I move—

To omit all the words after " hereby," in line 5, to the end of the clause, and to substitute " amended by the insertion at the end thereof of the following new sub-sections (the existing section becoming sub-section (1):

1. (2) Notwithstanding anything contained in sub-section (1), any such person may apply to a judge of any provincial or local division of the Supreme Court having jurisdiction in the area wherein the court in which such person is entitled to practise is situate for the appointment of three persons, one of whom shall be an advocate of not less than seven years' standing, and two of whom shall be attorneys of not less than seven years' standing, to examine him as to his proficiency in the knowledge of the law.
2. (3) No such application shall be granted by any judge unless he is satisfied that the applicant has made provision for the payment of such examination fees as are payable by candidate attorneys under similar circumstances.
3. (4) If such examiners or any two of them certify in writing that the person examined has reached the same standard of proficiency as is required in the case of persons seeking admission as attorneys in the province concerned, such person shall be entitled to practise as an agent in any court in that province.

I have amended the amendment. This amendment now will be applicable to all the provinces. The position is that in the Cape Province, after passing all the examinations, and after serving articles, the candidate has to pass a practical examination in attorney's work and notarial work, and also an examination in law and conveyancing. What I ask for here is that in any provincial division the Supreme Court shall appoint three examiners, one of whom shall be a barrister and the other two attorneys, and they shall examine the candidate as to his proficiency in law. I think it would be advisable to take out sub-section (3). By taking out that clause, it would be left free to the Supreme Court to decide what sort of examination the candidates shall pass. The principle is the same as that accepted by my hon. friend (Mr. J. J. Pienaar) on the last occasion, but the details are more precise now, and I give the candidate, if he is a law agent, an opportunity of passing a simpler examination than the attorney is required to pass. The Supreme Court in the province will have the absolute discretion as to what class of examination he must pass. It may be a very simple examination in regard to magistrate's court practice Only, or it may provide for a little knowledge in drawing bills, and so on. As my hon. friend accepted my amendment the other day, I think he ought to accept this, because it is more to the advantage of the law agent. If he accepts it, I will support the Bill; otherwise I must oppose it. Otherwise, without serving any articles or passing any examination, the law agent is going to have the same rights as the attorney now has. It is the same priniciple as the other, but in simpler terms. I move the amendment.

seconded.

With reference to the amendment of the hon. member for Cape Town (Harbour) (Maj. G. B. van Zyl) I only want to say that rights were actually taken away by the amendment we passed recently, and the amendment I am proposing to-day is connected therewith. The hon. member for Cape Town (Harbour) by his amendment now wants to make the law agent pass the attorney's examination, but does not grant him the rights connected therewith. It would not be fair to demand a higher examination than they need for their practice, and I therefore cannot accept the amendment.

On considering this amendment it seems to me that the status of a law agent, if the old clause is deleted and the amendment is carried, will be worse than at the present time, because the right to practise in the one court where he was admitted would be taken away. They would be much better off as they are, because though they know what they are going to lose, they don't know what they are going to get. It is not the case that this Bill gives the law agent the same rights as the attorney. The attorney has the right, not to plead, but to practise in the Supreme Court. The law agent has no such right, and this Bill does not give him that right. He will have the same right so long as he confines himself to the magistrates' courts. It seems to me if the matter was to have been put on a fair basis an amendment should have been brought forward allowing the law agent to practise in any of the magistrates' courts of the province, provided he passes a practical examination in the practice of the magistrate's court. But to ask him to pass an examination which includes Supreme Court practice is going too far. It would be far better for the hon. member to drop the Bill rather than to have this amendment in.

I must honestly admit that from the beginning I was opposed to this Bill, giving these rights to law agents. My reason is that they are at present under the magistrate's jurisdiction, and can only exercise their functions in a particular district. The only security we now have against a law agent is that when he fouls his nest he cannot leave for another place. That is the only guarantee that he will practise honestly, because the law agent is only as honest as the law makes him be. Is there a necessity for this Bill which has been introduced for the benefit of only one law agent? I challenge the hon. member who introduced the Bill to say who that law agent is. Now it is said that there are only a few and that we should sympathise with them. There are about 100 in the Cape Province alone. I want to know whether, if this Bill is passed, they will come under the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court or the magistrate. We are a small and undeveloped nation, and we must keep the destroyers of our people in hand, and not remove the only protection we have against them. According to the Bill a law agent, if he commits malpractice anywhere, can go elsewhere and be a curse there as well. An hon. member next me asks if there are such blackguards. They are only as honest as the law compels them to be, but if we say anything about their practices we are told it is their bread and butter, and for this reason we have to permit them to do anything. They will then travel about from place to place like birds of prey.

The hon. member must confine himself to the amendment.

I am sorry to offend, but the reason I am against this Bill is that these people can go from one place to another. What I especially want to know is whether they will come under the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court. I know of law agents who have been struck off the roll and put back again in six months. They must commit a serious offence to be struck off, but shortly after they are on the roll again. Is it right towards the rising generation to grant those rights? We are taking nothing away from them, but must see that we are protected against the ruin of our people. Take the Fraserburg case, which cost £13,000 in consequence of bad advice. Afterwards it was said that bad advice was given, but in the meantime the costs ran up and subsequently it was taken on appeal. I do not believe in law agents, and do not want their rights to be extended further.

The amendment has this advantage, that men who are perhaps middle-aged and have been practising as law agents for many years will have to start studying for the examination, and it is impossible to expect them to do so like youngsters. I think the adoption of the amendment debars law agents from getting the privilege which the hon. member in charge of the Bill seeks to give them. Here we are 17 years after Union and we have different law societies, and law agents practising in one part of the Union who cannot practise in another part, and what is wanted is consolidating legislation by which you will have one law association.

I am glad to hear the hon. member for Marico (Mr. J. J. Pienaar) say that he cannot accept the amendment. We said in the 1917 Act that law agents then practising and registered could continue practising, but only at places where they resided. I think it was an unfair restriction to put on them, and, as far as I understand, this Bill is intended to remove it so that the law agents can also practise elsewhere. I think that is fair, but to say that these people, who are now old and have always given satisfaction to the public, must pass an examination is unfair. I am therefore glad that the hon. member cannot accept it, and I will vote against it myself.

I have been an opponent of this Bill from the very outset, and I do not think any good reason has been given for it by the hon. member who has introduced the Bill. The amendment is only one little safeguard of the position, and will make provision for these people who apply as law agents to be qualified. I see from the evidence given by Mr. Cohen, the chairman of the Cape law agents, Transvaal branch, [evidence before select committee quoted] that 13 law agents were enrolled in the Cape, never practised, and went to live in the Transvaal. In the Cape before 1917 they had to apply to the magistrate for a licence to practise, and no examination was necessary at all. If this Bill is passed they will be able to practise in the Transvaal.

What are you afraid of?

I am not afraid of that at all, but I want to improve the position of the profession. Here you have a retrograde step. An hon. member refers to a certificate, but what does this certificate amount to? That he applied to be enrolled before a magistrate in the Cape, and it was not necessary to pass any examination. As the Bill now stands, what does the hon. member for Marico (Mr. J. J. Pienaar) mean by the practical examination the law agent has to pass? I understand there is no practical examination at all in the Transvaal, and no machinery for such an examination. The amendment provides some machinery by which a law agent can take the necessary examination. On the evidence before us, the legal profession is overcrowded, and I have a letter from the chairman of the Law Agents' Association, who says—

Now you will open the door to a number of men who have never passed an examination, which is a great mistake; I, therefore, support the amendment.

I am afraid it is too late to discuss the merits as to whether law agents should be admitted, as is proposed by this Bill, because by the second reading we have accepted that position; but I would ask the Minister of Justice whether the Bill can remain in this form. It states, " A law agent may be admitted on passing a certain examination," but it makes no provision for what that examination is to be. I agree that these men, most of whom are advanced in years, should pass a prescribed examination which should test their knowledge or capacity to practise in a magistrate's court. I do not know whether at this stage it is competent to move anything in that direction without giving notice, but there is no provision in the Bill regulating what examination the agent has to pass, and unless we adopt an additional proviso such as that proposed by the hon. member for Cape Town (Harbour) (Maj. G. B. van Zyl), I do not see how they are to be examined at all.

The hon. member may move an amendment to the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Cape Town (Harbour) (Maj. G. B. van Zyl).

The Bill leaves it open to an agent who may not have practised for years and years to appeal for the support and confidence of the public, although he may not be in the least degree qualified. It might be unfair to ask an agent to pass a practical examination designed to test his fitness to practise in a higher court but I will move as an amendment to the amendment—

This will meet the point of view of the hon. members for Hanover Street (Mr. Alexander) and Durban (Central) (Mr. Robinson) and will show that the House has been regardful of the interests of the public. It will also prevent people obtaining a privilege for which they are not really qualified.

seconded.

Question put: That all the words after " hereby " in line 5 to " may " in line 9, proposed to be omitted by Maj. G. B. van Zyl, stand part of the Clause, Upon which the House divided:

I move, as amendments to the amendments made in committee of the whole House—

Will the hon. member explain to the House what is the object of that amendment? It sems to me to be a very far-reaching amendment.

The proposal of the hon. member (Mr. J. J. Pienaar) amounts to this, that the clause should read as follows—

The hon. member for Newcastle (Mr. Nel) has just asked what the meaning was of the amendment moved by the hon. member for Marico (Mr. J. J. Pienaar). In the first place, I want to point out that it is wrong to explain that in future law agents who have not passed an examination will be permitted to practise everywhere. There are possibly a few such cases in the Cape Province where a law-agent is only registered, but by far the large majority of law-agents have actually passed an examination, as such, whether in the Transvaal, the Free State or in the Cape Province where there is also an examination for law-agents. The representation is, therefore, wrong, and it will possibly lead to some members taking up a false attitude, and consequently voting against the Bill. The law-agent in the Free State, who has passed the examination, is entitled to practise in the magistrate's court, but only in the court where he resided at the time the 1917 Act was passed. But say that such a person removes to the Cape Province, or that he passes the full examination in the Free State, and goes to the Transvaal, then he is prevented from practising in the Cape Province, or in the Transvaal. That is surely an injustice under the Act of 1917. The object of the Bill is to remedy that injustice. The amendment of the hon. member for Marico is intended to give the right to the person who is entitled to practise, if he lives in the Free State, or Transvaal, to practise where he lives, if this Bill passes. It interferes with no one, of course. Suppose a Free State law-agent, who has passed his law-agent's examination in Bloemfontein, and has the right to practise in the Free State, has removed to the Cape Province or the Transvaal, arid now lives there, then he may not by virtue of his certificate practise in those provinces. The Bill is simply intended to remedy the injustice. It has already been pointed out that the people concerned are men from 40 to 50 years of age, and that they cannot be expected to pass an examination now. It is not intended to give the right to unqualified persons, who have never conducted a case before a magistrate, to practise in the future. I am astonished at the opposition to this simple Bill especially from the advocates and attorneys in the House. I do not think such opposition is quite justified. I shall be glad if the Bill is passed with the amendment of the hon. member for Marico. It will give the right to qualified persons to practise as law-agents in the province where they reside at present.

Upon which the House divided:

I move—

seconded.

Agreed to.

Amendment, as amended, put and agreed to.

I move—

Mr. P. C. DE VILLIERS seconded.

Amendment put and agreed to, and the Bill, as amended, adopted; third reading on 11th May.

I move—

That, subject to the provisions of an Act to be passed during the present session of Parliament and to such rebates and remissions of duty as may be provided for therein, excise duty be levied on spirits produced in the Union as set forth in the accompanying schedule.

seconded.

Why does not my hon. friend go a step further and take spirit used for fortifying wine? By not doing so he throws away a tremendous lot of revenue with regard to that, which runs into four figures.

May I just say, with the permission of the House, in order to make it quite clear that we are not interfering with the present right of the wine farmer to obtain spirit for fortifying wine, or that ordinary wine can be fortified with grape or wine brandy, my hon. friend will move an amendment to make it perfectly clear.

I move, as an amendment—

seconded.

