Mr. Speaker, I move—

I thought it appropriate to make some introductory remarks at the beginning of this debate. In the first instance I should like to refer to the important issue of privilege. Section 2 of the Powers and Privileges of Parliament Act of 1963, as amended, determines that a member of Parliament shall enjoy the privilege of free speech in debate in the House of Assembly. It is furthermore an established tradition that newspapers have the privilege to publish what is said in the House of Assembly. No responsible politician in South Africa will tamper with this privilege of hon. members and the media. [Interjections.] Section 4A of the Petroleum Products Act, 1977, however, prohibits the publication of certain information regarding petroleum products. The section also stipulates that the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs or the Controller of Petroleum Products is empowered to authorize in writing such publication. Despite the powers vested in the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs in terms of this Act, section 30 of the Powers and Privileges of Parliament Act, 1963, determines as follows—

I suggest that a suitable committee of Parliament attend to this apparent contradiction in existing legislation.

What contradiction? [Interjections.]

What I want to say in the second instance concerns the facts stated in the House regarding the Salem incident by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central. These alleged facts were taken from a statement of facts agreed to by two of the parties involved in the Salem incident in the British court case of Shell International Petroleum Company Limited vs. Gibbs. This statement of facts did not necessarily reflect the actual events surrounding the Salem incident. No evidence was ever led in court by which these facts could be proved and no witnesses were heard in court of subjected to cross-examination because it was a stated case. In his judgment, presiding Judge Mustill ruled as follows with regard to these alleged facts—

Would you rather accept findings of fact by an English court? [Interjections.]

In view of what the judge ruled in this case, apart from what the hon. member over there has to say about it—I am quoting the judge now—I should like to remark that one should be careful not to create the impression that what is known about the Salem incident is necessarily the whole truth. [Interjections.] I know it hurts, Sir. This also means that the allegation made in the Press that friend and foe, especially abroad, are already in possession of all the facts regarding the Salem incident, is also not necessarily true. The memorandum that has made available to hon. members also makes it clear that this is not the case. I should like to quote paragraph 4.7.7 on page 13 of the memorandum. It reads as follows—

Hear, hear!

I am very pleased that the hon. member has said “hear, hear!” [Interjections.] In addition I should like to point out that the Government and SFF constantly remained abreast of the developments surrounding the Salem affair. During the period of responsibility of successive Ministers the handling of the case was characterized by the purposeful collection if information regarding those persons involved in the matter and related developments abroad such as, for example, the court of law suit and the progress of judicial steps taken against the alleged offender. Ultimately the matter developed to such an extent that after consultation with the hon. the Prime Minister, experts were appointed early in the second half of 1982 to investigate the matter in depth and, in particular, to explore additional or new possibilities of recovering some of the lost money.

Is that not a year late?

Mr. Speaker, it seems I am waiting in vain now for the "hear, hears” of hon. members of the official Opposition. [Interjections.] The persons concerned have nearly concluded their investigation in South Africa, and one of them was until recently overseas in connection with the matter. He returned to South Africa a few days ago to make a progress report to me with a view to this debate.

He reported to me, inter alia, that almost everything thus far presented by the Press, in books and even in court as credible facts regarding the Salem affair was not necessarily correct or the whole truth. I could therefore not lend credibility to statements made in this House by agreeing to their publication in terms of section 4A of the Petroleum Products Act of 1977. It was also reported to me that the possibility still could not be ruled out that the money lost in the Salem transaction might be recovered. [Interjections.]

In view of what I have said here today, I wish to point out to hon. members that in the light of the fact that the Salem incident has not yet been finally dealt with, South Africa’s interests are still at stake. I therefore wish to appeal to hon. members to bear the abovementioned facts in mind during the debate on this matter.

I wish to assure hon. members of the fact that it has never been the intention of the Government to conceal in any way the facts surrounding the Salem incident. [Interjections.] The Government acknowledges and respects the public’s right to be informed … [Interjections.] … but the Government is also aware of the fact that the people of South Africa expect from the Government that South Africa’s interests should be placed first and foremost at all ties, and that details which are of strategic importance to South Africa should be dealt with in such a manner as to prejudice the country’s interests. [Interjections.]

It is accordingly made clear in the motion moved by me that the House should uphold the necessity of confidentiality. I therefore assume that the Opposition and all other loyal citizens will support the Government in this respect.

Mr. Speaker, may I start by asking the hon. the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs whether the agreed statement of facts, as quoted in the Mustill and in the Denning judgments, was not true. [Interjections.]

Carry on with your speech; I have already made my own. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, I move as an amendment to the hon. the Minister’s motion—

1. (1) a member to speak in the House of Assembly with complete privilege;
2. (2) the media to report Parliamentary debates without fear of prosecution;
3. (3) the South African public to be informed of facts which are public knowledge outside the Republic,

and calls for the appointment of a Select Committee—

1. (a) to establish control by Parliament over public corporations funded with taxpayers’ money;
2. (b) to investigate the Salem affair and specifically the steps to be taken in order to recover the 30,5 million dollars paid out by the SFF Association.”.

I want to thank the hon. the Minister for the memorandum on the Salem affair. In fact, it was prepared by the SFF Association. I wish to offer the following comment on it. I fully accept that at the end of 1979 the oil situation for South Africa was very difficult. I also accept that the price of $34,50 per barrel, which was paid, was a good one by spot-market standards. The price of $25,50 I quoted in the original debate was certainly the official Government selling price at which we should be able to buy under normal circumstances.

But the rest of the world could not either, stupid!

It becomes apparent that that hon. member does not know what he is talking about. [Interjections.]

You do not know what you are talking about. The rest of the world could not buy it either at official Government selling prices. [Interjections.]

I accept that calculated risks had to be taken at that time, but if those calculations are unsound and public money to the tune of $30,5 million, or even to the tune of $25 million, as the statement says, is lost, then someone has to carry the can. It is simply not good enough to say: “Sorry, we made a mistake.” I will in due course give an insight into the background of the men with whom we took this calculated risk.

The story of the advance payment of $12,3 million with which the Salem was purchased becomes, in the words of Alice, “curiouser and curiouser”. Mercabank certainly did not undertake the financing of the ship without security. Surely the person who offered the security must have been in the overall deal and received some financial reward. He would hardly have lent $12,3 million otherwise. This surely needs investigation. Then, who is the Mr. J. C. J. van Vuuren who got paid R10 million? Was he a front for anyone?

The memorandum in fact raises more questions that it provides answers. On page 16 it says in paragraph 5.6—

Does this mean: With ministerial approval? If so, which Minister or Ministers? The memorandum totally fails to answer crucial questions. Firstly, why have we made no attempt to bring the crooks to justice? Secondly, why have we made no attempt to recover in full, or in part, our $30,5 million? Thirdly, why did the Government cover up the details which had been widely published throughout the world, keeping secret in South Africa facts which were known to many anti-South African countries, anti-apartheid movements, etc.? The publication of those facts could in no way damage the Republic of South Africa’s crude-oil suppliers or help retain their trust once those facts had been published overseas.

I also want to thank the hon. the Minister for arranging this debate. In doing so, I want to stress that this debate was not what the official Opposition asked for. We asked for a committee of the House to be appointed. Nevertheless, we welcome the debate, but do not see it as a substitute for a committee of the House. What is more, we do not see this debate as some sort of panacea for the problems surrounding the Salem affair. If the Government believes that this debate is all that is required of them, they are mistaken.

Before disclosing further details of the Salem affair, I must refer to the replies I have thus far had from the two hon. Ministers concerned. In fact, I wish to thank them both for ensuring that my speech received maximum publicity. Their actions had a far greater effect than any amount of tea drinking that I could have done with Press men. I am prepared to recommend the public relations firm of Horwood and Du Plessis to anyone.

The hon. the Minister of Finance referred to the statement of 12 July 1982 and he referred to the briefing in February 1980 and he said—

This is not true. I have no knowledge of any briefing or the contents thereof, but even if I had, then surely the publication of those facts throughout the world destroys any confidentiality. This Government is attempting to use confidential briefings as a means of muzzling the Opposition and I shall not accept any offers to be informed in secret. The hon. the Minister also suspected that I had contravened—and said “blatantly”—the Petroleum Products Act. He has already been put in his place in that regard. He failed to answer my question and he stated that the R880 million going to the State Oil Fund and the Equalization Fund were not State funds. These funds are extracted from the public through legislation of this Parliament. As such they are public funds, and I strongly suspect that the Government has failed in its duty by not ensuring proper parliamentary control over these funds.

The hon. the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs spoke in the Third Reading, and I want to assure that hon. Minister that I am well aware that the supply of oil is a sensitive issue and I shall do everything in my power not to disrupt supplies. I want to tell this House that I have information, not obtained from the hon. the Minister, relating to South Africa’s fuel supplies which is quite astonishing. I have no intention of making that public. But things that are published overseas I shall discuss publicly, i.e. matters that are common knowledge and published openly in other countries. I also do not believe that our situation is so desperate that we need to become the receiver of stolen goods.

Do you think we did that wilfully?

I certainly do not believe that we should continue to do business with the crooks who perpetrated the fraud, and I shall be naming some of them later in this speech.

The original facts I used were contained in Lloyds Law Reports. The approximate amount of money that flows annually into the funds I calculated from information that is supplied to this House by the Government. They print in the annual report of the Department of Transport Affairs the amount of money flowing into the National Roads Fund from a levy of 2,354 cents per litre. It is a simple matter therefore to calculate the number of litres of fuel and multiply that by the 3,725 cents per litre that goes to the State Oil Fund and the 9,8 cents per litre that is controlled by the SFF Association. If one does that one discovers that it amounts to approximately R880 million per annum.

However, I now have another source of information. That is, a book that is freely available in South Africa and was sold in South Africa. It is called The Piracy Business, written by Barbara Conway and published by Hamlyn. This book, as I have said, was openly sold in South Africa and chapter 6 “The Stolen Super-tanker” is the story of the Salem. The facts, which were new to me, that emerged are as follows:

One Frederick E. Soudan started the ball rolling. He bought the Salem with the 12,3 million dollars letter of credit he obtained through Mercabank. Let me give my first quote from the book—

The next person on the scene was Mr. Anton Reidel, who is described as “a man of cosmopolitan tastes”, and further—

These, Mr. Speaker, are the people with whom we took a calculated risk.

Reidel suggested the deal to Soudan, and in August 1979 Soudan went to South Africa to raise finance using contacts provided by Reidel. According to the book he met up with a Mr. and Mrs. Jim Shorrock and Jack Austin in Johannesburg. This led to the signing of the contract. I might add that Jim Shorrock is known to me personally. For many years he lived in Port Elizabeth. In fairness to the three of them, and here I again quote from the book—

Next to appear, Mr. Speaker, was Bert Stein, according to his passport. Actually he was thought to be Thomas Jurgen Locks. Amongst other things he arranged for the crew of the Salem and specifically suggested the captain. All their arrangements having been finalized, Reidel and Soudan arrived in South Africa and with the assistance of Haven International, the agreement was signed. Here again I quote from the book—

And so the Salem, with its name now having been changed to Lema, discharged the oil in Durban. It is odd that the Strategic Fuel Fund Association did not appear to worry that it was receiving oil from a tanker which according to all available records did not exist. In an answer to a question replied to by the hon. the Minister here this afternoon it was confirmed that they do check up on ships in the shipping register.

I also want to quote what came out in the House of Lords judgment of not very long ago. I think it was Lord Roskill who was speaking. He said—

Finally came the payment. According to this book we paid $43,5 million through Volkskas in Johannesburg to the account of Beets Trading Co at Credit Suisse, Zug, less the $12,2 million already paid for the ship. From Suisse Credit $3 million was paid to an account at Paribas bank in Geneva. Of that $300 000 went to Haven International and around $100 000 went to an important South African Fixer who was involved in arranging finances”. Another $8 million went into a variety of nominee accounts. $20 million went into the account at the Union Bank of Switzerland in Geneva of a Greek citizen and from there $2 million went to a bank in Italy. Draw your own conclusions, Mr. Speaker, on the Italian connection.

Scotland Yard investigated this and as a result warrants were issued for the arrest of Soudan, the Captain Georgoulis, Reidel and Locks. These were the executive staff of the swindle. The main organizers were people whose names, I regret to say, I do not have. Let me again, however, quote from the book in respect of who the main organizers were. There it says—

Yet South Africa has not laid any charges or caused any police investigation to be undertaken. On Friday, 4 March 1983,1 asked the hon. the Minister of Law and Order whether the S.A. Police had investigated or were investigating any matter arising from the purchase of a shipment of oil which had been landed from the tanker Salem. For once, Mr. Speaker, we received an answer from that hon. Minister. [Interjections.] He said “No”. [Interjections.] I find that this was most remarkable. We are sold stolen goods which costs the public $30,5 million and we cannot even ask the police to investigate. Almost more than anything else this fact makes me smell a very large rat. [Interjections.] Why are we making no discernible effort to bring the crooks to court? Why are we making no discernible effort to recover our $30,5 million?

Reidel, according to The Piracy Business, owns a house in South Africa. He apparently moves in and out of South Africa at will. Surely we could have taken some action to recover some money from him. In April 1981 the Greek Minister of Justice was formally approached by the International Maritime Bureau, which is backed by Lloyds, the Salvage Association, various insurance companies and Shell in regard to the Salem. The approach was still being considered when this book was written. Why have we made no approach to the Greek Government or—and I ask the hon. the Minister— have we made any approach to the Greek Government to try to recover our money? Once again complete silence!

The Government’s own actions, Mr. Speaker, are also somewhat odd. The original silence in 1980, when the world Press gave the first news of the scuttling of the Salem and speculated that the oil had been offloaded in Durban; the clampdown in July 1982 in terms of section 4A of the Petroleum Products Act preventing the publication of any details despite the full knowledge of this Government two British courts had given details of the whole affair in two judgments; refusal by the present hon. Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs to lift the restriction despite the details in my speech being published; the attempt by the hon. the Minister to prevent publication of those details; and now this debate, which has not been asked for by the Opposition—this whole series of incidents. The only conclusion to which one can come is that the Government is almost forcing one to ask whether anything is indeed being covered up; and, if so, what? What are they so frightened of having exposed to the South African public? Let me ask the hon. the Minister again whether he will lift the restriction on the publication of details of the Salem affair.

Again no answer! If not, then why not? That is what we want to know. Why will the hon. the Minister not do that? [Interjections.] The whole of South Africa wants the answer because they are deeply suspicious of what has happened, and rightly so.

The Minister concerned at that time is no longer in this House. He has been put out to grass. The questions I asked during the Second Reading of the Part Appropriation Bill, however, still stand. Were the details kept hidden from South Africa for so long in order to protect our oil supplies or in order to protect the NP? The restrictions are certainly not protecting our oil supplies in this instance because all these details are common knowledge overseas. One has to assume therefore that we are protecting either Cabinet Ministers, ex-Cabinet Ministers or some other person or persons, and that a disclosure in full would therefore harm the NP.

The Salem affair is bad enough, but what is worse is the demonstration that funds taken from the public are not properly controlled by the hon. the Minister of Finance or this Parliament. These funds, as I have said, amount to just short of R1 billion per annum, yet the accounts are not audited by the Auditor-General. Can the hon. the Minister of Finance, or perhaps the hon. the Prime Minister, who has had something to say this afternoon, give me one good reason why not? Why should they not be audited by the Auditor-General? Do we not trust him to keep secret those things we need to keep secret? [Interjections.]

Before closing, I want to reiterate that all the information I have used in this and previous debates has been taken from the Lloyds’ Law Reports from which I quoted in the last debate, and also from the book The Piracy Business by Barbara Conway. The book is publicly available in South Africa, and of course the Lloyds’ Law Reports are publicly available in Great Britain.

And here.

Yes, in libraries here, certainly. What is more, so is the recent House of Lords’ judgment from which I also quoted today. I want to repeat my call, in the debate on the Part Appropriation Bill, for an investigation of the Salem affair, firstly with a view to recovering the $30,5 million, secondly with a view to preventing a similar future occurrence and, thirdly, with a view to establishing better control over taxpayers’ funds. Those calls I have formally made in the amendment I moved in this House.

Were I to be asked what I hope to accomplish by bringing, into public scrutiny, the Salem affair, which took place, as the hon. the Minister of Finance himself said, way back in 1979—he suggested I was reviving a very old story—my answer to that question would be that I wish to see parliamentary control established over funds which still, in 1983, flow into the two Funds concerned, the State Oil Fund and the Strategic Fuel Fund Association. In 1983 those funds flow in day by day. They are funds extracted from the South African public, funds for which this Parliament therefore bears a responsibility. Those funds amount to almost R1 billion per annum. If I accomplish nothing else except better control of those funds, I will feel that the exercise has been well worth-while.

Mr. Speaker, before I take the discussion further there is one aspect arising out of the speech by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central that must be disposed of. I am sorry that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition is not present at the moment.

He will be back.

It does not matter. I did not say he should be here. However, I had thought that he would stay if the debate was as important as those hon. members say it is.

He must have guessed you were going to reply. [Interjections.]

Order!

From time to time legislation is passed in this Parliament with the consent of hon. members of all the political parties, legislation aimed at keeping certain information confidential in the national interest. This also applies to laws relating to the defence of the country and laws affecting other security services of the country. There is unanimity among all hon. members that in given circumstances a need arises for such legislation to be placed on the Statute Book. This is not legislation unique to this country. It is legislation of which other countries in similar circumstances also make use. Moreover, it has become customary for successive Governments in this country and elsewhere to inform the Opposition in given circumstances on a confidential basis with regard to those matters that such legislation professes to protect. [Interjections.] This afternoon the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central adopted a standpoint—it is either his personal standpoint or that of his party—that he did not want to be informed on a confidential basis. Such a standpoint has certain implications for the country, for the legislation of this Parliament and also for the security of our country, and I intend debating it. The only claim the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central has in regard to the subjects under discussion is the fact that while other people were toiling day and night to acquire sources of oil, he was making money out of the sale of petrol manufactured therefrom. [Interjections.]

He was lining his pocket.

He was lining his pocket in circumstances which, for this country, constituted a crisis. The Opposition must now state whether they wish to be informed or not. They have the responsibility to say so in this debate.

I want to begin by placing on record that neither I nor any other member of the Government denies hon. members the right to act under protection of this House. Not one of us denies that a balanced, correct rendition in the Press of what happens here is privileged in terms of the common law of the country and as confirmed by the Powers and Privileges of Parliament Act of 1963. Moreover, this is privileged in terms of the findings of our courts. However, this is not the point at issue now.

Four aspects are important here. The first is the historical background with regard to our supply position; the second is the methods we had to adopt to be supplied with oil; the third is the results of these activities while the fourth is the conduct of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central. Let us consider the historic perspective in this regard, for the sake of those people with short memories or those with selective memories. The fact is that there was a time when South Africa’s supply position was critical. The hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central ought to know that. Historically speaking, there was a time when hon. members of all parties realized the sensitivity of, firstly, the acquisition situation; secondly, the supply situation and, thirdly, methods of acquisition. This was manifested by their conduct in this House. Moreover, there was understanding of the fact that it was a matter of considerable importance to South Africa’s interests that the confidentiality of origin, destination and conveyance be maintained. This was confirmed by the statements of hon. members in this House.

What is the historical background? The international oil crisis began in 1974 and had a more serious dimension for South Africa than for other countries. The fact is that the anti-South African powers used oil as a weapon against South Africa for political purposes. Moreover, in 1973, the conference of Afro-Arab countries decided to impose an official embargo against us. In the third instance the U.N. Committee on Apartheid decided that it should be used as a weapon against this country. In this atmosphere it was necessary to negotiate, firstly, for sources of supply. The hon. member will concede that it was a crisis situation. The hon. member will also concede that apart from Iran, with which successful negotiations were held, we had no official sources, but while he was enriching himself, other people had to go and find his sources, for him too. When the Sha’s Government fell in October 1978, South Africa was cut off from 95% of its oil supply. This crisis had grave implications for the Western countries of the world—for America, Germany, France and Italy, all of which considered steps to deal with this crisis situation. As far as South Africa was concerned there was another dimension, however, and that is that we could not be supplied openly. What does that imply? It implies that we could not be supplied on a commercial basis. We could not be supplied by conventional methods. Accordingly we had to obtain oil for our country by other means. I ask the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central, in all fairness: Does he not agree that in such circumstances the risk factor was greater than for others? If he does agree, does he not wish to go along with my argument a little further? As a businessman, does he not wish to concede that in the ordinary conduct of business there is a risk of fraud? Is there no risk of calculated fraud? [Interjections.] The hon. member agrees. If he agrees that the chances of calculated fraud are greater in this case, then he must display more sympathy than he has done.

Then you must give us the facts if it goes wrong.

I am coming to that. The amount we are speaking of is $30,5 million. If we say for one moment that in this particular instance the operating risks are greater because we are unable to trade openly—and I concede that—then one must assess the results of the operation of SFF, in the first instance, by the criterion of their success. What are the facts in this particular case? In the first place, over a period of four years oil to the value of R8,4 billion has been purchased. The total losses have been $30,5 million. That represents 0,36% of the operating expenditure for these purchases. There is no other large company with such a record. I say to the hon. member that his own company does not have such a record.

Does the hon. the Minister want it on record that R30 million is nothing?

No, I do not say that. [Interjections.] It is only a priest who makes a false exegesis of the Bible that could make a remark like that.

I want to take the matter further. The fact is that we succeeded because we maintained confidentiality. We succeeded because the suppliers who approached us were assured of the confidentiality of their business transactions. If we had not done that then I say we would not have survived the crisis.

I now come to the final aspect. Parliament passed an Act which protected the confidentiality of information. The Act was passed with the support of all the parties represented here. The Petroleum Products Amendment Act reflected the will of Parliament to preserve confidentiality. The legislation was unanimously accepted in this House. This House considered that it was in the national interest that this should be so. That the judgment of the House was sound has been proved by the fact that in difficult crisis conditions we have succeeded in securing the country’s interests in this particular sphere.

Therefore this legislation, together with the dedication of people who travelled the world day and night, helped to supply our country. It kept our industries going, it caused our transport systems to function, it allowed our economy to grow. Everything the House sought to achieve by means of that legislation it did, in fact, achieve.

This House also accepted other legislation. This House passed an Act concerning the privilege of the members of this House. That privilege imposes a tremendous responsibility on every hon. member of this House, because that privilege presumes that members cannot come and say here with impunity what would be punishable outside this House.

That is the point.

It does not mean that at all. [Interjections.]

It is not possible that this House passes an Act which, through the use or abuse of its privilege, can be nullified.

And if the other Act is abused?

I want to repeat: This presumes a certain code of conduct on the part of hon. members of this House. It presumes that hon. members do not jeopardize their privilege by doing here what would be an offence outside this House.

That was my whole point, Mr. Bamford.

That is a silly point. [Interjections.]

I do not believe the hon. member’s concern for taxpayers’ money or interests. I do not share the view at all that he is concerned about it. He is concerned for expediency reasons about his party and the little gain he thinks may be derived out of this. Having done this, what has he in fact done? He has brought into serious question the matter of the privilege of the House. [Interjections.] He has brought into serious question the privilege of members of the House.

Do you plan to take it away?

It is completely incompatible that while one Act protects the members and another Act, accepted by all members, prohibits something, that prohibition is contravened under the privilege of the House. [Interjections.] If the hon. member had been concerned about the losses, if he had been concerned about the information, the facts are that in terms of the previous arrangements he had access to the source of that information. The hon. member did not approach the hon. the Minister in charge.

Never.

If he had been concerned about the taxpayer, he could have written to the Minister and expressed his concern.

Then I would have been muzzled forever.

Is that not what members of Parliament normally do?

No.

Well, now I know why they are where they are.

I want to go further. The hon. members take exception from time to time when they are being accused of going soft on the security of this country. [Interjections.]

Being soft on what?

The hon. Chief Whip must tell his colleagues to stop interrupting; then he would be able to hear me.

Well, say it again.

You are coming very close to …

Order! I want the hon. member for Groote Schuur to give the hon. the Minister a chance to complete his speech. With a scratchy throat, he is doing it in very difficult circumstances in any case.

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: Is the hon. the Minister entitled to say that the hon. members on this side of the House are soft on security? [Interjections.]

I did not say that.

Order! The hon. the Minister may proceed.

Sir, I should like to condemn in the strongest terms the actions of that hon. member, but I want to condemn in even stronger terms, if that is possible, the attitude of the official Opposition. You know, Sir, in the Mother of Parliaments the Opposition is termed “Her Majesty’s most loyal Opposition”. I have a feeling that that is becoming unknown in this country. I have a feeling that the enemies of this country are watching with glee how their work is being done for them under the privilege of this House.

