of stability and confidence in the country as a whole, it becomes quite clear that imposing an emergency situation is not in any way going to obviate the unrest which we have in this country at the moment.

The reason why we should continue with this debate and indeed discuss the details of this Bill is that the measure is to be a permanent part of our legislation, as I have already stated. It is going to be on the Statute Book and will remain there long after the state of emergency has been lifted. Therefore it is necessary that we continue to raise our objections to this measure and that we vote against the Second Reading. The hon the Leader of the Official Opposition has already moved the most extreme form of parliamentary opposition in his excellent speech which he delivered on Friday.

What! An excellent speech?

Yes, a first-class speech!

A second-class speech! A hopeless speech!

A first-class speech, Sir. The hon the Minister of Law and Order has no sense of judgment in relation to anything at all—he is totally unable to pass judgement on the value or otherwise of the speech delivered by the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition. [Interjections.]

What I should like to ask the hon the Minister is whether he is going to allow the House to discuss the details of at least this Bill during the Committee Stage. He refused to allow us to do so when the Public Safety Amendment Bill was considered. I want to tell the hon the Minister that the Internal Security Amendment Bill, the Bill which we are discussing at the moment, is in exactly the same position as the other Bill in that the standing committee did not vote on any of the amendments which were on the Order Paper.

I believe that it is totally against the Rules of Parliament that no discussion should take place on amendments to a Bill as important as this one. I therefore hope very much that the hon the Minister will allow the House to go into Committee at the conclusion of the Second Reading debate.

Apart from giving the reason that this Bill will be a permanent part of our legislation, I deem it important to place on record some of the very relevant comments made in the memoranda submitted to the standing committee by a number of very important organisations. I believe that the proposed new section 50A will be very widely used in the future.

I want to remind the House that section 50 which is being amended by this Bill contains the 14-day detention without trial provision and it is a section which is very widely used by the Police. During the declared state of emergency 1 924 people were detained under section 50 during 1985 alone, according to a reply received in this House. I have no doubt that once the Police are released from any need to free detainees after 14 days, the amended provision will become exceedingly popular with them. I believe that when the state of emergency is lifted the 180-day detention without trial provision is going to be a very widely used piece of legislation.

I remember that when section 6 of the Terrorism Act was introduced in 1967, a senior officer of the Police stated that this was a “mighty weapon in the hands of the Police.” So it proved, since over 4 000 unfortunate people were detained in terms of that particular section. I wonder how many thousands are going to languish in jail as a result of the 180-day provision?

The organisations I referred to as having submitted memoranda included, first of all, the social welfare section of the Cape Town branch of Nicro. If the hon the Minister of Justice were present, he would bear witness to the valuable work that is done by Nicro not only in the Cape but also elsewhere. Nicro had this to say about the 180-day provision:

They go on to say:

Rumour has it—rumours are going to abound in South Africa since the new emergency regulations place the most severe restrictions on the media to report anything to do with unrest throughout the country—that over 2 000 people have already been detained under the emergency regulations. I do not know whether that is true or not, and the Police are not prepared to tell us. I have put a question on the Question Paper and I am hoping the hon the Minister will answer it tomorrow, or perhaps even today. The important thing, however, is that among those 2 000 people are the leaders of communities referred to by Nicro.

There are two other organisations I should like to quote. The first is the FCI—the Federated Chamber of Industries. As a final remark in its letter, the FCI says:

They are referring to the Internal Security Amendment Bill—

They plead that proper consideration be given.

There are also the two legal associations, the Association of Law Societies of South Africa and the Bar Council of South Africa. Both of them point out that it is extremely dangerous to have legislation on the Statute Book which does not offer any of the normal safeguards of access to the courts and so forth. I will simply repeat the Society of Advocates’ remarks which are:

We badly need an independent body charged with the task of monitoring Police practices and equipped with powers to prevent malpractices from developing. Our amendments on the Order Paper were framed with that particular objective in view.

I find it quite extraordinary that the Government does not learn from experience. I want to ask the hon the Minister when he has finished consulting with his officials whether the Republic has enjoyed peace and quiet since the passing of the security laws; on the contrary, from 1960, from Sharpeville onwards, we have staggered from one crisis to the other; from Sharpeville in 1960 and the first state of emergency, to Soweto in 1976, to Sebokeng in 1984, to Uitenhage in 1985, and the next state of emergency which ended in March of this year. Now we have Crossroads and the escalating unrest and violence throughout the length and breadth of the land. On Friday we came full circle with the declaration of the third state of emergency bearing with it the most ferocious regulations, exceeding the regulations that governed the previous state of emergency and striking a deadly blow at civil liberties in South Africa.

They even attempted to ban a lawful meeting which we held in the City Hall at lunch time today and arrested some of our officials who were handing out notices advertising that meeting. Those are the depths…

Which meeting was that?

The meeting that was held by the PFP. I might add that it was a packed meeting—the City Hall was completely full. It was banned but then it was unbanned when the hon the Minister’s department was told about it.

Once again we must repeat what we on these benches have said over and over again, namely that unrest and violence will not be dispelled by tough security measures. Even the Rabie Commission recognised that when it stated that in the long run security legislation by itself can be no guarantee of the maintenance of law and order in the country. [Time expired.]

Mr Chairman, one could have expected the hon member for Houghton to express herself very strongly against this legislation and for her party to oppose it with all the power at their disposal. I want to tell the hon member for Houghton that if that party were ever to come into power in South Africa there would be a permanent state of emergency in this country. [Interjections.] Then there would be the greatest bloodshed and chaos in this country which there ever could be at the southern tip of Africa.

It is since the NP has also accepted power-sharing as the hon member for Houghton’s party has advocated it over the years, that rebellion and bloodshed have broken out in this country. As a result of the fact that the NP started to implement power-sharing, we now have a state of emergency in South Africa. [Interjections.]

The hon the Minister of Law and Order accused the PFP of obstructing the security Bills. I agree with him that in the House of Assembly they tried their best with all the power at their disposal to obstruct the discussion of those Bills. But Rev Hendrickse and Mr Rajbansi are members of the Cabinet and are consequently part of the Government of the country. I assume they were present when this security legislation was discussed in the Cabinet, but it was indeed they—two members of the Cabinet—whose parties obstructed the legislation, so that it has not yet been passed and we have a state of emergency today.

If the PFP had been the only party opposed to the legislation, the hon the Minister and his party would, with the assistance of the CP and the HNP, have had this legislation on the Statute Book before today, and the proclaiming of a state of emergency in South Africa would not have been necessary. [Interjections.]

It was indeed two of the hon the Minister’s Cabinet colleagues and their political parties that were responsible for these Bills not being on the Statute Book today, and today we have a state of emergency in South Africa. Consequently the tricameral Parliamentary system is responsible for this.

In the past I asked what security legislation would look like after consensus had been reached in the standing committee, which consisted of 11 Whites, 7 Coloureds and 5 Indians and of which the hon members for Houghton and Green Point were members. What does legislation on which consensus has been reached in the standing committee look like?

I now want to ask the hon the Minister something. He holds it against the PFP because they are obstructing the Bills. But does he think it is right that after this two of his Cabinet colleagues who are also jointly responsible for the security of South Africa must have the right to remain in the Cabinet? My hon leader and the hon member for Lichtenburg had to leave the Cabinet because they did not want to walk with the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning and his leader on the road to healthy power-sharing with Coloureds and Indians. Now two colleagues of the hon the Minister of Law and Order are sitting with him in the Cabinet who have on occasion demanded his resignation. I just want to tell him I think he must ask the State President to send those colleagues of his as well as their parties packing … [Interjections.]

I received a message from Queenstown from where people have telephoned us because members of the commando are now being roped in there to guard Coloured schools at night along with the Police. In Queenstown three members of the commando, a Black constable and two Coloureds have had to guard Coloured schools at night recently. There is great unhappiness among the members of the commando because they, who must work or farm in the daytime, have to guard Coloured schools at night. These White farmers must work in the daytime, but at night they must leave their families and properties to go and guard Coloured schools.

Why are they unhappy? They are unhappy because they must guard Coloured schools while the Coloured and Indian Houses are refusing to allow their boys to do compulsory military training and consequently are also refusing to look after themselves. [Interjections.] These people are unhappy because the Coloured and Indian Houses are refusing to allow security legislation to be passed. They are unhappy because Coloured and Indian leaders are lodging appeals for the leaders of the ANC to be released. They are unhappy because Coloured and Indian leaders appear on television and suggest that right-wing White organisations must be banned.

These people feel unhappy because Rev Hendrickse and Mr Rajbansi are serving on the Cabinet and are obstructing security legislation so that South Africa must be plunged into a state of emergency. [Interjections.]

There sits the hon member for Queenstown. I have not heard him open his mouth about this yet. His voters tell us that they have to stand guard at night. They have to leave their farms and homes to guard Coloured schools while the Coloureds and the Indians in this tricameral Parliament refuse …

I doubt…

No, the hon member need not doubt my words. I can take the hon member to those people because I do not think he knows his voters. [Interjections.] He does not know what is going on in his constituency. That is the reason why recently in Hofmeyr four regional council members of the NP came over to the CP. The same happened at Molteno. [Interjections.]

I have here Die Transvaler of 25 May 1984. The hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning is being reported. The headline on the front page reads: “Skoolonluste Treurnicht se skuld.” One can see that this headline stretches right across the page.

And so it was!

They write the following in the report:

It was the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning who accused my leader of ham-handedness as far as those riots were concerned. [Interjections.] But whose ham-handedness is responsible now for the worst rioting this country has ever experienced?

P W Botha!

The hon the Minister of Law and Order has to try to restore law and order in a country which has been started off along a path of power-sharing by the clumsy hands of the State President and the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning under these circumstances in which we find ourselves at present. They are responsible for this situation.

We are very frequently told that the CP is responsible for the Afrikaners being divided amongst themselves. It is said that we have divided the Afrikaners at a time when we should have unity. But as far as security legislation is concerned we have unity in this House today. It is in fact the CP and the HNP who together with the NP are going to place this legislation on the Statute Book. It is also we who are not asking for amendments to be made, and are not asking the hon the Minister to make concessions to gain the co-operation of the Coloureds and the Indians. As far as this legislation is concerned, there is unity among the Whites of South Africa. [Interjections.]

When the ANC bases abroad were attacked, and when the other Houses and these hon members voiced criticism, we had unity, because it was the CP and the HNP who told the hon the Minister of Defence that it was a good thing that he had eliminated the ANC bases abroad.

We want to tell this hon Minister that when the security of South Africa is at stake, he can take those steps. Then he will have unity, and the support of the Conservatives in South Africa. [Interjections.] But I want to tell that hon member who is making such a noise that he must never expect us to join him on the road to power-sharing and integration, because it is this road which has placed us in this situation in which we find ourselves at present. [Interjections.]

What on earth has that to do with this Bill?

It has a great deal to do with it. In the preamble to this amending Bill it is mentioned that it is preventative legislation. Now I want to tell the hon the Minister that one of the most important preventative measures in this country will be for him to abandon the policy of power-sharing and adopt the policy of partition, which can bring peace. [Interjections.]

The CP says there must be legislation to combat public disturbances, disorderliness, rioting and public violence. We are in favour of this. The legislation is in fact aimed at making preventative or combating measures possible. The CP also says prevention is better than cure.

The Government’s policy of power-sharing is responsible for the greatest unrest and conflict and bloodshed this country has ever known, and it must accept that. [Interjections.] The policy of power-sharing which was held up as the policy which would bring peace, prosperity and overseas acceptance, is now responsible for the greatest conflict between White and non-White, between Afrikaner and Afrikaner, and between Black and Black, which this country has ever experienced. [Interjections.]

Before the referendum the CP warned that Black people would not be satisfied to be governed in the RSA by a multiracial tricameral Parliament and a coalition Cabinet on which only Whites, Coloureds and Indians would serve and in which they would have no say. The fact that the Black people were not brought into the constitutional dispensation of 1983 led directly to Black people under the leadership of the UDF and the ANC, starting to attempt to have a say in the government of the country by means of public disturbances, disorderliness, rioting, public violence and atrocious murders. [Interjections.]

The State President tried to resolve this position by means of his announcements of radical changes in policy. He tried to pacify the Black people when he saw that they were committing murder and sabotage and that there was unrest in the country because they did not have a political say. He made announcements in connection with equal treatment, full political rights for everyone, as well as South African citizenship. Certain legislation was abolished, such as that in connection with influx control. Identity documents will now ostensibly be “colourless”. What is more the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act was abolished. There is also the matter of Black freehold in the White areas. The State President made these announcements in the hope that he could be able to resolve the conflict with the Black people.

But he only exacerbated the cause of the conflict, clashes and bloodshed by his acceptance of power-sharing with Blacks. He tried to resolve the unrest situation with his acceptance of power-sharing with Blacks, but he in fact made the unrest situation worse by doing this. [Interjections.]

Radical Blacks see the State President’s concessions and changes in policy as a sign of weakness. Radical Blacks hope by means of further unrest, rioting and acts of terrorism to force the weak State President—that is how they see him—to make further concessions. The NP’s policy of power-sharing and the PFP and NRP’s acceptance of power-sharing with Blacks, Coloureds and Indians, is responsible for unrest, rioting, atrocities and acts of terrorism in South Africa.

This can only be eradicated by means of a policy of partition. [Interjections.] If the Government really wants to take preventative steps, it must accept the policy of partition which will afford each people the opportunity to govern themselves, as they wish and in their own fatherland. In this way each people will have to accept responsibility for unrest in their area and will have to pay themselves for the harm done to them. This is a policy which in fact eliminates the domination of one people by another. [Interjections.]

In the TBVC countries where separate development has been carried through to its logical consequences and where those people have become free in their own fatherland, there is peace today. [Interjections.] I hear that the government of Pres Mangope does not even wants its citizens to become citizens of South Africa again. That is how happy that Tswana statesman is who today is governing his own people in his own fatherland. That is the recipe for peace. In those countries schools are not being burnt down and buildings are not being destroyed.

There is not a state of emergency either.

We do not find a state of emergency there either. Necklace murders are not being committed on Black people there either.

[Inaudible.]

It is because of the hon member for Waterkloof's weak Government which is trying to give Black people a say in this country by means of concessions that we have a state of emergency in South Africa today.

Today there is not only conflict between Black and White in this country; there is also conflict and clashes in White ranks—clashes between Afrikaner and Afrikaner. The acceptance of power-sharing with the Coloureds and the Indians and the establishment of the multiracial tricameral Parliament is responsible for the greatest division in Afrikaner ranks. [Interjections.] The day this hon Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning and the leader of the National Party in the Cape—now the State President—introduced healthy power-sharing in South Africa and made it the National Party’s policy, they tore National Afrikaner-dom in two. In this way they became responsible for the greatest division which has ever existed in the history of this people.

The acceptance of power-sharing with Blacks, and the Government’s refusal to hold a general election, are responsible for emotions flaring up here and there. The National Party, which was elected to this Parliament on the principle of separate development, and has now accepted power-sharing with Blacks, is now being called to account at public meetings by the same people by whom they were voted to Parliament in 1981. People who still voted for the National Party in 1981, are being arrested in Uitenhage because they booed the hon the Deputy Minister of Information at a public meeting. I shall return to this later.

Those people in Brits and in Pietersburg, as well the people in Warden, in Uitenhage, in Uniondale and in Joubertina still voted for the National Party in 1981. Those people who now do not want to let speakers of the National Party address meetings, are all people who still voted for the National Party in 1981. [Interjections.]

That is not true!

Mr Chairman, the hon member for Heilbron now says this is not true. The hon member for Heilbron’s good friend Mr Frik Dreyer, who used to be one of the leaders of the National Party in Heilbron, and is now the chairman of the CP, was elected chairman of the meeting at Warden—the same meeting at which that hon member and the hon the Minister of Agriculture and Water Supply could not make their speeches. [Interjections.]

Give him some more examples!

Now that hon member says it is not true. I can give him many more examples. [Interjections.] Of course I can understand why the hon member for Heilbron is not allowed to address meetings.

Mr Chairman, is the hon member trying to tell us that Mr Frik Dreyer broke up that meeting?

No, Mr Chairman, I did not say that Mr Frik Dreyer had broken up a meeting. [Interjections.] What did happen, was that Mr Frik Dreyer acted as chairman at that meeting. When the hon the Minister of Agriculture and Water Supply stumbled over his words for the third time, he resumed his seat and did not carry on with his speech. Then the Nats walked out of the hall, and of the approximately 300 people who had attended the meeting, 70 moved to one side and held a meeting. That meeting was not broken up. Those were people who in 1981 were still leaders in the NP, leaders who helped to elect that hon member as a member of the House of Assembly. [Interjections.] It is they who are now holding it against this Government that it adopted this fatal course which it is still adopting.

Now I want to tell the hon member for Heilbron as well as the hon the Minister that the only preventative step which can be taken to eliminate this struggle between Afrikaner and Afrikaner, is to get rid of the destructive policy of power-sharing immediately. [Interjections.] The hon the Minister can re-unite the Afrikaners today. He can resolve the division in the Afrikaner ranks. He can bring about the unity which he has between the CP, the HNP and the NP with regard to the security legislation by abandoning the policy of power-sharing with Coloureds, Indians and Blacks at once.

Now I want to invite the hon members of the NP—I know there are many of them who do not accept power-sharing with Blacks—to stand together. Dr Malan said: “Bring bymekaar hulle wat uit innerlike oortuiging bymekaar hoort”. This party says that the Whites in South Africa have the right to govern themselves in their own fatherland. We would like to invite people who believe this, people who say that peace can only be brought about if each people is afforded the opportunity to govern themselves and in this way one can eliminate domination of one people by another—we want to invite them, to throw in their weight with the CP.

We have said that the Government can get rid of this division in Afrikaner ranks by getting rid of its destructive policy of power-sharing. They can hold a general election immediately so that the voters of South Africa can get rid of the NP, the PFP and the NRP with their offered policy of power-sharing.

Where are you going to stand?

I am going to stand in Kuruman. The hon member Dr Vilonel does not even have a seat and he is here by the good graces of President Botha. At that stage the NP helped the hon member for Krugersdorp in a nomination fight because they said that the hon member Dr Vilonel was too liberal. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon member for Kuruman must get back to the Bill.

To prevent clashes and conflict between Whites, a general election is absolutely essential so that the cancer which is destroying this people—ie power-sharing—with its casing, the NP and its partners in the coalition government, can be cut out.

I repeat that partition is the only solution, and the guarantee of full-fledged self-determination for the Whites in their own fatherland is the only alternative for peace between Afrikaners. The CP says that South Africa’s interests must be placed above the interests of parties and people. The CP realises that some of its supporters may be victims of the specific legislation now before us.

Yes.

The hon member for Winburg says yes. Hon members must now listen attentively to realise what the mentality of that hon member is.

The CP realises that some of its supporters may be silenced by a terrified Government by means of this legislation. I can give examples as proof of what I have said. A Coloured MP told a member of the public that he had been informed that the legislation was needed to keep the AWB in check. The hon member for Winburg has just confirmed this for me.

But you said it.

It is possible that this was used as a method or argument to gain the support of the Coloureds and Indians for the Bills. The Coloured MP told a member of the public that the State President—I am sorry he dragged the State President into this—had told them that the Government needed this legislation to control the right-wingers.

Do you believe the gossip-mongers and their street gossip?

No, it is not street gossip. I shall bring the hon the Minister an affidavit if he wants it. [Interjections.] I should just like the hon the Minister to repudiate that Coloured MP if this is not true.

You said …

No, I did not say it. I said that a Coloured MP had told this story to a member of the public.

Mr Chairman, on a point of order: You have just asked the hon member to get back to the legislation. I am asking you please to repeat this, because we are now sick of his nonsense. [Interjections.]

The hon the Minister must repudiate the hon Coloured MP in order to wring the neck of that gossipmongering story. I want him to do that.

I am going to wring your neck!

You cannot even wring your mother’s neck!

The hon the Minister, whom I support in this legislation, says he will wring my neck. Mr Chairman, may the hon the Minister say he is going to wring my neck?

Mr Chairman, on a point of order: I have no objection to swallowing the hon member for Jeppe’s insults as a politician, but I am not prepared to join him in the sewers regarding the remark he made.

You belong there!

I do not want to repeat the remark in the House, but I demand that the hon member withdraw it.

Order! I did not hear what the hon member for Jeppe said.

The hon member for Jeppe said: “You cannot even wring your mother’s neck.” My mother is 95 years old and then the hon member passes such a disgraceful sewer remark.

Mr Chairman, the hon the Minister looked in my direction and said something about wringing my neck.

I did not say anything about you!

Then I said: “You cannot even wring your mother’s neck.” I merely answered him. I will not withdraw it, because the hon the Minister said that he would wring my neck. I then told him he should rather wring his mother’s neck. [Interjections.]

You are a sewer rat, that is what you are!

You belong in a sewer; you are a piece of sewerage! [Interjections.]

Order! It is not only the duty of the Chair to maintain the stature of this House. It is the function of every hon member of this House. It is not only my function to maintain the order. Hon members who do not want to cooperate must simply say so. I think the hon the Minister must in the first place withdraw the words that he threatened to wring the hon member’s neck.

Mr Chairman, I withdraw them.

I did not say that to the hon member, Sir, and I did not even look at him.

Order! I simply assumed that the hon the Minister had said that.

He said it to me, Sir.

Order! I shall accept the word of the hon the Minister absolutely. The hon member for Jeppe must withdraw the words “the hon the Minister cannot wring his own mother’s neck.” It is inappropriate to say that in this House.

The hon the Minister looked in my direction. The hon member for Kuruman is right in front of me.

Order! I understand that, but the hon member for Jeppe must withdraw those words in any case.

I have already withdrawn them, Sir.

Order! I did not hear clearly what was said about sewers.

I can help you, Sir. The hon the Minister started with that.

Order! What did the hon the Minister say about sewers?

Mr Chairman, I said that the hon member was a sewer rat.

Order! The hon the Minister must withdraw that.

Sir, I can assure you that I was not…

Order! The hon the Minister must withdraw it unconditionally.

I withdraw it, Sir.

Order! As far as I know, that is all that happened with regard to sewers. The hon member for Kuruman may proceed. [Interjections.]

Mr Chairman, on a point of order: The hon member for Jeppe did not stop there, but said that the hon the Minister belonged in the sewer because he was part of the sewerage.

Order! Did the hon member for Jeppe say that?

I did, Sir.

Order! The hon member must also withdraw that.

I withdraw it, Sir.

Order! The hon member for Kuruman may proceed.

If hon members waste the CP’s time, we are going to be here until Christmas. [Interjections.]

We support the legislation knowing that some of our people can be kept in check by it. A peculiar phenomenon has manifested itself in South Africa this year. At every NP meeting there is a crowd of SA Police to maintain law and order there. This has never happened before.

… if he is a scoundrel.

I shall remember what that hon member said.

In Ellisras 122 members of the Police Force under the direction of a lieutenant colonel arrived to look after a few NP members. As far as the police action at Warden was concerned, the burden was placed on the shoulders of the District Commandant of Bethlehem. Twenty-five policemen and riot vehicles of the SAP were summoned there. There was a Casspir, in which there were also Black policemen, driving around the hall at Warden to maintain law and order.

Hooligans!

It is a crying shame that such things are happening. I should like to read out what the former member Mr Swiegers wrote to me. [Time expired.]

Mr Speaker, there is only one matter in respect of which I agree with the hon member for Kuruman and that is that the present state of emergency in the country is a direct result of the failure of this Government to govern South Africa properly. [Interjections.]

However, before I return to that, I want to express and place on record the horror of hon members in these benches at the car bomb blast in Durban on Saturday. I want to record our sympathy with the families of those who lost their lives, and our sympathy with those who suffered injury. It is tragic that this sort of event is more and more becoming part of our daily lives in this country. I believe that this is so as a result of the tremendous build up of resentment and hostility created by attitudes and Government policies adopted over decades in South Africa. [Interjections.]

I want to say that the sort of legislation which we are debating in this House this afternoon will in no way help that situation. This is simply another example of complete overkill and misdirection on the Government’s part in dealing with the situation in South Africa at the present time. When one looks at this Bill, one sees it is a Bill which in its terms is totally contemptuous of the rights of individuals and which clothes the Police with frightening powers to deprive individuals of their freedom and their democratic rights in this country.

Once again the rights of individuals are subject in terms of the Bill to the opinion of some police officer. In the case of the first detention of 14 days the rights of the individual are subject to the opinion of a police officer of or above the rank of a warrant officer; and later, for detention for an extended period, his rights are subject to the opinion of a police officer of or above the rank of a lieutenant colonel, for a period of up to 180 days on each occasion. In terms of the Bill the “opinion” must be simply that the detention of a person “will contribute to the termination, combating or prevention of public disturbance, disorder, riot or public violence”. This Bill is giving the widest possible discretion to that police officer, of whatever rank he may be, in his opinion to deny people what should be a fundamental right in any democratic society, namely their freedom and right not to have it denied them without trial and without recourse to the courts and the due process of law being in operation.

Unfortunately this concept has been with us in this country for a long time. It is not new because detention without trial has become a tragic and damaging reality of life in South Africa over the years, as the policies of this Government have plunged this country into recurring cycles of violence and unrest, each more ominous than the last. This is part of the pattern of life and of the history of this Government over the past two decades in South Africa. However, while this is not a new concept, what we are doing in this Bill is to extend and facilitate the use of those powers. I believe it is a further ghastly chapter in the nightmare of events which are at present striking at the very roots of our standing as a Western democratic nation. We talk about the threat of a communist take-over in South Africa. Last Thursday the State President dwelt on this at great length and told the country of his perceptions of that threat and its meaning for this country. I wonder whether it occurs to the Government that for many people in South Africa—I should think the vast majority of people in South Africa—what the State President implies would be the consequences of a communist take-over, are already a reality in this country at the present time, although in this instance attributable to the NP Government and the powers it is assuming. If the fear of a communist take-over is real and justified—and I think that for many it is—then that fear is based not only on our opposition to Marxist economic theories, policies and doctrine but also on the fear that we will, inter alia, become a society in which the State will have total authority over the rights of individuals and that we will become a communist society in which people can be arbitrarily eliminated from society; that we will become a society in which the public’s right to know is determined by the State and in which the Press and the media will be totally muzzled.

I think those are the concepts most people have of what life would be like in a communist-run country, and that is the fear which people have. Those are the consequences that are feared. However, this is precisely what is happening in South Africa at the present time as we debate this security measure. In fact, I believe that there is probably less freedom in South Africa at the present time than there is in communist Russia. [Interjections.] I see hon members are objecting, but they need only look at the emergency regulations published last week. They should scrutinise them and see what freedom is left in South Africa while those security regulations are in force. Let them try to compare those regulations with circumstances in countries behind the Iron Curtain and see which are worse when it comes to removing the rights of individuals in a country. [Interjections.] I want to say to the Government that it is in fact outdoing the gentlemen of the Kremlin. Whoever thinks up these laws—whoever dreams up these situations—is outdoing the people in the Kremlin when it comes to denying rights to individuals in a democratic country. This is the state to which the Government has reduced the country. It has done so because of its policies, its refusal to face realities, its determination to divide our people and its denial of meaningful rights to the majority of our people. That is why our situation has been reduced to what it is in South Africa at the present time.