Together with the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), I regret that the Minister does not go a step further. He said at once that he was not taxing the wine farmers any more, but I do not think it will throw a great burden on the wine farmer, if he follows the suggestion of the hon. member for Cape Town (Central). I think our object is to make South Africa more a wine-drinking country than one drinking brandy and spirits. We want light wine to be drunk, and I should like to see an excise put on alcohol which is used for fortification. It will undoubtedly have the effect of making heavy wine a little more expensive, and that more light wine will be consumed. The export trade will not be affected by it, because there is no excise on it, and if the wine farmers think that they are taxed too heavily, and will not be able to compete with the imported article, there is the protection for our own produce. The Minister will get considerably more revenue, and the drinking of light wines will increase. Why should a man who takes water with his brandy have to pay excise but none if the wine is mixed with wine? The rebate which is given will then enure for the benefit of the latter mixture. I hope the Minister will consider the proposal.

On the amendment, I want to say that it appears from the returns that 684,000 gallons were used last year for fortifying wine, at 12s. 6d. a gallon. It does appear very strange, as the last speaker has pointed out, that if a man drinks it strong in the shape of brandy he pays excise, and when the spirit is mixed with wine he escapes the excise. I do not see why he should do so when the spirit is mixed with wine, and, as my hon. friend says, it would not be so strong. I am perfectly well aware that the Minister cannot do it at the moment as he has fixed up his financial arrangements, but when he is short of money he can consider this. It is a fair, just and good source from which the Minister can get quite good revenue.

I am sure the Minister will not follow the advice given by the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), nor that of the hon. member for Winburg (Dr. van der Merwe). The hon. member for Cape Town (Central) years ago did whatever he could to encourage wine making, and gave a cup to be competed for at the annual wine show, and that wine is known by his name " Jagger cup." Yet, as he is growing older, he is growing not wiser, and now he suggests killing the good winemakers.

More sober.

I am not saying that. In his younger days he had his fling.

In what way?

The hon. member for Winburg (Dt. van der Merwe) is still to have his fling. He finds fault with the Minister and looks at the matter from the point of view of what he calls " the poor consumer." I am sure the Minister will not follow the advice of either hon. gentleman.

I only want to say a few words. We are now trying to make a great success of our wine industry, not only in South Africa, but also overseas. Just when we are succeeding, the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), and the hon. member for Winburg (Dr. van der Merwe) want to tax the wine farmers more.

It does not touch the export.

There is wine for inland consumption which also has to be fortified. Do hon. members actually know what the wine farmers pay to the revenue, what extra burden the new liquor law throws on them? They would be astonished. The industry is heavily taxed in every respect. I do not blame the hon. members, but I am sorry that they now want to throw a bigger burden on the wine farmers. We must not overdo the thing. I also know that the present Minister of Finance will not listen to the proposals of the hon. members for Cape Town (Central) and Winburg.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Motion, as amended, put and agreed to.

Second Order read: House to resume in Committee of Ways and Means.

House in committee:

[Progress reported on 1st May, when taxation proposals on customs duties and income tax had been agreed to.]

I move—

I move—

If the Minister is going to amend the law regarding customs, will he, at the same time, consider amending Clause 14, sub-section (3) of Act No. 36 of 1925, which deals with the question of domestic value. Domestic value does not include the excise duty payable in the country of export. I suggest it would be perfectly simple for the Minister to insert after " excise " the words " or customs duties in the case of goods imported into the country of final export."

The hon. member will have to leave that until the Bill is before the House.

Is it not competent for me to make a suggestion? The Minister has moved to bring in a Bill to alter the Customs Act, and if he would include an amendment such as I suggest, he would get over the difficulty of charging duty on domestic value which includes the duty payable in the country of final export.

I do not think the hon. member can discuss it now, but he will have his opportunity when the Bill is before the House.

I hope the Minister will look into the matter and see if it can be done. It is perfectly simple.

I wish it was so simple.

Motion put and agreed to.

Resolutions to be reported.

House Resumed:

The Chairman reported that the committee had agreed to certain resolutions on customs duties, income tax and excise duties and asked leave to bring up a report at the next sitting.

Agreed to.

I move—

seconded.

As I have an amendment which would have been an amendment to what has been proposed by the Minister, to delete the last item in this schedule, I take it I shall be able to do so when we come to the next page.

I am moving for the deletion.

Unless I mention it now if there are no amendments moved by the Minister to the next page, I shall not be able to move it.

Where does the hon. member wish to move it?

I am prepared to move it as an amendment to the first schedule. You are, however, taking the first schedule in two sections.

No, I can only deal with one amendment at a time.

So long as that is quite clear, Mr. Speaker, I am quite satisfied.

Amendments put and agreed to.

On second amendment,

I move—

seconded.

Agreed to.

Amendment, as amended, put and agreed to.

Remaining amendments put and agreed to.

I move—

That has become unnecessary, because, under this Bill, old Section 188 provides that when a general parliamentary election takes place, a general election for the provincial council and an election for members of local authorities, not being a by-election, each of these days is a closed day. Therefore, there is no need for this particular section which I propose should be repealed, except as regards a by-election for Parliament or the provincial council. A by election for a local authority is already provided for. A by-election for a local authority is not a closed day. As regards general elections for the provincial council, or Parliament, they are closed days under this Bill. What I wish to get at is to repeal this section of the Electoral Act, so that by-elections for provincial councils or Parliament shall not be closed days. The difference is that a by-election is a small affair. It does not bring that genera! political excitement which a general election causes. I see no serious risk in allowing places where liquor can be sold to be open during a by-election. It is difficult to lay down a restriction in the case of one particular division. It may be all very well in the country, although even there there are difficulties. In the towns one of two things happens—you may confine your closing order to the actual division. That is useless in a town, because people have only to go across the street and get as much liquor as they want. In order to avoid that the present law says that places shall not be open within three miles of the boundary of the division in which a by-election takes place. I say that goes much too far. As I pointed out yesterday, if an election is in progress in Malmesbury division, it means that some of the places where liquor is sold in Salt River have to be closed. If an election takes place in the Bezuidenhout division of Johannesburg, no liquor can be sold in Germiston. I say the present state of the law makes it a farce, and we should amend it. It was suggested yesterday that it might be amended by confining the closing order to places actually inside the division. As I say, that is really useless in a town, because it means that you can easily evade it by getting liquor at places which are open across the street or a short distance away. It seems to me the only thing to do is to lay down that this closing order shall not apply where a by-election is in force, but only in cases where a general election for Parliament or a provincial council is going on. That is the object of my amendment. It is consequential on the amendment which the House adopted yesterday. If it is not adopted it makes nonsense of the amendment that the House adopted yesterday, and will stultify entirely the decision which the House then took. That decision was to alter the definition of a " closed day " under this Act so as to exclude from that definition a day on which a by-election takes place for Parliament or a provincial council. Having adopted that amendment yesterday, I think it is only consistent with it that the House should adopt the present amendment.

seconded.

I cannot agree with the amendment of the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan). I think that as we confirmed the principle a few days ago of not allowing the sale of liquor on election days then we must maintain the principle throughout. What is the reason that the people do not want any drinking facilities on election day? They are afraid that there will be treating and thus exercising improper influence and that the keeping open of the bars may lead to fights. Those are the reasons why drink is not allowed to be sold at elections. I see the hon. member's difficulty, however. Why may not drink be sold three miles from the boundary of a constituency where there is a by-election? To assist the hon. member for Yeoville, and because I appreciate his difficulty, I move, as an amendment to this amendment—

If this passes then the Electoral Act of 1918 will only apply to the constituency where the by-election takes place. It will, therefore, be possible for liquor to be sold outside that area. I hope hon. members will pass these amendments. It is important, as the hon. member has said, that, if there is a by-election at Malmesbury, for instance, the bars shall not be closed at Salt River on the same day.

I second this amendment, which, I hope, is really so framed as to give effect to the principle that the hon. member has in view. In regard to what the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) said this afternoon, I can see that we may create a somewhat peculiar position in certain cases. You have the fact that the amendment exempts districts or constituencies in which a by-election may be in progress from the general prohibition which we have endorsed as a House, but you are faced with a greater difficulty, and that is that within that electoral division, while a by-election is in progress, you may have that very insidious method of influencing voters which was in the first instance the reason for enacting this prohibition at all, and that is that in some public house probably very near to the polling booth you may have an unlimited amount of liquor available for any voter who may choose to go and take it. There will be nothing to enable one to detect who is responsible for the supply of that liquor. The fact that under the new Electoral Act the proprietor of that hotel, if he supplies liquor free, must make a return, is not necessarily a check on fair conduct of the election. Therefore, one can easily imagine a case where a candidate with a good deal of money, or, much more likely, a candidate with a large number of friends who are prepared to spend money freely for him, would arrange with the proprietor of an hotel to open his barrels and his bottles and to keep a supply for the free and enlightened elector who might become thirsty on the way to the poll, and who, on going in, would probably have his attention if he went into the public house I have in mind, drawn to the fact that it was desirable to vote for Mr. A. or Mr. B. That, to my mind, was clearly laid down by the past experience, if not of South Africa, of other parts of the world, as a very undesirable state of affairs. To the worries and anxieties of the candidate standing for Parliament there would be added a fresh terror, and that would be the duty of retrieving his supporters who might have strayed into the rival public house. I think that is a very undesirable state of affairs, and one that rather recalls to my mind the famous election at Eatan-swill. We surely do not want at our by-elections to have a repetition of those hilarious scenes. Yet the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan), because of the anomaly that in the large towns you may cross the road and obtain a drink, if you wish, desires to do away as far as by-elections are concerned with the other objection which the experience of South Africa has found to be necessary. If the amendment moved by the hon. member for Ceres (Mr. Roux) will make it clear—and I hope it does—that within an electoral division in which a by-election may take place there shall be no liquor sold, I believe we shall be acting consistently and in the interests of fair and proper elections. In the vast majority of cases this will be found to be a wholesome provision and therefore, I am glad to be able to support the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Ceres (Mr. Roux).

I think the amendment of the hon. member for Ceres (Mr. Roux) is the more desirable one of the two. I would like to point out that if the amendment of the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) is carried, you will have to make considerable alteration to Section 74. Certainly some consequential amendments will have to be made if this amendment is carried. I do not see any difference in principle between a by-election and an ordinary general election. If the reasons for one are good the reasons for the other are equally good. I think we ought to keep Section 139 as it is, remove the anomaly of the three-mile limit, which will be met by the amendment of the hon. member for Ceres, and then we need not have any further trouble with consequential amendments to the Act.

To a point of order, I left out in my amendment the word " in " before the word " section ", and I, therefore, move—

Then the portion of the amendment will read thus: "In Clause 139 the following words: ' and within three miles of any boundary thereof.'"

I understand the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) is accepting this amendment, so I trust there will be no further discussion, because I believe it will meet the views of the whole House if that amendment is accepted.

Yes, I am prepared to accept that.

Amendment put and agreed to.

Amendment, as amended, put and agreed to.

There is a matter not on the Order Paper. I want, with leave of the House, to move, as an unopposed motion—

The reason is this—strong representations have been made to me by the Administrators of the Transvaal and the Cape Province that on the question of licences they wish to retain the powers the provincial councils at present have to deal with this matter. They point out that this was one of the matters kept open at the conference of Administrators that took place some time ago in Natal with the Minister of Finance. I have consulted the Minister of Finance and that position is correct, so my idea is to delete this now, and I am going to move in another place at a later stage to insert the words at the beginning of Section 12—

I am asking the House, if they accept the principle that we should leave some powers in the hands of the provincial councils, to adopt this deletion, and then I shall take this other step in another place to bring the clause into conformity with the change I am suggesting.

I object to the Minister's amendment, because no notice was given of it.

Therefore, I cannot accept it.

On a point of order, I had already raised this question with Mr. Speaker. It was my intention to move this as an amendment to the amendments to the whole schedule proposed by the Minister. Mr. Speaker thought there was no objection to my doing that. The point of order I put to you is this— that the schedule must be taken as a whole. Having been put as a whole, if an amendment is proposed to any portion of it, it would be competent for me to move an amendment such as this, although it is not on the Order Paper. In view of Mr. Speaker's ruling, I would like to put it as a point of order that it would now be competent for me to do this.

I am not putting the schedule as a whole. I am taking every amendment separately. I am afraid the hon. member has to give notice. It can only be done by previous notice.

