as chairman, brought up the report of the Select Committee on the Food, Drugs and Disinfectants Bill, reporting the Bill with amendments and specially an alteration in the title.

Report and evidence to be printed; House to go into Committee on the Bill on 7th May.

Agreed to.

My attention has been directed to certain paragraphs in the press in regard to a reported accident and other occurrences affecting the working of the railways. As the method adopted in bringing these occurrences prominently before the public notice is not calculated to allay the present state of public feeling in regard to rail travel, I have thought it advisable to place hon. members in possession of the actual facts.

1. (1) Press Notice.—Fire on Rand-Durban Express.—Passengers by the Durban-Rand express, which was due to reach Johannesburg yesterday morning, were urgently summoned from their beds between Cedarmont and Val shortly before 7 a.m. owing to one of the coaches catching fire. With smoke billowing from the undercarriage, the coach was brought to Val, and the passengers transferred to other coaches. Water and hand appliances were used to put out the fire, and the carriage was abandoned at Val, where it was still standing yesterday evening. The express arrived at Johannesburg 40 minutes late.
   Statement.—The suggestion in this case that one of the saloons attached to an important passenger train caught fire and had to be abandoned is entirely wrong. What actually happened was that one of the axles of the saloon became heated and developed what is known as a hot box. There was no danger to passangers, nor did the saloon suffer any damage. It was detached at Val for repacking of the axle box.
2. (2) Press Notice.—Hot Box on Union Limited.—The Union Limited, due to arrive in Cape Town at 2 13 p.m. yesterday, did not reach here until 4.11 p.m., or nearly two hours late. The delay was caused by a hot box, which necessitated the detachment of the coach at Fraserburg Road. Occurring in the small hours of the morning, the transference of the passengers to other portions of the train was not a very pleasant experience.
   Statement.—This incident is similar to the case just cited, and appears to be given undue prominence. Hon. members will be interested to know that on the Cape western system during the year ended 31st March, 1928, only twenty-nine hot boxes occurred on saloons in traffic. On the whole of the South African railways during the month of January last, and with a total of 3,555 saloons each with eight axle boxes, only eighteen hot boxes are recorded, as against 3,420 saloons and twenty hot boxes during the corresponding month of 1927.
3. (3) Press Notice.—Collision with Goods Train.—A passenger train which left Port Elizabeth at 11 a.m. yesterday crashed into the rear of a goods train at Bushman’s River at 4 p.m. No one was reported hurt. The line was still blocked at midnight. A breakdown train was sent from Port Elizabeth Statement.—Whilst shunting operations were being performed by a special goods train at Bushman’s River station at 3.55 p.m. on the 30th April, No. 2 up passenger train collided with the rear end of the goods which was standing on the main line inside the warning board. The van and truck of goods train were derailed. There was no damage to the engine and coaches of the passenger train, and no complaint received from passengers of injury, although the railway medical officer was in attendance. The line was cleared for traffic by 10.50 p.m. The driver and fireman of the passenger train have been suspended.

May I be allowed to say something in reference to the Minister’s statement?

No, the matter cannot be discussed.

Would it be in order for me to suggest that we confine the discussion for the time being to sub-section (2) before we reach sub-section (3)?

Yes, I think that will be convenient.

On new sub-section (2),

I move, as an amendment—

In moving this amendment I would like the House to remember that practically the whole of the Eastern Province is on exactly the same footing with regard to the question of the supply of tots as is the case in Natal. In Natal this tot system has not been permitted owing to the nature of the population, and it has been excluded from the Transvaal, and I hold that the conditions in the Eastern Province amply justify our request that it should be excluded from operation in that area. The labour supply is almost entirely from aboriginal natives with only a very small proportion of the coloured community. Under the present law the tot system is permissible yet it is not given, but if it is included in the statute and the natives demand it, we feel it will be very harmful both to the native population in the countryside, and to the general interests of the farmers. Since this measure was before the committee of the whole House I have seen a number of farmers of the Eastern Province, and townsmen as well, and one and all say that they very strongly object to the extension of the tot system into the Eastern Province.

You have it there now.

I have said that I know it is there now, under the present Cape law, but it is not specifically embodied in the statute book, and in practice it is non-existent as to 99 per cent., and the farmers especially and the inhabitants of the Eastern Province generally all view with great concern the possibilities contingent on the introduction of this system into that area. We know now the difficulty we have with the native population in brewing their kaffir beer. Ordinary kaffir beer is not so harmful, but they now use prickly pear and other sorts of pernicious stuff for making drink. They get brandy and add it to the kaffir beer to give it the “kick” they desire, and if the tot system is introduced into the Eastern Province I can assure the House it will not be only a tot of wine at certain hours in certain limited quantities and of a certain kind, as provided in this clause. It will open the doors to spirits.

What opens the door?

It is not done now, but if it is embodied in an Act of Parliament.

This Bill does not open the door.

The natives will say “this is a right we can demand.” The Minister shakes his head.

Do not say this opens the door. That is not fair. I am cutting it down.

Farmer after farmer has assured me that if this system is permitted—

It is permitted now.

It is no use repeating that. I know it is permitted now.

Then what are you talking about?

We want it excluded, and we do not want it embodied in the present Bill. We want to exclude the Eastern districts just as Natal has been excluded, and very rightly and very properly so. Farmers have told me that one of the reasans why they do not want it is that men will entice native labourers from other men by giving tots that the other farmers will not give; especially so at shearing seasons. I can assure this House that the vast majority in the Eastern Province will not give the tot, but those who do will assuredly entice labour from those who do not. I wish to put up the strongest protest and case I can for the exclusion of the Eastern Province from the operation of the tot system. We will be doing a very evil thing if we do not seize this opportunity of excluding the tot from the aboriginal natives of the Eastern districts of the Cape Province, and of limiting the system as far as possible to the wine making districts of the Western Province, where it is in practice. I would prefer to see the system abolished altogether.

seconded.

I am glad the hon. member corrected himself at a later stage of his remarks, because the true fact is that the tot is being cut down by this Bill in the Eastern Province, and his idea is to cut it down further still. That was a perfectly fair way of stating it, but I did not like him to say that I was opening the door by this Bill, which is not a fact. I have never had complaints from the police and anybody of the public that the tot has been abused in the Eastern Province by farmers—that they are abusing this privilege. I understood the hon. member to say they were doing so.

No.

If it is not abused, I do not see the need for further restriction, because legislation is introduced to deal with abuses. If the hon. member thinks that farmers ought to be placed under a stronger disability, it is for them. I do not personally like this cutting up provinces into various parts, and I think it is unwise. I want to emphasize you can have your tot system as a system only in a district which is wine and brandy producing. There is no intention of imposing the system, except where it has grown up—as in the Western Province. Although the Free State has had the right to give the tot, there is not the faintest system of giving the tot. What happens in the Free Sate is that on occasional days in the year, such as on the day before Christmas, and perhaps the day before New Year, the farmer calls his natives together and gives them a tot of wine bought from the Western Province. I think it a very pleasant thing, and it causes a pleasant state of feeling on occasions, when a native obtains a small tot, and causes a feeling between employer and employee that is better on a festive occasion. I also understand that in the Eastern Provinve the same use is made. If the hon. member convinces the House it is not wanted there, it means the natives are cut out and the farmers will not be entitled to give them a single bit of drink when they are drenched by rain. The farmers will be able to get some drink, but not the unfortunate natives. It is the same in Natal, and hon. members from Natal are not strongly concerned about the natives; they have decided there that they do not want that right. It is difficult to understand that the greatest rights should be given in that part of the Cape Province where, the argument is used, it is most abused. In the Eastern Province, where it is less abused, we give less rights. That may be a logical argument; and if that argument is accepted by the House, I will abide by it.

Perhaps there are more jamborees in the Eastern Province, and many periods of time in which natives are gathered together drinking kaffir beer. It is not the effect of kaffir beer that is so bad, but the spirits that are added that makes it such a dangerous proceeding. I do not think the hon. member (Mr. Struben) accused the Minister of trying to open the door, but the Minister has said he is trying to close the door to the abuses of drink Under those circumstances, may I appeal to him to close the door still further in this particular case? The main argument in favour of the tot system in the Cape during the whole course of the debate was that the Western Province is a wine making country, and employees have been accustomed for years and years, almost for generations, to be given tots of wine—and that is not the condition in the Eastern Province. The difference between these is as great as that between Natal and the rest of the country. If the Minister will study the history of the whole native legislation in this country he will find that our great success in the administration of territories like the Transkei, where the aboriginal and uncivilized natives are centred, is due to there being total prohibition to natives. A large number of these natives come to the Eastern Province as shepherds. I would appeal to my hon. friend to accept the amendment, because I can assure him it is the desire of the vast number of the farming population of the Eastern Province that such legislation should take place. He can close the door entirely in this direction as far as this is concerned.

I move, as a further amendment—

As the Bill now stands it would in the Cape Province be possible to give only unfortified wine. I want to say at once that, if the position in the whole of the Cape Province was the same as in the Western Province, I would heartily support the proposed clause, and it could then remain as it is. I do not wish to increase the use of spirits as against unfortified wine; on the contrary, I should like the latter also to be used only by white people, but the conditions are such, except in the Western Province, that the people are not able to give unfortified wine. The position in the rest of the province, that is in the Karroo, in the Eastern Province, and in the north is just the same as in the other provinces. The farmers are in the same position, as for instance the farmers in the Free State. They cannot get unfortified wine if they do not order it direct from the Western Province wine farmers. The result is that they have to get spirits in its place just like the farmers in other parts of the country, excluding the Western Province. I hope the Minister will see that this amendment is necessary, because otherwise the farmer in the Cape Province, excluding the Western Province, is obliged to contravene the law, because it makes for better understanding between the employer and employee that the latter should get his tot, and to give that the employer has to contravene the law. Therefore I believe the Minister will not object to the amendment, because, under it, the areas which do not produce unfortified wine will he put into the same position as the Free State.

seconded.

It seems to me entirely illogical that we should prohibit a native who is a registered voter, from obtaining a drop of liquor, as we have done in a previous clause, but at the same time allow a farmer the right to give his native workmen three tots of liquor a day. We are carrying out the obligation imposed on us by the League of Nations under section 22 to prohibit the sale or supply of liquor to natives in South-West Africa. We have made a pledge to uphold that prohibition, but it looks neither logical, right nor just to the native when we say that in a state adjacent to us in the interest of the natives there we prohibit them from obtaining liquor, but within our own borders we are throwing open the doors to natives to obtain liquor. The Minister’s argument is that the system of giving liquor to native labourers on farms has been in existence in the Eastern Province for many years. At Christmas time, when the natives have a jollification, a few of the farmers may give them tots, but are we to say that in consequence of that we are going to give them the right to have three tots every day of the year? I challenge any man in the House to say that he has not broken the law in some, shape or form at one time or another. If these farmers wish to break the law let them take the risk. I myself have broken the law in this matter, and have taken the risk, and it is infinitely preferable that I and others in occasional cases should be liable to be put in gaol than that the natives of this country should be poisoned by liquor. If we agree to the Minister's proposal the natives will say, and they will be entitled to say, that the law says they can demand three tots a day of unfortified wine. You call it unfortified wine to-day, but it will be brandy to-morrow. I do not know any native who would drink unfortified wine (I personally have never heard of this class of drink); he would infinitely prefer Kaffir beer. I protest against the opening of the door to the extension of the liquor traffic as far as the native is concerned. In the days of Jan Hofmeyr and Cecil Rhodes the Brandy Farmers’ Associations controlled the policy of the old Cape Colony, and these bodies were continually straining for natives to be allowed to have drink, and we know the fight that took place over this matter in the early days of Kimberley. It is absolutely wrong for this House to do anything that would in any way endanger the white section of the population, for once a native becomes a brandy drinker this will react against the white community, and we shall not be able to control the traffic which will lead to the degradation and downfall not only of the natives, but other whites. Who has asked for this tot system? Not the natives. The Native Council at Umtata, and many other native bodies, have passed unanimous resolutions requesting that the system be not extended to the Eastern Province and other areas. Yet because a few farmers happen to give natives a little liquor we are told that this departure is necessary. Why? To protect a few farmers? If we do this the natives will say that the white man is using this as a lever to keep them down. We have the evidence of the Secretary for Native Affairs to support that view. If that opinion gains ground among the natives it will be a menace to our white civilization. If this practice has grown up in the Western Province it should be limited to the Western Province, if it is necessary, although I do not think it is necessary. To extend the system to other areas that do not want it will be committing a crime against the best interests of the country. At any rate, give us the right to say to the natives, “We will give you your natural beverage, which is Kaffir beer,” and I think we, in the Eastern Province, if our natives reach the stage of demanding liquor, which I think quite possible if this provision goes through, should, at least have the right to give him what he would probably prefer and what would do him less harm, that is a drink of Kaffir beer rather than three tots of unfortified wine which would really ultimately mean brandy. I move—

seconded.

The hon. member for Tembuland (Mr. Payn) said he protested most strongly against the clause, but that protest, though forcible in words, was very barren of argument, so barren that it convinced no one. What does he say? That the Minister by the tot system is going to introduce something new, something pernicious, into the Eastern Province, something that will have a terrible effect on the natives, and something against which the civilized world ought to protest. Is there a word of truth in it? Is the Minister by the clause challenged introducing anything by which facilities for obtaining drink will be extended? Does the clause open a door which is shut? The opposite rather is the case. Under the existing law of the country no restriction is placed on the farmer in the supply of liquor to his workpeople. The laws apply just as much to the Eastern as to the Western Province, not only is the quantity of liquor which the farmer can give under this Bill to his workmen, whether native or coloured, now restricted, but he can only give unfortified wine. If the hon. member for Tembuland really thinks that natives must get as little strong drink as possible, then he should thank the Minister for the restriction, and not attack him, as he has done. I should think that the Minister has gone quite too far with his concession to the total abstainers. I think that the farmer ought to have the right of also giving a tot of brandy to his workpeople when he wishes. There is no reason to fear that the farmer will exceed proper limits in supplying liquor to his labourers. There have never been any complaints against them. I do not know of a single farmer who has been prosecuted for intoxicating his workpeople. It is not to his advantage to make his people unfit. The hon. member for Tembuland has, as he admits himself, given brandy to his natives, and now he preaches to us morally about the harm of opening the door to such consumption. Is the hon. member serious? Or did he merely rise to speak with a political object, and without having first read the Bill? To judge from his speech, you would swear that the Minister had decided to send liquor to people who had never yet tasted it. The truth is that farmers have been entitled, since the establishment of South Africa as a white man’s country—now a few hundred years ago—to give wine to the aborigines. Van Riebeek gave it to the people at Saldanha, not once but on every occasion. The farming community is much stronger and tougher physically than the people in towns and villages. Accordingly they live longer. We must prevent drunkenness, not moderation. The hon. member speaks about prohibition in South-West Africa, I want to remind him of Mozambique. The natives in Portuguese territory can freely take wine. Are the natives who came from Delagoa Bay physically weaker or worse than other natives? They are more sober than the Union natives. On the Band there is more drunkenness among the natives than among the natives from Delagoa, or among the coloured people from the Cape, and on the Rand there is actually total prohibition for natives. No, the hon. member for Tembuland insults the farmers when he fears that they will give their workpeople too much liquor.

I have some amendments on the Order Paper, but before I move them I should like to say a word or two in support of the amendment of the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben). Though technically correct for the hon. member for Piquet-berg (Mr. de Waal) and the Minister to argue that there is no proposal before the House to extend the tot system to the eastern districts—

It is not “technically” correct; it is in reality correct.