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: I want to ask you for a ruling. The hon. the Minister is quite clearly insinuating that the enemies of this country are watching with glee what is happening under the guise of privilege in the House which is being abused by this side of the House … [Interjections.]

Order! I have listened carefully to the hon. the Minister’s speech and I have also come to the conclusion that the hon. the Minister must select his words very carefully. I do not think that the insinuation he made is a correct insinuation to make as far as the official Opposition is concerned.

Sir, I have made no insinuation whatsoever. What I have said, in all fairness—and I bow to your ruling …

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order …

Order! It can be interpreted in that manner. I listened very carefully to the hon. the Minister’s speech and I can assure him that it can be interpreted in that manner. Where it in any way refers to the loyalty of the official Opposition, I think the hon. the Minister must withdraw his words.

I withdraw them, Sir. Let me take it further. It is quite obvious that all over the world people innocently do the work for other people. I should like to reiterate today that, if we go on the way we are going on in the House in connection with issues like security—and security is not only military or physical security …

What about killing individuals?

… we must know that we are playing into the hands of the enemies of this country. [Interjections.] Let me take this particular point further. If information today, information which is available elsewhere, becomes available from this source, we will not be able to convince suppliers that we can be trusted.

That is a new one.

It is not only oil that we buy under sensitive circumstances. It is also a fact that there is an arms boycott against this country. There is an arms boycott against our country. Is it suggested that we must discuss the acquisition of sensitive supplies of arms in public so that the sources can be determined?

That is what they say.

Yes, that is what they say. At one stage the acquisition of oil was more difficult than the acquisition of arms, when the non-availability could have destroyed this country. And what are we doing today? We have, because of the political expediency of that hon. member, to give information that normally should not have been given. I make this point in all seriousness. When the Government, any Government, is prepared to share information with hon. members, what does it imply? It implies the acceptance by the Government of the fact that hon. members, even members of the Opposition, can be trusted with that information. Secondly, the Government accepts its responsibility for sharing that information with hon. members. In this regard the hon. member for Yeoville and the hon. member for Amanzimtoti will both confirm that this has been the procedure. I ask you, Sir, is that not seriously questioning the privilege of this House when this House is used to publish information that the law prevents from being published outside? We shall have to go further. Does it imply that the provisions of the Secrets Act can be contravened in this House with impunity?

Do you seriously think people are going to do that? [Interjections.]

Does it imply that the protection of this House implies that hon. members can discuss the security of the country in this House? I suggest that a precedent has been created by that hon. member.

That is not correct.

What it in fact means is that we shall have to look again at the Acts of this Parliament and its procedures.

Mr. Speaker, the CP accepts several of the statements which the hon. the Minister made this afternoon. During the course of my speech I shall come back to certain aspects of them. For example, there is the question of confidentiality, that legislation on confidential matters should be passed, the fact that critical circumstances existed with regard to the purchase of oil, and that certain matters should be treated with the utmost circumspection. We concede all this.

Obviously, all matters pertaining to the oil transactions of the Republic of South Africa are delicate. Even if no such legislation as the Petroleum Products Act existed, all right-minded South Africans realize that this is a sensitive matter and that it would therefore be better to err on the safe side. Therefore the hon. the Minister can depend on the CP’s wholehearted co-operation as regards matters which constitute a threat to the interests of the Republic of South Africa, viz. that threaten to prejudice them in any way. However, what we must guard against is confusing the interests of the country with those of the NP.

When the Republic becomes involved in an unfortunate incident such as the Salem affair, it demands precise judgement and anticipation to determine to what extent the public, this hon. House or the Press ought to be taken into one’s confidence. We have all experienced the phenomenon that what is described as “the public’s right to know” has really become a question of “the reporter’s right to know”, and then the Press only presents to the public what it believes the public ought to know.

Now you are talking sense for the first time.

The hon. the Minister need only listen, and he will hear a great deal more sense.

The rights, the duties and the actions of the Press have been discussed in such detail in this hon. House, that it is scarcely necessary to say much more about them. By way of summary, I just wish to mention what the CP’s standpoint is in this regard. Firstly, the CP believes in a free and responsible Press. This is essential in a democratic dispensation. Secondly, the CP emphasizes the correctness of the statement that true freedom obeys the laws. Thirdly, the CP is painfully aware of the indisputable fact that there are journalists who are simply sensation-seekers and who care not a whit for the secure continued existence of a democratic dispensation in South Africa.

Like Die Patriot.

Just listen to that, Mr. Speaker. Listen to the nonsense coming from a responsible member of a Government which is supposed to be responsible.

There are journalists in this country who would only be too pleased to sniff things out and blazon them abroad in order to harm our country. Hon. members would do well to go and read what Dr. Chris Barnard had to say in one of his books on this subject, viz. in his book South Africa: Sharp Dissection. I quote from page 35—

Then he referred to one Michel de Gre who worked for the Paris newspaper Le Monde. In 1976 he published a book entitled Le Monde As It Is—

On page 4, paragraph 1.4, the SFF memorandum emphasizes that a case of this nature should not be judged in the light of hindsight. It is accepted that there was a bridging period during December 1979, as well as that this was a critical period. The finding of the House of Lords, to which the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central also referred, shows how determined the South African buyers were to obtain the oil even if it was not “Arabian Light” oil. It is also striking that the Shell company failed in an effort to obtain a settlement of their claim against Lloyds on the facts submitted. The case was first heard in the Royal Court of Justice. Shell succeeded there. However, from there it went to the Court of Appeal. There the defendant was partially successful. Eventually, it went to the highest court of appeal, where the case was decided against Shell, both as far as the recovery of the loss of oil was concerned, and in regard to the ship itself. In the process, the Court of Appeal and the House of Lords even departed from the previous ruling, viz. that of the Mandarin Star of 1969. The finding was that “the taking at sea …” mentioned in the policy included the case where the owners of the ship were themselves responsible for the sinking of the ship. The entire course of events was therefore very much to the detriment of the SFF.

Yet, in reading the memorandum and the court reports, one asks certain questions, questions about which the hon. the Minister ought to take this hon. House into his confidence. Firstly, I come to the matter which has just been raised by the hon. the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning, viz. the question of providing certain hon. members with confidential information in respect of certain matters. Mr. Speaker, it occurs too frequently that certain people are informed about sensitive issues, whereby they are, in fact, made accessories. This House, or a Select Committee of this House, as chosen representatives of the nation, ought to be brought up to date in respect of the spending of State funds. During January, February, and even until April 1980, the Press throughout South Africa gossiped about the Salem affair. I have here a file full of Press cuttings of reports which were distributed throughout South Africa and which, in fact, did more harm than the incident and the circumstances surrounding it warranted. This matter has been gossipped about throughout South Africa. Newspapers even knew what the settlement amount was and where the oil had been offloaded. Under the circumstances it would surely have been wise to have acquainted this House with the story, as it has been revealed now. It would have been wiser under those circumstances to have endured the criticism and have done with it! But what happened? Firstly, a superficial reader could have thought that the Republic itself had been involved in the fraud. Secondly, a matter which could have been disposed of and debated conclusively in April 1980, came to this House in instalments, to the greater detriment of the country than would have been the case if we had been given the full dose all at once. It is like an infected tooth which is not extracted and which later affects the entire system.

The fact is that the Salem affair has been described as the greatest maritime fraud in the history of the world. Police in no fewer than eight countries investigated the case. It was, and still is, a complicated affair. All the facts are still not known.

In this regard I wish to quote from a newspaper which, regrettably, no longer exists, viz. Oggendblad.

Oh, that little newspaper!

Let us hear whether the hon. the Minister agrees with this quotation—

The printing is a little obscure here … [Interjections.] Sir, I do not know what is so funny about that. The fact is that the house then very soon becomes filled with smoke and the damage is then so much greater.

Secondly, it has become clear from Press reports that Mr. Soudan insisted that his own crew should man the ship; i.e. people employed by him. If this is true, did this step not arouse the suspicions of the purchasers? While I am dealing with this point, I wish to ask, in the third place, how well known was Mr. Soudan to the SFF? Had business been conducted with him before; and if not, could a mere contract and guarantees, as indicated on page 9 of the memorandum, be at all sufficient? This was merely a contract, together with a mere guarantee from Mr. Soudan himself that the oil would be delivered, and that they were the owners of the oil. We are aware that it is extremely difficult to obtain insurance against fraud. Therefore it is obvious that under those circumstances a guarantee would have been required for the purchaser himself. Was the seller asked to supply some guarantee?

If one reads what is said about Mr. Soudan, as the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central read here, it really seems as if this man—this is the impression one gains from the descriptions of him—is a somewhat slimy character.

Moreover, what the CP wishes to know is what the real loss was. The purchasing price of the consignment of oil in question was R45 million. Shell paid R52 million. Each party will pay half of the damages. I assume that that oil was resold, and if Shell had not intervened, the Government would not have suffered any loss in any case. Therefore it was Shell’s loss of which the Government or the SFF has to pay half. In view of the purchasing price of R52 million, half of that therefore amounts to R26 million. Where, then, does the R30,5 million come from? Precisely how much oil was sold on that occasion? A figure of almost 1,5 million barrels of oil, or a certain number of tons was mentioned. At a price of R34,50 per barrel, this amounts to R50 million. We should therefore like to know the exact details in this regard.

In the fourth place, I refer to page 8 of the memorandum, in which mention is made of an organization known as Haven International. Who are they? Where do they enter the picture? What was their role in this whole affair? Who were their shareholders? Who were the people who had an interest in Haven International? What was the position with regard to Mercabank? What role did Mercabank play with regard to this affair? Who at Mercabank benefited in this regard?

You should have read that in the memorandum. Have you not read the memorandum since last night? Apparently you were so occupied reading Oggendblad that you were unable to read anything else. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, with great respect …

Why is the hon. the Prime Minister getting so excited now?

Be quiet, old “Sappie”. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, I request the hon. the Prime Minister to read page 8 of the memorandum, and then to read the entire memorandum in conjunction with that. Then I should like to know from the hon. the Prime Minister whether he could tell me where in that memorandum any details with regard to Mercabank, Haven International and J. C. J. van Vuuren are to be found?

Go on PW, answer now!

Where is your clean administration now, PW?

Mr. Speaker, these details do not appear anywhere in this memorandum. I have read it very carefully. The full details are not given.

I want to know what became of the clean administration?

What did you say, old “Sappie”?

I would rather be an old “Sappie” than an old Prog like you. A new Prog. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, in the fifth place—and now I come to my amendment—after this entire affair was brought to light, and now that it is known to South Africa’s enemies, as all hon. members in this House concede, why can actions not be brought against Beets Trading Company and/or Mr. Soudan and/or Reidel? After all, there have been court cases, and in addition, the police of eight countries have investigated this matter. The question of surety was also mentioned in this memorandum. We also want to know why action has not been taken against these “certain people” referred to in the memorandum, people who have already received some of this money.

In the sixth place I wish to ask: Has the possibility of an action against Mercabank been investigated? In other words, would the SFF Association have purchased oil if it had known that the Salem would have been purchased with the money from the price of that oil, or that the purchase of the Salem would be financed by it?

In conclusion I just wish to mention that the person who is settling the account is the man in the street in South Africa, it is the public of South Africa.

It is only R36 million; that is nothing, after all!

It is to them that this hon. House has a responsibility. This is always the tragedy of circumstances such as these. The victims are the people who look to us to act in their best interests at all times.

I therefore move as a further amendment—

1. (1) stresses the need for confidentiality in connection with the acquisition of crude oil as prescribed by the Petroleum Products Act, 1977, to be maintained;
2. (2) requests the Government to take active steps to recover the loss suffered as a result of the Salem events, as the crucial facts in connection therewith are now known.”.

Mr. Speaker, I listened very attentively to the hon. member for Brakpan, and I want to thank him for adopting a basically sensible attitude to the question of secrecy and to the sensitivity of the matter of oil supplies, I have one problem, however, which is that it would seem to an increasing extent as though hon. members of that party, and their leader who is no longer here, do not adopt the same approach to matters.

Do not talk nonsense.

The hon. member adopted a fine standpoint here on confidentiality and on how this matter should be handled, but his hon. leader spoke to the Press about this matter.

I should now like to quote from a report in the Eastern Province Herald of 1 March 1983—

Are you going to believe the English-language newspapers again?

No, wait—

Surely it was I who put all those questions.

I shall go further—

I had someone go into this matter. On two occasions the Cabinet was fully briefed on this matter by the hon. Dr. S. W. van der Merwe … [Interjections.] … namely on 14 February 1980 and on 15 April 1980. [Interjections.] We cannot allow those hon. members, when it suits them, to act in a responsible way here and to formulate their case well, only, to act in an irresponsible way when they are outside among the voters, in a way contrary to the interests of this country. [Interjections.] Besides this attempt to present the CP as a responsible party, the hon. member also had two other elements in his speech. In the first place, he asked a lot of questions.

Reply to them.

I shall reply to some of the questions.

Why not to all of them?

Secondly … [Interjections.] … he tried to make out that they were not considering with sufficient circumspection how the money could be recovered. [Interjections.] But then he did not read the memorandum.

Order! I have already allowed many meaningless remarks. I think the debate is far too serious for such remarks. In future I am going to take strict action against hon. members who pass unnecessary remarks. The hon. the Minister may proceed.

He insinuated that not enough trouble was being taken to recover the money. The memorandum spells out the facts clearly. Why do he and the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central not admit that Shell, as the memorandum spells out, went to a great deal of trouble to recover the money? Why do they not emphasize to hon. members of this House that there is an agreement that any moneys which are recovered will be divided equally? Despite the entry of Scotland Yard into the picture, and despite the engagement of the best advocates and despite the best investigations which could be made, it has thus far not been possible, not by Shell either, to recover any moneys. Surely it is not a case of nothing having been done. Surely it was not said that R30,5 million was insignificant. What they are actually asking is that we should have instituted two sets of legal proceedings and that we should have ploughed this country’s money into them. We should not have been so practical and should instead have made two efforts. They are asking even more. They are asking that we should have moved onto the international scene with a high profile and noised our methods abroad. The disclosure of facts which are not generally known, but which are known to us, create a certain impression abroad and indicate the methods by means of which we are evading embargoes and dealing effectively with the problems which the world tosses into our lap by means of boycotts, etc.

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

No, I have very little time. It has been said that this was the greatest fraud of the century. Why are the hon. members not proud of the fact that despite world pressure, as in the case of the arms embargo, we have also succeeded as far as oil is concerned in effectively guaranteeing our country’s supply position? Today we can look the public in the eyes and say that we have made so much progress with our stockpiling programme that oil is no longer the Achilles’s heel of South Africa. Today we can look the public in the eye and say that despite the difficult circumstances which my hon. colleague sketched earlier, no wheel in South Africa has ever stopped turning. But those hon. members are not proud of this. Because they do not have a policy, they are trying to drag Salem and Seychelles incidents into the political arena here in order to fight elections on suspicions.

The hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central said that he did not like being informed privately. However, he was prepared to raise this matter in public on the basis of unconfirmed evidence, evidence which he did not test against sources from which he could obtain first-hand information. I am not saying that he has to accept the information which he receives from this side. I am saying that a loyal member of this House, before he acts in this way in public, ought to examine the other side of the matter. It is not only I who feel this way. When I stand here and look around, I look into the eyes of hon. members on that side of the House who also feel that way, and who came to make inquiries from me, when I was Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs, on matters pertaining to our oil supplies. These are people who first make inquiries before they believe what is being said in the foreign Press and what the enemies of South Africa are digging up by going through ships’ registers, etc. Those hon. members will be able to testify that I replied to them honestly and openly. Because they received the information and were able to check it against the stories which were doing the rounds abroad, those hon. members acted in a responsible way and did not need to splay open this matter in public.

The hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central said that he did not ask for a debate, but for a Select Committee. Of course, he wanted to arouse all kinds of suspicions in the country and then cover up by asking that the matter be referred to a Select Committee. Now the country is receiving the facts in this memorandum and from what is being said in this debate. I hope that, during the past week, while he was happily basking in the glare of publicity of which he admitted in his speech he was so fond, he will now shrivel up in the heat of his own shame. [Interjections.]

The hon. member for Brakpan as well as the hon. member for Pretoria Central asked: Why this secrecy? They asked: Why all this secrecy if all this information is already known abroad? In this connection I wish to mention a few reasons. Firstly, it is necessary for the protection of suppliers and shipowners. We purchased this oil and we are at this moment still purchasing oil in the face of embargoes and the people with whom we do business must therefore be protected. At that time it was very often shady persons. If you are hard up and you only have so many days’ oil supply left in the country, then you do not first check everyone’s credentials all the way back to his grandmother and his great-grandmother. It is armchair business which those hon. members want to conduct. In those times we had to operate in an underworld, a cut-throat world, in order to look after the interests of South Africa. The men we sent out there were honourable men, men who deserve this country’s gratitude and esteem and praise and they are not men about whom cynical questions should be asked here and all kinds of speculations made without any factual basis. The people with whom we are doing business, who are trying to circumvent these embargoes with us, demand loyalty from us. They demand the maximum protection from us. Did hon. members know that a ship that has been identified as having been in a South African harbour in connection with oil is never again allowed into the harbours of the Persian Gulf? That is only one example. Secondly, the reports which appear in the outside world do not, for the most part, contain the correct facts. There may frequently be correct facts among the others, but these are mixed with stories and speculations and, in general, the reports are full of distortions. The repeat publication of those reports in South Africa, without rectification on the part of the Minister or of the department or of the department of the SFF, would surely give rise to the public in this country being misinformed. Consequently, if we were to allow the publication of such distorted stories, then we cannot keep quiet. Then we must at the same time say: These are not the correct facts, however. Then we have to give the correct facts and we have to begin to disclose facts which it is not in the national interest to disclose. That is why it is better not to allow the gossip and the distorted stories over which there is speculation abroad to be published in South Africa, so that the public will not be misinformed. From this it follows that permission for reports which have been published abroad to be published in South Africa will have to be accompanied by statements on the correct facts. This would defeat and undermine the main object of secrecy.

The third reason why secrecy continues to remain essential is that the prohibition on publication and the secrecy provisions in the Act prevent organizations involved in crude oil supplies to South Africa from being required in terms of overseas legislation to disclose sensitive information concerning crude oil supplies to South Africa. The fourth reason is that suppliers and shipowners must be able to rely on confidentiality. Although they may be harmed by unconfirmed speculation in foreign media, the position changes if official information is made known. They want to and are only prepared to accept the risks because they have confidence in our ability and—until the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central spoke up—were able to have confidence in this Parliament’s ability to handle this matter confidentially.

The fifth reason relates more specifically to the Salem. Official information in regard to the Salem would, in the time under discussion, have offered a clear indication of South Africa’s vulnerability at that stage. Similarly, confirmation referring to any source as well as other particulars in connection with specific crude oil transactions would only have been in the interests of our enemies.

The struggle against boycotts is by no means over. UN attempts to prevent crude oil deliveries to South Africa continue. Active groups such as Kairos and the Amsterdam Shipping Bureau are attempting to embarrass South Africa. The latter attempting to monitor ships plying around the Cape in order to determine which of them deliver oil here. At the moment they are firing shots in the dark as long as it is only speculations and rumours in the outside world. Any relaxation in respect of secrecy, however, can help to spotlight the target and enable our enemies to identify our friends and partners who deliver to us.

Secrecy is essential, and not merely to protect the NP’s interests. I maintain that we should not politicize a matter such as oil supplies. It would be different if the hon. members had evidence at their disposal to the effect that the Government had been grossly negligent, if the hon. members had evidence that the Government in this case did not genuinely have to suffer this loss as a result of a specific fraudulent situation under difficult circumstances. However, the hon. members do not have such evidence, because they are merely asking questions. They are not producing any evidence; they are relying on speculation from abroad. The question is whether this is what the privilege rule of Parliament had in mind, whether that is the kind of freedom it wishes to give hon. members.

I want to return to another point raised by the hon. member for Brakpan. His argument was: To what extent were these facts known and then he asked how well that person was whose name was mentioned in the memorandum was known.

Soudan.

Yes, Soudan.

I have just explained to the hon. member that when that oil was bought, we and the SFF certainly did not have time to go deeply into the man’s past. The circumstances are explained in the memorandum, but does the hon. member not want to understand that a specific situation arose which placed us before a choice between concluding a longterm contract at a much higher price per barrel, or quickly purchasing a spot load?

Just ask for security.

We quickly purchased a spot load. The hon. member says “Just ask for security”.

It is a pity he did not leave the country long ago.

Surely the hon. member also read in the memorandum what Britain’s top expert said about the possibility and the deficiencies in the system in respect of security as it then was and even as it is now. As a former attorney, he must try to gauge the atmosphere in which business was done. He tried to kick up dust about certain payments made to Mercabank, etc.

It was R10 million.

When he used to process a deed in his attorney’s office, did he frequently divide up the purchase price on behalf of the seller among 10 people? Did he know why each amount was paid? Of course he did not.

The mode of operation of our time in White politics has now become to make suspicion-mongering one’s point of departure, even in regard to such a matter as oil supplies.

I want to conclude because my time is running out.

Yes, your time is running out.

I want to conclude with an appeal. There are hundreds of subjects on which we can attack one another politically. We can talk about constitutional development until the end of the year. We can talk about anything under the sun, but let us leave this country’s security alone, in which the matter of oil supplies is deeply implicated, and not politicize it.

Are my questions unfair?

The hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central can say whatever he likes now. He can croak and he can squawk, but in dealing with this subject he has politicized the supply of oil to South Africa for party-political gain, for petty party-political gain.

The hon. member for Brakpan has asked whether he was unfair. I say no, but I remind him of the passage quoted from what his leader said, and I say his leader is prepared to politicize this matter to canvass votes for the CP in four by-elections, the outcome of which is negligible in comparison with the importance of this matter to South Africa.

Mr. Speaker, we in the NRP believe that the whole question of the procurement of oil for South Africa is of the utmost importance and sensitivity. We recognize that South Africa is fighting on many fronts for survival, not the least of which is the fight for economic survival, which depends on the procurement of crude oil from the Middle East and other sources. Hon. members will recognize that we are fighting a hot war in South West Africa and other sensitive areas. They will recognize that we are fighting internal sabotage and that we have a vital fight on our hands when it comes to fighting for the procurement of crude oil for South Africa’s main bloodstream, her industry and her transport. Therefore we believe that the issue of the procurement of oil is of such vital importance that it should be debated as it is in fact being debated today.

I should like to say to the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central that, when he started the ball rolling, I am sure he did not anticipate the seriousness of what he was saying. In this very process of procuring oil by intrigue, behind closed doors and also in back-rooms with international cadres, it is necessary to involve the utilization of secret funds. As the hon. the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning said earlier on in his review of the historical background, the concept and the utilization of confidential funds was accepted on all sides of the House previously. However, regarding the utilization of those funds, a number of very serious questions arose, for instance whether under the cloak of confidentiality there is not the possibility of corruption and mismanagement. If one asks such questions, one is led on to the next set of questions such as: What has happened to the privilege of Parliament and the right of the Press to report what is said in the House? Undoubtedly the democratic system finds it anathema that members of the House should be unable to secure and procure information regarding the expenditure of what are essentially public funds. It cannot be argued that this is not a tax. It is an administered tax, the funds for the State Oil Fund, and therefore it is public money that is being spent and it is a pertinent question to ask how the Parliament of South Africa, which embodies the democratic rights of its members and therefore of the public, can inquire into whether such funds are being utilized correctly or whether corruption or dishonesty has crept into the administration of those funds.

I am not going to deal this afternoon with the details of the memorandum, for which I thank the hon. the Minister. I refer to the 17-page memorandum he gave us containing the chronological events of the Salem scandal. There is not enough time available for that. I do, however, wish to deal with two cardinal questions here. Firstly, does this House continue to believe that secret funds are necessary? I want to re-emphasize that this party says: Yes, under the present circumstances, where South Africa is fighting a war on many fronts, secret funds are absolutely essential. There can be no question about that. At the same time we must beware that we do not undermine the essential democratic process in South Africa which has been jealously guarded and which has been fought for over decades. Therefore the question arises how we can accept the concept of confidential funds and yet possibly deprive members of the House of their democratic and constitutional right to know how those funds are being expended. I shall deal with that fairly shortly.