May I put it to you again? I think, perhaps, you are in a little difficulty, because I am speaking of what happened in your absence. If you think what I have said would be confirmed by Mr. Speaker, do you not think it might be advisable that that should be done? It was clearly understood— hon. members will bear me out—that I should have the right to move this when we came to the end of the schedule. Mr. Speaker only prevented me, as I understood him, from doing it at the time, because he was putting these amendments seriatim.

I suppose what the hon. member mean's is Mr. Speaker asked him to wait until a certain point was reached, and then he could move it. He can only move such an amendment as an unopposed motion. If there is any objection taken, I am afraid I cannot accept it.

I am moving it as an amendment because other amendments have been moved to the schedule.

No, not to the schedule as such—only to amendments whether made by the select committee or amendments by the committee of the House. It is only at the committee stage that we take the whole schedule.

Amendments in second schedule put and agreed to.

Amendments in third schedule put.

I promised at an earlier stage, in the committee stage, that I would go into the question of reducing the licence fees that were before the House on a previous occasion. I have done so, and I think hon. members will agree with me that I have reduced them substantially indeed, but, after all, the question of what the amount of these licence fees should be should be within the administration of the taxing authorities, so I must ask the House not to interfere with these items, which may throw them out of gear. A strong argument has been brought forward by the administrators of the Cape and of the Transvaal, that the reduction has gone too far. Hon. members will readily understand the difficulty I am in in getting the licence fees in a fair state, and they must not ask me to go further. I do not want to make licences unduly low. I do not think they are, and I would move—

I think that is perfectly fair. There is no doubt that your licensing board will give off sales to every hotel. Unless I move the amendment they would pay exactly the same licence as one to whom this is refused by the licensing board. I may also say—I forget now who told me—I understand the licensees will have no objection to a course of that kind, and feel it is the better thing to do.

Rather heavy.

It is not heavy. You must take the case of renewals. In an ordinary case of renewal, an hotel for off-sales pays £75, and for on-sales alone, £50. Surely off-sales are worth £25 a year in licence fees to the licensee, who has been placed by this House in a very fortunate position indeed. The real logical position is that they should be doubled. The bottle store has the same amount to pay as the hotel, and the two added together, £50 plus £50, would be double. But at the same time I hope that an hotel is not going to do its best to press its bottle trade in this way, and that the bottle trade will be more kept in the background. The amount paid should be less than that paid by a man who is pressing the bottle trade for all it is worth.

I second. I move the amendment on page 730 of the Votes and Proceedings.

The hon. member cannot do that now, as he has seconded the other amendment.

Omission of schedule put and agreed to, and amendments made in Committee of the Whole House dropped.

I move—

seconded.

In regard to my amendment, I have adopted the Minister's suggestion, and am not interfering with the figures at all. I think the intention is the maximum shall be £15.

Per day.

My amendment will clarify the position, and I hope the Minister will accept it. I move, as an amendment—

seconded.

Yes, I am quite satisfied with that.

I move as an amendment—

Col. D. REITZ seconded.

You could have the same argument in connection with hotels. Suppose an hotel belongs to a company. I am afraid this will open the way to other reductions.

I hope the Minister will accept the amendment. Clearly the licence holder in the case of a club, is just the nominee for the time being. If a secretary leaves, why should the unfortunate club be mulcted in the sum of £25?

It is the same in the case of hotels.

That is very different. Although the holder of an hotel licence may, in practice, be a dummy, still he is the licensee, whereas a club secretary holds the licence merely on behalf of the club.

The amendment is a very reasonable one. There is no analogy between a club licence and an hotel licence. In the case of the latter when it is transferred there is a change of proprietor. A club pays no dividends. I am chairman of a club, but I would not like to hold a liquor licence to add to my other distinctions. A secretary may become undesirable, and the club may have to pay him three or six months' salary to get rid of him, and in addition it will have to pay £25 for the transfer of the licence.

If the secretary goes on a holiday you will have to transfer the licence temporarily.

The argument in favour of reduction in the case of a club transfer could equally reasonably be applied to a hotel transfer. It is not a question of profit, but whether there has been a real change in the ownership or not. Some breweries own hotels, and the licence stands in the name of the manager of the hotel, but if he leaves there has been no change of ownership. I move, as a further amendment—

The Minister has made some substantial reductions in the fees for new licences and renewals, but they still remain unduly high so far as transfers and renewals are concerned. Ten pounds for a renewal or transfer is all that could reasonably be expected. In regard to the twelfth item, it is not necessary to move my amendment, for the Minister has agreed that £10 would be sufficient for the removal or transfer fee. I think the Minister might meet those who have drawn attention to the high fees charged in the schedule by making a still further reduction in the case of transfers and removals.

seconded.

There is no doubt the hon. the Minister has put forward a schedule which is much more reasonable than the one which was in he Bill. At the same time he made a statement on the previous occasion that it was not the intention to increase the revenue of the provincial authorities to any large extent. He wished to conserve the revenue. With regard to country hotels, this is a very heavy licence fee. A country hotel will pay £100 for a new licence, £50 for renewal, on transfer £25, and on removal to other premises also £25. I am told that, in the Cape the licence of a country hotel is only four or five pounds. I am told that. I do not state it with any great confidence. But I know in Natal a country hotel licence costs only £8. Here we have a jump from £8 to £50 for a renewal of a country hotel licence. A country hotel exists for the convenience of the public, and it seems to me that in many cases the effect of these very heavy licence fees will be to close some of these small hotels where they are situated in the country districts and are used mainly by passing travellers. This scale of fees is very much too heavy. I hope the Minister will, with a sympathetic ear, listen to the amendment I propose. To add—

Even these figures, as far as country districts in the Cape and Natal are concerned, are much higher than the present licences. I want to insert " licensed hotel in a rural area, £20, £10, £5 and £5." I think that is perfectly reasonable, because as I have said, these rural hotels as a rule do very small business. They exist for the convenience of the travelling public, and if we ask them to pay an annual fee of £10 a year for a renewal while increasing the the amount considerably in regard to the Cape and to some smaller extent in Natal, we are, on the whole, asking a reasonable sum, but to ask them to pay £50 for a renewal seems to me quite unreasonable. I know, of course, the Minister may say that if his proposal to delete the reference to the Financial Relations Act from this schedule goes through, he will allow the provincial authorities to make the necessary reduction. Still, the provincial authorities after all will be guided to a large extent by the fees in this schedule, and I think it is very unlikely that they will make any reduction. I move, accordingly, as a further amendment—

seconded.

I think it would be convenient if I put these items now and deal with each amendment as it arises.

Amendments proposed by Mr. Alexander in first, second, third, fourth and fifth items, put and negatived.

In supporting the amendment of the hon. member for Dundee (Sir Thomas Watt), I wish to state that it seems to me that the fees charged in this schedule so far as they apply to country hotels are in many instances quite prohibitive, and the result will be that a number of hotels will close down. It seems rather extraordinary that a country hotel should have to pay the same fee as an hotel, say, in Adderley Street, Cape Town, or West Street, Durban. There is no comparison whatever. The hotel in the country with a small population of one or two hundred will find it almost impossible to pay this fee. I have been drawing a comparison between the fees charged in this schedule and the fees charged in Natal at the present time. I find that the country hotel will now have to pay £100, while at the present time it is paying £8 in Natal, that is for the original granting of a licence or renewal. Then there is a differentiation under our laws between boroughs and townships. In boroughs in Natal the fee is £50 as against £100 here, and in townships £25 as against £100 here. I hope the Minister will give this matter consideration, because I am sure the effect will be that a number of country hotels will have to close down if the fees set out in this schedule are charged.

May I appeal to the Minister? Does he think it quite fair to put the country hotel in the same position as the town hotel? Take, for instance, the Mount Nelson and the amount the country hotel will have to pay for a licence in contrast with that hotel.

The Bill is intended to discourage country hotels.

Is not that a mistake?

Yes, but the whole Bill is based on that mistake.

It is a pity to pursue a mistake to the end. The Minister acknowledges that it is a mistake. We want to encourage the country hotels to provide good accommodation. There is a lot of motoring going on in the country, and surely it is desirable that hotel proprietors should be encouraged to keep their premises in a good condition. I think the Minister ought to meet this application which is made to him.

First part of amendment proposed by Sir Thomas Watt put, upon which the House divided:

I think this is eminently a case for us to take the third reading at the present moment. The House is so jaded that it will never reach the zest it has shown during the discussion. If there is no objection, I move—

seconded.

Motion put and agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

I have a motion on the paper. Am I in order in moving it?

Yes.

I move—

I do not want to hold up the House long, but I do want it to accept the motion and give the committee the power to exclude co-operative societies from the operation of He Factories Act. I think the position boils down to this: Is this House in earnest in excluding the agricultural industry from the operation of this Act, because if it is, it will discuss this matter fully. In so many of our agricultural industries the raw materials are brought to the finished article in small factories working on the farm; to that end it is very desirable that the Minister should not extend the provisions of the Act to any such factory if it is under the control of a co-operative society. The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg (North) (Mr. Strachan), who I do not see in his place, in discussing this Bill previously, said he very strongly resented the preferential treatment accorded to the farmers in this House. I wonder if the significance of that remark has ever gone home to hon. members, and if the country realizes that in the report of the Economic Commission it is stated that the average income of the farmers in this country is £160 per annum? Hon. members on the Labour benches have been responsible for legislation that has fixed the standard income of a skilled workman at round about £350. That is the sort of preferential treatment the farmers are getting The Labour party estimate the value of their services to the community at more than double that of a farmer! Does that justify the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg (Mr. Strachan) saying that he resents the preferential treatment the farmers receive in this House? He should not have made a remark of that sort. If my motion is carried we shall, when we get into committee, not be bound down to its actual wording, but may modify it. For instance, to make it apply to the smaller co-operative societies employing only about 10 persons. There is another point. The Minister says farmers' co-operative societies obtain an exemption when they ask for it. Then why not include a clause making that exemption permanent? If the House really means to exempt agricultural industries from the operations of the Bill, it must go a certain distance along the line indicated in my motion.

I second the motion. We have suspected the Minister of Labour of ulterior motives in connection with all the industrial legislation he has introduced. When he brought in the Industrial Conciliation Act he made it perfectly clear that he did not intend to extend it to building operations on farms, but no sooner did the measure pass than the Minister extended it so as to include buildings erected on farms.

You are on the wrong Bill.

Does the Minister intend to extend the Factory Act to farming enterprises? If he does not intend to do so he should accept the motion of the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson).

Motion put, and the House divided:

stated that the committee had power to consolidate the two Bills into one Bill.

Before we consolidate surely we shall take the committee stage of this Bill.

Yes, we must first take the Factories Further Amendment Bill.

On Clause 1, Factories Further Amendment Bill,

I move—

I hope in speaking to this amendment we shall have a little courtesy from the Minister. The motion has just been before the House, and we had not the courtesy of one single word from the Minister in reply.

I dealt with it fully in the previous debate.

I would commend to the Minister the attitude of the Minister of Justice who has just piloted a very difficult Bill through this House and by his courtesy and urbanity has at least assisted in no small measure in passing the Bill. Instead of that, we have the Minister keeping silent like a Greek god or an Italian image without replying one single word. I hope when we do get a vote on this question we are going to get a vote on the honest principles that actuate members. It is astonishing to me that a Minister who represents a shattered fragment of a party, who represents nothing at this present moment in the country, should lead the farmers by the nose in the way he is doing. Because I know the real feelings of the farming members of this House—I do not care which side they sit on—and I know the vote was given in obedience to the lifted finger of the Minister, and did not represent the real opinions of the men who gave that vote. I want to point out the implication of my amendment. The Minister has gone a small way towards redeeming a promise he made to the agricultural industry. I think we all thought he was going to introduce a Bill which would make it clear that the agricultural industry of this country was exempted from the operation of the Factories Act. As far as the Minister has gone, he has struck out the words " food or drink for human consumption." That only applies to the individual farmer. If two farmers are working together they are immediately excluded from the benefit of this amending Bill, and brought under the operation of the Factories Act. If I erect a machine-shearing apparatus, and they are coming very much into vogue today, and my neighbour comes along with his sheep and I shear them for him, that shed immediately comes under the Factories Act. The Minister need not shake his head, there is no question about it.

Would you be shearing all the year round?

Quite possible.

It never happens, you know it does not.