Faced with that situation, instead of bringing about meaningful and timeous reform, the Government comes along with legislation of the kind which we are debating this afternoon in an attempt to contain a situation which they themselves have created. Against a background of abject failure, they do this by asking for more powers. Not even all the inroads into individual rights—this has become an annual event in South Africa—will restore security and stability in this strife-torn country. They have tried it, Sir, they have tried it for two decades but have not succeeded in getting us back to a situation of normality in South Africa. It does not work! The very powers which they assume, more often than not, often tend to aggravate rather than alleviate the dangerously volatile situation in this country.

I believe this Bill must be seen against the deplorable background of the exercise of emergency powers by this Government over the years. The judgment of the Government and of the Police Force, which is given indemnity and is encouraged by the hon the Minister to do what it likes, is totally suspect, and they must realise this. The judgment of the Government and of the people whom they control is totally suspect when it comes to exercising discretion with regard to the rights of individuals in South Africa.

Even the courts—we are proud of the reputation and competence of our courts— have expressed themselves more and more in recent times as being concerned about these issues. They have expressed concern about the circumstances under which people are detained and deprived of their freedom. There is little doubt that, in view of the immense scope given by the law to the authorities to detain people without trial, there have been repeated abuses of that power. We know it; we can think of the Biko case, we can think of the Aggett case and a number of other cases where the Government have abused the powers given to them, even the enormous powers given to them in terms of the security legislation which is on record. The track record of this Government in regard to detentions without trial and the treatment of detainees is absolutely appalling. [Interjections.]

Whatever assurances the hon the Minister may give on these matters, no one will have a great deal of faith in those assurances, because these measures—and this is part of the whole pattern, the measure which we are discussing in the House this afternoon—are part of the whole black-out which is taking place over all South Africa; a black-out in respect of which, at the present time, meetings are banned. We had an example here in Cape Town today. The hon the Minister looked critical when the hon member for Houghton raised the matter. We had an example today with the Official Opposition wanting to hold I believe, a perfectly legitimate meeting in the Cape Town City Hall, but a few hours before that we were told that the meeting had been banned. We had the situation where officials of the PFP, distributing pamphlets advertising the meeting in the streets of Cape Town, were in fact detained. I have one of the pamphlets here. It says:“16 June—this Monday, City Hall 1.10 pm; PFP: Eglin, MP, and other speakers: Crossroads KTC crisis: We must protest.” My question to the hon the Minister is why that meeting was originally banned this morning. Who gave the instruction for that meeting to be banned?

Who banned the meeting?

We were informed that that meeting had been banned. [Interjections.] Within a half-hour or three quarters of an hour we were told that they had changed their minds and that the meeting could proceed.

Who banned the meeting?

We were informed.

Just give me the names.

One of your policemen.

No, I think the hon the Minister must give us the names. [Interjections.] I think the hon the Minister must investigate on whose authority we were advised that that meeting …

Who banned your meeting? [Interjections.]

Who arrested our officials? [Interjections.] The hon the Minister must answer that.

Just tell me who banned the meeting.

A Captain Parker advised us from the stage that the meeting had been banned.

Who arrested our officials? No, it is no good the hon the Minister just shaking his head. [Interjections.] The fact is that officials, employees of the PFP were arrested and detained this morning because they had the temerity to hand out pamphlets, advertising a PFP public meeting. It was not members of the public who arrested them. They were arrested by members of that hon Minister’s Police Force. They were arrested and detained by members of the SA Police Force. The hon the Minister should investigate this matter. [Interjections.] This hon Minister has such total confidence in his Police Force that he gives them indemnity; that he gives them carte blanche; that he states they never transgress their powers. I want to refer him to this simple incident that occurred in Cape Town this morning. I want him to tell us why officials of the PFP were detained for distributing pamphlets and who gave the order for that action to be taken. [Interjections.]

Sir, this is part of a pattern of life which is developing in South Africa at the present time. Meetings can be banned. There can be arbitrary bannings by somebody, and the hon the Minister does not know by whom. [Interjections.] No, Sir, the hon the Minister does not know by whom.

[Inaudible.] [Interjections.]

It is that hon Minister’s department which arrested members of our party for distributing pamphlets advertising a meeting! [Interjections.] We were subsequently told that that meeting had been banned. [Interjections.]

Order!

Mr Chairman, this is the sort of thing which is taking place in South Africa when the Government has powers such as those being contemplated in the measure now before us.

Captain Parker is the hon the Minister’s able man!

When we look at what else is happening in South Africa at the present time, it appears that there is a total screening of the situation all over the country. We have a situation in which Black townships outside Durban, outside Cape Town, outside Kimberley and outside other centres in South Africa have had their telephone communications completely cut off. We want to know why, Sir.

This is a country in which we fear a communist take-over. These are the powers being used by this Government at the present time by means of which tens of thousands of Black people are completely without telephone communication with the rest of South Africa. In aid of what is this being done? [Interjections.] That is what is going on in South Africa, Sir, while we are sitting here today debating.

There are also rumours of people disappearing in large numbers in terms of the emergency powers. Still, Sir, we are being asked here today to grant the Government the power to put on the Statute Book yet another measure enabling them to detain people. If the Government thinks this is succeeding, if the Government thinks this is helping South Africa in any way, then I must doubt their judgment even further, because when one looks at what is happening in South Africa today one realises that despite the powers of the hon the Minister, much of this country today is at a standstill. There is fairly little commercial activity. Much of South Africa is at a standstill. This sort of situation will continue. The Government can go on taking powers. They can go on passing more and more security legislation. It is not, however, going to help the situation at all.

I believe this is the atmosphere in which we have to deal with this type of legislation. I believe that the hon the Minister and the Government intend that if this legislation is passed, in time they can lift the general state of emergency, and then they will have a much easier weapon to use from time to time in order to proclaim powers in terms of this measure which will make it easier for them. I want to tell the Government, however, that that will not help either. This sort of action will, in most cases, aggravate the situation in South Africa, and it will certainly not restore peace and stability and security to this country.

Mr Chairman, I observe a note of extreme disappointment on the part of the hon member for Berea because of the fact that there is at this juncture no more unrest and carnage than has already taken place. That is why he is sorry, Mr Chairman. [Interjections.] Today the PFP wanted to have something to celebrate at their meeting of 16 June. They were looking for a reason for the meeting of 16 June. They did not get it, however. [Interjections.] If I had been a policeman, I would also have arrested those pamphlet-distributors of the Progs. When one takes a good look at the wording of that pamphlet, it is clear that it would have created the impression in every right-minded policeman that it was not concerned with Crossroads, but with the holiday which the communists wish to declare for themselves in South Africa. [Interjections.]

Mr Chairman, I wish to ask the hon Minister in advance to have them arrested again— with or without a warrant—when they distribute such ambiguous, equivocal pamphlets, which would compel any right-minded policeman to act as in the case referred to by the hon member for Berea. [Interjections.] The hon member for Berea made the astounding assertion in this House today that there was less freedom in South Africa than in Russia. In Russia he is not at liberty to go and distribute pamphlets. [Interjections.] In Russia he would be arrested for even distributing a pamphlet advertising a certain brand of icecream. [Interjections.] He can be eternally grateful that he can still distribute a pamphlet in South Africa without being arrested every time he does so.

The hon member for Berea spoke about Russia. Here in South Africa he had the great privilege of at least being soundly defeated in a recent municipal by-election in Johannesburg. In Russia he would not have had that privilege. He could, with all the best will in the world, plead with the Kremlin to be allowed to lose just once more in a by-election—in a municipal by-election—and the Kremlin would not grant him that privilege. [Interjections.] I think that is the height of exaggeration, and it is for that reason an affront to South Africa. I do not mind the PFP putting their case the way they do. However, to go so far as to complain about the present situation in South Africa in the way they are doing is not acceptable to me. After all, we have a Press that can write just about what it pleases, and we can hold elections. Now they come and complain about it! No, they do not have a case, and their complaints stem from their bitter disappointment that at this stage we do not have a greater degree of arson, violence and bomb-attacks than have so far taken place. [Interjections.] That is what they are complaining about.

I see their reaction. Actually, I am pleased because I was waiting for it. I was on the alert for this because I wanted to see whether they were going to say something about the bomb-attack in Durban.

We did, the hon member for Berea …

All right, I concede that, the hon member for Berea did in fact express his party’s sympathy for the victims, and I want to tell him that I appreciate it, particularly because I was listening carefully in case he did not.

Now I want to ask those hon members, firstly, how many visits they paid to Crossroads, and, secondly, how many visits they paid in Durban. Which of the Durban MPs of the PFP went to even one of those people who were injured in the bomb-explosion? Not one of them! As far as I know, neither the hon member for Durban Central nor the hon member for Berea went to pay a visit to these people. I think it is a crying shame that they draw this distinction by paying such regular, continual and prompt visits when Blacks are involved, but when the Whites are involved, even in their own city, they come to the House with a mere statement which I do appreciate, but which I do not think is nearly enough. [Interjections.]

In the second place, as far as Crossroads is concerned, we are, according to my information, dealing in Crossroads with the root of the evil on a small scale. According to my information there was an initial Black squatter community in Crossroads. At a later stage, after the Government became more lax, or maybe even before then—I am not so sure about that—there was an influx of other Blacks after, let us say, the “original” squatter community had already established themselves there to a certain extent.

Yes.

Here we now have the hon member for Meyerton saying that it is true. My information is also that this was in fact what happened, but I do not have more detailed information at my disposal.

Here we are dealing with the phenomenon which Robert Ardrey called “the territorial imperative”. That initial community rose against the intrusion of other, new arrivals, even though they were also Xhosas, because they disrupted the old community, even though it was only a squatter community. The new arrivals wanted to take over the older inhabitants’ work. Immediately a Black versus Black conflict, arose, which probably had nothing to do with the political dispensation in South Africa. It was rather a question of a local community having to fight for its own interests.

If we project this against the background of the situation in South Africa as a whole, then according to Robert Ardrey’s “territorial imperative”, we as well as the PFP see all the more clearly why other communities and in particular the Afrikaner community, will never waive its right to its own fatherland. What Robert Ardrey wrote about the animal world in his brilliant series of books, especially the second one, the Territorial Imperative—those hon members can go ahead and read the book for themselves—applies almost equally to this situation of mankind and his society, particularly when it comes to a people.

As far as the power struggle in South Africa is concerned, I wish to emphasise that a struggle for power is in fact taking place in South Africa. In communist terminology, the White establishment is still dominant in South Africa. There is a power struggle from the left to take over sovereignty in South Africa. In this regard the role of the PFP is of the utmost importance.

The hon Leader of the Official Opposition said in his speech on Friday: “The Government must make way for other people to lead”. According to a newspaper report the hon member for Houghton had a few days previously spoken, if I remember the phrase correctly, in terms of “for others to govern”. Now I wish to know from these hon members this afternoon who the other people are who should govern. [Interjections.] I know with whom my party and the CP and the right-wingers in South Africa in general wish to replace the Government.

With whom do the hon members of the PFP wish to replace the Government? They should at least mention the names of the organisations which they would like to involve in an alternative government because the PFP cannot replace the Government. They recently suffered a defeat in Johannesburg and lost nearly 50% of their votes in Springs. The PFP has absolutely no hope, in this world or the next, of governing South Africa. [Interjections.] That is why they speak of “others” who should govern.

Ever since I came to this House my impression has been that they are hoping for a large part if not the full support of the NP. They can of course rely on their own members’ support and hope for the support of the ANC and the NRP. Even if they were able to get together such a constellation as the “other people” who should govern, I should like to tell them this afternoon—they acknowledge it—that even then there would still be violence. Hon members of the PFP acknowledge—and one should also appreciate it—there will still be violence if they were to come to power in South Africa.

Why do even they acknowledge that violence will continue under a Prog regime in South Africa? They know, but they do not say it, that there will be no peace in South Africa before they have also come to an agreement with the Communist Party. We cannot get away from it that the Communist Party—this is apparent from the document which the Government kindly made available to us—is the heart and soul of the ANC. No one has any hope of peace in South Africa before the power of the Communist Party and the ANC in South Africa has been broken and totally destroyed.

The State President also spoke about the question of violence. In the concluding sentence of his speech he said: “Let us free our country from violence”. At a glance of course it immediately engenders sympathy on the part of peace-loving people—most people are peace-loving—but there is no possibility of our being able to rid our country of violence unless we adopt the course I have just indicated. The hon member for Krugersdorp also said: “All reasonable South Africans are sick and tired of the continued violence”.

There are forces in South Africa—the ANC, the Communist Party and the UDF— who are not interested in being reasonable. They are not interested in arriving at an agreement. They are adamant that they alone should take over political power in South Africa. Because that is the case, there will be no peace unless the Communist Party and the ANC are defeated.

In the document, The SACP Directive, which was handed out to us—I presume we may quote the document here—it was stated in paragraph 10:

That refers to the PFP and their kindred spirits.

A little further on they continue:

Here one should possibly of course include the greater part of the NP, especially the “New Nats”.

What we are concerned with here is a struggle against those forces who want to usurp everything for themselves—they do not want to share—and that is why even the PFP and the “liberal bourgeoisie” will not be able to meet their demands by means of negotiation. I shall also quote the conclusion of the paragraph:

The ANC and the Communist Party are convinced that “true majority rule” rests with them and not with the “liberal bourgeoisie” to whom they refer in this document.

Another very good example—in fact I think it is a more suitable illustration—of why we on the right say that despite all the good intentions of the PFP and the Government, there are no prospects of arriving at an agreement with the leftist forces in South Africa around a conference table, is the following incident. It was reported in the Oosterlig of 10 June. I have not seen it in any other newspaper, and the reason is probably that it reveals so much about what is going on in those circles.

Mr Harry Oppenheimer attended a meeting together with Mr Cyril Ramaphosa, the general secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers. I quote from the report:

Mr Oppenheimer then offered himself as an ally of Mr Ramaphosa. He told him that he should see things in the correct light and realise that he was his ally against the people who applied racial discrimination. I shall quote further:

It could not be clearer. Here the far left forces of today are telling a man like Mr Oppenheimer, the PFP and especially the “New Nats” in the NP that it is too late. They are no longer interested in what free enterprise can do for them. In South Africa they want to have all the means of production and the whole country in their hands.

It is all on record in eloquent academic terms in the book written by Prof Arnheim of the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa after Vorster. In it a classicist writes in the most elegant and most rational prose and spells out in crystal clear terms why there can be no end to the violence in South Africa. As much as the State President and the hon member for Krugersdorp may want to rid South Africa of violence, they will not be able to do so by following the course they have now embarked upon. There are many books which they can go and read, but I shall mention only one the Anatomy of Revolution by Prof Crane Brinton.

There it is spelt out for them that they are in fact playing into the hands of the far left if they proceed with the reform steps they have in fact taken. In fact it only prepares the way for the takeover by the far left forces of the communists and their sympathisers.

The State President, or rather the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning—I wanted to address him as the State President in anticipation, but perhaps that was a bit premature—said something very important in last Friday’s debate. According to a report in the Cape Times—I could not get hold of his Hansard speech in time—the hon the Minister said:

Because the hon the Minister cannot say which political solutions he wishes to implement and because he cannot produce concrete proof of why he considers these steps to be justified by saying what the solutions are—is there for example room for a Black State President in his solution?—he merely creates tension among the right-wingers and whets the appetite of the left-wingers for further concessions. With his terminology and his conduct he is continually engaged in fanning the flames of the revolution.

I know the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning differs from us, but let him differ. His lesson lies in the following facts. For years we had personal experience of the Government telling the voters during elections that if they voted for the HNP, there would be war; if they voted for the HNP, there would be sanctions; if they voted for the HNP, there would be violence.

Now the average voter sees the worst threat of sanctions while the NP is in power. Bloodshed such as that in Pretoria and Durban is increasing and states of emergency are occurring in quicker succession, not under an HNP Government, but under the present Government. The voter is not stupid; he can see only too clearly that this tale that was spun all the years about the HNP, and I presume about the CP and other right-wing groups, is not true. It is not true that violence occurs when the HNP or other right wingers are in power. It is, however, occurring now.

Last Thursday evening I held a meeting in Durbanville. I shall admit candidly that Durbanville does not have one of the largest HNP branches in the country, but the hall was filled to capacity. There was room left for only eight people or so.

They came for the circus, Louis.

What would the Progs not give to have such an attendance at meetings in their residential areas? [Interjections.] One would not call Durbanville a right-wing stronghold. [Interjections.]

Why did the people come? I was able to gather from the reaction to my speech, especially when this matter was dealt with, that they knew that the story that those on the far right would cause a war, and that their policy would inevitably lead to sanctions, was simply not true. It is one of the most important reasons, in addition to those which already applied during the Sasolburg by-election, why the voters are turning against the Government.

Furthermore it is interesting, if the hon members of the PFP and the Government would take note, to see how derisively this communist document refers to a man such as Dr Van Zyl Slabbert. If I were Dr Van Zyl Slabbert and the communists were laughing up their sleeves at me in their inner circles, I would take a careful look at myself. Who has better left-wing intentions than he? Who is a more fluent, brilliant exponent of the cause of the left-wing forces in South Africa than Dr Van Zyl Slabbert? We all know he is one of the very best, but they are laughing up their sleeves at him in communist circles because his fundamental premise is wrong and his basic approach to the struggle is not profound enough.

However, who receives the laurel wreath in this Communist Party document? There is only one group of people in South Africa they are afraid of, and that is the right wing. It is only in respect of the right wing—the HNP is mentioned by name—that they say: “… we must also bear in mind the danger of the potential growth in the strength of out-and-out …” Then they carry on in the usual way in which they try to label us.

I must honestly say that it is inter alia the strength of the right wing that the left wing, the communists, the UDF and the ANC do not have a more fundamental approach that is more incisive and that exposes the truth more plainly than that of the right wing itself. Theirs is a totally different approach to ours, but they do not see things more profoundly than we do. We and they see things more profoundly than the so-called “liberal bourgeoisie”, and that is why it will be a matter of either them or us winning, but it will not be the reformers. In the same way as Kerensky’s government in Russia, “liberal bourgeoisie” is going to be swept off the table because their premises were wrong.

Mr Chairman, I have listened to a few of the political philosophies of the hon member for Sasolburg. He hopped off the apartheid wagon in 1969 and the hon CP members hopped off in 1982. The hon members of the NP are still riding in the 1986 model. It reminds me of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. She said that this porridge was too hot, that was too cold while this was just right, but all of it was only porridge. All three apartheid models remain the same to us and the world. Sanctions will be instituted, regardless of whether it is HNP, CP or NP apartheid. [Interjections.]

The hon member also made the disgraceful allegation that we were hoping for unrest. Of course nothing could be further from the truth than this allegation, and I dissociate myself from that remark. But I do want to ask him how he knows there has not been a blood-bath somewhere in South Africa. What we are opposed to in fact is that the news is being withheld from the people of South Africa. [Interjections.] Legislation such as this, as well as regulations which are at present applicable due to the state of emergency, withhold such news from us so that we do not know whether there has been a blood-bath or not. The people of South Africa must know what is happening in their community so that they can take the right decisions.

The hon the Minister was obviously not aware of what exactly happened here in the city this morning.

†Between 11h30 and 12h00 we spoke to Captain Parker and he advised the PFP …

He is acting station commander in Cape Town. [Interjections.]

He advised the PFP that the meeting had been banned by the District Commandant, Col Van Eeden. During that time the PFP’s general secretary as well as the attorneys were still at the station where they were negotiating for the release of six PFP organisers who had been arrested this morning and who were kept at the police station for four hours. They were arrested for handing out this little pamphlet in my hand. The hon member for Berea read out what was printed on the front of it. The message on the back of it reads as follows:

Can the hon the Minister perhaps answer some of these questions now? I quote further:

[Interjections.] Then we said:

I may say that the people of Cape Town did come out in force because they were outraged and are still outraged at what this Government does under the guise of a policy. [Interjections.]

Why is the pamphlet printed in red ink?

It is the same colour as the blood in Crossroads. [Interjections.]

If the hon the Minister does not succeed in piloting these Bills through Parliament—it does not look as if it is going to succeed—the Government of course intends taking them to the President’s Council. Since our democracy is now structured in such a way, the NP can get them passed there if it does not succeed in having them passed by Parliament, because the majority of the elected leaders of the people are opposed to his legislation. It now seems to me as if the label “a White minority regime” would be an entirely accurate description of what would happen if this legislation is steam-rollered through the President’s Council.

The Bill now under discussion, more than any other, the one which the hon the Minister wants to apply in order to muzzle his political opponents.

†The hon member for King William’s Town said the other day that this was not the case and that we were going a bit far when we said the Government used these measures and the detentions to silence its political opponents. However, I want to quote just two examples. After the Embassy sit-in this hon Minister detained about seven of the political leaders who took part in that sit-in. The hon the Minister issued the orders so clumsily that it seemed he did not even know the difference between grounds for arrest and the reasons why people were arrested.

That is not unusual.

I sat in on the court case and I could see the hon the Minister’s advocate sitting there sweating it out. Eventually those orders were ruled invalid and the hon the Minister had to try again to give reasons for the arrests. In the meantime, however, the hon the Minister realised that he could furnish no reasons. The result was that he kept those people locked up, however. Then we saw the trumped-up treason charges. The treason trial in Pietermaritzburg lasted about six months. One after the other of the hon the Minister’s witnesses went by the board until finally those people were set free, having been cleared completely by the courts after having been harassed for about a year by that hon Minister. If ever there was a good example of what can happen to the Government’s opponents, this is it. It takes nine of its political opponents and locks them up.

Do you want the State to win all its cases? [Interjections.]

Part of the problem is that all of their political opponents are thrown into this “revolutionary cart” and they try to deal with them all in the same way. That is exactly what we have been warning the Government not to do. [Interjections.]

The second case I want to refer to is that of Paddy Kearney who was also detained for no reason at all. Once again the hon the Minister did not know the difference between reasons and grounds for arrest. He was again taken to court. Once again the case was thrown out. The hon the Minister was not satisfied and he appealed against the finding. He lost the case and Paddy Kearney was set free. [Interjections.] What is more, the hon the Minister now wants to introduce this new measure whereby, if the police officer cannot find a reason for arrest, all he has to do is to say that he is of the opinion that a person should be detained. That will be enough and in that way the courts are circumvented. The result is that the hon the Minister does not have to give reasons for detentions. He may simply think that it is necessary.

That makes you think, doesn’t it!

The hon the Minister does not simply want this measure because he wants to detain revolutionaries. One may assume that the people who have been detained under the state of emergency regulations would have been detained in terms of this Bill if it had been passed by now. This Bill has been designed as part of a political package to remove thinking opponents of the NP. This political package is, of course, not available to any other political party, with the result that the Government changes the rules of the political game all the time. The irony, of course, is that if one could detain thinking Nats, they would probably all fit onto grandma’s feather bed. Yet this Government detains hundreds of its political opponents, and when one analyses the so-called anti-revolutionary strategy one realises what these Bills are all about. This Bill which is designed to detain one’s political opponents is quite simply the Government’s answer to the terror and sabotage stage of the so-called revolutionary war.

I spent the weekend in Durban. On Saturday night there was a car bomb explosion. That was an act of terror and it is to be deplored because it was aimed indiscriminately at a defenceless population. [Interjections.] I might just add that ambulances were on the scene within two minutes. Those people were all cared for. One cannot compare them to the 60 000 people of Crossroads who sat in the rain for days and days while the Government did nothing about it. [Interjections.]

The other leg that accompanies terrorism is that of sabotage. Terror and sabotage are linked together in the minds of the Government as the third step in the terrorist onslaught. On Thursday and Friday last I saw this hon Minister’s own form of terror and sabotage in the way that he went about dealing with his political opponents. When the time comes that a government surrounds an ecumenical centre with armoured cars on a fine, ordinary Thursday morning when everyone is going about their business in town, and when one suddenly sees hundreds of soldiers in armoured cars surrounding that centre at which a lot of people are doing a lot of good work in Durban in the fight against, and in helping those people who have suffered under the laws of this Government, then something is indeed wrong.

It is the hon the Minister’s way of terrorising people, because it was equally indiscriminate. He takes away student leaders, churchmen and workers for social justice in this country. [Interjections.] These are people who have nothing at all to do with the so-called revolutionary onslaught. If he starts doing that—if he keeps on harassing people in that manner—it amounts to nothing less than terrorism, because it is equally as indiscriminate as that car bomb. What he is trying to do, is to terrorise his political opponents into submission and trying to sabotage their organisations and thus prevent them from functioning properly in the fight against his unjust system. [Interjections.]

*The hon the Minister said that we sabotaged these Bills. I thank him for giving us the credit for doing that, and I am still voting against these Bills.

Mr Speaker, it would appear that the average NP members are now out of the debate. I do not know the reason for this—whether they do not see their way clear to participating in the debate and whether perhaps they do not see their way clear to supporting the hon the Minister on this legislation. [Interjections.]

I want to react briefly to the speech made by the hon member for Greytown. He said inter alia that the hon the Minister wanted to use the measures contained in this Bill “to remove the thinking opponents of the NP”. The only thing I can deduce from that, is that in that case the hon member for Greytown has nothing to fear. [Interjections.] We on this side of the House may have something to fear, however.

I want to return briefly to what the hon member for Kuruman has referred to already, and that is the use of members of our Police as well as of our Security Police for the protection and support of NP public meetings. We have no objection to members of our Police exercising their normal duties in this regard. When a crowd of policemen turns up, however, as happened in Uitenhage recently, apparently by order of the political leaders, for the support and protection of an NP public meeting, and when members of the public are arbitrarily arrested, removed in police vans and subsequently released without any charge having been or being able to be laid against them, one begins to think that things are being taken a bit far.

My old home town Carolina, which is one of the most peaceful little places I know, is in my constituency. Even the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning held very peaceful meetings there with me in the good old days. Before the referendum Dr Gerrit Viljoen came to hold a public meeting of the NP there, and to their dismay, my people were guarded by police dogs that evening, although there were no disruptions. When some of my people got up to put questions to the then hon Minister Gerrit Viljoen, they were confronted by members of the Security Police and asked for their names and addresses. The only offence those people had committed—I am not spinning yarns—was that they had had the “cheek” to put a question to Dr Gerrit Viljoen! When things like that happen, we think things are being taken a bit too far.

Our hon friends in the NP must not become so sanctimonious today about public acts of party members and their supporters. Since my youth, I was a member of the NP initially, and I am not going to boast about everything we did in the good old days when the hon member for Turffontein was still on the receiving end.

I was a good Sap; you were a bad Nat! [Interjections.]

Well, the roles are reversed today. I am a good CP member now, and he is a bad Nat. [Interjections.]

I want to return to this Bill and discuss it briefly. During the past few months the PFP and the Press who support them, have ceaselessly demanded that the Police and our Security Forces should in general withdraw from the Black residential areas. That would ostensibly be the solution which would restore peace and quiet to those Black residential areas. [Interjections.] In the case of Crossroads, Nyanga Bush, KTC and other places, we are hearing the opposite, however, from the chorus of voices coming from the Official Opposition. Our Police and Security Forces are in fact being reproached for not taking action! One simply cannot win!