Secondly, the question is whether the Press has a right to report verbatim what is said in this House. May I say to the hon. the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs that this issue would not have flared up into the veld fire that it did had he not attempted actually to suppress publication of the Hansard of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central. That added the fuel to the fire because then it became a whole new issue. The hon. the Minister may argue that it was sensitive information and, as the hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs said, once one starts replying to accusations one is forced to reveal information and facts that will aid and abet the enemies of South Africa. I believe that strategically it was a cardinal mistake for the hon. the Minister to try to suppress the publication of the Hansard of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central. What would have happened if it had been published is that the Press and the public would have seen that there was something macabre in the intense delight that the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central took in wallowing in the embarrassment of South Africa. That would have been the result. That is what would have happened. Then this whole business of the right of the Press would not have been dragged into this discussion here today.

The attitude of this party is that we stand for a free and responsible Press in South Africa. It is their right to publish what appears in Hansard. It is an intrinsic constitutional right that the public outside should know what is said in this House. Mr. Speaker, you yourself have confirmed that constitutional right recently in your ruling in this House. However, at the same time the Press must be aware that that does not grant them a licence for irresponsible reporting and if a matter is reported with mala fide and not bona fide, then they will suffer the consequences and the harshness of the law outside this House. The right to publish what is in Hansard is not a right to manipulate the news in an irresponsible way. However, I am sure the Press is aware of their responsibility and although there are some black sheep in every flock, I believe that the greater majority of the hard core of the Press in South Africa are responsible and sensitive to the key issues in South Africa.

May I say to the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central that, regrettably, we shall not be able to support his amendment for a number of reasons, the least of which is that he asks for the impossible in many respects. Although we agree with him in sentiment, as I have said, the right of the media to report parliamentary debates is an intrinsic right, and to ask that they should do it without fear of prosecution is to ask for something that is beyond the control of this House. If they do reporting with mala fide, then, of course, they will be prosecuted. That is something the Press must decide for themselves. The right of the South African public to be informed of facts that are public knowledge outside the Republic of South Africa is also something that requires a value judgment. It is not for this House to exercise value judgments on what is reported outside and what is a fact and what is not a fact. It is an impossible task.

Then to ask for the establishment of control by Parliament over public corporations funded by taxpayers’ money, is something we would not argue about if public corporations were in fact being debated here today. But the SFF is in fact a Pty Ltd company incorporated under the Companies Act and therefore the scope of what the hon. member is asking for is far too wide. I say this because it would then include Escom and Iscor—the whole lot.

Mr. Speaker, I trust that the hon. member’s amendment will be enjoying your attention to see whether it is appropriate as an amendment to the motion moved by the hon. Minister.

Are you taking a point of order?

I am merely asking that Mr. Speaker should give it his attention. The hon. member for Yeoville is obviously very agitated about the fact that the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central stole his gravy.

As far as the amendment of the CP is concerned, we have considerable difficulty in understanding their philosophical approach to this problem and, therefore, we shall not be supporting their amendment either. We shall in fact be tabling our own amendment. This party has always adopted a responsible attitude and has been sensitive to the key issues affecting the survival and development of South Africa. There is no enjoyment in wallowing in what has now become the embarrassment for South Africa, not for the Government only. These are the risk factors one takes when one becomes involved in cloak and dagger operations to obtain crude oil. I want to stress that it is absolutely essential, in the face of the international boycott against South Africa, that we have to become involved in such cloak and dagger operations. To accuse only the Strategic Fuel Fund Association or the Government of mala fides is in fact to point a finger at Shell International as well. They were also taken for a ride. They were also ambushed by the international rascals who perpetrated this fraudulent act against South Africa. Therefore, what we say about the Government must equally apply to Shell International. They were also sufferers owing to this fraudulent act on the part of the international crooks. [Interjections.] Mr. Speaker, the hon. Chief Whip of the PFP should rather take note of what we say than constantly to interject in an irrelevant manner. [Interjections.] When we have taken note of the fact that in war time it is possible for an enemy to ambush one’s own soldiers—and it is possible—then, even if one is ambushed, it still does not discredit the whole military operation. It is an unfortunate incident in the whole strategy for victory, and we consider the Salem incident also an unfortunate ambush, an unfortunate incident in the strategy for victory over the boycott mentality of the international world.

Allow me to say, Mr. Speaker, that as far as this country is concerned, I believe we have a proud record of honesty when it comes to trade and commerce internationally. A previous speaker has said that even now, despite the mala fides of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central, and despite the dust that has been kicked up here on the grounds of suppositions and innuendos …

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: I may have misheard the hon. member for Durban North, but I think I heard him refer to the “mala fides” of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central.

Order! What did the hon. member for Durban North mean when he used those words?

Mr. Speaker, I meant that the intentions of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central were dishonourable. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member must withdraw that allegation.

Mr. Speaker, I withdraw it. [Interjections.] When it comes to international trade, and when it, even now, comes to the confidence of our suppliers, I believe that our overall track record … [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member for Green Point must restrain himself.

… that our overall track record and the history will show that people who are really concerned about assisting South Africa will not be put off by this unfortunate incident. I trust, and my party trusts, that we will continue to obtain oil on the international market. Allow me to say to the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central that when he claims that he had no knowledge of any briefing, I would question the factuality of that allegation. I would question it because the record shows that he was a member of the NRP …

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order: Is the hon. member for Durban North entitled to say that he questions the factuality of a statement made by another hon. member? [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member for Durban North may proceed.

The hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central, on 29 February 1980, was still a member of the NRP.

Yes, unfortunately.

The briefing by the then Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs, the hon. Dr. Schalk Van Der Merwe, took place on 29 February 1980, when the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central was still a member of our caucus. In fact, he only withdrew from our caucus on 16 March 1980. He was therefore aware of the confidential briefing. [Interjections.] Let me say to the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central that this party has always respected everything that has been done in confidence, and it will never exploit it for short term political gain or for publicity. [Interjections.] However, the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central obviously no longer believes in that principle. Obviously his caucus also no longer believe in it because they must have given him the sanction to do this thing which he has done to South Africa here today. [Interjections.]

We believe that in order to maintain the necessity of confidential funds, it is necessary for South Africa to continue to spend those funds on the black market—if I may use that word—internationally, but without abrogating the democratic right of every member of this House to know what is happening. Therefore I should like to propose a further amendment, which, I believe, will serve the democratic purpose of informing hon. members on a confidential basis, as well as prevent the kind of thing that has happened in connection with the Salem incident here, and will also assist the Government.

I therefore move as a further amendment—

I think the hon. the Minister will see that in sentiment he must agree with this. Ex-Minister Dr. Schalk van der Merwe accepted the principle of confidential enlightenment of all parties in this House, and also accepted that that confidentiality could be maintained. [Interjections.] That the official Opposition will have to decide for itself.

What did the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central do with that confidentiality?

The House will take note of the fact that he would probably not be a member serving on such a committee.

Did you advise not having him sit on such a Committee?

No, I would not. That is a matter for his own conscience, a matter for his leader to decide. [Interjections.] They must live with their own risk-factors. [Interjections.] That is why I moved my amendment. I believe this will serve the interests of South Africa and the democratic right embodied in this House.

Would you put the Progs on that Select Committee?

Yes, because they are, until proved otherwise, a loyal Opposition in this House. [Interjections.] There may be some black sheep in that flock … [Interjections.] … but we have always been a democratic and fair party, a just party. It is up to the hon. Leader of the Opposition to sort out his own black sheep in his caucus. [Interjections.]

Let me say in conclusion—because my time is getting very short—that we regret that the incident occurred. It was wrong strategy on the hon. the Minister’s part and an incorrect assessment on the part of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central, but we trust that it will not have a long-lasting detrimental effect on the welfare of all South Africans. [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, may I say at the outset to the hon. member who has just resumed his seat that I think that his whole tone was one—if I may use the term—of bitterness towards somebody who was once a member of his party but who has now left that party? [Interjections.] It was that bitterness which turned his speech into a personal attack. I do not believe that hon. member advanced any argument of any validity at all by becoming personal, by becoming abusive, by doubting people’s bona fides and by alleging that they had told untruths, because the reality of the situation is that either he has a case or he does not have a case. [Interjections.] If he wants to prove himself to any other political party in this House, because he wants to join them, let me tell him that they would take him without this type of action. [Interjections.]

There is no bigger joiner than you.

I only … [Interjections.]

Order! Hon. members must give the hon. member a chance to continue with his speech.

I join honourable organizations, let me assure the hon. the Minister. [Interjections.] The same tone crept into the speech of the hon. the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning. I do not think it does him any credit to start talking about a man’s business, about what he does, about whether he makes a profit or whether he suffers a loss. In fact, the hon. the Minister is way above that or should be way above that. [Interjections.] I really do not think that that is the way to debate this issue.

You understand it better at that low level.

I think that the debate is actually a very important one. I should like, if I may, to present it as I see it, in my way. I believe there are five issues involved in this debate.

This first issue is the Salem affair itself. This involves an assessment of the losses which have actually been suffered, a judgment as to whether with reasonable care they could have been avoided.

In the circumstances.

Yes, in the the circumstances. I concede that immediately. It also involves assurances, which we have not received up to this moment, that steps have actually been taken to endeavour to prevent similar frauds being perpetrated to the extent that it is possible to prevent this kind of fraud. Lastly, it involves the determination whether the wrongdoers can be found, whether they can be punished and whether any amount can be recovered. These are the issues relating to the Salem affair, issues which I hope the hon. the Minister will deal with when he replies to the debate.

The second matter which I want to refer to relates to the supply of oil. I believe the public wants to be assured that the supply of oil which is necessary to satisfy the needs of the Republic will in fact be forthcoming and that the authorities have the necessary ability and contacts to obtain the fuel despite the boycotts, and that the authorities are able to obtain it at what may be regarded as reasonable prices in the circumstances. That is the second issue which arises in this debate and which I want to ask the hon. the Minister to deal with.

Thirdly, there is the issue that the Government has to discharge a responsibility to Parliament, and so to the taxpayers, for the administration of State-owned corporations financed with public money. The hon. member for Durban North, in trying to draw a distinction between a State corporation and a private company, is really talking nonsense, because what we are talking about are companies of which the shares are owned by the State and which are financed by the State.

What does Escom have to do with this?

I will come to that in a moment. The hon. member does not understand the constitutional history of Parliament. This involves not only an acceptance by the responsible Cabinet Ministers that they have a duty and responsibility to account for, but it also requires from them a willingness to answer questions and to debate matters concerning such companies where the shares are owned by the State. It also involves the creation of machinery to enable Parliament to inquire into the spending of money by such companies.

I now come to the fourth issue, the freedom of a member of Parliament to say what he will in this Assembly, with a sense of responsibility but with absolute privilege.

Lastly, I want to refer to what has become one of the major issues, the right of the media to publish proceedings of Parliament in open session without fear of criminal prosecution or civil action. This involves the removal of any doubt where Acts of Parliament dealing with specific matters override the Powers and Privileges of Parliament Act. I want to deal with this first because my time is limited.

I believe that what has happened as a result of this debate and as a result of the reactions of the governing party in this House is that a constitutional issue—I do not want to exaggerate by saying that it is a constitutional crisis—has arisen in respect of two matters. The first is the issue of privilege, which Mr. Speaker has ruled on in terms of the Act and which is clear, namely that any member of Parliament is entitled to say what he wishes in this House. However, the hon. the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning today again threw doubt on that issue and created a situation as to whether in fact it was correct that there was absolute privilege for a member of Parliament in this House. That to my mind is approaching a constitutional crisis situation.

That is not what I said. It is not true.

It is. The hon. the Minister raised it. The second matter which is important is the issue which has been raised by the hon. the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs as to whether the provisions of the Powers and Privileges of Parliament Act, in particular section 30, give privilege to the media to publish. This is something which they have always believed they have had. The issue arises whether in fact an act of Parliament which deals with a specific matter such as, for example, the particular Statute to which we are referring here, namely the Petroleum Products Act, overrides the general provision of the Powers and Privileges of Parliament Act. The reality is that the hon. the Minister has again raised this issue because he …

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

I have very little time, but the hon. the Minister may, if he is quick about it. Come on, hurry up, do not waste my time.

I want to ask the hon. member whether the fact that doubt now exists has not been caused by the action of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central.

No. I had hoped that this matter would be laid to rest now as a result of Mr. Speaker’s ruling and as a result of the general acceptance that there is a convention in respect of the right of the Press to report what is said in this House, something which is also entrenched by the Act. However, the hon. the Minister has suggested that a suitable committee of Parliament attend to this. In other words, the hon. the Minister was referring to the issue as to whether the specific Act overrides the general Act.

Why cannot Parliament look at it?

Let us look at it now and let the hon. the Prime Minister tell me now across the floor of the House whether he accepts that in this Parliament there should be absolute privilege to hon. members.

But I have said that.

No, I am asking the hon. the Prime Minister.

It has been stated on behalf of the Government what our attitude is.

The hon. the Prime Minister will not answer my question, which is whether there is absolute privilege and whether he will allow it to continue.

It has been stated this afternoon.

Answer whether you agree with it or whether you do not agree with it. That is the issue.

The second issue is that if there is doubt about it, whether the hon. the Prime Minister will commit himself this afternoon to ensuring that the right of the media to publish what is said in this Parliament will be entrenched …

Silence!

Raise it under my Vote and I shall deal with it.

To my mind this actually creates a very important constitutional issue in South Africa. We are in fact on the brink of a new constitutional development. We in this House abide by the traditions of Westminster in regard to this. It has been said that the Westminster system is no good, but I assure you, Sir, that the traditions of Westminster …

You are sidestepping the issue.

No, not so. I am asking this question which is a vital question for South Africa to answer.

You are sidestepping the issue.

No. What is the issue? The issue is a very simple one. Is the media entitled to publish what we say in this House or not and will it be entrenched in the new constitution? We are going to enter into a new constitutional development, which is not to be based on the Westminster model. And yet all the traditions here rely on the Westminster model. We are based on the Westminster model for which people have fought.

Go and look at my Hansard.

If that is so, why is it then said by the hon. the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs that he wants Parliament to have a committee to go into it?

Because an hon. member abused the privilege.

No, Sir, the reality is that we want is an assurance that under the new constitutional dispensation, which on the face of it will depart from the Westminster system, the tradition of Westminster will be entrenched in regard to the right of the media to report. That is what is vital in this.

There is another issue which is equally a constitutional issue. It is one which has been raised by the hon. the Minister of Finance. He raised the issue and said in so many words that as far as he was concerned these funds were not State funds. He referred to the Exchequer and Audit Act. He said—and I quote (Hansard, 24.2.83, col. 1715)—

The hon. member did not in fact refer to State funds, but to, in the hon. the Minister’s own words, “taxpayers’ funds”. There is a big difference. I quote further—

What is wrong with that?

This is another issue which has a long constitutional history which the hon. the Minister of Finance should know. The reality is that the whole issue of the fighting for liberty, the fighting for human rights, relates to the struggle in the English Parliament in order to control the finances of the Executive. The whole of that history relates to this point. I can give one example after another of people who found themselves struggling in order to obtain freedom by using the power to withhold money and the power of getting the Executive to account for its actions in order to ensure that liberties were granted to the individual. That is the tradition of this House as well. We now have a situation where we put taxpayers’ money into a private company, a private auditor is appointed for that company and it is then said: You have no right to ask me questions. I have no accountability to you at all.

Who appointed him?

I say that what is needed now is that the agent of this House who is the Auditor-General whose function it is to examine the accounts of public corporations which are not excluded from his authority, should be brought back into this issue. He audits the Special Defence Account which is a secret account. Why cannot he audit the accounts of these particular companies?

Then the constitution of the SFF will have to be changed.

Quite correct. Will the hon. the Minister of Finance not agree to do that? [Interjections.] It is really very interesting because if we go back in history in regard to the accountability of people, we find out what happened to that same Richard II to whom I referred the hon. the Minister once before. Do we remember what happened to him? Because he did not account for funds, that was the end of his career. [Interjections.] That is what history tells us. There were also many other people in Britain who went the same way. There is an accountability in respect of the taxpayers’ money which we require the Government to shoulder.

In many Parliaments there have always been ordinary members of the House—not members of the Executive—on all sides who have stood up for the rights of Parliament and for the rights of individuals because by controlling finances, one actually protects the rights of the individual. That is history. Gladstone told us that and other people have as well. Hon. members may remember how people in Britain spent money without seeking to account for it. However, what has happened now? Because this party has been in power for so long, its members no longer have the spirit of wanting to be true Parliamentarians or wanting to protect Parliament and its heritage. On the contrary, Sir. They believe they are part of the executive. [Interjections.] What is happening now is that the only people who speak up for the taxpayer, the only people who have some feeling for Parliament, its spirit and its traditions, are the members on this side of the House. [Interjections.] We act to protect the taxpayers. We act to ensure that the taxpayers’ money is protected and that is what we shall continue to do.

Mr. Speaker, the speech of the hon. member for Yeoville was important for two reasons, in the first place for what he said and in the second place for what he did not say. The hon. member for Yeoville reminds me of a man who must argue a very weak case in court and then seizes upon on a technical point.

The hon. member has probably had a lot of experience of that himself.

Yes, of course. I have sometimes had bad clients. We thought the hon. member for Yeoville was going to attack the Government on the Salem affair today. Mr. Speaker, I call the entire House as witness. What did the hon. member say to criticize the Government about the Salem affair? [Interjections.] He said nothing about it. However, the hon. member came to this House with an argument which he could have raised three or four years ago. He came here with a technical argument and I am now referring to the auditing aspect of this matter, which has nothing to do with the Salem affair as such, a state of affairs that has existed for several years already. After all, the official Opposition has not complained about it over the past few years. They have not said that this state of affairs should be changed. There has been no attempt to change the Act in this regard. In this case action was taken in terms of an Act of Parliament to which we are hearing an objection for the first time today.

What is at issue here is public funds, but the actions of the people or the companies who administer those funds are not subject to audit by the Auditor General. Surely this is an old established principle in South Africa. What about Escom, Iscor, Armscor, the IDC—after all these are also Government funds—the Small Business Development Corporation? These are after all also public funds and the Auditor-General does not audit them. What about the development bank which is to be established? [Interjections.] What about Soekor? All the money used by Soekor is State money, but Soeker’s statements are not audited by the Auditor General. What about the Atomic Energy Corporation? The fact of the matter is that although they use public funds or, put another way, funds from public sources, it is an accepted principle in South Africa that they are not subject to audit by the Auditor-General. Let me immediately make it quite clear that the funds of all these companies and corporations are properly audited by recognized and leading firms of auditors in South Africa, and as far as this is concerned the public’s money is safe.

The second point raised by the hon. member for Yeoville and to which I want to refer is the matter of the newspapers. In this regard I want to draw his attention to what the hon. the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs made quite clear in his introductory remarks. He said—

He went on to say—

He then referred to the privilege of members—

But read a little further.

Surely it is now very clear what the case is here.

No, read a little further.

It is very clear what happened here. In section 4A of the Petroleum Products Act it is provided that no person may furnish any information in connection with petroleum products. This is a clear, absolute prohibition. All the hon. the Minister is now saying is that if there is an absolute prohibition in one Act and there is absolute privilege in the House of Assembly, there is clearly a conflict. I think some or other body of Parliament ought to look into this matter.

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

No, Sir.

I do not believe in any way that what we have here …

Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the hon. member …

The hon. member for Yeoville may not put a question to me. [Interjections.]

Order!

The situation is that here we have an ostensible conflict between an Act on the one hand and the rights of a member of this House on the other. We must look into this anomaly, and that is all the hon. the Minister said. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member for Yeoville must not keep on interrupting the hon. member for Pretoria Central.

All he has to do is reply to a question.

Order! The hon. member for Pretoria Central may proceed.

I can see no sign at all of the constitutional crisis to which the hon. member referred. I think the hon. the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs made the matter of the privileges of a member of this House clear, but the hon. member was just trying to raise dust.

What was the charge against the Government? That is why this debate is taking place today. The charge against the Government is that there has been a “cover-up”. Who today produced any proof of any kind that made things look like a “cover-up”?

Just tell us who Van Vuuren is.

Who produced any proof? No proof of anything was submitted to this House.

Who is Van Vuuren?

The hon. member who is shouting interjections and the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central, as well as other hon. members, totally neglected to take one important aspect into account.

Tell us who Van Vuuren is.

Oh, Sir, the hon. member is making a terrible noise and what is more he has an irritating face as well.

Order! The hon. member for Langlaagte must give the hon. member for Pretoria Central a chance to proceed with his speech.

The hon. the Minister made it quite clear that an investigation was in progress. He said the matter had reached an advanced stage and that the hon. the Prime Minister would be consulted. This matter is therefore being dealt with at the highest possible level, at the level of the Prime Minister. Certain experts were appointed early in the second half of 1982 to investigate the matter in depth and, in particular, to investigate additional or new ways of recovering some of the lost money. As far as the Government is concerned, this matter is at present being investigated at the highest level. It was also made quite clear that this investigation was taking place both inside and outside South Africa. What recognition for this fact did we get from that side of the House? How was it dealt with in their speeches? It was simply ignored, because it did not suit them to mention that this Government has been engaged in a high-level investigation for several months now. It simply does not suit them and they therefore ignored it. We take that amiss of them.

Now the hon. member is asking: “What about Mr. Van Vuuren’s role?”, whoever he may be—I do not know who he is. The reply to his question is that the Government is investigating this matter. Now it is quite clear that it is absolutely unfair and quite wrong for any member to try to elicit information bit by bit from the Government with regard to this matter. The Government said in a statement here that the country’s interests were still at stake as far as the Salem affair is concerned. After all, it is important for us not to show the public our hand as regards the information at our disposal at this stage. The information the Government has in this connection—I assume there is a great deal of information that has not been made public and that will not be made public either until the entire matter has been finalized—cannot be made public because it would not be in the interests of South Africa.

How was this matter dealt with today? The hon. the Minister said clearly tha the recognized and respected the public’s right to information. He also said that at a more opportune moment, when the interests of the country allow it, the public would be given further information on this matter. If we see the Salem affair in its full context, there is no doubt that what we actually have here is a success story. In this regard I want to refer to the motion as it is printed on the Order Paper which, inter alia, reads as follows—

Do we realize that in many countries in Europe there were shortages in 1979? Are hon. members aware of the fact—and I can quote many sources in this connection—that in 1979 Iran was the second largest oil supplier in the world, that up to the end of 1978 Iran supplied 95% of South Africa’s oil and that suddenly in January 1979 Iran no longer supplied oil to the world and South Africa therefore had to look elsewhere for oil at that stage, also against the background that South Africa was being boycotted? The question we want to put to the official Opposition today is: Do they realize that throughout the world people had to queue up for fuel? Do they realize that there were petrol shortages in America, France and the Netherlands, countries that were not boycotted, countries that could purchase oil freely anywhere in the world? Where was there no shortage, however? Where did the public not suffer? In South Africa! If we therefore compare the position in America, France, Italy and the Netherlands in 1979 with the position in South Africa, we can say today that in spite of the boycott we were saddled with and in spite of the tremendous problems that we had in obtaining of oil, we were successful. Where is the gratitude of that side of the House for that success? That is the first part of the motion. If hon. members vote against the motion, they are showing gross ingratitude for the success the Government and the SFF achieved in 1979.

The second aspect of this motion is that confidentiality must be maintained. I now want to put a question to the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central. Is the hon. member of the opinion that confidentiality in connection with oil supplies in South Africa should be maintained by the Government and the SSF? Can the hon. member tell us whether the PFP is in favour of the preservation of confidentiality? Sir, we shall not get an answer from those people. The situation is that those hon. members have an armchair approach to this matter. They are looking at the 1983 situation from a drawing room point of view. They look at the situation and then say: You should have done this and you should have done that. That is their “armchair approach”. Not one of those hon. members stood up here and placed the actions of the Government within the context of 1979 and said that within the context of 1979 the Government had acted incorrectly. We really resent that.

I want to deal with the actions of the hon. the Minister who allegedly—so it was said— prohibited publication of what was said in this House. The Sunday Times is involved in this, and I want to quote from a report in the Sunday Times of 27 February. The report reads—

What is at issue here is the important principle of giving permission for publication on the one hand and refusing permission for publication on the other. There is an important difference. In the first place, the hon. the Minister could have said that he was prohibiting publication, or he could have said that he would not allow publication. But, according to the Sunday Times that was directly involved in this, the hon. the Minister said: “I am not giving permission for publication”. The hon. the Minister’s behaviour can only be criticized if the Sunday Times did not have the right to publish. In view of what we all now know and according to what the hon. member for Yeoville said, the Sunday Times had the right to publish. If the Sunday Times had the right to publish and the hon. the Minister did not give permission to publish, but also did not say: “F prohibit you from publishing”, then what is the problem? The hon. the Minister did not say he was prohibiting newspapers from publishing what was said in this House. What this basically amounts to is that the hon. the Minister said that the newspapers must not ask him what their rights are. For that reason the hon. the Minister’s behaviour cannot be criticized. The hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs also referred to this. If the hon. the Minister were to have said that he gave the newspapers permission to publish and the Sunday Times published the report and said, “We are doing so with the permission of the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs”, this would indicate to the world outside that the Government had said that these were the facts they stood by. This means that the impression would be created that the Government was lending credence to the allegations made by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central. The hon. the Minister cannot be expected to lend credence to allegations by saying that he has given his permission. That is why, seen in context, it is quite clear to me that the hon. the Minister cannot be held responsible for or accused of trying to suppress the rights of Parliament as such or the rights of hon. members. This is a misconception that has arisen.