It is a mere quibble. There is no law which either legalizes or regularizes the tot system anywhere in the Cape Province. What we are doing in this Act is to regularize, and, I hope, to some extent, limit the tot system. The representatives of one district come along and say, as a Natal member said 18 months ago, “Whatever you may do in other parts of South Africa, we have never had the tot system, and we do not want it.” Surely that ought to be sufficient. The Minister was willing to agree to the determined cave which exists in Natal. Now the eastern districts people say the same thing, and I say we should argue on realities and not on a quibble of the sort as to whether we are

The reality is the law always has permitted it there.

The law has always been silent on the question. The law has never in express terms prohibited it.

The law has never permitted white people to drink in that sense.

The Minister is wrong to this extent that the law in express terms forbade the native to get the white man’s liquor, and, therefore, in so far as this clause extends the tot system to the native, that is an extension, and my argument is justified. There are very few coloured people in the eastern districts. The tot system there is a question of native labour, therefore, actually and legally, my hon. friends are right in saying that this is a proposal to extend to the eastern districts a system which they have never had before. I am sorry to hear the hon. the Minister adopt the special pleading about drinks at Christmas time. He and I know there is not a clause in this Bill that we have passed up to now out of which you cannot evolve some “hard luck” story. Take the case we had only on Monday of closing bars at 10 o’clock at night. A man turns up, say, at eleven, thirsty and tired and wants a drink, and he cannot get it because the bars are closed. His lot is just as pitiful as that of a native who cannot get a drink at Christmas time. You cannot make good legislation out of “hard luck” stories. You cannot put into a clause a general provision with your eye on one or two single occasions in a year. If the tot system is generally bad, do not legalize it because at Christmas or on a wet day or some other special occasion an employer of labour might want to give a native a tot. I want to move my own amendment to sub-section (2 I move, as a further amendment—

I want to exclude the native entirely from the purview of the tot system of the Cane. At the present time the tot system is in vogue almost entirely in regard to the coloured people, and I do want this House to say that it will keep the native out of it. I would remind the Minister that he has already passed in this Bill old Clause 95 which says this—

That is the fundamental principle which we have laid down in this Bill, and we want to make this one exception, do we? In whose interests? In the interests of the natives? If it is in the interests of the natives

Not to have the colour bar.

No, but we have laid down in definite terms the general rule that a native snail not have the white man’s liquor and this is to be the only exception of any importance. It is said that on a farm in the Cape a native may obtain the European liquor. In whose interests, is it said? In the interests of the native? No, it is not pretended that that is so. It is said to be laid down in the purely selfish interests of the farmers who employ him, and therefore. I hope that the House will agree to delete the word “native.” That is consistent with the whole spirit and tenor of this Act. I have some other amendments on points of detail designed to stiffen up the working of this clause. I am moving these amendments because I have had a communication from a Dutch Reformed clergy man who is the minister of a coloured congregation in one of the Western Province win? producing towns.

Name.

I can give no further details, because he has written to me confidentially.

Ah !

My first amendment is in line 62, after “employing” to insert “in regular employment.” I take it that even my wine-farmer friends will agree that they do not want to give the tot to casual labourers, that they should give it only to persons employed in regular employment. The second amendment is with the object of eliminating Sundays. In line 64 after “day,” I propose to insert “except Sundays.” Finally, I want at the end of line 67, after " three” to insert “and not more than four,” that is to say, that there shall be not less than three equal portions, and not more than four, otherwise this process might go on throughout the day. I want to read this letter, because it comes from a man who actually lives in a district where the tot system is in full operation [Letter read. ] These last amendments I have moved are amendments really of detail calculated to regularize the system.

Give the name of the writer.

I do hope that these amendments will prove acceptable to my wine-farming friends. You should not employ Sunday labour on farms.

Are you not going to milk the cows on Sundays?

Are you going to give the tot on Sundays? I should think if there is one day that should be sacred from what is going on in the Western Province as a result of the giving of these tots, it should be Sunday. I can only say that an earnest church worker working amongst these people and seeing what is going on asks for this at least, that if you cannot spare us the tot system altogether, you should spare it on Sundays.

I have pleasure in seconding this amendment. I am prepared to do anything that will tighten up this iniquitous tot system. I do not want to discuss the system itself at this stage.

When the Minister developed a passion tor uniformity just now, I think he was having a little joke with us, trying to lighten our labours a little bit, I do not think he was serious. If there is one thing which is characteristic of this Act it is its want of uniformity as between the various provinces. The conditions are vastly different between parts of the country. Take one example. We might logically ask why this privilege should be confined to those engaged in farming operations, and if we answer that we will get back to the reason why this tot system was originally introduced. There is no doubt that it was originally introduced into the Western Province owing to the simple reason that at one time the chief farming operations of the Western Province were the growing of grapes for wine making. I suppose people were actuated by the old ordinance that you must not muzzle up the ox that is treading out the corn, and perhaps it was found impossible to keep people employed in making wine from occasionally having a sample of the product they were engaged in manufacturing. In the Eastern Province there is no wine made and there never will be any considerable quantity of wine made there, and there is no reason whatever why the use of this beverage which may perhaps have proved unavoidable in one corner of this country, should be extended to another. So I shall support the amendment of the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben). I might logically ask the Minister if he has a passion for uniformity why he confines this to farming operations. Won’t the natives in the towns of the Eastern Province demand the same privileges as their more fortunate brothers on the farms. We would be well advised, if we cannot abolish the tot system altogether—I wish we could—at all events to confine it within the narrowest possible limits, and above all, to discourage its extensive practice in other parts where it is unnecessary and not warranted by the facts of the case. I want to make a special appeal to the sheep farmers in this House. It is my experience, at all events, as a sheep farmer, that when natives indulge to a large extent in intoxicating liquor, they invariably want meat, and the result is they steal sheep. So for that alone, I would appeal confidently to my fellow farmers. There is no doubt there have been very serious losses to sheep farmers through thefts of sheep by natives, and I am sure that in the vast majority of cases they could be traced to this particular cause. The tot system has developed the taste for intoxicating liquor.

You are talking nonsense.

I wonder how the hon. member would like the experience of coming out one morning to find that some of his best ewes had been stolen and used for meat.

Even if they are well fed and well paid.

Yes, I quite agree, and no doubt a very good remedy would be to open a butcher’s shop on every farm. But we are talking about liquor now, and at all events in the Eastern Province I invite the assistance of other farmers to help us to avoid that great loss. Sheep farming is not carried on to any great extent in the Western Province, and farmers do not suffer losses in that way. I believe that if sheep farming were a considerable industry in the Western Province, people would look with different eyes on the tot system.

The tot never affected sheep farming.

I also ask our friends from Natal to take note of their neighbours to the west and to help them in this respect. We do not want this to grow amongst us. We do not want it to be the case in the Eastern Province—as I am afraid it often is in the Western Province—that it is looked upon, not as a privilege, but as a right and a ration to have the tot. I think this amendment is a desirable one. When the Minister has heard the strongly expressed views of those people who are most intimately connected with the matter, I hope he will accept the amendement.

I am surprised to hear the arguments of some of these hon. gentlemen opposite. One would thing that through the tot system you are going to supply the native with drink ad lib. The tot system is just to prevent that idea. A cupful of fact is better than half a barrelful of theory. May I be permitted to state my experience as a boy when at school at Graaff-Reinet? When I was there many years ago, my widowed mother lived with my brothers and sisters, and we had an old real pukka Bushman with us, caught and tamed on our farm, and he went with us to Graaff-Reinet. No sooner had he got there than he got into bad company and got drunk. My mother said to him, “I want to try and reform you, and if you will promise me not to get drunk again, I will give you a tot every night.” From that time he got his tot every night before he went to bed, and he never got drunk again. He was a sober and respectable inhabitant of Graaff-Rienet at that time. And he never stole sheep from the Graaff-Reinet farmers. I say the tot system is an absolute cure for drunkenness among natives. This is not a matter of a joke, but actual fact. This is an actual case where, by giving a servant a tot every night, it kept him sober for years. I hope with this lucid proof of the effect of the tot system keeping natives sober, the Minister will hold fast and not budge a single inch.

I hope hon. members will support the amendment of the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben). He has voiced very strongly, and not too strongly, the feelings of the farming population in the Eastern Province. There we are living on lonely farms, scattered all over the province, and I feel the legalizing of the tot system will not only be a blunder, but will be a crime, because as a crime it would increase crime. On these farms the farmers live in peace and security; they can go away and leave their families, secure in the knowledge that the sober, hard-working native will respect the farmer’s family and property and look after it. If you introduce the tot system, I am convinced you are not going to have that sense of security any more.

You have the tot system now.

We do not wish to have the tot system. We do not want it legalized in our district. There is no part of the world where farmers, scattered far and wide, live so securely on their farms. I want hon. members to take into consideration the feelings of the Eastern Province and not force upon them a policy which they do not want, and have it legalized.

I cannot understand the hon. member for Queenstown (Mr. Moffat) who says he does not want the system—he has it now. At the present moment he is allowed to give liquor to his employees, and he tells us that if such a law is passed allowing us to do such a thing he does not know what will happen. He has had it since he was born. It is the same with the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben) who farmed for many years at Tafelberg in the Cradock district under this law. He asked what would happen—the whole world would go wrong. The hon. member for East London (North) (Brig.-Gen. Byron) who has now become a sheep farmer,—I am glad to hear it—tells us, as a sheep farmer in the Free State, I suppose, that this liquor business means the farmer’s sheep being stolen and eaten. That is not correct. The hon. member has missed the point; it is the kaffir beer drinking which took place in his district which made these people go for meat. The hon. member knows that the right of giving a little bit of liquor to the native does not mean the killing of sheep. There is no such thing as the “tot system” in the Free State. I want the House to tell me, before it goes further, what is the tot system? How can you have it in an area which does not produce wire, any more than you can have scab for sheep in a place that does not grow sheep? Is any farmer in the Eastern Province and the Transvaal going to purchase three bottles of sherry per day for every man who works for them? That is the tot system. Is it likely, economical or practical? You have the tot system in the Western Province to-day—and it is a very wicked system indeed there—the Minister should cut it down; but it is impossible to take that system into the Eastern Province unless you use wine as a portion of the ration. We have had it all the time, and no harm has come of it in the Eastern Province. But there are some people who do not pay their natives enough. I have an extract here which says that P. Alban, a robust coloured man, and the father of a family, was getting 10s. per month and a bag of corn, absented himself from a wagon and was fined. (Extracts read from newspaper reports.] We have worked under this system in the Free State for many years, and we are the most sober province in South Africa. We have this system there—that a farmer, whenever he likes, may give his native one drink of liquor per day, so long as it is consumed in front of the farmer or manager. It is not much practised. We keen the people sober. We say: “Why not take the middle course?” In the Western Province they take the outside course, and say a man shall have six or seven drinks a day, which are too many The hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) knows a lot about the liquor question from the theoretical point of view, but he has never been an employer of labour. With regard to giving liquor to natives on a Sunday, the very morning to do so is Sunday, to keep them out of the towns. They stop on the farm, and if they do not they will go to the shebeens in the towns. I know nothing about the Transvaal in this connection, but I have had experience in the Free State. Why should the Eastern Province be cut out of this system? I want it on the same footing. You cannot have the tot system in the dry Eastern Province where you do not produce drink, as you have it in the Western Province.

What if the native forces you to give it?

I give the hon. member far more credit for intelligence than he himself thinks he possesses. He knows that no native will force any farmer to do that. The hon. member is a weaker man than I thought he was.

I can tell you how I can be forced.

I think that is cheap; it is no answer at all. I want to stop liquor to natives, and the whole country go dry—then we know where we are. To say that the Transvaal should have one system, the Free State another, Natal another, and the Eastern Province another, is doing more harm than good. I think the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben) is mistaken, and he is opening the door to the Eastern Province. He is going to tell the people of the Eastern Province that they have a law of which they know nothing.

I cannot understand the representatives of the Eastern Province. They want to think out some imaginary possibility, and want to argue that we ought to believe it. I think that some of the sheep farmers of the Eastern Province give drink to their workpeople. The shearers are given liquor, and also other workmen, when they work hard. I believe now that those who do not give their shearers liqur are afraid that they will get no shearers. They are too stingy or have some other reason for not giving it. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) has insulted the farmers more than I have heard for a long time. He read out a letter in which the farmers of South Africa were, reminded of their duty, and the whole letter was insulting to them. It said that the workpeople go from farm to farm to get liquor. It is an unwritten rule among the farmers not to give liquor to workpeople from other farms. It is a scandalous insult. When one of my neighbour’s servants comes to me, possibly sent by his master, I give no drink to him. My neighbour knows I will not do so, because it would mean a quarrel between us. I, myself, am a total abstainer, but there are other Europeans who say it is healthy to take something. Just as little as I want to prevent them from drinking something which they think healthy, do I see the necessity for prohibiting the farmers from giving a tot to natives.

Give them coffee.

If a boy does not want coffee, and has been doing his best, why should I not have the right to give him a tot? How, however, anyone can say that the workpeople go from place to place to get liquor just as if the farmers were standing ready with tots for the coloured people I cannot understand. In the Eastern Province very little liquor will be given. The farmers there will have to buy it, and will be very careful with it. They cannot distribute liquor all day, and would not do so in any case. I have been a farmer all my life and my father before me, and we have given tots, but never so as to have drunken workpeople on our farm, because I am the man who decides how much they shall get. If I do not want to give it I do not.

People can be forced to give it.

It is given gratis, and they cannot be forced. Only when there are farmers who have an agreement with a boy and the tots form a part of his wages can there be any question of compulsion on the part of the boy. We cannot speak of compulsion. A farmer gives a tot if he thinks the worker earns it. We have a proverb which says the one hand washes the other, and the two hands wash the face. When a boy has gained my approval, and has done his best, why should I not then win his approval and give him a tot which will do him no harm? It is said that it is a pernicious thing to give tots to the coloured people, but liquor can be given to Europeans without any ration or restriction. Then it is no curse. Hard work is often done on the farms from early morning to late at night, and then the farmer distributes tots and they are worked off during the day. I have never yet seen a drunken boy who had become so from drink given him by his master. Let hon. members opposite, who are opposed to liquor, employ honest arguments, but not malign other people, and use imaginary cases to support their arguments. The farmers are not so bad. It is said that if the natives get beer or drink they will want meat. I know of no such thing in the Western Province. There they regularly get meat. In the Eastern Province, however, they have to live on mealie porridge, and get hardly any meat; if they got meat regularly, they would not long for it. It is said that valuable sheep are stolen, but the argument is only used to establish their point. Let us use honest arguments, and if the use of drink is to be abolished, let them propose that it should also be prohibited for Europeans. If it is a curse to one it is also a curse to the other. I am opposed to the farmers being deprived of the right of giving a tot from time to time when they wish to, and their being imprisoned for doing so.

The hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert) says that reasons are given here just for the sake of argument. That is not the case. People will actually be forced to give the coloured people drink.

No.

You said yourself that farmers in the Eastern Province would be afraid of getting no shearers if they gave no tots, and the hon. member himself used the argument that the farmers would be too stingy to buy liquor. That is just what will happen, and has already happened, namely, that shearers come and say that they want a tot; if it is refused they go to another farm and boycott the farmer who will not supply liquor. The strongest proof that the Eastern Province does not want the tot system is that they never gave tots in the past, although they had the right to do so.

And yet the shearers compelled them?

We all grow older, and as we develop we insist the more on certain things, and if the law gives the right to supply tots, use will be made of it. In the Western Province the position is already such that when the servants get no tot they go to another farm. We are afraid that we shall have the same thing in the Eastern Province, and ask to be excluded.

Is it abused there?

No.

Why then are you afraid?