Must we conclude that as long as the PFP’s left-wing friends are on the verge of taking over a Black residential area, they demand that the Security Forces must withdraw from that area? If the ANC and their followers are on the verge of in fact taking control of a residential area, they demand the withdrawal of the Police, but if it is not going too well with their friends, they demand the protection of the Police for those left-wing friends of theirs!

We have debated the so-called “rule of law” ad nauseam. Each of us who has a legal background and training and every person who has a sense of fair-play is an impassioned exponent of the sovereignty of the law. We now find, however, in the circumstances in our country, that those people who appeal most to the sanctity of the sovereignty of the law, are the very people who are abusing it to destroy law and order in South Africa. I do not think there has ever been a lawyer in South Africa who appealed to the sovereignty of the law more often than the late Mr Braam Fischer, former leader of the SA Communist Party, and we know what he was engaged in.

Perhaps it is said quite rightly that the present drastic measures which are about to be passed and should already have been implemented for the sake of the restoration of law and order in South Africa, are not the answer to the country’s problems. We concede that this is not the answer. The answer may or may not be supplied by what happens in South Africa after this.

Those who see the solution in the process of negotiation and especially those of whom we read time and again that they are undertaking one pilgrimage after another to Lusaka, should be careful, however. I make this statement because I had the privilege of meeting a Chinese statesman. I asked him on occasion whether they as Chinese Nationalists would ever consider concluding an agreement with the Communists. His answer to me was very illuminating and yet very simple. He said: “Mr Uys, you must never forget, for the Communists war is war. For the Communists negotiation is war. For the Communists peace is war.” [Interjections.]

That is why I also want to tell hon members of the NP that they are placing their hopes on the so-called negotiation option and on one’s salvaging the problems of South Africa and the situation we are experiencing at present, by means of negotiation with communists and their followers.

Not all Blacks are communists.

There are Nationalists who think the release of Mandela is the solution to the situation, whether he rejects violence or not. [Interjections.] How can one accept the word of a communist, even though he says he rejects violence? Today he will say that he rejects violence, simply because it suits him for the moment, but tomorrow he will use that violence, because it is part of his being and part of his solution to achieving his revolution.

That is why we support the Police, why we support the security legislation and why we support the hon the Minister in his handling of the situation. We must not lose sight for a moment, however, of our standpoint that on the course this Government is taking with South Africa, such as by further measures— especially this week—of dismantling one pillar after another of the separate continued existence of the Whites in South Africa, the Government is playing with fire and is playing into the hands of the eventual Black revolutionaries who want to take over power in South Africa for themselves only.

Although we support the Government and the hon the Minister in this drastic legislation, we say in the same breath that we do it to restore law and order in South Africa, but we can never ever support them in the fatal political course they are pursuing in South Africa at present. [Interjections.]

Mr Speaker, we have come to the end of a debate which ranged very widely over the subjects of politics and security, but very seldom dealt with the legislation itself.

Before I reply in greater detail to the debate, I just want to tell the hon member for Barberton, in spite of my appreciation for his support and that of his party for this legislation, that the great majority of voters in South Africa stated during the referendum already, and still state today, that the policy of the CP and the parties that are close to it and that accompany it, is heading for a race conflict in South Africa.

Just hold an election.

It is heading for a race conflict in South Africa and from among many reasons I just want to single out one for the hon member for Barberton. During his membership of the NP the hon member made a substantial contribution to the development of the party and the implementation of the party’s principles and policies. One matter in particular to which he dedicated himself was the development of people. One of the strong standpoints of the NP is the development of people, and this party, as represented in this Government and in our country, has most certainly accomplished the best of achievements over many, many years in regard to the development of people when compared with any other country in the world. This has nothing to do with education, level of culture, etc. I am talking about the constitutional development of people and everything that goes with it.

I want to mention only two examples of this. Over the past five years the number of matric pupils in our Black schools has increased by more than 400%, and the number of students at Black universities doubles approximately every two and a half years.

How many schools did they burn down?

We all worked towards that end—the hon member for Barberton as well.

Ask Andries how many schools were burnt down.

What is among many one of the essential characteristics of a developed person? It is that a developed person says he also wants to share power. He also wants to share power, whether in a family or extended family context, in the social sphere, or on the administrative level—from the third tier to the highest tier of government. Any party which refuses to recognise this striving for power of a developed person is bringing a revolution upon itself.

Mr Speaker, on a point of order: May the hon member for De Kuilen say “Andries burnt down the schools”?

Order! What did the hon member for De Kuilen say?

Mr Speaker, I said: “Ask Andries how many Black schools were burnt down”.

Oh, no! That is not what he said!

That is what I said. Of course!

He said: “Andries burnt down the schools”.

Order! The hon member for De Kuilen said that he said: “Ask Andries how many Black schools were burnt down”.

No, Sir! The hon member said—and I heard him with my own ears—“Andries burnt down the Black schools”. [Interjections.]

Order! At this stage I am obliged to accept the word of the hon member for De Kuilen. However, we shall institute a careful investigation in this connection. We shall consult Hansard to establish what the hon member’s precise words were. The hon the Minister of Law and Order may proceed.

Mr Speaker, we both recognise this standpoint. The hon member and I both recognise this standpoint. Now the hon member is saying that no power-sharing may ensue from it, because power-sharing is the downfall of South Africa today. According to him there may be no power-sharing among developed people. Among these developed people in the situation in South Africa there must only be a rigid division of the land, the hon member says.

A division of power, yes.

A rigid division of the land, was what the hon member advanced. Accompanying that is a division of power. According to the hon member that is the only answer.

Precisely as you, too, always advocated!

In that situation the hon member and his party leadership cannot, to this day, tell us where that division should take place in regard to the Indians and the Coloureds.

But you have been in the National Party for fifty years, and you still do not know what it is all about!

The hon member for Sasolburg’s party at least has four demarcated areas in regard to the Coloureds—four demarcated areas that will have to constitute the Coloured homeland. The one is up there in the vicinity of Steinkopf. Then there is one down here at Atlantis, with a third area, also here in the Western Cape, and the fourth in the Bethelsdorp area, near Port Elizabeth.

Those are the four possible areas, yes.

The hon member for Sasolburg is confirming it. The party leadership of the hon member then asks whether people realise what the great advantage is of these four separate areas that have to constitute the Coloured homeland. His answer to this question is that they do not have to travel through the territory of a White homeland when they want to visit one another— they can go by sea. [Interjections.] That is how ridiculous their whole idea is! [Interjections.] It is completely ridiculous, but it is on record as an official statement by mr Jaap Marais, leader of the Herstigte Nasionale Party. In any event the hon member for Sasolburg has expressed his support for it time and again. [Interjections.] That is why I am now saying to the hon member for Barbeton that we should not fritter our time away with absurdities. [Interjections.] For that reason, too, we must not try to such an extent to disregard the development process of people in South Africa. When we have to discuss matters concerning Black people in the urban areas and Black people outside their national states with one another, surely the hon member knows what problematical areas we are venturing into in regard to the argument we are now dealing with.

It is not the standpoint of this Government that National Party meetings should be wrapped in cottonwool. It was never the Government’s standpoint. Nor is it the Government’s standpoint that only National Party meeting should receive attention from the Police. It is the Government’s standpoint that every party that holds a political meeting and which is concerned about a possible disturbance of law and order at that political meeting will be entitled to the necessary presence of the Police, in accordance with their request. Nor does it make any difference whatsoever what political party is holding such a meeting. We shall not allow the strong-arm tactics of hooligans to triumph at political meetings. [Interjections.] Nor shall we allow people to be hurt and damage caused to property. I repeat that it does not matter at all what political party is involved and what political party is holding a meeting. The SA Police will give the necessary attention to it—within the scope of their activities of course.

Hon members need not think—I have said this before in this House—that the NP is trying to present itself as being sacrosanct in this regard. As I have said before, there is not a single hon member sitting in this House, except perhaps for the hon members for Houghton, Germiston District and the hon member Dr Venter, who should consider themselves to be sacrosanct in regard to matters of this kind. I think the hon member and I understand one another, and we need not discuss this matter any further. [Interjections.]

There is another aspect I want to discuss in greater detail. [Interjections.] Last night an incident occurred at the St Athan’s Road Mosque in Athlone. In regard to this incident I just want to quote two brief paragraphs from reports in this morning’s Cape Times. I am quoting these paragraphs because they have a bearing on the information I should like to furnish hon members with. I quote:

The report continues a little further on—I am quoting what these “mosque-goers” said:

The provisional information I received from the Divisional Commissioner of Police pointed to the following facts, which I should also like to place on record. Yesterday the Police received information that armed members of the Muslim community inter alia were going to attend a meeting in the mosque. Members of the Police were ordered to give further attention to the matter. During the course of observations by the Police, armed persons were spotted on the roof of the mosque. The mosque’s lights—I do not know for what reason—were constantly being switched on and off. A certain vice-principal of a well-known senior secondary school—I have his name here but I do not think there is any need for me to mention it in public at this stage—spoke over a public address system and said inter alia, and I quote:

That was what was broadcast. I must admit I am not an authority on the Koran, but I do not think these words occur anywhere in the Koran. [Interjections.]

Subsequently a police captain, by means of an announcement over a loudspeaker, warned the people attending the meeting and those who were still inside the mosque, in both official languages—after having first warned the public to stay at home—that the gathering was illegal and that they should disperse. Immediately afterwards the people in the mosque closed the gates to the mosque, thereby preventing access to the grounds.

At approximately the same time three shots were fired at the Police from the roof of the mosque. Slogans such as “Amandhla” were constantly being shouted from the vicinity of the mosque.

Because an unlawful gathering had been held in the mosque and because the proper lawful warnings had been issued, the officer in charge ordered some of the policemen to break the windows and to throw tear-smoke cannisters into the mosque to compel the people in the mosque to disperse. In this process window panes were broken and tearsmoke was used. Tear-smoke canisters were also thrown outside the mosque and two men, an Asian and a White, were arrested in the street outside the mosque. The Asian man was in possession of seditious publications. [Interjections.]

One of the persons attending the gathering then tried to run down one of the constables with his car. A rifle-shot was fired at the vehicle. Apparently no one was injured, and the vehicle did not stop.

To prevent further confrontation the Police did not make any further arrests, apart from the two men to whom I have already referred. According to my information the Police used the least possible degree of violence to disperse this illegal gathering. These are the facts I want to place on record with reference to this matter, which is a sensitive one.

I should like to continue by coming back to the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition who was the first Official Opposition speaker on Friday. In essence his speech dealt with the emergency regulations that had been promulgated in terms of legislation other than the Bill we are now discussing. He also discussed other measures in greater detail than the one we are dealing with at present, but I shall not say anything further about that.

†He said among other things that the Bill before us and the regulations which have been announced deny access to the courts. Where does he find that in the Bill? I ask the hon leader where in the Bill before us he finds that the Bill denies access to the courts. He knows very well that is not the position. Why then does he make such an allegation? Nowhere in the Bill is there any denial of access to the courts.

It is in the Public Safety Amendment Bill.

The hon leader further stated that a state of emergency was declared after the shootings at Sharpeville in 1961 and that there was another one after the shootings in Soweto of 1976. He knows very well no state of emergency was declared in 1976. Why then does he maferring to the regulations he said:

The hon leader knows very well that that is not correct. He knows very well that the jurisdiction of the courts is not excluded and he also knows that in terms of the indemnity that applies under the regulations members of the Security Forces are not covered for “any act” whatsoever, or for any act that they may commit. The hon leader knows that very well so why then does he make these allegations? He knows that very well and he has competent legal advisers. Can I refer him only to one of the most recent cases in this regard and that is the case of Nkwinti versus the Commissioner of Police and five others in the Eastern Cape Division about six weeks ago.

[Inaudible.]

The judge said among other things:

[Interjections.]

I do not want to spend too much time on this; the hon leader can read the decision for himself. However, I ask him as the hon Leader of the Official Opposition why he makes these allegations, the one after the other, when he must know it is not true. He also said:

He was referring to me as the responsible Minister—

I am coming back to this use of the word “agents” by the hon leader because this is also a new issue which is being dragged into our debates—

I want to ask the hon leader whether that was what he also told his friends and audiences abroad. He can just give us an indication.

Read the exact words.

I am reading his exact words. I have the Hansard of his speech with me and I prepared my notes from his prepared speech.

I said the Minister is responsible.

The hon leader also refers to the Police being the “major cause” of unrest. Has he read any of the reports on unrest incidents in the problem areas during the past while? Has he read the report of the Van der Walt Commission? Has he read other reports? I cannot see how the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition can make these allegations if he has read those reports.

The hon Leader of the Official Opposition is always the first person to ask us if we have read those reports and if we know what the Van der Walt Commission and other commissions say. Now the hon Leader of the Official Opposition makes those allegations. If he has not read those reports I want to ask him if he has ever heard of the UDF, the SA Communist Party, the ANC, the PAC and all the other organisations? Has he heard of Cosas? Has he read the newspaper reports about the Supreme Court cases presently being heard in Delmas and other places? Has he read the evidence brought before those courts? Has he seen in the papers what is being presented in court as some of the major causes for the revolutionary climate we have in South Africa?

Surely he must have read this. If so, why does he make these allegations? One can only draw one conclusion and that is that he does it because he and his party are so committed against the SA Police that he is not prepared to take any other stance. [Interjections.]

The hon member says that the PFP has been engaged in an extensive programme of monitoring in difficult unrest situations. Let us take only the Western Cape and consider the results of this alleged “magnificent” effort by the PFP’s monitoring team. They have reported only one complaint to the SA Police during the past few months. It is the subject of a question on tomorrow’s Question Paper.

They have plenty of affidavits!

There was only one complaint through the assistance of the PFP monitoring team. Does that sound like overwhelming evidence against the Police? That is what the hon Leader of the Official Opposition called it. He said that they had “overwhelming evidence”. [Interjections.]

Then he told us of his visit to Mamelodi when he became very despondent because the Mamelodi people told him: “Get out, Whitey, we do not want to talk to you.” Eventually he found four people who were prepared to talk to him and the other members of his team.

The hon the Leader of the Official Opposition then came to this House and said: “There had been conflict with the Police … alleged bombings of people’s homes by agents of the Police.” The hon member does not refer to policemen as such any more—it is now the agents of the Police. He then said: “I do not want to get involved in the truth or the untruth of that situation.” He has, however, the temerity to repeat some of those allegations in this House but he does not want to be involved in the truth or the untruth of those allegations. That is the hon Leader of the Official Opposition! [Interjections.]

I want to ask the hon Leader of the Official Opposition something. If he is not interested in the truth why does he spread untruths? [Interjections.]

He is only interested in headlines!

Yes, why does he not try to ascertain the truth before making those public statements?

On the following page of the Hansard report he says: “The facts as they presented them may have been wrong.” He refers to the facts presented by those four people. However, why does he repeat them? He says further that there are allegations—here my Hansard copy is unclear; it seems to me the word has been changed to “questions” and, if that is so I read it as such—such as: “How much longer must our sisters be raped and our mothers be shot?” Why does the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition repeat these allegations if he does not want to be involved? I have ascertained from the Police in Pretoria that not a single complaint of rape has been laid against the SA Police by anybody in Mamelodi. There has not been a single complaint. I asked the Police this morning.

This allegation has been repeated in this House and because the hon Leader of the Official Opposition is an important person it will also be quoted elsewhere in South Africa and abroad.

*Why does the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition lend itself to these kind of debating methods? Surely they cannot benefit this House? Surely it cannot benefit anyone in South Africa to debate in this manner.

Let me refer to four other matters which one found significant in the speech made by the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition. On four or five occasions in his speech he referred to “the agents of the hon the Minister” or “the agents of the Police”.

That is me, I suppose!

Surely that is the way the agents of the Gestapo or the KGB are referred to. The hon the Leader of the Official Opposition did not do it only once; it was a style which he revealed throughout his speech. Is this the style which is now going to be adopted by his party?

So the Police cannot use agents?

“The agents of” bears a connotation of everything that is ugly, clandestine and furtive. [Interjections.]

Mr Speaker, may I ask the hon the Minister if the Police do not have a single informer operating in this country? [Interjections.]

Yes, Sir. [Interjections.]

They are agents!

The hon member is not going to get away with this. Of course the Police have informants (beriggewers). Of course it is part of SA Police operations to have registered informants.

They are agents!

An informer is not an agent in the sense in which the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition used the word. There is a great difference between an informer and an agent, so the hon Chief Whip cannot get away with that one!

That is hopeless, Brian. Have another try!

There was another matter I identified in the speech of the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition. In one debate after another and in speech after speech he and the hon member for Berea, as well as other hon members of the PFP, were constantly referring to the question of indemnity as though the Police were being protected in regard to any act, and they said as much. [Interjections.] Surely the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition knows this is not true.

Anything under the regulations…

I refuse to believe that to this day the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition has not yet been told by his law advisers what the indemnity provisions mean. He knows they are very clear, in this sense that a member of the Security Forces who commits wrongful and unlawful actions is not protected.

[Inaudible.]

Then why did the hon Leader say it? Why does he not tell the world that?

Anything under these regulations …

Why do the hon members of his party not tell the world? Why do I have to identify it every time days after the event when it is not newsworthy any more? I set the record straight when I reply to a debate, but the hon the Leader makes these allegations when he knows he has the news media at his disposal. Why otherwise does he not deal with this matter clearly? [Interjections.]

*The next statement by the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition was that the jurisdiction of the courts was being excluded in regard to this legislation and regulations under this legislation. In this case too the hon the Leader knows it is not true. Again I ask him why he mentioned such a thing. How much credence must be given to his standpoint as an hon Leader of the Official Opposition if we are able to identify four, five or six matters in regard to which he is not being honest or open-hearted with this House?

I want to mention a fourth matter. The hon the Leader of the Official Opposition and the hon member for Berea, as well as other hon members of the PFP, are constantly and repeatedly saying that I am guilty of at all times defending any actions of the Police. Surely hon members know that is a lie.

My mother, drunk or sober!

They know, and the hon member for Houghton who has just made that interjection also knows, this to be untrue.

[Inaudible.]

She knows!

She wants to become the new leader!

How many times do I still have to say this to the hon member for Houghton and her hon leader and other hon members for cognisance in this House and elsewhere, and how many times have I not said this during the past seven years, that it is the standpoint of this Government that no wrongful act by any member of the SA Police or the other Security Forces will be approved in advance or condoned afterwards? We have never adopted any other standpoint. What is more …

Mr Chairman, may I ask the hon the Minister in that case why he waited until 30 000 had been rendered homeless in Crossroads before he issued the order which he issued on Thursday or Friday, saying that he would not tolerate violence, no matter which side it came from?

I issued no order in this respect, and the hon member need not put words which are not true in my mouth. I was not involved in anything of that nature, nor was it stated in that way in public. There is no question of this having been done. [Interjections.]

I am not going to comment now on the legality or otherwise of the conditions in Crossroads.

And the Police action?

I have dealt with that, too, during this debate as well as in previous debates.

Why does the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition not concede that the Government is right in regard to this simple, but important matter? Why does he not, just for once in his life, say here or outside this House or to his friends abroad—which I am now ascribing to him in good faith—“my friends, I must at least tell you what the Government’s standpoint in this connection is, as has been repeatedly stated by the Minister concerned”? [Interjections.] This is not being done, and I cannot understand why we do not have that kind of honesty in this debate. [Interjections.]

Because we bring cases…

No, how many cases still have to be presented to prove this standpoint? [Interjections.] No, the hon member must wait now, because I want to mention two examples. I stated previously that I was mentioning some of the most serious cases. I have mentioned cases which have most certainly not been a pleasure for any police force to listen to, knowing that their members were involved. I could mention many examples of cases in which the Commissioner of Police and I were involved with a view to disciplinary steps.

When I was preparing my notes for today, I thought of two cases in particular. There is a White member of the Security Police who is at present serving a ten-year prison sentence. Why? The Commissioner of Police as well as the Police Force and I took action, and that person is serving a ten-year prison sentence. I can also mention another case to which I as Minister, in co-operation with the Commissioner of Police and at a subsequent stage also a public representative of the Official Opposition gave attention but it does not matter now at what stage that happened. Urgent attention was given to the facts of the case and the result was that the senior member of the three policemen who were charged recently received a 21-year prison sentence.

I replied to questions in this House dealing with that matter, and on every occasion I paid a visit to that area, I made personal inquiries about that case. Together with the investigating officer, I had the dossier in my hands, but then hon members charge us with at all times condoning any acts committed by any policeman. Cannot we at some stage or another make progress to the point where the Official Opposition at least has the decency to say that they have now received sufficient evidence from the Government which adopts the correct official standpoint and takes action when matters are brought to its attention? [Interjections.]

However, they will not even refer to these cases. [Interjections.] They will present them in a distorted way, yes, because it is easier to present such cases if they have been distorted. All I am asking however, is that they must stop presenting these things in such a distorted way in this House, as well as in public. Let us come closer to the truth for a change. The hon the Leader of the Official Opposition, in particular, ought to set his fellow party members an example. Let us come a little closer to the truth.

The hon member Mr Theunissen made a completely correct allegation when he said that the delaying tactics of the Official Opposition in these debates had been one of the most important contributory factors that compelled the State President to proclaim a state of emergency.

What about your colleagues in the Cabinet?

There is no doubt about that.

As regards my hon colleagues in the Cabinet, I shall conduct a debate with the Rev Hendrickse and Mr Rajbansi on their attitude in this connection when I speak in the other two Houses later today. I have no intention of conducting a debate on that matter in this House. What is more, it is the responsibility of these two gentlemen to the State President to state their standpoints in the two Houses or in public. I have no intention of commenting on that and allowing a political controversy to arise in regard to the question the hon member put to me. [Interjections.]

I thank the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning for having participated in the debate. It was an effective speech in reply to the speech made by the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition. He said some things to the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition which he should have heard a long time ago. I want to emphasise that my colleague participated in the debate with my full co-operation; in fact, I welcomed it. I said previously that at times we were also involved in a no-confidence debate, and I welcome the fact that my colleague entered this debate and made a sturdy contribution.

†The hon member for Durban Point said that if we were prepared to accept his amendment he and his party would be prepared to support the Bill before the House. That is basically what the hon member said. The hon member moved an amendment to the Bill, of which I want to quote just a portion. His amendment reads, inter alia, as follows:

That is the basis …

Those are your words. You are quoting you. You are quoting your words.

I am sorry, but I am quoting from the hon member’s amendment…

Yes, my amendment quoted from your Second Reading speech which you said you no longer stood by.

That may be so, but I was now quoting from the hon member’s official amendment that was handed to me which is part and parcel of the documentation of this House.

What is the problem with that?

No, I do not know what the problem is about that.

†In this regard I want to refer the hon member to the content of my Second Reading speech which unfortunately he is not prepared to accept. However, that is his baby. In my Second Reading speech I said that specific directions regarding the treatment of detainees will be issued, which will make provision, inter alia, for the medical examination of persons being detained, access to such persons by relatives and legal advisers, the notification of a next-of-kin of the detainee and the place of detention of such a detainee, as well as the informing of the detainee of his rights regarding the making of representations for his release to the Minister and the making of representations to the board of review. This is nothing new.

Mr Speaker, may I ask the hon the Minister whether it is not correct that the hon the Minister not only gave that undertaking in this House in regard to the Public Safety Act, but that when he came back he also refused to have a Committee Stage and said that he was not going to give any undertakings and that those fell away? He also withdrew his amendments. If that was his attitude on the one Bill, how can we accept his word on the other Bill?

I never said I was going back on my undertakings in this respect.

You said you were not giving any more undertakings …

I said I was withdrawing my amendments on the Order Paper. These undertakings were not part of my amendments. The hon member will not find it in my Hansard. I never said that I was withdrawing my undertakings. That is why I interrupted the hon member during his speech to tell him to look up my speech in Hansard. I used words more or less to that effect. I never withdrew those undertakings of mine, not in this House or in any other House.

However, this is nothing new. In my directions regarding the detention of persons in terms of section 29 of the Internal Security Act of 1982, as published in Government Gazette No 877 of 1982, provision is already made for most of these matters. I have the Government Gazette here. In terms of regulation No 2 of that notice the detainee must be informed of the reason or reasons for his detention as well as of the fact that he may at any time make representations to the Minister regarding his detention or release. In terms of regulation 3 he must be informed of his right to make representations to the board of review and also that he may request the board of review to give oral evidence before it. The directions also contain a provision that if he wishes to make such representations he shall be given full opportunity to do so. All this information is in this Government Gazette that I have in my hand.

[Inaudible.]

Yes, it is published in the Government Gazette. It is all in here. In terms of Regulation 5 the detainee must, as soon as possible after his arrest, be examined by a district surgeon. Provision is also made for the notification of the nearest available relative of the detainee of the fact of his detention. These provisions are all contained in this Government Gazette. I shall give the hon member the date of the Gazette. It is 3 December 1982. These are matters which can more appropriately be dealt with in the regulations which regulate the circumstances in which a person is detained.

May I also refer the hon member in this respect to Government Gazette No 9878 of 21 July 1985. These regulations were published by the Minister of Justice in respect of some of these people. May I refer the hon member to Regulations 5, 19 and 20. Regulation 5 provides as follows:

The hon member may also read Regulation 19(1) and (2), as well as Regulation 20 which relates to religion and religious circumstances, as well as the question of medical treatment. My reply to the hon member for Durban Point, therefore, is that in respect of every matter mentioned in his proposed amendment, there is already published provision in the Government Gazette—which is official—for all the requests made by the hon member. I therefore really see no need to provide for them in the Bill itself, and for that reason his amendment is not acceptable to me. I hope I have made it clear to the hon member what the particular reason is for his amendment being unacceptable. May I just have a look at my notes to see whether he raised any other matters. [Interjections.] In any event, that covers the crux of the issue.

Mr Speaker, may I ask the hon the Minister a question? I should like to know whether the regulations made by the Minister of Justice and which applied to detainees, ie those made in 1982 and subsequently in 1985, have been gazetted now for application under the new state of emergency, or whether the hon the Minister is giving us an undertaking that they will be included?

Mr Speaker, I have not seen the latest regulations drawn up by the hon the Minister of Justice for publication, but I take it that they will be on the same basis—or on very nearly the same basis—as those published last year. I do not know of any substantial deviations from those regulations.

*In regard to today’s debate, I just wish to raise a few brief matters. The hon member for Houghton made quite a number of generalisations in this connection, but there is no particular matter I wish to dwell on. I think most of the matters raised by the hon member had already been raised in general at some stage or another of this debate.

The hon member for Kuruman accused the Government party of its policy of power-sharing being the cause of all the problems. That hon member has power-sharing on his brain of course. [Interjections.] He thinks that if we were to do away with power-sharing in South Africa we would no longer have any problems at all. But let us go back to the good old days when the hon member was still a happy member of the NP, under the policy of separate development. In those years the hon member for Rissik was just as happy a member of the NP. [Interjections.] The leader then, with whom they are so happy today, was Dr Verwoerd.