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Brakpan put the standpoint of the CP in a very clear and courteous way, and he also formulated and motivated the amendment moved by this party extremely effectively. I believe he did this in a very sensible and informative way, as befits every responsible member of this House. Since the inception of the CP, and in our actions in this House over the past year as well, our attitude is this regard has always been very clear: that as far as the security of the State is concerned, and as far as it affects the interests of Southern Africa and its large diversity of peoples, internally as well as abroad, this has been a matter of the highest priority to us.

Go and tell that to your leader!

Every hon. member of the CP, the leader of this party in particular, has consistently stated the principles of the CP in a dignified manner. I should now like to come back to the interjection which the hon. the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Information has just made. I wish to put it to him clearly that we …

Security matters?

Yes, security matters, but also the behaviour and attitude of certain hon. members of this House towards foreign visitors to this country, and the way in which these matters are dealt with. I address what I am saying now specifically to the hon. the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Information.

Yes, we shall also talk about the way in which you do it when you tell visitors that it is time that the Boers wage war for their freedom. [Interjections.]

Yes, we may talk. [Interjections.]

This afternoon we listened to two hon. Ministers who took part in this debate. We listened carefully to the hon. the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning. I think the hon. the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning put the standpoint of his party in an extremely effective way. The fact that a second hon. Minister had to enter the debate—apart from the hon. the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs, of course—was evidence to us of how seriously the Government takes this matter. As far as the hon. the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning is concerned, I adopt the standpoint—and the hon. the Minister will not excuse me for saying this—that the conduct of the hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs here this afternoon involved the leader of the CP in this debate in a way which, to me, was completely beneath the dignity of this debate. The hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs is not present in the House now. He has apologized for his absence, and I accept this. However, the hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs referred to the Leader of the CP and said …

That he had lied. [Interjections.]

The hon. the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Information said that my leader had lied about some matter or other. [Interjections.]

I did not say a single word.

Someone did, in fact, say that. Who was it then? [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, this is proof of the style of conduct of some hon. members on the Government side. However, this does not concern me. [Interjections.] All I want to say is that the CP will state the policy and the principles of our party in future by-elections, as well as those which are about to take place now, and set them against those of the parties which oppose us in those by-elections. We shall do that. True to the principles stated here by the hon. member for Brakpan, we shall deal with the affairs of Southern Africa. The fact that the hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs dragged a newspaper report in here, and held it up as proof that we were supposedly blowing hot and cold, is something I find remarkable in the extreme. I wish to put it to the hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs in his absence—and I shall repeat this in his presence in future too—that he is the last hon. member in this House who should refer to hon. members of the CP as people who blow hot and cold. After all, that very same hon. Minister, as information officer of the NP, committed certain things to paper a few years ago—these were not things which a newspaper told him to say— which he denies categorically today, and which he no longer stands by. Therefore, as far as I am concerned, the hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs is the last person who should refer to people blowing hot and cold. [Interjections.] In the forthcoming debates, the hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs is the one man who is going to be exposed because what he said a few years ago is not the same as what he says today. [Interjections.] The CP is the party which will maintain the traditions and principles of Parliament as an institution to the best of its ability, and which will preserve them like a treasure. I say this because it is this party which, in its political actions, does not want the sovereignity of this Parliament to be affected by the appointment of a President’s Council which will eventually have the final say over this Parliament. [Interjections.] The members of the NP are the last people who can afford to be sanctimonious and make a fuss about the sovereignty, the history and meaning of Parliament as an institution. [Interjections.]

There were a few questions which my hon. colleague put to the hon. members on that side of the House, but thus far the hon. member who spoke after him have not yet replied to them. I should just like to say something to the hon. the Minister who is about to speak. In the Northern Transvaal we are not only going to debate these matters, but other matters as well, and we shall do so not only in the best traditions of democracy as an institution, but also in the spirit of the principles on which we agreed a long time ago.

What did we agree on long ago? What principles are these?

Principles on which the hon. the Minister and I were agreed a long time ago. [Interjections.] The hon. the Minister knows what is at issue. [Interjections.]

The hon. member for Brakpan said that the debate being conducted today, should have been conducted a long time ago. Then much of the damage which has been done and which is at issue today, would not have been necessary at all. It would not have been at issue at all if the Government had debated the matter at the outset when the problems of the Salem arose. The second point advanced by my hon. colleague related to Mr. Soudan. In the light of the difficult circumstances under which we had to obtain oil, and since the Government had to take action, the Government should have known that as in many other cases, one might easily have to deal with people who could act in a dishonourable way. My hon. colleague put a question about this which could readily be answered.

The question was answered.

Then there was a question as to what the exact loss was. The SFF said it was R45 million and Shell said it was R52 million. How, then, do we arrive at the amount of R30,5 million? [Interjections.] This brings me to a further aspect. The hon. the Minister said that this matter would be investigated further, but the hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs said that it was so sensitive that we could not do that at all. This brings me to the final question put by my hon. colleague. Who or what is Haven International? Who are the shareholders and who is Mr. J. C. J. van Vuuren? These are the questions we are asking, and an Opposition is entitled to ask these questions.

Mr. Speaker, I am grateful to the hon. members who participated in this debate today. I think it was necessary for us to hold this debate today so that certain points could be emphasized and there could be greater clarity on certain matters.

In the first place I want to tell this hon. House today that this Government—and the instruments or organs it has at its disposal— would be the last to suggest that it cannot make mistakes, that its judgment is always precisely correct. I do not want to make such a claim here today. I think all hon. members who participated in this debate admitted that South Africa is a country that is being boycotted internationally as far as the supply of crude oil is concerned. I want to challenge any hon. member in this House to try to purchase oil from an oil-producing country without entering the twilight world. I challenge anyone in this House to show me a country that will openly say that it sells to South Africa and will be prepared to shout this from the rooftops. I challenge anyone to show me shipping companies that will be prepared to shout from the rooftops that they supply oil to South Africa. I am issuing this challenge. If it had been that easy we would not then have had a problem. Those hon. members should just listen to what is being said in the UN. They should take a look at what the Amsterdam Shipping Bureau and Kairos are doing. They are committees that are trying day after day to cut off the essential supply of crude oil to the Republic of South Africa. Those are the facts.

They still are.

Yes, they still are. At present a conference is being held in Europe on ways in which the boycott methods used against South African can be refined and intensified. They want to achieve with oil what they have to a great extent achieved with weapons. That is the struggle we are waging in the outside world.

Today no one in this House mentioned that the coastal price of South African petrol is lower than the price of petrol in Britain. Since the recent decrease the coastal price of petrol in South Africa is lower than that of petrol in the United Kingdom. Our coastal petrol is also cheaper than petrol in Germany, Austria, France and many other countries in Europe. The United Kingdom produces North Sea oil, but the fact remains that coastal fuel in South Africa is cheaper than fuel in the United Kingdom.

I want to go further. In what other country in the world has so much oil been stockpiled in proportion to its consumption than in the Republic of South Africa? Show me that country. I maintain there is no country in the world that is not itself an oil-producing country that has the same amount of stockpiled petrol, expressed as a percentage of consumption, as South Africa. There are certain petroleum products of which we have sufficient supplies to last us many years even if there is a total boycott. Why did the official Opposition not praise the fact that the Government has made provision for boycotts and for the difficult times that lie ahead? Neither I nor any of my predecessors have ever received any praise for this. My officials and the organizations involved in this did not receive any praise either.

The only really viable synthetic fuel project in the world which has received recognition is the Sasol project. That is a fact. The Sasol projects are the only really successful synthetic fuel projects in the world. We all pay for them. In spite of the fact that we are all still helping to pay for the erection of our Sasols, our petrol price is lower than of Britain. That is an achievement. We can thank a far-sighted Government for this, a Government that cares. It is a Government that plans and acts with circumspection with an eye on tomorrow and the years ahead.

Soudan outwits you lot every time.

That hon. member should rather tell us about Corlett Drive. One day he must stand up in this House and tell us about his involvement in Corlett Drive and about how successful Corlett Drive was. [Interjections.] I am tired of that hon. member’s nagging. He should rather tell us how many people they outwitted at Corlett Drive. That hon. member has something to say about everyone. Let me tell that hon. member he should rather tell this House the story of Corlett Drive.

I shall tell it to anyone, but I shall also tell them what the hon. member did in Geneva. [Interjections.]

Order!

Tell us about Glen Anil.

Tell us about the Immorality Act.

I can understand the hon. member for Rissik’s obsession with the Immorality Act. I can understand it. [Interjections.] The party to which that hon. member belonged was not opposed to that Act at that time.

Tell us about the connection with Glen Anil.

Order! The hon. member for Langlaagte has asked that question often enough now. The hon. the Minister has made it quite evident that he is not going to talk about that. The hon. the Minister may proceed.

Mr. Speaker, in all fairness I want to say that I can understand the dismay of the hon. member for Langlaagte at what I am saying.

I want to go further and today I want to tell all hon. members that when we are dealing with the supply of crude oil to South Africa, irrespective of what is stated in this memorandum …

Irrespective of race or colour?

I beg your pardon?

Irrespective of race or colour?

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Pinelands is so obsessed with racism. Racism is so much a part of him that he cannot allow an opportunity to pass without referring to colour. But I understand his problem. [Interjections.]

I now want to make an appeal to the hon. members. Let us move to a level where we can consider the national interests of this country. There are certain things we can attack each other about, and we can score a few points off each other, and that is only right because we are all politicians. We can fight each other in the political arena on these matters. However, I really want to ask in all seriousness today: Let us take this matter of the supply of crude oil to South Africa, which is essential and of vital importance to every resident of this country, irrespective of race, language, culture, religion or whatever, and let us lift it out of the mire of the political debate. Let us decide what is in the interests of this country. I want to go further and say that I for my part am dealing with this matter with the utmost responsibility. I can give hon. members the assurance that my department and the SFF Company will do their very best to promote South Africa’s interests.

Mr. Speaker, I now want to go further and mention to this House that the suppliers of our fuel, the countries our fuel comes from, the shipping companies and all these people are exposing themselves to risk. Steps can be taken against them in their countries of origin at other harbours or by people who support oil sanctions against South Africa. The hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs and the hon. the Minister of Constitutional Development and Planning mentioned the matter of the certification of ships. Ships can be placed on a black list and are then refused access to harbours. An oil tanker is not a flea. It is a huge monster of iron and steel. It cannot hide away, and that is why we tell the people who supply us with oil: “We shall not blow the whistle on you. We shall protect you. We shall keep you identity and the methods you use to get here a secret, because we do not want to play into the hands of the enemies of South Africa”. Mr. Speaker, can you imagine a situation where the Minister of Mineral and Energy Affairs concerned has to comment on every wild tale or rumour and where the comments the Minister makes on those reports can then be presented as a verification of the contents of that report? The hon. member for Pretoria Central quite rightly stated here that I have never prohibited anyone from publishing what has been written here. However, the moment I give my permission for someone to publish an article that means that I have read that article, that I agree with the contents of that article and that I give credence to the statements made in that article. [Interjections.] It can be used against our overseas suppliers. In my speech I said recognized the privilege of the House of Assembly and the right to report on it in terms of section 29 and 30 of the Powers and Privileges of Parliament Act. Must I repeat this? What we must not forget, however, is that in the same way that a wedding implies the joy of having a wife and the affliction of having a mother-in-law or the responsibility of having a mother-in-law, this privilege implies that there is a responsibility resting on the member. We must guard against a member making use of the privilege of this House to say things here under the privilege of this House that he may say outside this House without contravening the law. [Interjections.]

May I ask a question? The hon. the Minister said that a member may not make use of this privilege in an incorrect manner. I want to ask the hon. the Minister to repeat outside this House what he has just said about Corlett Drive under the privilege of this House. [Interjections.]

Order!

The courts have determined by way of judgment that that privilege exists and that what is said in this House may be reported. I maintain that when a member speaks in this House he must not exercise that privilege in an irresponsible way to circumvent legislation which makes his statements punishable outside this House.

May I ask a question? When the hon. the Minister says that a member of Parliament must exercise his privilege in a responsible manner, I should like to ask him who is to test that responsibility?

I do not want to become involved in another debate now. When a member takes the oath of allegiance to the Republic of South Africa, then he is taking on responsibility and then this House can apply tests to ascertain whether that member has abused his privilege or not. [Interjections.] I do not want to become involved in that debate now. I have stated my point of view and I want to go further as far as this matter of the supply of crude oil is concerned.

May I ask a question? [Interjections.]

Mr. Speaker, I always answer questions and hon. members know this, but I should first like to state my standpoint with regard to certain cardinal points. If there is then sufficient time left, I shall afford them an opportunity to ask questions.

A multitude of questions have been asked here today. Doubts and fears were voiced, but I must say certain suggestions were also made which I did not like at all. Some of the allegations made here and some of the matters to be debated here, include the matter of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central’s behaviour here in this House. I should like to put a few questions in this connection. The hon. member used the privilege of this House to make a speech on a matter which I think everyone realizes is a sensitive matter. Why did the hon. member not first consult me about this sensitive matter before he raised it here in this House? [Interjections.] I have a suspicion that that hon. member made that speech here in which he made such a fuss about the interests of the consumer etc. with the aim of making a little political propaganda.

I do not merely have a suspicion, I know it for a fact. [Interjections.]

What was also at issue, was that every attempt was made to create the impression that the Government was engaged in a “cover-up”.

He said it too.

Yes, it was said and it was also said by some newspapers.

Why did the hon. member not adopt the golden mean of coming to speak to the relevant Minister and obtaining details about this matter? I want to put a further question, and I am glad that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition is here at the moment. If I understood him correctly, the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central said that he was no longer prepared to hold confidential discussions with the Government concerning the matter of oil supplies.

No.

He said that.

That age-old tradition, practice and convention which has arisen that the Government will call in the Opposition confidentially when the national interest is at stake and will ask them not to mention certain matters in public debates, is therefore being rejected by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central.

No.

By implication all co-operation with the Government is now being rejected. [Interjections.] I am asking the hon. the Leader of the Opposition whether he agrees that the co-operation which should exist between the Government and the Opposition is now being rejected.

No, he did not say that. [Interjections.]

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition therefore does not agree with that; he says the Government and the Opposition must sometimes be able to hold confidential talks with each other about sensitive matters.

That is in the discretion of the hon. the Prime Minister.

I am now referring to the discretion of the hon. Leader. Is he prepared to co-operate?

I shall discuss this when the Prime Minister’s Vote comes up for discussion.

Let us forget about the Prime Minister’s Vote and confine ourselves to the matter of petroleum. Is the hon. Leader prepared to co-operate so that I can inform him in confidence when the national interest is at stake, and then to keep that confidence?

Yes.

Then he will have to take steps against that hon. member because that hon. member said here today that he was not prepared to share confidential information with the Government, because he does not want to be part of a “cover-up”. [Interjections.] The hon. member for Houghton said the same thing.

† She said that she did not want to become part of a “cover-up”.

If it means an accomplice is a cover-up, certainly not.

I am not referring to a cover-up.

But I am.

The hon. member said he would no longer co-operate with the Government.

Di Bishop did the same thing to him in Stellenbosch. [Interjections.]

Since time is running short there is only one further very important point I want to make. I feel that a very cunning attempt was being made today to place the Government, which performed its task successfully under difficult world conditions, under suspicion. That is what this entire attack amounted to.

I am now issuing a challenge to the Opposition. If they want to cast suspicion on or have doubts about any of the Cabinet members and more specifically the hon. Ministers who deal with petroleum products, I challenge them to go to the Advocate General with their charges and their evidence. [Interjections.] If they are accusing us of a “cover-up” or of an irregularity, they must go to the Advocate General. The Press and the nation are here—everyone can hear what I am saying—and I say they must submit a proved charged to the Advocate General. They must not gossip and make insinuations. If the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central does lay a charge with the Advocate General, I think he will have to give serious consideration to his position. [Interjections.] Many hon. members have asked: Are the credentials of the potential suppliers checked?”

Did Shell?

Exactly. That is the point.

*I have had various offers from MP’s who want to give me the names of people who will supply us with crude oil.

Name them.

I now want to ask them whether they have also checked the credentials of the people they have suggested. I received offers from Adv. Langley, MP, Dr. Snyman, MP and Mr. Widman, MP. [Interjections.] Did these hon. members check the credentials of their prospective oil suppliers? That is a fair question. [Interjections.] As far as the Salem affair is concerned, the Government was in the position that if it did not purchase that “spot” load, it would have had to conclude a long-term oil contract at a very high price. Because it did in fact purchase that oil, although it paid more for it, it gained room for manoeuvre and it was able to conclude a favourable long-term contract.

I have also been asked to say who Van Vuuren is and who this person is and who that person is. However, I have not yet heard a single word of thanks for the fact that the Government has appointed experts, as I mentioned in my announcement, to investigate this matter further in depth. That was under the instructions of the hon. the Prime Minister.

When?

Does the hon. member really want to know when? It was on 30 September 1982.

I want to go further. In the interests of this investigation and in the interests of the result we may perhaps obtain, it is not desirable to go into details at this stage, particularly as regards the local bodies. It is in our interests to assist the people undertaking the investigation in this regard. I want to convey my thanks to these people who are undertaking the investigation and who are in many cases endangering their lives abroad. I also want to tell this House that some of the SFF members had to undertake negotiations abroad under very dangerous circumstances. I am just mentioning this. Bearing in mind the expertise of the people at present investigating this matter, I am confident that they will at least be able to bring all the real facts of the Salem case to the fore. This will then place us in a position to discover precisely what happened. As the hon. member for Amanzimtoti rightly pointed out, Shell was also caught out, and Shell is a powerful international company with all possible expertise at its disposal. They were also caught out, but they were not attacked as vehemently as we were.

I want to repeat my challenge. If there is any reflection or suspicion on any member of this Government, the hon. member must take his evidence to the Advocate General. I am telling the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central that if he does not do so, all he was doing was raising a cloud of dust here and trying to make political propaganda. Then he was only trying to make political gain from a situation in respect of which South Africa is still vulnerable. That is why it is in the national interest to show the greatest degree of responsibility so that the interests of this country are not harmed.

Question put: That all the words after “That” stand part of the Question,

Upon which the House divided:

Mr. Speaker, it is not pleasant to talk to an Opposition which has just lost a disgraceful debate. [Interjections.] In any event, the hon. member for Berea and other hon. members of the Opposition really seem to be omniscient. They knew in April last year that we could expect a negative growth rate. They also knew that a world depression was imminent and they knew that there was going to be a drought. All this they knew. [Interjections.] Pleas are very often made in this House for tariff reductions. They were over-optimistic. I admit that this is a lovely budget for an Opposition to criticize. Any Opposition could criticize this budget, but why did the Opposition not study this matter, as the people on my side did, and why did they not prepare themselves as hon. members on the Government side did? However, they just stood here and waffled. They said some things to which I shall reply.

† The hon. member for Berea tried to create the impression that there is a distinct difference in interpretation of policy between myself and the management and the S.A. Transport Services. He also quoted from certain newspaper clippings. The hon. member for False Bay has already referred to this. It was unfair of the hon. member to have referred in that way to the new General Manager of the S.A. Transport Services, Dr. Grové, because he cannot defend himself.

But I praised him. Why does he have to defend himself?

The hon. member should go and read what he said.

I praised him.

I want to state categorically that there is no major deviation from the basic strategy of the past. I see Dr. Grové practically every day and we agree on certain points. We do, however, disagree sometimes. Between one o’clock and two o’clock, for example, we had a difference of opinion, and that is to be expected because we are businessmen. I want to state that there is no disagreement about the interpretation of our policy as far as the General Manager and myself are concerned.

*There is wonderful co-operation. However, I think it is wrong of the hon. member for Berea to say that there is a difference in interpretation between the new General Manager and the Ministry. There is no deviation. It is true that circumstances have changed, and adjustments were made at once. However, go and read what the hon. Opposition said four or five years ago. Then there were ships lying at sea which could not dock here, which sailed round the Cape without entering the harbour because the harbour was overcrowded with ships. One has only to go and read their fulminations. Subsequently we spent R600 million on this harbour, and then, all of a sudden, the traffic disappeared. Now we have this modern harbour, with container facilities and new cranes. You name it, we have done it, but the traffic has disappeared. However, the capital investment has already been made.

Whose fault is that?

Go and read what the Opposition said about our inability to handle the ships.

† The hon. member for Berea accused the S.A. Transport Services of a lack of foresight and forward planning. He stated that last year every member of the PFP and the private sector knew what was coming, except the Minister. Those were his words.

*However, he cannot tell me what the gold price is going to be next year. Nor can he say what the agricultural circumstances are going to be next year. No one can determine these things in advance. This organization is losing R125 million on the transportation of grain alone this year. However, he did not tell me last year that this was going to happen. Surely he was not being quite frank if he did not tell me last year that there was going to be a drought. He knows everything, after all! [Interjections.] None of us realized that our trading partners would ask us to send them 40% less iron ore. The private sector said that we should double the Richards Bay line so that we could export more than 28 million tons of coal. They said we should spend R600 million on that line, for South Africa should be able to export 80 million tons of coal within five years. This was the advice of our trading partners. Who anticipated that millions would accumulate at Richards Bay, that we would have to cut down on the supply of coal because the world would not have the money to pay for it?

† The hon. member went on to say that there should be collaboration between the S.A. Transport Services and the private sector to work out a general strategy for the transport needs of the country. The Department of Transport has a committee at present undertaking a study in regard to a national transport policy and the private sector is fully represented on this committee. Before raising the tariffs last year we had discussions with Assocom, the Afrikaanse Handelsinstituut, farmers’ associations and others. What did they predict? None of them could predict this dilemma which we are in now. We shall reply in writing to the other questions asked by the hon. member for Berea.

The hon. member for Berea said certain areas should be demarcated for the private sector, but he did not say which areas. We are showing a loss and we cannot find enough transport work. But still the hon. member says we should demarcate some of our business to the private sector.

*The hon. member for Walmer wanted to know why our business was deteriorating. I replied that there was not enough traffic, whereupon the hon. member suggested that the work should be done by the private sector. The hon. member for Beaufort West referred to railway buses transporting bales of lucerne to remote areas in his constituency. No private company is prepared to undertake that kind of work. No private company would be prepared to transport kraal-manure for the vineyards of wine farmers, because it is not profitable. However, the SATS has to provide all these non-profitable services while the private sector only skims off the cream. When we show a loss, hon. members on that side of the House raise a hue and cry. I am not quarrelling with them; I am in a very friendly mood today. However, we have to examine these things realistically.

The hon. mmeber for De Kuilen pointed out that we were faced with a world recession, that ships were not being utilized and that there were private companies in the country that were doing just as badly. He also pointed out that this organization could not lay people off on a large scale. We can only lay off temporary workers and pensioners. We cannot reduce salaries in a time of inflation. We have an infrastructure which cannot be wiped out with the stroke of a pen. The hon. member also pointed out that we would not cancel contracts, because we had committed ourselves. He also referred to several new services we had introduced in an attempt to pick up a few dollars here and there. I want to thank the hon. member for De Kuilen very sincerely.

The hon. member for De Aar said we did not have to pay dividends. He is quite right. If we had to pay dividends, it would be wonderful, for then we would refuse to convey even one passenger. However, we render a service to the nation. It is easy to upbraid me when we show a loss, but we suffer a loss of R690 million a year because we transport people at 1,2c a kilometre. When fares are doubled, however, we are also criticized. If we paid dividends, we would become a business with only one end in view, namely to make a profit. In that case we would not convey uneconomic goods.

The hon. member for De Aar also said that tariff increases should be announced in Parliament. If the hon. the Minister of Finance were to have problems, he could, for example, increase the GST at any time in the course of the year. This is done in all countries of the world. If Parliament had to be convened to increase tariffs by 10%, for example, because we faced economic problems, the Opposition would oppose it in any event. That is their job, after all. I have already said that we do not intend to increase tariffs because we do not want to give another boost to inflation.