Because the fact that it is contained in the law will encourage the requests for liquor. The natives prefer their kaffir beer to the white man’s drink, but when the desire for the latter is created they will ask for it. I have received a good many resolutions from farmers’ associations asking me to do my best to oppose the tot system in the Eastern Province, and I think if the farmers say that it is not in their interests, and if, like Natal and the Transvaal, they want to be excluded, we ought to meet them. I do not say that it is here proposed to increase the consumption of liquor, but the danger is that we shall legalize the supply of liquor, the result of which will be that the natives will get the impression of having a light to it, and so will force the farmers to give it. As a representative of the Eastern Province I protest against the proposal, and will support the amendment of the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben) in which he asks that the Eastern Province should also be excluded. We shall then be prohibiting something which, anyhow, is not done, and will not cause the extension of the system to the Eastern Province, which does not desire it. I might go further and support the amendment of the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) to delete the word “native,” and, as far as they are concerned, to prevent drink being given to them even in the Western Province. The natives cannot be put on the same footing as the coloured people in the Western Province.

After the speech of the hon. member for Cradock (Mr. G. C. van Heerden), as a colonial, I cannot omit to say a few words. The hon. member has all his life had the right of giving liquor to the natives.

I have never done so.

I hope the hon. member has never done so. I do not give my workers any drink either, but why is he concerned about having something permitted now which has always been permitted? The hon. member retains the fullest right to give a cup of coffee, but no liquor, to his workpeople. I cannot understand why the hon. member wants to protect the coloured people against drink so much, yet wants to permit the Europeans to drink themselves to death and lose their farms through drink. Why does not the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell), who drafted the Bill, plead for the prohibition of drink to Europeans also? The right is given to Europeans in almost every clause of the Bill to get as much drink as they want, and the hon. member for Cradock agrees with that. The Europeans may drink, but not the natives. The Europeans can be ruined, but the natives must be saved. It is said that if the workpeople take drink they get a desire for meat. My experience is that, after eating fruit, there is also a great desire for meat. In Riversdale we give the workers liquor, but do not know about that great desire for meat, nor of the theft of sheep. It very seldom happens, however, that we give liquor. Do hon. members think that we shall buy liquor to supply to the workers? Let us allow every man the liberty to act as he wishes. I am not going to give any liquor, and I hope my neighbours will not either. Hon. members must, however, he consistent, and say that the Europeans also must not get liquor if it is forbidden to the coloured people. Why should we injure our own people?

I did not intend to speak on this point, because I am sorry that there has been such a long discussion about it, but I want to support heartily the amendments of the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben). They are the best proof that the people in the Eastern Province of the Cape do not want it there. The hon. member for Riversdale (Mr. Badenhorst) argued that the Eastern Province people always had the right, but had not used it. Why then is the hon. member afraid of such a restriction being put into the Bill, if they do not use the right in any case?

I am afraid the farmers will be prosecuted.

Why should we not prohibit by law what no one wants to see introduced? The hon. member for Riversdale says that he gives no drink to his workpeople, but there are other farmers who do give it to their coloured and native workers, and if the hon. member for Riversdale does not give drink, but another does, then the workers will say that they must go to the other master, where they can get a drink. I should prefer to prevent the possibility. I do not now want to go into the Transvaal position, but I want to support the amendment.

Are you in favour of the prohibition also extending to Europeans?

Yes, I have often in my career heard that yarn about prohibition to everybody in discussions of the liquor laws, but has the hon, member for Riversdale forgotten that the European is his own master, and knows what to do, and what to leave undone? It shames the white man if the hon. member wants to put him on the same level as the native. The European looks after himself, and the hon. member wants to put him on a par with the natives. I agree with the hon. member that we regard drinking as an evil; then we ought to prohibit it entirely, and if the hon. member will introduce a motion on those lines I will support it. I have voted for such a motion before. We are not concerned with it to-day. The hon. member for Namaqualand (Mr. Mostert) attacked the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) because he read a letter here which insulted the farmers of the Cape Province. That is not the case.

It is.

It was written by someone who is not a farmer, but I do not doubt that the people who do spiritual work amongst that population have much trouble owing to the liquor which is given to the workpeople.

Why is his name not given?

It is possible that that person made a mistake, therefore we cannot disapprove of all of them, but the names of such persons cannot always be given. It may damage their spiritual work. I have already received deputations of persons who for one reason or another did not want their names mentioned. I agree with hon. members who recommend the use of unfortified wine instead of spirits, but what happens? The hon. member for Hopetown (Dr. Stals) has already proposed to give the workers brandy also. I do not want to accuse the hon. members for Worcester (Mr. Heatlie) and Stellenbosch (Mr. J. P. Louw) of favouring it, but if the amendment of the hon. member for Hopetown is passed the farmers, excluding those in the Western Province, will give their workers brandy, because I also know something about the farming industry in the Cape, and they will give nothing else but what they themselves make. I agree with the hon. member for Albany, and I hope that hon. members will support the amendments, and will also give their support when it is proposed to keep the system out of the Transvaal.

We are concerned here with the right which people have always possessed, although they have not exercised it, namely, of giving liquor to the natives. Now, some hon. members want to take away the right, and to make criminals of those who give liquor. They want to exclude the Eastern Province, and just as in the Transvaal create criminals and prohibit the supply of liquor to natives. The Eastern Province farmers have always had the right, and have not abused it. Why should we now bring them into trouble?

I was slightly disappointed in listening to the hon. member for Riversdale (Mr. Badenhorst). He made out that the Eastern Province representatives, who are in favour of prohibiting the supply of liquor to coloured people, are careless about the Europeans, and he went so far as to ask why the hon, member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) had made no provision in the Bill for prohibition in the case of whites. We know that the hon. member for Bezuidenhout tried to go as far as possible, and make it as difficult, as possible for the Europeans to get liquor, just as in the case of coloured people and natives. I should like to know how the hon. member for Riversdale voted then?

I voted with the hon. member for Bezuidenhout.

For local option?

Yes.

I am glad to hear it. I was under the impression that he had voted against it. Why does the hon. member say that the hon. member for Bezuidenhout has never done anything for the Europeans? I hope the Minister will meet us. Circumstances in the Cape Province differ very much, and there is quite a different position in the Eastern Province from that in the Western Province. In the latter it is customary to supply the workers with drink, and we see that it is such an inveterate custom that it cannot be abolished, but in the Eastern Province the farmers have been entitled to supply liquor, but have not made a rule of it. My experience of a large part of the Eastern Province is that it was the greatest possible exception for a farmer now and then to give drink to his workpeople. We always regarded it as a dangerous principle, and I hope it will not be extended. If a law lays down that liquor may be given, then the danger of its being given will be much greater than when it was not so stated in the law. Nor are we concerned there with the light wine of the Western Province, and practically no liquor is made there. I hope the Eastern Province will be excluded, and the wishes of the people there respected, namely, not to allow specially in the law what has not been the practice in the past.

I notice that the feeling of the House, especially on this side, is in favour of rejection of the Minister’s proposal in the Bill of allowing the people in the Eastern Province to give tots to their workers. If that is defeated we shall not, I understand, be allowed to make any further amendments in the clause. I cannot see why, when we are dealing with a Bill to consolidate the law for the Union, we should make exceptions in the case of every province and every district. If the Bill ran be applied to the Cape Division, I do not see why it cannot be applied to the Eastern Province. It is said that, although the Eastern Province always had the right of giving liquor to natives and coloured persons it was never used. I am surprised that hon. members, and especially the hon. member for Colesberg (Mr. G. A. Louw), should say in this House that no tots are given to coloured people. He is an exception possibly, but I think he is one of the few exceptions, and that even the hon. member for Queenstown (Mr. Moffat), who is a large stock farmer, has now and then given a tot to his servants, as he is entitled to do by law. There was no need for him, as for us in the Transvaal, to be afraid of getting into trouble. I fear that if this clause is got rid of we shall not have the right of moving any further amendments to it, and I, therefore, want to explain my position now. I prefer to introduce a practice of which the farmers do not avail themselves, as is the case with hon. members in the Eastern Province. I would rather the law gave the opportunity to the farmers of doing something which they, nevertheless, do not do, than that it said that it might not be done, and the farmers, nevertheless, did it, and, in consequence, got into very great trouble. In the northern province we always regarded it as a sword of Damocles, and were afraid of giving a tot. I admit that I broke the law myself, but I looked about carefully to see if, there was anyone who could lodge a complaint. Why should I always have the anxiety and make an offender of myself? Let us pass legislation leaving it to the citizens of the country to do as they please in this respect. If the farmers in the Eastern Province are so good that they do not want to give the tot, I appreciate it in them, but yet I do not believe it. I do not believe a word of those nice things that have been told us in the House. The hon. members will thereby possibly gain the favour of the parsons, but I am not afraid of the parsons. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout quoted a letter from someone who painted such a terrible picture of the conditions at Fransch Hoek. We, who are acquainted with the routine and the way matters are dealt with in this House, can very well imagine who the person was. I could mention his name, but every hon. member can find it out as well. When the hon. member referred to it he practically gave the name away, although he did not mention it. I take it the person was right to a certain extent, but whence does it arise? We know where it arises. I have, myself, seen, on farms where no tots are given, coloured people walking about on Saturday afternoons with bags full of bottles which they bring on to the farms from outside. Where, however, the workers get tots they remain on the farms. I need not go far. I want to mention the farm of the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger). There they walk about with full bags which they have brought on to the property. If the workers got a proper tot on Saturday afternoons when finishing work, most of them would go home, and there would be no further abuse of drink. We must try to pass a law for the Union, and my great fear is that if we do not pass this clause we shall have no other opportunity of moving further amendments to the Bill.

The hon. member for Vrededorp (Dr. Visser) said a lot of the arguments used against this system were not clear, but I think far less clear arguments were used in favour than against. The hon. member himself actually gave us a pocket edition of Grimm’s Fairy Tales to show why he was for it. An hon. member here said the white man could get as much liquor as he liked, and why should not the native be allowed to do so. Evidently his idea is that if it comes to the question of providing another market for the wine farmer everything is justifiable. Some members have argued in favour of the tot system. They say: “They have had it in the Free State, they have had it in the Eastern Province, and it has never been put into operation, so what are you worrying about?” If it has never been put into operation why extend it? On the other hand, other members argue that the tot system has always been in operation in certain areas, and there has never been any abuse. You could not abuse it if it had not been put into operation by certain farmers. To my mind this is not a question of a tot system at all. It is a question of a truck system. Were it not for the fact that certain farmers were producing wine, this House would not vote in favour of the tot system for the employees of the farmers, and it is only because a certain section of the farming community is producing that commodity, and they wish to pay the natives in the cheapest possible commodity to themselves, and that is the commodity they produce. It is part of the wages oi the native. The hon. member for Bloemfontein (North) (Mr. Barlow) said: “Can you imagine any farmer buying so many bottles of sherry a day to give his natives a tot?” Of course you could not imagine it. That is why, in one particular area, we find the tot system more prevalent than in other, areas. The reason for the tot is not because they are going to get more work out of the natives, or to confer a benefit on them, but to pay them less wages and to make a greater profit by giving them wine in lieu of wages. Hon. members, who, in the past, have spoken against the truck system, are voting to-day in favour of something that is more iniquitous. They voted against the system of stop orders on the mines of the Witwatersrand, and said that system was bad; but when it comes to supplying their own employees with the commodities that they themselves produce, it is an excellent system. Another argument used in favour of the tot system is that it tends to keep the employees sober—the cure for drunkenness is to give more drink! Instead of the police running in people who are drunk, give them a few more whiskies! That is the effect of the arguments which are used.

We find from the report of the Commissioner of Police that in the Western Province of the Cape there has been an increase of drunkenness. It is peculiar, if the arguments advanced in favour of the tot system are correct, that most of the abuses of liquor in the Cape are where the tot system is most in force. As far as the farming community is concerned, on this question of the tot system and of supplying kaffir beer, many farmers place their own pecuniary interests first; in the one case there is a greater market for wine, and in the other for kaffir corn. We realize that the farmers are an asset to any country —as a matter of fact they are the greatest asset we have—but at the same time they should not be prepared to vote in favour of things which are absolutely evil to the country, because it happens to be to their good and they are making more money; and that has been the point of view influencing many hon. members in voting for this particular system, to which they know there are evils attached. It may be unpalatable, but there is not the slightest doubt it is the truth. If the farming interest was not so much represented and not so inclined to cling together, but was inclined to vote from the national point of view, this particular system would not have a hold in South Africa, and this particular clause would not have a hope of passing. If every farmer voted according to his own private opinion and eliminated the question of profit and loss, there is not the slightest doubt that this clause would be defeated. I hope it will be, and that the amendment of the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Strubep) will be agreed to. If we cannot abolish this system, I hope it will be restricted. I regret to see the farming community is in favour of extending the liquor trade in certain directions, where that extension may mean increased profit, or an increased demand for productions of the farming community. I hope farmers will place the national interest before that of any section of the community.

The hon. member for Tembuland (Mr. Payn has built up his whole argument on what is called “the Minister now opening the door,” but the Minister is not doing so—he is really restricting the tot because any employer to-day can give as much as he likes, whether in the Eastern Province or any part of the Cape Peninsula, As the hon. member built up his whole argument on the door now being opened, it falls to the ground. With regard to the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben) and other hon. members representing farming constituencies in the East, I would like to know, if the farming community felt so strongly on this, how it is that not one word of evidence was given before the select committee which sat for months. They knew what was proposed, and that the tot system was not being extended. The farmers are well organized, and there are farmers’ organizations over the whole country, but not one of these organizations made representations or gave evidence before the committee. It was well known that the committee was sitting. Their members representing them here must have been asleep if they did not know the committee was sitting. The opposition does not really come from the farming community, who know full well that the extent to which farmers may give drink to-day is really being curtailed or limited, and they are quite satisfied. The opposition has come from this House. Before I go further, I should like to know whether I can deal with the other amendments afterwards.

All the amendments to sub-section (2) are before the House.

The hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) has moved two amendments; one amendment to exclude natives. From my earliest recollections—which date from long before the hon. member for Bezuidenhout’s birth—a good many of our farm labourers were natives. Their descendants still work with us on our farms, and now it is very difficult to say whether some of the farm labourers are aboriginies or not. How could you possibly give some of your labourers the tot and not give it to others Such a differentiation would give rise to dissatisfaction and discontent. The hon. member is not honest over the matter. If he cannot get his way he would sooner make conditions worse, so that subsequently the liquor traffic may be abolished. He takes a cup of tea or coffee on Sunday just the same as he does on other days of the week, so why should he try to prevent farmers, from giving a tot to their labourers on Sundays? He should visit some of the farms where tots are given and he would see perfect order prevailing, both on week days and Sundays.

Sometimes you also have rows.

The hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) has been telling us of the rows he has on his farm, but we do not have them, as we give our workers tots, and that keeps the men away from the canteens and shebeens, and we do not have any disturbances. As to restricting the tot to those in the regular employment of the farmer, that would lead to the breaking down of the whole system. How can you discriminate between regular employees and casual employees by doing so you will cause dissatisfaction. The hon. member for Brakpan (Mr. Waterston) has talked a good deal about this being the truck system, but he has never said a word about the truck system introduced by the Minister of Labour, for every wage determination states that the employees are to be supplied with tea; this is also the truck system. The Bill will not lead to an extension of the tot system, but we do not want to make people law-breakers because they give a tot to their labourers. Can a farmer, whether he lives in the east or on the west, say he has never given a tot of liquor to his men?

In reply to the hon. member for Worcester (Mr. Heatlie), I may say I have consulted the report of the Select Committee on the Liquor Bill, and I cannot find a word of evidence given by farmers in support of the tot system with the exception of a few farmers in the Western Province. Can the Minister point to any evidence outside the interested evidence of vine growers or brandy farmers in support of the tot system? If he cannot do so, what has induced him to propose to continue the system in the Eastern Province and to extend it in other directions? Where has the demand come from?

The House passed it in the committee stage.