Another leader with whom they were also very happy was Mr Vorster. [Interjections.] But what was the situation like in our country in 1960, under Dr Verwoerd, the NP and the policy of separate development? [Interjections.] Surely there was at that stage no power-sharing, and yet we proclaimed a state of emergency which lasted for months! It was a serious state of emergency, and large detachments of the Defence Force were mobilised. [Interjections.] From 1960 to almost the end of 1962 there were approximately 470 to 480 serious acts of sabotage and terror in South Africa. Those were serious conditions, and the NP was in power then, too, and was still adhering to the policy of separate development. In 1976 the hon member was still a member of the NP…

But then the Progs were right in 1960!

What happened in 1976 under the same policy with which he was so happy, and under the leaders with whom he was also happy? Surely the hon member was still a member of the NP in 1979, when we had riots! [Interjections.] Hon members will surely remember the riots we had among the Coloured community in particular, here in the Cape. [Interjections.] Before the rift in the party occurred, and those hon members left to form the CP, there were also riots in 1982, particularly in the Coloured areas on the Witwatersrand. On what basis can the hon member for Kuruman accuse the NP and its policy of power-sharing of being solely responsible for the present situation? Surely it is absurd to do so! [Interjections.]

The hon member for Kuruman also referred to the situation in Queenstown, and I think it was a pity that he referred to it in the way he did. According to him a member or members of the Commando in Queenstown ostensibly objected vehemently to guarding a Coloured school. [Interjections.]

Because the Coloureds refused to help!

Surely it is a lie that the Coloureds refused to help. Surely that is an untruth!

Did the Coloureds here not refuse to pass the legislation?

No, I say it is an untruth! I shall tell the hon member …

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

No, Sir. I am arguing with the hon member, and I say it is an untruth.

There are Coloured members of the SA Police and of the SA Defence Force in Queenstown, who joined the Police and the Defence Force as volunteers. I am referring now to the reservists, and to other Defence Force members. They joined as volunteers in order to become involved in the security of the country.

The Whites are compelled to do so! [Interjections.]

Those Coloured members of the SA Police or the SA Defence Force are good enough to patrol the houses of the hon member’s friends in the dark of the night, and to ensure that law and order is maintained near their houses in town, and in the district if it is necessary. [Interjections.] But now the hon member comes forward here and says those things about members of the Queenstown Commando! Surely they are not true!

The hon member for Queenstown contacted the senior commando officer there. I have the note in this connection in front of me.

The senior officer reported back and said there was one member of the commando who felt aggrieved about his involvement. [Interjections.] The specific member of the commando and his senior commanding officer then discussed the matter in a proper way. Afterwards that member of the commando said that he would do his duty in this connection. [Interjections.] I assume it was a member of the CP, because the hon member for Kuruman spoke about “our” members and “our” people. That member of the commando was so loyal that, after his talk with his commanding officer, he said that he would do his duty.

But the Conservatives will always do their duty!

The hon member for Kuruman dragged that member of the commando into this matter, and spoke as if there were other members of the commando who felt as he did. He conveyed a message here that was supposed to have a completely paralysing effect on the country as a whole! I now want to ask the hon member … [Interjections.] Wait a minute, give me a chance!

I want to tell the hon member for Kuruman in all earnest that all of us in this House, whoever we are, should really watch what we say and not try to drag members of our security forces into debates in this House in this way. I am telling the hon member now that it has a paralysing effect on the country as a whole!

You must listen to what I am saying; I said … [Interjections.]

I made copious notes of the hon member’s speech, and I want to tell him now that he did not do anyone a favour with it! [Interjections.] In fact, he did that member of his party a disservice, because that member of the commando proved himself to be a loyal member of the Defence Force, while the hon member for Kuruman proved himself to be a moaner and a squealer here! [Interjections.] The message I received was that that member of his party was none of these things! [Interjections.] Today the hon member for Kuruman also produced a really juicy piece of gossip about something he accused the State President of doing. In a very roundabout way he told us how a Coloured MP had allegedly said to him…

Not to me; he said it to a member of the public.

Very well then; however I only have a note in front of me that a Coloured member of Parliament said this. Nevertheless the hon member picked up the story and then dished it up in this Council Chamber of South Africa so that the public could take cognisance of how that Coloured MP had said that the State President had allegedly stated that we needed this legislation to keep the right-wingers in their place. When I confronted the hon member with this and told him it was a piece of gossipmongering and that he was behaving like an old gossip-monger, he told me that I should then reprimand the Coloured MP and that I should tell him that he should not repeat such gossip. Why does the hon Chief Whip of the CP, an experienced member of this House, bring a piece of gossip which he picked up in the street to this House like a piece of rotten fish, and say the State President was involved?

Do you want an affidavit? [Interjections.]

No, Mr Chairman, that kind of thing has no place in this House. When we are dealing with security matters we must not drag this kind of street gossip into this House. [Interjections.]

You distort every word.

No, I have comprehensive notes here. [Interjections.]

You distort every word. You ought to be ashamed of yourself!

Order! The hon member for Kuruman has used the word “distorted” often enough now. He must withdraw that word.

Mr Speaker, I withdraw the word “distort”, but it hurts one if one makes certain statements and the hon the Minister then distorts them. You must therefore pardon me. [Interjections.]

Let me give the hon member for Kuruman a piece of advice. The other day the hon member for Soutpansberg said: “We are cowboys, we do not cry.” Consequently the hon member for Kuruman must not sit there in his bench, shedding tears now. [Interjections.] He must not tell lies about the State President, and then cry about it.

[Inaudible.]

I thank the hon member for Sasolburg for his contribution in support of this legislation. The hon member referred to a few positive aspects, which some hon members in this House may as well take to heart.

The hon member for Greytown has the strangest way of presenting something. The essence of his speech today …

It is no wonder Hendrickse no longer wants Louis.

You are unscientific …[Interjections.]

Order! The hon the Minister is now making his reply, and hon members must therefore limit their comments. The hon the Minister may proceed.

Thank you, Mr Speaker, I should at least like the hon member for Greytown to be able to hear me.

The essence of the hon member’s speech is that we need this legislation to gag our political opponents.

You can use it for that purpose.

Which one of the political opponents of ours sitting on the opposite side, has ever been gagged by legislation of this Government? [Interjections.] It is in fact this Government which has adopted the strongest standpoint of all political parties in South Africa in regard to the development of political dialogue. It is owing to the fact that we have developed political dialogue in South Africa that we today have independent states, national states, administration on the third tier of government and a tricameral Parliament.

Mr Chairman, would the hon the Minister reply to a question?

I shall give the hon member an opportunity in a moment. It is precisely as a result of this political dialogue that we have this political development in South Africa, but the hon member knows very well that there is a big difference between lawful participation in a lawful political dialogue, and subversive discussions which could endanger the security of the State. I want to tell the hon member that this legislation and also the existing legislation will be utilised to try to protect the security of the South African state. If some of his political friends are going to get hurt as a result, and if this should prove to be inconvenient for some of his political friends, he will simply have to put up with it. However, we shall not flinch from our obligations in regard to such people, simply because he has identified them as political friends of his, or as mere political opponents of the Government. [Interjections.]

Mr Speaker, can the hon the Minister tell us whether he thinks that the application of the guillotine during the discussion of the Constitution Bill in 1983 did not prevent opposition parties from having a say in the political debate, in that way balking the rights of opposition parties? [Interjections.]

Mr Speaker, I was a member of the Standing Committee on the Constitution, and I can still remember how we sat for many long months and gave very full attention to each aspect of the measure. However, I am not going to give the hon member a full reply in this regard now. That would keep me busy for all of ten minutes. Our time in this debate is unfortunately very limited. I am not going to allow myself to be led astray by him. I put it to the hon member for Langlaagte, however, that I am satisfied that there was very good advance consultation and discussion before the guillotine was applied. Having said this, I shall now leave the matter at that.

Mr Speaker, before the hon the Minister resumes his seat, I should like to put the following question to him. In connection with his statement during the early stage of his reply, when he said as far as he was aware there was only one complaint in connection with Police action lodged by the Cape Western Monitoring Action Committee, was he suggesting that only one incident was brought to the attention of the Police, or did he mean that the PFP was the complainant only once?

Mr Speaker, I made it clear—and I do not want any misunderstanding in this regard—that I caused inquiries to be made and that the Divisional Commissioner of Police informed me that during the past few months only one complaint had been lodged with the Police in the Western Province in which the monitoring team of the PFP was involved. That is my reply.

Mr Speaker, will the hon the Minister take another question?

No, Sir, I am not prepared to reply to any further questions now. [Interjections.] I thank all hon members who made a positive and constructive contribution in our attempt to have this measure placed on the Statute Book.

Question put: That the words “the Bill be” stand part of the Question.

Question affirmed and amendment moved by Mr W V Raw dropped (New Republic Party dissenting).

Mr Speaker, I move:

I move this motion for the same reason that I moved a similar motion on the Public Safety Amendment Bill and that is that none of the amendments proposed at the standing committee’s deliberations … [Interjections.]

I will give the hon member time to discuss her motion. Let us just wait for more order in the House once hon members have all resumed their seats.

[Inaudible.]

Why does the hon member not get out? Is he going to vote with us?

We are on your side this time.

Well done!

Order! The hon member may proceed.

Mr Speaker, the reasons I advanced as far as the former Bill was concerned apply exactly to this Bill as well. Although we had detailed informal discussions on the standing committee about the amendments which were on the Order Paper, this was not the case as far as the Internal Security Amendment Bill is concerned. There were no discussions at the meetings of the standing committee on the amendments on the Internal Security Amendment Bill. There were a number of amendments on the Bill some of which the hon the Minister assures us are going to be incorporated in the rules which will be framed by the hon the Minister of Justice in regard to the manner in which detainees held under the 180 day provision are going to be treated in prison. Next-of-kin he says will be informed. However, I must say that I have my doubts about that, because although the hon the Minister said that that applied during the previous state of emergency my experience was that next-of-kin were by no means always informed of the detention of a relative and where that relative was being held.

The hon the Minister says that there will be access to the detainee by medical personnel—that is fine—and also by legal representatives. I want to know whether he is going to allow the legal representative to assist the detainee in the preparation of oral or written representations which may be given by the detainee to a board of review if the board decides in its discretion—that is in the Bill— that it will hear such representations. Thereafter those representations go to the board which either accepts or rejects them and the board sends them on to the hon the Minister with its recommendations. The hon the Minister seemed very surprised when I mentioned that he could reject the representations. The hon member for Roodepoort pointed out that when the hon the Minister rejects those representations they have to be tabled in this House. I pointed out that that is the end of the matter. There is no opportunity to debate the fact that the hon the Minister has rejected those representations. Is the hon the Minister now informed as to what happens after the board of Review has sent the representations to him? He seemed very much at sea during the Second Reading debate when I mentioned that.

The other point is that one of the amendments which I would like to have debated in this House and perhaps persuade the Committee of the House to accept, was that people who had been detained without trial under the 180-day provision would be treated like awaiting trial prisoners. That is certainly a very different form of treatment from the treatment meted out to the persons who were detained either under the old section 50 of the Act for 14 days or who were detained under the emergency regulations the previous time.

Will the hon the Minister not be prepared to see that the same rights, privileges or whatever one wants to call them of an awaiting trial prisoner are at least accorded to the man who is detained without trial and who can be held for up to six months under this provision? He would then be allowed many privileges which he would certainly not be allowed under the rules framed by the hon the Minister of Justice.

The hon the Minister himself had some very interesting amendments and no doubt these will go the way of all flesh just as the amendments on the Public Safety Amendment Bill. The hon the Minister was going to move the amendments but he then withdrew them. Perhaps he can enlighten the House as to whether he intends to withdraw his amendments which have been put on the Order Paper to the Internal Security Amendment Bill as well. Would the hon the Minister please tell us that at least?

I said so in my Second Reading speech.

For this Bill as well?

I said so in my Second Reading speech.

So those go as well?

Yes!

Therefore the amendment “on any particular occasion” also goes. This was an important amendment. The removal of those words did, I think, imply that a person could not be rearrested under the 180 day detention provision. This is of course what has happened in regard to the 90-day provision. A man was arrested, held for 90 days, let out for five minutes and then rearrested for a further 90 days.

When the 90-day detention provision was on the Statute Book and being implemented for a period of two and a half years—that was before it was suspended—I had cases of people who were held for up to two years under the 90-day detention provision. I want to know if the hon the Minister will not at least reconsider omitting the words “on any particular occasion” for they certainly imply that a person may be rearrested over and over again under the 180-day detention provision. To my mind there is no point in limiting detention to 180 days if the object is not to make sure that no person is held beyond 180 days without trial, as seems to be the case in this Bill.

It is an important argument that I am using. This Bill will undoubtedly be passed despite the problems that the hon the Minister may be encountering in the other two Houses. The two Bills—differing perhaps— will be sent along to the President’s Council where they will undoubtedly receive its approval. They will then be a permanent part of the Statute Book. That is the point that I am now making. These arguments may seem quite redundant in the present state of emergency, but when the emergency is lifted this Bill will still be on the Statute Book.

Mr Speaker, the hon member for Houghton has declined to mention something that is crucial to the amending Bill under discussion, namely that it can only be activated or put into practice by way of a proclamation by the State President. To say therefore that this Bill will be permanently on the Statute Book and in the same breath decline to say that it can only be activated by way of proclamation by the State President ignores a very crucial aspect of this legislation. We concede that this is serious legislation which makes inroads into the rights of individuals, but it is only fair to state that particular point as well. [Interjection.]

I want to mention two other aspects. It seems that a new pattern is developing in these debates, namely that with the second reading debate hon members’ speeches range as widely as they wish while they ignore the merits and substance of the legislation under discussion.

[Inaudible.]

A large number of the speakers in that particular party did not in any way discuss the merits or substances of the Bill under discussion.

[Inaudible.]

They choose to squeal, complain and raise certain detailed arguments now.

*There are some arguments which I want to advance here with much more fervour and seriousness. The hon member for Houghton refuses to believe or to realize that this Parliament is no longer a Westminster Parliament.

What has that to do with it?

That is why the Committee Stage of this House is no longer comparable with a Committee Stage of an ordinary Westminster Parliament.

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

I only have six minutes left, Sir. If I have time left at the end of my speech I shall take the hon member’s question.

*It is of the utmost importance to realize that if one votes against the desirability of a Bill or opposes its principle, there is no question of consensus on it. That is what happens on the standing committee. If one is opposed to the desirability of a Bill and expresses oneself so strongly about it that no consensus is reached, the subsequent amendments also lapse.

Admittedly members of the standing committee may consult with one another informally and see how they can accommodate one another, but that is something which the hon member for Houghton does not mention.

†I want to take her to task about this. She said that not even informal discussions took place on the proposed amendments to this Bill.

I did not say that.

It is important to note that when the question was put to the standing committee everybody conceded that we could not possibly reach consensus or find one another on the principle of the Bill and therefore also on the subsequent amendments. That is the reason why the amendments were not discussed in great detail. The fact of the matter is that we could not find one another. I shall now take the question of the hon member for Houghton.

Mr Speaker, may I ask the hon member if it is not true that the whole procedure has been changed so that clauses can be put in the standing committee and that this did not happen in this case? That is why we are asking for a Committee Stage now. May I also ask if it is not true that the Public Safety Act is a permanent part of our legislation and that it too has to be activated by way of proclamation?

The hon member is absolutely correct, but we are now dealing with the Internal Security Amendment Bill.

Yes, but …

The Internal Security Act is not statutory in the sense that it applies all the time. The State President has to activate it by way of proclamation. [Interjections.]

I would like to return to the first issue raised by the hon member. It is quite clear that one can keep on negotiating and discussing in an attempt to find ways of accommodating and finding one another, but if the principle of the Bill is opposed it is not possible to proceed along those lines. We can try to find one another, but ultimately one cannot ignore the question of whether one is for or against the principle.

*When we first discussed this measure I had some sympathy for the hon member for Houghton, but every student will recognize the PFP’s arguments. The essence of the matter is that those hon members, in the second reading debate, choose to discuss as many subjects as possible and to drag all sorts of matters into the discussion, but now they want to go into Committee on a Bill which they do not want to see on the Statute Book at all. For that reason I feel myself at liberty to recommend that we do not support the hon member in this regard.

Mr Speaker, the CP does not support the PFP’s request that the House go into Committee on this Bill. We think the PFP have forfeited every moral right to make such a request now, considering the delaying tactics they have adopted from the outset.

I want to say at once that the fact that they voted against the Bill in principle, does not of course deprive them of the right to move certain motions in a Committee Stage. I think the hon member for Krugersdorp is not correct in that respect. But we say that they do not have the right morally because the PFP opposed the desirability of this Bill in the standing committee. They have also just voted against the principle of the Bill, and although we say they are entitled to do so, morally they have no right to ask the Bill to be discussed in a Committee Stage.

I want to repeat briefly what my colleague the hon member for Brakpan said last Friday regarding similar standpoints of the PFP. He said it was the delaying tactics of the PFP which led to the proclaiming of a countrywide state of emergency. Perhaps the PFP can admit today that their behaviour in opposing the two pieces of security legislation had a significant effect on the attitude of the Coloured and the Indian Houses.

South Africa is in a serious economic crisis and if law and order are not restored urgently, the economic crisis will get worse. No political party may make a contribution towards delaying the economic recovery of our country.

In conclusion I want to say that I really deplore the behaviour of the hon the Minister of Law and Order this afternoon when he circumvented the standpoints of the hon member for Kuruman when that hon member referred to the fact that the leaders of the Coloured House had opposed the legislation while the SA Police and the members of the Commando had to protect the Coloured schools against terrorists. We are not ashamed that Coloureds are members of the Police Force and voluntary members of the Defence Force, but we are dissatisfied that their leaders are leaving South Africa in the lurch at this critical time.

Mr Speaker, in the one minute at my disposal I shall only be able to deal with two aspects. The one is that we have consistently abstained from voting because the hon the Minister made it clear that we would have no opportunity to debate our proposed amendment to this Bill. The amendment called for a reduction of the review period from 90 to 60 days.

It was a simple amendment which simply would have meant that for 60 days detention would be entirely at the discretion of the Police, and thereafter they would have to put their case to the review board.

Then the hon the Minister had three amendments of his own which I think would have improved the measure. If they were good enough to improve the measure, can he tell us why he is not continuing with them? We would have liked to support those amendments.

This is our attitude towards it, and this is why we abstained. We accept the need for special powers, but we do not like the period concerned, and we would have like to see some of the controls placed in the Bill itself instead of being effected by regulation. That is why we have consistently followed this line of conduct, and why we shall support the motion to go into Committee so that we can be able to debate these amendments.

Mr Speaker, right at the beginning I want to tell the hon member Mr Theunissen that if that is the reason the hon member for Kuruman became excited a few minutes ago, I am quite prepared to consider that aspect again and to give further comment upon it on a later occasion, when it is appropriate. I shall leave it at that for the moment because I want to come back to the question of the Committee Stage. I think the hon member for Kuruman will understand that I cannot go into that aspect while we are talking about the question of the Committee Stage.

In previous debates of this nature, I spelt out to the hon member for Houghton why I was no longer prepared to ask for a Committee Stage at this stage. We have been involved with this particular legislation in the parliamentary process for more than two months now and have got no further than a discussion about the principle involved. We have got no further than voting about the principle of the legislation. A lot of time was spent on this on the standing committee and in the House alone, the time spent on the legislation must amount to anything between 15 and 18 hours. We are still only at the principle of the matter this afternoon. We cannot continue in this way.

This country has serious security problems. The Government told the hon members of the Official Opposition what had motivated the extension of section 50 of the Internal Security Act. I can understand that people do not like the principle of the matter, but why can a party not get so far as to say we must get this step over with and get to the details of the legislation. Why can they not say that although they do not like the principle of the legislation, they are at least prepared to consider its necessity? The hon members are not even prepared to consider the necessity of the legislation. They are completely opposed to it. The hon member for Houghton even said it did not matter which amendments were accepted, they would still be completely opposed to the legislation. [Interjections.] We have to continue in this way week after week and in the meantime this legislation is urgently necessary so that we can employ it in the interests of the security of our country. [Interjections.]

That is why the Government is not prepared to continue in this way. There is no parliamentary process which has not been employed by the hon member’s party. That is quite understandable and it can be done. That is why we are in Parliament. We made those rules; therefore I do not wrongly blame the hon member for that. I am merely saying that is the position. We must reach finality somewhere, however, and that is why I am telling the hon member I am not prepared to go through that process any longer, because it is getting us absolutely nowhere.

The hon member moved certain amendments, some of which are not acceptable. We need not discuss that in detail, but I merely want to give the hon member an indication …

Mr Speaker, may I ask the hon the Minister, if the amendments are accepted at the Committee Stage in the other two Houses, would he be prepared to recommend that those amendments be included when the Bill is referred to the President’s Council?

I do not know what is going to happen in the other two Houses. The public indication I have of the standpoint of the other two Houses, is that they are going to reject the Second Reading of the legislation as well. The Whips will simply have to explain to me how they can have a Committee Stage after the principle of legislation has been voted down. I do not think there is any such procedure. Even if there were such a procedure, however, I would not go into Committee in those two Houses either, for even stronger reasons than those I have given the hon member on why the Government is not prepared to do so here. This applies to a much greater extent in those Houses after all the efforts that have been made there.

What amendments does the hon member think should be introduced? Once again she was asking for measures which I explained to the hon member for Durban Point are already part of official proclamations which were promulgated in the Gazette. The hon member wants this to be embodied in the legislation. Inter alia the hon member wants such a detained person to be entitled to have legal representation not only in preparing his representations, but also in giving oral evidence before the board of review. I replied to that request during an earlier debate. We are not prepared to accept it, and nor is the chairman of the board of review.

I can give the hon members an example. Suppose we detain 1 000 people under this provision. After a month, as proposed by some people, we have to go to a board of review with those 1 000 people. It is completely impossible physically to complete the proceedings in that period. If, in addition, 1 000 hearings have to be concluded before the Board of Review in which everyone can give oral evidence by means of legal representation, we shall not be able to conclude one case within those three months. We have experience of what happens in the courts, after all. Friends of the hon member for Houghton, inside and outside the legal world, will keep us busy with those cases for years. We are not prepared to take part in that kind of absurdity. That is why I am telling the hon member that from a practical point of view, it is absolutely absurd, and one cannot lend oneself to something that is that unpractical and in addition consider it during a discussion of an amending Bill.

The hon member Mr Theunissen has already mentioned that he blamed the Official Opposition for requesting a Committee Stage, because if one looks at the course they have taken in connection with the Bill, they cannot really lay claim to a Committee Stage. I agree wholeheartedly with the hon member. I also tried to rectify the other matter for the hon member.

†The hon member for Durban Point referred to the request for a review board which we considered in the previous Bill and went on to refer to his proposed amendment to this Bill.

The period of 60 days.

I am referring to the hon member’s proposed amendment to this Bill.

There is only one.

As regards this Bill, there was only the one which the hon member moved during the Second Reading debate.

No, the 60 days.

Yes, I am sorry, I have it now. In a previous debate I explained to the hon member the circumstances which led up to my refusal to go into Committee, even on this particular issue. I explained to the hon member that at a certain stage during the discussions surrounding this particular proposed amendment and/or clause we were considering shortening the period to 60 days when hon members of one of the other Houses flatly refused any further discussion on the issue and simply said: “30 days; take it or leave it.” That was all they said. I know the hon member will agree with me that 30 days is certainly too short. It cannot be applied in practice. We do not differ on that score. I would like to ask the hon member, however—and he does not really need to reply to my question—what he would have done if he had been the Minister, knowing full well that 30 days was an impossible period to accommodate in this Bill, and he had been confronted by an attitude of “30 days or nothing”. He would also have said: “Then I know what to do.” [Interjections.] I am not taking it out on hon members of the NRP. I am explaining what the situation was that we were confronted with by other hon members of Parliament during the negotiations concerning this particular Bill.

All in all, I regret that I cannot consider the suggestions put forward by the hon member for Houghton. I thank the hon member for Krugersdorp for his very able support as chairman of the standing committee.

I regret that I cannot accede to any of these motions.

Mr Chairman, I move:

The Bill makes provision for the amendment of subsection (3) of section 2 of the Payment of Members of Parliament Act, 1974. The subsection sets forth the circumstances under which a member of Parliament is exempted from the deductions from his salary and allowances which, in terms of that section, are to be made on account of his absence from meetings of the House of which he is a member or joint sittings of the Houses or meetings of committees of which he is a member.

The fixed periods of absence without deductions permitted by the subsection, ie 25 days during a Budget session and seven days during any other session, do not make allowance for special circumstances that may arise in any particular session of Parliament, for example the proposed resumption of the business of the present session in August. Experience has also shown that the concession of one day’s absence out of every four days on which a committee meets during the recess or during a long adjournment of all three Houses, does not adequately cater for the legitimate needs of members.

The Committees on Standing Rules and Orders of the three Houses consider it desirable that the Speaker should have the authority to extend the periods of permitted absence and to condone absence from committee meetings if good cause for such absence is shown.

The amendments proposed in the Bill will confer such powers on the Speaker.

Mr Speaker, this particular measure has two provisions. They were both fully considered by the appropriate joint committees, and I understand that the approval was unanimous from the various parties concerned. We are perfectly happy that in both provisions Mr Speaker should have a discretion as to the particular ground for condonation.

I might just also say that in respect of the second provision the Whips are also acknowledged so that the Whips will have to support Mr Speaker in deciding whether there are sufficient grounds.

The last point I want to make is that we on this side of the House have always been of the view that matters relating to the privileges of members of Parliament should be discussed in public and I am very glad that we are again doing so by way of this Bill that is going to be discussed in this House.

With these few words we support the legislation.

Mr Speaker, the hon the Leader of the House was not in the House earlier, and on behalf of our party we want to tell him that we are grateful that he has returned hale and hearty. We hope that he will have no further trouble with his back, and we also want to express the hope that his wife will recover fully to assist him in his task.

We are glad the hon the Leader of the House is back, because the hon Acting Leader broke his promise, namely that we were going to adjourn on 22 June at 12h45. The hon Acting Leader of the House also succeeded in getting the House to break the promise of the hon the Leader of the House.

The CP takes pleasure in supporting this Bill. It gives the Speaker the discretion, when he is of the opinion that there is a valid reason for an hon member to be absent for more than the permissible 25 days, to grant that hon member such permission, without his having to be fined for it. The legislation also authorizes the Speaker to excuse the absence of hon members from committee meetings in some cases and then exempt them from the fine of R50.

The Standing Committee on Constitutional Affairs sat last week while the House was sitting, and it frequently happened that an hon member had to be in the House too and consequently was not in the committees for valid reasons. We support the fact that the speaker may use his discretion to exempt such a member.

These measures were introduced to compel hon members to attend meetings of standing committees, because in the past we battled a great deal to obtain quorums in standing committees, and I think the obligation placed on hon members by the legislation was effective because since the legislation came into force we have found that we have no longer so frequently been unable to obtain a quorum at committee meetings. For that reason we take pleasure in supporting the legislation under discussion. We also wish to give the Speaker of this Parliament the discretion to exempt hon members when he finds valid reasons for doing so.

Order! I have heard officially that this discretion is going to be used very sparingly. [Interjections.]