If I installed a stationary threshing machine and my neighbour brought his crops to be threshed I should come under the Factories Act, unless, as is suggested by the hon. member for Graaff-Reinet (Mr. I. P. van Heerden), one applies for this seasonal exemption. But why are we going to be so degraded that we have to go on our knees, hat in hand, to a Minister of Labour who should have no authority over the farmers, and ask his consent to exempt us? I put it to this House that he is not bound to exempt. He has the right to do it, and the Minister's action in extending the operation of the determinations under the Conciliation Act as far as buildings in the country districts are concerned, shows that, where the Minister has the power, he will not hesitate to impose that power upon the farmers of this country. Every one of the examples that I have given will be sufficient to bring the farmer under the operation of this Act unless he can persuade a Labour Minister, a courteous Minister of Labour, that he has a right to exemption, and I say that is not a position that he should be put into. I am perfectly certain that the intention is a sound one, that the intention of the farmers is to see that this Bill is amended so as to exclude farming operations like this, and I trust that in this amendment I am going to receive the consent of the Minister and the support of both sides of the House.

I regret that the hon. member (Mr. Gilson) took offence because I did not deal with the previous point, but as that point had already been fully discussed and fully dealt with in the previous debate, I did not think it necessary or advisable to take up the time of the House. The hon. member has moved a further amendment. I am sorry that I cannot accept it, because he is putting up a hypothetical case which really does not, in actual practice, exist. If he has a threshing machine installed in his premises and it was installed for the purpose of manufacturing his own produce, then he is not entitled to be registered, he is exempt, and if some neighbouring farmer asks to have his stuff threshed or dealt with in that machine, they might possibly be committing a technical offence, but no court would take any notice of that, because the premises they are using are not entitled to be registered, inasmuch as you are using them for your own purposes. They are erected for the purpose of manufacturing your own produce and consequently, under my amended Bill, for whatever purpose you manufacture, you will be exempt so that you cannot be interfered with. Now along comes your neighbour and says: " Cut some for me." He is not going to be prosecuted because he has not got premises of his own, and they cannot prosecute you because the premises you have got were erected by you and used by you for your own purposes. That is the interpretation placed upon the matter by the law advisers. I have met the point raised by the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) and the point raised by the hon. member for Cape Town (Central). I say the anomaly which existed under the main Act, and I gave the House a promise that I would remove that anomaly. I discussed the matter with the farming members, and also with the law advisers, and they told me that this was the effective way of removing that anomaly. I hope the House will accept this as an honest attempt to protect the bona fide farmer who manufactures his own produce, whether it is for sale or whatever it is for. The position is fully and freely and honestly met, and I would appeal to farmers in the House not to be scared by the imaginary or hypothetical and border line cases which have been set up. No matter what the farmer manufactures on his own farm for his own use or for sale from his own produce, he is exempt under the provisions of the Factory Act. Further than that I do not think we should go. By his amendment the hon. member would, I think, produce this further effect. He would make it possible, say, for the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) who is a farmer, to rent a farm, say, on the Cape flats or at Camps Bay, and put up the biggest boot factory in South Africa, and carry on boot manufacture in competition with other people simply because he happened to be on a farm. You cannot support a position like that. The bona fide farmer who wants to manufacture his own produce is amply protected. He was not protected before. I would ask hon. members on both sides of the House to accept it as such, and let this little Bill be embodied in the main Act, and let it go through.

I am glad the Minister has stated he will not accept the amendment of the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson), and I would like to express my surprise at the attitude of members of the South African party, because here they are putting up a tremendous fight—for what? To amend a Bill for which they themselves are responsible. If their interpretation of that Bill was incorrect, what right have they to come now and ask this Government to get them out of the difficulty they set up?

Every right.

If you have every right, be fair, and admit you are now asking the Government to rectify the mistake you made. I quite agree with the Minister that the amendment moved by the hon. member for Griqualand would have the effect of the example he gave, that the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) could erect a factory and he could manufacture not only the produce of his own farm, but other farmers could come along and give him their produce, and he could manufacture it for them, and so be able to start an industry and have people employed there. I am rather alarmed at the interpretation given by the Minister in connection with the hypothetical case put up by the hon. member for Griqualand. According to the very generous interpretation the Minister gives, it would seem that assuming a shearing machine was put up on a farm, other farmers would be able to come along and pay the farmer certain prices. If the Minister's interpretation is correct, then obviously the logical conclusion is that the boot factory could be established. I see a great danger in that interpretation, and I ask the Minister to get the opinion of the law advisers as to whether that would be the effect, and if that is the effect the intention of the Bill is not to go as far as that, and it should be so amended as to see it does not go so far.

I thought we had already explained that matters have to be handled, and they are often administered and interpreted in a direction different from what was intended in the Bill.

That is not correct.

Take the Malmesbury case, where it is brought against persons who are packing lucerne.

We are amending that.

It was never intended to apply to that. It frequently occurs that the draughtsmen's intentions are in a certain direction, and that the administrators who have the final say go in a different direction. Those who are accustomed to legislation frequently see that. It is said you have the power to start a factory on the Cape flats, but there is nothing in the argument; how can there be anything in it? It is said I could start a factory on the Cape flats, where there is plenty of space. But how can I be farming there?

Read the clause.

I have the clause here. [Clause read.] If I put a factory on the Cape flats I should not be a bona fide farmer, but a manufacturer.

If you rented a farm you would be a bona fide farmer.

No, I should be a manufacturer, and there is no getting away from that point.

Is not Mr. Schlesinger a farmer?

Why bring Mr. Schlesinger into it? We want to provide for bona fide farmers, and not what are known as cheque-book farmers.

I am very glad the Minister has changed his mind in regard to farming operations. I have tried for several years to induce him to do so in the case of the wattle farmer. This is an opportunity for clearing the matter of all ambiguity. At present the clause is involved. I move—

What are farming operations?

It is not necessary to enumerate them. If there is any dispute the court will decide.

But we don't want to go to court.

The criticisms I made when the Bill was originally before the House are not met by the Minister's amendment, and I should be glad if we could know clearly what the position really is. My objection to the Bill and the amendment is due to the fact that a farmer is confined to dealing with the produce and the animals raised on his own property. When the Bill was previously under discussion, I pointed out the conditions existing in my own district of Stellenbosch, where, if there was not a material alteration made in the Bill, owing to the interpretation that has been put upon it by the Minister or the Minister's department, it would be impossible for me and a brother farmer to join together in one packing shed without coming under the Factories Act. If I were packing fruit and a brother farmer were packing fruit, and our orchards joined one another, it might be much more economic and much more convenient for his fruit to be packed in my shed, or my fruit to be packed in his, and as the amendment of the hon. the Minister goes at the present moment, it will not be possible for either of us to do so, without coming under the operation of the Factories Act. If the hon. member for Graaff-Reinet (Mr. I. P. van Heerden) and I happen to be adjoining farmers, and I or he happen to have a wool shed thoroughly equipped and fitted up, it will be impossible for him to send his sheep to me to be shorn, or for me to send my sheep to him to be shorn, under the Minister's amendment, without that shed falling under the Factories Act. My hon. friend says I am wrong. Perhaps my hon. friend can convince me that I am wrong, I know I have his sympathy, but I want to warn him that in the vote he casts on this question he may find that he is wrong, and that what I say is right. It is for the purpose of clearing that up that the hon. member for Griqualand East (Mr. Gilson) and my hon. friend who sits behind me, have moved an amendment. Take the case of my Free State friends who happened to be engaged in the cattle industry. One farmer has a little separating plant on his farm and is making butter. His adjoining neighbour also has dairy cattle and is making butter, but by mutual co-operation they find it would be much cheaper for them and would do away with unnecessary overhead expenses, if one farmer sent his cream to the other. I maintain that if that is done, under the amendment of the hon. the Minister, that plant will fall under the operation of the Factories Act.

If three men are constantly employed.

He has now made it clear that if three men are employed in that operation, it falls under the Factories Act. Why should not he have told the Minister of Labour that this is as far as he can go?

Why should it not come under the Factories Act?

I hope the farmers in the committee are listening very carefully. Then this is the intention, in a sort of subterfuge to get poor simple members, like the hon. member for Graaff-Reinet, representing farming districts, to vote for the clause, the intention of which they do not understand.

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

When business was suspended I was trying to bring home to my hon. friend the member for Graaff-Reinet (Mr. I. P. van Heerden) and the other farming members of this House, how dangerous the amendment was that had ben moved by the Minister, and that it did not go any way nearly as far as I had suggested and other members had suggested, with the sympathy of my hon. friend and his colleagues opposite the other day, that, when the Bills were being consolidated, we should move forward in that direction. I have no doubt that since the dinner hour my hon. friend has enquired into the position, and assured himself with regard to what the hon. member for Jeppes (Mr. Sampson) said, that when three people are gathered together in a packing house then it would be a factory and come under the operation of the Act. During the dinner hour I have been thinking what would be the position of the hon. member for Graaff-Reinet were he to be a party to accepting the Minister's amendment, and he went back to his constituents and told them that when any two farmers desired to shear in combination, and ran their sheep into one shed from two different farms, even though they had only three shearers, they would come under the operation of the Act, and be subjected to all the restrictions which apply to a factory, that they would have to start their work at a certain time, and finish it at a certain time, etc. What affects my hon. friend affects every other farming representative in this House, and I can only imagine that considerable pressure must have been brought to bear upon hon. members opposite who represent farming constituencies, when they have yielded to the pressure that the cross-benches have brought to bear upon the Minister and insisted that he should not go any further in his amendment than he has gone now.

Did you say you had been thinking during the dinner hour?

Yes, and I will repeat it again. I was thinking that my hon. friend, the member for Graaff-Reinet, now that his eyes have been opened, and the scales have fallen from them, would be torn into shreds and tatters by his constituents in Graaff-Reinet were he to be even an unwilling participant in this amendment, and my remarks were addressed particularly to him, knowing that he represents a very large farming district, and knowing that the remarks I have addressed to the hon. member also apply even to the Minister of Agriculture, who represents a farming constituency, and to other members who sit on the opposite side. What explanation the Minister of Agriculture will be able to give to the farmers of Wolmaransstad who desire to combine to shear their sheep when he has got to tell them that, simply for the purpose of keeping peace within the Cabinet, he has allowed the tail to wag the dog so far as the Factories Act is concerned, I do not know, but I am certain that when he begins to make that explanation to his constituents, the majority of whom are farmers, they will ask themselves the question whether the time is not ripe when the farming members of this House should take further steps to see that the dog is not wagged by the tail in these particular matters. Notwithstanding my differences of opinion with the Minister of Agriculture, I do not want to see his having to clothe himself in a white sheet like the hon. member for Graaff-Reinet (Mr. I. P. van Heerden) when he meets his constituents. In his own interest I would warn him in advance. It is really a very serious position. I say, so far as farming operations in this country are concerned, which are not very lucrative operations—

When did you learn that?

My hon. friend asks me when did I learn that. Because for the last 40 years everything I possess in this country has been invested in farming operations, and I speak from experience. I know, whether I am fruit farming in the Stellenbosch district or sheep and wool and agricultural farming in the Karroo, I find the farmers are in an entirely different position from industrial undertakings, which, when the key is put in the lock at 6 in the evening, and if they are insured against fire, are perfectly safe until the next morning. At periods when fruit looks like producing a magnificent crop a heavy east wind comes up and 40 or 50 per cent, is on the ground the next morning. You cannot treat farming operations on the same basis as you treat great industrial undertakings, and to make farming a success, you must do everything you possibly can to encourage co-operation amongst the farmers. With the interpretation put upon the Act of 1918 with the amendment now proposed by the Minister, you will make it impossible for two farmers adjoining each other to combine, whether it be fruit farming, sheep farming or dairy farming, because, if they have more than three people they come under the operations of the Factories Act.