The House threw it out in the committee stage by a narrow majority. As far as the rural districts are concerned, the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben) has had communications from farmers asking him to oppose the continuance of the tot system. Other members have also had letters from farmers in their constituencies asking them to do the same. If the Minister will refer to the report of the select committee he will find that the churches unanimously opposed the tot system, and that the police condemned it in toto, while not a single native has asked that the privilege shall be extended to him. He will also find that such eminent authorities as Dr. Roberts and Dr. Loran of the Native Affairs Commission roundly condemned it in giving evidence before the select committee; he will also find that the Native Affairs Department roundly condemned it; he will also find that at most of the important farmers’ congresses in the Transvaal and in other parts of the Union, the system has been condemned, and there have been overwhelming arguments against the continuance of the system or any extension of it. I therefore want the Minister to tell us why he is desirous of continuing the tot system. One would think that, with his knowledge of the deplorable conditions in the Cape Province brought about by the tot system, instead of moving in the direction of continuing the system, he would move in the direction of abolishing it. This is what Dr. Loram said in giving evidence before the select committee [extract read]. I would like the Minister to tell us exactly why he is so eager to have this system continued and extended, in view of the overwhelming evidence given against it before the select committee.

At the beginning of the debate, the Minister of Justice challenged the mover of this amendment to get the House to say whether the Eastern Province farmers favoured his amendment or not. I think the answer has been given conclusively this afternoon. Member after member representing the Eastern Province farming districts, and other Eastern Province districts, has supported the hon. member without reservation. The Minister is a very reasonable person, and having issued a challenge and got a reply, I put it to him that he could save a whole lot of trouble now by accepting the amendment of the hon. member. He knows it is supported by the people most directly concerned. You have to approach this matter from the point of view of the tot system generally, and that of the native. I am not going to argue about the advisability or inadvisability of the tot system. I suppose every member has made up his mind whether the tot system is or is not an iniquitous system. There are those who hold that it leads to great trouble in our body politic, and members feel very strongly that in the first place it ought not to be allowed in the country here at all, and, in the second place, that it ought to be confined as much as possible to the places where it is at present a custom. The justification for this tot system has mostly come from those who carry out the system themselves in their own farming districts. I wonder whether they would consent to an amendment in line 61, by which the giving of this tot should be confined to employers bona fide engaged in wine farming operations. That would be a test of the justification which they allege for the tot system. I use that point because the hon. member for Bloemfontein (North) (Mr. Barlow) said that it is only used in a wine district, and that the extension to the Eastern Province need not be feared because it will not be carried on in places outside the wine farming districts. We know, as a matter of fact, that this tot system is in vogue in the grain farming districts as well. There may be a little truth in both those arguments; it may be a fact that the tot system is mainly confined to the wine farming districts, but it is also used in other districts which are not wine farming districts. That is where the possibility of the extension comes in. Seeing that we have the fact that the tot system has spread outside the districts where it probably largely originated, to other areas, Eastern Province farmers who are aware of the extension to the grain districts may very well fear the extension of the system to the cattle and sheep districts. The point I wish to make is this. The hon. member for Bloemfontein (North) goes on to ask: Why object to this clause as it stands, because, at the present moment, it is allowed in the Eastern districts? Well, the answer is that here you have, I think, for the first time in our legislation, express permission to give drink to a native. Most farmers thought they could not, and that was quite a common impression. You cannot give drink to a native in the native areas, because, by special proclamation, it is excluded. Why? Because it has been found absolutely essential for the safety and protection of the people of this country, that the natives in native areas should be excluded. Section two of this Act excludes the native areas, so I do not want to carry that argument too far. But let us take Bechuanaland. In the Annexation Act, the principle of the refusal of drink to a native is contained in section 16, which provided that no alteration in the existing law with regard to the sale of intoxicating liquor to natives should be effected by the passing of that Act. That only preserved the position existing when the Act was passed in 1895. The restriction or prohibition on the supply of liquor to natives was maintained at the passing of this Act. I think I am right in saying that no alteration has been made in that law as regards the natives of Bechuanaland since then.

That is so.

By this. Act we are giving express power to supply liquor to natives which during the whole period of the existence of that territory in our country, has not been supplied. This is not a mere allowance; it is an extension. The very fact that you are putting it in here goes counter to the whole principle which has been embodied in our legislation for the last 50 or 70 years, and that is to prohibit almost entirely the supply of liquor to natives. Take what was done in 1898 in our own province, when an Act was passed which, although no prohibition was laid down for natives, I think has been construed by most people in this country ever since that that is practically what it amounted to. What did we do in the Administration Act of last year? We had the Hofmeyr Act, under which natives who were registered were entitled to get their drink. The Minister, last year, refused most strenuously to allow that law to remain, so that even natives who had reached a certain stage of civilization by which they had qualified themselves to be placed on the voter’s roll, were not allowed to have their drink. That provision has been taken away altogether. It means now that natives who are not registered voters are entitled to be supplied with liquor. Why? Because they are engaged in farming operations. On what basis of logic or consistency can you make an exception in favour of people engaged in farming operations when you specifically lay it down that everybody else shall not have liquor?

What do you want?

I am prepared to strike out the whole clause. The hon. member just now said, “You are now wanting to prevent this in the east, where there is no trouble, and leave it in the west, where all the trouble really is.” The Minister knew perfectly well what the value of that argument was. He knew perfectly well that we fought hard to get the whole of that clause out. We come back to this, that the farmers in the Eastern Province firmly believe, like a great many people in the country believe, quite apart from Bechuanaland or any other special provisions, that under our law no native can get drink in this country. That, of course, is not so. We have, as a matter of solemn legislation, laid it down, telling the natives that they can get drink from the farmer as well as telling the farmer that he can give drink to the natives. Is not that going to be a real extension, a clarification of the present position which, to a large number of people, is doubtful? What is going to be the effect of that when other less enlightened members of the community get to know what is the law, that they can, contrary to every rule of legislation which we have had before, give way to these people? I say that whatever may be law we have, in fact, made a very serious and a very dangerous extension of the Act in extending it in such a way that you give direct permission by law, for these things to be done by employers to employees. I think, therefore, that if we cannot, as a matter of opposition to this tot system, do away with the whole of this clause, we should at least do our very best to limit the effects it has, and not allow it to go beyond the area where it is, in fact, in actual practice now. It is clear from all the evidence before the House, that in fact this tot system is very little used, though it is allowed in the Eastern districts. Is not this the very time to do what in 20 years it may be quite impossible to do? Once the possibility of this extension is recognized then there may be developments which the Minister, if he is Prime Minister, we will say, in 20 years’ time, will find the very greatest difficulty in dealing with. For these reasons I hope the amendment of the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben) will be carried.

I am afraid I do not quite agree with the amendment of the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben). It is a fact that, although the tot system is not as widely used in the Eastern Province as it is in the Transvaal, almost every farmer there, at one time or another, does give his natives liquor. I am not going to speak of the jollifications at Christmas time, but when there is any special work, especially shearing, tots are administered. If there is a pressure of work, or the weather is bad, it is a common practice in the Eastern Province for natives to be given a tot. In my experience the tot is frequently given in the Eastern Province. The argument advanced by my friends here is, “Let us pass a law against this, and let us all go on breaking the law.” I think that is absolutely unsound, and I, for one, would not be prepared to vote in favour of legislation of that sort. The hon. member for Rondebosch (Mr. Close) got up and one of his arguments was that farmers in the Eastern Province, or most of them, demanded that the amendment should be passed and that they should be excluded. For that reason he said he supported the amendment. I want to put the converse position to him. The Transvaal farmers, one and all, have demanded that they should have the tot system.

They do not.

Is my hon. friend prepared to get up and, following his own argument, prepared to support the Transvaal farmers and allow them to have the tot system? Another argument has been advanced, and that is by the hon. member for Tembuland (Mr. Payn). He says we are absolutely inconsistent. He said that this House had refused to allow registered voters to obtain liquor; therefore, we should be consistent and refuse to allow the tot system to obtain. It does not appeal to me at all in that light. Those who are fighting for this amendment now, those who are taking up the position which the hon. member for Tembuland (Mr. Payn) takes up, one and all said the right should not be taken away. If a great many members say it is absolutely right that registered voters should have unlimited rights to buy as much liquor as they like, I do not see we should be doing much harm in allowing the farmer, in a time of emergency, to give his native a glass of liquor. There is another very interesting point. When the local Option Bill was first introduced into this House, we divided on it, and now we find every member who is opposing the tot system opposed that Bill. I will read a few of the names of members who voted against local option: Arnott, Close, Moffat, Payn, Smartt, Struben and a good many more. This is the old division—local option against the rest. There is one point on which I join issue with the hon. member for Brakpan (Mr. Waterston). He talks about the truck system, and says the farmer wants it in order to get more work out of his natives, and to give the tot in lieu of wages. I am sorry to say he does not know what he is talking about. There is no place I have come across in the Eastern Province where the tot has ever been given in lieu of wages. It has been given from the sheer humanitarian point of view, that when a man has worked 12 or 14 hours a little pick-me-up is his due. I wish to deny most emphatically that there has ever been any question of giving a tot with a view to reducing the natives’ wages accordingly. It has been stressed by the hon. member for Klip River (Mr. Anderson) that evidence has not been given by farmers in support of the tot system, but why should they give evidence in support of something they are permitted to do?

Can you do it in East Griqualand?

No, because special restrictions apply in the native area. I think it is perfectly right in the interests of what is practically a native area that liquor facilities should not be too freely permitted. On these grounds I am afraid I cannot support the amendment. Very emphatic evidence has been given that the Eastern Province is united in this demand. I do not think that is actually so, and I think you would find a considerable consensus of opinion in favour of legalizing a practice which does exist rather than ask the farmers to break the law and make themselves criminals in continuing a practice which is now their right.

T do not live in the Eastern Province, but I do want to put this point to the Minister. Does the evidence of the Secretary for Native Affairs in this country carry no weight at all in the eyes of the Government and the Minister? The responsible official dealing with native affairs gave evidence before this select committee, and I want to read to the Minister what he said in speaking of the tot system—

I want the Minister to realize that the responsible official for the government of natives in this country is here directly warning the House of the effects of the tot system on the government of natives, and in spite of this evidence, we are going out of our way to do exactly what he warns us against. He goes on—

He goes on in subsequent evidence to point to the dangers which may arise from this system. What appeals to me about it is this. We are setting out now, responsible members of this House, leaders of public opinion, we are setting out to say this is a laudable practice. Although in the past there has been a certain amount of influence against the giving of tots, a considerable amount of prejudice indeed, even where it was possible to give the tot without incurring penalties, we are advising the people of this country that it is a laudable practice to give tots to natives. I ask what the effect of that is going to be. If every person who hitherto has had a repugnance to giving tots because he thought it was not quite a right thing in the interests of European civilization, if that prejudice is now to be broken down by authority of this Parliament, then we shall have removed one of the restraints which I think it should have been our duty to maintain under any circumstances. With the natives learning for the first time that they can obtain this tot, that Parliament considers it the right thing they should obtain it, and with the farmers themselves beginning to believe it is a laudable thing, I ask what is the ultimate result going to be? It is going to be that within a very few years we shall have the farmers of this country thundering at the gates of the Government to repeal the legislation we are passing this day. We are taking a very grave step and a very grave responsibility indeed in view of the overwhelming evidence of the evils which will arise from the introduction of this system if we now pass this legislation.

I have hitherto not intervened in this debate, but I feel so strongly on this question of the tot system, that I consider it is my duty to express my views.

I hope it will be a new argument.

I think it will be new in some respects. I have been brought up from the days of my youth in an atmosphere in which we were taught that we should never supply any liquor to a native, and another danger against which we were warned was that we should never supply him with a firearm. If I had to vote to-day in favour of granting the tot system, I would be doing violence to the upbringing I had which I still think was perfectly just and fair. I want to make one particular point to the Minister. If we allow the tot system to be spread throughout the country we are going to give the native a taste for intoxicating liquor, and if he goes to parts of the country where he cannot get drink, there is bound to be a very strong movement for him to obtain it illicitly. Another argument is this, that economically, in my opinion, it is going to be the farmers’ ruination. It will mean there is going to be auction through the tot system amongst farmers to obtain native labour. The time is coming when native labour will become scarcer on the farms, and it is only the farmers who are able to give a tot to the natives who will be able to obtain their native labour. I will read from the evidence given before the select committee by Mr. Roux, with whom was Mr. Kohler. [Question 5295 read.]

If that argument is correct, the natives will come from the Eastern to the Western Province.

To force a man to obtain labour by giving a tot is pernicious. [Question 5297 read.] If you give natives tots, you give them a taste for liquor, and you are going to increase the illicit liquor trade. If a native goes to a town and has acquired a taste for liquor, he will try to obtain it, and this will increase the number of illicit liquor sellers. The hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) said he was opposed to the amendment of the hon. member for Albany for the reason that the tot system had been allowed in the Eastern Province, but in the area from which the hon. member comes the tot system is prohibited, and there must be some good reason for that. It is that the authorities who have power to make proclamations there realize it is a pernicious and wicked system. I feel very strongly on the subject, and that the farmers who are now in favour of the tot system will realize in time to come that it is the greatest curse we could possibly have, because the rich farmer will have the advantage over the poor farmer who is not in a position to supply tots, and these will be used as an economic weapon by the rich man against the poor man. I think no greater evil could possibly be encouraged than to allow liquor to natives. In Natal the work done on sugar and wattle plantations by natives is task work—every native gets his pay according to his task, and no tot is given. The task is a very fair one, and the native is able to fulfil it without being subsidized or strengthened with a tot. I have tried to deal with a new phase of the subject, and I hope the Minister will take notice of what I have said.

I did not intend to take part in this debate, but we appear to have lost our perspective in our general discussion on the tot system. Here we have to deal with a particular area, the Eastern Province, and it has been impressed on this House by many hon. members that this is apparently a new thing, and that we are now extending the tot system. I think it ought to be clearly understood what we are now discussing. It has been the law of the Cape Province, and the Eastern Province is of course included, and up to now farmers of the Eastern Province had a perfect right to give unrestrained tots to their employees. Some hon. members conveyed the idea that we are now legalizing the tot system in the Eastern Province; what we are doing is restricting it. If this Bill becomes law a native voter who had the right to get liquor on licensed premises is now debarred. The only restriction in our legislation is that no licence holder had the right to sell to a native except to a registered voter, but the ordinary employer of the Cape Province had a right to give a tot to his natives. If people tell me that the Eastern Province farmers never gave their workers or labourers the tot, it is almost incredible, and it is incredible to think that Eastern Province farmers did not know they had that right. For hon. members to say of a practice which has existed for 40 or 50 years and which is to continue in a restricted form you are going to purchase labour from his neighbour and bring all sorts of horrors on the Cape Province is, I think, to lose our perspective. We must realize we are really restricting the present rights of the people, and we are not extending the tot system.

Amendment proposed by Mr. Struben put, and the House divided:

I move, as as amendment—

Of course, it is impossible to say anything new upon this subject because the argument would be precisely the same as in the case of the amendment of the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Struben). I only want to say there never has been a tot system in the Free State, and there never will be, and what we want in the Transvaal is exactly the same position as in the Free State. There is no question of a tot system, which is only possible in a wine-producing country. The farmers of the Transvaal are no worse than the farmers of the Free State, and when the farmers of the Free State have always used the power they have under the law properly and very occasionally given their natives a drink, the farmers of the Transvaal also have the practice of very occasionally and very sparingly giving their natives a drink. What we want is to legalize the practice in the Transvaal, which, whether we pass this law or not, will continue to be the practice there. I had a very strong letter from Sir Hamilton Fowle, who, as hon. members know, farms in the Sabie district, and he says that members voting against this amendment do not know what the position there is. In parts of the Transvaal, as where he is, where he has to do tree planting in the wet season and where He requires from the point of view of the health of his natives to occasionally give them this drink when they are drenched to the skin.

Will you confine the wet clause to the wet districts?