You are going to do it after 10 May.

No, those hon. members just want to play politics. What would a tariff increase mean to us? At the time of the latest tariff increases, I said that no ox or sheep would be transported at a higher tariff, and there was no question of a by-election at that time.

The hon. member said that we should retain our own workshop. He is right; we should retain our own workshops, but now we find that there are some items which we can give out on private contract at a price which is better and which is competitive. However, we have to keep people in our employ, and therefore we are retaining the workshops. The Brown Book contains the amount we are spending on more facilities to be able to do certain work ourselves.

Exactly what I said.

But I am not arguing with the hon. member.

The hon. member for Kempton Park dealt with the situation in general and conceded that we had cut down on expenses. He also reviewed the activities of the SAA and pointed out that losses were being suffered all over the world, but it is very gratifying to see the yellow tail of a South African aircraft at London or Houston Airport. When one is a nationalist and a patriot, it is very gratifying to see the services that are operated to foreign countries. The hon. member for Kempton Park referred, quite rightly, to airlines which had closed down. It is unbelievable.

The hon. member for Amanzimtoti delivered a well-prepared speech. He makes a study of these things, and I want to thank him for his contribution. The hon. member asked me quite a number of questions.

† He said that self-financing should be kept within reasonable limits so as not to place an undue burden on tariffs. The reply is that the reserves of the SATS increased from R633 million on 31 March 1977 to R2 083 million on 31 March 1982. This represents an average annual addition of approximately R300 million. The major portion of this addition represents higher replacement costs resulting from raising depreciation on the replacement and not the original value of the asset. It should be noted that if no reserves were created and the R2 083 million was obtained as additional loan funds, the interest on such loans would have been of the same order as the amount of higher replacement costs. The method of raising depreciation on replacement costs does not therefore place an additional burden on the tariff structure. We will not raise tariffs solely because of this problem.

*The hon. member also referred to certain differences in investments per rand in respect of harbours. He has made a study of this and I am pleased, because this is what one expects of a positive Opposition. He examines the figures and then he asks constructive questions.

† The revenue per rand invested depends mainly on the capacity utilization of the asset. As hon. members know, Richards Bay and Saldanha were built in the mid-70s. A harbour is not a facility that can be utilized to its full during the first year of operation. It is therefore logical that the revenue per rand invested would show a short term decline after such investment is made. The position will, however, improve as utilization improves. In 1981-’82 the figure had already improved to 38,2 cents per rand invested and will improve further as these harbours are more fully utilized. A harbour is built at an enormous expense and is then not fully utilized.

The hon. member also asked a question about the illegal sale of tickets between Montclair and Rossburgh. He referred to a chap who put tickets to the value of R2 000 in a drawer. The only case which has come to notice concerns a Black ticket clerk at Montclair who sold an uncancelled ticket, valued at 40 cents. A further six uncancelled tickets were found in his desk drawer—total value R1,50. Disciplinary action is pending. I will be glad if the hon. member would furnish me with more detailed information about the incident he referred to. We shall investigate it.

*The hon. member also referred to the Railway Board. He said that we should appoint experts to the Railway Board. Other members also suggested that we use people from the private sector to serve on the Railway Board. The Railway Board does not consist of retired members of Parliament. The members of the Railway Board used to be sitting members of Parliament who were chosen to advise the Minister on policy. This body now consists of experts who are the best in the world, whether hon. members want to believe it or not. Among the members are financial experts and the best engineers. Some of them make a study of staff matters, and we have enough specialists in every field. We need a board to assist the Minister. Since 1910, the members have been mainly politicians. Dr. Botha was an economist, but most of the members were always politicians who had to advise the Minister.

Now the hon. member says we should appoint people from the private sector to the board, and he mentioned agriculture, commerce and industry. From which sector in private commerce should we choose a man to serve on this board? Should it be a man from the coal or the iron ore industry, or perhaps from the sugar industry? While we are on the subject of agriculture, should it be a man who has an interest in transport affairs or in the production of maize of possibly of fertilizer?

Let the FCI or Assocom and other bodies of that nature nominate the members.

But they will elect a person with a specific interest. If one wishes to increase the price of certain commodities the man from FCI will say we cannot do so. I want a separate body of three people to advise me on policy. That is what I need and that is what I have.

*There have been so many inquiries into this Railway Board, and after every inquiry the people come back and say that the composition of the SATS is such that the Minister needs three people to advise him on policy. If the country were struck by disaster one day and those hon. members took over, I guarantee that the hon. member for Amanzimtoti would do only one thing, and that is to appoint experts and intelligent politicians to the Railway Board to advise him as Minister of Transport Affairs.

I come now to another important point, and I am glad that the hon. member for Durban Point is here. I want to discuss the question of free passes. I have tried to change this system and I notice that there are certain problems in this connection. Like hon. members on this side of the House, the hon. member for Durban Point has advocated concessions, cheaper travel privileges for the elderly and members of the Defence Force. The hon. member for Durban Point has advocated this. However, the hon. member was not here yesterday when hon. members on that side gave me a hard time with regard to this question of free passes and concessions. I did what had been requested by the Opposition and by hon. members of the NP, by telling servicemen, because this is a matter of national interest: My boy, if you want to fly, you can fly. Reserve your seat on a flight well in advance and you will get a 50% discount. Now we are told that we are showing losses because we give concessions. I just want to spell out this question of concessions to hon. members. Travel concessions such as the “40 off’ card … [Interjections.] … in 25 years’ time the hon. member for Durban Point will be 60 too, and then he will be glad to have this “40 off’ card—the tripper card and various other air travel incentive concessions are granted on the basis of normal business principles. By granting such concessions, the net revenue of the service concerned is increased. For example, a train is not full, and then a married couple aged 60 or 70 years turns up. Then one tells that couple that if they do not book seats during the holidays, and if they do not want seats when the train is full, they will receive a 40% discount. Then those people who are not bound by school terms travel during the slack periods, and they fill up the train.

Secondly, there are travel concessions granted to our own staff. These travel concessions are a basic service condition of our staff and are in line with the generally accepted principle that a firm gives its employees certain benefits in respect of its own business activities.

It is a fringe benefit.

Yes, it is a fringe benefit. Everyone has fringe benefits, and that is why I disagree about the tax on fringe benefits.

Not only is the cost of the benefit small compared to its value; it also helps us to retain the services of our staff. A good official receives an offer to leave us. He says to his wife: My goodness, in that firm I am not going to get a railway or flight concession. If our staff were deprived of these travel concessions, we would be morally obliged to compensate them by increasing their salaries. Under the present financial circumstances of the SATS this is impossible, of course. It seems to me that hon. members of the Opposition want the staff to be deprived of this benefit without being compensated for it in any way. Are we to abolish it…

No, but it should be entered in the accounts against “salaries” and not against “operating expenditure”. After all, it forms part of the salaries.

The hon. member for Amanzimtoti asked a question about the pass colours. There are brown, grey, red and golden passes. They fall under this category. Under the same category we have certain foreign air travel concessions for pensioners, as has been mentioned in this House. A man who has worked for the SATS for at least 30 years can travel abroad once during his lifetime, but for that overseas trip he has to pay 10% of the price of the ticket on a flight nominated by us. We may tell him, for example, that the flight to London on a Wednesday night is not full. However, he gets this privilege only once during his lifetime and only after he has been working for us for 30 years.

All we are asking for is that this should be debited against his salary.

It has been argued that we are suffering losses because we issue so many free tickets.

Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. the Minister a question? I think the hon. the Minister does not quite understand. Will he not concede that all the free passes and all the other people in the Public Service for instance who are travelling during the course of their duties cannot fall under the category of socio-economic services? Should those costs therefore not be debited against the departments concerned? Let us say that an employee of, for instance, the Department of Agriculture is travelling on the railways or even on SAA. The question is, should not the Department of Agriculture be debited for the cost of the trip so that we can know exactly what it is costing the various departments?

It boils down to a book entry in so far as our personnel is concerned. If an employee of the Department of Agriculture is flying, that department pays every cent back to us. We do not fly Public Servants at no cost to the different departments; we get the money back from each department concerned. Up to this stage I have been referring to our personnel.

*When a man books a seat and he wants a concession, he has to book five months in advance. Then we can tell him which flight is not fully booked. There are flights which are not fully booked. However, how many people have made use of this? 400 people with 30 years’ service have made use of this. Why have only 400 made use of it? Look at it this way: One has been working for the SATS for 30 years and now one wants to go overseas. One has to pay 10% of the price of the ticket itself, but then there is still the question of hotel costs overseas. Overseas hotels are very expensive compared with local ones, with the result that people are simply unable to make use of these flights on a larger scale. So there is no question of abuse, and therefore I do not regard it as a major problem.

Thirdly, there are the concessions granted to public servants such as teachers. At present, the burden of these concessions to public servants is borne by the SATS. They form part of the reciprocal concessions between the State and the SATS. In the past, some of the concessions have been paid by the SATS. That is now being rectified. The SATS still receives a concession with regard to customs duties. In exchange for that, we bear the cost of the free tickets or concessions received by teachers and other people. I propose to make figures available with regard to the amounts and categories involved. The free tickets, i.e. those which are not paid for at all, cost us R28,6 million a year. When one takes into consideration the reciprocal concessions, military concessions and State concessions, I do not regard this as an exorbitant amount.

However, when a team of sportsmen comes to this country from overseas, requests are made by the Opposition and by people all over the country for them to be granted concessions. Then there are requests concerning people from whom I have a great deal of sympathy, such as paraplegics. Someone tells me that these people are going to compete overseas in wheel-chairs and asks me whether they can fly at half price. Then there are school bands. Someone tells me that there is a band from a school in New York which wants to compete against a South African band in this country and he asks me whether they can fly at half price. Hon. members would be surprised to know how often such cases occur. However, people never ask the hon. the Minister of Finance whether they can get bread and meat at half price.

They should go to the Department of Sport.

Why do they always ask for cheap transport? Now we are putting our foot down. We are not doing it at all any more. There are special cases, though. Recently, a request came from an MP concerning a school for mentally handicapped children which wanted the children to go on a domestic flight. I told him: “My friend, I shall help you. Let us open a list and collect the money.” We cannot allow this organization to foot the bill in all these cases, even though we sympathize with them.

The hon. member for Amanzimtoti raised some other matters as well. I shall reply to those in writing. It would take too long now. I was told to finish before lunch. Perhaps the Whips could give me about a quarter of an hour after lunch. I request your ruling, Sir. [Interjections.]

I have referred briefly to the hon. member for Walmer. The hon. member for Nigel spoke about our railway wagons that were being used in Africa and asked why they were not being fully utilized in this country. Of certain wagons there are 9 000 at a standstill in this country at the moment because there is no work for them. If we can use them to pick up a little business beyond the Limpopo, we do that. As I said in my introductory speech, we are making a profit of more than R16 million on this.

You misunderstood me.

Very well. Sir, I have a whole series of replies here.

† The hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central asked me certain questions about flights. He is perfectly right that, as regards the flight from Johannesburg to Houston, the crew have to wait in Houston for a week. We are busy organizing this whole thing. They arrive there on a Thursday at 9 o’clock and come back on the following Thursday at 4 o’clock in the afternoon. We are looking into that. I can also tell the hon. member that the decrease in the fuel price was taken into consideration in the budget. It is expected that we can save about R570 000 monthly or R7 million annually. Compared with our total turnover, that is not such a big saving.

The hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central also asked whether a complete reassessment of South Africa’s international routes can be carried out. All routes are continuously reassessed, as is reflected in the amalgamation of the Buenos Aires-Rio de Janeiro route and the Rome-Tel Aviv route and the elimination of Las Palmas as a stop-over station. We did those things. The hon. member also asked whether S.A. Airways could not negotiate joint ventures with other airlines with a view to eliminating some uneconomical services. The possibility of “joint venture” services are discussed with foreign airlines from time to time, but the foreign airlines have not been able to operate services on behalf of S.A. Airways on terms acceptable to S.A. Airways. We do, however, have pool agreements in terms of which we make certain agreements with other airlines.

The hon. member asked over what period aircraft are depreciated. As I said before, the depreciation is over a period of 16 years.

The hon. member also wanted to know why S.A. Airways were expanding their fleet and staff establishment when other airlines were doing the opposite. The Boeings, especially the 747s, which are being delivered now were ordered two and a half years ago. One cannot order an aircraft from the Boeing factory in Seattle and expect to get it next week. It is not like going to Pick ’n Pay. It is a long-term affair. However, we do foresee an increased demand.

*Then there will be growth again. After all, it is the NP which is in power. We are going to overcome our present difficulties and then our flights will be fuller again. However, the S.A. Airways has not increased its staff during the past 15 months.

I regret that I have to refer to the hon. member for Kuruman at this stage. This hon. member moved an amendment. I took some trouble to be able to reply properly to his amendment, but the hon. member simply sent me a note saying that he would not be here this afternoon. This is the first time an hon. member has moved an amendment, and said some other things as well, and has then been unable to be present in this House when these matters are being dicussed.

There is a reason for it.

He had to go to Waterberg, of course, to indulge there in gossipmongering about us.

He has not gone to Waterberg.

Very well. Where has he gone?

That does not matter.

Very well. He simply let me know that he would not be here.

Do not talk nonsense.

Now listen to what the hon. member said here. The hon. member made a terrible fuss about certain things and tried to arouse people’s emotions. I want to tell the hon. member that during the term of office of Mr. John Vorster as Prime Minister, a Coloured, an Indian and a Black were appointed to the National Housing Commission, a body which takes decisions concerning all the State’s funds in respect of housing. A Coloured and an Indian were also appointed to the Group Areas Board, a board which helps to take decisions about all group areas. Why did the hon. member not object at that time? However, he attacked me in this House yesterday. What is even worse is that the hon. member was a member of a Select Committee which was subsequently converted into a commission which he then chaired. They investigated the Environment Affairs Act. This commission, under the chairmanship of the hon. member, recommended that people of colour should also be appointed to the board. The Government accepted the recommendation and the Minister concerned is looking for knowledgeable people of colour to be appointed to the board on merit. Therefore the hon. member endorsed the principle that people of colour could and should be appointed to this statutory board. The Minister concerned accepted that merit should be the criterion. That is why he is still negotiating to find suitable people of colour whom he can appoint. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. the Minister does not need a chorus to help him to make his speech.

The hon. member for Umlazi said that we should attract passengers and that we should bring about better human relations. Sir, management tells me that this is one of our priorities, i.e. that when someone is buying a ticket, he should be asked with a smile: My friend, would you not like to travel even further? After all, that is the feeling one would like to get, the feeling that someone is not trying to tell one that he resents having to serve one. Under the new General Manager, special attention is going to be given to that kind of human relations. We want people to be eager to do business with us. People should be eager to travel by train.

The hon. member for Umlazi referred to the national servicemen and to the “40 off’ card. He mentioned several examples with regard to both these subjects. I thank him for doing so.

† The hon. member for Walmer said the worker should be paid a sufficient wage in order to enable him to pay the full price for a train ticket so that we could wipe out the current deficit of R690 million. Some train fares would have to be increased by more than 300% in order to wipe out the deficit of R690 million. The hon. member is absolutely correct. We are moving towards parity. People of colour are receiving increased salaries, and the time has also come to see to it that they pay more economic train fares.

*The hon. member for Bloemfontein East gave some very good examples of the way in which the CP and the PFP trim their sails to the wind. What they said last year was quite different from what they are saying in their speeches this year. I must say that this state of economic depression in which we find ourselves at the moment is an absolute godsend to the Opposition. The hon. member for Bloemfontein East also spoke about the under-utilization of trains. In this respect he drew a comparison between South Africa, Japan, the United Kingdom and the USA. However, the hon. member for Bloemfontein East mentioned one other important matter. What businessman would convey 204 000 people from Soweto to Johannesburg between 06h00 and 08h00 at 1,5c a kilometre, while thousands of trains have to stand empty for the rest of the day, waiting to convey those 204 000 people back to Soweto between 18h00 and 20h00? Surely it is like buying a tractor of 150 kw in order to plough one morgen of land. That is exactly what the hon. member for Bloemfontein East spelt out quite clearly.

That is a poor comparison.

What do you know about comparisons, anyway? [Interjections.]

The hon. member for Nigel wants to know why the Railways was the first to suffer. In April and May we noticed that shipping traffic was coming to a standstill, that exports were declining. At the same time, our imports were dropping, and dealers in this country were beginning to cancel orders. There was no traffic. The hon. member for Nigel added, however, that we should control the price of food. Those were the words of the hon. member for Nigel. There are farmers in South Africa who find themselves in financial difficulties today, farmers who used to harvest 2 000 pockets of potatoes per hectare, and who today are not even harvesting a full 300 pockets of potatoes on the same land. Now they are getting only R12 per pocket for that small amount of potatoes which they do harvest. Then the hon. member for Nigel says that we should control the prices of food. Let us tell the farmers in the Transvaal, or throughout the country for that matter, that we want to control the prices of food because the hon. member for Nigel begrudges the farmer that R12 per pocket which he receives for his potatoes. Interjections.] These ill-considered remarks which people make are quite ridiculous. They should remember that these remarks are not so easily forgotten. [Interjections.]

Hendrik he was speaking of chain stores. [Interjections.]

Now the hon. member for Nigel wants to know why he is jeered at when he says something positive about the Afrikaner and his organizations. Do hon. members of the CP believe that they are the only ones who are entitled to talk about these things which I hold sacred, to talk in that vein and to create the impression that I am unsympathetic towards the ATKV, which established the seaside resort at Hartenbos and which controls it? The hon. member referred to Hartenbos and asked what we were going to do, and whether we were going to allow people of colour at that resort.

It was Jan Hoon who asked that.

That is correct. It was Jan Hoon who asked that. The hon. member for Nigel says, however, that we are unsympathetic when Afrikaner sentiments are discussed. They create the impression that I have turned my back on those things that I hold sacred. Surely I cannot simply turn my back on those things. However, why do they have to bring up these matters in a debate on the SATS?

Hartenbos is the White people’s beach, and this Parliament is the White people’s Parliament. [Interjections.]

The hon. member for Nigel referred to Hartenbos. Hartenbos is controlled by the ATKV, and the management of Hartenbos has decided that there will be a beach for Coloured people and other people of colour next to that of the Whites.

That is all we wanted to know.

I want to make it clear that I am in favour of separate residential areas. I stand by that. They must not go and tell lies in Waterberg and say that we are going to integrate. [Interjections.] I stand by those principles. I would be the last to trample upon those things that are of value to my people. [Interjections.] This is only done by the members of the CP, and they do this kind of thing under the cloak of Christianity. [Interjections.] To me, that is the most tragic aspect of it. [Interjections.] There is the feeling that they are the only people who can see the light in the road ahead, but along the road they can carry on just as they please. [Interjections.] It simply does not work that way.

The hon. member for Kroonstad invited me to visit Kroonstad. He took me to the railway workshops. He introduced me to the whole spectrum of Railway workers in Kroonstad. He knows virtually every one of those people. He does not go about spreading gossip. He makes positive suggestions and he helps me to do this job. I want to thank him very sincerely. [Interjections.] He spoke about economising. He also gave a well-prepared account of our staff associations and suggested that Railway camps be abolished. Like the hon. member for Witbank, he spoke about housing. Every man who owns a property in this country, who lives as a Railway worker and not in a Railway camp, has a warm feeling towards this country. This kind of man is proud and wants to protect his property. Therefore he does not listen to a lot of rubbish from that side of the House. That is why I want to convey my very sincere thanks to the hon. member for Kroonstad.

The hon. member for Greytown, I want to say, did not make a bad speech. [Interjections.] He mentioned a few positive things. He said it was good policy to discontinue uneconomic services, no matter how unpopular it may be. When there is a train running between Paarl and Wellington and it is running at only 18% of capacity we get those people together and we say: Let us introduce a bus service, because we cannot provide that train service. So we are doing away with uneconomic services. However, the hon. member said that we should reduce the number of pensioners employed by the SATS and appoint people of colour. He says our Black-White ration is 1,3:1. We do the one thing, but we do not omit the other. We try to give people a good pension. The traffic has declined, and therefore we are already taking away the overtime and Sunday time of workers. Therefore we cannot employ the same number of staff. They have to be reduced. However, no worker has been laid off. This is something which the hon. members of the CP must please bear in mind. No Railway worker has been laid off. I want to repeat that. Not a single Railway worker has been laid off.

There are 27 000 who are no longer being employed. [Intejections.]

We simply stopped appointing new people a year ago. People who have absconded have simply not been re-appointed. We are not re-appointing pensioners either, but bring me the name of a single person … [Interjections.] Bring me the name of a single person employed by us who has been laid off. [Interjections.] I ask those hon. members to give me one single name. They must not go round telling people that workers have been laid off by us, whether it be in Langlaagte, Nigel or anywhere else. They must just bring me the name of a single person who has been laid off. [Interjections.] The hon. member for Greytown said we should try to achieve parity. That is our aim, but I also have a problem with parity. I have said so before. I myself believe that one should do certain things, but if parity were brought about overnight, it could lead to problems. One of the problems with parity is that we could be making things too attractive in this country. It is our policy to establish Black States, but one could be making conditions so attractive here in the White area that the Black man will never go and develop his own country. He will simply remain right here where the big money is. One has to do this kind of thing in the right way. However, it is our intention to bring about parity eventually. [Interjections.]

The hon. member asked why we were spending R6,4 million on advertising. Under the heading Publicity and Advertising of the Railways there is an amount of R600 000, but we have to advertise the Airways as well. We have to tell a man in New York: Fly South African Airways.

The hon. member for Newton Park has made a study of our harbours and the results are illuminating. He spoke about the decline in the activities in harbours such as the one at Amsterdam. I went to inspect those harbours in December.

Mr. Speaker, before we adjourned for dinner, I was replying to the hon. member for Newton Park. I just want to point out again to hon. members that it is impossible to reply fully to all their questions in the limited time available to me. I shall reply in writing to some questions. The hon. member for Newton Park referred to the decline in the activities in overseas harbours. He has made a study of the matter and he also referred to the rate of occupancy of our dry-docks, compared with those of other countries. Opposition speakers tend to point to the 60% or 70% rate of occupancy of our drydocks, but—this is a world-wide tendency. The hon. member also referred to the cost of making our harbours safe. The Cape is also known as the Cape of Storms. We had to build large breakwaters in all five our harbours and no money was spared in our attempts to make these harbours safe.

The hon. member for Newton Park also referred to the billions of rands we have spent on containerization. Facts such as these are disregarded by the Opposition and are not mentioned. Therefore I want to thank the hon. member for Newton Park very sincerely.

The hon. member for False Bay asked the Opposition to suggest alternatives, but they have not done so. No one can give me an alternative when one finds oneself in a situation where the business is not there. The hon. member for False Bay also suggested that we should give special attention to security aspects. He also spoke with appreciation of the security measures implemented by the Railways and the Airways. I want to thank him for doing so. The hon. member takes a great interest in the security aspect, which is so important. He suggests that a trophy be awarded for good security. We already have certain trophies, but I am grateful for the gesture made by the False Bay constituency in putting up a trophy for security and in saying that we may call it the Adriaan Jordaan trophy. That was the idea expressed by the hon. member. I want to thank him for his excellent contribution.

† I have already referred to the question asked by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central about the utilization of SAA flights to Houston. Flights from Johannesburg to Houston carry a 45,1% capacity and those from Houston to Johannesburg a 46,8% capacity.

Is that profitable?

No, it is not profitable. We do however cut out one flight to New York. We wanted to introduce a flight to Houston because we could not get full flights to New York because of financial problems. We still fly to New York but we have cut out one flight.

[Inaudible.]

It might be bad. Another thing the hon. member must remember is that although a flight might carry a 46% capacity we also carry cargo to help us pay the expenses. That is additional.

The hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central also said the tourist industry could increase fivefold if our prices were more competitive. He spoke of the buldge of Africa and the cost of flying around the buldge of africa. El Al, KLM, BEA and British Airways do not need to fly around the buldge and their flights are not full either. They fly directly over Africa. It is therefore not a matter of management and competitiveness but a matter of a shortage of money worldwide. That is the reason why flighs are not as full as they should be.

*The hon. member for Bellville made an admirable contribution. He has made a study of the operating budget and of cross-subsidizing, and these were among the matters he referred to. He asked how we could get out our financial dilemma. I agree with him. When tariffs are increased, one encounters resistance. It is inflationary. It is not going to be the solution. The hon. member mentioned several alternatives and also said, quite rightly, that the loss of R690 million could not be offset only by means of tariff increases. It is a matter for the Treasury. I wish he would make that speech every-morning and every night so that we could put across the message that one cannot provide a service without being compensated for it. As in other countries of the world, we also recognize that passengers have to be transported. I think one of the hon. members on this side of the House mentioned the fact that Britain, which is a small country, has a subsidy of £3 000 million in respect of transport services. The hon. member Dr. P. J. Welgemoed mentioned the figures for Germany, the subsidy in respect of the transport services there. These are the countries which are so wonderful at everything, according to the PFP, but just look at the contribution made by the State in these countries to offset the losses. And here we are in South Africa, an enormous country, with a Karoo region which does not lend itself to such intensive production, but which is nevertheless served by a railway network. I should say that under present-day circumstances, it is quite an achievement that bigger losses are not being suffered. The hon. member Dr. Welgemoed asked me a few questions. I want to thank the hon. member for his contribution. He referred to rolling stock which was out of commission at the moment and to capital investments that were not being utilized. The hon. member suggested that the possibility of a broader advisory and co-ordinating transport body should be investigated. Actually this question should be put under the Transport Vote, but we have asked the Commission for Administration to investigate the matter. They are working on it. They have consulted numerous interested persons and bodies and we have consulted them too. I take cognizance of the hon. member’s ideas and we shall go into the matter.

† Mr. Speaker, members of the hon. Opposition sometimes accuse us: “You have to govern by committees”. Yet they are always asking for commissions and committees. I feel that we can do this job without committees. We have the brain power and we have the know-how. It is only a financial problem.

*The hon. member Dr. Welgemoed asked for greater co-operation with the private sector. We endeavour to obtain the co-operation of the private sector, and we are getting it. An hon. member, I think it was the hon. member Dr. Welgemoed, referred to the capital investment of the Transvaal Coal Owners’ Association in a project such as Richards Bay. This is a sign of co-operation with the private sector. The hon. member asked what the loss was on every rand invested by us in respect of passenger services. We lose 20c a year on every rand we invest in passenger services. These are the hard facts.

† Mr. Speaker, I have already referred to some of the questions of the hon. member for Umhlanga. He talked about a board of directors. I asked him whether we should operate in the same way as Escom and Iscor and he said “No”. I appreciate that, because then we would have problems. This is too big an organization to take it away from parliamentary discussions, budgeting, etc. We have taken note of most of his proposals concerning cabin services and we are still considering, for example, what we are going to do about the little towel and the free drinks. But then he asked for a special tariff for Gingindlovu. According to the estimate we gave the hon. member, we are going to cut the price by 21%. What we quoted the town council of Gingindlovu was below 30%, but we are going to cut it by 21% to make it possible for those people to travel, because the circumstances are special.

*Then the hon. member for Sundays River made some very positive remarks about the curtailment of certain services. And when an MP realizes that one is going to take away some of his services, even if it is in the interests of profitability, and he has that kind of approach as well, then I say that when we do away with a service, we shall give special attention to the introduction of a bus service. We have decided to consult the MP concerned every time we do away with a service, and to deliberate with him in order to see whether we cannot introduce some other service there if the train is not being utilized. The hon. member also spoke about communities which have adapted. The hon. member for Sundays River made a positive contribution to this debate and I want to thank him for it.

The hon. member for Beaufort West expressed his thanks for the fact that the tariffs for stock farmers had not been increased. These are the people who are struggling today. The mutton and beef prices have plummeted and we have a great deal of sympathy with these farmers. The hon. member for Beaufort West suggested that we should use lighter vehicles. One has a depot with three buses, for example, and then one gets an order for a big truck with a trailer. Tomorrow or the day after one may get an order for a quarter load. Therefore one has to stock spare parts for those light and heavy vehicles. We try to use smaller trucks for smaller loads, but it is not easy with such an extensive network all over the country. I visited Touws River in the company of the hon. member and I want to tell this House something about the conduct of the hon. member for Beaufort West. The day we visited Touws River and the hon. member’s constituency, we were very impressed by his treatment of the workers and by his approach to our problems, as well as the way in which he put his case to me. I want to tell the hon. member for Beaufort West, therefore, that if he approaches me with a request, we shall go out of our way to help him. I thank him for his contribution.

† The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg North asked me whether the SATS undertakes continuous economic monitoring and also considered overseas economic tendencies when budgets were being drawn up. I want to tell the hon. member that we are in constant contact with our partners overseas and locally. We discuss with them the possibilities of a freight increase and we solicit their views in regard to the coming season. It stands to reason that we are in constant contact with those people.

The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg North also asked whether with the appointment of Coloureds, Indians and Blacks to higher graded posts the SATS was not departing from the basics of sound business principles. The SATS is a business-oriented organization and strives to utilize its greatest asset, namely its manpower, in the best possible way. 40 000 Blacks, Indians and Coloureds have already been appointed to graded positions of which approximately 23 000 were traditionally occupied by Whites. This step was resorted to after we had had discussions with the White staff associations. They asked why a train should be at a standstill for the lack of a shunter just because there was not sufficient White manpower available. It was for that reason that they asked us to appoint these people to certain of these posts.

*There are people who say that we are replacing Whites by Blacks. That is absolute nonsense. The people who make such allegations should bring me the names of those Whites who have been laid off. I am waiting for the names of those people.

The hon. member for Rosettenville asked whether we could not arrange for the Drakensberg express to travel along the Garden Route through Port Elizabeth. We have already experimented with that and there was no support for that train. If we could possibly earn a little extra in this way, we would reconsider the matter, but as I have said, we have already experimented with this and it was not successful. I want to assure the hon. member for Rosettenville that we shall keep him informed if we want to move in that direction again. We shall have to do some further research first, but at the moment it is not profitable.

The hon. member for Rosettenville also referred to 1948. This is one of our problems. We have been governing for 35 years, and those hon. members opposite do not know what it is to govern. They have no understanding of the way a Ministry functions. They have no idea of the way in which the top management of the SATS and the Minister co-operate. They have no knowledge of that personal contact. They have never tasted what it is to govern. We have only to refer to 1948, when those hon. members’ grandfathers and great-grandfathers were governing. That was when those spoons and forks were stolen on an enormous scale. [Interjections.] Today this kind of theft does not occur at all. We see to it that there is supervision. I am very grateful to the hon. member for Rosettenville for his contribution. In 1948, a third of the steam locomotives were out of commission. It was a haphazard business … [Interjections.] … and things had to be fixed up all the time.

The hon. member for Langlaagte referred to a meal. Look, we are conducting a debate on the SATS. I do not want to be unaccommodating, but I have always said that I dread the day when people who belong together start hurling abuse at one another in public. Why make an insinuation in this debate because the hon. member Dr. Welgemoed and the hon. the Minister of Internal Affairs had a meal with some strangers? There may be an insinuation that the SATS paid for the meal. There may be another insinuation as well, but what was the reason for raising something of this nature in this debate? [Interjections.]

Just give us the names; that is all I want. [Interjections.]

Unfortunately, I have to reply to these things. Purely for the benefit of Hansard, the hon. member makes the insinuation that 21 000 people have been laid off.

Are they still working?

I have told the hon. member repeatedly that these are not working members of the permanent staff …

They are not permanent, but they are working members.

They are members who qualify for pensions. [Interjections.] Everything is being politicized in this House.

The hon. member says that a member of the President’s Council can board a train on which a man, his wife and their children have paid for a compartment, and can demand that that couple with their children be evicted from the compartment so that the member of the President’s Council can be accommodated in that compartment.

Are you saying that such a thing never …

I am saying now that I have never seen that …

But it was in the newspaper. [Interjections.]

I am saying now that a person who has paid for a compartment will travel in that compartment. The hon. members may take my word for this.

But was there such an instruction?

There was no such instruction.

So the Sunday Times is lying.

Only negative things are said. I know what is going on in that hon. member’s mind. He is reading to his voters what I am supposed to have said in Parliament. Then he says: “Look here, is it not disgraceful the way these people are treating the paying White passenger on a train!” Because this is the situation, I have to react to this, although I wanted to ignore it, because these little things should vex only little minds. However, I say that these remarks cannot be allowed to pass without comment. [Interjections.]

The hon. member for Bloemfontein North said that the workers of the SATS were loyal to their organization. The hon. member knows what the attitude of our loyal worker is towards our organization. He also referred to the fact that there are some hon. members of this House who suppose that only they have the right to protect certain Afrikaner interests. The hon. member is quite right. They make an unseemly display of the things we value. This is downright cheap. However, people are coming to realize what these people are doing: They are going the way of the HNP and they are indulging in slander and vituperation. They produce a photograph showing Mr. Hendrickse as Minister of Agriculture, but it boomerangs, because the man in the street says: Really, these people need to have their heads read.

The hon. member for Witbank thanked the Railway workers and pleaded for staff housing. I have already dealt with that in reply to the hon. member for Kroonstad. There are 26 306 departmental houses that are being let at the moment and we have 8 000 officials who have already obtained their own houses and loans running into millions of rands. In any event, we shall give attention to what the hon. member for Witbank said.

He also referred to welfare housing. There is an association for the care of the aged. That association receives aid and contributions from us so as to be able to provide housing for the aged. I have visited several of these homes.

I just want to tell the hon. member for Witbank that his constituency borders on the best constituency in the country, but the relationship which exists between him and the workers helps me in Delmas, too, because he takes an interest in matters, and when there are problems, he comes to me and brings them to my notice. I want to thank the hon. member for that attitude of his, as a member of Parliament, towards the Railway worker.

I have a programme for what we are going to do in this financial dilemma, for what is envisaged by management, Dr. Grové and his team, but I shall deal with that at Third Reading. Let us rather proceed to the Committee Stage first.

Question put: That all the words after “That” stand part of the Question,

Upon which the House divided:

Mr. Chairman, as the first speaker on the Opposition side there are one or two general comments I want to make before dealing with more specific issues. Firstly, I want to say to the hon. the Minister that I found his reply to this debate totally disappointing. The hon. the Minister has the habit of being very superficial when he replies to debates in this House on his Vote. For example, one of the crunch issues that was put to him, and it has been put to him year after year, relating to uneconomic passenger services and to the progress that has been made between him and the hon. the Minister of Finance as to what is going to happen, was passed over by the hon. the Minister with a few comments on what the hon. member Dr. Welgemoed had said on the subject. The hon. the Minister then says hon. members must say this day after day because he agrees with the general sentiments. Mr. Chairman, that is simply not good enough. This hon. Minister is a member of a Cabinet. He sits next to his Cabinet colleague, the hon. the Minister of Finance, and on the other side of the hon. the Minister of Co-operation and Development. In previous years the hon. the Minister told us he had had close discussions with his colleague the hon. the Minister of Finance on the whole issue of how to pay for uneconomic socio-economic passenger services. The hon. the Minister must, before this debate ends—either during the Committee Stage or during the Third Reading stage—give us a definitive statement about what progress is being made. It is not necessarily the function of ordinary hon. members of this House, be they in the Government benches or in the Opposition benches, to persuade the hon. the Minister’s Cabinet colleagues. This hon. Minister, together with his Cabinet colleagues, must bear the responsibility. Year after year he tells us that negotiations are taking place. In this debate, however, he has given us no definitive statement at all on what has happened in connection with this very critical issue, an issue which is totally critical to the whole financial situation of the SATS.

This was one of the legs of our amendment, and I am pleased that that leg of the amendment was supported by the hon. member Dr. Welgemoed and by the hon. member for Bellville. There is obviously a great deal of consensus on all sides of the House on this issue that it is up to the Cabinet, to the hon. the Minister and his colleagues, to bring this matter to resolution. I want to put it clearly to the hon. the Minister that we are not going to let him get away with it. Before this debate has ended, be it during the Committee Stage or on Monday, when the Third Reading will be taken, we want a statement from the hon. the Minister, a statement which will make sense and which will be definitive.

Mr. Chairman, I have said that hon. members on the Government side, during the Second Reading debate, agreed with us on this particular issue. There are also other issues on which some hon. members opposite should indeed have voted in favour of the Opposition amendment. There was agreement among hon. members that there was a need for closer co-operation between the Government and the SATS on the one hand and the private sector on the other hand in regard to our whole transportation system in South Africa. When one looks at the speeches one sees that particularly the hon. member for De Kuilen, who came into the debate early, by implication agreed with many of the points that we had made. For example, he started off by quoting …

I agreed only with one point.

Well, Mr. Chairman, the hon. member says he agreed with only one point. Nevertheless, he started off by quoting from a newspaper article that appeared in March of last year, about which he said this showed that the shipping industry was in a state of recession. The point he tried to make was that there was a general recession and that everybody was affected by it. Mr. Chairman, that is the very point that I made in my speech during the Second Reading. In fact, way back in March 1982 everybody knew that we were in a situation of recession. Everybody knew that it was going to deteriorate further. The hon. member for De Kuilen, however, then comes forward and quotes from a newspaper article of March last year, when we are considering the hon. the Minister’s budget for this year.

We are not saying, and we have not said at any stage during the Second Reading debate, that there are not financial difficulties. Everybody concedes that. One concedes that the SATS are operating in a very difficult financial climate. Our case, however, clearly was that there had not been adequate planning. The hon. the Minister actually finds himself in a position in which he has been out 37 times because he told us early last year that he was budgeting for a deficit of R10 million; he ended up with a deficit of 37 times R10 million. That does indicate a lack of planning. Certainly there were difficulties but surely the extent of the difficulties must indicate that there has not been adequate planning on the part of the hon. the Minister; that there has not been adequate foresight on the part of the hon. the Minister in respect of the difficult times in which his services are operating.

So one can go on and analyse the debate that has taken place so far. The hon. the Minister took me to task—as did the hon. member for False Bay, in the strange speech that he made—for commenting on or reciting comments of the General Manager of the SATS. He then said that the General Manager was not in a position to defend himself. Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Minister must really read my Hansard. I applauded the General Manager. I said this was the one aspect of hope which one saw because there was an attitude of realism reflected in a statement which the General Manager had made to the Press. This was applause. There was no need for the General Manager to defend himself. I was quoting with approval the remarks which he had made, remarks which also indicated that the General Manager recognized some of the basic weaknesses in the past administration of the SATS. This hon. Minister must realize that at this stage we are looking at his record whilst discussing his budget, and the record certainly indicates, as I have said, lack of planning in the past. We believe there was evidence of indiscriminate buying in the past, and the General Manager confirmed that in the statement which I referred to in the House. There was no intention of attacking the General Manager. It was a statement of approval, and I indicated that this was realism on the part of the General Manager who had pointed out difficulties which he spotted when he took over the post of General Manager of the SATS.

Having made those general comments— and one can pursue this further at Third Reading—there are one or two specific items I want to raise in the Committee Stage. The first relates to the question of the attitude of the SATS to the question of ship-breaking in South Africa. This is an industry which is thriving at the moment in countries like Taiwan, South Korea and more recently in Pakistan. The present position, I believe, is that Iscor, having set the South African price for steel at about R400 per ton, is committed to providing the necessary steel for re-rolling and is being paid approximately R40 per ton, which is hardly economical. I believe that this industry—a new industry, perhaps, or an industry that has potential—could be helped by the SATS in a number of ways. In the first place our docks at the present time—and probably for the foreseeable future—have a number of wharves which are not being properly used and probably, as I have said, will not be used soon, if at all. If the SATS could therefore lease these wharves, at attractive rates, to South African industry to enable industry to break up old ships and recycle the metal, we could develop what I believe would be useful labour-inducive openings, not only for unskilled workers, but also for artisans. This could then also be a source of valuable steel. I am told that at present the position is that old South African ships are either broken up in Taiwan or otherwise dumped at sea because the charges levied by the SATS include high tariff charges for wharfage. This puts the ship-breaker in a very difficult position, because not only does he have to pay high leave charges for wharfage, but he also has to hire SATS trains, and I believe that the charges to send the steel from the coast to Iscor are in the region of R25 per ton. If one realizes, as I have indicated, that the present price is about R40 per ton, one realizes that the contractor is left with virtually nothing after he has paid the high charges. I think it is a matter that needs attention. I think the SATS could be of assistance to this particular type of industry in South Africa, because the fact is that Far East shipping-yards in 1982—according to information at my disposal—bought no less than 56 giant tankers for demolition. This obviously indicates that there is profitability in this type of business if it is properly run. I believe that we should therefore be doing something in order to assist a local industry of this kind by providing more amenable facilities for ship-breaking.

The other matter I should like to refer to, if time permits me—and I should like the hon. the Minister to reply—is the whole question of SAA catering and the contract that was recently given to Marriott, thus taking the contract for providing food services on our aircraft away from the S.A. Railways. I should like the hon. the Minister to tell us about this. I know that this is a ten year contract which is renewable for another period of five years, a contract that is worth about R9,5 million per annum. I want to know whether the hon. the Minister can give us an indication as to why this was necessary. I also want to know whether it is true that the kitchen facilities at Jan Smuts Airport were such that they were actually condemned by the State Health Department and also by the British Airways because of deficiencies in the type of food and the health conditions that prevailed in those kitchens. So I should like the hon. the Minister, when he replies, to give us an indication as to what the precise contract is, what alternatives were investigated and what the circumstances were behind the awarding of this contract to a foreign company.[Time expired.]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Berea is trying to create the impression that we on this side of the House agreed in the main with the amendment moved by him. As far as I can remember, the only point in respect of which there has been agreement thus far is this debate between what hon. members of the official Opposition argued and what we on this side of the House have argued, is the fact that we are suffering a tremendous deficit on our passenger services and that some form of deliberation and agreement in this regard has to be reached between the Minister of Transport Affairs and the Minister of Finance.

† That is a hardy annual. It is not the first time that we have been discussing this. I think I should also point out to the hon. member that if one wants the Minister of Finance to come to some sort of agreement with the Minister of Transport Affairs this year, one will have difficulty. If we have financial difficulties as far as transport is concerned, then surely one can also expect the same sort of thing to appear in some way or another when it comes to the main budget. However, I think what one can assume is that at some stage or another the State will have to take a greater interest in the deficit which occurs annually in respect of passenger services. That is the only point of agreement between the official Opposition and the Government.

*I think it is correct that this should be so. Everybody referred to the fact that what is being rendered, is a socio-economic service. It is a service that must be rendered and no one else is prepared to render it. What the SATS can offer, is nevertheless the cheapest form of passenger transport. No one else can compete with it.

When heavy losses are incurred, it is the duty of the State to play a role, and the State is already doing so. However, the total loss of R690 million is not covered by the State. Nevertheless, if one can work towards the ideal that the State will eventually take over the bulk of the loss, it will mean that the SATS will be placed in a much better position.

The hon. member alleges that I once said—unfortunately I do not have the cutting with me, but I will fetch it later—that as long ago as March last year there was evidence that the shipping industry was experiencing difficulties. The argument I advanced, was that every year, in October or November, the hon. the Minister performes his calculation and surveys on the basis of talks he conducts with representatives of commerce, industry, agriculture, etc. about their expected requirements for the coming year. At the stage when the hon. the Minister made his surveys it was not foreseen that the economy would cool off so rapidly. It was expected that world trade would show a considerable improvement during the previous financial year. However, this did not materialize. However, what I told the hon. member was that as far back as July last year there were companies in South Africa that had shown that they would not be able to maintain their turnovers and profits of the previous year. It was precisely at that moment that the previous General Manager of the SATS, Dr. Loubser adapted and announced his economy measures. The time which elapsed between the point at which he announced the economy measures and the point at which the private and public companies in South Africa said that they were having considerable difficulty maintaining their turnovers and profits, was less than three weeks. The hon. the Minister and his department had budgeted, in the first place, according to what they had been told by the people who made the surveys and whom it was appropriate to consult. The budget was drawn up on that basis, and it was on that basis that it was said that we would have a growth rate of about 2%. It is quite true that this did not occur, but in the subsequent six months those same companies that were consulted— the Chamber of Industries, the Afrikaanse Handelsinstituut and the Chamber of Commerce—experienced a drop in trade turnover. When, then, should the hon. the Minister have done his planning? Originally he planned with the people, and when losses occur and the SATS do not obtain the necessary revenue, they act accordingly and try to implement economy measures so that losses do not become too heavy.

The hon. member for Berea cannot just sit here in the House and criticize. Surely he must at least tell us what he would have done under those circumstances. I should like to know at what stage the hon. member would have started this so-called planning of his, which also involves economy measures. Would he have initiated it last year or the year before that, or at some time this year?

[Inaudible.]

No, Sir. In that respect the hon. member’s amendment is meaningless. He merely talks about “longterm planning”, but he must be able to spell it out. He must be able to spell it out as was done by the SATS. He said that he wanted to improve marketing methods, rationalize train services and do things to save more fuel, and that he did not want to dismiss those people who were not on the permanent establishment, the pensioners and the temporary workers, or the permanent employees, the people who are on the permanent establishment, but instead would only refrain from filling the posts of temporary workers and people who resign. The hon. member must spell out to us what he would have done other than what the SATS has done thus far. He must give us one, two, three, four, five, six to ten, or 100, examples of how he would have economized, but he cannot do this, for the simple reason that the one will say that the economy must grow and carry on, while the next will say that it should already have been done two or three years ago. This is the problem. They are the same hon. members who can say outside this House that the SATS should have increased its tariffs, but that it did not grant the officials, the employees of the Transport Services any benefits as regards their salaries and the like. After all, we know that they are telling these stories out there. However, I should like to ask the hon. member what the deficit would have been if the salaries and wages of the employees were to have been increased across the board at this stage. What would his tariff increase on 1 January this year have been then? This is the type of question to which the hon. member must provide an answer. He cannot just come here and criticize; that is the easiest thing in the world. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for De Kuilen made a statement which was correct to a certain extent, but incorrect in other respects. A man who is a temporary worker is not a temporary eater. He must continue to provide his family with food. [Interjections.] Yes, it is the “fat cats” who ask: What discovery have you made now?

You are the last person who should talk about “fat cats”. [Interjections.]

There are 27 000 temporary workers and pensioners working for the SATS. Come to a constituency like mine and visit the people there as I have done over the years. Nowadays when one arrives at a house one is told: I do not have a future. Tomorrow I shall not have a house. That person asks you: Please lend me money so that I can travel to the Cape tomorrow to talk to the Minister. I am not talking politics now. I have given people R2 000 from my own pocket so that they could come and put their case to the hon. the Minister. These are SATS people who have been evicted from houses in Mayfair.

Give me just one name.

The hon. the Minister is not following what I am saying. These people live in the housing scheme in Mayfair and when the area was reproclaimed for Indians, they were evicted. [Interjections.] No, they are also SATS people. These are people who tell you: I feel like throwing stones at Parliament. These are people who tell you: I would rather gas myself than leave here. These are people who see no future for themselves. They are my people. They are people who must eat. A temporary worker must eat just like anyone else. [Interjections.] The hon. member for Kroonstad must just promise me one thing. Before I get too old, he and I must learn to box one day. [Interjections.] One visits people who tell one: A proclamation has been issued in terms of which I must move out of my house in Mayfair. When one asks: What did your husband do? she replies: Sir, he was a SATS pensioner. [Interjections.] One then asks: What is your future? She replies: Sir, we do not know. We do not know how we are going to be able to pay these high prices. The hon. the Minister may think I am talking politics. I am not afraid of politics because I grew up with it. However, deep in my heart I am concerned about people. When this country again experiences a levelling off in the economy, hon. members must remember that these people are still living in a period where the inflation rate exceeds 13%.

Why then is the hon. member crying so?

Yes, I am crying for my people and I am crying for people who suffer.

Resign and see whether those people will vote for you. [Interjections.]

If that hon. member thinks that the only reward in a man’s life is someone’s vote, he is making a mistake. [Interjections.] I shall work for my voters even if they do not vote for me. I shall have their interests at heart and I shall stand by them if I think it is right and I shall do so against anyone anywhere.

I want to tell the hon. the Minister that he must not think I am quarrelling with him. I am quarrelling about the circumstances. It is not the department that is responsible for this state of affairs. I have already explained how things have gone wrong over the year. I maintain that the planning for next year is wrong. You cannot make an amount of R82 million available for capital expenditure next year. Does the hon. the Minister realize how many people will have to be paid off if he cannot obtain new capital before next year? Surely these are facts that speak for themselves. [Interjections.] I think I should rather read out to hon. members what the hon. the Minister said. In his budget speech he said (Hansard, 1983, col. 2085)—

Take note, he says “existing projects only”. He goes on—

Then one must understand that in the next budget there must be a very large appropriation for capital, otherwise people will have to be paid off.