When the hon. member for Graaff-Reinet (Mr. I. P. van Heerden) goes back to his constituents, I hope he will tell them that what is proposed to be done under this particular Bill is to modify the Act passed by the South African party Government. It is being modified by the Pact Government, for the benefit of the farmers. It would be very interesting to find out how this Act was originally passed. The right hon. member spoke about the tail wagging the dog. Was it a Unionist tail wagging a South African party dog when this Act was put into operation? What happened in the secret conclaves of the Cabinet when this Act became law? The right hon. member says he has been fruit farming. I suggest he has been wool gathering, not fruit farming. He has found it a profitable occupation to try and pull wool over the eyes of the people, but in this particular case I do not think he will succeed. I support the amendment of the Minister. I would point out to the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) it would be perfectly possible for him if the amendment of the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) were carried, to establish that boot factory we have heard about on his own farm. The Act, as sought to be amended by the hon. member, would read as follows—

Is there anything under that to prevent him from establishing a boot factory on his farm? The farmer is actually benefited by this Act. The harsher terms of the South African party Act are modified by the Pact Government.

I should like to support the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus), because I feel it is absolutely necessary to make this clause clear, and prevent the farmers still coming under the law. The Minister wants to do a half-hearted thing, but the farmers will remain under the law. We have had experience in the past with reference to the Industrial Conciliation Act, and we have seen how the Minister of Labour thought that the farmers came under the Act, while we thought that it was clearly provided that they should not. The Minister of Justice had to come and say that he was of opinion that the farmers were excluded. The hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) indicated clearly how precarious farming is in South Africa.

Farmers were excluded.

The farmers are not excluded. What, for instance, about a wheat grower milling the wheat of his neighbour? Then he comes under this Bill, even if he buys the wheat from his neighbour. As for sheep shearing, the hon. member for Fort Beaufort rightly said that if a farmer joins with his neighbour in shearing with a machine he will come under the Bill, and that is much done, especially with the new organization amongst the wool farmers.

Do you shear for 12 months in the year?

I think the law is quite confused on this point. If there are many farmers who co-operate, then they may be occupied for three or four months.

It is not the whole year. It is only doubtful to you.

I must honestly say that I am very much astonished at the attitude of hon. members opposite.

You need not be astonished at all.

I never though that, if hon. members opposite came into power, they would administer the Act in that way. I thought they promised to put things right.

We are engaged in rectifying your Act.

You are so much under the thumb of the Minister of Labour that you dare not speak your own convictions. Hon. members feel that the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) is right, but they dare not declare themselves. We have not yet heard the views of any hon. members opposite. They say nothing. We have often heard about block voters, and I think we have a case of it here, and they are being forced by the Labour party against their better judgment.

What forced you in 1918 to make this law?

We felt at that time that conditions should be improved, and we did not expect that hon. members opposite, who are conservative, would ever assist in putting the Labour party into office. As far as this measure is concerned, the Labour party are practically in power.

What farmer has suffered under it? Mention one.

Why then was this amendment necessary if no farmer has suffered? How did not the farmer, for instance, suffer under the Industrial Conciliation Act?

Who, then, passed the Industrial Conciliation Act; is it not your Act?

We all know that in that Act the farmer was excluded, and, according to the Minister of Justice, no farmer would have been prosecuted under that Act, and yet there is a Minister who says that the farmer can be punished under that Act, while another Minister says that that is not so. It has always been a Cabinet that spoke with two voices. That is exactly why it is so necessary that we should clearly set out the position in the Bill. The Minister says that, as the amending Bill now reads, the farmer is excluded, but why then will the Minister not allow it to be stated as clearly as possible? I think hon. members opposite themselves see that there is no danger in passing the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital. It excludes all operations whatsoever for the farmer. I hope hon. members opposite will, during the evening, understand that, as representatives of the farmers, they ought to vote in favour of the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital.

I am quite sure I deserve the sympathy, not alone of this side of the House, but of the other side, when we have listened to the tirade of the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) when he speaks of the poor, subtle farmers like the member of Graaff-Reinet. I am perfectly satisfied, and so are the farmers of the backveld, and so are all the farmers, to accept the amendment as it was introduced by the Minister of Labour. Perhaps the right hon. member will think back a few years and remember what his subtlety has cost him as far as the farmers are concerned; cost him his seat here. Does he remember that it is the Act of 1918 we are trying now to rectify? Where was this right hon. member when this Act was passed? Who was responsible for it? When taxation was imposed as far as the farmers were concerned, where was the right hon. member? Where was he when we were legislating for the extermination of scab?

You have been on that job a good many years.

Does he know who was the cause, perhaps the primary cause, of the South African party having to take their seats there (in Opposition)? Does the right hon. member remember how he dipped the poor unfortunate man's sheep?

I dipped my own, and I hope the hon. member dipped his.

Order.

I am glad you are defending the right hon. member.

What do you mean?

That you are sorry for him. But if you hear the hon. member for Cradock (Mr. G. C. van Heerden) you would think that this Act of 1924 and the Act of 1918 were introduced by the present Government. I am sure the hon. member will go and tell the people of Cradock that the Conciliation Act is the work, not of the South African party Government, but of the Pact Government.

We are amending it now.

For the benefit of the farmers. Will you allow me to analyze the amendment as proposed by the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson)?

I intend to withdraw it.

I am pleased the hon. member has come to his senses. Let us analyze it for one moment. [Amendment quoted.] " Any factory," it does not matter where it is, whether here in Cape Town or Port Elizabeth.

The hon. member is evidently bemused by his meal; we are not discussing my amendment at all now.

I must analyze it for one moment. The hon. member is trying to run away from it—poor, unfortunate man; not only he, but the hon. member for Cradock and the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort spoke of shearing. The only sheep which can be sheared continuously are sheep such as those of the hon. member for Weenen (Maj. Richards). In his attempt to allow Natal to propagate scab, he told us here that the sheep in Natal grew three inches of wool in three months. These sheep do not fall within the purview of this Act, because it means working continuously. Neither fruit packing nor lucerne packing come under the Act. I feel sorry for the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt). I have the highest regard in the world for him, but he will never again induce the farmers to place him at the head of affairs agriculturally. If we exempt farmers entirely, they will be able to start harness making or jam factories. But what of the worker, who has been exploited all along?

By whom?

By men like the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Buirski), who would like to employ men at 6d. a day if possible.

That is very cheap—nobody would believe you.

What do you pay your men?

Would you like to go into my personal affairs?

Then you should not go into mine.

Because you interjected when you should not have said a single word. If you explain your business, and I explain mine, I would feel very sorry for the hon. member for Swellendam. I pay my men a living wage, and I have had men on my farms for 18 years. The time is past for exploiting the unfortunate worker. Don't try and mislead people by telling them that as far as sheep shearing is concerned, they fall under the purview of the Act. If farmers desire exemption, why should they not go to the Minister of Labour? Or to a South African party Minister, should that party ever get to the head of affairs again? But if it does, I am afraid there will be exploitation once more, and we shall have to introduce a Bill to protect the worker.

I wish to deal with the point raised by the hon. member for Graaff-Reinet (Mr. I. P. van Heerden), who says the farmer does not fall under the Act as regards shearing or other matters, because they are seasonal. There is only one clause which deals with the intermittent supply of raw material— Clause 13 [clause read]. The only exemption my friend gets is in the matter of hours. We have 44 clauses which apply to the owners of farms, and the only seasonal exemption is in regard to hours. So far as shearing is concerned, farmers come under all the restrictions of the Act except in regard to the hours.

That is not correct.

Read section 1.

Is a shearing shed not a building which falls under both clauses?

Shearing is not whole time work.

Of course it is.

Read subsection 2.

I will read the whole Act if you like [Sub-section 2 read.] I shall later withdraw my amendment because the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) moved a very much simpler one which exempts the bona fide farmer. Of course, cheese-making is a whole time employment. All our remarks seem to bounce off. They do not seem to penetrate.

If I move a resolution, I do not run away from it.

If the hon. member was a man of common sense he would accept a better amendment than his own, and I am accepting a better amendment than mine.

Hear, hear.

As for the criticism the hon. member may erroneously offer of a motion which I moved, I never ran away from it. I divided the House on it, and much to my surprise the hon. member voted against it. Even the hon. the Minister, when he replied, said that these industries which I have outlined, do technically come under the Act. The hon. the Minister said, " Probably they technically come under the Act, but we should never dream of applying it to them." Do farmers want to be left in the position that these Acts can be applied at any time at the whim of the Minister? I am certain that farmers on both sides of the House are unanimous in wanting to contract themselves entirely out of the application of this Act. When the hon. the Minister goes so far as to say " We should not dream of applying it to them," you have the very finest argument to support an absolutely sound amendment which contracts you out. What did the Minister do under the Conciliation Act? That point will bear making again. The Minister deliberately applied that to the farming districts. There was no need for him to do so. He had every power to exempt those districts. It was not until the hon. the Minister of Justice pulled him up and said he was going to refuse any prosecution, that we checked the Minister. You lay yourselves open to exactly the same course under this Act. Do you want the Minister to start applying this to farmers, and the Minister of Justice to have to start championing the farmers and saying " I will not allow it?" I intend to withdraw my amendment, but I have not withdrawn it for the moment.

The hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) said that we as representatives of the farmers were afraid of debating the matter. I want then, as such a representative to express my thanks to the Government, and especially to the Minister forgoing so far as to make the Act of 1918 of the South African party clear, and to lay down that the farmers are excluded. I want to ask the hon. members for Cradock (Mr. G. C. van Hoerden), and Fort Beaufort, whether this Bill is an improvement on the 1918 Act or not.

A little.

I am very glad the hon. member admits that it is an improvement. He, therefore, admits that this Government has introduced an improvement on the old Act. It is strange to me that, since 1918, when the Act was passed, we have never had a member speaking about the danger of that Act. Now the hon. member for Fort Beaufort warns us. I only want to say that I do not believe in that kind of speech. It is only too clear to me that they have only one object, namely, to catch votes on the countryside, but I want to tell the hon. member that the farmers will not be misled by such speeches. The farmers are grateful to the Government for clearly excluding them now. I do not want to go into details because I know the speeches of the hon. member were not meant seriously, and I think they were an absolute waste of time. I have only risen because the hon. member for Fort Beaufort said we were afraid. I am satisfied, and certainly represent just as many farmers as any other hon. member, and I am prepared to meet any member on a platform about this matter. The hon. member for Cradock (Mr. G. C. van Heerden) must not make such a fool of himself as to say that shearing sheep will also come under the law. I believe he has more sense than that. This attempt at frightening people will not pay hon. members. The farmers do not believe it, and they are satisfied.

I hope the hon. member who has just sat down will not accuse me of wanting to talk to get votes. He has a mistaken idea as to the scope and intent of the Factories Act. Members take up the position that the Factories Act applies only where there is continuous employment. That is not so. If you look at the various sub-sections of the first section you will see that the clauses are alternative. Therefore, it does not matter where on a farm in South Africa there is machinery, or mechanical power or mechanical appliances are used, there the Factories Act will apply. The issue is whether the farming operations are to be excluded from the operation of the Act or not. What is the genesis of this amendment? I was one of the first to refer to this a year or two ago. I received a communication from a wattle farmer in Natal pointing out to me the anomalies of the Act. This farmer said that he had been harassed by the Minister who had sent his factory inspectors to him, and they had told him that he must do all sorts of things. He also said: " I cannot carry on my farming operations under those conditions. We have one set of labourers whose hours are practically from morning till night, whereas the natives employed in cutting up wattle bark and timber fell under the Factories Act, and have eight hours a day." This man found it impossible to carry on his farming under those conditions.

How long ago was that?

About two years ago. I appealed to the Minister and he did not deny that this particular phase of farming came under the operation of the Act, " but," he said, " I will give special exemption." Now he has seceded from that point and taken up the position that so far as the preparation of timber by mechanical power is concerned, he will except it from the provisions of the Factories Act. I know that what is wanted by all farmers in this country is very simple indeed; it is simply that bona fide farming operations by bona fide farmers shall be exempted from the provisions of this Act. Now is the opportunity to make clear what, as I understand, is conceded by the Minister, but which I think is not sufficiently clear from the amendment he now puts forward. I understand from the Chairman that I cannot move my proposal as an amendment to the amendment before the House, but I can move the elimination of the section in the Minister's amendment, and the substitution of this in place thereof.

That is so. This clause has to be negatived before the hon. member can move his clause. The hon. member may discuss it.

I can state what my clause is. Instead of having an involved and very difficult clause to apprehend, as you have now in this sub-section, I propose substituting the following—

That is, I know, what farmers want. They say they don't want to be worried with the Factories Act. They say: " We carry on bona fide farming operations; let us be exempt." I would ask the Minister to let us put an end to this lengthy discussion by accepting my very simple, very clear and unequivocal proposition. I think it expresses his intention, if I understand him lightly. Before proceeding further, I would like to know whether he would be prepared to accept it.