All the districts in the Transvaal are wet in summer when they get their normal rainfall. I do not wish to use the term tot system, because there is no question of the tot system. If there was any such question you would have it in the Free State, and I challenge anyone to say there is anything remotely approaching the tot system in the Free State, where this right is very sparingly used. Members themselves would be very surprised, if we did not pass this, to be told that the Transvaal farmer will never give his natives a drink. Those who did think so would he much more optimistic than I. There have been prosecutions. There was one prosecution in Middelburg (Transvaal), where a man from the Cape Province bought a glass of beer and took it out to the coloured man who had driven him in a cab. He was promptly convicted and got six months’ hard labour. The Transvaal is nearer to the Free State than to any other province in the country. We wish to have the Free State law on this point. A very large majority of farmers in the Transvaal wish to have this right. It has not been abused in the Free State and it certainly will not be abused in the Transvaal. There is one mistake I have made in regard to the Transvaal. I have made the language approximate as closely as possible to the Free State position, which is general, but an amendment will be introduced to restrict the Transvaal tot simply to the case of employees in farming operations. I do not think the hon. member should try to alter the ’egislation of the Free State, which does not require that alteration in its legislation, and has done very well in the past. It is not the intention to extend it to the towns. The difference between the Orange Free State and the Transvaal is, we know a large illicit traffic is carried on in the large towns of the Transvaal, and is non-existent in the country districts. You have to watch the liquor traffic in the towns very narrowly indeed.

interjected a remark.

If the hon. member wishes to make it general in the Transvaal, I have no objection. I think the arguments have been both exhaustive and exhausting this afternoon, and I have nothing fresh to adduce.

seconded.

The Minister told us that he had been instructed by a certain farmer (Sir Hamilton Fowle) to support the amendment which was passed by the House on a former occasion, but I want to ask him if that is his strongest argument, that one farmer in his district? I want to ask him whether he has not received other requests? I am certain that he has. He received a petition from his constituency signed by 700 or 800 of his constituents, who asked him not to allow the tot system in the Transvaal, and I ask him whether he had not received a request from the Synod now sitting in the Transvaal. I hope the Minister will pay attention to that Synod of the Dutch Reformed Church. The Church represents 175,000 Europeans and 110,000 natives. The telegram reads—

I should like to know whether the Minister is going to slight that strong representative voice.

I also have my duty in Parliament, and I am doing it. Other people cannot dictate to me what I am to do in Parliament.

If the Minister does not pay attention to the request of the Synod

I did not say that. I merely said that other people cannot say how I am to vote in Parliament.

I am glad to hear that. I am here as the representative of my constituents, any of whom are members of the Church which has expressed itself against something as unworthy and unholy. I appreciate the telegram from the Church, and am thankful for it, and I hope hon. members opposite who are members of the same Church will agree with me, and will see that the appeal is not made in vain. What about the constituency of the Minister? The Minister will surely not deny that he received a petition from 800 people in his constituency?

Then they must not support me at the next election.

I do not want to make a party matter of it, but the Minister will have to give an account. For the last 25 years approximately such a thing as the tot system has not existed in the Transvaal. The Minister has said that the law is evaded, but then he is the greatest sinner for not punishing the guilty ones.

Am I to imprison a farmer who gives his workpeople a tot once a year?

I think that when a law is made the country should be made to respect it. Otherwise, how shall we put things right? It would create an unhappy position in our country, and the people would not tolerate it. But I want to ask what will become of this House. A month ago, by a majority, we rejected the tot system in the Transvaal.

A majority of one.

Yes, but it was a majority of this House. Nothing has happened in the meantime to upset the decision except the letter from the Colonel to the Minister, who lives in a wet area and wants to give his workpeople liquor. He is, I suppose, a Nationalist. I do not know him. I do not want to go over again the whole debate we have had on the tot system, but I should be neglecting my duty if I did not again protest, possibly for the last time, against the tot system in the Transvaal. We shall be able to talk about it to-day.*Mr. BADENHORST: And vote.

I hope the hon. member may yet be converted before his death and take a little notice of the Church he belongs to. It is said that the people in the Transvaal are evading the law. The Minister went so far as to say that they were all evading it.

I did not say so. I said that it was a general practice to give tots.

Here, at any rate, is one of those who give no tots. I want to point out that the result will be that the rich people will give tots to the workers, and the poor will not be able to get any labour.

The rich people are too stingy to give tots.

I think hon, members in the Cape Province ought to assist us. If the liquor were to be made in the Transvaal the Cape produce would suffer. Why did the Cape product formerly have such a bad name? Because ten bottles were made out of one or two bottles of brandy bought. The brandy was mixed with vitriol, tobacco, and other things, and the natives were only maddened. That started the movement for prohibition for natives. The conditions on the goldfields were such that on Mondays 50 to 60 per cent, of the natives could not work. The Minister is honest here, and proposes not to allow it there, but it will have the effect on the farms of the natives becoming accustomed to it, and wanting other drink than kaffir beer. It will not remain at one tot. When the natives have had one tot it will lead to a second and third, and subsequently they will be drunk.

No.

At some places brandy stills are already to be found in poplar bushes and so forth. The result of the tot system in the Transvaal will be that bad brandy will be distilled. No good wine will be taken, but bad stuff will be put on the market, and all kinds of poison will be distilled. Why is the Minister prepared to exclude Natal, and not the Transvaal? I hope the Transvaal members will assist us. The Free State people are satisfied with what they have; very well, let them keep the system, but why should Parliament press something down the throats of the natives which they do not even want? In the old days the native chief Kama prohibited drink in the whole of his territory. Is it not a shame that the natives should be ahead of us? The churches also are to-day strongly against the system, and I hope the Minister will hearken to them. I also hope that the ministers of religion on the opposite side will support, and will not allow the tot system to be introduced into the Transvaal. I just want to say here that I am sorry I said the other day that the hon. member for Winburg (Dr. van der Merwe) voted for the tot system. I was wrong. I know that he is one of the members who stands with us on this point, and I hope that other hon. members, members of the great Church will vote with us to-day.

I do not propose to go into the merits of this matter, but I rise to propose an amendment in view of what the Minister has said. I am concerned with the feeling in the towns of the Transvaal in regard to this clause. I quite agree with the hon. Minister that no good will come by applying this clause to the towns. There really is a feeling amongst the farmers that they desire this legislation, but there is no such feeling in the towns For that reason I propose to move, as an amendment to the amendment proposed by the Minister of Justice—

That may mean in the towns, too.

Business suspended at 6 p.m. and resumed at 8.5 p.m.

When business was suspended I had just read the amendment which I proposed to the amendment of the Minister. I think I should read the amendment out again. [Amendment read.]

May I just interrupt the hon. member? The Minister’s amendment is to insert after “in” the words “the province of the Transvaal and”

Will it be in order to amend the Minister’s amendment in the way I am proposing?

I see the hon. member wishes to qualify only in respect of the Transvaal and not the Orange Free State.

Yes. The amendment would read “and in the province of the Transvaal in respect of natives employed in farming operations”. At that point there were certain interruptions from hon. members to the effect that the amendment was too limited, and I am quite willing in insert also the words “outside urban areas”, so that the clause would read—

My reason for tabling this amendment is that I believe in the towns of the Transvaal public opinion is strongly against this clause, but if this amendment is accepted, that opinion will be alleviated. There is a definite opinion among the farmers of the Transvaal that a clause of this nature should go through.

Should it not start “In the Transvaal?”

Yes, the Minister is quite correct. It would then read—

Let me say finally that if the clause is not amended as I propose it is going to make policing in the towns extremely difficult. Proper control of the liquor traffic in highly populous areas is obviously imperative. For these reasons I move the amendment.

I second the amendment for a reason which the hon. member has not mentioned, namely, that I am convinced that another article will be accepted which I think was proposed by the Minister, namely, to establish beer houses at Pretoria and on the Rand.

Another novelty.

I agree with the hon, member for Johannesburg (North) (Mr. Geldenhuys) that it is a new principle, but it is a very good principle, and I hope the House will adopt it. I support the amendment because undoubtedly the natives will be given the opportunity in the near future to drink their natural beverage.

The Minister might say he is not introducing the tot system, but he is certainly introducing a fundamental change in the liquor legislation in the province of the Transvaal.

Not in the practice.

I will come to that. We know that in the province of the Cape Colony leading farmers and successful farmers, like the Duminy’s, the Pickstone’s, the Leonard’s and others, have carried on operations successfully without giving any tots. The grain farmers have successfully abolished it, with results satisfactory to all. Before I come to the Minister’s observation, I would like to refer to and read portion of an article which appeared in “Die Burger” on the 8th February last. I should like my farming friends, particularly on the other side, to follow this, because I think the argument is very cogent and convincing. [Translation]—

This article is the result of a letter written by Dr. Gerdener, of Wakkerstroom, a well-reasoned letter in which he set out the arguments against the tot system in the Transvaal. The deductions from that letter appear in the article in “Die Burger” which I have read. I would like to ask from whom this demand comes. It does not come from the natives, and, as far as I can gather, it does not come from the farmers.

It does.

I join issue on that. During all the years that I have been in Parliament I have heard of no urge or even request on the part of the farmers to introduce this. The farmers have never said: “This is a matter of such paramount importance, let us have this legislation.” There has been a singular silence which is evidence that they were satisfied with the existing conditions. I farm myself. I have mixed with farmers and none of my neighbours want it. I have here a letter, which I would like to read, from a well-known Transvaal farmer, Mr. Poultney—

I had a meeting with Poultney and others, and all the other farmers voted against Poultney on that occasion.

How many other farmers? I would like to have some further information with regard to that. He goes on to say—

They do not allow you to see it, but do it on the quiet.

The letter goes on to state that the feeling against this is—

I should like to know what the Minister says to this. He goes on to say—

I would like to quote a telegram received from Maj. Hunt, whose name is well known in this House, and who is, or was, the president of the South African Agricultural Union. He knows farming opinion, and on account of his knowledge of rural conditions he was put on the Land Bank. He occupies a very high position, and is well known by the farming community. He says—

What is the Minister putting against this? We have it from the hon. member for Johannesburg (North) (Mr. Geldenhuys) that 700 of the Minister’s constituents have sent a petition against it.

That shows how honest I am.

Authoritative and representative opinion is decidedly against it. I have been trying to find out where the request comes from, and I have failed. The Minister quoted Sir Walter Hamilton Fowle, who said that the country was so damp and dismal that the native must get a tot. I have been among many farmers, who never found it necessary to give the natives the tot. I do not give my natives tots; I do not want to debauch them. The only evidence I can find is from the Cape wine farmers, and it is easy to understand why they want it. I cannot understand the statement made by the hon. member for Worcester (Mr. Heatlie) that the wine farmers of the Cape do not want the system introduced into other parts of the Union. I am referring to the statement he made on the 22nd February. The hon. member said—

That and the resolution from the National party Congress at Pretoria, and the letter from. Sir Hamilton Fowle, is the only evidence I can find from farmers of the Transvaal to have the tot system introduced there. Can we ignore the representations made by the church? A telegram has been read by the hon. member for Johannesburg (North), and we should have it on record in “Hansard”; I look upon this as very important, what the opinion of ministers of the Dutch Reformed Church is. This is the telegram from the secretary of the synod—

Yet the Minister says he must do his duty. The members of the synod are men of very high moral standard and decent living, and they decided to send this telegram by 165 votes to 1.

We must decide what we think is right, not what the church thinks is right.

These people are men of sense.

We also have sense, I hope.

They express the views of the members of the church.

How can they express my views? I am also a member of the same church.

The Minister is a very important personage, but, after all, he is only one.

Quite.

The Minister is putting himself on a pedestal by pitting his individual opinions against the opinions of these people who know what is good for the natives.

I admit that their opinion is more important than the opinions held over there.

That is a very stupid remark. The point is, is the change intended to be for the good of the natives? Distinctly not. Evidently the well-being of the natives is of secondary consideration. In addition to the views of the church there is a mass of other opinion which the House cannot ignore. The missionary committee of the Lydenburg presbytery sent a telegram expressing the hope that the Minister will withdraw the kaffir beer clause, otherwise the presbytery saw nothing but disaster for the natives in this proposal. Then the Rev. Mr. Meiring informed the select committee that the farmers saw the danger of this system.

That is in the Cape Province?

Yes.

We have passed that.

But the principle is the same. The chief magistrate of Pietermaritzburg says it will be a bad day for Natal when liquor is sold to natives. What difference does it make whether the liquor is sold to the natives in Natal or the Transvaal?

Oh, yes, it does make a difference. I have tasted liquor in both places.

Then we have the opinion of the director of native labour on the Band, who says that of the 80,000 Portuguese natives employed on the reef, only a small number are habitual drinkers.

The hon. member is now discussing a matter which is not before the House.

The principle is the same. My point is the giving of European beverages to natives in the Transvaal. I can find no authoritative opinion in favour of the tot system. This is the evidence given by Dr. Loram, before the select committee. [Extract read.] I wish to emphasize what was said by one of the witnesses and by “Die Burger.” It is one thing in the Free State and another thing in the Transvaal. In the Free State you have a homogeneous population and in the Transvaal you have a heterogeneous population. I have always maintained and will maintain that the tot system is a dark blot on the statute book of this country. I remember the early days on the Rand when the natives were able to get drink. It is all very fine for the Minister to say it is one drink. The thing is that the taste is acquired, and we know perfectly well it is not going to stop at the giving of the quantity mentioned in the law. The matter is of such importance, and the danger so imminent, and the risk so big, that I would ask the Minister not to introduce this amendment unless he is satisfied, and is in a position to controvert the overwhelming evidence and facts which I have laid before this House. We cannot take this risk. We know the European is referred to as a “voogd en vader” of the native. I have heard it said in this House. It is a very poor way of treating your ward to give him alcohol and let him acquire a taste for the white man’s drink. We know of many a white man whom it is difficult to restrain from going to excess, and once the native, or the untutored savage, as he is called, once acquires a taste for this drink, there is nothing to restrain him. The craving will be created and he will strive to make every effort to get alcohol. I say, for the protection of the women on the countryside, we ought not to take this step. I have a letter here from a lady in the Transvaal who has lived practically all her life there, and who has done much good public work. You must remember that if the law is carried out as is laid down, it will be bad enough, but you may make up your minds that this law will be broken over and over again. I do not say it will be broken by everybody, but there are men who have no regard for the spiritual or physical well-being of the native, and who will give him all the liquor he can give. It is bad enough already. This is going to make it infinitely worse. The lady writes to put forward the women’s point of view: “We get absolutely no protection, we are in fear of our lives. What will our plight be if thousands of natives congregated in Johannesburg are allowed to drink unreservedly?” This does not refer to Johannesburg only, as there are thousands of natives in the Transvaal who will be able to get a certain amount of liquor. We all know that an appetite for drink can be cultivated, and she relates an experience of a native breaking into a house when under the influence of liquor, and if the lady of the house had attempted to interfere, as she was alone, he would probably have committed murder. This drink traffic is not kept under control by the legislature to the extent I would like to see. I know a legislative body cannot act in advance of public opinion. I think there is a distinct improvement, but this is a retrograde step. The Minister takes a very heavy responsibility. There is no necessity for the native to have the European’s liquor. I appeal to the Minister to withdraw his amendment.

I listened attentively to the speeches this afternoon, and also read the articles which were written opposing the so-called tot system in the Transvaal. I must say it made the impression on me a little that we are making a mountain out of a molehill. I do not think it is as serious as it is represented. I am perhaps slightly influenced by what I have seen in the Free State, and the impression that I got there was that, particularly if it is restricted to the countryside, it will not lead to so much drunkenness and demoralization among the natives. I do not believe that for a moment. I said before in the House, that we are trying something in South Africa which is impossible—and we will see this more and more in future—namely to have total prohibition for a section of the population, allowing another section to buy as much as they want, and as cheaply as they wish. This places the poorer section in terrible temptation, and I feel that if we want to do anything in the interests of the population of our country we should remove that temptation, so that the poor whites shall not be given the great temptation of smuggling. If this measure would really put an effective stop to smuggling I would vote for it. Before the introduction of the Bill I said several times in public that I felt that the tot system in the Cape Province was a great evil. I here agree with the Minister of Justice that we cannot talk of the tot system of the Free State, and that we cannot call what is proposed for the Transvaal a tot system either. Let us be honest. The tot system is quite a different thing, and it can never develop in that way, except perhaps in the areas where peach brandy is made. I do not think it will easily degenerate into the tot system of the Cape Province, and I have frequently said in public that if the Free State system could be extended to the whole of the Union, it would be such a forward step for the Cape Province that I would unhesitatingly vote for it, even if some people in the Transvaal thought that it was a backward step. Unfortunately, according to this Bill, the Free State system will not be extended to the Cape Province. My agreement, therefore, lapses, as far as I personally am concerned. Yet, I admit that a big step forward is being taken in the Cape Province, and limits are being imposed on the quantity of drink which can be given to the coloured people, so that farmers need no longer compete with each other in the quantity they give. I do not believe in the great demoralizing effect the motion would have on the natives. There are very few farmers to be found who would intentionally intoxicate natives What weighs with me is the question whether the motion can assist us in reducing smuggling, and in doing away with the temptation to the white population. I must say in this connection I am not entirely convinced that it is going to assist us. The system has not led to much drunkenness in the Free State, but I doubt whether it has done much to prevent smuggling. What I fear with regard to the motion is that it will not stop at one tot a day, that the native will not be satisfied with one, but will acquire a desire for more, and if he does not get it will subsequently pay a large sum for it. Instead of stopping smuggling the system will assist it. That is one of my greatest objections. I must say that what also weighs with me on the other hand is that many people of the Transvaal do not want the tot system to be introduced there. I must say that the punishments in the past, if a farmer gave an innocent tot to a native, were very drastic. I feel that it was too severe to send a man to gaol for it. It does not approach to the illicit liquor traffic, and even with regard to that the law was, in my opinion, too drastic. We must, however, also be guided by representative opinion from the Transvaal, which has been voiced inter alia by the Dutch Reformed Church Synod. It may be that some people regard it more from an ethical point of view than from the point of view of the actual position, but there were many practical men amongst them, and half of them consisted of farmers living on the countryside, men of experience acquainted with the conditions. Those elders, with one exception, voted in favour of a motion that the system was not desirable in the Transvaal. We must take notice of that, although I, in so far as the Free State is concerned, have not noticed such a very unsatisfactory effect. Therefore I do not want to force the system on the Transvaal. I have never seen the Transvaal people admitting so much that the Free State was better than themselves, but in this case they seem to think that things are more satisfactory with us.

What side actually are you on?

I want the hon. member to understand why I am voting against the motion. I am not doing it because it is such a frightfully dangerous thing as some people want to make out. There is one thing which actually weighs a little in the objection of those people against the system, namely that when it has once taken root in parts of the Transvaal it will compel the farmers, who would otherwise never have come into touch with liquor, to have it in their houses for the purpose of giving it to the workers. We must attach weight to the opinion of people competent to judge about Transvaal conditions, and who have no financial interests in the matter, but only desire the welfare and the progress of the population. I feel that we have not yet properly attacked the actual question of smuggling, and I am convinced that the native population will still force us to introduce legislation which will not merely be patchwork like this. We shall have to go to extremes and impose prohibition not only on a section, but on the whole of the population if it can be carried out, and if it cannot, then the native population will ultimately compel us, I fear, to take full Government control of the whole drink traffic. I know that the temperance reformers do not entirely agree with me on the point. I know that there is much opposition from all sides, but it seems to me possibly the only way of getting proper control of the whole liquor traffic, so that the European population shall not be exposed to the great danger of smuggling. As for the natives on the countryside, I cannot see such a great need for the farmers to give them tots. The natives’ national drink is kaffir beer, and I think the more we can restrict them to it, and not give them the European drink, the better it will be. The farmers already have full powers regarding the brewing of kaffir beer on the farms. They can let the natives have as much beer as they wish, and I think it leads to less danger. In view of the danger of smuggling, and the fact that so many responsible people who are acquainted with the position in the Transvaal are against the introduction of the system there I do not want to force it on to the Transvaal and I will vote against the introduction of the system, although I do not regard the motion as being as dangerous as some hon. members do.

Whatever be the result of the division upon this particular proposal of the Minister, whether the tot system is to be adopted in the Transvaal or not, I will say this, that the temperance cause and the churches to which he alluded to-night have, on the whole, every reason to be grateful and thankful to the Minister. And I will say this, too—I do not think he would take it as a compliment—that I look upon him as a better temperance man than most parsons in this House. The Minister has had my loyal support right through this Bill up to the present moment. Here, I am sad to say, we part company, because he is doing the most extraordinary thing that any Minister has ever done in regard to any legislation I have seen in the House. Here is a Bill to reform the liquor law. There is reform practically in every clause, and various sections of the community, in fact I may say all sections, have been told that in the general good they must submit to some measure of restriction. The licensed victuallers, brewers, wine farmers, natives, coloured people—right through the whole gamut they have been told the common good demands that a certain measure of restriction must be imposed on all because this is a measure of reform, because drunkenness is on the increase in our land, because our gaols are getting more full every day.

Not in the Free State.

I am sometimes inclined to say damn the Free State !

Order.

No, I say I am inclined to say it.—I don’t say it. At any rate, in the Transvaal to which this clause is applying, our gaols are getting fuller, and the illicit liquor evil is growing, and this Bill is a weapon which together, in all good faith, we are trying to forge to cope with that, and yet, in that very Bill, you find proposed to he inserted by the Minister a provision which goes absolutely in the teeth of the rest of the Bill, which is entirely foreign to its principles, and which absolutely negatives the whole spirit underlying the Bill. Why, two clauses before that we passed a section which lays down that the chief principle of this Bill is the principle which has been followed in the Transvaal ever since I have known the Transvaal, and much longer than that, that there shall be total prohibition to natives of the white man’s liquor, and that is the principle on which we are endeavouring to work out our problems in this country. And yet it seems that the farmer’s little finger in this House is thicker than the loins of any other person. If the farmers say, “We, as farmers, demand a special privilege to do things which no other section of the community is allowed to do,” that is sufficient. The voice of the farmers is stronger than the Minister, stronger than the united voice of the Dutch Reformed Church; it is stronger, apparently, than the whole voice of the churches in South Africa. It is stronger than the natives. A few Transvaal farmers, through their representatives, come along and say, “In our own interest we want to be allowed to give this to the native.” The Minister, who has insisted that other sections of the community must submit to a curtailment of their liberty, says, “Yes, you may have it.’ The hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) stated the case admirably and fully, and showed there was no representative opinion which was articulate before the select committee which demanded this particular measure. I defy any member opposite to turn the pages of the evidence and to show me one line of evidence in that book which justified the imposition on the Transvaal Province of the tot system, except a resolution of the caucus of the Provincial Nationalist party of the Transvaal. That is to say, the members of the Provincial Council of the Transvaal belonging to the Nationalist party, apparently had a caucus and sent a resolution to the Minister, and that is the sum total of the evidence coming from the Transvaal Province in favour of the introduction of this clause, and introduction, as I have shown, going dead in the teeth of every other reform mentioned in the Bill. Now let me say a word to the Free Staters. I remember the time when they said, “From early days we have had no rural licences in the Free State, and we intend to stick to that.” I remember the time, not long ago, when to a man they said, “We do not want restaurant licences in the Free State, because they may corrupt our young people.” Does the temperance of temperate Free Staters stop at the Free State? Does their solicitude stop with their own "young white people? Are they entirely oblivious to the voice of their own Church? Inside the House the voice of that church seems to count for very little.

My point was the congregations were never consulted.

Surely the Minister will not deny that these ministers have as much right to speak for their congregations as the members of the Transvaal Provincial caucus have the right to speak for their constituencies. I cannot understand the argument that the Church should not speak on maters of this kind. I do not claim to be a church-goer, but in a great social question such as this, affecting the lives and morals of hundreds and thousands of people, black and white, the first voice one should listen to is the voice of the church, and I deprecate very much the habit that has grown up in this House of pushing aside, apparently as unnecessary, and almost contemptible, the views of the church when expressed on these great social questions. I am never in favour of the church pushing its nose into politics, but on a great social question such as this, if the church, whether it is the Dutch Reformed Church or any other, may not speak, on what question, may it speak, and what value is to be attached to its views? Coming back to my Free State friends, nothing has caused me more astonishment than their attitude over this particular question. Simply because the Free State system has been quiescent and inoperative and therefore inocuous, they will vote to thrust on the Transvaal Province, without any request, and in the teeth of all the evidence, a system which all the churches of the Transvaal tell them they do not want, and which is pernicious.

Who is in a better position to judge, the Free Staters or the Transvaalers?

With your policy and votes, it is proposed to thrust on the Transvaal a system which there is no evidence the Transvaal wants, and I challenge any member who follows me to give one jot of affirmative positive evidence to show the Transvaal wants this system. Resolutions have been read from the Dutch Reformed Church. I have resolutions from the Presbyterian Church, the Witwatersrand Church Council, the Wesleyan Church and the Johannesburg Joint Council of Europeans and Natives, probably the most thoughtful body existing to-day for the study of native affairs. They say—

The evidence against it is overwhelming. Why are they to-night, some of them, going to vote to impose this system on the Transvaal? The Minister, in a piece of special pleading, said in effect, "It is wrong, intellectually dishonest, to speak of this being a tot system." What are we asked to vote for? For a law which permits any farmer in a rural district of the Transvaal to give his native as much as a quarter of a pint of spirits, that is, five ounces, or one pint of non-spirituous liquor, once a day, to be drunk in his presence.

If they want to.

Of course, I am not going to assume that every farmer is going to lay in a cellar of liquor and have a daily parade of his servants for it. But do not forget that we are laying it down for the first time in the statute law of our land that the Transvaal, which has always had total prohibition for natives, that a farmer may give spirits up to five fluid ounces to his native. Farmer A may do it, and farmer B may not, only to find that the superior attraction of the tot attracts his native away to the man who gives it. I ask hon. members from the Free State, where they have not these problems, to allow us Transvaalers to know our business. I ask them to follow their own Dutch church in the Transvaal. Nothing has shocked me more painfully than that in this House we have actual ministers of that church, and so far from endorsing the lead given by it, we have seen them, and we will see them, voting in the teeth of their own church and imposing the tot system on the Transvaal—some of them. Can they wonder that those of us who do not belong to the church and clerical profession get cynical sometimes, when we see how little influence on their vote on grave social questions their previous training in the church has given them? I am disappointed at the speech of the hon. member for Winburg (Dr. van der Merwe), although grateful that he is voting against this, but I am disappointed that he regards it as a question of no importance. I am speaking for the temperance people when I say that we regard this as most dangerous, and shall never cease to fight against it. If I got the power I would move for a Bill repealing this provision, if it is ever carried. I ask my hon. friends opposite who are men of strong temperance leanings, to realize what will flow from this if it is passed. With an unscrupulous employer— and what is the use of arguing as if every individual farmer is high-souled—the native will get a taste for liquor, womanhood would not be safe, natives will be attracted to farmers by the lure of the tot. Natives will read that they are forbidden to get European liquor, but the farmer may give the native a tot, and they will say, " In general we are treated as children and may not get the white man's liquor, but in order for us to work for the farmer, he is allowed to give us liquor when no one else is allowed to do it, under a heavy penalty." What colossal selfishness. The Minister is breaking the law if he gives his own servant liquor; and why not the farmer? Why do the farmers vote for it but to improve the conditions of their own native employment? The native leaders will say that this is another instance of the white man's selfishness. He makes one exception—and not in the interest of the native; not a single speaker has said this is intended in the interest of the native, but to cover up the delinquencies of certain farmers.

I have never thought that because there are thieves abroad we must legalize theft or because there are women walking the streets we must introduce a law to legalize prostitution, or because certain farmers have given natives the tot that we must legalize it.

It is possible they don't think it is morally wrong.

If the Minister were able to speak to-night to half a dozen women from the streets of Cape Town, they would say they did not see anything morally wrong in walking the streets, because hunger drove them to it; yet it is morally wrong.

Do you believe giving a tot is morally wrong?

I most definitely do. Where the law of the land has laid down that the policy in regard to natives shall be total prohibition, any person who, from selfish and callous motives, gives a native liquor is committing a grave moral wrong. I have no doubt about that whatever. Does the Minister consider it morally wrong for a white man to consort with a native woman—any worse than for a white man to consort with a white woman?

Equally wrong.

Just so. Yet, on social grounds, the Minister said that a white man who consorts with a black woman should be punished, while if it is a white woman, he escapes.

You cannot compare the two things.

The fact that we are a white race of one and a half millions, superimposed on a black proletariat of six millions, makes it necessary to have prohibition, and we cannot live in this country if we allow the natives to get the white man's liquor. It would not be a fit country to live in at all, and there is not a single hon. member sitting opposite me to-night who does not know it is true. The sole exception proposed to be made is because some farmers—we do not even know how many —have told the Minister that they find it convenient to give natives an occasional tot.

We made an exception in the previous section; in the Cape.

The Minister will agree with me that the Cape has not the traditional policy the Transvaal has on this matter.

You argued that the natives were not allowed to drink in the Eastern Province unless they were voters.

Apparently I was wrong on that point. We say that both in the interests of the natives and the whites, natives should be prohibited from obtaining European liquor, but we make one exception which enlightened farmers think will do harm to the farming community. Will hon. members deny that the farmers of the Union and he Farmers Congress have, so far as they have expressed their opinion, been dead against the legislation of the tot system? Whatever the position may be no evidence was laid before the select committee that any body of farmers favoured the introduction of this system. No representative farmer ever gave that evidence. The Native Affairs Commission, the churches and the natives themselves were against it, and I believe the great body of people of the country are also against it. I do not believe that anyone who votes wantonly to impose this system on the Transvaal will be forgiven. When the matter was discussed in committee of the whole House, the hon. member for Worcester (Mr. Heatlie) said the introduction of the tot system into the Transvaal would not benefit the wine farmers by one penny. It is a curious thing, however, when it came to the vote that every member on this side of the House except two or three Transvaal members representing farming constituencies, and two or three members representing wine farmers constituencies, voted against the extension of the tot system to the Transvaal. Whatever the hon. member said, it will never be believed that his vote was a purely unselfish one, but given in the interests of the wine farmers in order to promote the extension of their trade whatever may be the result to the natives. Through Mr. Kohler, who appeared before the select committee, the wine farmers actually asked that the tot system be extended to the Transvaal—a more transparent instance of selfishness I have ever come across. Apparently it means more to the wine farmers to increase the sale of wine and brandy than what the churches and the natives want and what the Native Affairs Commission recommends. Whatever be the result of this vote, we will never cease to do our utmost to keep this system away from the Transvaal. It is a departure from all the traditions under which the Transvaal has grown up. I remember, what used to take place in Johannesburg before total prohibition for natives was enforced. While admitting all the difficulties that must exist in that heterogeneous mass of people called the Rand, I know how much better the present system is than the old. Every Transvaaler should stick closely to the system under which we have lived and should keep the white man's drink away from the natives. If you allow drink to be given to the natives on the farms it may open the door to the making of other exceptions. Keep the native away from the white man's drink, and more especially keep him away from spirits.

With regard to the amendment of the hon. member for Pretoria (Central) (Mr. te Water), I am entirely in favour of this amendment not being enforced in the town areas of the Transvaal. The hon. member who has just spoken has dealt entirely with the town areas—he knows very little about the country areas of the Transvaal. One of the reasons why it is so important to allow the farmers to give a tot to their labourers is that every week-end natives from farms collect together and drink until they are drunk. It is said that it is a wrong principle to endeavour to keep them from collecting together for this purpose, but it is also a wrong thing to encourage that drinking. I am told there is total prohibition in the towns, but I have an excellent native and every Sunday he goes to Pretoria and returns drunk. It is better to keep a native straight by giving him one drink and thus preventing him going to a place where he will obtain many drinks, which is the position to-day. The great danger is that you will never be able to obtain a conviction in the towns if you allow this system to be extended there.

What sort of legislation is this which makes a thing a crime in the town, but not in the country?

I have no objection whatever to extend the system to the towns, but if that is done it will be very difficult indeed to prove that the supplying of drink to natives in towns was for gain and was not a gift. It is a practical difficulty. If we were certain that all cases in which liquor was supplied for money would be discovered, then I would say there is no reason why the system should not be free to the whole of the Transvaal. I go one step further. Natives can obtain any amount of drink in the Transvaal countryside and also in the towns. Are we going to say that it is morally wrong to give these natives one drink? If that is morally wrong, then I do not understand what the word means. I can understand that it is morally wrong to seduce a teetotaller to take a drink and to enter into those devious ways which some of us may have entered upon.

There is something wrong with the administration if a native can get as much drink as he likes.

I am giving the hon. member facts—facts which existed before this Government ever came into power. I am giving facts that have always been facts in the Transvaal and in Pretoria where the trouble is much less than in Johannesburg. I have endeavoured, over and over again, to find out where those supplies took place to my own natives. It is one of the things you can never find out from a native. He is the most secretive person as to where he gets the drink. If you close one way of supply, the native will find another way, and if you close all ways, you find the skokiaan evil developing. It is difficult for anybody to say that you can stop the provision of yeast to a native. If he can take yeast or mealie meal and turn them into drink, or sugar or rice and turn them into drink, surely it is an almost impossible problem to stop all these supplies. All these things can be turned into drink. Some hon. members think the only man who can turn things into drink is a distiller They are wrong. Your ordinary native is a fine distiller. If you give a native a bag of mealie meal and tell him he can eat as much as he likes, you will find him turning it into drink. People talk about this matter as if the native in the Transvaal was a man unspotted and unblemished, and never got any drink except what the white man gives him. He has been able to turn everything into drink and obtain all the supplies he wanted. The discussion comes to this—that unless the farmer gives the native drink, the native never acquires a taste for it. That is an opinion that can be held only by people who have no knowledge of the matter. With regard to religion, the only religion which has succeeded in keeping drink from its devotees has been the Mohammedan religion. If the hon. member is right in saying we must always follow the churches, surely we must follow the Mohammedan faith and become Mohammedans, because that has been the most successful faith in that direction. I, personally, have no desire to be a Mohammedan. I am quite satisfied to be a member of the Dutch Reformed Church, but I would also like ministers and church councils of the Dutch Reformed Church first to consult their congregation before they say: " We the church, representing 167,000 white souls in the Transvaal, we, representing all these souls, say so and so," when they have not consulted one-half of those souls. They cannot represent me or anybody of us in matters which are not direct matters of religion, unless they consult us. If they are dealing with questions of religion, they bind us on those questions, but when they deal with other matters, they must consult us before they can bind us, the members of that church. Surely that is ordinary common sense. I must say I, at all events, have never been able to understand how the church councils or the ministers of any church— I do not care what church—can bind the whole of their congregation without consulting the whole of their congregation.

They cannot do it.

I do not wish any hon. member to run away with the idea that I or any of us belonging to any denomination in South Africa wish to flout the opinion of the church in matters lying outside religion, if the church, as a whole, has been consulted, but there is a growing tendency in South Africa for the churches to deal with matters which are not directly religious without consulting the community. They have a perfect right to speak in the name of the whole congregation if they have consulted the congregation. They would have a perfect right to send that telegram spoken of by my hon. friend opposite in the names of the ministers and church councils, but not the right to say that they speak in the name of 167,000 white souls and a number of native souls. That is ordinary common sense, It is also ordinary common sense that whatever representations are made to us, in the final result the responsibility is ours, the vote is ours, and we must not lay down in any sense that any other body has a right to enforce its will on our will in Parliament.

What about constituents.

Even your constituents. I take that as proof of the honesty in which, at all events, I am placing this matter before the House that, where I have a petition from 700 of my constituents, which most hon. members opposite would hasten to obey, I am prepared to say that, in spite of that, and knowing the responsibility, I have taken on my shoulders for the next election, or any subsequent election, I am prepared to flout the opinion that is placed before me by my constituents.

It is proof of your honesty, but rather stupid, is it not?

If I were not right, it would be a stupid attitude on my part.

And unnecessary, too.

Knowing I am right. I have taken up that attitude, and I think I shall be able to show the House at a later stage that I have judged the position rightly, and my 700 misguided constituents have judged the position wrongly in this matter. I am going to differ from the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell), but if this House gives its vote to-night, I will take no step whatever in the Senate to change that vote. I will support it in the Senate.

That shows a sneaking conviction that you are wrong.

As far as this Bill is concerned, the course I have adopted from the start I will carry out to the end. I said I wanted this Bill to be dealt with as a non-party matter, and having said that, when this House lays down certain provisions, I shall support in another place what this House has laid down. I think that is the only fair attitude I can take up. However warmly I may debate any point in this House.

Why did you not take the last opinion of this House?

I am taking the final findings of this House. That is a perfectly fair attitude. I am going to defend those final findings in another place.

Even if you think they are wrong?

Even if I think they are wrong, having taken up the attitude that this is a non-party measure, because no hon. member of this House will be able to accompany me to another place and urge his viewpoint, and, therefore, I must urge the view point of this House in another place. If the right lion, member thinks I should try to vote something down that he has managed to put into this Bill, I am afraid I must dissent. I am going to support his view in the other place. I want to be fair. As a matter of fact, I do not very much care what the vote of this hon. House is on this point in the sense that, as far as the vote is concerned, I only want to make it clear to the farmers of the Transvaal that I, at any rate, do not rate them below the farmers of the Free State. Where the farmers of the Free State are able to do something—not to be praised for doing it—I am not going to say that the farmers of the Transvaal are a heterogeneous mob of such a nature that they cannot be trusted to carry out the provision of this Bill in the same fair spirit in which the farmers of the Free State have always been able to carry out an exactly similar provision.

That is platform stuff.

The hon. member is right. It is very good platform stuff, and it is platform stuff that I will give them from every platform in the Transvaal. I can assure hon. members opposite that that will be done, and I can assure them also that the names of hon. members who have not the same appreciation of the high qualities of the Transvaal farmers, will also be given, as well as the names of those who are trying to protect them.

That is a threat.

No, it is not a threat. As a matter of fact, the true position will be that your ordinary Transvaal farmer will not give two drinks in the year from the year's beginning to the year's end. They will do it in exactly the same way that it is being done in the Free State, and I say where that is not morally wrong it is a very dangerous thing for us to say that it is legally wrong.

I must say that we have just listened to a very extraordinary speech. The Minister declares that natives in the Transvaal can get as much liquor as they want, and bases the whole of his contention upon this pivot. If it is correct, that they can obtain all they desire, then what object is there in limiting the number of tots which may be given to them from time to time? Notwithstanding what the Minister has said, I also claim to have a very fair and intimate knowledge of natives, especially those along our frontiers, and I must say that the natives in those areas are not greatly addicted to drink. This pernicious habit of the tot system has not extended to our part of the country at all. I feel that anything which is going to make it easier for natives to obtain liquor is a pernicious evil thing. We have heard evidence given by the Secretary for Native Affairs most strongly deprecating the tot system. He is one of the best authorities, I think, we could have. The bulk of the evidence on the select committee on the liquor question is entirely opposed to the tot system. Is the Minister callously going to disregard that, to sweep it all aside, and say that he is not going to be guided by the evidence which his experts have given? Surely, he is not going to take up that attitude. The farmers throughout the Eastern Province especially are very strongly opposed, not only to the introduction of the tot system in the Eastern Province, but they are opposed to it in principle. The natives themselves are opposed to it. I think that all organized native bodies have expressed themselves against the introduction of the tot system. I have received a resolution passed by the Joint Committees of the Bantu Association, which sat at Aliwal North some little time ago, in which they say—

That is the considered opinion of a responsible body of natives, and I would commend it to the Minister. It is very extraordinary, further, that the representatives of the wine industry of the Cape Province, who claim this is not going to increase the sale of their wine one iota, are associating themselves with the other side and voting solidly in favour of the tot system. The same thing took place earlier this afternoon. I am quite sure the country will gauge their action a great deal better than they themselves profess. Then the hon. member for Witwaters berg (Lt.-Col. N. J. Pretorius). in support of the same theory, said that he had been in the habit of giving his natives drink on certain occasions, but found it very inconvenient because it had to be done surreptitiously, and thus pleaded for the removal of the impediment. The Minister also used a further extraordinary argument, which was that in the rainy climates of the Transvaal, it was found necessary to stimulate workmen with a tot of wine or some drink. I wonder if the districts that he had in mind had the same high rainfall as New England or Barkly East. In my district, for the last ten years but one, the average rainfall has been 37.12 inches. I think that is far in excess of the majority of districts in the Transvaal, and I may say that I have never, on any single occasion, found it necessary to stimulate my servants with a tot. I think our servants compare very favourably with those in the Transvaal, about whom we constantly hear complaints.

I have heard complaints from the natives that their wages are very small in those parts.

Yes, what has that to do with the giving of a tot. In the Western Province where wages are high, the tot system is most abused. Our natives are very contented, and they are a very good class.

They complained to me.

There is no shortage of labour there. But there is a shortage in the Transvaal, where it is necessary to stimulate them by tots and encourage them to come and work by holding out to them an inducement of some wine or spirits. The hon. member for Queenstown (Mr. Moffat) pointed out what a serious thing it would be if our sober, law abiding natives in the Eastern Province, especially along the frontiers, were to acquire the habit they have in Johannesburg. We often have to leave our women and children quite alone on the farms. Our womenfolk have to travel about very frequently, and if the conditions prevailed which they have in Johannesburg and the Transvaal, life there would become intolerable. We are fortunately preserved from those conditions. I would like to remind members from the Transvaal, those who, like myself, represent country districts adjacent to large native areas, what the effect is going to be if their natives become demoralized. What would be their feelings if at any time their women or children became victims of drunken natives roaming about the country? They would change their tune, yet that is what they are deliberately heading for. Perhaps the word " deliberately " is too strong, because they may not realize it, but once we give the natives a taste for drink and legalize it, the evil is going to be such that the Minister will deeply regret the very serious step he is now taking.

I am sorry that the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) is not here, because it was interesting to hear him argue that the attitude of the church should have much weight. I remember how, when he still sat here, he spoke against the churches and even against their faith, but to-day we hear that we must pay great attention to the churches. The Synod has now passed resolutions against dancing. Will the hon. members for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) and Hospital support the church there as well? Will they there pay so much attention to the church? I do not think it is fair to drag in the church just when its standpoint suits hon. members. I, myself, have no objection to the church expressing its opinion. It is customary with the Dutch church in our country to do so, and they have always taken up a hostile attitude to the spreading of drinking customs. We do not object to that, but I think the reason why the Synod was so strongly against the tot system is because most parsons qualified in the Western Province and knew the tot system here as pernicious. They are afraid that that system will be extended. I think most members of the Synod do not know what the motion is before this House. They think that the Western Province tot system is to be introduced into the Transvaal. I just want to point out the attitude taken up by the hon. member for Win burg (Dr. van der Merwe); the hon. member for Pretoria (South) (Dr. van Broekhuizen) is possibly the only parson who differs from it. The hon. member for Winburg admitted that the Free State tot system had done no harm. He knows conditions there, yet he is opposed to extending it to the Transvaal, which has asked for the tot system. The hon. member for Hospital quoted the opinions of a number of people, amongst others those of Mr. Poultney. He was never a farmer, although for years he was secretary of the Agricultural Society. His sons are farmers, but he is not. It is said that the Transvaal farmers have not asked for the tot system. They are represented at the congresses of the Nationalist party, and a resolution was taken there in favour of that system. Even the Agricultural Union has more than once passed a resolution in favour of the tot system in the Transvaal. Our farmers are not accustomed to sending petitions and telegrams to Parliament like the church and other societies. They trust their representatives, and we must shoulder the responsibility. I want to say here in regard to the Transvaal, that 90 per cent. of the farmers are in favour of the tot system. Various other points have been raised here, and one of them was that if a farmer gives so much liquor to his workmen and the other farmers give nothing, the men will go to that one farmer. Such a farmer will soon go insolvent, because it will be impossible to supply natives with liquor which costs from 8s. to 10s. a bottle. Then it has been said that our women will be endangered. Why then are the Free State women not endangered? We, in the Transvaal are, on the contrary, worse off. Do the hon. members really think that if we thought our women were running a risk we would propose any such thing? We are not so stupid. We value our wives and daughters just as much as those hon. members, and do not want to expose them to danger. Our greatest difficulty in the Transvaal is that, when Saturday arrives, a native will possibly go ten miles to a large beer party. He drinks the whole of Sunday, and on Monday the farmer has no labour. However, we want the right to give the natives a tot when we think it necessary. In the Free State it has not led to smuggling of liquor, and I do not see why that should happen in the Transvaal. I will not detain the House longer, but hope the tot system, a thing the Transvaal farmers want, will go through.

When this matter originally came before the committee of the House on the 23rd of February last, it was moved that it should apply also to the Transvaal. I had the honour to move the deletion of the word "Transvaal " and the committee accepted that by a majority of only one. I understood the Minister to say that if defeated to-day on subsection (2) he would not move the amendment on sub-section (3). The Minister said he had a native in his employ who got all the drink he wanted every Sunday. The Minister occupies a very responsible position, and vet he does not employ the detective department to follow that native and see where he gets the drink.

That would be very unsportsmanlike.

I did not know that coupled with the position of being Minister of Justice is that of being a sportsman.

Very important.

For the same reason, I suppose, he does not prosecute the farmers breaking the law in the Transvaal—because he is a sportsman.

The Attorneys-General and the public prosecutors will do that.

The Minister is quite wrong, for he got the Act of Union altered a few years back, so that prosecutions, etc. were taken out of the hands of the Attorneys-General, and vested in him. He has shirked his duty. I can enjoy a laugh also, either at the Minister's expense or at mine, but this is too serious a matter to laugh at. Had I been in the position of the Minister of Justice and my native boy got drunk every Sunday I would have invoked the aid of the detective department and traced who the suppliers were. Another point of inconsistency about the Minister is that this afternoon on sub-section 2 it was moved that in the Cape in addition to what is provided in that section they should be allowed to supply their natives with liquor. You failed to get in the Cape what they are now, by the amendment, trying to impose on the Transvaal. In the Cape you will not be allowed to give spirituous liquor to the natives in your employ, so why try to force it on to us in the Transvaal. I maintain most strongly that the arguments put forward against introducing this tot system into the Transvaal are conclusive and consistent. Although the Minister cleverly says it is not a party matter when he votes the lambs follow the lion of the North.

They do not; that is the trouble !

What is the Minister about? He said he had a letter from Sir Walter Hamilton Fowle, and also used the additional argument that the farmers are breaking the law every day. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell) pointed out that there are other offences committed to-day, and on the same grounds, the Minister might legalize theft and other offences, I do not think that argument will hold water for one moment. If the Minister's native boys steal, will he wait for the Attorney-General to prosecute them?

No, I would discharge them.

The Synod of the Dutch Reformed Church resolved by 165 votes to one, that the tot system shall not be introduced. I would ask the Minister, is he not going to abide by his prayer book, " Die Burger," which also recently wrote against it?

I do not pray over it.

"Die Burger" is one of his prayer books. I will support my hon. friend (Mr. Blackwell) and say that if this becomes law every year as long as the Minister is Minister of Justice we will introduce a law to repeal it; nay, he himself, will introduce a law to amend this Bill.

I hope not; it is a terrible fate !

" As ye sow, so shall ye reap." It stares you in the face.

Seed does not stare you in the face !

I think it was the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) who quoted rather voluminously what took place at that Synod, and I have a fairly full report of it.

Do not quote it; we know all about it.

I shall quote from an article which appeared in the " Sunday Times last week (article quoted). It says that the work of the police has been made extremely difficult owing to the manufacture of a certain strong drink called " Mompoer." The article tells us that where this drink is manufactured, farmers get for it from 6s. to 10s. a bottle from the native.

A rather sensational publication.

The Minister may say, " What credence do you place on anything that appears in the ‘Sunday Times'"?

I do not.

When it suits the hon. gentleman and his friends they quote the " Sunday Times." I hope this will not be passed. The devil can quote scripture to suit his own case.

What have you been doing?

We have followed the debate attentively, and I have sat here continuously this afternon, and if there is anyone in the House who can speak of conditions in the Transvaal it is I, even more than the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell). He knows, just as well as I, that before the second war of independence in the Transvaal the farmers had the right of giving their natives a tot. It has been said here that it would constitute a danger to the Transvaal women if the natives were given a tot, and that it would encourage drunkenness. In this connection I just want to say that in those days the men left the farms for the front, and although the right existed of giving the natives a tot there was not a single case of a native assaulting a woman. Although they had that right, the Transvaal farmers never abused it. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout was possibly a mere boy in those days, but I went from farm to farm and the farmers did not abuse it. What is the position in the Free State? A Bloemfontein parson recently said that he did not know the tot system existed in the Free State. So little is it used there, but now it is said that if the Transvaal farmers get the right of giving tots a terrible position will arise, and that the Transvaal farmers will absolutely abuse it. It is an insult to the farmers.

Then the churches have also besmirched the farmers.

I am coming to the Church. The opinion of Maj. Hunt has been quoted, but I want to give the hon. member the name of someone he also knows, namely Petrus Erasmus. He is one of the best farmers from whom my friend there can learn farming, and he said to me: "I thank you for standing by the farmers in this matter." I held many meetings in my constituency, and at all there was a large majority, practically unanimity, in favour of the granting of the right to a tot. Mr. Petrus Erasmus said that he thought that the churches were wrong. I admit that the churches have a perfect right to express their opinion. I also have received a telegram, and it is right, but as a member of the Church, and as a minister at one time, I have my own convictions. It is not a matter of faith, but my sound commonsense and my conscience dictate to me how to vote, and in that respect I do not allow myself to be led by the Church. I respect the view of the Synod. I want to ask my hon. friend, the member for Bezuidenhout, whether he will follow the churches if they say the use of nicotine is to be reprobated. What will the hon. member do then? He smokes a lot, much too much; he uses a great deal of nicotine. Will he give up smoking if the Church says so? Nicotine is just as dangerous poison as alcohol any day.

Nonsense.

I would like to make an X-ray plate of his lungs. What would they look like? Let the hon. member ask the doctors what a dangerous poison nicotine is. I speak as a sportsman, and any sportsman knows that when you are training smoking is one of the worst things. This moral talk is the greatest folly. I come back to the Church. The hon. member for Winburg (Dr. van der Merwe) said that if he were convinced that the tot system would stop the illicit liquor traffic in the Transvaal he would vote in favour of it. I have spoken to Col. du Toit, formerly Commissioner of Police. He does not agree with me, but said that the position in the Transvaal cannot continue as it is now, that, as a result of the illicit liquor traffic, scores of poor whites go to gaol and that cannot continue. The hon. member for Cradock (Mr. G. C. van Heerden) talks so glibly. He has the right of giving a tot to his natives without going to gaol in consequence, but I want to quote what happened to Mrs. Durant. She gave a glass of wine to a native, and got six months imprisonment. If the hon. member for Cradock does it it is not wrong, but when a Transvaal woman does it she goes to gaol for six months. What is no sin here, is a crime in the Transvaal, a great sin. This is the greatest folly. We have a Union, but the hon. members want to exclude the Eastern Province, and the Natal members Natal. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout may possibly want Caledon to be excluded, but not Worcester, and Cape Town, but not the Paarl. This is the sort of legislation hon. members want to introduce. I have quite a number of notes but I will not say any more. The views of Mr. Poultney have been referred to, but he is not a farmer although his sons are farming.

Do you know him?

Very well. He is an old Free Stater, and I have known him since the old Grey College days, but he is not a farmer. He was present at one of my meetings and took up an opposite view to mine with regard to the tot system, but yet the majority voted with me. The hon. member for Bezuidenhout talks of morality and the like. We respect his views, but he must also respect ours, when we think that we are working in our own way for the benefit and blessing of the country. He must not get up and clothe himself in a kind of priestly garb and make out that his opinion is infallible. My constituency is in favour of the tot system.

No, I can tell you a story of your constituency—

At all my meetings the majority agreed with me. That is the point. The hon. member for Johannesburg (North) (Mr. Geldenhuys) took up an attitude which much disappointed me. I did not think he would vote that way. He is a big prohibitionist in name, but has not proved it in deed. I have always been consistent.

Show me any evidence before the select committee in favour of the tot system.

The parsons just like you said that they knew of no solution. That was their reply, and we must search for a solution of the matter. I am not voting for this reason or the other, but in the interest of the people. I admit that the Church has the fullest right to express its views, even on political matters as churchmen who know their people and are sons of South Africa. My great point is that an end must be made of the terrible conditions prevailing in the Transvaal to-day, and one of the means by which that can be done is the means we are now debating. We do not say that the Transvaal farmers must give the tot, but they must have the right to give it. Scores of Transvaal farmers will never give it, but they want the right, like the farmers in the Free State and the Cape Province. They will not abuse it, and it will have a good effect on the Transvaal.

I was very much disappointed to observe the heat with which the Minister of Justice defended his amendment this evening. It seemed to me that he had entirely departed from the altogether admirable tone he had hitherto adopted throughout the very trying debate on this Bill, and for some reason, entirely unknown to us, he regards it as absolutely essential for us to pass this clause.

No I don't.

In our sober senses we are asked to contemplate a clause which provides that not earlier than 4 o'clock in the afternoon a farmer may supply gratis to a native during the period of employment, one single drink of intoxicating liquor per day in quantity not exceeding one-quarter of a pint in the case of spirituous, or one pint in the case of liquor of any other kind, to be consumed by the native, Asiatic or coloured person at the time of supply in the presence of the employer or his duly authorised adult European agent. We shall be lining up our servants at 4 o'clock in the afternoon and seeing them gratefully consuming this stimulating stuff.

: That has been the law in the Free State for years and years, and I have never seen them lining up.

I want to indicate the degrading business on which we are embarking. We are as respectable people going to legalize the sort of thing which, in the past, has been looked upon as disreputable. I do not want to mince words, because it is better to be frank. Every sort of criminal instinct amongst the natives is aroused by the sort of thing proposed in this clause. We are simply laying a rod to our own backs and the backs of our women and children of this country. We are inflaming the natives and starting them on a criminal career, which sooner or later is going to end in disaster to this country, and the Minister of Justice is, of all people, the person who is going to recommend it in this House with so much force and indignation in his tone, that he would almost compel his followers to vote for this infamous thing. The purpose of this is that so many disreputable people should not go to gaol. The people who have been mentioned this evening as having had to go to gaol for supplying liquor to natives are not the sort of person who give a tot to a native when he is suffering from a cold or exposure, but people who probably gave a bottle of liquor, and more likely than not were making a profit out of it. As a matter of fact the law of supplying liquor to natives is very strict, and the proof, in such cases, has to be absolute. It is not merely a chance case of a native having swallowed a little quantity of liquor and the man who supplied him being obliged to stand his trial. The man must have been guilty of a much more deliberate offence, and probably fully deserved his punishment. What is the effect of this going to be as far as The brandy farmer is concerned? I venture to say it will add to his trade not less than half-a-million per annum. That is why these gentlemen are so keeny interested in it, and why so much pressure is being brought to bear upon us in this House. I hope the respectability of this House will be revolted by the proposal, because it can only lead to the derbauchery of the natives, and to our own position in the minds of the natives, being brought lower than it is to-day. Natives to-day have little enough respect for the white man, but if we, in our sober senses, pass this legislation we shall be doing our best to forfeit any remnant of respect they have for us. Taking the number of farmers who would be affected, it would mean that 250,000 natives employed per day throughout the year would be drinking their single tot at four o'clock in the afternoon, or in fact, demanding it. Before very long the trade of the brandy farmer would in full blast. The result in the country will be readily seen. These things cannot take place without bringing about their Nemesis. You will see the result in the attitude of natives towards Europeans. We are already suffering badly enough in the want of mutual trust between native and European. Is this sort of thing going to promote that attitude of respect which the native ought to have For his employer? I have had a long experience, and I have never known any employer who systematically supplied liquor to his natives without forfeiting his self respect, and without arriving at a stage when the native would bargain for further advantages of the same kind. I can remember a period of great stress when it was necessary to get the maximum of work out of the natives, and when it was suggested that this very dop principle—want of principle, to my mind—was proposed, and I resisted it to the uttermost, because it means the final and complete relinquishing of any sort of control over the natives, from whom we expect to get work. Once you have begun to bargain with them on the question of liquor they know they have you at their mercy, and they will drive you to further concessions in this direction. If once we adopt this system, the Minister may not be in office to meet the whirlwind or to wipe up the mess, but we certainly shall have the whirlwind to deal with. I had hoped the Minister's experience in office would have led him to realize that he should not unadvisedly embark on a wild cat scheme of this sort, which is the very antithesis of the elements of good government and statesmanship, but that he would be content with passing a Liquor Bill that is going to minister to the sobriety of the country, and not increase drunkenness and debauchery amongst people who cannot look after themselves. I ask the Minister to pause before he cracks the party whip, as he seemed to be doing very loudly a few minutes ago, and compels his followers to vote for this, to my mind, shameful piece of legislation. It amounts to placing the native in a position in which a portion of his wages is going to be tendered to him in the form of drink. Whatever we say about this, it is going to prove a cheap means of getting labour and a means of so debauching your labour that the labourers will remain with the man who practises the system and prefer to remain with him rather than go to people who strictly avoid it because of its degrading effect. The evidence in the select committee, I believe, even tendered by wine farmers themselves, amply proves this. We are being told that it is necessary in the Transvaal. Where are the piles of petitions from the farmers of the Transvaal in support of this movement? I have not heard of a single petition being presented to this House. I lived in the Transvaal and farmed there for more than three years, and I never met a single Transvaal farmer who favoured this system. I have, on the other hand, a very distinct recollection, as far back as 1889, of travelling in the Transvaal before prohibition was the rule and being absolutely revolted by the sights one encountered through drunkenness and intemperance among the natives. I can remember the main reef road in those days being littered with almost inanimate bodies of natives, as I went past them on horseback, and that was due to the fact that at that time the natives were allowed to have canteens of their own in which the strongest of drinks were allowed to be sold to them. The Minister seems resolved to embark upon legislation which is going to implant amongst the natives the taste for the strongest of strong drink. When the question of the dop system was being discussed in relation to the Cape, it seemed as if fortified wine is the very peak to which any strong drink was to be allowed to be consumed by these people, but is was not very long before one of the members on the other side showed how hollow that suggestion was. He definitely proposed that spirituous liquor should be sold, and the Minister makes no bones about the matter at all. He proposes in his clause to provide in the Transvaal that the natives should be entitled to have one quarter pint of spirituous liquor or one pint in the case of liquor of any other kind, which is a very wide definition. I suppose the sort of thing which is known as peach brandy would come under this definition of liquor " of any other kind," in fact, almost any sort of alcohol would come under this very catholic definition, on the principle that any sort of strong stuff is good enough for the native who, as we all know, prefers to have something that takes a grip of his mouth. We cannot regard this state of things with unconcern. The Natal border marches with the Transvaal border along a considerable portion of our boundary, and our natives have considerable kinship with the natives throughout the whole of the south-eastern Transvaal. There is also considerable interchange between the natives of Natal and the natives of the Transvaal, natives from Natal going to work in the Standerton and Heidelberg districts in large numbers on the farms and subsequently returning to their homes in Natal. It is therefore a matter of first importance to the people in our province, and I would say this: there is no suggestion that has ever been made in this Parliament that has caused more indignation amongst the people of Natal than the original suggestion that the tot system should be extended to that province. And when the effects of the Minister's proposal come to be realised in Natal I think there will be equally strong feeling. Personally I can only regard this as one of the most unfortunate proposals that has ever enterered the mind of any responsible Minister of the Crown, and it is also a very distinct anomaly. The whole of the machinery under the control of the Minister is set in motion for the purpose of preventing the sale of liquor in certain areas, and with the greatest unconcern, the Minister now proposes to make wet areas practically throughout the whole of the Transvaal where the natives shall be allowed to drink every day at 4 o'clock in the afternoon up to the boundaries of those very municipalities where the very taint of liquor on a native's whiskers would result in his being arrested. I can only hope that those who have been addressed by the Minister in terms of such persuasive eloquence will resist his charm and refuse to be deluded into the misguided course of action which is embodied in this clause. I hope, in any case, the Minister of Labour will refuse to be tempted into such a misguided course and will show his manliness by voting against this clause and shaming the devil.

That is me?

No. I am not wishing to suggest anything so sinister as that. I was merely using it in general terms, rather in the terms employed in the pulpit as a rule. I was grieved to hear the hon. member for Pretoria (South) (Dr. van Broekhuizen) speaking so lightly on this matter. He seemed almost to ginger himself up on the ground it was quite a sportsmanlike thing to do. With a little more knowledge than the hon. member has of the results of this sort of thing, I say the hon. member ought to be ashamed of himself, standing up in this House representing the Church—

Not in this House.

I have a great respect for that Church. I am surprised to hear an hon. member who still, to his credit, represents that body, coming into the House and speaking so lightly in favour of the course of action the Minister proposes. I am persuaded that the hon. member does not realise what he is doing, does not realise the seriousness of the course which he supports in this House or I am sure he would not dare to recommend that we should legalise a provision under which every farmer in the land at 4 o'clock in the afternoon is entitled to line up his natives and give them this poisonous stuff. If the hon. member for Riversdale (Mr. Badenhorst) could visualise the numbers of natives who are likely to seize upon this provision, who are going to insist upon its fulfilment, and who are going to have resort to those people who practise it—and there will be only too many people who will resort to this with the aim of getting cheap labour, and as a cover to selling illicit liquor. This is going to defeat the end the Minister has in view, and I think he holds honestly, of endeavouring to do away with the curse of the illicit liquor seller. This is going to promote illicit liquor selling, and is going to encourage under the guise of this clause a great deal of illicit liquor traffic, which is going to spring up in the neighbourhood of every prohibited area. We shall have this at 4 o'clock every afternoon.

The section does not say anything about 4 o'clock.

I understand the Minister has omitted 4 o'clock.

The clause says nothing about it.

I understand there is no limit now.

The clause makes no limit; not my amendment.

The clause in its final form makes no limit; originally it had as a limit 4 o'clock or corresponding to sundown, which was considered the most suitable time to administer this. We can give it early in the mornings or late at night, as the spirit moves us. I do appeal to the Minister to drop this very misguided clause.

Amendment proposed by Mr. te Water put and agreed to.

Amendment proposed by the Minister of Justice, as amended, put, and the House divided:

I move—

seconded.

Agreed to.

Amendment in Clause 99 put and agreed to.

In Clause 100,

I move—

seconded.

Business interrupted by Mr. Speaker at 10.55 p.m., and debate adjourned: to be resumed to-morrow.