The Government will have to accept the fact that the hon. the Minister will not be able to defray the expenditure incurred on socio-economic services by means of crosssubsidization. The hon. the Minister cannot pay the levies and for this reason the Government will have to carry the cost of socioeconomic services. There is no chance of its being said that they will not carry it; they will have to carry it in future because otherwise we shall be faced with an unemployment problem as far as the SATS is concerned. We are going to be faced by the problem that we cannot carry out our capital works properly.

Do you live in Mayfair?

I am prepared to live in Mayfair at any time, because it is part of my constituency. I am not a “fat cat”; I live where my people live.

Oh, you are nauseating (“vieslik”).

Order! Did the hon. member for Jeppe say that another hon. member was “vieslik”?

Yes, Sir.

The hon. member must withdraw that.

Sir, I withdraw it.

When one considers the services rendered by the SATS, one takes one’s hat off to them. If one considers the task of the SATS and one sees what the people at railway stations do, how carefully they work, one does not simply come here to complain. One does not use Parliament only to make attacks.

What did you do?

I discussed political situations I believed were wrong. I said that we were moving in the wrong direction, and I stand by my opinion that the Government is going totally awry with its new guidelines and with the situation it is creating in every Government department and particularly in the SATS.

Mr. Chairman, may I ask the hon. member whether he proposes that during the coming financial year our capital expenditure of R1 800 million should be increased considerably?

The hon. member for De Kuilen is now referring to a financial year in respect of which the appropriation has already been done. He must not ask me such silly questions. Let us stick to the facts. If he wants me to help him with next year’s budget, I shall do so with pleasure. However, this year’s budget has been finalized. [Interjections.]

I want to tell the hon. the Minister once again that when one listens to people who say they want to start fires, they want to throw stones, one has to realize they are not jesting. They have reached the point where the reservoir of their emotions has run dry.

What?

The reservoir of his emotions has run dry; he is in tears. [Time expired.]

Mr. Speaker, I am sure you will sympathize with me when I say that it is very difficult to reply to the speech of the hon. member who has just resumed his seat.

You are too stupid to do so.

If there were a test for stupidity, that hon. member would pass it with flying colours.

The NP has proved in the past, and today it is history, that this party has compassion for the workers, that it has sympathy for the workers of the Railways. It is this party that has taken care of the workers of the SATS over the years. There is no other organization that has done more for its people than this organization. The SATS has made housing available for its people in a way that no other organization has done in the past. It is absolutely unique. The Railway worker has always voted for the Nationalists and he will continue to do so in the future, because he knows the NP is the party that has looked after him over the years. That is why we can face the future without fear. We know the Railway workers are behind us.

Sir, I must make haste because I have little time. More than ever before this budget attests to planning and economy, as we have already said. The profitability of the SAA is largely determined by two factors. The first question I ask myself is whether the Airways has a suitable and modem fuel-saving fleet of aircraft. To this one can reply emphatically that we have an extremely modern fleet, as good as, as if not better than, those of other countries. This is evidence of thorough planning. The hon. member for Berea referred recently to “indiscriminate buying”. Is the purchase of two new Boeing 747-300 aircraft “indiscriminate buying”? Is the replacement of our Boeing 737 fleet with Boeing 727 aircraft which use less fuel, evidence of “indiscriminate buying”? Is the introduction of powerful engines by means of which we expect to save R8 million in fuel, a sign of “indiscriminate buying”?

The second question—and this is linked to the first—is whether we make adequate use of the available seats in our fleet of aircraft and whether we use them economically. Various steps have been taken by the organization to solve the problem of low seat occupancy on certain days and at certain times of the day. This also applies to overseas flights which are subject to serious seasonal fluctuations and effects. Accordingly various excursion fares have been permitted which help to fill the empty seats. Owing to a lack of time, I do not want to repeat everything now, but in this way an attempt is made to utilize seats fully. A special concession has been made for overseas visitors, the so-called “Visit the RSA fare”. This gives people the opportunity to travel the length and breadth of this country at a very low fare.

I therefore want to congratulate the SAA on these initiatives it has taken. However, I feel that these excursions should be more intensively advertised. I do not think the general public is aware of all these concessions that are available to them. I should like to put it to the hon. the Minister that a campaign should be launched to advertise them more effectively. I should like to hear from the hon. the Minister what success has already been achieved with these excursions. I should like to know whether these schemes have been successful to date and to what extent the public is already making use of them.

The S.A. Airways has run the flight meal kitchen at Jan Smuts Airport for many years, but since 1 February of this year it has been taken over by the private sector. I believe that this was the right step for the SATS to take, although I am sorry that this service could not be continued with. I greatly appreciate the excellent service the S.A. Airways rendered in this regard in the past. We can all attest to it.

The provision of meals at the flight meal kitchen at Jan Smuts Airport began to cause problems as a result of the inadequate and outdated equipment and the outdated facilities. The entire matter was investigated thoroughly—I say this in consequence of the question which was asked earlier—by the chief civil engineer of the SATS in co-operation with consultants. Their finding was that it would cost a great deal of money to make the essential changes. The outdated equipment had to be replaced and functional changes had to be made to the building itself. It would have required a capital outlay in the vicinity of R7 million to effect these improvements. The management carefully considered the recommendations and came to the conclusion that it would be better to appoint a private body to take over this service. It was obvious that owing to its many other duties and the serious staff shortage, the catering department of the SATS could no longer undertake this demanding task.

The staff problem in particular is causing tremendous problems. Top people are scarce and very difficult to get hold of. Well qualified and trained chefs are being lured away by the private sector, who are prepared to pay these people more. Hon. members can imagine what it is like to arrive in the morning only to find that one’s cook and one’s chef have not arrived and there is a tremendous amount of work to be done. There are only a limited number of qualified experts able to do this work, and the sources from which they can be recruited are extremely scarce. In consequence, certain firms who were equipped to take over this service and were interested in doing so, were consulted. From the negotiations it was clear that the firm known as Marriott Corporation was outstanding. Marriott Corporation is a large international firm that undertakes catering services of a diverse nature and on an extensive international basis, including flight kitchens. Marriott Corporation runs flight kitchens in most overseas countries. The firm supplies services to various overseas hotel groups and has the knowledge, manpower and funds to render excellent service. This firm has supporting services of such magnitude that none of the other firms or transport services could compete with it. Accordingly this firm was also prepared to effect improvements totalling R2,7 million to the flight meals kitchen at Jan Smuts Airport. On this basis approval was granted for negotiations to be held with Marriott Corporation with a view to leasing the flight meal kitchen at Jan Smuts Airport to the firm. This was done for a period of 10 years. Ten years is considered a reasonable period of time to recover the capital investment of R2,7 million. The fact that Marriott Corporation is undertaking the necessary improvements costing R2,7 million at its own expense, in itself led to a saving of almost R7 million. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Kempton Park has raised the matter of the flight kitchen at Jan Smuts Airport and the fact is that this has now been handed over to a private company. I believe it is an American company, if my information is correct.

Yes, that is correct.

Mr. Chairman, I think it is very sad that the day has come that South Africans cannot provide the necessary facilities required by flight kitchens. I think there is something radically wrong when the SATS, which, for many, many decades have provided excellent service as far as catering on railways, airways and elsewhere is concerned, should now find that they have to hand their flight kitchen over to an American company.

I thought you were in favour of private enterprise.

Maybe so, Mr. Chairman, but it is nevertheless an American concern. I should prefer it to be a South African company. Then I should like to ask the hon. the Minister something else. On the one hand we are handing over the flight kitchen, which involved hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of rands worth of business a year, to an American company. Yet, on the other hand, we have the Blue Room restaurant at the Johannesburg railway station, in respect of which this hon. Minister has agreed to spend R375 460 on renovating it, on airconditioning it, on removing the old pub counter from the old Durban railway station and installing it at the Johannesburg railway station. What for? For a loss operation. Mr. Chairman, I asked a question earlier this session about the Blue Room restaurant. According to the reply given, prior to the renovation the revenue for 12 months was R468 000. The expenditure was R892 000, which meant a loss of R424 000 a year. If one works that out at the cost per meal, that cost amounts to R37 a meal. Then the hon. the Minister goes and spends nearly R400 000 on renovating the place. Yet, it is still running at a loss.

What concerns me, Mr. Chairman, is that one finds this type of expenditure on a high class restaurant for only 65 meals a day, according to the reply I received to my question. What concerns me even more is the answer I received when I asked whether senior officials of the SATS were given a special tariff at that restaurant. The reply then was that senior officials who were entitled to entertainment allowances received a special discount in the Blue Room restaurant when acting as hosts in their official capacity. The question I put …

For the mink and manure brigade.

Maybe just that, Sir. Maybe for the mink and manure brigade. I wonder nevertheless at the wisdom of this kind of expenditure while the SATS is faced with a financial position such as the one in which it finds itself today.

Earlier this evening we heard the hon. member for Langlaagte pleading for his constituents. Many of them are railway workers who are suffering as a result of the difficult times in which we live, times of recession and inflation. Then we have the hon. member for Kempton Park, who contradicts this and says that no organization has done more for its workers than the SATS. He referred, for example, to housing and to the amounts that have been spent on housing. I am sure hon. members might be interested to know how much money has been spent on housing for SATS employees during the last four years. There have been 40 604 loans totalling R1 540,8 million. The average value of a loan is R37 947 per employee, according to the hon. the Minister’s memorandum. This is an indication of how well-off many of the railways employees are.

I believe the main issue of this debate is the fact that the SATS are running into a very high loss situation. We have repeatedly heard about the R690 million loss on passenger services. I disagree with the hon. the Minister on what he said in his reply to the Second Reading debate that the amount of money spent in terms of allowances, etc., only amounted to R28 million. If I remember correctly he quoted the figure of R28 million. I believe, however, it is much more than that. The hon. the Minister also said that in order to reduce the loss he would have to increase fares by 300% in order to obtain an economic price system. I want to submit to the hon. the Minister that if he increased rail fares to that level he would certainly kill railway passenger services. I certainly do not believe that railway passenger services can survive this never-ending increases in fares. I am most concerned, even about the Blue Train …

[Inaudible.]

Yes, but already this hon. Minister is planning to put up the fares on the Blue Train. I have some documentation here that shows that next year the price for standard accommodation, on a trip from Johannesburg to Cape Town, is going to be increased from R270 to R325.

Is that for the Blue Train?

Yes, the Blue Train. [Interjections.] I believe that the number of passengers using the Blue Train has fallen off in recent times. As I said last year, if the market can stand the increased fares, put them up, but I believe that we are reaching the stage where we are possibly squeezing the passengers a bit too much. Therefore I appeal to the hon. the Minister to reconsider, to look in depth into what I suggested during the Second Reading debate, and that is that we should find out how many people who are not socio-economic cases …

The Blue Train is a train for wealthy people.

Every man has his price.

It is beyond my reach.

My leader says it is beyond his reach. I want to tell the hon. the Minister that if he goes on this way, it is going to be beyond the reach of many people who have been using it in the past. Let me repeat: Let the hon. the Minister look into the figures and find out whether there has been a falling-off in bookings on the Blue Train.

A little.

A little? Well, there is the danger signal. I think we definitely have to look at this business of fares. [Interjections.] There are many people who are travelling on the railways on various concessions, passes and so on who are not socioeconomic cases. Therefore as far as those people are concerned, no matter what department they work for, what section of the Transport Services they work for, I believe that their department should be debited with the cost of the relevant trip. This is very easy today with our plastic money-card. Instead of having the passes that we do have, let us have one of these plastic money-cards with our number on it. One then goes to any station and says one wants to travel from point A to point B. The ticket-seller puts the card into a machine, a ticket automatically pops out and the person’s account is debited with the relevant amount for the department concerned. I believe that the hon. the Minister has to look at this, because if there are people in Pipelines, for example, who are travelling by rail—for whatever reason—I believe that Pipelines should be debited with the cost of the relevant trips. Those are not socio-economic cases. I keep thumping this home because we are asking the fiscus, the hon. the Minister of Finance, to find money to cover the R690 million loss, but I do not believe that it is all a question of socio-economic cases that we are subsidizing. I believe that we are subsidizing the employees of the Railways. I want to make it quite clear, however, that I am not against the perks, something the hon. the Minister mentioned earlier on. If I receive a perk as a member of Parliament, I do not want to hide it. Let it be charged against my gross emoluments so that everybody knows about it. Why hide it? If the General Manager or the lowest-ranking Railway employee gets a particular perk, charge it against his total emoluments, so that we know exactly what those people are getting and what it is costing. If the hon. the Minister would do this, he would probably find that it is not only R28 million that is being lost to the Passenger Services’ Account. It may well be an awful lot more. I therefore appeal to the hon. the Minister to look into this. I say this because if the hon. the Minister does not get his cost-accounting right, this will tend to corrupt the whole accounting system. As a practising farmer he will, I am sure, agree with me about this. If one does not know exactly where one’s costs are being incurred in one’s business operation, one does not really know exactly what any particular operation is costing one. It is bad business management to hide one’s costs in other people’s departments as is happening in the Transport Services. I therefore believe that the hon. the Minister must get this sorted out once and for all.

I only have one minute left. I believe that the passenger services have to become far more innovative. The hon. the Minister mentioned running a full train with only 18 passengers on it. Why, however, run a full train? I have travelled on trains overseas that only had three coaches. One of them was a dining-car and one coach contained the electric traction unit. It was not the massive long trains we have in South Africa. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I am not going to react to the speech of the hon. member for Amanzimtoti. He raised a few specific matters. However, I want to do something unusual for this side of the House, and that is to thank the hon. the Minister first. Last year I asked a question concerning food facilities for Black workers at Sentrarand. I want to thank the hon. the Minister and his staff, who evidently realized that there was a shortcoming in this regard. They may have realized this earlier on, but it is nevertheless possible that they acted somewhat more promptly. I know the workers at Sentrarand are very pleased about the services they have at the moment.

I should like to deal with Railway affairs affecting my constituency. The local man in charge of the Railways in Natal is, as we know, the System Manager.

† I asked the System Manager to kindly arrange for myself, the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg South and the hon. member for Greytown a tour of railway facilities in the Pietermaritzburg area particularly. He very kindly arranged that. I should like to compliment the Railways on their diesel locomotives shop. I do not think there can be a cleaner one anywhere in the world than the one we have in Pietermaritzburg. We are also having some fine hostel facilities built for Black staff in Imbali. However, once again I must ask the hon. the Minister to consider seriously whether this is the best kind of facility for Black staff. He himself earlier this evening said it was important for every man to have his own plot of land and his own house. There is no political or ideological reason why Black staff in Imbali, which is a Black area right up against Pietermaritzburg, or in Edendale, which is a freehold title area, should not be housed by the S.A. Transport Services in family housing units. I know they are not keen on the railway village concept any more but I believe for the lower income group Black worker it is a valid approach. I do not see why the Administration could not spend some of the money which they put into hostels on family housing areas where there are no impediments because ideology or political reasons. I want to ask the hon. the Minister to bear that in mind.

In the Pietermaritzburg mechanical engineering workshops we have a very rich heritage because it used to be the old Natal Government’s railway workshops. We have in those mechanical workshops a great depth and breadth of skills. There is a full blacksmith section, there is a brass foundry and we have the men who have the skills which have laid the basis of our technological society. There is a real sense of sadness and lack of confidence, one feels, among the men in that mechanical workshop because, as the Railways are modernizing, many of the old skills are falling away. The skills which are used for example in overhauling our steam locomotives are being lost as many of the locomotives are being scrapped. I want to appeal to the hon. the Minister—I again want to stress that it should be on an economic basis—to consider turning the workshop at Pietermaritzburg into a specialist workshop for the whole of the South African Railways to deal with the increasingly limited but very specialized requirements of a mechanical nature which the South African Railways will still continue to need but which cannot be justified in all the workshops around the country, such as those at Salt River, Koedoespoort, Bayhead or Bloemfontein. Specialized highly qualified artisans could be transferred and those particular skills could be practised at one particular mechanical workshop, such as for example Pietermaritzburg. Although it is a small mechanical workshop, it has the full spectrum of those rather special and dying mechanical skills which our workshops of 20 and 30 years ago all used to keep. These are the same sort of skills which one regrets to see disappearing when one, for example, switches from a steam-driven tug to a diesel-driven tug. A steam-driven tug hardly makes a sound and it is a magnificent mechanical machine whereas a diesel-driven tug is a rather noisy and invisible type of operation. I appreciate that the steam tug has to make way for the diesel tug. However, I believe that in an organization such as the SATS, it would not be practical to have a highly specialized section at each of the workshops, although it might be sensible to have one mechanical workshop for the whole of the Republic which specializes in this highly skilled mechanical work. I would like to suggest that Pietermartizburg would be a very good centre for that and maybe the mechanical engineer of the SATS could consider that.

Furthermore, I should like to congratulate the management on the very good apprentice training facility which we have in Pietermaritzburg. I think it is an excellent one. I was very pleased to hear— the hon. member for Newton Park once again brought it to our attention—that the SATS are continuing the very important role that they have had in training apprentices in this country because the skill and wealth of a country rests in large measure on the skill of its artisans. The SATS have a vital role to play in enriching our society through the training of apprentices. It is very pleasing to see that there are also Coloured, Indian and Black apprentices. I hope that the standards that will be insisted upon will not be altered at all for these men. If a Black, Coloured or Indian wants to be an apprentice with the SATS, he must meet the high standards they have always maintained.

In the last instance I should like to remind this House that in Pietermaritzburg we also have a part of the SATS which is now unique. It is only in Pietermaritzburg that there is an orphanage of the SATS. There were of course others in the country, but it is only here in Pietermaritzburg that we have one remaining. I should like to thank the System Manager for his support. I believe that this House should know that that orphanage is supported by voluntary contributions by SATS employees throughout the country. I think it is a great tribute. Two girls from that orphanage passed their matric last year and have been admitted to university. It is not a home for delinquent children but a genuine orphanage although, obviously, the need for this, particularly among Whites, is disappearing as the socio-economic situation improves. I hope that the Administration will bear in mind the needs of the other members of its staff who are not White and I hope too that the management will continue to give all possible assistance to that orphanage when they need it.

Mr. Chairman, I wish to return later to what the official Opposition, through their chief spokesman, said about the financial position of the SATS. I also want to deal with what the hon. member for Langlaagte said in respect of the SATS workers. Before I do that, I wish to say that during the past few days we have debated the SATS in its entirety at some length. Many positive ideas were expressed here, but unfortunately many negative ideas which verged on nonsense were also expressed.

Unlike large manufacturing concerns, unlike industries that are able to adjust their production depending on the available demand which arises, the SATS is geared to rendering a service. I think this is something we keep on overlooking. If the demand for transportation declines, the revenue also de-clines but the running costs remain the same and cannot be reduced. The transportation services must always be available, even in conditions of half-capacity. We are therefore dealing with the rendering of a service in spite of the knowledge that there is going to be reduction in the revenue. In 1980-’81 the budget was based on an economic growth rate or assumption of 5% and in 1981-’82 on an assumption of 4%. The 1982-’83 budget is being based on a growth rate of 2%. Initially it seemed as though the budget had been on target, but as from May or June 1982 there was a substantial drop in revenue, a drop of as much as 11% in certain inputs. These danger signs were spotted in time and certain adjustments were immediately put into operation to counteract this dramatic reduction in revenue. That is where I differ with the hon. member from Berea. He alleged that there was no proper planning in order to foresee this recession. I think that it is a faulty assumption to simply snatch that out of thin air and say that the planning had been inadequate. Control over expenditure was immediately intensified. This is a trend which was immediately made an integral part of the system by the Management. An attempt was made to increase productivity on all levels. Everyone set to work to establish a more efficient and effective labour force.

I think this Committee and every inhabitant of South Africa should take cognizance of the sacrifices which the officials of the SATS have made in this connection during the past months. It cannot be allowed to go unnoticed that the Railways, the Harbours and the Airways do not have the normal quota of staff available. Then the hon. member for Langlaagte has a lot to say here about the fact that the SATS wants to get rid of 27 000 temporary workers and pensioners. [Interjections.] I would be pleased if the hon. member for Jeppe would keep quiet, because there is absolutely nothing but rubbish between his ears. [Interjections.] The vacant posts which arose, did not arise as a result of dismissals of staff members. [Interjections.] The hon. member for Langlaagte almost burst into tears here a moment ago because an alleged injustice had been done to certain inhabitants of Mayfair as a result of dismissals or the fact that they were now no longer in the employ of the SATS. [Interjections.] We have reached the stage where we must take a realistic look at the staff position on the SATS. [Interjections.] Mr. Chairman, if the hon. member for Jeppe keeps on cackling, he is going to lay an egg any minute now, and it will be a rotten egg. [Interjections.]

Order! Hon. members must give the hon. member for Gezina an opportunity to complete his speech.

We are in the position that the SATS, as far as economizing on staff was concerned, immediately ceased to keep pensioners in its employ. What is more important is that the vacant posts in the establishment were not immediately filled. This gave rise to a position of greater work capacity which the normal officials in the employ of the SATS have to produce. I think this is something for which and in regard to which we ought to say thank you, and not vent our spleen at the fact that there has been a reduction of 27 000 in the staff. The fact of the matter is that we were able to bring about a saving in the rendering of a service, while still maintaining an effective transport service.

You were the ringleader (“voorbok”) at our secret meetings.

The hon. member for Jeppe must stop making interjections now.

Thank you, Sir. He cackles so much that I cannot hear my own voice.

We on this side of the House pay tribute to the officials. We appreciate their sacrifices. We see what they are doing and we accord them recognition for this. It is not only in the interests of the SATS; it is in the national interest, and as such the future will pass judgement on their actions. The various staff associations also deserve our gratitude and appreciation in this House for not, in the interests of South Africa, insisting at this stage on salary and wage adjustments. This is something one may be proud of. We also thank the hon. the Minister and the Management for the way in which they are dealing with staff matters. I referred quite a number of cases to the hon. the Minister, and these were dealt with with the greatest compassion and responsibility. The understanding with which each case was handled, testifies to loyalty to the employees and officials. With such a team—the hon. the Minister, the Management, the staff associations and the officials and workers of the SATS—we can only win. We thank them for this.

I just wish to touch on a matter which is causing us a reasonable degree of concern in Pretoria and in respect of which we ask the hon. the Minister and the Management to give thorough consideration to again. It is the putting into operation of the Mabopane-Belle Ombre railway line. The intention and the expectation is that it will be opened during June. It would seem as though there will still be a large measure of bus traffic which will be used to convey commuters.

Karel, that is my speech.

I am not going to say much about it.

Bus transport parallel to train transport will inevitably lead to an underutilization of train transport. I should just like to hear from the hon. the Minister what the position in regard to this bus traffic from Mabopane to Pretoria is going to be as from July when the train service will be fully operational. I personally welcome the more convenient transportation which trains provide, and I would like to see commuters enjoying the pleasure of train traffic. However, I have on various occasions expressed my concern in regard to the dispersion of commuters after they have alighted from the train. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, with reference to the last part of the speech made by the hon. member for Gezina, I just wish to say that I share his concern. I do not wish to go into this any further because the hon. member for Roodepoort said that it was his speech. Consequently we must therefore leave it to him. With reference to what the hon. member for Gezina said to the hon. member for Langlaagte, I just want to ask: Et tu, Brute? [Interjections.]

The hon. the Minister said on a previous occasion before he introduced his budget that he was going to introduce a tragic budget. Much criticism has been levelled at this budget and there has been much lamentation, concerning this budget. I wish to refer to a few matters in the hope that they may possibly be accepted by the Minister as a positive contribution to effect a further saving on expenditure and possibly in this way to help to bring the budget a little closer to a balancing point.

Before I come to that, however, I just want to tell the hon. the Minister that he should not be too concerned about certain spoons and forks which disappear on the Railways. Some people have the tendency to keep such items as souvenirs. One must simply see that loss in this light.

In the first place I want to tell the hon. the Minister that the passenger train service is really excellent. For example I made use of the Trans-Karoo train and I can testify that the compartments are very neat and clean and that the service is excellent. In this connection I wish to make a suggestion with which I do not think all hon. members will agree. On the train one pays for one’s ticket, one pays for a bed, one pays for one’s meal, one pays for one’s coffee or tea and one pays for any strong liquor which one might consume. Consequently one therefore pays extra for the services one receives on the train. These are excellent services and one does not mind paying for that. I wanted to suggest that the price of meals should be increased slightly, but there are hon. members who tell me that one should rather not suggest this. Perhaps it is something we should nevertheless consider.

In contrast, I want to come next to the S.A. Airways. While a train journey takes a day, or a night or a day and a night, or longer, there are very few internal flights which last longer than two hours. There are exceptions, but there are very few which last longer than two hours. What justifies the provision of food on a single journey of two hours or less, even if it is only a light snack which is offered? I know there are some hon. members who do not like this, and I know that you do not like it either, Sir, but I want to refer to this again: For what reason should liquor be supplied on a short journey or two hours or less, and free of charge to boot? At the boarding and disembarking points at airports there are in any case facilities available for people to purchase food and liquor. They can also purchase cool-drinks, tea or coffee there. Consequently I want to suggest that meals and liquor on aircraft should be done away with completely. I do not think it is necessary for anyone who leaves his home to catch a flight to wait to have a meal on the aircraft. He can have his meal at home or at the airport. Otherwise he can have his meal once he has landed. I suggest that the hon. the Minister can bring about a saving in this way. If there is someone who becomes thirsty on such a flight, that person can ask the air hostess for a glass of water.

I agree.

That is a very good speech.

I also want to point out that if meals and drinks on the short flights are done away with, the equipment necessary to provide those services need not be taken on board the aircraft either. I am not certain about this, but as I see the matter, there could perhaps be a saving on staff as well, fewer personnel and air hostesses on aircraft to serve the passengers. I want to suggest to the hon. the Minister that he should not merely dismiss this matter, because it comes from a CP member, but that he should give serious consideration to it because I am convinced that he will be able to save on unnecessary expenditure in this way.

I hasten now to bring another matter to the attention of the hon. the Minister, and that is in connection with what the hon. the Minister said in his Second Reading speech, referring to what the hon. member for Witbank said about housing, that it was true that the Railwayman as well very much wanted to own a piece of this country as his own property and wanted the title deeds in his own possession. I can mention several examples from my constituency, of pensioners for example. I do not wish to tire hon. members with many figures, but I am going to refer to one exceptional case, and that is the case of a driver, a special grade, who is retired on pension. He has had 33 years service, and he is receiving a pension of R444 per month. On that meagre income that pensioner can hardly afford to continue to own that home of which he is so proud, that title deed for that piece of land which he owns. He also has to pay for his water and lights. He has to pay for his telephone. He also has to pay tax and he also has to cope with the expensive cost of living and inflation. He has the same problems and expenses as every normal person has. On such an income I am afraid that such a person cannot keep his family going. I can take hon. members to a few of my pensioners whose wives have to work. I know of a case where the husband is so ill that he is almost unable to walk. He recently underwent a very serious heart operation. His wife is working in order to earn a little something extra so that they can live a decent life. I realize that the SATS pay good pensions, but it is unfortunately the case that some people retired before a certain date and that their contributions to the pension fund at that stage were not sufficient to enable them to obtain a larger pension now. In the realization that this will mean additional expenditure, I nevertheless wish to ask the Minister to give serious consideration to this matter. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, all I want to say to the hon. member for Koedoespoort, is that I think he is a chicken. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member must withdraw the word “chicken”.

Mr. Chairman, I withdraw the remark that the hon. member is a chicken.

And you are merely an old rooster.

Order! I have just made the hon. member for East London North withdraw the word “chicken”. Now, believe it or not, another remark in a similar vein has been made. Who said that the hon. member for East London North is a rooster?

Mr. Chairman, I said it and I withdraw it. [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member for East London North may proceed.

Mr. Chairman, the SATS has become part of our nation and of our country. It is part of our heritage, our history, our growth and development and part of our entire future. It is part of our lives, it is part of our eating and our drinking, of our work and of our holidays. The S.A. Transport Services has played a major part in the upliftment of the impoverished Afrikaner, and offered our poor Whites of earlier years a livelihood, an education and an ever rising standard of living. Our transport services continued to render the same service to all population groups in South Africa. They also offer the Coloureds and Black people in this country the same benefits. It is such a pity that the Coloureds in general are so hesitant to make use of the benefits which a careeer in the SATS could offer them.

Consequently, when we express criticism, we must do so in the light of the facts that I have just mentioned. We would like to operate our transport services on a profit basis, but when we sometimes have to suffer a loss, we accept it. Besides, transport services are after all a national service. It is a living part of our nation. Surely one does not aputate a part of your body when it is no longer functioning well or is possibly not functioning at all any more. Transport services have not only helped us to develop internally, but have played the same role in our neighbouring states. The SATS keep the wheels rolling to and from our neighbouring states; they keep the lines of communication open, and help to convey freight, including fuel and foodstuffs, between harbours and major cities of South Africa and our neighbouring countries. In this respect I am thinking for example of Zambia, Zaire, Mozambique, etc. Moreover I want to submit that without the good neighbourliness, co-operation and willingness to help of the SATS, some of the transport services of our neighbouring countries would at certain times have come to a complete standstill. These are services which are being rendered to everyone in Southern Africa and they are there day and night, year in and year out. These are services which are being rendered by dedicated and delegated workers of the SATS.

Now I want to know whether any thanks or appreciation whatsoever is given for this by hon. members of the official Opposition. I do not think that is the case. There is no recognition or thanks whatsoever from their side. We find only the opposite. In their zeal to get at South Africa, hon. members of the official Opposition are still trying to make everyone believe that the Government of South Africa is destabilizing our neighbouring countries. There is no doubt whatsoever, Mr. Chairman, that the official Opposition are experts in the field of destabilization. They have been trying for years to destablize the SATS in every possible sphere. Whenever they can they destabilize not only the transport services, but also the Defence Force and the trade union movement. We had another fine example of this this afternoon from the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central. For quite a few years he has been destabilizing everything in South Africa. He tries to destabilize everything he sets eyes on in South Africa. Fortunately the only success which the official Opposition has ever achieved with its attempts at destabilization has been the destabilization of the hon. members of the CP. All they have ever succeded in destabilizing is the CP. The offical Opposition has even tried to destabilize the President’s Council. What is a boycott movement if not an attempt at destabilization?

To come back to East London and the transport services there, I want to point out that the Progs in that part of the world, particularly those on the East London city council, have been trying for years to destabilize the entire border area. Let us take only the case of wool exports as an example. When the wool farmers decided to centralize the sale of wool, the Progs from that part of the world noised it abroad to the whole of South Africa and the outside world that that would mean the end of the East London harbour. According to them it would mean that all wool would have to be exported through the Port Elizabeth harbour. Everyone had to be stampeded. The Government had to take immediate action and prohibit the wool farmers from selling their wool in Port Elizabeth, otherwise no one would ever have confidence in the future of East London again. And then we still talk about destabilization!

But what are the facts? Wool is being sold in Port Elizabeth on the basis of wool samples sent there by road. This has had no detrimental effect on the transport pattern. Wool is being exported more efficiently and is still going through the East London harbour. No problems were experienced during the last season with the conveyance and delivery of the large wool clip. The Railway men rendered excellent service to the farming community of the Eastern Cape.

In 1981 the same Progs came forward with the same campaign when the maize farmers requested that Richards Bay should be considered as an export harbour for maize. The facts and the realities immediately had to make way for emotionalism and intimidation. Once again the Progs asked the Government to intervene and prohibit maize exports through Richards Bay. There was no question of individual rights or democracy. They also said that if the SATS did not build more and bigger grain silos in East London and the Government did not make all maize exports compulsory through East London, it would mean the end of East London and its harbour. According to them it would be a demonstration that East London was to become Black, that the Government would give East London to the Ciskei. Talk about destabilization.

At that stage the Progs also dragged in King William’s Town. According to their council members on the city council of East London, a certain Mr. Carr, and also according the the Leader of the official Opposition in the House, King William’s Town would also become a Black area. The hon. the Prime Minister was also alleged to have given King William’s Town to the Ciskei in a secret agreement with President Sebe, and was apparently only waiting for the election to be over before he would announce it. Talk about destabilization. Where could we find a finer example of how a certain group of people are trying to destabilize an area or a country?

I called their Mr. Carr a downright liar over and over again from various platforms. I did not, as some hon. members do, hide behind the privilege of this House. I did so outside, from a public platform. I am still waiting to this day for him to sue me. Now they have nothing to say. They have fallen into the graves they dug for others. Can the Progs not realize that East London is part of South Africa and that the Government and the SATS must at all times act in the national interests?

† The SATS System Manager in East London, Mr. A. J. Jonker, expressed this sentiment very well and responsibly the other day when he was asked to comment on the rerouting of citrus exports from East London through Port Elizabeth and Durban. He replied—

These words should be printed on a card by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition and hung around the neck of every Prog in East London.

Mr. Chairman, I do not want to follow the same track as that hon. member. I want to talk to the hon. the Minister about capital. I sincerely hope that the hon. the Minister takes seriously what is said in this debate. I assume he does, I am sure he does, but I was a bit disappointed about his reply to my reference, in the Second Reading debate, to the rate of depreciation. Before I get on to that, however, I just want to quote to him from The Citizen of Monday of this week. On page 2 there is a headline: “Escom’s cost set-up to be probed”. In the article it is stated—

It goes on further to state—

It then states further—

I refer the hon. the Minister to this, because he said, in reply to my observation that the reserves in the capital employed by the Railways—as shown in the balance sheet—had increased from R633 million in 1977 to R2 082 million, which he said was about R1 450 million over five years, an average of R300 million. Incidently, I do not agree with his statement that it is cheaper to finance Transport Services this way than to borrow the money, because here one is taking R300 million, on average, out of the transport users’ pockets, whereas if one had borrowed the money, one would probably have been paying 12% on R300 million—or more, perhaps 15%—which is certainly not R300 million. I did not quite understand his logic as far as that is concerned. The point I want to make to the hon. the Minister is that whilst the amount may have averaged R300 million, the annual increases were not R300 million for each year. The first year the increase was R63,5 million, the following year R280 million, the next year R196 million and then it increased rapidly—because of a decision of the Select Committee to alter the depreciation rate—to an amount of R347 million. Last year it was R563 million, and this year—I challenge the hon. the Minister on this point—one will probably find that there is going to be R700 million or R800 million per annum in depreciation.

It is not R300 million on average.

No, the hon. the Minister has to be logical in this connection. The point I am making is not about the average. I am saying that because of the increased rate of depreciation, the amount of money sucked out of the economy is increasing at too great a rate. One might therefore find at some future date, the same investigation, which is now being launched into Escom, being called for in the case of the Transport Services. If the hon. the Minister would look at the total depreciation allowed in 1977-’78 as a percentage of total capital employed, he would see that it was 4,63%. In 1980-’81 it had increased to 6,58%. In 1982-’83 it was 8,24%, i.e. depreciation expressed as a percentage of the total assets or capital invested in the Transport Services. This is taking an upward curve which, I believe, is getting a little out of hand. So the hon. the Minister must not come back and say it is an average of R300 million per year. He must look at the trend to see where we are going, if indeed he is going forward-planning.

I have another query as far as the hon. the Minister is concerned. He said, in his Second Reading speech, that he had only increased the amount for new capital projects by R82 million. However, I want to put it to the hon the Minister that we have not only approved an amount of R82 million—that is the amount for this year, certainly—because the total estimated cost, of these capital items at this stage, is not a mere R82 million, but actually R718 million. The hon. the Minister says it is only a matter of R82 million, but Parliament has approved projects, which we will not be able to stop once they have started, totalling an amount of R718 million. I therefore believe that the hon. the Minister must come clean with us and tell us exactly what we are approving.

In the little time available to me, I just want to say that I believe that we have to have better utilization of our assets. We also have to save costs. Talking about the utlization of capital assets, there is such a thing as marginal costing, which I am sure the hon. the Minister understands. I know of a ship that wanted to use the Durban dry dock in January this year. The ship repair company concerned got a quote from the Harbour Administration for R87 631 for the use of the dry dock. The ship owners got a quote from a German drydock for R46 510 in respect of the same period. The S.A. company wanted to know whether they could get a reduction on the dry-dock rate because of the lower German figure and because this contract to repair the ship would have brought R350 000 worth of business to that Durban firm. However, the Railways refused and said that that was their price, whereupon the ship had to steam all the way to Germany. It was diverted and the extra one and a half days’ steaming cost them R20 000, but they saved R21 000 by having the job done in Germany rather than in South Africa. The Railways lost some revenue and the ship-repair company lost R350 000 worth of business. We talk about a recession, Mr. Chairman, but I believe we should become more market oriented and this could have been a case where marginal-costing could have been applied

Was space available in the dry-dock?

The dry-dock is probably still standing empty. Talking about competition, I wonder whether the hon. the Minister’s road transport services can match what appeared in the Farmer’s Weekly of 3 December 1982. I quote—

This is productivity and I should like the hon. the Minister to tell us whether his trucks can do 223 000 km per year.

Was that a Railway bus?

No, it was not a Railway bus at all, but a privately owned truck. It has an NC licence plate that is the area from which I come.

I now want to talk about costs. The hon. the Minister talked to us about the new Transmed medical scheme. This was originally considered a wonderful idea. It was going to give the Railway workers the option to use physicians and pharmacies of their own choice, but what is the result of this now, one year later? I have a circular here from one of the district managers of the medical scheme which says—

I ask the Minister who is going to pay this R5 million. I have heard that this new scheme has required the appointment of an additional 370 clerks. This may be an exaggeration, but perhaps the hon. the Minister can explain this to us. This scheme that was brought into being is costing the Administration an extra R5 million. I believe that this is one area where the hon. the Minister could save costs.

Again talking about saving costs, I should also like to refer to the time taken to settle appeals from Railwaymen who were suspended for various reasons. I have heard of a stationmaster who was suspended and paid off because there was a shortage of R7,10 in his station’s cash. He appealed, but it took eight and a half months for that appeal to be dealt with. He was reinstated, told he was a naughty boy and he received R10 560 in back pay. Talk about saving costs! For eight and a half months he has had a holiday at the expense of the Railways.

Let us talk about the wastage of fuel. I wonder whether the hon. the Minister has read the following press report: “South African Airways pilots: ‘We sought revenge by wasting fuel’”. When one looks at the Sal-staff Bulletin of October 1982, one sees that in an official announcement the expenses of aircrew members were cut. According to this article the pilots burnt up fuel notwithstanding the instructions to save fuel. I do not have the time to go into it, but maybe the hon. the Minister can explain why SAA pilots, seeking revenge, are wasting fuel. I think this is a very serious matter. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, all I can say to the hon. member is that he is not a winner.

I want to mention a few matters pertaining to what the SATS is doing for the border areas. The SATS is restructuring that entire area of the Eastern Cape with a view to economic development. Daily approximately 9 360 Black commuters are being conveyed from the Mdantsane area to East London. It is recommended that rail transport for the new Mdantsane 2 area should be provided between Berlin and Potsdam and on to Arnoldton where it will join the existing railway line to East London. Diesel locomotives are now operating on almost all the branch lines in those areas. Regular container service trains are running between East London, Bloemfontein and City Deep. Extensions to the modem workshops at Cambridge are being made at a cost of over R5 million. New workshop facilities for the civil maintenance department are also being constructed at a cost of R2,74 million. A new workshop for the mechanical maintenance department is also under construction at a cost of R500 000. East London is the only harbour in South Africa where specialized facilities are provided for roll-on roll-off ships. The freight handling rate achieved at East London harbour already compares favourably with the best in the world and will one of these days quite probably be the best in the world with further expansions and adjustments. Two modern tugs have been purchased for East London harbour at a cost of R5,3 million. A new breakwater crane was purchased at the end of 1982 for almost R1 million. Since the introduction of the various home ownership schemes, 2 957 properties have been purchased for Whites. The electrification of the railway line between Spring-fontein and East London over the next few years has been envisaged at an estimated cost of R136 million. This year R10 million has already been appropriated for that purpose. Consideration is being given to the erection of new administration buildings in East London, in the near future, at an estimated cost of R20 million, to provide a central marshalling yard at an estimated R13 million and also possibly—I say possibly because an investigation in this connection is still in progress—to increase the capacity of the grain silo at a cost of R40 million. The decentralization policy of the Government has resulted in R200 million having already been spent in the Wilsonia/East London area on expansions and new projects.

In Queenstown at present a steel motor chassis factory has been constructed for more than R6 million while three other factories were recently established there. I can keep on and on for hours with this list, but I want to tell the hon. members what the Prog. Mayor of East London has to say.

What does Mr. Errol Spring say about this phenomenal investment and growth? He said—

Can you believe it! This is the old become White become Black story. Surely this is the language spoken by the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central. He taught these people these things before he ran away to Port Elizabeth. The mayor went on to say—

The mayor did not say this years ago before all these concessions were made and East London became the leading area in South Africa. He said it only four days ago. Can you believe it! Surely this is no longer mere destabilization, it is blatant sabotage of an area by the mayor of East London. It is a disgrace. [Interjections.] It is a disgrace that the man who was elected by the taxpayers there should sell out their interests in their environment to such an extent.

Since the establishment of staff associations for Black workers during April 1981, various other unregistered trade unions have made sustained efforts to persuade Black employees of the SATS to join them in order to obtain recognition for themselves in that way. The aforesaid trade unions are still engaged in this poaching technique in the East London harbour area, of course with the blessing and the support of the Progs. As a result of good countermeasures which were taken, as well as the loyalty and sense of responsibility displayed by the Black employees in East London in regard to the SATS, there has, however, been no disruption of harbour activities up to now. To the regret of the Progs and in spite of all their destabilization attempts and interference with the trade unions in those areas and elsewhere in South Africa, the relations between the SATS …

Mr. Chairman, on a point of order: Is the hon. member for East London North entitled to say that the Progs are destabilizing the harbour situation in East London?

Of course, yes.

The hon. member for East London North did not refer to members of Parliament; he referred to the city council. The hon. member for East London North may proceed.

Sir, I do not want to make matters difficult for you now, but the hon. member for Port Elizabeth Central was once the hon. member for East London North; you can draw your own inferences from that. That is why he is being so petty. He knows why he ran away. Because he was guilty, he knew that he did not dare stand there again. His friends and the others will run away in exactly the same way as he ran away; I do not know where room is going to be found for all of them.

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

No, I do not have the time now. [Interjections.] The hon. member may ask me as soon as I have finished.

I said that despite interference with the trade unions, the relations between the SATS and the staff associations for Black workers in East London remain basically sound. There are 4 020 Whites, 62 Coloureds and 4 179 Blacks in the employ of the SATS in East London. Since I have been praising the hon. the Minister now, I want to say something about his air service, the SAL. Every time I board an aircraft, the fellow in the seat in front of me lowers his backrest and lies back almost in my lap while I am trying to eat or drink coffee. Look, since internal flights only last an hour or 90 minutes, is it necessary for a person to move his backrest backwards? Surely he can sit up straight and sleep for that short period of time. In any event the seats would last longer if they were made rigid and perfectly straight so that they would not be moved. Since many of them are now faulty, I want to recommend this to the SAA. Although I have now given him some advice, I also want to say something that will please him. While I was travelling in Peru, I sat next to an Englishman and his wife in the aircraft. I am now referring to an Englishman from England. We had a long conversation and he did not know I came from South Africa. We were travelling Air France, and I thought it very pleasant. There were pretty girls and an excellent service; everything of the best. Then the man said to me: Do you know what the best airline in the world is? I said: No. He replied: The SAA. I said: What! He said: That is undoubtedly the case. His wife said: Yes, that is true. They also told me that the second best was the Singapore airline. I did not even know that they had one. However, they said that the South African one was by far the best. I felt I should at least tell this to the hon. the Minister. This is the first time the hon. the Minister has smiled at me. [Interjections.]

However, I must also tell him that I have never travelled on the Blue Train, because it does not run anywhere near my area. In any case I do not think I have the money to travel on it. However, when I was overseas, although many people hardly know where South Africa is, I heard them telling one-another in North and South America of the Blue Train in South Africa. They were saying that one should not miss a journey on the Blue Train. [Interjections.]

Since I have dished out a bit of praise now, here is a bit of criticism. People have Springbok lounges all over the place, but we in East London, as the hon. the Minister himself would put it, have “bugger all”. We only have a VIP lounge there. I want to know from the hon. the Minister why that lounge there should remain locked. Why cannot we as representatives of East London sometimes use it when we need it? If President Sebe wants to entertain me, he has the lounge opened and he entertains me there, but if I want to entertain him, I cannot have the lounge opened, because I am merely an MP. For the rest the lounge remains locked. I want to ask the hon. the Minister and the top men in the SATS who are responsible for this whether they cannot give us an armchair or two there, as the other people have in Cape Town, Johannesburg, Durban and other places? [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for East London North put a number of questions to the official Opposition. I think we can ask him why he ran away from King William’s Town to East London North.

I represent both.

He has a lot to say about this side of the House, but he is now the member for East London North and I think he owes it to us to tell us why he ran away from King William’s Town.

† I do not intend following on that hon. member any further. I want to come back to something the hon. member for Amanzimtoti raised because I think it is very important that we should continue with the debate on that subject. I want to refer the hon. the Minister to page 66 of the annual report and specifically to the paragraph headed “Medical Scheme of the S.A. Transport Services”. Here it indicates that from 1 April 1982 this Medical Scheme replaced the Sick Fund and members and beneficiaries will have a free choice of practitioner, specialist, hospital and pharmacist.

*I should like to refer the hon. the Minister to the document “Mediese Skema van die S.A. Vervoerdienste: Algemene Oorsig” of 15 November last year. The hon. member fr Amanzimtoti has already in this connection referred to the R5 million more which was spent during the first four months than the amount budgeted for. I should like to quote the following from this document—

It is also stated—

I do not think this is a loss. I think it was an incorrect estimate. These people now have a free choice of doctor and more of them are of course going to private hospitals. I am simply asking that this be rectified because I do not think it is attributable to an increase in medical expenses, but to an incorrect estimate. In the “Algemene Oorsig” one also reads—

I should like to know from the hon. the Minister what is meant by that. May the people no longer go to their doctors? May they no longer exercise their free choice? I should like the hon. the Minister to listen carefully to this—

Is there still any question of a free choice of pharmacies? I quote further—

Then it goes on to say—

I see the hon. the Minister is laughing. I think he is quite right to laugh because I cannot see people despatching urgently required medicine per rail. In my opinion this policy, which is constantly giving problems, is in contrast to the free market system which the Government is supposed to advocate. I do not think the hon. the Minister can deny that.

In the second place, it seems to me as though Transmed’s pharmacists are above the law since the Pharmacy Board prohibits the receipt of prescriptions by post and from patients whom the pharmacist does not know. Here it states that they should do it, while the Pharmacy Board prohibits this. Transmed only looks at the medical expenses, but they do not take into consideration the real costs of pharmacists’ buildings, administrative affairs and supplies. Unfortunately there is a tremendous problem in connection with Transmed, and particularly because of this report.

Then I just want to refer to the payment which Transmed makes to doctors, pharmacists and other medical staff. There is an obligation to pay within three months. There are accounts which have been outstanding since September last year, in other words six months ago. There are tremendous problems in this connection.

In the short time which still remains, I should just like to bring something to the attention of the hon. the Minister.

† I refer to a matter that was reported in the newspapers earlier this year. What is the hon. the Minister’s opinion about this condition which is known as acquired immune deficiency syndrome? There are reports in the newspapers, emanating from some of his officials, stating that they left instructions with the employees of the hon. the Minister that they must go for tests. This was apparently a direction to 700 of his employees, but I believe it now also affects thousands of other employees. I should therefore like to ask the hon. the Minister whether these tests have been made, what the results are and who looked at the tests to ensure that this very dangerous disease has now been identified, that it is limited and that the public can feel that the hon. the Minister’s department has dealt actively with this matter.

Lastly, on page 67 the annual report of the SATS deals with health and industrial welfare and I should like the hon. the Minister to reply to me in connection with a small item appearing on page 68 under the heading “Industrial diseases” and which states—

I should like to ask the hon. the Minister what these hazards were, what measures were taken and what success has been achieved. Then, with regard to health and hygiene, it is stated that malaria did not constitute any problem during the year as only five cases were reported and the position has stabilized due to the precautionary measures applied. I want to know what measures were applied because I think the hon. the Minister of Health and Welfare would be very happy to hear from the hon. the Minister how it is he can deal so effectively with this problem.

Lastly I wish to refer to infectious diseases. The report states that of the cases of notifiable diseases reported, 180 were of tuberculosis. It also deals with other cases. It then states that a total of 107 employees and their dependants was immunized against smallpox, 294 against tuberculosis, 573 against poliomyelitis and 615 against diphtheria. Out of 250 000 employees and their dependants was only this number immunized? Who immunized them and were they not immunized against whooping cough, measles and typhoid? Was the immunization limited to only a certain number of diseases? The hon. the Minister is responsible not only for the health of his employees but also for the health of the millions of passengers. I think that the hon. the Minister should reply to my questions because I think they are very important.

Business interrupted in accordance with Standing Order No. 22.