Mr Speaker, we are sure that you will use your discretion at all times. Furthermore, I should merely like to say that we in these benches also welcome back in our midst the hon the Leader of the House. It is good to see him here in the House again. I want to tell him he is going to find that the hon the Acting Leader of the House really did a shocking job in his absence. Be that as it may, however, we are sure that everything will go well now. [Interjections.] That, Sir, is of course said a little bit tongue in cheek, and I hope the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning will not take it too much to heart.

We are very pleased about this Bill being passed, Sir, because we believe that in the future we are going to be in a position in which you are going to be asked to condone absence because of the pressure of work in this place. I think it is going to be something that is going to be well used. We are very pleased too that the difficulties that have been encountered in standing committees in relation to the inability of hon members to attend standing committee meetings—owing to difficulties they have come across, of course—are being ironed out by way of your discretionary powers. For those reasons, Sir, we in these benches have no hesitation whatsoever in supporting the measure now before the House.

Mr Speaker, first of all I want to thank the hon the Chief Whip of the Official Opposition for his remarks. He is perfectly correct when he says the measure met with the unanimous approval of all the members of the standing committee.

*I want to thank the hon member for Kuruman, as well as the hon member for Umhlanga, very much their fine and appreciated words in connection with the health my wife and myself. I also thank all hon members of this House for their intercession and support in this time. I really appreciate it tremendously

The hon member for Kuruman and the hon member for Umhlanga also both referred to the hon Acting Leader of the House in my absence. I should actually have come back tomorrow, but my doctor said I could come back today. I told him I was afraid things were being messed up here. [Interjections.]

Be that as it may, Sir, I should like to thank my hon bench-fellow for the time he stood in for me as Leader of the House.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Mr Chairman, I move the amendments to the Votes printed in my name on the Order Paper, as follows:

1. To substitute the amounts indicated below for the corresponding amounts in Columns 1 and 2 of the Schedule and to insert the following new and substituting Column 2 items and amounts under Votes 8, 29 and 30:

Mr Chairman, I believe the question in this debate is whether or not to approve the additional expenditure for which the hon the Minister of Finance is asking. We should ask whether this is in fact a realistic supplementary budget in the light of the facts as they are known at this time. Secondly we have to ask exactly what these additional amounts will do in relation to the problems which confront us at this particular moment, not only in regard to the economy, but also in regard to matters which are of equal concern to us, viz the stability of our country, and also whether by the time we reach the end of the financial year, these supplementary estimates, together with the actual estimates, will be shown to have been realistic, and that the actual expenditure will have taken place as anticipated.

The problem we have with these supplementary estimates is, first of all, that we would like the hon the Minister to tell us what has happened to his proposal to cut back expenditure across the board by 2%. That particular proposal, especially in the light of the figures that have been published to date, needs to be explained at this time. Together with that, we require an explanation as to the progress of the cash flow projections which the hon the Minister said he would have for the current year. In other words, when one looks at the published figures, one gets the impression that, despite the customary distortion at the beginning of the year, there is something wrong with the cash flow as it was contemplated. That is something that must be explained, and I think the hon the Minister should do so in his reply.

Moreover, the question arises as to what this does for the economy. I want to say to the hon the Minister, and I am going to say so loudly and clearly now, that, as we have repeatedly pointed out to him, one of the main reasons for the unrest has been the high level of unemployment in our country. Unless something is done about that high level of unemployment, we are not going to solve the stability problem of South Africa. Even as we sit here in this very House on this very day, one of the reasons why there is a state of emergency in South Africa is the high level of unemployment which has been one of the major factors contributing to the unrest situation. [Interjections.] That is a fact we cannot ignore.

The remarkable thing is that when we look at these particular supplementary estimates, we realise that it is probably the first time in many years that one can say one supports the hon the Minister in respect of virtually every item of expenditure he requests finance for. [Interjections.] The reality is that at long last—it has taken a long time to sink in with this hon Minister and this Government—they have realised that unemployment is a factor in stability. The hon the Minister will remember what his reaction was when we raised this matter during this debate last year. He will remember how he said then that spending money on the creation of employment opportunities was socialistic. Well, the hon the Minister has now seen the light and all I can say to him is: Welcome, Sir, to the ranks of the social democrats! Last year, when the hon the Minister was contemptuous of this …

I was not contemptuous of it.

The hon the Minister was indeed contemptuous of it. When he said he was appropriating R100 million and I said it was a drop in the ocean, he came back viciously—to put it mildly!—and said I was behaving like a typical socialist. [Interjections.] It took him two months to become a typical socialist, if not worse! Within two months, the hon the Minister not only spent R100 million, but also realised that he had to spend several hundred millions of rand, and that even then he had not yet spent enough.

And now I am becoming a vicious socialist?

This year I want to say to the hon the Minister once again that we support every item of expenditure in respect of job creation. Even so, I want to tell the hon the Minister that there is still something wrong. Does the hon the Minister know what it is that is wrong? The problem is that, instead of our really getting on with formulating plans to deal with structural unemployment in South Africa in order to secure jobs for people on a long-term basis, we are spending money on short-term training schemes and not on long-term solutions. The programmes on which we are spending money are not going to produce long-term results.

So I tell the hon the Minister that he will not solve the problems by dealing with these issues in the way in which he is dealing with them now. He is shaking his head again, I see. He is trying to restrain himself from being vicious again. [Interjections.] He really is trying hard not to be vicious again, and that is very difficult for him.

You make life very difficult for me.

The reality, however, is that we are not dealing with the problem of structural unemployment. Every year 300 000 more people need jobs, but we are not creating jobs. It is very nice and quite right to give people help when they are hungry. It is also very nice to get people to pull out weeds and to plant grass. The reality, however, is that we have to deal with the problem on a long-term basis. I have repeatedly made suggestions to the hon Minister and eventually, I know, he will heed my suggestions. It takes a long time, however, for the hon the Minister to understand; and I am very sympathetic to people who have this kind of problem. [Interjections.] It takes a long time. Eventually he is going to realise that the only way to deal with this is to create jobs in order to improve the quality of life in South Africa, to give people long-term jobs, to let them see the fruits of their labour and to let them see that what they are building belongs to them and is going to be enjoyed by them. I have yet to see somebody who burns down a house that he himself has built. I still have to see somebody who is going to burn down a clinic that he himself has built. That is why I make this appeal in voting for this measure.

In all seriousness I want to congratulate the hon the Minister for doing this so that in these circumstances we are actually doing something which is at least taking us on the right road. It may not take us all the way we should go but at least the hon the Minister is walking along the road that we would like him to walk and any minute from now he is going to start running. Then he will get into a car, drive fast and achieve that objective. The only point is that he must not leave it too late. If he leaves it too late he may not be able to remedy the problem…

There is a second thing which we again will support. I am not going to anticipate what I hope he is going to say tomorrow, and I do not intend to deal with any package of suggestions as to what he should do to stimulate the economy and what he should do to create confidence because that will be presumptuous. As far as the second category dealing with housing is concerned there is again money available for housing and we support it. The third category is to deal with pensions and welfare promotion for the aged, the handicapped and military personnel and this also has our support. However, I want to put two points to the hon the Minister. The first is that we have to pay greater attention to the plight of the aged of South Africa. Particularly bearing in mind the high inflation rate and the fact that interest rates have now come down very substantially, many of the aged are in very difficult circumstances. We cannot ignore them and have to pay attention to them. I want to appeal to the hon the Minister that he should please give attention again to the concept which I put to him again and again of an index bond for the aged. It has worked in other countries such as England where the aged people are allowed to have a bond which is indexed so that they are protected against inflation in respect of their savings.

The second point that I want to make here is in regard to military personnel, the veterans of World War II. Our view is that there can be no discrimination in regard to the provision of pensions and benefits for them. Secondly, it is no good just looking at World War I veterans in regard to the means test. We must also look at World War II veterans. The hon the Minister only has to look around this House to see how old some of those World War II veterans are getting. [Interjections.] They really are getting on in years.

The other factor in regard to this is that the hon the Minister together with his colleagues has got to look at a concept of bringing about equality in pensions and in regard to all social services. What we need to do is to set targets. We must tell people what the targets are and what we hope to achieve within a reasonable period of time so that they can see that as far as the provision of social services is concerned discrimination will be removed in a relatively short time.

The fourth category is the assistance to the Small Business Development Corporation. What I would like to know from the hon the Minister is not only how many businesses are involved but also how many people are actually getting jobs as a result. How many people are in employment and are actually carrying on their own business as a result of the activities of the Small Business Corporation and the additional funds that are being given to them now. I would also like to know what we hope is going to be achieved by them.

The fifth matter is what I call the “miscellaneous items”. Here I think we need some explanation from the hon the Minister of Environment Affairs and Tourism as to what he is going to do with this extra money which is being asked for because I do not know. Secondly, I would like to know something more about the provincial subsidies and I would like to know whether included in this amount is part of the money I hope that will go to private schools this year. I would like to know whether private schools are going to get this subsidy this year. I would also like to ask whether all the money which is being asked for under Vote 11 in respect of Development Aid will go to job creation.

I ask these questions because we have no other time to ask them and our other members cannot ask the questions in order to get answers to these particular problems. However, all in all we will support these supplementary estimates.

Mr Chairman, I will respond to as many of the questions that the hon member for Yeoville put as I can right now. Firstly, the hon member asked if these estimates were realistic. We are already in the process of changing some of them in consideration of the package for the further stimulation of the economy that we would like to submit to Parliament.

As far as these particular amounts are concerned we will do everything in our power to spend the ones that are unchanged because if we allocate them without spending them we lose certain opportunities. On the other hand, if we overspend, this also leads to problems. In these days it is not easy to achieve expenditure figures that are exactly spot-on and I think that the hon member for Yeoville will appreciate that. In business people are much more able to control their environment but I do not think that any of them can say that they are really achieving all their targets. We are developing more and more sophisticated methods and exercising a greater degree of control than I believe we did before, and in this process we are certainly achieving some promising results.

Insofar as the 2% is concerned I am hopeful that we will achieve, if not all of it, then most of it. We are again going through a difficult period right now and those departments that are sensitive to the rand-dollar exchange rate are suffering if they have purchases that they have to set off at the present time. We would like to have a broader outlook on the issue but it can really only be seen in totality towards the end of the year. The first revision of the Budget will be in September and it is only then that we will be in a position to see what our cash flow has been and how the various expenditure figures look for the rest of the financial year.

At the beginning of the financial year we have difficulty in trying to restrict every department to one-twelfth of the total of their budget per month. It is not possible and we are not trying to do it.

[Inaudible.]

No. One cannot therefore really draw any definite conclusions from the figures as they stand now.

We are as concerned about the high unemployment figures as the hon member for Yeoville or any other concerned South African is. However, I must point out that if we had carried on the way we did in 1984 in our economy as a whole when we had reasonably low unemployment figures, we would have destroyed this economy.

No!

I have no doubt in my mind that we would have. The inflationary tendencies in our economy at that stage were such that we did need drastic action to curb them.

[Inaudible.]

We can debate this matter at length but the fact remains that the creation of sound employment can only take place when the economy is in a better shape than it was in 1984. I do believe that the economy was in a much better shape towards the third quarter of last year because of the introduction of mild stimulatory measures.

I can be criticised for it, but in this respect I prefer—this is after having consulted very widely, including with experts in the private sector—rather to be conservative in my approach to economic stimulation. We would rather approach it piecemeal than do too much at one time resulting in having to put the brakes on again at a later stage. I would rather err on the conservative side as far as our economy is concerned right now.

That is why we were absolutely open in our approach to the Budget. We restricted our deficit before borrowing to only 2,7%. This obviously left some room for further stimulation. Right now we are in a better position to evaluate what happened in the first quarter of the year as far as the performance of our economy is concerned. We are therefore also in a much better position to evaluate what we should do in future to stimulate the economy further. However, this should not be done in such a way that either the demand for credit or for consumer goods gets out of hand again. I would like to submit to the hon member that he really should not accuse us of being insensitive about the whole question of unemployment. I fundamentally disagreed with him when he said that what we were doing now in terms of training was only of short-term significance.

It is not the right…

The type of training we are giving adults is helping them to become self-employed and, for the first time in their lives, to gain some kind of qualification, restricted though it may be, which enables them to approach employers and ask for a chance to demonstrate their abilities in the fields of bricklaying, plastering or paving.

[Inaudible.]

I do not see how the hon member can argue that that is short-term.

Of course it is.

It is not short-term. If one gives a person a skill which enables him to become self-employed …

In three weeks?

That is something which will last forever.

… and enables him at least to be in a better position to seek employment than he was before, that is not a short-term action. It is much better than nothing at all. That has been substantiated for me by contact with the people and by letters of appreciation from people who received training and were thereafter employed. These letters must amount to about 3 thick volumes by now. All the evidence clearly points to the fact that this is one of the most worthwhile investments that any government could have made in a time of economic problems such as those we are experiencing now.

I do not think that we are leaving the stimulation until too late. I agree that our approach is a bit conservative, but I would rather err on the conservative side than do too much, and in that sense I again do not agree with the hon member that we are leaving it until too late.

You have already left it until too late!

I would like to refer to the aged. Last year the plight of those aged people who at least had an income and qualified to pay income tax was very substantially lifted. We lifted the threshold with regard to those over 65 years of age by as much as 70%. That is dramatic in any language, and it is unprecedented in the tax history of this country.

[Inaudible.]

I agree that one of the major problems we face, particularly in the White community, is that of the aged White person who made provision for his old age and now finds himself in trouble. I am now no longer referring only to those who pay tax, and whose tax burden could be alleviated, but also to those who no longer even qualify to pay income tax and who have fixed incomes. The hon member again mooted his idea of an index bond, and I would like to ask him a favour. Will he not give us his proposal in detail? If he has presented it before, perhaps he could dig it up from his file.

Yes.

I am not against the principle of doing something like this for the aged, but I have a problem. I have not been in this position as long as the hon member suggested—it has been under two years— although in terms of events it seems to have been a lifetime, but I have learnt one hard lesson in this period. If one offers the tiniest concession, abuse bursts it wide open. If we introduce a concession for the aged, I have no doubt that their children, grandchildren, their children’s friends and acquaintances of younger ages will climb onto that bandwagon unless we go to extreme lengths to prevent that. Unless we prevent that, it will again be of no avail whatsoever. I hope that the hon member will give us his ideas.

I will.

Hopefully he will also be able to tell us how we can prevent such a scheme from being completely abused in the kind of environment we find ourselves in right now.

We have heard the hon member on the question of World War II veterans, and that certainly comes into the equation. I just want to make a brief remark about equality in pensions. The hon member said we must set targets to remove discrimination. We have been dealing with this very issue for more than 18 months now in an attempt to find formulae which will give us an opportunity to reach certain targets within a certain period of time.

There is only one principle on which we can really do it—I believe we have made tremendous progress in this regard—and that is if we seek equality as far as the amount is concerned, we must also seek equality in regard to the percentage of that specific population group that qualifies for that pension. Unless we do that, there is no way that this country will ever be able to afford the kind of pension money that will be demanded from the Treasury.

Then you must uplift the standard of living of the other population groups.

At the same time, obviously, if we can achieve our economic growth rate, the need for pensions will diminish in the end. However, if we accept the basis of monetary equality, then we must also accept the principle of a target for the percentage of the various population groups qualifying for that pension—otherwise this country will only be working for pensions. That is all.

So, we have done a lot of work in this regard, and we have made good progress. My hon colleague will certainly come to light at some stage with the results of this particular issue.

If you thought non-racially, we would not have that problem.

If we thought non-racially on this issue, and overnight tried to maintain the kind of pension standards that we have now, we would not be able to afford it. There is no country in the world which would be able to afford that kind of burden. [Interjections.] If the hon member disputes that, I challenge him …

I never said overnight. I said set a target.

Well, we agree on targets. That is exactly what we do through our formulae. However, I am just saying that striving towards that particular target, at the same time we are also striving towards the other target, namely the reduction of the overall demand, otherwise we shall have problems.

As far as the Small Business Development Corporation is concerned, my hon colleague will respond to that, as will some of my other hon colleagues.

Vote agreed to.

Vote No 5—“Constitutional Development and Planning”:

Mr Chairman, an amount of R170 million is being requested here for housing for Blacks. This is being added to the capital of the National Housing Fund. Now I want to refer to the general Appropriation of the Department of Public Works which we have in front of us. There we have the same thing, namely R138,3 million which is being added to the capital of the National Housing Fund for Black housing. Can the hon the Minister tell us what the difference is between these two entries? Which Blacks fall under the Constitutional Development and Planning Vote and which fall under the Public Works and Land Affairs Votes? I cannot reconcile these two entries?

Mr Chairman, programme 6 makes provision for housing aid to Blacks totalling R170 million. What was the other question which the hon member put?

Mr Chairman, I want the two amounts to be linked together. According to Programme 6 of this Vote this amount is an addition to the capital of the National Housing Fund, but one comes across precisely the same wording on page 10-33 of the Public Works and Land Affairs Vote. Here the addition to the capital of the National Housing Fund totals R138,3 million for Blacks. What do these two amounts mean? Which Blacks fall under this Vote and which fall under the other Vote? Both amounts are an addition to the capital of the National Housing Fund.

The amount of R170 million which the hon member is now mentioning and which appears in the programme, is an additional amount which is being added. Both amounts are for Black housing.

Why was it not indicated under Public Works? We want clarity on this. Why are both these amounts additions to the capital of the National Housing Fund?

Mr Chairman, the purpose of the Supplementary Appropriation is to make provision for amounts for which the expenditure is determined after the finalising of the amounts published in the White Book. Consequently these are the amounts earmarked at the time the White Book was compiled. As a result of later developments and decisions which also concern other amounts included in this Appropriation and with a view to further stimulation of the economy this particular amount was also set aside for housing. Further expenditure on this item for which there is a great need was decided on after the White Book had been finalised. This is the object of the Supplementary Appropriation and that is why it appears here and not in the White Book when we tabled it.

Mr Chairman, that is not yet a reply to my question. Why is R170 million for housing aid to Blacks being provided under the Constitutional Development and Planning Vote and not under the Public Works Vote in the supplementary appropriation? The White Book talks about “Addition to capital of the National Housing Fund”, but in the supplementary appropriation it is also stated that this amount of R170 million is being used for “Addition to capital of the National Housing Fund”. Why is this programme under the Constitutional Development and Planning Vote and not under the Public Works Vote? Why is this being budgeted for under two separate votes? The hon the Minister must throw light on this matter for us. We cannot go on like this.

Mr Chairman, these are two totally different matters. We are dealing here with an additional amount. This concerns the R1 billion voted additionally for this purpose of which this department is getting R170 million which must be used for Black housing. Consequently this amount is entirely additional, as the hon the Minister of Finance has just explained to the hon member.

Mr Chairman, are these other Blacks who are benefiting from this than those benefiting from the Housing Fund of the Department of Public Works? Are these two groups of Blacks? [Interjections.]

I put the Vote.

Sir, you cannot put the Vote because I have not yet received a reply to my question. If there is no other way, we must move an adjournment so that the hon the Minister can go and do his homework.

Mr Chairman, I cannot give the hon member any more information to bring home to him what I have just tried to explain to him. The National Housing Fund Account of the Department of Public Works is now also being divided between the own affairs departments of the different administrations. That is why it appears in that department’s Vote under the programme for Black housing. This specific amount is being voted additionally for Black housing by our department.

Mr Chairman, really, these kind of questions are enough to make one weep. Up to and including last year the funds of all the population groups were pooled in one fund. But from this year it is different. What is more, it is indicated differently in the supplementary appropriation because the amounts are being added additionally by means of the supplementary budget. This means that it is now being handled separately as different funds for Black housing. It is no longer all paid into the National Housing Fund.

Mr Chairman, but reference is still made to Black housing under the Public Works and Land Affairs Vote. I am now referring to page 10-33 of the Appropriation, if the hon the Minister will look at it. The amount of R138,330 million is voted there for housing for Blacks. All that money goes in to one fund. Why are the amounts not all added together. We cannot have bits here and bits there. This gives a misrepresentation and does not reflect the actual state of affairs. We must know precisely how much is being spend on Black housing.

Mr Chairman, whether we want to do it in bits and pieces or whatever we want to do, it is not still possible to add two amounts together if one is dealing with the second amount two months later. In the first place the hon member must consequently understand that this is a supplementary amount which it would have been physically impossible to add to the other amount. Does the hon member understand that?

I understand, yes.

Thank you.

Now the other amount to which the hon member referred, is mentioned on page 10-7.

[Inaudible.]

If the hon member for Koedoespoort will just keep quiet, I can speak to his colleague. Is the hon member for Sunnyside’s book open on page 10-7? This is the Public Works and Land Affairs Vote. [Interjections.] Can I ask the hon member whether the amount he is referring to is R118 million?

The amount I am talking about appears on page 10-33, and it totals R138 million.

The 138 million is the figure for 1985-86 and is not this year’s figure. [Interjections.] The hon member is dealing with last year’s Appropriation. [Interjections.]

The hon the Minister is misleading the House. [Interjections.] An amount of R138 million is given for the 1986-87 financial year. There it is; the hon the Minister cannot read.

May I ask the hon member to raise his eyes a little and look at the top of that column? It reads 1985-86. [Interjections.]

There is an amount of R118 million under that. That is last year’s figure. I am talking about this year.

The figure is R138 570 000. [Interjections.] On page 10-33 there are four amounts under the 1986-87 financial year and four amounts under the 1985-86 financial year. Is that what the hon member is referring to? There is an amount of R138 330 000 with regard to Blacks. [Interjections.] According to the remark on page 10-7 with which I have just dealt, these amounts which are indicated here, appear under the Constitutional Development and Planning Vote. I now see where the hon member is. It is under Blacks for the 1986-87 financial year. [Interjections.] Consequently the hon member is quite correct in that respect. There is also an amount of approximately R138 million above that.

What difference is there between the Blacks on one side of the line and those on the other? How do these Blacks differ? Does this concern national states or sovereign independent states? Which Blacks are these? [Interjections.]

Vote agreed to.

Vote No 14—“Manpower”:

Mr Chairman, may I ask the hon the Minister whether he is aware that a large amount of this money that has been earmarked for job creation, is going to over 200 contractors who have already won those contracts? It is therefore not a question of job creation, but rather of subsidising contractors who tendered for work and who won those contracts. They obviously allowed for the cost of that labour in their tender make-up. Now they are taking on labour in terms of this job creation scheme and my question is whether the hon the Minister is aware of the fact that these over 200 contractors have already allowed for that labour in the costing of their tenders? They are now being subsidised through this scheme at the rate of R4 per day per labourer to do that work. Firstly, therefore, it is not job creation, as they would have needed that labour in any event, or a large proportion of it, to do the work. Secondly, the hon the Minister is handing a present to a contractor of R4 a day per labourer when he has already built that cost into his tender price. It seems to me that this is something that should be looked into. It is difficult to quantify it here, but I honestly believe that it would be worth the hon the Minister’s while to investigate that because many millions would appear to be involved.

Mr Chairman, if the hon member for Walmer has set out the problem absolutely correctly, then it sounds quite irregular to me. I should like to ask the hon member to submit his formal observations in this regard to us. In the meantime, I will certainly take the matter up with my hon colleague. I can tell the hon member that it is certainly not the idea to employ these funds as has been set out by him. There is no way in which the funds should be employed for that purpose, and I should therefore like to obtain further information in this regard.

Mr Chairman, while the hon the Minister is on his feet, may I ask him whether he will, in due course, please deal with the Small Business Development Corporation, since he overlooked it before?

Mr Chairman, we are not dealing with the Vote on Trade and Industry now, but I shall come back to the hon member for Yeoville’s question when we get to that.

Vote agreed to.

Vote No 15—“Trade and Industry”:

Mr Chairman, I should like to respond to the hon member for Yeoville’s question now. According to the note I have here concerning the Small Business Development Corporation, the advisory services receive 7 000 inquiries per month. Under the general finance programme 368 applications have been approved for the year involving a total of R22 million. Since the inception of the SBDC 1 098 loans have been granted, totalling R62,4 million. The corporation is running a business premises programme and has provided accommodation for 1 024 business undertakings, costing R18,6 million and providing employment for 14 070 people.

Vote agreed to.

Title:

Mr Chairman, I am just looking for an opportunity finally to answer the hon member for Sunnyside’s question. May I take this opportunity?

Order! The hon the Minister may proceed.

The hon member for Sunnyside looked at the page on which all four funds appear together in summarised form. The answer I gave him at the very start, namely that up to last year all four funds were grouped together, but that they were separated as of this year, was the correct answer from the very start. The hon member looked at the page on which the summary appears, and if he takes a look at the pages on the Vote on Constitutional Development and Planning he will also see the amount of R138 million listed there. That is why we could not understand the hon member’s question. This is not a page listing new amounts; it reflects amounts already shown on other pages. It is a page on which the summary appears, but since it caused so much confusion, I shall ask the department not to include it again.

Mr Chairman, while the hon the Minister is on his feet, may I ask him whether he will not please ask the hon the Minister in charge of National Health and Population Development to deal with my query about war pensions? [Interjections.]

Mr Chairman, I should love to answer the hon member for Yeoville on this issue. As a matter of fact, I agree entirely with him insofar as I think we should do something with regard to the Second World War veterans. Looking at them in this House especially, I think they need to be looked after! [Interjections.] I think the important point is money. If we had enough money there would have been no difference as far as pensions are concerned; if we had enough money, we would have done much better as far as pensions are concerned. We would have done so tomorrow and with the next budget. [Interjections.] The problem is that we do not have enough money and therefore we have to do the best we can with what we have. Every year the hon the Minister of Finance allocates as much as he can and then we try …

Mr Chairman, may I ask the hon the Minister a question?

Order! I have a problem. We are now dealing, under the title of this Bill, with a Vote and I do not think that is procedurally in order.

Mr Chairman, the hon the Minister wanted to answer me, but you went too quickly—that is the problem. It is a very short question. All I would like to ask the hon the Minister is: If one does not have enough money to deal with the equalisation of pensions and to do away with the means test, there is a relatively small number of Black Second World War veterans who are in dire need. Can we not do something about them, because that involves a very small amount?

We will look into that.

Amendment agreed to.

Schedule, as amended, agreed to.

Clauses and Title agreed to.

House Resumed:

Bill, as amended, reported.

Business suspended at 18h30 and resumed at 20h00.

Evening Sitting

Mr Chairman, in the discussion of the Abolition of Influx Control Bill there are also certain other perceptions we must analyse. Over the years we had a situation in which we thought that we had to try to ensure that we only allowed as many Blacks to come to the cities as there were employment opportunities for. We also took the needs in respect of employment opportunities in the cities into consideration. But what we neglected to do was to analyse what effect this approach would have on the rural areas—the Black rural areas.

Consequently I now want to try to point out the adverse effect of this on the rural areas where in accordance with traditional views the Blacks maintain land tenure by means of ownership by the tribe. Because of this we have the situation—and I am now talking about an area I know very well; it is in my constituency: the mountain locations in Natal, between Estcourt and Bergville, in the Drakensberg—of erosion which is probably the worst one can get, because there is over-population, and consequently over-occupation; also because too much livestock is being kept and—also because of our legislation—they are clinging to the idea that families must remain in the rural areas, while the economically active men between the ages of 18 and 55 years mainly go to the cities to earn their wages on a basis of migrant labour.

What was the effect of this? The effect was that one of the most important possessions of South Africa, viz its fertile land, washed into the sea. During the Domoina flood disaster a large part of the surface of kwaZulu washed into the sea—gone forever; lost forever for the future of South Africa. This happened because no soil conservation was applied; because we adopted the standpoint that these were the homes of those Black people; that this was where they had to remain; that they did not belong in the cities.

Through the point of departure that we at least allowed the men to go to the cities to earn their living there, while their families had to remain behind, we surrendered the second most important possession of South Africa—of course its people are South Africa’s most important possession—viz its land, to the sea. People come and go, but the land should be there forever. But no new land is being created, and land which is lost because of erosion, is gone forever. That land was lost because we, through the restrictions we enforced by means of legislation, and through the influx control which was applied, prevented the normal flow of people to the cities from taking place.

This is also one of the reasons—one of the most important reasons—why our land has deteriorated so and why a large percentage of the Blacks never developed the idea of private land tenure, because traditionally the families clung to the idea that there had to be tribal ownership of land. Under tribal chiefs in the old feudal system in Europe, which also took root here among the Black tribal chiefs, private land tenure never gained acceptance as an idea. In actual fact it never took root.

This is one of the problems of the South African economy today. If we had allowed a proprietory class to develop in the normal way at that stage, we would not have had the problem with soil erosion which we have today. Then we would have had normal development. People would have attached value to land which they themselves owned.

If the people in the cities had also learned the concept of private land tenure, they would also have developed the concept of private land tenure in the rural areas. But now they have not developed it. We thought that because they did not have it in their areas they should not have it in the cities either. In that way we had a paralysing effect on the situation. We had our reasons for this, and I do not want to suggest that those reasons were wrong in all respects. But I do want to say that if we try to ascertain the effect of this now, we must be frank and honest, and we must admit that it had a very negative effect. Many negative aspects of this policy were brought to light.

Now it is essential for us to weigh up the negative and the positive aspects. Once we have done this, it is clear to us that it is correct to move away from the negative effect and to strive for the positive effect, because after all influx control had far more negative effects than positive effects. I am making absolutely no excuse for the fact that the NP has shifted emphasis today and that we have adopted the standpoint that influx control…

Have changed principle.

It has absolutely nothing to do with principles.

Stop talking nonsense.

It has absolutely nothing to do with principles. I do not want to start a long argument about principles now. The hon member will lose the argument in any case. [Interjections.]

Order!

I do want to say something about another principle. [Interjections.] Seeing that the hon member for Rissik is challenging me and provoking me, I want to ask him whether he supports the principle that a man must be separated from his wife and family when he has to go and work.

Where do you think my wife is?

I want to ask him whether he supports the principle of migrant labour, where the man must of necessity go away from his family. [Interjections.]

How many wives must he take with him?

It seems to me the hon member for Rissik is hiding behind the rules of the debate, and does not want to answer. But he provoked me about the principles. [Interjections.] I maintain there are certain circumstances—I still stand by my statement today—in which we must not allow the man’s family into the country. This concerns the migrant labourer we allow to come here from outside the country’s borders. [Interjections.] In that case we have no obligation to provide work to Blacks who are not part of the South African rural setup.

Mr Chairman, I want to ask the hon member for Klip River whether he thinks the Black man who moves here to work here, must be allowed to bring more than one wife and all his children with him? [Interjections.]

Let me put it to the hon member this way: If a normal process of urbanisation had taken place, the custom of polygamy would have changed long ago. [Interjections.] I do not support the idea of polygamy either, but the case of the migrant labourer who leaves his family here in the locations and goes to Soweto or to the city where he gets himself another wife, is a custom I do not want to condone. Any person with a Christian outlook on life cannot support this custom or system. That is why I do not endorse that system either.

But I want to ask the hon member for Kuruman whether he supports the principle of compulsory migrant labour in those cases where a husband must leave his home and his wife and children in the location while he looks for work in Soweto or in other urban areas to support them.

We will answer you.

I am looking forward to that answer. I do not support the principle, and all the years—also when those hon members were still members of the NP—I was always opposed in the first place to the hostel system and in the second place to the migrant labour system which had such a destructive effect on the stability of the family which was essential for the stability of a community.

You spoke softly; I never heard you.

Now you are abolishing influx control.

My standpoint is that if someone gets a job in whatever area, the principle must apply that a community that gives a person a job must accept him and his family.

If there is no work for them?

That is a principle I can support anywhere.

It depends who the leader is before you support a principle.

Order! The hon member for Rissik is constantly passing remarks and interjecting. I am asking him to restrain himself. The hon member for Klip River may proceed.

We must face up to the practical implications of our policy and adopt a standpoint on it. The longer we cling to the system that we consider a lobola economy to be the norm among the Blacks, the longer we will prevent people from developing a pride in private property.

We condemn outlooks on life such as polygamy which many of the Blacks have and we do not agree with that. But what are we doing in this connection? Are there not hon members whose attitude amounts to the fact that this must of necessity continue? We have changed our standpoint because we considered that the circumstances were of such a nature that we had to weigh up what was positive and what was negative and then decide what was expected of us. The circumstances of today demand of us that influx control must be abolished, that we must face up to the realities and that we must not recoil from the truth.

Mr Chairman, I find the hon member for Klip River very peculiar. It seems as if he changes his standpoints according to the seasons.

Prove that.

I shall prove it. He was one of the greatest supporters of the idea of a Coloured homeland the NP has ever had. This has been placed on record for eternity and can never be erased.

That is not true.

The hon member is now struggling to refute his own words recorded in Hansard. I could spend time now on reading exactly what he said from Hansard to him. I want to go further and tell him that polygamy amongst the Blacks is not in any way due to the system of migrant labour. It is due to the fact that polygamy has been a custom amongst the Blacks for centuries. Whether they came to the cities and whether they remained in the rural areas, would have made no difference to it. They would still have practised this custom of theirs as they still do today.

The hon member also expressed the viewpoint that the fact that developing a propertied class amongst the Blacks was neglected, has helped to further soil erosion and the destruction of land. The hon member is now specifically arguing that these people from the rural areas should go to the urban areas. The propertied class on behalf of whom he is lodging a plea, would then have developed in the urban areas, and not in the rural areas. I do not know how a propertied class could really have stopped a storm such as Domoina. I think nothing nor anyone can stop such a natural disaster. No policy of any party or of anyone could stop a natural disaster, in which thousands of hectares of soil disappeared into the sea and, as the hon member said, was lost to the future. The hon member should rather revise his standpoint. He should take note of how he changes his standpoint from one day to the next, and from season to season. I want to leave the hon member at that for the time being, but I shall return to him at a later stage.

In his Second Reading speech the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning said, and I quote:

The hon the Minister says the abolition of influx control is “a great moment”. At a later stage in his speech, the hon the Minister says, and I quote him:

This great moment therefore deals with far more than the mere abolition of influx control. It is precisely as the hon member for Bellville has said. He waxed lyrical about it, and on the strength of the abolition at influx control he triumphantly called out that apartheid was finally being abolished. This Bill therefore means the death, the end and the funeral of the policy of apartheid, separate development, partition and separation in South Africa.

Mr Chairman, on a point of order: Is the hon member for Waterberg entitled to take his seat from where he entered at the main entrance, and can you still see the hon member for Koedoespoort?

Is the hon member for Koedoespoort standing behind the hon member for Barberton? If so then the hon member for Waterberg has broken the line. [Interjections.] I cannot see very well from here where the hon member for Koedoespoort is standing, but the Secretariat tells me that the hon member for Waterberg is in order. The hon member for Waterberg may resume his seat. [Interjections.]

Unfortunately that is the case with this Bill.

Order! It seems to me as if there is quite a discussion going on. If hon members want to know where the line runs, they can certainly find that out, but now is not the time for it— the hon member for Koedoespoort is speaking now, and he may proceed.

To the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning—I say this with emphasis— who was never really a supporter of apartheid, who never really propagated it, and who never really defended it, this could possibly be a great moment, but for the Whites, and in particular the conservative Whites, of the RSA, the abolition of influx control as one of the measures whereby apartheid is being destroyed, is a fatal moment. This is also the case for the Government supporters who still cannot see, who cannot or do not want to believe what the Government is doing to the Whites of the Republic. I think there are a few hon NP members who must take note of what is happening.

I should have liked to refer to the hon member for Mossel Bay, but I think he is the wrong one. The hon members for Bloemfontein East and Welkom, as well as other hon members, should just take a look at what is going to happen in this country after the abolition of influx control. This Bill is nothing other than one of the Government’s biggest steps towards the total abdication of the White man in South Africa. [Interjections.] This is another piece which is being added to the jigsaw puzzle of the eventual domination of Whites by non-Whites in the Republic of South Africa.

This step is therefore ironic, tragic and traumatic in light of the following quote from a work of Prof F A van Jaarsveld entitled Afrikaner—Quo Vadis?

He is a PFP member!

We all know where Prof Van Jaarsveld stands today. That is precisely why what he has said is so important to me.

Where does he stand now?

He is a Prog now!

Prof Van Jaarsveld said the following:

We all know how mixed up this state of affairs was in this country under UP rule. I do not want to enlarge on it any further, but I merely mention it as a fact. I quote further from what Prof Jan van Jaarsveld says:

Forty years ago!

The policy of separate development—apartheid—was therefore accepted in order to establish a new ordering of race relations in South Africa, and one of the laws that were placed on the Statute Book under this policy, is the one affecting influx control. [Interjections.]

Mr Chairman, may I ask the hon member if he would concede that one of the most important measures in regard to influx control is contained in the Blacks (Urban Areas) Consolidation Act, and that that Act was recorded in the Statute Book in 1945, and not after 1948?

That is true, but that Act was worked out after that, improved and finally established according to the policy of separate development. That surely is a fact, is it not. [Interjections.]

Apartheid has been the main theme of the NP for a period of more than three decades, and for more than a decade the father of the hon the Minister of National Education worked very hard at collaborating on this issue. It was the main theme of one general election after the other, and through that they not only retained the confidence of the corps of voters, but won it to an increasing extent, to work out and to establish the policy of separate development in South Africa. In 1981 it was still the election policy of the NP, by means of which it won the election.

We should at least concede that in 1981 already we were struggling with a whole number of voters who were no longer very happy with the NP, as a result of the dubious statements which the State President—as the then Prime Minister—and some of his Ministers were making about separate development.

For 33 years the electoral corps remained confident in the NP on the basis of apartheid or separate development, which the NP put to them year after year, and not on grounds of anything else. In that they saw that the NP was the one responsible for the protection of the interests of Whites in this country.

This policy of separation between races and people in which the voters put their confidence for longer than three decades, was the formula for success for the structuring of ethnic relations in this country. If we want to deny this this evening, we must deny that separation come about between the Whites, Coloureds, Indians and Black peoples, and that four peoples have become independent while six peoples have accepted national status. Then we must also deny that there has been separation between group areas as well as between business areas. I can continue to list everything in this way. It was all brought into being on the basis of the structuring which the policy of separate development, of apartheid, brought about, and influx control formed a part of this.

Now this policy, and the voters’ confidence in it, has to be buried, and we have to celebrate the funeral triumphantly.

You can give the funeral service, Frans.

The hon member for Randburg, however, says that this is not final enough. He says there are still other apartheid measures which first have to be abolished before apartheid can finally be buried.

Yes, schools and residential areas.

I in fact want to ask now whether it also includes schools, residential areas and community life. But I shall get to that later on.

By abolishing influx control, the Government is abolishing one of the methods through which the ordering of race relations in South Africa were arranged successfully, and is returning to the mixed-up conditions of the period before 1948, and that is a fatal course for the Whites.

I now want to return very briefly to the hon member for Klip River. [Interjections.]

Mr Chairman, may I ask the hon member a question?

No, I am being bothered too much.

The hon member for Klip River made a statement here this evening about the late Mr John Vorster. Let me now tell the hon members on the opposite side of the House that because Mr Vorster is dead and buried, they should not attribute all sorts of things to him which they harbour in their own thoughts. [Interjections.] I took the trouble of discussing many of the matters which are attributed to Mr Vorster in this House personally with him and to get the facts from him. That is why I know what I am talking about.

The hon member for Klip River said in his day already Mr Vorster had doubts about influx control and that is why he asked Black leaders to come up with a plan.

Is that true, or is it not true?

I went into this matter, and if the hon member would only shut his mouth and open his ears, he would hear the actual facts. That is what he needs.

The former Prime Minister did not have any doubt about influx control, the pass laws or whatever, but he was badgered by the Black leaders who constantly complained about it to him and asked him to devise a plan. They asked him to change influx control, and after he spoke to them and consulted his Cabinet about it, he told the Black leaders they should go and think about influx control and the pass laws …

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

Mr Chairman, oh please just let the hon member sit down. I have been bothered with many questions this evening, and I have replied to them.

When Mr Vorster told the Black leaders they should go and think about influx control and the pass laws—not because he had any doubt about these measures, but because they constantly consulted him about them and asked that he should introduce changes—and he told them to bring suggestions to him.

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

Mr Chairman, if the hon members would only give me a chance to put my case! [Interjections.] I am discussing things which I know about. I am giving the facts. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon member for Koedoespoort will indicate when he is prepared to reply to questions and until then no further questions will be asked.

Then these Black leaders returned to Mr Vorster and reported that they could not come up with any better plans. [Interjections.] Mr Vorster then told them that in other words they accepted that the standpoint adopted by him on influx control and pass laws, was the correct one because they could not suggest anything better. [Interjections.] Three of Mr Vorster’s Cabinet Ministers who are still alive today confirmed that this was reported to the Cabinet by Mr Vorster himself at that time.

The hon the Minister also says that…

Mr Chairman, may I ask the hon member a question?

Mr Chairman, I do not want to reply to the hon member’s question because he does not know what it is all about. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon member for Klip River must resume his seat.

The hon member for Koedoespoort gives a wrong …

Order! The hon member for Klip River must resume his seat. The hon member for Koedoespoort may proceed.

The hon the Minister goes on to say in his second reading speech that there is more to this Bill than the mere abolition of a number of influx control measures. This Bill gives effect to the Government’s philosophy about the elimination of racial discrimination and the extension of equal opportunities to all South Africans. There are three matters of importance in the statement of the hon the Minister. Firstly, according to the hon the Minister it concerns the elimination of racial discrimination. Secondly, he says it concerns equal opportunities, and thirdly these equal opportunities apply to all South Africans, regardless of race, colour or whatever. The hon the Minister simply speaks of “all South Africans”. The Bill therefore deals with the elimination of racial discrimination, according to the hon the Minister himself.

The hon the Minister also says:

The hon the Minister therefore says the reason for the repeal of influx control is to eliminate discrimination. He attributes it all to discrimination. While South Africa is still a country of different races and peoples, or as the NP states, a country with different groups and minority groups in particular who have to be protected, what about the diversity of races, peoples or minority groups? The hon the Minister of National Education has after all been the big exponent of groups up until now, or has he been eliminated in that respect by the left-wing elements in the NP? Does the hon the Minister of National Education still stand by the differentiation of races and peoples, or then at least of groups? Is he still the big exponent of an own community life for the different groups?

The whole NP is. [Interjections.]

It is clear that the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning no longer recognises the different races or peoples, or at least groups, judging from these words of his where he speaks of all South Africans, equal treatment and rights and equal opportunities. For him it is a matter of placing everything on an footing. He even talks of equal opportunities for all South Africans. Somewhere else he speaks of “freedom of movement within the country to all South Africans”. He makes no differentiation between the different groups. Every South African who is a citizen of the country, White, Coloured, Indian or Black, has the freedom to move around the country just as he pleases. In his speech he says:

He speaks of the right of individuals “to move around within the boundaries of their own country”. He also says:

This therefore concerns the fact that every citizen, regardless of who he is or what his colour is, can move around freely.

That is why I want to ask the hon the Minister if this means that differentiation is no longer on the NP’s agenda. Is there no longer a possibility of differentiation between the various population groups? A measure aiming to differentiate regulate, order and the protect Whites, Coloureds and Indians against being crowded out by the great numerical preponderance of Blacks is now being eliminated. The measure which was introduced to establish this differentiation, is now being abolished. [Interjections.]

This measure of differentiation was a positive measure. Influx control was a positive measure, just as the identity document was a positive measure which was taken with the aim of differentiating. [Interjections.] It in fact also protected the Blacks against themselves. [Interjections.]

Uncontrolled influx—that is to say free movement to and in urban areas—would have created chaos and untold misery on a large scale, as it is creating at Crossroads at present. [Interjections.] At Crossroads we have the situation where uncontrolled influx has created greater chaos and misery than we are experiencing in any other place in this country, and this is while we still have the legislation in the Statute Book.

It is very interesting now to note that Dr Gerrit Viljoen on page 100 of his book Ideale en Werklikheid writes:

He therefore says one can only lessen and eventually eliminate discrimination if one carries the policy of separate development through to its logical conclusion. [Interjections.] Here we now also have the situation where the hon the Minister did a somersault and moved away from the standpoint to be able to agree to the abolition of this measure. [Interjections.]

Uncontrolled influx—the hon the Minister calls it the freedom of movement in one’s own country—according to the hon the Minister means the freedom of movement within the borders of the country or the right of every citizen to have freedom of movement within the borders of the country. Now this means that the millions of Blacks …

[Inaudible.]

Yes, that is what the hon the Minister said in his speech. [Interjections.]

It means that millions of Blacks who are all becoming South Africans, are all citizens or are becoming citizens and are all being given equal opportunities, can now according to their own choice freely move to every part of the country and every urban area. They can enter these areas and move around in them. They can settle there, regardless of whether there is accommodation, job opportunities and so forth.

I know now what the hon the Minister will ask: But what about the clauses in the amending Bill, for example clauses 9, 12 and 13, which introduce certain measures? I now want to tell him that the minute he wants to apply these measures, he is going to be in the situation where he will be contradicting himself on what he said in regard to complete freedom of movement. [Interjections.] That freedom of movement would then surely be ended, and then the situation would simply revert to the one he called discrimination.

He should really just come along with his system of one man, one vote.

What we are dealing with here, is the result of the new policy of the NP of one undivided South Africa—a unitary state with one citizenship and with equal opportunities, rights and privileges. This policy demands the abolition of influx control. But the alternative is not what the Government and the hon the Minister like to present to us, ie orderly urbanisation. The alternative is the fundamental point contained in the White Paper on Urbanisation. Par 4.3.4 on page 7 reads as follows:

I repeat: In future, freedom of movement to and within urban areas will apply to all citizens of the RSA on a non-discriminatory basis. If words still have any significance in Afrikaans, it means that no restrictions will or can apply. Every restrictive measure will be an unlawful assault on this provision with regard to the freedom of movement. With that the hon the Minister and his wretched Government are heading towards an influx which will be unprecedented in the history of South Africa and towards the free creation of squatter camps, with such chaos and misery that it will make Crossroads look like a Sunday School picnic!

The worst is that as a result of the freedom of movement that equal citizens will enjoy, it will not be possible to keep the stream of homeless Black citizens out of established White, Coloured and Indian urban areas. The Government will try to check the stream, but will not succeed. New areas will have to be created. The Government will have to bar these people from settling in White, Coloured or Indian areas. Those against whom this prohibition is issued, however, will immediately say they are citizens of the country, and have freedom of movement. They will ask why they may not settle where they want to. It will be regarded as discrimination. The Government will therefore once again be accused of practising discrimination.

The hon the Minister will probably ask me now if I have not read clause 12, according to which he is authorised to allot a piece of land as a piece of land on which people who cannot obtain housing can live. Furthermore the hon the Minister in accordance with this clause can issue regulations in accordance with which provision can be made for the orderly development of land as a residential area, etc. In regard to this one should also bear in mind clauses 4(c), 4(d) and 4(e).

The measures built into this, create the impression that the promotion of orderly urbanisation is being worked on. The problem is just that the hon the Minister has put the cart before the horse! The White Paper and the legislation which supposedly has to exercise control, but which at the same time abolishes influx control, is unfortunately just a lot of words at this stage. What has the Government done, practically speaking, to bring about orderly urbanisation from the stream which is now being let loose as a result of the abolition of influx control? How are they going to receive these people in an orderly way? These are just empty words, because in my view nothing practical has yet been done to prepare to receive the stream of people. Areas have not really been demarcated yet where they will be settled, and the necessary housing is unavailable. [Time expired.]

Mr Speaker, I am sure the hon member for Koedoespoort will forgive me if I do not reply in any measure to his speech. He and I are simply living on different planets—not only cannot we get to odds and discuss matters like the Bill before the House today but we have no contact whatever in our philosophy and ideas. Therefore, I will leave it to the hon the Minister to deal with his extraordinary arguments which really belong way back in the Middle Ages. I certainly cannot be bothered to deal with them.

I must say, I think it is a very sad thing indeed that a Bill of this nature, which I believe to be the most important reform measure that this Government has ever passed, should be introduced at a time like this, when the country is under a state of emergency and where it will receive absolutely no attention whatever from the millions of people who should be welcoming it with open arms—I mean, of course, the Black population who have been harassed beyond endurance all these years by pass laws. The measure will now also receive no attention in the outside world which has badly been looking for some positive sign from the Government for the reform measures it has promised.

Are you suggesting I should withdraw it under these circumstances?

No, I am not; on the contrary, I wish the hon Minister had introduced this 10 years ago when it might have had the full impact which it deserves to have! [Interjections.] I only pointed out that that is the tragedy. However, the hon the Minister could perhaps have liaised with his colleague the hon the Minister of Law and Order not to have introduced his security measures at the same time that this measure came before this House.

It was a good week ago, I suppose, that the hon the Minister introduced this Bill, and I am afraid I had to reread his Second Reading speech to recollect the arguments which he used at that time. Since I am quite sure that nobody in this House can remember what he said, I just want to mention two or three of the salient points the hon the Minister drew to our attention.

The first was that he said it was the elementary right of every citizen to have freedom of movement within the borders of his own country. That, of course, is a sentiment with which all of us on these benches agree and indeed it is the major argument we have been advancing for decades against the pass laws and influx control. We are very glad that at long last the Government has come to accept that as an elementary right of every individual. It is one, of course, which is totally denied by the hon member for Koedoespoort and his party.

The second point the hon the Minister made was that legislative recognition of urbanisation was now necessary, and the Government accepted that, and that it must follow the ordinary route of laws, as regards housing, squatting, slums, health and town planning. We do not disagree with that either; we agree that there ought to be rules and laws which will control slums. We do not agree with the manner in which squatting is being controlled, but I must admit that one or two of the really objectionable clauses which originally appeared in this Bill and which seemed to nullify the good effects of the abolition of the legislation on influx control, were removed during the discussion in the standing committee. For that we are very grateful. The hon member Prof Olivier went into those details when he advanced the view of the Opposition in this House, after the hon the Minister’s Second Reading speech. It is not necessary therefore for me to expound on any of those aspects of the Bill; they were adequately covered in the excellent speech delivered by the hon member Prof Olivier.

The third point the hon the Minister made was that this Bill introduced clauses whereby there is a removal of laws, first of all which were highly complicated, as all hon members have agreed. Over all these years the pass laws were so complicated, as the hon the Minister himself admits, that not even the bureaucrats who had to administer those laws were able to understand them. It needed in depth legal study to understand those laws. Secondly, they were laws which made inroads into judicial decisions, into the right of the judiciary to make decisions. He quoted as examples the legislation on the Prohibition of Interdicts, which we too have objected to over the years, and section 10 of the Blacks (Urban Areas) Act, which lays down the 72 hour maximum for the presence of a Black man in an urban area unless he had been born there, had worked for one employer for ten years or had been in the city for 15 continuous years. He also mentioned section 29 of the same Act which gave officials, commissioners and later magistrates quasi-judicial powers to decide who was idle or undesirable and could be expelled from the towns. Finally, the hon the Minister mentioned—this is very important—that the object of this Bill was to phase out the system of migrant labour. That is something which we welcome with open arms because all of us have been expounding on the evils of the migrant labour system ever since I can remember.

Indeed, it was the study of the migrant labour system that first brought me into politics—heaven preserve me—in the mid-forties, when I prepared evidence for the Institute of Race Relations to the Fagan Commission on the second aspect of that Commission’s inquiry which was to inquire into the whole aspect of migrant labour in South Africa. [Interjections.] The first term of reference of the Commission’s inquiry was to inquire into the laws which governed Africans in the urban areas. That commission was appointed by General Smuts in 1946. General Smuts was no liberal, as anybody who has followed his career would, I think, agree. He was, however, a highly intelligent man who recognised that post-war South Africa—that is post-World War II South Africa—was going to be a very different place from pre-World War II South Africa in as much as thousands upon thousands of Black people had flocked into the urban areas to prosecute the war effort, invited in because they were needed. They came to Cape Town—probably in droves—for the first time because Cape Town had not been very familiar with Black labour until World War II came about, and the labour of Black people was urgently required, not only to man the factories that were set up to prosecute the war effort, but of course to man the docks for all the ships that were passing around the Cape of Good Hope on their way to the Middle East.

General Smuts realised that the principle, which had been laid down and followed in regard to Blacks in the urban areas, would no longer be applicable. That was, of course, the Stallard Commission’s philosophy which laid down that Black people—“Natives” as they were then known—could come into the urban areas and serve the White man, to depart from the urban areas when their services were no longer required. That may have served a purpose up to World War II. From World War II onwards, however, it was no good at all, because the Blacks who came in at that time, came in with their families. They were no longer leaving them behind in what were known as the Native reserves. They were bringing their families with them, on a permanent basis, with the intention of staying. Therefore the laws had to be changed. The Fagan Commission was therefore appointed, and it reported in 1948, admitting that conditions had changed and that the laws had to change, and accordingly it recommended changes. It used some very telling phrases such as: “We need them and they need us.” That was, of course, nothing short of the truth. [Interjections.]

They quoted a dominee on that issue.

They may have quoted a dominee, but as far as I can see the dominee did not subsequently play much of a part in seeing that the migrant labour system was removed. They then went on to say that one could perhaps guide and control the flow of Blacks to the urban areas, but that one could not stop that flow. They acknowledged what they called the “push factor” of rural poverty amongst Blacks—even then, in 1946-47 when they were investigating the issue, and that has become much worse since then— and the “pull factor” of job opportunities in the urban areas. They recommended accordingly that the laws be changed and that the permanent urbanisation of Black people be recognised and catered for.

Well, General Smuts accepted the recommendations of the Fagan Commission, but then came the disaster—and I mean disaster—of the 1948 general election, and General Smuts’ government went out of power and the National Party came into power. It promptly reversed the recommendation of the Fagan Commission’s report and went right back to Stallard and his dictum that Blacks should only be in the urban areas as long as they served the White man and should thereafter depart from the urban areas. That is the policy we have been labouring under ever since.

I am very sorry that the hon member for Klip River has disappeared, because I wanted to compliment him on the fact that he had at last seen the light and had changed his mind.

Temporarily.

I do not know whether it is temporary …

Until there is a new State President.

No, I do not think it is that at all. I think the hon member was speaking with considerable sincerity and vigour. I think he actually now believes that the urbanisation of the Blacks is a factor that has to be accepted in our lives and that the laws have to be changed. I do not, of course, think it is a sin for anyone to change his mind, politically speaking.

Especially if they are on their way to the PFP.

Well, I would hardly say that.

As long as they are on the right path. [Interjections.]

All of us here have changed our parties, even that hon member.

Why do you not welcome my change of mind?

Because you went the wrong way.

Well, because the hon member changed in the direction of what I call the Middle Ages,’ and not towards modern, industrial South Africa, which all of us have now accepted. [Interjections.]

It is a beautiful age, because you and I are in the middle ages.

Well, I am really beyond the middle age, let me tell the hon member, but anybody who changes for the better, who accepts the facts of the situation and is therefore prepared to say that he had made a mistake in the past should, I believe, be complimented and not chastised. That is why I would very much liked to tell the hon member for Klip River that we are all very pleased about that.

Since the 1948 election one law after the other has been put on the Statute Book. There are two fat volumes of Butterworths just labelled “Blacks”; they were called “Bantu”—I suppose before that they were called “Plurals”, I am not sure but the nomenclature changes very rapidly in this House. These laws subjected Blacks to the most rigid restrictions on their mobility, on their right to seek a livelihood in the best possible market and, perhaps the cruellest of all—which the hon member for Klip River emphasised—deprived them of the right to lead a family life. It was during Dr Verwoerd’s term of office that the most far-reaching of these measures were put on the Statute Book. One need only look at the laws passed in the fifties and up to the midsixties to see that those were the most stringent laws of all.

The most rigid was Act 54 of 1952. That was the Act which introduced section 10 of the Urban Areas Act with the prohibition on Blacks staying in an urban area for longer than 72 hours. Anybody who was not born in the area or had not worked for one employer for ten years or who had not been in the city for 15 successive years—since overthrown, I might say, by several cases in the courts of law—was doomed to the life of a migrant worker. That meant that he spent 11 months of every year working in the city or on the mines or wherever he had a job, and saw his family for only one month of the year. What a disgraceful system which allowed him only one month a year to spend with his family!

Does your point of view also apply to the migrant labour system in other countries?

No, I am now talking about citizens, but I do not like the migrant labour system in other countries either.

I just wanted to inquire.

No, the point is that every country has restrictions on aliens—real aliens not created aliens like the six million we have created in the four independent states—from other countries. For example, America does not allow Mexicans to enter that country as they wish. They have to get permits and many of them do not.

So the morals then disappear?

No, it is not a question of morals. [Interjections.] That is a ridiculous argument. I want to tell the hon the Minister that in any normal country a man could apply for citizenship if he had been working there for a certain number of years. However, because the Aliens Act specifically excluded Blacks from applying for citizenship they were never able to become citizens and bring their wives here. The hon the Minister must remember that there were many laws that prevented migrants from doing so.

I am not talking about laws; I am talking about your view on migrant labour.

I must tell the hon the Minster that there is a difference between the citizen of a country and an alien because every country has its laws about aliens. Therefore that is something that has to be accepted.

He is not listening.

No, he is not going to listen to me. Anyway, what I want to tell the hon the Minister who is feeling very satisfied with himself is that it is the Government’s policy since 1948, when they reinstituted the whole policy of migrant labour as the basis of our labour policy in this country, which is responsible for the housing shortage. It is reflected in the shortage of housing—a shortage of half a million houses for Blacks in the urban areas throughout the country. It has been reflected in the development of squatter camps like Crossroads. Crossroads is a memorial to the whole migrant labour system and the Government’s reluctance to allow Blacks to come into and work in the Western Cape. As the hon the Leader of the Official Opposition mentioned the other day that the Government’s insistence on the Western Cape being reserved as a Coloured labour preference area resulted in the total non-provision of housing for Blacks in the Western Cape. In 10 years, right throughout the seventies, not a single family house was built for Blacks in the Western Cape. The hon the Minister looks quizzical but I can assure him that that is so. I have asked questions about this year after year in this House. Because of that policy, because the Government was determined to reserve the Western Cape for Whites and Coloured people only, not a single family house was built during the seventies for Blacks. That is why we have Crossroads, and that is why we have those shocking incidents of faction fighting and of deaths and destruction at Crossroads.

It is not only the deliberate lack of the provision of housing which reflects the old policy of the Government, which, I am delighted to say, is being abandoned now; it is of course also the provision of schooling. In particular, high schools in the urban areas were not provided, the idea being that children reaching high-school age would go to their so-called homelands and get their high-school education there. Then, I might tell the hon the Minister, they experience great difficulty in being readmitted to the urban areas. This is one of the really big grievances which the Blacks have in the urban areas.

Black women, I might add, were most discriminated against of all those people. They were not allowed to come into many areas, even as migrant workers. They were doomed to a life of poverty in the homelands or the old Native Reserves. That is why we have in the Western Cape hundreds of thousands of Black women who are here illegally. They are here illegally because their only hope of providing any sort of livelihood for themselves and their children is by coming in from the Black homelands to try to find work in the urban areas. These people are fugitives from poverty, and they are ever on the run from the Police. What a way to treat law-abiding citizens who are only attempting to provide a living for their children!

Now, Sir, we have seen the consequences of the Government’s policy over the past forty years. I am delighted to notice that the hon member for Klip River is back in the House.

I was called away for an urgent telephone call.

Good! I am not complaining. I am just sorry the hon member was not here when I said how pleased I was to hear that he had changed his mind about migrant labour. [Interjections.] Now, I am not taking the line taken by the hon member for Koedoespoort. I am genuinely pleased that the hon member for Klip River now has a new attitude towards Blacks coming into the urban areas. It is a very healthy attitude, and I am glad he has adopted it.

I hope you are feeling happy now, Tino! Helen is praising you!

Sir, it is a blot on the escutcheon of the National Party that over the years literally millions of Black people have been arrested and thrown into prison as a result of the pass laws.

Tino, why don’t you hang your head in shame? Helen is praising you!

I only mention the figure over the past ten years, because that is the only official figure I have. There is an estimate, I might add, of 17 million, according to an academic who did an investigation. Official figures, however, which I have obtained in this House over the past ten years add up to 2 111 087 Black people arrested under the pass laws and influx control legislation. That is the figure over the past ten years. What this adds up to in the destruction of goodwill and good race relations, in economic terms, with lost man-hours, in the effect on the relationship between the Police and the Black community, is simply horrific.

Something I have mentioned in this House year in and year out is how this policy of the Government has poisoned the relationship between the Police and the Black community. It has made the Blacks regard the Police as oppressors instead of people who are there to protect their interests. What it has amounted to in contempt for the law, heaven only knows. What we do know, is the effect on the family life of Black people. We know the devastating effect on the population explosion, which is something about which at least the medical men in this House should take note. It has also given rise to a tremendous increase in illegitimacy and in one-parent families and in incidences of Black male migrant workers taking up with women in the urban areas, fathering children without supporting them, and going home for the one-month period that they have, and producing children in the homelands and in the Black states as well.

I believe that if this Government had deliberately set out to create an unstable society it could not have done better than it has done in this manner since 1948.

Now, Sir, why has it taken the Government forty years to discover its mistake? I should like the hon the Minister, when he has finished dishing out sweets, to tell us why it has taken the Government forty years to appreciate the mistake it has made.

There have been other commissions apart from the Fagan Commission. There have been the Industrial and Agricultural Requirements Commission, the Smit Commission and the Viljoen Commission; and all these commissions have pointed out the dangers and consequences of the migrant labour system. Why then, one wonders, did it take the Government 40 years to change its policy and get rid of influx control and the pass laws? Why did it take the Government so long to get rid of a policy which economists have condemned outright?

It took 40 years for Chris to arrive!

Yes, perhaps that is it. As I was saying, both economists and sociologists condemned influx control as being totally destructive.

Well, today, at last, we are ridding the Statute Book of this myriad of laws which should never have been passed in the first instance. There are 34 such laws in this schedule which are being abolished, and I have to say on behalf of the hon members on this side of the House, as the hon member Prof Olivier has already done, that we welcome the disappearance of these laws. I have to say, however, that the effect of passing a law like this one, now, is far less than it would have been had this law been passed, say, 10 years ago when this really would have been a most effective reform measure. The effect of this measure has been lost in the general tempo of the South Africa of the 1980s. Unfortunately, because of this tempo the effect of this measure has been totally lost.

If only this measure had been introduced when the disaster at Sharpeville took place in 1960! At that time 69 Blacks were shot dead by the Police and 128 wounded for carrying on a peaceful demonstration outside the Sharpeville police station against the pass laws. If only the Government had taken action then, instead of banning the ANC and the PAC! My colleagues in the Progressive Party and I opposed that banning. It is my belief that if only the Government had sat down and investigated the genuine grievances that arose out of the pass laws, South Africa would not today be facing its gravest-ever crisis and would not have been awaiting June 16 with a feeling of dread and with expectation of widespread violence, leading to the declaration of the state of emergency.

I am not saying that the Bill we are supporting today spells the end of all the restrictions on Blacks, although it will certainly considerably reduce the harassment to which Blacks have been subjected over the years.

Of course, many causes of grievances are still left unchanged. This Bill does not, for instance, address major issues like the Land Act and the Group Areas Act, neither does it solve the citizenship issue which is still very ambiguous. Moreover, it retains many effects of the provisions of the Prevention of Illegal Squatting Act which I mentioned earlier. Nevertheless, the Bill does represent far-reaching reform, and we on this side welcome it wholeheartedly.

Mr Speaker, the legislation that we are dealing with must have caused quite a stir. I find it interesting that an hon member such as the hon member for Houghton, whom we know to be a very liberal person and who has always fought for the abolition of influx control, always sees this matter from a political point of view.

I had thought that she would at least say something tonight about where these people are going to live. One would have expected a liberal at least to ask himself or herself where these people are going to live if we unlock the gates, so to speak, and allow them to come to the cities to look for work, since they are unable, as the hon member said, to find work in their homelands. I repeat my question, therefore: Where will those people live?

In Langlaagte.

This hon member says in Langlaagte. Very well, let me accept what the hon member said. I am glad it is being recorded in Hansard, because it represents the view of hon members of the NP and the PFP who are not concerned about the fact that we have no accommodation for Coloureds, Whites and Asians in Langlaagte at the moment, and who nevertheless want to allow these people who are streaming into this country to live in Langlaagte. [Interjections.]

†The hon member for Houghton says there were no Blacks in Cape Town in former days.

No, there were no Blacks.

The hon member is totally wrong.

Only a very few.

In 1919 one of the most wonderful people who has ever set foot in South Africa, a man called Bishop Lavis, and other people complained because Coloureds were living in slums while Blacks were living decently in hostels near the docks. [Interjections.] I am talking about Bishop Lavis, Beatty and other people who said the Blacks living in hostels had proper housing. Men like the Bishop Lavis understand the problem better than the hon member for Houghton, who is a liberal. They understood that when their wives were pregnant it was the custom of Black men to go away for six or seven months. According to their customs, Black men do not stay at home if there is another place they can go and work. [Interjections.] Hon members must not tell me stories about that. They must realise what the facts of life are.

In 1947 and before that, Natal University gave out a book—I tried to get hold of it—in which it was said that 40% of the Blacks whom they asked at that time, said they preferred to go to the mines and work there without taking their families with them. A bigger problem arose when they were asked whether they were going to live in the city with their family, because they asked which wife and which children had to go with them.

That was 40 years ago.

An old Broederbonder like the hon member Prof Olivier shakes his head. I can understand that because years ago he was thinking exactly the same as the people of that university. Today he has changed.

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

No, Sir, at this moment I am not answering any questions. The hon member must not say that he was not a Broederbonder.

*All these years, it has been the practice in Black states to send thousands and thousands of people to the mines, and they are still doing so. They come from Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

†Why do hon members not tell them that they are terrible people sending their workers here without their wives and without their children and that the workers suffer because of that? It is only on account of the political views of hon members that they are fighting these issues although they say they do so on moral grounds.

Would they not bring their wives if they could?

The hon member must tell Mr Gavin Relly not to go to Lusaka to talk to the ANC. He must talk to the people working in the mines and find out what they want.

They want their families there.

I at least expected the hon member for Houghton to worry about the children and families who will continue living in squalor—for instance in KTC—unless squatting is stopped in this country. [Interjections.]

It is important to note that this legislation is politically orientated.

Nobody can tell me that Prof Schlemmer and Prof Giliomee are not Progs. Their book, Against the Fences—Poverty, Passes and Privileges in South Africa, was the main reason for this change in the influx control laws. [Interjections.] I agree with the hon members that most of them have not read it, but some hon members have read it. The communists have an apt saying according to which one should not worry if one cannot attack another person’s belly because in due course he will get used to the sun and lie on his back. Then one can strike at his belly. This is what happened to the NP. The NP got fat and lazy and they are worthless not fit to run the country.

However, I want to get back to the Bill. I can prove to the House that two thirds of the Coloured population died before the age of 25 in 1919. Nobody killed them—they left them to live in squatter camps. People like Beatty and others said that the tuberculosis soil was the most dangerous thing in the country. There was the danger of children living under conditions that were not even fit for pigs.

If a person gets ill and dies in a squatter camp one can bury him but the ills of squatting remain within the community. These ills have been with us since 1902. There was squatting in Cape Town in those years and it is still here today. Cape Town has a permanent squatter culture.

They are also starving in the homelands!

I want to explain to the hon member for Houghton that there is a difference between the two situations. I would rather a Zulu child lived in a good and peaceful Zulu home—even if it only had mealie meal porridge every day and perhaps a piece of meat once a week—than have that child run around in the squalor and rubbish of places such as KTC and others in Cape Town. There are also murderous attacks on such people.

Then there are still people who for political reasons come to this House and say that all the gates should be opened so that the people can move into the cities. This happens when we do not have houses ready for them.

You can always send them to jail, can’t you!

No! That is typical of the sort of person who is always chopping and changing! Why does he have to go to jail? I want to tell the hon member that all people are entitled to apply for work, but the number of people who come to an area should be limited by the number of jobs available there. Since that hon member has become an associate of Anglo American and a proponent of other political views, he has forgotten the poor man. I want to ask him whether he believes that the minimum wage should be abolished immediately after the abolition of influx control.

In what connection?

If the hon member does not know that, he should not take part in this debate. [Interjections.]

Let us suppose, for example, that there are 200 jobs in a city such as Johannesburg and a worker earns R200 per month. If 800 people were to come to Johannesburg in search of work, more people would have to work for the same money, if one decided to share out the jobs among them. This means that such a worker would earn R50 a month.

[Inaudible.]

Oh yes! The alternative is to allow the people who did not get the jobs to remain unemployed and to go hungry. In the end, they will not be locked up for a pass offence, but for stealing, because such a man has to support his family and himself, and he cannot get a job. Such a man will end up by committing a criminal offence, therefore.

[Inaudible.]

Really, Sir, the hon member cannot get away from that! One simply cannot allow thousands of people to flock to places where there is no work for them. Nor can one allow thousands of people to flock to places where there is not accommodation for them.

Of course not!

Quite correct!

It is entirely wrong! [Interjections.]

Barnie, you are an AWB squatter!

Really, Sir, …

Ignore him.

Very well.

In a city such as Johannesburg, we have had one of the most tragic experiences. I am thinking, for example, of the old Sophia-town. I sometimes took loads of vegetables there, which we had fetched from my own shops, as well as from other shops and from the municipal market. It is true that these vegetables were no longer quite fresh. However, we took it to places where up to 40 people were often living on one stand and sleeping on sheets of corrugated iron. They actually had to pay other people up to R3 a month each for the sheets of corrugated iron on which they slept.

Where was influx control then?

That was in 1945.

Was there influx control at that time?

No, not in 1945. But just wait a minute.

Was there really no urban areas legislation?

Oh, no! Now that hon member wants to know what the position was in 1945 regarding influx control. After all, when one implements influx control legislation while 70 000 people are already settled in a particular area, surely one must begin by making provision for those people. Then control must be exercised with regard to the others who wish to come to that area later. Unfortunately, the hon member for Welkom finds it rather difficult to understand these things. [Interjections.] That is why the hon the Minister of Education and Culture sometimes listens to him so contemptuously. [Interjections.]

I just want to ask who wrote these documents which I have with me. They are not political people. They are this Mr Domingo and others, people who have had to witness the destruction of their own homes among their own people. Of course I believe in freedom of movement.

Never! [Interjections.]

Of course I believe that people should enjoy freedom of movement! In that case, however, there must be jobs for those people. Any person who has any capitalist inclinations will want to provide more and more jobs for more and more people, of course. However, one cannot allow a sick community to come into being. In a sick community, no growth is possible. A sick community of people who have no accommodation, who are poorly fed and clothed, is more costly in the end than the price of so-called progress. For these reasons, I find it very difficult to understand how on earth we can talk about controlled squatting in this day and age. Sir, it is absolutely impossible to control squatting. It is impossible to control squatting because one cannot uphold people’s right to move about freely and at the same time confine squatters to a specific area. Moreover, services have to be provided in the area in which those squatters are told to settle. Providing the necessary services to one single ordinary unit can easily cost between R5 000 and R10 000 today, depending on how and where the stand is situated. Let us say, for the sake of argument, that the cost is R2 000.

Rands or cents?

For heaven’s sake! Just listen to that! Is it asking too much to build another ordinary dwelling unit on that same stand at a cost of R2 000? The total cost of the unit concerned would then be R4 000 with regard to the provision of such a house. In that case, however, let us do everything we can in this connection, and let people also pay rent for those dwelling units which they will then occupy. However, let us continue to control the influx of people to our cities. The hon member for Hillbrow knows—and I have referred to this before; we cannot get away from it—that hundreds of Black children are roaming the streets of Hillbrow today…

Oh no, I do not know that!

Did you not mention that to the hon the Minister?

[Inaudible.]

What then did you ask him for? You spoke about Black children roaming the streets of Hillbrow, without anywhere to go. Where, do you think, they have to go?

Wake up Alfie!

They have to spend their nights in the open, perhaps with only a tree under which to hide. They have to sleep in parks. I am sorry, Sir, I do not want to become personal. It is, however, true that when the PFP cannot use the plight of destitute people for political gain they are quite prepared to leave them to starve and rot in sewage pipes. They do not care what happens to those poor people! [Interjections.] Politically, however, they make a big song and dance about it. Why? Purely for political gain; for no other reason on earth! [Interjections.]

You are talking about vagrants now!

Why do you refer to them as vagrants? No child is ever a vagrant!

But those children have no homes!

I tell you now, a child is never a vagrant! Any hon member who refers to a child under the age of fourteen years as a vagrant…

But they have no homes!

That does not matter! The word “vagrant” has, however, a very ugly meaning. It means much more than merely a homeless person. [Interjections.] Many of those children may perhaps even be orphans. The hon member for Hillbrow should refer to them as orphans then, but never as vagrants.

Allright, I will call them orphans then!

The biggest problem in this country at the moment is that we have changed from a system in which we believed. Maybe the Government or the party to which I belonged made many, many mistakes, but they did not make mistakes because they wanted to or because they hated people. They made these mistakes because they believed, sincerely believed that they were helping people. Now, if the world and everybody around asks for something new, maybe they must get it, but we have to look after those families and those children.

*I want to quote just a few examples tonight of one of the biggest…

You are a leftist member of the CP!

No, hon members must not think that the CP is not capable of fellow-feeling, just like anyone else. [Interjections.] Our feelings are exactly the same, because we come from a party which has been putting people first since 1948. [Interjections.]

†The hon member for Houghton pointed out that a lot of these families were on the streets and were experiencing great problems in keeping their children together. She was talking about children born out of wedlock.

No, I did not.

Oh yes, you did …

[Inaudible.]

… and she talked about people being unable to look after them. So, when we passed the Immorality Act, because we were against the fruits of immorality, the hon member took it as a reason to grind us into the ground, worldwide. She made a sin of it. She made it the worst thing in the world. This Government was in fact against the fruits of immorality, the birth of children whose parents did not want them to know them in the light of day.

[Inaudible.]

This was the biggest cause, and nothing else.

Take it easy!

Yes, I have to take it easy.

*I want to read something to hon members which has a bearing on this country which we all love. It will give hon members food for thought. In 1919, when this Government was not yet in power, a report was published … [Interjections.]

†The hon member was talking about things about which he knows nothing yet. In the report from which I want to quote the following is said about the non-European death rate in squatter camps:

It all boils down to a lack of proper housing. I want to quote further:

The cause of this was squatter camps and the way in which people lived. They refer here to certain places, and then they say the following:

That is the point. Hon members must think about that.

Then they go on to ask why Coloured labourers cannot work in the docks. They say:

They say they are healthy because they are not living in the squatter camps. They go on to say:

Do we not have the same story today? Are we in this House going to allow people to carry on living like this? Are we going to allow them to live in the same squatter conditions? Are we going to allow all this just because we want to change a law for political gain?

*Should we not perhaps re-examine this matter? One of the most striking things that are said in this report is that the slums are “cemeteries of the living”. An elderly priest once asked an old man how it felt to be dying. The old man replied: “Do not talk to me about death. I have been dying for years. I live in a squatters’ camp.” Hon members must bear in mind that we are still talking about Cape Town.

I want to come back to the work done by people such as Mr Domingo and others. I want to show hon members this report. [Interjections.] I want to show hon members what people have been saying about this over the years. They talk about squatters’ camps such as Werksgenot, Modderdam and others. Surely these are things with which we have become familiar over the years. Surely these are the diseases of our society. When one buries someone, one has got rid of the body, but the harm that is being done to the children in the squatters’ camps cannot be undone in two or three generations. Do hon members realise how long it took, when the Government was developing Elsies River, before any of those people were even prepared to pay for their housing? As a result of circumstances, the squatter develops a resistance to the normal way of life. When one treats a person like an animal, he becomes an animal, and he will behave like an animal.

I am asking hon members of this House tonight to consider not implementing this legislation until proper housing has been provided for these people. Do not use influx control as a kind of political buzz word to cause greater problems for people who are already having problems in the cities.

Can anyone tell me how many Black names there are on a waiting list for housing at the moment?

†Maybe the hon member for Houghton can tell me: How many Black people’s names are on a waiting list for housing?

Hundreds of thousands, because you do not care at all.

There are 200 000-plus people who have to be housed, yes, but the hon member wants more people here because she is not interested in their way of life and in their lifestyle. She is interested only in what she can achieve politically. I am so glad the hon member for Houghton thanked the hon member for Klip River tonight because, according to her, he has seen the light. She said he has actually seen the light. I can understand that she has had some of those hon members on a string for years, but I never thought she would have a “verkrampte” like the hon member for Klip River on a string, and that he would follow the hon member for Houghton the way he is doing at the moment.

*I trust that this hon Minister will realise that this problem must be solved. We must first provide housing and create jobs for these people before influx control can be abolished.

Mr Speaker, I listened attentively to the speech of the hon member for Langlaagte. Permit me to say at once that regardless of what anyone might say of him, I have come to know him over the years as someone with a great deal of compassion for his fellow man. The thread running through his speech here this evening attested to his compassion for children and for those subject to social hardships, and I am 110% in agreement with that compassion exuded by his speech.

I respectfully want to suggest to the hon member for Langlaagte that the very fact that he has an understanding of, and compassion for, shocking socioeconomic conditions, the neglect of children and people who are living in parlous circumstances, ought to convince him this evening that he should support the Government in the implementation of this measure in South Africa. This is the simple fact of the matter, and we do not need to argue with one another about that.

I can refer hon members of the CP to questions to which replies were given in this Parliament on 27 February 1984, on 14 May 1984, on 10, 12 and 14 March 1985 and on 6 March 1986. The latest question which, to my mind, gives the best perspective on the matter which he highlighted, is that to which a reply was given in this House on 25 March of this year by the hon the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning about the number of people arrested in 1985 owing to influx control measures. I can quote all these figures to hon members, but I shall content myself with one figure relating to Pretoria. In the year 1985 29 000 Black men were arrested and charged in terms of contraventions of pass-book measures. In Johannesburg approximately 20 000 people were arrested.

Let me tell the hon member for Langlaagte, in regard to his argument about having a great understanding of, and compassion for, family housing and for the stability which the family guarantees, that if he had only made a study of the numbers of these people arrested, he would virtually, in each of these cases, specifically have been able to make out a case for influx control being lifted so that we can help to stabilise families and communities.

How? [Interjections.]

I am not one of those people who are concerned about the fact that one apologises for the wrong things one has done in the past. There are many things in the country’s history, many things in a party’s history and many things in an individual’s life about which one can feel oneself at liberty to say one is sorry that one made a mistake. Let us, in all fairness, be honest and acknowledge that although we had the very best of intentions—let me say at once that I do not believe that the NP ever had anything but good intentions—with influx control we did a tremendous amount of damage and caused tremendous hardships in the lives of other people.

The hon member for Houghton spoke here this evening, and I just want to tell her that I see that my opponents now have a little circular that they are distributing in my constituency and in which they quote her. I am so glad she likes me, and I am so glad she calls me “her Albert”. I do want to get back to saying something else—and I shall do so—but I just want to tell her: Helen, it is all very well if you want to show your fondness for me, but just do not put your arms around me, because then I really am in trouble! [Interjections.]

This evening I want to get away from party politics altogether…

Order! The hon member for Innesdal should find another occasion for such a declaration! [Interjections.]

Mr Speaker, I submit to your greater insight into these matters. [Interjections.]

As a quite ordinary South African parliamentarian—this might sound very liberal to many people and quite off the rails too—and as one person to another I should like to tell the hon member for Houghton frankly this evening that as far as these measures are concerned, measures in regard to which she, without any assistance, took up the cudgels in this House for many years, she had a better insight into the problems and could see further than many other people in South Africa. [Interjections.]

I want to add that although she does lash out at us at times, taking us to task in a manner which we feel is very unfair to the NP, for example in regard to security legislation, I hardly think there will ever again be anyone in the history of this country who could do as much for human rights as she has done. So much for the “declaration of love”, however, because I know that everything I am now going to say will be held against me! [Interjections.]

Let me, just in passing, tell hon members of the CP that I hear them speaking about the Innesdal constituency and about how wonderful things are there. Let me just tell them that whoever their informants might be, either they do not understand that constituency or they do not understand the people there! By the way, I am reminded of the fact that when we held an election in 1970, Mr Jaap Marais sat next to me. He was absolutely convinced that for them that constituency was in the bag. Never in my life will I forget his consternation after the postal and special votes had been counted!

Let me tell the CP that it has a very big problem. It has a very big problem amongst the voters—in regard to this measure too— because although we are also criticised about our policy and about this measure, the majority of the voters in South Africa, in fact 99% of them, say we have no choice—we must change in South Africa.

Where do you get that figure?

The CP says our changes are wrong …

Where do you get that figure of 99%?

Sir, let me tell hon members of the CP that they will not find a single person in South Africa who says we should not change? Why, even in its own ranks the CP has people, the Orania crowd, who want to fight for a White homeland! [Interjections.] In their own party, with their own standpoints in regard to homelands, for example, their efforts are aimed at change. [Interjections.]

We take tremendous pleasure in supporting this measure. The hon member for Koedoespoort said influx control was a positive measure. With just these few answers to certain questions I have tried to indicate that we should not try to convince ourselves this evening that all our high ideals and sound viewpoints on influx control did not eventually amount to anything.