If I wanted to do the farmers a bad turn, I would accept it.

I wish the Minister would explain.

I will explain.

In the meantime I would like to hear the Minister's explanation.

I am glad that the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) has agreed that his amendment is not satisfactory, and that he is going to withdraw it. Now he is withdrawing it in favour of another amendment moved by the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) who, instead of doing the farmers a good turn, as he is supposed to be doing, is actually doing the farmers the worst possible turn they could have. He says that people who are exempt are those who are carrying on bona fide farming operations. The manufacture of jam is not a farming operation. What court is going to say that the actual manufacturing, the bottling, labelling and packing of jam is a farming operation? If that is a farming operation, surely I could go to Hill's, in Woodstock here, and say: " Look here, you are farmers."

Np.

That is ridiculous.

A bona fide farming operation, as hon. members know, is the ploughing and sowing and pruning and reaping, and working of the land to produce the things, but when they start to take the produce which they have raised from bona fide farming operations and begin to manufacture that produce into some other article, then no court is going to say that is a farming operation. I venture to say that if this amendment goes through, all the farmers who to-day are exempt under my amendment—farmers who grow their own fruit, and make their own jam, and send it for sale under my amendment are all exempt, or if they make anything else either for human consumption or for animal consumption—

Butter?

Yes, butter or anything else, they are exempt under my proposal, hut if you accept the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital you have got to expect the courts to decide that the manufacture of butter, which can be done here, or anywhere in the towns from the milk, is a farming operation, and so, in regard to a cheese factory. Suppose I go along to a cheese factory in Woodstock—

Is the manufacture of butter not a farming operation?

The breeding of the cows and the producing of the milk certainly is a farming operation, hut once you start to manufacture butter or cheese or other things, you are manufacturing the produce of the farm. Under my amendment all these processes are exempt, but under the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital the court will be called upon to decide that the manufacture of butter or the manufacture of cheese or the manufacture of jam in a factory, no matter where it is, whether in Woodstock or Johannesburg, or anywhere else, is a farming operation. Well, they are not going to do it. I say the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) is rendering the farmers the greatest possible disservice if he insists upon his amendment. The right hon. the member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) kept on referring to the criticisms of my Bill. Let me say my Bill has had little or no criticism. The whole of the criticism and hostility on the other side has not been against my Bill, but against the main Act, portions of the Act which I was not touching. I brought in a Bill to amend the Act. I expected there would be a certain amount of criticism of my amendments, instead of which I found that my amendments went through without any discussion whatever hardly, and the whole of the hostility is devoted to the main Act which they passed.

And which you supported at the time.

That may be, but the fact remains. I agreed that there was an anomaly and that we should do something to meet the farmers, and I hope members on the other side, when they go round the backveld making electioneering speeches will be candid enough to admit that it was left to the Labour Minister in the Pact Government to amend the Act which they passed in order to benefit the farmers of South Africa. Instead of being attacked, I ought to receive the congratulations and thanks of all the farmers in this House and in the backveld. Instead of that we are being attacked from the other side. I cannot accept the amendment of the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson), and he himself admits it is not much good, and he is going to withdraw.

I did nothing of the sort.

I cannot accept the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital because to do so would be to render the farmers a disservice and would make the Act much worse than it is to-day in the farmers' interests. I ask all farmers to accept unreservedly the amendment I have put forward which will meet the position amply and honestly and give satisfaction throughout the country. Can the right hon. the member for Fort Beaufort give one case where any of these things have happened which he says are going to happen unless their amendments are carried? Not one case has been quoted of where a farmer has been interfered with for doing the things referred to by the right lion, member. The hon. member for Cradock (Mr. G. C. van Heerden) talks about exemptions at the hand of the Labour Minister. I have given something like fifty exemptions for cheese and butter factories and these seasonable exemptions.

What did you do about the Conciliation Act?

We are not discussing the Conciliation Act. We are discussing the Factories Act. He was ridiculing the idea of farmers having to go to a Labour Minister for exemption. I am telling him I have given something like fifty exemptions to farmers and co-operative societies engaged in cheese and butter making and things of that sort. Does he want me to stop these exemptions? Certainly not. Then why raise the point? I am administering the Act fairly and lionestly, and the hon. member has no right to raise the question as to exemptions. Those who are producing perishable products are getting seasonable exemptions wherever justified. The hostility would certainly suggest I was not giving a fair deal to these various cheese and butter factories and other farming institutions round the country. I hope after the explanation I have given, and the debate we have had, that both amendments put forward will be defeated by both sides of the House.

The Minister has expressed the hope that members of the South African party, when going among the farmers, will give him credit for having introduced a measure in the interests of the farmers. I am rather afraid that when members of the South African party go into the industrial constituencies they will be telling the people in the towns what a terrible thing a Labour Minister has done inasmuch as he has exempted farmers from the operation of an Act which the South African party passed in the interests of industries. They are trying to have it both ways in as many ways as they can. After hearing the vitriolic attacks on the Act of 1918, you would have imagined that was introduced by the present Government. It does not say much for the intelligence of members of the South African party that it has taken them from 1918 to 1928 to discover that some amendments are necessary to this Act. I think the seriousness of the accusations levelled can be gauged from the attitude of the right hon. the member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt). He told the House and the hon. member for Graaff-Reinet (Mr. I. P. van Heerden) how sorry he was for him on account of the fact that Labour pressure is responsible for the present position and for this present amending Act. I want to compare that with some of the speeches he makes on other occasions when he talks of differences that exist in the Labour party, from which you could come to no other conclusion but that, in his opinion, the Labour party is finished. There is no doubt whatever that if there is any pressure at all the pressure is the other way. I am perfectly satisfied with the Act of 1918 which was introduced by the South African party and which was, apparently acceptable to the Unionist party until they found they could make party capital out of the position as against the present Government. The amendment that is introduced at present by the Minister, if it is to be attributed to any pressure, it is not to pressure by the Labour party on their Nationalist allies, but rather to pressure by the Nationalist allies on the Labour Minister. Speaking for myself, I hope the Minister will accept the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus).

Will you vote for it?

Yes. I prefer that amendment to that of the Minister, for the reason the Minister has given, that, whereas, under the amendment of the Minister very far-reaching exemptions will be given to the farming population, under the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital only bona fide operations will be exempt. From a Labour point of view and from the point of view of industrial workers in the towns, I much prefer the restrictive exemptions proposed by the hon. member for Hospital to the very generous exemptions proposed by the Minister. I wonder, if the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital is accepted, whether in a year or two, the South African party—or rather the remnants of them, because, although a united party, they are also a dying party—will come along and again attack the Pact for not having introduced more generous exemptions than is possible under the amendment of the hon. member. I believe, if necessary, our friends on the other (ministerial) side would be prepared to vote for the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus), because it is quite clear from the discussion that our Nationalist friends are much more generous and humane in their outlook as regards the workers in the towns than the South African party. I hope the Minister will reconsider the matter, and accept the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital, which will be more beneficial to the workers in the towns.

I am sorry there has been so much heat engendered by the discussion, because all have declared at the beginning of their speeches that they are out to help the farmer, and then belaboured one another. I was a member of the select committee on the Bill of 1918, and so was the hon. member for Jeppe (Mr. Sampson). I particularly regret the reference of the hon. member for Graaff-Reinet (Mr. I. P. van Heerden) to the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Buirski). Although the hon. member for Swellendam and I are on different political sides, he is known to be a generous man and a generous employer. It was not the present South African party that was in power when the Bill was originally introduced in 1918, but it was the predecessors of the present South African party—the South African party before amalgamation. I was one of those in Opposition at that time. The Bill as introduced by the then Minister of Mines and Industries contained no exemption for the farmer. This clause was not in the Bill, and it was put in by the select committee. The application of the Act was general, and had it not been for the amendment put in in the select committee, there would have been no exemption for farming operations of any sort. The hon. member for Jeppe and I objected to this clause being put in, our contention being that if a factory was established anywhere it should come under the Act. The then Minister of Mines and Industries moved in the select committee the clause, except for the amendment I moved, which is now part of the law. [Amendment quoted.] The only difference between that and the law is that I moved to insert " bona fide farmer who is also, etc." The Minister has left out the last words of the sub-section, so it is wider than the present law. The amendment of the hon. member for Hospital does leave the matter in some doubt. His intention is to put the matter oil the broadest possible basis, but if you do not define what farming operations are, it will lead to different interpretations. If you grow fruit, one of the results is that you may make jam, but I doubt if it will be held in a court of law that jammaking is farming. There are two separate operations; the growing of produce and the conversion of that into an article of food. One is the work of the farmer; the other of the factory owner.

Would you develop your argument on the lines of butter and cheese?

Of course I would. Milk is the natural produce, but you speak of a butter and cheese " factory." My hon. friend is labouring under a confusion of thought. He thinks because the original raw product is grown by the farmer, every article into which this is turned is part of farming operations; surely he can see the two are different. Turning milk into cheese is a manufacturing operation. The object of the Minister is to protect the farmer to that extent—not only with regard to produce he grew on his farm, and the turning of that produce into articles of food and drink, but the turning of it into any other kind of goods. He knew that was converting it into a factory. It was to prevent other than farmers to make use of that protection that I moved in the words " bona fide farmer." The original Act is rather vague, and has given rise to different interpretations. There should be no party recriminations at all. The former Minister of Mines and Industries thought he was protecting the farmer, and did not do so sufficiently. If you do protect the farmer, do so in clear and unequivocal language.

I think there is a great deal of force in the argument of the hon. member for Cape Town (Hanover Street) (Mr. Alexander), and I propose, when the right time arrives, to move an amendment which I think will meet his objection. I propose to add somewhat to the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus), so as to make the section read—

Why don't you put in engineering shops or motor garages?

The hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) has indicated a sphere within which it is undesirable that all the elaborate provisions of the Factories Act should apply. The Minister has pointed out that his provision is more generous than that of the lion, member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus), but the Minister's amendment simply eliminates a part of the section which previously exempted any factory which had to do with the manufacture of food or drink for human consumption. It is necessary that a very much wider range of employment for factories and sheds which turn into their marketable form the primary products of the farm should be given in order to avoid the irritating interference of the Department of Labour, which has a bad pre-eminence for mal-administration. We have had the Minister of Labour interfering with the farmers in a way which has put back production, has resulted in the discouragement of industries, and has been a very serious hindrance to the carrying on of farming. In addition, this interference has had a very much wider effect on native labour and the efficiency, generally, of the farming industry. I hope the Minister will not shelter himself behind any ambiguity in his own amendment.

Might I suggest to the Minister that he should report progress and ask leave to sit again? We now have three amendments from the South African party. We are entitled to know which amendment they want. The Minister should give them an opportunity of deciding which one they desire. I would like to know what an agricultural factory means.

I think the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) is labouring under a mistake. None of the amendments come from the South African party. They all come from the old Unionists.

I am not an old Unionist.

The hon. members for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt), and Illovo (Mr. Marwick) were members of the Unionist party. I do not know whether the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) was. Probably he was not politically born in those days. It is in view of that fact I want to read a little discovery I have made. When the Act was originally introduced the only man who spoke for the whole of the Unionist party which was then the official Opposition, was the hon. member for Bezuidenhout (Mr. Blackwell). According to the "Cape Times" report—and I take it no member of the South African party would take exception to its reports—he wanted the whole of the provision relating to farmers cut out. If the Minister is in doubt about the amendment he should accept the suggestion of the hon. member for Troyeville and find out what the official view of the South African party is on this matter.

I am sorry I cannot accept that suggestion, as I wish to place the Bill on the statute book as soon as possible. After the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) asked me to deal with his amendment, and I showed how ridiculous it was, there was a little meeting on the Opposition benches in order to improve it. Now we have the result in the amendment of the hon. member for Illovo (Mr. Marwick), which makes an amendment already ridiculous even more ridiculous, for his amendment is so far-reaching and covers practically the whole country, that if it is carried we might as well scrap the Factories Act. It amounts to this—that a man growing trees could cut them down, saw them into planks, make the planks into furniture at any place he likes, and merely because he has converted the trees into a manufactured article he is to be exempt from the Factories Act. The same with every commodity a farmer produces. That shows how perfectly ridiculous and impossible such an amendment is. It makes the Act ridiculous and a farce. Of all the amendments put forward I do not know which is the official one, and I am certainly not going to move to report progress so that the other side can decide. As far as we are concerned on this side, we stand by the amendment I moved in the first place, which pets the position amply and fully, and gives the farmers a square deal.