The CP speaks about the rights of the Whites as if the Whites had no rights at all, and there is not the slightest bit of truth in that. Just look at the situation in every South African city when it comes to housing, job opportunities—including job opportunities in the public sector—and dozens of other things. What I am saying is that anyone who, in present-day South Africa, speaks of the Whites as not having any rights, as still having to achieve certain rights, is instilling in the Whites a very dangerous illusion as far as their aspirations are concerned.

Who said that? You see, you are now setting up an Aunt Sally!

The politics of yesteryear have also caught up with the CP. They are in trouble, as are all the NP’s opponents, in the sense that with their eyes fixed on yesteryear they are shouting vengeance. Sir, I have no doubt—you can look at all of the Government’s opponents, from the left-wing elements to the right-wing radicals—that they are all shouting for vengeance. The NP says we cannot solve the White man’s difficulties if we are obsessed by ideas of vengeance. We must confine our attention to positive standpoints and give our people a positive vision of the future in South Africa.

On whom do we want to avenge ourselves?

Albert, you are setting up one Aunt Sally after another!

The hon member for Jeppe can talk about Aunt Sallys as much as he likes, but there is something from which he will not deflect a single hon member on this side of the House, even in the difficult circumstances in which our country finds itself today, and that is our absolutely positive orientation, our faith in what we are doing and our belief in justice. The measure we are dealing with today bears the stamp of our complete commitment, that of dispensing justice to everyone in South Africa so that we can ensure stability for our children.

I have already said that we do not consider it shameful to apologise. Many people in South Africa are surprised at the Black Power slogans sounding out all around us. If we are to be honest, we must acknowledge that the drums of racism in White politics have been beating out the message of a “Black threat!” for so long now that we ought not to be at all surprised at the intensity of the Black Power slogans that are now coming to the fore.

We should like to say that we agree with all the hon members on this side of the House and also the hon the Minister who said that this measure represented the most fundamental change in the history of this Government. There is no single measure on the Statute Book at present that represents a more fundamental change than specifically this measure. [Interjections.] The NP is not introducing this measure in conflict with the interests of our own people, but specifically for their benefit, because we are hereby saying, loudly and clearly, that the old concept of White South Africa—a part of South Africa that belongs only to the White people, and the homelands which belong only to the Black people—is being wiped out completely by this measure. [Interjections.] We speak of South Africa as a country in which its citizens—Whites, Coloureds, Indians and Black people—work together on a future because they all feel they are partners in this country. [Interjections.]

One of the biggest problems faced by the CP, whether that is their intention or not, is that all people in South Africa outside the White-group spectrum—therefore all Black people, Coloureds and Indians—experience the CP’s policy, whatever that may be, as a rejection of them as people and as South African citizens. As long as people in a country experience a political party’s policy as one of rejection, one is dealing with emotions that one will never be able to handle.

That is why this measure epitomises our standpoint, and that is that we want to do justice to everyone. We are looking for allies for our cause, the cause of the Whites, and not comrades for Moscow’s cause.

From a study of the history of the Black people, it is apparent that many mistakes were made in the past, but it is no use fighting about what is past. One should merely look to the future.

I think the CP’s single biggest problem, as far as Black politics is concerned, is that it has taken over all the NP’s liabilities. We walk forward with our ideals, a new vision and a positive idealism, but they have taken over all our liabilities. As far as this measure is concerned, they are apparently also dragging around the burden of influx control as an answer to the future problems of this country. Strength to their arm, is what we wish them if they want to drag along this load; we as a Government have decided that we are going to meet the future without this burden.

That load is your mandate.

The hon member for Langlaagte speaks of economic development. Let us put it to him in very simple terms. We have factories in South Africa which produce. We have a tremendous shortage of housing. What we are now looking at, ie a positive campaign of urbanisation, is in itself an economic generating source. Every single house that is built is made up of cement, bricks, walls, doors, windows and roof-sheeting. [Interjections.] I have made a few calculations, and from these calculations it would appear that there is tremendous economic dynamism embodied solely in this challenge we are now facing—ie urbanisation—which will eventually prove to be to the benefit of all people. That is why we know what we are now doing is the right thing.

Let us be honest and acknowledge that in so many respects influx control discriminated against people. One need merely mention a few instances, for example that of initiative. The man living in his Black State, completely imbued with the feeling of his own intrepreneurship and drive, was restricted by influx control. Let us have no further illusions about the breaking up of families. It is a universal phenomenon. One need only look, for example, at Frankfurt in West Germany. There are thousands upon thousands of migratory labourers, but the fact of the matter is that the West German Government is faced with tremendous socio-economic problems as a result. For example, simply look, too, at the rights of the individual, his mobility and his job situation and the choices he has. Surely we discriminated here in the implementation of influx control. For how many years did we not say that politically all Black people would remain linked up to their Black States? That is true, after all. The hon members of the Conservative Party will concede as much. They know the history of this Constitution and know in what debates we became involved. The hon member for Rissik, who is always honest in such matters, will know that he and I conducted many debates. He fundamentally disagreed with me, it is true, but that is a debate that has been in progress for a long time now. To a very large extent we therefore did, along the way, take work that was not available to everyone in the free-market system. That is true. I am also saying this as a businessman. One still sees it today. All of us who employ people in the cities know, do we not, that along the way our own people had opportunities that others did not have in the free-market system. We are not apologising for being alive. We are not saying that we were not conceived and born in sin. We are not saying that we must crawl, and that is one of the interesting things I have encountered along the way. For many years now, along the way—as in the case of most of the hon members in this House—I have had dealings with many Black leaders, community leaders, and I have seen that no one in the world has any respect for anyone who crawls. A Government or party or person who wants to crawl can forget it, because it gets him nowhere. That is not the spirit in which the National Party wants to bring about this kind of change.

You slide along on your stomachs.

We are speaking about social discrimination and also about the small business sector. Only last year I saw a group of people get hold of a Black man who was selling brushes and combs near the station because he was trading illegally. Fortunately—thank heavens— we are also coming to light with measures to rectify that sort of thing in the future, and many of these measures involving influx control have, as far as we are concerned, led to a feeling or standpoint of paternalism. In other words, what we do for Black people is good, and they ought to be thankful that we do all these wonderful, good things for them. That is, after all, the truth of the matter. That is a burden of the National Party that the Conservative Party is, unfortunately, still carrying lugging around, ie the fact that it decides what is good for other people. [Interjections.]

There are many things that are going to result from the abolition of influx control, and of course many consequences involve land. Hon members of the Conservative Party are quite right. We all believe that we shall still have to make a very great deal of land available to communities and groups, because the process of urbanisation simply does require land. After all, we cannot continue having Black, Coloured and Indian residential areas which are poor adjuncts of rich White cities.

What about the political rights? What do you say about that?

We are speaking about land. We are speaking about the division of wealth.

We are also speaking about political rights.

There is a simple truth. The Whites, with their right to possess land, cumulatively amassed wealth. The fact of the matter is that the system in Black States discriminated against Black people there. So they could not, with land as an asset, amass wealth. In numerous places in our own area we denied people land tenure. One of the results of the abolition of influx control is going to be that with our system of land tenure that came into effect earlier, Black people are going to share fully, as partners, in the wealth amassed by virtue of our economic system in South Africa.

Let us look at State expenditure. There is something I am completely convinced of. With this new urbanisation policy of ours, with Black people here in our midst, together with a new constitutional dispensation that we are entering upon, all population groups will be able to claim a more rightful share of State expenditure. As we are now doing in the tricameral system, too, in the future the political structure may also establish a better and more equitable overall system in the eyes of the people.

Tell us all about what it is going to be like.

Every revolution has its feet firmly on the ground and, figuratively speaking, every revolution therefore has firm ground under its feet. [Interjections.] If we just apply this statement to South Africa, every person who can think and understand will know that the abolition of influx control measures embodies a very great future for South Africa.

There is something I want to say very frankly. The humanity in legislation—the hon member for Langlaagte will understand this, and he agrees with me—means more to the National Party and to South Africa at this stage than the mere provisions in that legislation, and here we have such a piece of legislation. The humanity in this legislation means more than the provisions we are repealing.

I do not think I would agree with you.

We have so often looked at peoples and communities in South Africa that we have often altogether missed seeing the human beings. We as the Governing Party say: Over and above the peoples, the groups, we should also like to see the human beings, because it is not a man’s skin that ultimately counts. It is the man under the skin that counts. So when we speak about reform, when we speak about the rights of the individual, we do not mince matters when it comes to what we eventually want to do. We do not mince words, because we believe that this is the just course to adopt. One does not, after all, win any future victories with debates. One wins one’s future victories by the decisions one takes, and decisions such as these are winners as far as the future of the White man is concerned. In looking at this measure, let me extend to the hon the Minister and the rest of the Cabinet, and to everyone who worked on this, a sincere word of thanks on behalf of my children, because here is a measure that is helping to shape the future, which is helping to create stability and which will allow the people in South Africa to look us in the eye and make the necessary progress.

People think power is to be found in politics. That is not true. Ultimately the power in South Africa is embodied in the extent to which we can maintain the system in which we all believe. True power is to be found in the system, in the freedom that people experience and in those things that come into being in a society as a result of the freedom of people. Power is to be found in the system and in the people who believe in it. If we can, with this measure, ensure that Black people also share in the free-market system, we are investing power in our country and in the people of our country by way of this system. If, by way of this measure, we can involve Black people in a democratic political dispensation, we are vesting power in the system, and ultimately that is very important.

I am telling hon members of the CP what I also tell people in my constituency: Ultimately it is not how separate we are, but how united we are in this country, that will be the deciding factor. That is the fundamental question. Do we have national unity? Do all the groups and communities have a desire for national unity?

This measure brings us to the brink of freedom. Let us say as much to hon members of the CP. We have learnt from bitter experience that one cannot corner freedom and think one is going to catch it. Those in the CP who want to confine people’s efforts to achieve freedom in the absolutistic pieces of land that they make available, will definitely not engender peace by such a political policy. No government can guarantee anything greater than peace. That is why we give thanks for a measure such as this which guarantees freedom.

The hon member for Langlaagte spoke about poverty, but let us be frank with each other. On a previous occasion the hon member joked about my use of the image, but let me say this to him again. Poverty is like a merry-go-round—it starts where it stops and stops where it starts, and it goes endlessly on.

What are the characteristics of poverty and squatting?

Let me tell the hon member that Dr Verwoerd’s site and service scheme in the early ’fifties was nothing but a kind of glorified scheme for squatters. It was a self-help building scheme whereby people were uplifted who had no accommodation and were living in precarious circumstances. That is what we have in mind.

Poverty in South Africa is the costliest of all items. People speak about education being expensive. People speak about health services being expensive. People speak about defence which is expensive. There is, however, nothing more expensive than poverty, because it is a tremendous price one pays for poverty, and the burden of poverty is increasingly weighing down the scales. [Interjections.]

Order!

That is why the dynamism underlying this measure is that of breaking out of the poverty spiral with people who are free to use their initiative, who can establish themselves economically and can help build up the future of South Africa. We do not want our children to reproach us one day for what we failed to do when we had the power to do it.

[Inaudible.]

Let me tell the hon member for Sasolburg, in all humility, that we on this side of the House have never tried to blow hot and cold. What we say accords with the way we see things. Let me also tell the hon member for Sasolburg—he is a good man—that with every standpoint that I raise in this House I will again win the Innesdal constituency for the NP, with an even larger majority. The people in South Africa are looking for dynamism, for the leadership of people of conviction, and above all they are looking for steps to be taken that make sense—and they do not have to worry. We recently won the city council election in Pretoria East. It is quite interesting to note that the CP does not tell us how many votes they drew there. [Interjections.]

Order!

One cannot win any victories in the future by beating the drums of rascism. In South Africa this is no time for political muzzle-loaders. What we now need in South Africa are picks and shovels. The NP will help everyone, with his idealism and enthusiasm, enjoy the freedom to help, with pick and shovel, to build up al and beautiful country in which we are looking for positive people. We do not want to drag along any negativism such as that which hon members of the CP want to drag into White politics. Hon members of the CP must, in Heaven’s name, think for a moment, because they are dragging our people down by their negative attitude which will eventually not even help them surmount their problems, but will actually dash them to the ground. It is with great conviction and with a great feeling of gratitude that we support this measure.

Mr Chairman, before I come back to my former friend, the hon member for Innesdal, I ask hon members to permit me to say a few things about the hon member for Klip River. Earlier today he rejected suggestions from this side of the House that there had been a period during his political career in which he had held different views in respect of the Coloureds. I think I understood him correctly.

Quote it correctly.

I shall quote the hon member’s words verbatim from Hansard, and I hope I shall quote him correctly. In a debate in the House of Assembly, the hon member said (Hansard, 1968, col 1379):

That is what the hon member said, and he then continued (Col 1380):

[Interjections.] An hon member of the United Party, Mr Hourquebie, then put a question to the hon member for Klip River:

The hon member for Klip River then replied (Col 1381):

[Interjections.] Sir, I shall say no more about the hon member. [Interjections.]

I now want to come back to the hon member for Innesdal. When I listen in this debate to the mock fight taking place between the “New Nationalists” and the hon members of the PFP, particularly when I listen to “Our Albert” …

Order! The hon member for Barberton must refer to the hon member as the hon member for Innesdal.

That was just an endearing name, Sir. I did not mean it in a contemptuous way. [Interjections.]

The hon members to whom I referred, especially the hon member for Innesdal and the hon member for Houghton, revealed that rare characteristic that one finds in only one animal, the cat. They have the ability to fight and woo at the same time. [Interjections.]

That is nonsense, but it sounds good! [Interjections.]

Sir, if ever there was a true convert of the hon member for Houghton in this House, it is really the hon member for Innesdal. Through the years, when we were still all in the National Party, we listened ad nauseum to speeches such as the one made by the hon member for Innesdal tonight. The only difference, however, is that those speeches, with their content which we know so well, were not made by the hon member for Innesdal at the time, but by the hon member for Houghton—almost word for word. All the arguments used by the hon member for Houghton in her attacks through the years—and we remember them so well—on the then Minister of Bantu Administration and Development, Mr M C Botha, are virtually the same arguments, word for word, advanced by the hon member for Innesdal here tonight. If it would be worth the trouble, I should like to read in Hansard what was said in the speeches of the hon member for Innesdal at the time. I should like to read what he said, because I know what his arguments were then.

He was still fighting then; he was not wooing yet!

In one respect, however, the hon member for Innesdal was quite correct, of course. The National Party has made a radical turn to the left in respect of its traditional policy of separate development. I also agreed with the hon member for Innesdal when he said this measure in respect of the abolition of influx control was the single most important confirmation that the National Party had made a left turn and was running back as fast as it could on its own tracks of the previous 38 years. The hon member for Innesdal was correct in showing that the NP Government now regards it as its greatest right and obligation to undo, in the shortest possible time, everything it brought about earlier. That is what the National Party is doing today.

The measure we are discussing today cannot be regarded as a single isolated measure. It must also be seen in the context of other legislation which still has to be dealt with during this session. I am referring to the Bill which will deal with new raceless, colourless identity documents which, so we hear, will be instituted. This Bill concerns the so-called restoration of the lost citizenship of some Blacks in Southern Africa. This Bill cannot be properly appreciated if one does not also look at the practical implications of the Bill for South Africa.

In its White Paper on so-called orderly urbanisation, the Government says the following, and I quote from page 16:

This was always the objective of the NP—it was, when it still believed in separate development—that we would do everything in our power in respect of the urbanisation of the Blacks, which is inevitable and inescapable, to…

But did it succeed?

I am coming to that.

We wanted to channel this to the Black homelands themselves. That is why the NP asked its supporters to make sacrifices in the good old days. They not only had to make financial sacrifices by means of taxes, but also had to make their land, which had been in White hands for generations, available for the implementation of the NP’s ideals. Were our people prepared to make those sacrifices? Yet the hon member is asking me whether that policy succeeded.

If one looks at what is going on in the world at large today, we are experiencing a state of emergency. [Interjections.] No, wait a minute. There is no state of emergency tonight in those parts of South Africa where separate development has been implemented successfully and where the Black man himself is governing his people—viz in the Transkei, the Ciskei, Bophuthatswana and Venda.

What about the urban areas?

Is that proof that separate development has failed, or is the contrary true, viz that integration is necessarily headed for chaos in Southern Africa? [Interjections.]

We are told that separate development has failed. [Interjections.] In a certain respect it is not separate development which has failed, but rather the people who had the responsibility of making it work.

Of whom you were one! [Interjections.]

By coincidence I was not a Minister.

May I put a question to the hon member?

No, Sir, the hon member may sit down again. [Interjections.]

André, go and talk to Clive!

It is particularly since Dr Piet Koornhof was given the responsibility of implementing the policy of separate development that absolute stagnation set in.

What became of 1978?

This happened for the simple reason that Dr Piet Koornhof never really believed in separate development.

Yes, that is a good point.

He said in Palm Springs in the USA that apartheid was dead. When there was an uproar about that in NP ranks, we heard all of a sudden that he had been incorrectly reported.

What became of 1978?

Ostensibly it is the incorrect concept of apartheid which is dead.

The hon member for Innesdal is rejoicing tonight, and before him the hon member for Bellville did. It is not only the caricature of apartheid which is dead. They now say apartheid itself is dead, although the hon member for Randburg does not believe it to be quite dead yet.

He tortures apartheid.

The NP received a mandate to govern this country on a platform of separate development, and we who are sitting here in the CP now, were still part of the party which asked for and received that mandate from the voters of South Africa in 1981.

Have you heard of party congresses?

What about your Coloured homeland?

We are talking about Black influx control. [Interjections.] I am not running away from a Coloured homeland, and as was said by the hon member for Klip River, and years ago by the hon the Minister of Education and Development Aid, who was an ardent advocate of a Coloured homeland in his level-headed years, I also say tonight that the only just and justifiable solution for Southern Africa is a separate homeland for each people. [Interjections.] That is the answer.

The NP is replacing all measures which were placed on the Statute Book not only by its predecessors, but also in particular by the NP itself, and which were imperative and indispensable for the creation and the eventual realisation of separate homelands for every people in this country. It is all very well to say they are replacing these so-called negative discriminatory measures by an orderly policy of urbanisation, but where is the legislative muscle? The NP Government’s timing is just as amazing. On a day in our country’s history of absolute chaos and anarchy right here in the Western Province, this Government talks sanctimoniously about orderly urbanisation. [Interjections.] Who says they are going to be responsible for that orderly urbanisation? That is conveniently left to private initiative. [Interjections.] Give me a chance, I do not have much time.

What is more, the President’s Council did retain one little condition in its recommendations. This condition was that before anyone was permitted in the city, he at least had to have employment or housing. The Government does not lay that down as a prerequisite anymore. Just like General Smuts of old, when he spoke about immigrants from abroad and said, let them come in their hundreds and their thousands and their millions—the good and the bad—the NP is telling White South Africa today, let the Blacks come, in their hundreds and their thousands and their millions—the good and the bad.

Cas, what is your policy on this matter?

We are issuing a word of warning that if the Government permits the influx of Blacks to White cities without exercising the necessary control, as it intends to, not only they, but all of us in this country, are going to reap the fruits.

The hon the Deputy Minister said elsewhere that the people need not be concerned, since this Government does not intend to use the Group Areas Act as an instrument to replace influx control. The hon the Deputy Minister must tell me now whether my deduction of what he said is wrong.

Yes, I did. I do not shy away from the truth.

Very well, he has said it now, and that is all I wanted to know. I do not want to interpret him incorrectly.

I do not think the hon the Deputy Minister was misleading the people when he said that. We all know it is the intention of the left-wing group, which is in power in that party, also to abolish the Group Areas Act.

Your deduction is wrong, Cas!

We shall talk again next year. Then I will remind the hon the Deputy Minister of the interjection he made now.

I say the Government does not intend to use the Group Areas Act to replace influx control. There is a simple reason for that. Even now, while the Group Areas Act is on the Statute Book in all its glory, that Act is no longer being applied in the urban areas of Johannesburg. The Government is no longer applying that Act. It is permitting Blacks to settle in a White group area unhindered, and is not stirring a finger to do anything about it. [Interjections.] The hon the Minister was quite correct, therefore, when he told the other people the Government did not intend to use the Group Areas Act as a measure to replace influx control. [Interjections.]

The most important aspect of this legislation is perhaps the list of Acts and particular provisions of a considerable number of other Acts which are mentioned in the schedule and are going to be abolished by this Bill. One of those provisions which is being repealed inter alia, is chapter IV of Act No 18 of 1936. The whole chapter is being scrapped. We who have had experience of the miserable conditions that arose not only in urban areas, but also in rural areas, as a result of large-scale squatting of Blacks on farmlands in the most miserable conditions …

Despite the influx control measures we had.

When there was still an NP which had guts … [Interjections.] … when the hon member for Lichtenburg was still the Deputy Minister, those Black squatters’ spots in our part of the world were cleared. [Interjections.] What is the hon the Minister doing now, however? He is giving them the green light. Just ask the hon member for Middelburg what the position in his constituency was, and whether the hon member for Lichtenburg did not clear up those terrible conditions. [Interjections.]

No, that was Dr Andries Vosloo, the Deputy Minister at the time.

No, it was the hon member for Lichtenburg. [Interjections.] That was in the Middelburg constituency. If the hon member does not know where those Black spots were, I shall show him. [Interjections.]

That was before his time!

I think it was even before the hon member became an MP. [Interjections.] In any case, this hon Minister is now giving them the green light so that a repetition of those miserable conditions can take place again in future.

What I find interesting, however, is that this hon Minister and his party were prepared to abandon the provisions contained in the proposed clause 3 of the initial Bill, which would still grant the Minister the authority to direct that undesirable squatters’ conditions be cleared up. We on this side of the House should like to hear from the hon the Minister why he abandoned that clause if he was really of the opinion initially that it was an imperative clause for his so-called proper strategy for urbanisation. Was it possibly abandoned to oblige the PFP and the Coloured and Indian representatives in the other two Houses?

Concessions!

The Coloureds and the Indians demanded that it be done!

I want to conclude …

We have not heard your plan yet, Cas! Tell us what you are going to do!

Sir, the hon member for Innesdal said he had not yet heard what our plan was, but he himself said what he thought our plan was! He said the CP had taken on the burden that had been borne by the NP initially. [Interjections.] He is quite right! [Interjections.] The CP has taken on the burden of stabilishing the continued existence of the Whites and the Afrikaner people in this country because the NP is no longer prepared to bear this burden! [Interjections.] The CP has taken it upon itself to ensure separate development and the preservation of separate freedoms in this country. We are not going to do so, however, in the spiritless way in which the NP has been doing so during the past few years!

The hon member for Innesdal asked about our plans, but we in turn want to put a question to the NP. Why is it necessary to forward with another Bill during this session which will add certain territories to the independent or the self-governing Black states— and this from the NP which, with a cruel blow, has created a new South African nation, and wants to get rid of all discrimination? [Interjections.] Why do they still go on with that, while we are all one nation; one nation which, up to the highest level,…

Are you going to support it?

No, definitely not! Not in its present form, and for very important reasons.

You have the same morality.

No, we shall not, and for very important reasons. We shall debate it when that Bill comes under discussion. [Interjections.] We shall argue about it, because there are aspects of the Bill which meet with our approval, and there are others which we reject—for obvious reasons. [Interjections.] The CP, and also the HNP, stands for a separate, White freedom in this country.

A White homeland!

We are not ashamed of any measure which is necessary to realise that ideal. We do not apologise for that, because we cannot display the kind of dual morality displayed by the PFP as well as by some Nationalists, who object loudly about how immoral it is to take someone who comes from South Africa or from an area which was part of this country previously, into service as a migrant labourer. That moral standard disappears like magic, however, when a Black man comes from Mozambique, Zimbabwe or Malawi.

Swaziland.

Or from Swaziland. [Interjections.] The Transkeian citizens are citizens of an independent Black state to the same extent as the citizens in my neighbouring state, Swaziland, are. [Interjections.] Why then the argument that it would be immoral of us to expect a migrant labourer from the Transkei to come and work for us without bringing his wife and child along, while it is morally justifiable for a Swazi from Swaziland to leave his wife and children at home. [Interjections.] I should like to know where that morality comes from. [Interjections.]

Order!

Mr Chairman, may I reply to that?

No, the hon the Minister has the time to reply to that. In fact, he has a lot of time. I want to conclude now. This National Party and that Minister of National Education…

National surrender. [Interjections.]

We debated the question of the independence of the Transkei together in this House. Together we reached the solution of channelling the political rights of the Blacks to their own homeland. The hon the Minister was as ardent a supporter of that as we were.

We still advocate full independence.

That citizenship, which the hon the Minister and I advocated together, that citizenship which the Black man was to get in his own homeland, is disappearing now, because they are obliterating their own tracks. They are apologising now for what the National Party, in all fairness and justice, included on the Statute Book of South Africa.

Mr Chairman, I should like to put a question to that hon member who called the hon member for Sasolburg tonight and said they were in favour of this with the HNP. When he was still in the National Party, on what basis did he ridicule the HNP’s arguments, which he is supporting now?

I can give the hon the Minister a very quick reply. In 1981—as far as my conviction was concerned—the National Party was still on the course of separate development. [Interjections.] Even then the HNP accused us, the National Party, of having deviated from that course. Let us call a spade a spade. During the 1981 election some of my HNP friends in my constituency asked me: Is the National Party going to abolish the Immorality Act and the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act? And what was my reply to them? [Interjections.] No, I did not say “no” as the hon member for Hercules did. [Interjections.] I told them an NP to which I belonged would not abolish those Acts. That was my reply, because even then the indications were that the kindred spirits of the hon members for Randburg and Innesdal were at work.

Are you still fighting the HNP? [Interjections.]

These days it is imperative to check the NP in its new-found, liberal integration pilgrimage in South Africa. There are differences between us and the HNP, but there is no difference in one respect, viz that we want to keep the White man’s government over himself in his own White hands. We are in complete agreement on that.

Mr Chairman, it is almost time to adjourn. [Interjections.]

Order!

We have experienced something remarkable here tonight, viz that the faster the NP repudiates Dr Verwoerd, the more intensely they are ingratiating themselves with the hon member for Houghton. Dr Verwoerd was repudiated by the hon the Minister of Education and Development Aid recently and tonight he was repudiated here by the hon member for Innesdal in a way which thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of NP supporters, would find quite disgraceful. I say tonight that there are people even in the NP who would be shocked by what was said here, and we are going to take the NP to task regarding this matter.

That is the way of the world, however. The more they reject and repudiate Dr Verwoerd and turn their backs on the past, the more they ride roughshod over their own history, the more they no longer honour their political fathers and mothers, the less they will inherit their fatherland. [Interjections.]

Order!

They are transgressing that commandment in political terms day after day. If the NP repudiates Dr Verwoerd, it is no longer honouring its political fathers and mothers, and members of the NP should know what the results are in the country the Lord their God has given them. [Interjections.] That is what the NP is going to bring upon itself. It is going to bring a curse upon itself because of what it is doing to its spiritual forefathers. [Interjections.]

Order!

I want to ask the hon member for Innesdal tonight, as I asked the hon member Prof Olivier, whether there was nothing good in the policy of separate development and division. Did it contain no virtues and no idealism? Were there no principles which were great and good in the policy it is rejecting and trampling underfoot to such an extent today?