I want to reply to one statement the Minister made. He keeps harping perpetually on the question of the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus and a jam factory at Woodstock. I do not know what connection the Minister has with Woodstock or with a jam factory, but let us take his example. If he understood the amendment he would have known that it applies to factory operations carried out on a farm by a bona fide farmer who is the owner-occupier thereof. How on earth can you have a farm in Woodstock?

There are plenty of farms on the Cape flats and in the neighbourhood of Cape Town.

Is Woodstock on the Cape flats? Perhaps I am out in my geography. He tried to hold the amendment up to ridicule because it would give permission to a man to start a jam factory in Woodstock. It does nothing of the sort. It applies to a bona fide occupation carried on by a farmer. The Minister says his amendment meets the position and covers everything, yet he admitted in his earlier speech that technically the very farming operations which I outlined did come under his clause. He bulks the question entirely. We want to be fully and adequately contracted out of this Act. For that reason I am not quite sure that my amendment still does not meet the position better than the Minister's or any of the others. I have only asked him to cut out the words " produce grown or animals kept by him ". I am only asking him to accept the principle that where you take your neighbour's milk and make cheese or your neighbour's fruit and pack it with your own, you are contracted out. If the Minister will be good enough to explain how farmers will benefit by being technically left under the clause so far as certain industries are concerned, we on both sides of the House will be very grateful.

The hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) said that instead of pressure being brought by the Labour party on the Minister, pressure has been brought by the Nationalist section, of the Pact to make the Minister amend his Bill in the direction in which he has done. I do not deny that. The only thing I say is that these people have gone a great deal further than he has gone, and I was trying to point out to them the position in which they find themselves placed. The Minister was good enough when this Bill was under discussion at another period before the consolidation measure came in to say he would inquire into certain questions I put to him. The questions I then put to the Minister were: If two farmers utilizing the products of their farms combine in one shed to treat those products, and three people or more are employed in the treating of them, do they come under the whole of the provisions of the Factories Act?

He has amended that.

I ask my hon. friend with his amendment.

No, they do not.

If two adjoining farmers join co-operatively to deal with the products of both their farms—

What sort of products?

Any products— the produce of both farms—whether they bring their sheep together and shear them in a common shearing shed where shearing machinery is used, I ask my hon. friend if the Minister will not answer me, will they come under the Factories Act? Does the hon. member deny it?

Yes, you do not shear sheep all the year round.

In many cases you do. In many cases people are shearing different flocks of sheep at different periods. If two farmers adjoining one another desire to treat their products together in one shed where three or more people are employed, and those products are not all grown on the same farms, but on one or two adjoining farms, do they fall under the provisions of the Factories Act.

Read the definition yourself.

Might I ask the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) if he knows of a single case where anything like this has happened where there has been any interference whatever? Can he tell me where any farmer has been interfered with by virtue of allowing his neighbour to assist him in packing or manufacturing his products? My amendment now exempts both those two farmers if they have their buildings or factories on their own farms, so that the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort on his farm could manufacture cheese or butter to his heart's content, and sell it, and he would be exempt. The hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) on the next farm could also manufacture butter and cheese to his heart's content and also be exempt. Surely no court is going to say, that being the case, that if the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) sends some supplies to the hon. member for Fort Beaufort he is guilty of an offence. You cannot be guilty of an offence because your factory is put up for your own use, and as you are using it for your own use you are exempt. The hon. member could do the same. You have two exempted persons and you are now trying to make out a hypothetical case which has not happened and trying to make out that two persons who are exempt, if one does it for the other, they are both going to be guilty. I do not see how any court can prosecute, because the court would say, " You could do this on your own, so what you could do individually, you ought to be able to do collectively."

Take out the words " grown or produced on the farm " and you meet us.

Then you open the door to their getting stuff from all over the Union and putting up a big factory. A farmer could then purchase his requirements from all parts of the country and put up a big factory in competition with others. We do not want to do that, and that is the reason why those words are in. If the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) became more of a manufacturer than a farmer and purchased large supplies from all and sundry, not his neighbours—he always brings in his neighbours, like the poor widow—if he were to start purchasing raw material from all and sundry and to put up a big factory for the manufacture of those materials, I say he would be a manufacturer, not a farmer, and he should then come under the Factories Act. The cases he quotes are simple cases, and I do not see where it is possible for any court to interfere.

The Minister has been kind enough to answer me, but I do not think he has answered the question I put to him. He may be a very kind-hearted soul, and he may make provision out of his generosity for such cases as have arisen, but when you are amending Acts of Parliament you do not amend them in such a way as to leave them to the idiosyncracies of a particular Minister to do what he thinks fit at the proper time. We have found that these clauses can be interpreted far more stringently than was originally contemplated, and we have also learnt that Labour ministers may not always be so complacent as the Minister of Labour. We have heard it stated by the hon. member for Umbilo (Mr. Reyburn) and also by the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) that they rather disapprove—I think that is not the only question on which the hon. member disagrees with the Minister of Labour—of the complacency of the Minister. I was under the impression that there were even more vital questions than those that divide my hon. friend (Mr. Kentridge) and the Minister of Labour and if, as I understand, there are different sections of the Labour party who are trying to secure the good graces of the Nationalist party and the section of the Labour party represented by my hon. friend (Mr. Kentridge) and his friends supplant the section of the Labour party represented by the Minister and his friends, they might go by the letter of the law. I ask the Minister again for a straight answer: If I, on my farm at Stellenbosch, have a packing shed for dealing with fruit and have automatic graders going into it, either worked by hand or by a small engine, and I join my brother farmer and we treat our fruit together, is it not possible under the law, for the Minister, if he were not so soft-hearted as the Minister is, to bring us to book under his own amendment? The Minister, in his responsible position, dare not deny that that is the case, and that is a thing that we want to protect ourselves against. If I erect a small grading-plant and a small transmitter to put my boxes on it as they come out of the grader and as they are packed and if my hon. friend, the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger), or any other farmer who is growing citrus trees on an adjoining farm brings his produce to be dealt with on my farm, we would be dealing with the produce of two farms, and if we employed more than three people it would be open to a less complacent Minister to bring these operations under the law.

I would like to put a case to the Minister. In my district we are not concerned about fruit-growing. We are stock-farmers, but we go in for agriculture and grain-growing on a small scale. We do not grow sufficient grain so that every individual farmer can buy his own threshing machine. The farmers club together and' buy a small threshing machine and they have a mill. They thresh their corn and grind it in the mill and I would like to know whether that would fall under the Factories Act.

No.

I should like to put a case to my hon. friend. I have a grading machine, run by a petrol engine, and I employ more than three hands. Where does that come in?

You are exempt.

Yes, but supposing another farmer wants to come in and join with me?

You are both exempt. You are putting these hypothetical cases. In the first place, you are growing the stuff, grading it, packing it, and sending it away as a farmer on your own property. It does not matter whether you have 300 employees. You are not affected by the number. A man comes to you, he does not want to go in for a plant like that, and he asks you to do it. It seems to me two exempted persons are not to be found guilty for doing something which, individually, they are both exempted from. If you take out this proviso about " on his own farm," then you are going to open the door to any farmer purchasing raw materials from all parts of the country, and going in for large scale manufacture. The bona fide farming operations or those he has referred to, he can take it from me there has been no interference with, and there will be no interference with, but to go and try and prevent that is to open the door to possible abuses, and the second stage will be ten times worse than the first. Another thing. The hon. member talks about the citrus industry and export and so on. It is all seasonal. Any number of these places have their seasonal exemptions. There is no doubt whatever about it, but you want to close the door so that it will lead to much greater abuse and make the position much more difficult. If the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) would tell me he has been interfered with in doing anything like this, or has not been able to get seasonal exemption for the process he now refers to, I should be exceedingly surprised. Well, I know it is not true. There is no operation which has been referred to here, which cannot, under the Act, Be adequately met. If you support the amendment, such as has been suggested, by those on the opposite side, you are going to open the door to many abuses. I am not prepared to accept it.

I understand, so far as regards butter and cheese making, they do not come under the Bill, but suppose with my own fruit I start jam making?

Under the amendment you are exempt.

But suppose two farmers join together to make jam, then they are not exempt? If I make jam on my own place, it is all right, but if I take fruit from another farmer and we join forces, is that a factory?

There you come to the two individuals who are exempted as individuals, trying to make them guilty if they do together what they are legally able to do separately. I do not think any court would convict in circumstances like that, because you are both able to do it individually and why should it be a crime if you help each other. Your season might be a bit later than that of your neighbour. You might help him when your fruit is on and he might help you. These are hypothetical cases.

Has the Minister ever heard of a maze? Has he ever got into a labyrinth, because I should imagine he had by the extraordinary manner in which he is arguing. He says if I have a right to do a thing, I can do it, and if my friend has a right to do a thing, he can do it. That is provided for in the Bill. That is not what we are talking about. What I am saying is this: That I can only do things from produce grown, or animals kept by me on my own individual farm, but I am asking the Minister what the position is when I am dealing with products produced by me and by my neighbour, and the answer given by the Minister is no answer.

Is it not logical?

Even his political friend and colleague is smiling at the answer he has been giving. Even the hon. member for Maritzburg (North) (Mr. Strachan) realizes the illogical position in which the Minister places himself. Why does not the Minister get up and honestly say that if two farmers combine, then, under the law, even as he proposes to administer it, the Minister holding his position can bring them up under the Factories Act, and if he did, any court in the country would convict them? Let us know exactly where we are. The Minister knows there is a very old saying that you can fool individuals for a particular period of time, but you cannot fool everybody all the time. And my hon. friend will not succeed in continuing to fool even a simple soul like the representative of Graaff-Reinet (Mr. I. P. van Heerden). In the end he will find out you cannot fool them all the time. I do not object to the Minister being obstinate; I do not object to him, with the power he possesses in the Cabinet, insisting on his amendment. What I object to is the Minister not standing up and honestly confessing what is going to be the effect of the amendment if it is legally carried out.

There is no doubt the effect of the amendment of the Minister is to improve things to this extent that, whereas the original section only protected such operations on the farm as far as food and drink were concerned, now the Minister's amendment protects it for all purposes. As the Act is now, it is limited to operations on the one farm and at the same time also limited to the manufacture of articles for food and drink. The Minister takes away the limitation in regard to food and drink, but he does not deal with the other difficulty. The Minister has not created the difficulty; the difficulty is in the existing law. I quite agree, the Minister's amendment does not touch the other point. The other point is you will find the Act does not protect the farmer, it protects the farm. That is the governing point of the whole section.

The Minister won't own that.

It is quite obvious if a farmer who is a neighbour comes on that farm with his produce, so far as his produce is concerned that produce is not being prepared on a farm of which he is the owner or occupier. I am not trying to make party capital, but this amendment does not touch this point at all in regard to another farm. It protects the farmer only on his own farm. There can be no doubt if it came into a court of law it would have to find him guilty. If hon. members read the first line they will see that those words govern the rest of the sentence and if the intention of the Government is to make such a thing legal, there should be a further amendment.

The last speaker is quite correct; there is no question or quarrel about that.

The Minister has been denying it all through.

Can the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt) mention to me any farming operation, as he tells us, that lasts for 12 full months, and where you employ three people continuously? If you take your fruit farm, you have a season of three, four or five months, and then it is finished

That has nothing to do with the point.

It has everything to do with it. If the right hon. member for Fort Beaufort and the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) combine in their fruit industry, say for instance, citrus, and have a season of five months, they can have 20 to 100 men employed for those months, and will not come under this Factories Act. They are exempt, because they do not employ three people for more than 12 months continuously. But, of course, the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) understands by this time that his amendment is a hopeless one for the farming population. If you want to meet the position we ought not to delete the words proposed by the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) or accept the amendment of the hon. member for Hospital, but we should delete these words, if the Minister is willing to accept it, " of which he is the owner or occupier." In Section 2 you exempt the farm, but not the farmer. The farm is exempt if a bona fide farmer prepares bona fide produce produced by him, or animals kept by him—but those words are limited to his own farm. If you take out those words it will allow his neighbour to come to his shed, but it must be his own produce or animals kept by him, and he must be a bona fide farmer. It makes no difference to the principle of this section, and I will not move it unless the Minister is prepared to accept it. Why cannot I take my cream to my neighbour's farm if he has a machine?

I understand the hon. member, when he lives in Johannesburg, has a brass plate, and at the bottom, in microscopic characters, appears his name. It is a clear indication of the very microscopic knowledge of the law the hon. member has.

Ask your friend, the lion, member for Cape Town (Gardens) (Mr. Coulter) whether I am correct or not.

He continually harps on the question that a factory is a place where employees must be in whole time employment. A factory can be (a) any place where mechanical power is used, and there is no definition of employees at all, and (c) is a separate definition and one which also comes under the Act. Have I driven that into the intelligence of the hon. member? Let him drop the idea that a factory must employ a certain number of people in whole time employment. (c) is a distinct definition. A factory is any premises in which mechanical power is used. It has taken us from 5 o'clock in the afternoon to drive into the Minister's head the fact that his amendment does not cover operations where two farmers join together. At last the hon. member who has just spoken admits this. We have at last arrived at a perfectly clear understanding that when a farmer is treating produce grown on his neighbour's farm, he comes under the Factories Act. Does the Minister mean in his exemption of agricultural operations that if I buy from or take milk from my neighbour and make it into butter or cheese, I come under the Factories Act? If he means that and if he wishes to keep his word to the farmers that he desires to exempt legitimate farming operations, let him accept my amendment. In the agricultural world we have to co-operate and manufacture our neighbour's product, pack his fruit, and possibly shear his sheep. The Minister's amendment, however, does not cover this point. The Minister apparently is afraid that he will open the door to possible abuses of the exemption.

I am.

The Act will not be interpreted by the Minister, but by the courts, which will decide that any produce not grown on the farm where it is manufactured, will immediately bring that factory within the scope of the Factories Act. Unless the Minister will accept the amendment which makes the point clear, the Act will bear very hardly on the farmers, who should not be prevented from helping one another.

It seems to me that hon. members are now splitting hairs, and I cannot understand how we can pass a law which deals with every possibility and obviates all small mistakes there may be in it. The result would be that the Act would be larger than the whole statute book. I am a farmer myself, and have to represent farming interests. When the Minister introduced this Bill, I said: Look, we must see that the farmer gets more protection under it than under the 1918 Act. We saw the Minister and got certain amendments made in sub-clause 2. That was done by us.

After we had opened your eyes.

No, our eyes were already opened, and we saw in 1918 what the effect of the Act would be. Now hon. members opposite say that if we two farmers co-operate in shearing sheep it is a factory. That is unnatural, it is not stuff which is made or produced. If I join with a neighbour in buying a machine to shear our sheep jointly, because I cannot afford to buy one alone, and my sheep and my wool remain my property, and his sheep and wool his property, that is two farmers only cooperate and help each other, will hon. members opposite say that is a factory? It is nothing but splitting hairs. The Bill can possibly be further improved, but in any case, it is an improvement in the protection of the farmer. Every proposal on the Bill from the other side makes it worse. I am glad that we have induced the Minister to go so far, and if it appears in future that the application of the Act is abused, then it will still be time enough to come to Parliament for the necessary amendments.

Why should we not make them now?

It is impossible to deal with every possibility in the Bill, as it would then be larger than the statute book. The law is being made much better than before by this proposed Bill, and if we find out next year that the Minister is not administering it as we expect, then we can make the necessary amendments.

There has been a great deal of talk about continuous employment, but the Act makes no mention of that.

Whole-time employment.

That is quite different. What a fine state of affairs it would be if a factory could be worked for 11 months and closed for one month, and the manufacturer could therefore claim to be free from observing the conditions of the Factories Act. That means that if you employ a man to do this work by the day, his whole day must be in your employment; if you employ him by the week his whole time must be in your employment and similarly by the month. It does not mean that you have to carry on for a year. Whole-time employment is opposed to part-time employment. The moment a factory opens it has to comply with the law, even if it closes down the following day. Members are confusing continuous employment with whole-time employment. Whole-time means that it must not be casual employment, say for half a day, while doing other work for somebody else the rest of the day, but for the whole time the man must be employed with the particular work according to the working hours allowed by the law. It does not mean that if a man does not work at that work the whole year you can escape the obligations of the factory law. Whole-time is quite different from continuous employment, and confusion has arisen from hon. members thinking that whole-time employment means continuous employment during the year.

I would urge my hon. friend to reconsider the situation. Two very important points have been brought out. The first is that my hon. friend is wrong when he said my neighbour could bring his stuff to my place and we could do it together. That is against the law.

I said no court would convict.

We cannot make laws on those lines. I have seen cases myself in which, when we have passed a law, and it has gone to the judges they say, " That may be the intention of Parliament, but that is not our business. We have to administer the law as we find it." I could mention several cases within my own knowledge and experience. Then there is the other point which has now been raised about whole-time. I have been wondering what whole-time meant. All along my hon. friend the Minister and members generally have taken the wrong view. I would urge my hon. friend to move to report progress and ask leave to sit again and go thoroughly into the matter in the light of the discussion that has taken place. I am certain my hon. friend must have learnt a lot. I know I have. Then he could draw up an amendment with the assistance of the law advisers which would meet the whole position. The position has been tremendously clarified this evening. It may be irritating to my hon. friend, but I think it has been.

I think the Minister would be wise to listen to the appeal just made to him. It seems to be clear, after this detailed discussion, that the hon. the Minister can hardly have had the benefit of the full advice of his advisers. It is clear that the Minister, and those who have supported him, have been suffering under what seems to be a misapprehension in regard to three very important points. I think the Minister has been giving us his own interpretation, and in fairness, to those who may be advising him from the legal aspect, he should give them an opportunity of considering the whole position. Anyone listening to this debate until the last few minutes would have come to the conclusion that there was in this Act a stipulation with reference to the conduct of factories which are kept open continuously throughout the year. We heard the Minister himself and others continually using those expressions and, as the hon. member for Cape Town (Central) (Mr. Jagger) has observed, until the matter was gone into fully I do not think anyone realized that the Minister and others were placing such a misinterpretation on those words. I do not think it is a matter on which we should necessarily blame the Minister. He should ask his advisers whether or not these views are correct. He has been giving us to understand that " whole-time work " means " whole year work." The hon. member for Hanover Street (Mr. Alexander) has made that point abundantly clear. Let us take another point. The Minister seems to be under the belief that if in his judgment no court of law should deal with the case which has been put to him repeatedly to-night that would be sufficient warrant to justify any farmer acting in co-operation with other farmers. The argument of the hon. the Minister comes to this—that he will put his Act through and if any unfortunate farmer is prosecuted for doing the very thing to which his attention has been drawn it will then be sufficient for the farmer to produce a copy of " Hansard " and quote the assurance given by the hon. the Minister. If the hon. the Minister were always supported by the hon. Minister for Justice, a farmer, under those circumstances, might feel disposed to put the law on one side and to say: " I will exercise my rights on the strength of what I see in ' Hansard." Has it always been the case that the Minister of Justice has seen eye to eye with the Minister of Labour? I call to mind a case not so long ago when the Minister of Labour took up a certain attitude in regard to building work carried on on farms, and he gave the world to understand that if, in his view, there was an infringement of his particular interpretation, he would see there was a prosecution. We recollect that considerable perturbation was aroused because of a statement to the contrary effect: the Minister of Justice does not always see eye to eye with the hon. the Minister and he stated he was not prepared to act in the way in which he was asked. Is it not possible that while he was giving us the assurance that there would be no prosecution, his colleague might have been thinking that there would be. After all, there are farmers who are in very great doubt as to the value of the assurances of the hon. the Minister of Labour. If the Minister went down to a place called Doornkop at the present time and reminded the persons who have been residing there for the last two or three years of what he assured them some time ago their prospects would be, and then compared these assurances with the present situation, would it be possible to convince them that the assurances of the hon. the Minister of Labour are immutable like the laws of the Medes and Persians? I almost feel that if he went down there to-day he would find it difficult to address them. He would be like the Minister of Mines and Industries, who does not like the word " Licht en burg " mentioned in his presence.

What has this to do with the Bill? You are wasting time.

That remark illustrates one of my difficulties. The more you try to persuade the Minister, the more he says: " What has that to do with this Bill? " When he says: " What have these matters to do with the Bill? " and " What has Doornkop to do with the Bill?" I would like to remind him that Doornkop is quoted against him to show the fallibility of the assurances which he gave to the poor settlers at that place. The hon. member for Krugersdorp (the Rev. Mr. Hattingh) has frankly pointed out that there is a serious flaw in this definition, and I think this debate has served one purpose, if it has served no other, and that is, it has convinced the hon. member for Krugersdorp. He has pointed out what the effect must be unless the words " who is also the owner or occupier thereof " are struck out, but he has still left unfortunately a consequential amendment in the next line of the clause which does not fulfil the object he has in view. Let me put it to the Minister, because I want to assist him—

You are about the last man to assist anybody.

Could there be anything more discouraging, after I have been standing here drawing attention to matters which the Minister would not listen to in the first instance, to find him now describing me as the last person who wants to assist him? I sympathise with the Minister in the difficult position in which he is placed, harassed as he is with Labour troubles, and the difficulty of being unable to tell us what particular part of the Labour party he belongs to. Surely he should not accuse us of failing to assist him. Let me invite his attention seriously to what I am going to say. What the hon. member for Krugersdorp wished to provide was this—he wanted those bona fide farmers who may work in co-operation for their joint farming interests, to be relieved from the onerous obligations that are laid upon them by this particular section. What is required to give effect to that? In place of confining his amendment to the omission of these words, I would like to suggest to the Minister that after the words " kept by him " in subsection (2), we should add words to this effect, so that this particular section will read as follows—

[Time limit.]

There being no intermittent speaker, the hon. member for Hospital.

I should like to make an appeal to the Minister. The discussion this evening has been very interesting. The question is bristling with problems, and is not so simple as the Minister thinks. I confess it is not so simple as I thought it was. Various valuable suggestions have been put forward. Various amendments have been suggested, and I would suggest to the Minister in all seriousness, that he should analyze those suggestions and see whether he can meet the legitimate desire on the part of the farmers to co-operate in the circumstances stated by the right hon. the member for Fort Beaufort (Sir Thomas Smartt). We have heard from the hon. member sitting behind the Minister that it was at his instigation and that of his colleagues in the Nationalist party that the Minister was approached and told he must see that the farmers were exempted from the provisions of this Act— naturally within reason. I think a considerable amount of light has been shed on the question. If it is his earnest desire, as I assume it is, to give to the farmers that relief to which they are entitled, and which he has promised, then he will amend this section of the Act so that the relief may be clear and unequivocal, and so that the farmers will be rendered independent of the goodwill of the Minister in carrying on their operations. He can come with an amendment that will appeal to everybody. There need not be any further discussion. I think with the assistance of the law advisers, he can bring an amendment which can be generally accepted. He is under a misapprehension. He has read the law wrongly. There is a conflict of opinion, and in the circumstances, I think he should not take up such a dogmatic attitude, but should come to the conclusion that this is a question on which he should, and in fact is bound to, take the advice of his law advisers, and then come to the House again with a section which will be acceptable to Parliament. As far as I am concerned—and I think I am speaking for my colleagues—he will get every assistance and every co-operation. There will be no objection. On the whole, it has been a very free and full discussion, and therefore I appeal to the Minister to let us adjourn the debate.

I think the matter has been very fully discussed. The amendment which I have on the paper has been drawn up by the law advisers. It meets the position, I think—

No.

To the extent to which we are going to allow it to be met.

Oh.

Is that a threat?

And any other alteration is going to open the door to no end of abuses. As the matter has been fully discussed since 5 o'clock, I move—

Oh no.

Most unfair.

Upon which the committee divided:

Is it not competent to propose a further amendment as suggested by the hon. member for Hospital (Mr. Papenfus) on this clause?

A new clause may be moved if this clause is deleted.

Amendment proposed by Mr. Gilson put, and the committee divided: