I just want to say a few words in answer to the question of the hon. member for East London (Brig.-Gen. Byron) whether I was prepared to make a statement in connection with the resignation of the Minister of Mines and Industries. I want to inform the House that Mr. Beyers, unfortunately owing to his bad state of health, sent in his resignation as Minister as from 1st August. I just want to add that I am specially sorry, as indeed are all who know with what efficiency he ran his department, that he has to retire for this reason. I may further add, as has already been stated in the paper, that the present Administrator of the Cape Province is intended to be his successor.

I welcome the announcement that the Government is going to appoint a commission to enquire into the working of the Miners’ Phthisis Act. There have been complaints that the various sections are not working equitably, and it seems to me that the amendment of some of them is necessary. It will, therefore, be useful if the commission can enquire into the complaints and give the complainants an opportunity to explain their grievances. The hon. member for Vrededorp (Maj. Roberts) would have the House believe that the mines are doing nothing for miners who contract this disease. In compensation alone the mines are paying £800,000 a year. They have paid £10,600,000 in compensation since 1912. In addition to that they are putting aside annual amounts for their outstanding liability in respect of the miners who have contracted phthisis, and this increases the amount of £800,000 by almost one-third. In addition, the mines provide employment for sufferers to a larger extent than any other employer. It is clearly shown that the mines are doing what they can for these unfortunate men. I should also mention that the provision for the prevention of miners’ phthisis involves a very considerable expenditure on the part of the mines, and this provision has always been gladly made by the mines. In respect of native labour, I trust the Government will give every encouragement towards the recruiting of native labour from whatever source may be available to increase the number needed for the coal mines and the gold mines of the Witwatersrand. This Portuguese treaty is going to hit the mines very hard in this respect, and it will be necessary to make up the complement required from other sources, unless we wish to see many mines going back, and further unemployment created on the Witwatersrand, because in proportion to the number of natives employed, the number of whites will fluctuate also. The Portuguese treaty also hits another section of the community very hard, and that is the reef traders. In my own constituency they have unanimously complained of the way in which the treaty affects them. Natives returning to Portuguese territory have to-day to pay, under the treaty, customs duty on any goods they take over the border, instead of the allowance of 7s. 6d. per head, which used to be paid by our Government for them in commutation. These natives purchase on the average £4 or £5 worth of goods per head before returning to Portuguese territory. One would think it would be good business to arrange with the Portuguese Government for another commutation. If 7s. 6d. is not enough, a larger amount might be paid, and still leave a balance in our favour, either through customs duties paid on the goods, or through purchase of goods manufactured by us. I, therefore, recommend this point to the attention of the Minister. The hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) said a few days ago that we were paying £9,000,000 in duties for the protection of local industries. The hon. member for Benoni (Mr. Madeley) extended that, and added on another £5,000,000. In the first place, I agree with the hon. member for Benoni that the figure of £9,000,000 should be increased, because what is paid directly in customs dues does not reflect what the consumer pays. If an article is imported at 10s. and a duty of 2s. is paid on it, it must be costing the importer 12s. If the distribution cost increased the import price by 50 per cent., it would cost 18s. to the consumer, and I think the hon. member was perfectly right in increasing the £9,000,000 to £14,000,000. But there is an additional important factor, and that is that, although you are not paying direct taxes on the articles manufactured in this country, the consumer does pay upon them to the same extent as if you imported them. If you purchased for 18s. an article manufactured in South Africa, an article that you could have imported and have paid only 15s. for you have paid 3s. extra, so that whether it was manufactured in South Africa or not, you still pay 18s. for an article that would otherwise cost 15s. Therefore, one has to add a proportionate amount to articles manufactured in South Africa in order to get the total sum the consumer pays for the benefit of South African manufacturers. I have taken the figures from the year book, 1927-’28, and I find in the first place that the £9,000,000 includes duties on many articles not manufactured in South Africa. I have taken a list of six classes of goods which have to pay duty if they are imported, and which are competitive with South African manufactures. Of these we imported 34.7 million pounds’ worth of goods on which was paid 6.5 million pounds duty, the imported value being thus 41.2 millions. On the same class of goods we manufactured 72.1 million pounds’ worth in South Africa, of which 51.5 million pounds represented wages and money spent on South African materials. A proportionate duty on these would have been 11.4 millions. We have to add the cost of distribution, say, 25 per cent., and if we do that we find that £22.4 million is the cost to the consumer of articles to the value of £72,000,000 produced in South Africa, of which 51.5 millions represents the wages and salaries and the cost of purchasing South African materials. This is the net figure I arrived at from my analysis of the figures of the Year Book, that is, in respect of these six classes of goods, the consumer has to bear 43.4 per cent. of the full value, and our protection policy is costing him 22.4 millions for 51.5 millions spent by the manufacturer in South Africa. One may say it is a very high figure, and a very poor result from our protective policy, but I do not agree with that, and, like the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge), I am a thorough protectionist myself, but I wish to know what I am doing. I think the policy is fully justified, the stream of money we are circulating in South Africa and the employment we are giving have increased prosperity, with the result that what we have been reaping has amply repaid the cost to the consumer. But we have to guard against carrying this policy too far, and in illustration of that, one may refer to the case of Australia, where a similar policy has been pursued, coupled with that of raising wages by means of the arbitration courts they have in operation there. The result is that wages have had to be raised to cope with the cost of living, and these increases of wages have again to be applied to the cost of production which has increased that of articles manufactured in that country, and that again requires a higher tariff. So there is an increase in the cost of production and higher wages, and these have been chasing each other in a vicious circle, in an ascending spiral, as it were. This is clearly set out in the report of the Economic Commission published this year, which should be studied by every hon. member who takes an interest in this question. I will read only a short sentence—

That is the direction in which we are heading. Although we have no arbitration courts, we have wages boards and industrial machinery which will produce the same results even if more slowly. Farmers need not think that they will not be affected. The Australian farmers thought the same thing many years ago, but first the gold mines were closed down and finally the farming industry is beginning to feel the pinch. It may be said the same thing has not taken place in the United States of America, but the reason is there is such a large internal market there that they are not dependent on the world’s markets for the sale of primary goods. In South Africa we have to be careful to see what we are doing and to see what the effect will be on the gold mines and farming industries, which both produce products which have to be sold abroad; and most of our other mining products also would have to suffer, as they also have to be sold abroad. We should take warning in time, and shape our policy somewhat differently from what is being done at present. I am one of those who believe that a way can be found out of the difficulty and that there are ways and means of obviating it by pursuing a slightly different policy; and I trust the Government will investigate the matter, and if necessary appoint a commission to enquire into it and see if we cannot devise a different policy which will, no doubt, protect our local industries as effectively as the tariff has done and not have the effect of increasing the cost of our primary products. On the question of low grade ore on the Witwatersrand, I think it will be of interest if I give some figures as to the magnitude of the problem with which we are dealing. Millions have been spoken of, but I think it will be better to give concrete figures. The Mining Industry Board, in 1922, had some figures prepared by the Chamber of Mines and revised by the Government Mining Engineer’s Department placed before it, which are the only ones in existence to-day, and these figures show that at that date the mines had payable ore (4½ pennyweights) of 340,000,000 tons, and that the ore below this limit of payability, down to 3 pennyweights, was 440,000,000 tons. In this unpayable tonnage was included also some payable tonnage, but in mines and areas which were unpayable on the whole. The figures to-day, no doubt, would be quite different, but would still be very large, and what it means is that if the payable limit could be reduced from 4½ to 3 pennyweights, that is, if the cost could be reduced by 6s. a ton, we would have 440,000,000 tons of additional ore available on the Witwatersrand. Taking these figures as a basis, they are equivalent to this, that for every shilling of reduction you can make in working costs, we should have from 75 million tons of ore made workable. That means that ore worth £60,000,000 to South Africa in money spent on it would be rendered workable. Tf you spread that over a period of 20 years it would mean £3,000,000 extra expended in wages and materials in South Africa every year. That is a very valuable figure, because £3,000,000 when compared with the gold mining industry is small, but it means an industry nearly as large as the coal mining industry of the Union. I mention this so that the Government may be induced to assist in reducing costs in various ways. I do not expect everything from the Government. The main burden of bringing this tonnage into use will rest upon our engineers. They have already done wonders, and many of these men are the sons of South Africa. It is to these men I look to spread abroad our name and fame and not to the ambassadors with long titles whom we are going to send abroad. These men have made our mines on the Witwatersrand attain the position of being recognized as the most efficient gold mines in the world. We look to them to reduce costs in the first place. In the second place, the Government can do something. I have already referred to the question of coal rates. Then there are the native pass fees, a large amount of £240,000 a year, for which, at the present day, there is no other justification than that it serves as a source of revenue. There is one other item, and that is a reduction in the claim licences. The claim licences have already been partly remitted as a result of legislation passed in 1918, but only part of it, and if the whole of the State’s share of claim licences were remitted both for diggers’ licences and for prospecting licences, it would mean a saving of £140,000. In this connection the Government can handsomely assist the gold mines, and most of this money would come back to them, because the profits would increase, and the Government would share in the profits. A great deal of this money would come back to them, partly in increased income tax from the mines, and partly also in another way. It was calculated by Mr. Collie years ago, in a report which he made for the Government, that very large sums of money accrued directly and indirectly to the Government from the working of gold mines. He calculated that an amount of at least 4s. 1d. was contributed to the revenue for every ton that is worked, and that the railways benefited to the same extent. Therefore, for every ton worked more than 8s. comes back to the State, including the railways. The amount of 8s. on 3¾ million tons is £1,500,000 per annum which would come back to the coffers of the State. I say, therefore, that this is a most important question which fully justifies any attention the Government and the House can give to it. We have heard a great deal of the fertilizing influence of irrigation in this country. I am a hearty believer in irrigation schemes. A stream of water flows through our land, producing handsome results in the way of produce. The influence of money is of the same character. This fructifying influence of money which flows from the mines into the country in the form of wages, the purchase of farmers’ produce and of manufactured articles, acts like an irrigation scheme which brings wealth, prosperity and employment wherever it goes. I, therefore, consider that the two things may very well be considered on the same footing, and that where one deserves consideration and support, the other does likewise.

The hon. member for Springs (Sir Robert Kotzé) has had a long and honourable record in the mines department, and he speaks with authority on the subject of mining. This afternoon he has followed the lead given him by the hon. member for Kimberley (Sir Ernest Oppenheimer) in laying a number of complaints at the door of this Government which he himself in the past probably had a chance of rectifying. With regard to the first question that he touched upon, he said he noticed that the Government was introducing a measure to ameliorate the position of the unfortunate men who suffered from phthisis, but said the House probably had forgotten that the mining industry already paid £800,000 a year towards the amelioration of the conditions of these men. The hon. member, however, forgot to tell the House that the mines are producing these unfortunate people at the rate of one a day, and that it is the Government’s duty to see that the amount set apart for these men is augmented in proportion to the amount of revenue we receive from the mines. He complained also that the Government had restricted the purchasing power of boys on the mines, so that they made their purchases in Mozambique territory instead of on the Witwatersrand, but the hon. member forgot to say that had it not been for the action of the Government in restricting them, the whole of this money would have accrued to the mining trading companies. It makes very little difference whether this money is spent inside the country or outside. If spent inside the Union it would have gone towards the increase of dividends. The question that he brought up to you here this afternoon and which the member for Kimberley (Sir Ernest Oppenheimer) stressed here in the House was as regards the working costs of the mines creeping up and the Government taking no steps to assist them. I have taken the trouble to take a few figures from the mining report which the hon. member has read. In 1910, there were recovered 6.68 pennyweights and the working cost was 19s. 10d.; in 1917, they recovered 6.37 on a working cost of 19s. 2d.; in 1924, 6.5 pennyweights on a working cost of 20s.; 1927, 6.6 pennyweights on a working cost of 19s. 7d. Where does he find this big falling-off? With regard to the grade of the mines existing at the present time. In 1910 it was 6.68 pennyweights and the working cost was 19s. 10d. and in 1927, 6.6 pennyweights on a working cost of 19s. 7d. As he suggested to the House this Government has ever interfered with the mining companies in order to deal with the grade. Has this Government ever interfered in the mining industry and laid it down and said “your grade in that particular mine is laid down because the mines are a Government asset; and the Government would be within their right in laying down that every mine on the Rand is a potential low grade mine in the future. If the Government does not take that action why come back and say “there are these millions of tons of unworkable rock left.” What a man has been working on his finding, let us remember that fact. It is one of the natural corollaries which follows that the working cost will automatically increase. The deficiency on the Rand has increased. The hon. member has not quoted the deficiency in 1904 and the deficiency to-day. If we were working on the 1904 figures to-day, the whole of the mining industry on the Rand would be closed down. In 1904-’05, the proportion of men employed was 2.5 whites, and 2.10 coloured in order to produce a thousand tons of rock. We had .7 white and .62 coloured as compared with .95 to produce that thousand tons of rock. I stated the elimination of low-grade mines is largely depending on the industry itself and it depends on how far they are willing to carry out that means. The member for Kimberley put in a very strong plea and he told us that one of the best institutions we had in this country at the present time was the stock exchange. We are well aware that the hon. member for Kimberley has been very successful on the stock exchange, but I do not think that the Minister of Finance will ever go to the stock exchange to increase his finances. The member for Springs (Sir Robert Kotzé) during the period during which he was Government mining engineer was largely for the restricted area which the Rand occupied. He said that when the sub-section of the Nigel was worked out, there would be no Rand left. I wonder what would have happened if the mining engineer had taken up a wider attitude at the time; if he followed the Rand to Vredefort and put down some holes there and seen that there was a possibility of a Rand extending in that direction, or whether he had seen that a sum of money should be set aside for land development. If we do not talk too much about low grade mines of the future, we would have been able to look out and do more prospecting for new mines. The hon. member for Springs is just as much aware as I am that the determining factor is the amount of native labour available for that market and that is the one reason why those groups are so jealously guarding that area shall not be extended at the present time. They are jealous in that for any further extension which takes place there will be a larger force of native labour available. I contend that the hon. member for Kimberley (Sir Ernest Oppenheimer) would be very much annoyed at any extension of gold mining outside the limits of the areas which the groups are so favourably controlling. Group control on the Rand is limited to a few very large companies, with very extensive claim holdings, and when they reach the boundaries of their areas they can always come to the Government and obtain fresh claims. Owing to the great depth at which it is now necessary to mine on the Witwatersrand, the public is not able to establish small mines in that vicinity, so that the existing mines are in a position to control the deep levels so long as they control the present deep level mines. If the hon. member for Springs (Sir Robert Kotzé) had applied to the Government that it should make available these valuable claims he would have been more sincere, and would have had more sympathy from this side of the House. The hon. member for Kimberley explained to the House that the diamond industry was in a very precarious position, and that the diamond syndicate was in a very “choppy” state owing to the depreciation of diamonds engendered by the Government’s diamond mining operations in Namaqualand. He suggested that a conference of diamond producers should be held to establish confidence in the industry. The hon. member, however, did not tell us whether that conference should be attended by the representatives of diamond producers from Angola and Kenya. In 1926 Parliament passed an Act to control the diamond output, but up to the present the Government has not seen it necessary to introduce the measure of control indicated here. The hon. member pointed out that owing to discoveries in Namaqualand and the expansion of diamond cutting in the Union it was necessary for that conference to meet. I wonder if the hon. gentleman did not think how impossible it was for any conference on those lines to come to an equitable agreement so far as the allocation of the different quotas is concerned. The hon. gentleman, if he had wanted to meet the Government, should have suggested that it was time for the Government to call a diamond control board into existence, for it would be impossible for any Government to decide how the allocation of output could be made. For instance, the Government has itself become a very largely interested party on account of the Namaqualand stones, and then there is the position of the mines that are closed down and the different alluvial interests also have to be considered. If the hon. member had made such a suggestion, we should have believed in his sincerity. But when he told us the conference was entirely necessary on account of Namaqualand, he is trying to get around a position in a manner that is not quite seriously intended so far as he is concerned. The hon. member for Kimberley further stated that a diamond cutting industry could not be established in the Union on a large scale on a 10 per cent. export tax, and he suggested that the diamond buying syndicate was taking a very active interest in the advancement of a South African diamond cutting industry. He is quite aware that the diamond buying syndicate would cease to function if all our diamonds were cut in South Africa. So when he told us that the diamond buying syndicate is actively interested in diamond cutting in the Union he is speaking against his better judgement, because he is not interested in the cutting industry to the extent he wants us to believe. He and the diamond syndicate tried their utmost to retard the progress of the first measure to establish the cutting of diamonds in this country. If the syndicate has, at this stage, resorted to cutting in this country, it is with the object of seeing what quantity of Namaqualand diamonds they can cut. How many diamonds have the producers’ syndicate made available for cutting in South Africa since that first contract was entered into? Have they sold a single parcel of diamonds to the diamond cutters in this country? Again, how many of the diamonds produced by the Merensky Syndicate have been made available for South African cutters, and why do they ask that Namaqualand stones should be made available for cutting when they are in possession of a very large quantity of these stones? If they had seriously intended to assist the industry instead of strangling it they would have adopted very different tactics. Suppose the end of the Namaqualand diggings were in sight, what would become of the cutting industry in South Africa, if it had to remain in the hands of the diamond syndicate? A very strong plea on behalf of the Namaqualanders was made in a very eloquent speech by the hon. member for Namaqualand (Dr. Steenkamp), and I have a very great deal of sympathy with his constituents. I think a great mistake we have made is to assume that prospecting had to be controlled through the prospectors and not through the Government when the discovery of diamonds in Namaqualand first took place. If the latter course had been adopted probably the position in Namaqualand would not be what it is to-day. The Government diggings in Namaqualand centre largely on Alexander Bay, which has made its first blush of production, and the recovery in the tailings will probably not amount to more than 10 per cent. of the original production, and there is very little likelihood of any discovery of the same magnitude along the coastal belt. When the Government was frightened by the hon. member for Kimberley, and was called upon to introduce very strict measures to prevent the diamond market being upset, we probably went a very great deal further than it is necessary to go to-day. I have not the slightest doubt that when the Government has the position in hand it will be able to ameliorate the conditions of the Namaqualand people. It is quite within the scope of the Government to control any overproduction without placing any restrictive measures on prospecting. It is in the interests of the Government that they should know where their true wealth lies. They are custodians of the wealth for the people, and they have to see that the resources are spent for the benefit of the whole community and not for a few. That is one of the complaints that we have against the hon. member for Kimberley (Sir Ernest Oppenheimer) and the party on the other side. With regard to the remarks of the hon. member for Springs (Sir Robert Kotzé) that the Government should decrease the cost of production by lowering the coal rates, he almost wished us to believe that the Government have done absolutely nothing in that direction. I want to quote from the last report of the general manager of railways. He says—

I do not know whether the hon. member had knowledge of these facts but certainly he did not inform the House that was the position. I will give him some further figures. In June, 1926, the long distance coal rates were reduced involving a sacrifice of revenue to the extent of £25,000. In January, 1928, there was a general reduction of 1s. per ton on bunker coal involving a sacrifice of revenue of £71,000. In January, 1928, there was a reduction of 6d. a ton on export coal involving a sacrifice of £69,000 and in January, 1929, we had a reduction in rates on long distance shipment coal involving a sacrifice in revenue of £12,000, a total sacrifice in revenue of £179,000 per annum. These were all made in the time of the present Government. Whenever a serious case has been put up for the reduction of coal rates, they have met the complaint, but we have not met in the past with a corresponding sympathy as far as the coal owners are concerned. As fast as the rates have been reduced, there has probably been a corresponding increase put on by the coal owners themselves. The Government has consistently tried to encourage the export of coal through these channels, and it is a fallacy to come and say that the Government has not assisted the coal owners. When the hon. member says that the mines would be largely affected by a reduction he knows that a small reduction of 1s. a ton would make very little practical reduction so far as the working of the mining industry is concerned. When the hon. member for Kimberley puts his facts before the Government, I trust in building up on those facts, the Government will take them with more than the ordinary pinch of salt. I trust where the actual facts are concerned and where there is a possibility of extending the diamond industry, without, in any way, affecting the security of that industry, the Government will be guided in the future more by its own experts than by the chairman of the diamond syndicate who is largely interested in controlling that industry as far as he is concerned.

A few days ago the hon. member for Namaqualand (Dr. Steenkamp) touched our hearts and I want to say a few words about it because during the past twenty years I have had experience of the poor white question and can thus speak with authority about it. The hon. member for Namaqualand spoke eloquently about the Namaqualand people who are very dear to him and whom he has known from childhood; he only spoke for his district but I want to talk about the poor whites throughout the Union. We are thankful for what the Government has done in recent years and it was refreshing to see how stability, rest, comfort and confidence have again come to the people, so that what I am going to say is not to criticize the Government—far from it—because we know how the Government has helped in the past and is still helping, and I think the time has come when we must tackle the great question of the poor whites as such, as a problem which is a cancer in our public life. I am sorry to see the word poor white being practically turned into a term of abuse; only a few days ago I heard somebody say, “He is only a poor white.” I do not forget that those people have the blood of Retief, Andries Pretorius and Paul Kruger in their veins, nor do I forget that if the day comes those poor whites will be willing to sacrifice their lives for their country. I am thinking of the second war of independence when I led the State Artillery and the Mounted Police of the republics. I do not forget how the young men sacrificed their lives on the battlefields of Europe especially in the heavy artillery. Nor do I forget how those boys have held our name high on the football of South Africa and England, and it is especially for that kind of young man that I want to say a few words. During the election I so often heard that the poor white question and unemployment had been solved but during the last eight or nine months my experience has been different.

Our experience also.

Before I left Pretoria I met a few young people who could get no work. I know that on the railways and on other departments the young men are given much work and we are very thankful, but the welfare officer was mentioned the other day. I certainly thought of getting work for the boys there. The officer said that they were employing no people before November. In the meantime the boys surely have to exist. Two things have struck me very much in my experience with young people. The first is that there are many of them who commence their career without discipline. By this word I do not mean military discipline but home and school discipline by which the character is formed. One of the things that makes your heart ache when you see it is that so many of our young people grow up without discipline. It is the thing which has struck me very much during the past years, and I say that it can be easily prevented. When I recollect the organization of which I was a member during the past eight years and noticed that some of the poor boys later became respectable and respected members of the community, I ask whether it is not possible for the same thing to occur on a larger scale. Another type of people who also affect our sympathy are the very old people who are too weak to provide for themselves any more; I am convinced that after the concern we have noticed the last few days on the opposite benches they will support me fully. I was told that the concern opposite is an entirely new phase, but I believe that their intentions are honest with regard to the poor white question, and that they mean well. I want to ask them then whether in the circumstances they do not also feel that we have a Government which is sympathetic about the poor white question and wants to solve it as far as possible. I have noticed another thing, namely, how soon our boys are discouraged; it is something we often see and which during all the years I had to do with the problem I often noticed how a person who is constantly pushed on one side gets a discouraged look in the eyes. It is one of the saddest things when people lose courage. I feel that every South African boy and girl has the right to demand a small place in South Africa from the Government, and I feel that if the Government is prepared to put its hand deeply into its pocket that the poor white question as such will be solved within five years. I do not think for a moment that there will no longer be poor people, because the old Book says that we shall always have the poor with us, but I think it can be avoided that a man should think it almost a disgrace that he is poor. It is easy enough to break down, but I want to try to be a little bit constructive. I find that a new member must not talk too long and therefore I shall only touch upon this question. One scheme I want to suggest to the Government is the establishment of labour bureaus. I know that there is such a bureau in Pretoria to-day, and I have often seen the manager distracted because he cannot assist in meeting ail the applications. I feel that the Government should encourage every employer in South Africa as soon as there is any vacancy in his service to get in touch with the labour bureau to find out whether it cannot supply a boy or girl for the job. There is something of the kind in the Free State and excellent work is done. I feel that if such bureaus existed throughout the Union and that if all employers are encouraged to apply to the bureaus that the unemployment question will be solved. A less pleasant phase of the poor white question is the man who wears his boots out looking for work but thank heaven when he does not get it. I say the time has come to establish labour colonies for this class of man; then he can still get a chance. In the meantime the Government can take charge of his wife and children and have the latter educated and removed from the surroundings they are growing up in. With these two preliminary hints I have done with the matter. Then I want to say a word about defence. A few days ago the hon. member for Vereeniging (Maj. K. Rood) touched on a matter about which he can talk authoritatively, as he is an active member of the rifle associations and has reached the rank of major. Here I mean the training which is given to the Citizen Force. I know from my own military experience of thirty years that the training our farm boys and members of the rifle associations get is entirely unsatisfactory. I went to a wapenskou where I heard a commandant say to the others that the training was a “joy ride.” The squadron drill which is taught to-day is not worth much. We have in the Union to-day more than a thousand police posts and with the intensive training which is given to our police it is possible to have excellently trained commanders at every post. Hon. members know that the police train at least once a month at every post. Now I want to suggest that the Government, instead of the present system, should use the police posts for the training of members of the rifle associations. Every post can be taken on its merits and in some cases the boys can come within an area of five miles and in others within fifty miles to the police post for training according to law. I do not say that it must occur once a month but certainly not less than four times a year; then in two years’ time some thousands of our boys will be well trained.

We have had an hour this afternoon on the subject of the mines, one of the primary industries of the country. It may not be unfitting to say a few words upon another primary industry, the industry of sugar growing, which, after all, holds no mean place in the economy of South Africa. In the first place I would like to express the appreciation of the industry of the action the Government has taken in preventing an industrial disaster in Natal, by the imposition of a dumping duty on Czecho-Slovakia sugar. Had the dumping continued at the same rate of the last few months during which 30,000 tons of sugar has been dumped into South Africa, the effect on the industry in Natal would have been very serious. Employment would have been greatly restricted and development curtailed. Members have seen the report of the Board of Trade which has been laid on the Table of the House, and are able to judge what the whole sugar position is and the reasonableness of the Government’s action. There have been two or three objections to the imposition of the dumping duty during the course of the debate from Labour members; but I think the Government can afford to ignore them. Protection against the dumping of surplus goods is the law of the land. The matter has been thoroughly investigated by the Board of Trade, which has gone into the conditions in South Africa, and has decided that in the interests of South African industry it was essential to set the machinery of the law in operation. The sugar industry deserves well of South Africa. I may be pardoned for saying a word or two to this new House regarding the actions of the sugar industry in the past. The sugar industry has always been reasonable; it has played the game throughout. It holds the proud record that during the years of the war it was the only industry in the country that voluntarily restricted the price of its commodity to the consumers. It took this action when world prices were soaring and when it could have greatly profited. But it chose the path of patriotism. It is acting in accordance with the spirit of that action to-day. It is supplying sugar to South African manufacturers who use sugar in their manufactures, at a price which enables them to manufacture to advantage with the world. I am informed by a manufacturer of jams that he is able to manufacture in South Africa to better advantage than he would be in a position to do if he were in England in consequence of the price he is charged for sugar. All sugar sold to manufacturers for export is sold at the world’s price, and the existence of the industry is of great advantage. Those hon. members who object to the dumping duty should remember that economically the dumping of articles has a similar effect upon employment as the dumping of cheap labour. There is not the slightest difference, from an economic point of view, between the dumping of goods and the dumping of cheap labour into this country. There is no difference in principle between dumping sugar from Czecho-Slovakia and the dumping of surplus bricklayers and carpenters in order to get cheaper houses. All countries which have adopted a protectionist policy have always maintained the right of imposing a dumping duty for the protection of their industries. If that right were taken away there would be no protection to those industries which are fighting for a market against a world over-production. Since the duty has been imposed it is unnecessary at this junction to say any more. I wish to refer to another matter. During the course of this debate the Minister of Native Affairs took occasion to lecture Natal upon its un-South Africanism.

He did not. It was the Governor of Natal.

Seventy years ago; you all live in the past.

For five years many of us have admired immensely the dignity and unfailing courtesy and impartiality with which the Minister of Native Affairs has occupied the high office of Speaker, and it was with considerable sorrow, and not a little astonishment, that we saw that his first speech as a Minister landed him straight into the mud of party politics. It was as unnecessary as it was unexpected. It was quite unnecessary for the Minister of Native Affairs to adopt that tone in reply to the speech of the hon. member for Greyville (Maj. Richards). The state of affairs which he revealed as existing in Durban calls for investigation, and not for the kind of lecture which the Minister chose to administer to Natal because the hon. member for Greyville had the temerity to mention this matter in the House. As the only member for Natal in the Government, the least we could have looked for from the Minister was that he would try to maintain the honour of Natal.

There was a time when you considered me the only blot on Natal.

The course you are adopting will make you a blot on Natal. The fact that the Minister owes the development of the talents he has so admirably displayed in this House to the education he received in the town which he held up to reproach the other day, led us to expect from him some loyalty to Natal. Instead, however, of showing any loyalty, he saw fit to launch an attack upon press and people for daring to call attention to a glaring evil growing in its midst. What were the facts? They were not new. They had been stated in another place by a Dutch-speaking South African, also from Natal, and they were repeated in the Minister’s constituency. That hon. gentleman said: “We have heard a great deal about poor whites at Durban. After personal investigation, I found that poor white railway employees were residing in the coolie quarters in Durban; they are people of our own flesh and blood who were decoyed there by the Government.

Is that true?

I am repeating the charge made by the senator, which has been laid before the Government.

Do you consider it is true that these men were decoyed there.

“These men went to Durban in order to enter the service of the railway.” The hon. member in another place states that these men are living next-door to coolies and natives, and sleeping on mealie-sacks. He adds: “I do not raise any objection to employment being given to our poor whites on the railways. What I object to is the starvation wage paid to them.” “In order to make an existence, the wives and children of this class of Europeans go about, under cover of selling lace and needlework, on the streets and in the better portions of Durban.” This hon. gentleman also states that 75 per cent. of the Afrikaans-speaking people in Durban are residing in the slums of that town, and that they take part in illicit liquor traffic, and that those people did not go to Durban with the intention of taking part in this traffic, but were decoyed there by the Government. He further stated: When complaints were made by residents of Durban in regard to that state of affairs, some of our papers regarded it as “racialism.” I can assure hon. senators that the main support extended to those poor whites in the slums of Durban hail from those very people who are alleged to sow “racialism.” The sum of £20,000 was spent on poor relief in Durban during the past year, and it went to relieve these poor people.

It was denied by the women of Durban.

It was found to be true.

There is at present a great campaign going on in the press against the existence of slums in Cape Town. Though this state of affairs has been under our noses for years, it is only now that it has attracted sufficient attention to induce Nationalists to make individual enquiries. We read that certain members of the Government have expressed themselves in strong terms, and said that the continuance of these slums will degrade the white people of the country. And because the people of Natal and the papers of Natal have protested against the same condition of affairs being created in Durban, they are condemned wholesale by the Minister as un-South African, as jingoes, as people in constant revolt against the Government. In order to illustrate what the Minister describes as the psychology of Durban and Natal, the Minister went back seventy years. With the indulgence of the House, I should like to give the reason for the state of affairs in Durban seventy years ago, and for the strictures which Governor Scott made on Natal seventy years ago. The Minister of Native Affairs is a student of history, and he knew better than anybody else what the facts were, and he is hiding the real purpose he has in view when he is making these comments. The policy and words of this discredited Governor Scott were read out to the amusement of the House as a true description of Natal seventy years ago and true of the people to-day. Governor Scott, who came here in 1856-’57, succeeded in raising the whole of the people of Natal against him by refusing to abide by the wishes of the legislative council of the day. He was responsible for the introduction of the Asiatic into Natal, and was responsible for much of our trouble in native affairs. To show how the occasion arose, when those words quoted by the Minister were written, let me go back and throw light upon the politics of Natal seventy years ago. In 1852 a native commission sat in Natal, and it is interesting to read the names of those who sat on this commission. Excluding the Secretary for Native Affairs, there were seven Englishmen and seven Dutchmen. All of the Dutchmen were voortrekkers. The following are the names of those on the commission: The hon. W. Harding, the hon. John Bird, Theophilus Shepstone, Captain Struben (the grandfather of the Struben in this House), P. A. R. Otter (the grandfather of Mr. O. R. Nel), Fredk. Scheepers, Evert Potgieter, Soloman Maritz, C. Labuscagne, A. Spies, John Moreland, Joseph Henderson, W. Macfarlane, Dr. Addison, Chas. Barter. These were the gentlemen who started the ball rolling. This commission’s report finally culminated in a Bill, which was introduced in the legislative assembly, and the Governor, who had only been nine months in the country, would have nothing to do with it. Petitions of protest came from Weenen, Umvoti, Greytown, Maritzburg, and meetings were held all over the country.

Vryheid?

Vryheid had not been won by the Union Jack then. Later on matters became so acute that the people asked for the Governor’s removal, and they forwarded a petition from the legislative council asking that he might be removed from the colony, to which the Governor replied, informing them that he would forward a copy of their report to his grace the Duke of Newcastle. The despatch to the Duke of Newcastle contains these words—

It is a very extraordinary thing that the Government of to-day has assumed the position of Governor Scott, and uses the same language about the people of Natal that Governor Scott used when they opposed his will. The meeting referred to, in December, 1858, was about the time when Governor Scott introduced a Bill into the legislative council of Natal to bring in Asiatics. Meetings of protest were held in Durban and elsewhere in Natal against the introduction of Asiatics into the country. The Asiatic policy was mixed up with the Governor’s native policy. Asiatics were required because he objected to natives working for Europeans. On the occasion of his introduction of the Eastern Immigrants Bill to the council, he used these words—

Cheap cotton means prosperity in Lancashire, therefore the natives of Natal were to be used to grow cotton cheaply. And so, while the natives were to be confined to their reserves growing cotton, Asiatics were to be introduced to work for wages. In the election of 1859 every member who stood for the Natal legislative assembly, and who favoured the introduction of Asiatics, was rejected, and a complete block went back against bringing Asiatics into the colony, yet, despite that, Governor Scott—whom the Minister so much admires—introduced the Bill that led to the introduction of Asiatics. We have the extraordinary spectacle of another Governor Scott—the Minister of the Interior― who has never been beyond the Drakensberg, settling our Asiatic problem. I can see how all this trouble has arisen—the hon. gentleman from Natal, whom we so recently all admired, is now sitting next to the Minister of the Interior. Evil communications have corrupted his good manners. Is there a single member of this House who thinks for one moment that Governor Scott was right and Natal was wrong? Protests in those days were unavailing, succeeding generations have reaped the fruit of Governor Scott’s refusal to submit to the wishes of the Natal people, wishes dictated by local knowledge. And knowing all this, the Minister, to raise a smoke-screen to hide the poor whites of Durban, brings up the criticism of a discredited Governor of seventy years ago to show the psychology of Durban. The Minister of Native Affairs has begun rather badly, and we hope for the honour of Natal that he will improve his manners. This question has another and more serious aspect, and one to which I sincerely hope the Minister of Native Affairs will not lend his countenance. I have had a letter from a Dutch South African who fought a constituency in the Transvaal. In the course of this letter he said—

The observation of the Minister could only have been designed to hold up Natal as being imperialistic in the sense in which Nationalists deem imperialistic and jingoistic, and that the hearts of the people of Natal are not in South Africa, and their voices are not worthy to be heard. I invite the Minister to reflect on this fact: in all the troubles which have arisen in the past between the two great white races of South Africa, Natal has had no part. Natal had nothing to do with the troubles which led up to the Jameson raid and the Boer war, yet she had to bear her share of the burdens which followed. Again, when Union came about, the people of Natal were the first to throw in their lot with Gen. Botha, and try to build up a solid union of the two races. Natal has done its best to build up a true South Africanism. I want to leave this thought with the Minister. The foundation of true patriotism begins in loyalty to one’s own hearth and home; loyalty to the province which has bred you, loyalty to the place which has educated you. Without those lesser loyalties there can be no true spirit of patriotism. I hope in the future, when the Minister of Native Affairs addresses the House, he will endeavour to maintain the honour of Natal.

I will try to supplement the appeal made by the hon. members for Langlaagte (Mr. Christie) and Prieska (Mr. C. H. Geldenhuys) on behalf of the re-organization of our present financial relations with the provinces. In the Free State we have been the martyrs of Union, the provincial system leading to a very heavy taxation of the artizans of the Orange Free State. The hon. member for Prieska claims that the Cape has been the Cinderella of the Union, but the Free State, under previous Governments, has, I maintain, been the orphan of the Union. In regard to our educational subsidy, we receive 19s. 6d. per child per annum less than is paid to the Transvaal. Every artizan in the Free State is paying £3 or £4 more per year in taxation than are the artizans in the other provinces. We are penalized under the Baxter report in regard to our provincial relations, and this was anticipated more or less by the members of the commission. The report says: “As capital expenditure had been kept at a low figure in the Free State, considerable arrears must be overtaken at an early date.” Now we have to overtake these arrears by imposing a capital debt on the province, and we have additional expenditure in order to cover loan interest. Again, we are put to very heavy expense to maintain roads owing to climatic conditions and lack of good road-making material, and, although we are in the position of a junction for the rest of the provinces, we have no extra grant for the maintenance of our roads. We, therefore, appeal to the Minister of Finance to grant us a little more assistance proportionate to our position. It is with great interest that I have listened as a newcomer to the remarks of the gentlemen on the Opposition benches, and I must congratulate them on having become ardent converts to what the Labour party has been preaching for many years. We have been asking them for a long time past to regard with sympathy the poorer section of the population. In the past they have turned a deaf ear. We are very glad to know that the newcomers to the party on the other side have now learned the lesson, and they are prepared to support the measures that we have proposed in the past to ameliorate the lot of those whose position is worse than their own. We have heard demands for the protection of various interests, but this House should not lose sight of the lower classes when it comes to legislating in this direction. We have heard an appeal that a deaf ear should be turned to the recommendations of the Board of Trade with regard to further relief for the sugar industry. I should like to suggest that any further measures for the relief of that industry be coupled with limitation of the profits. It is not enough to limit the price. Coming to railway matters, we very much appreciate in the Free State the developments that have taken place, and the offers that the Minister of Railways has made to us. In the past we have been neglected, but we are glad to hear the assurance of the Minister that further developments are in progress. There are certain sympathetic regulations we should like to see put into force. I would like to see better collaboration between the Minister and the Education Department in regard to technical instruction for railway artizans. There is one particular section we can help, the men engaged in the rough work of quarrying. They could be taught the finer points of stone work. We should like to see an extension of the 8-hour system. There are men doing very arduous work, such as plate-laying, in all sorts of weather, and these men are very anxious for a limitation of their hours to 48, to which the artizans are entitled. It would not entail great expense, and it would be an olive branch from the Government. We are very pleased to see the Government persevering with its policy of civilized labour to do away with the menace of unemployment, but I should like to ask the Minister if he is aware that men are now being dismissed from the railways by unsympathetic officials on the ground of there being lack of employment in certain departments. I commend to the Minister the policy of persevering and of keeping all these men in employment, even if it means a reduction of hours. There are men who have been employed on the railways for four or five years, and who are receiving 5s. 6d. a day, with a house allowance of 1s. a day. Theirs is very heavy work, and I commend to the Minister all the help he can possibly give to these men. There is the question of the district appeal boards. We were very pleased when the Administration instituted the policy of appeal boards representing both the Administration and the workers, but that policy, which held out such great promise, is being neutralized by the fact that system managers can turn down the results of any investigation, and can turn down the recommendations of the board, which really makes the boards a farce, and I should like to see the Minister step in and say that these boards shall be an integral part of the policy of his Administration. There is also the question of degrading. Men who have been for ten years in certain phases of the railway service are now being penalized simply because they have not the education to rise to a higher status. There are men who have been doing good service as firemen for ten years, and who are now being de-graded to the grade of washer-out simply because they cannot pass an examination to pass out as engine drivers.

Surely that is sound?

I contend that if these men have given satisfactory service for ten years as firemen, surely they can be trusted to carry on for the rest of the time as firemen without being penalized. It is a better system to prevent the making of poor whites than to have to try to unmake them. We have heard the appeal rightly made for better conditions and pensions for those who were in the forefront of battle in the late war, but those benefits should also be applied to the war-scarred veterans of industrial strife. When it comes to these men we do not hear a word advocated. When it comes to an appeal for better conditions and better pensions we trust these men will not be forgotten, but will receive the same consideration from hon. members opposite. We have heard a good deal, and rightly so, of the conditions under which these men are housed, and we have heard appeals for better housing. We have been appealing for this for years, and also for better wages to enable these men to live under better conditions, and we trust we shall hear less of the antagonism of hon. members opposite to wage determination, which will enable people to be paid reasonable wages and live under reasonable conditions.

As representative for a country area I am pleased to say a word of appreciation on behalf of my district of the services which the Government has rendered the country during the past five years. I can assure hon. members that we feel the Government has not merely let matters slide as a man allows his boat to drift down stream without oars, but that the Government has done something and that the countryside appreciates it. It is noticeable that although the hon. member for Zululand (Mr. Nicholls) made a long speech we look in vain for anything constructive in it. It is easy to find fault, I do not even think that much intelligence is required for it, but to say something constructive is much more difficult. Much has been said especially by new members opposite about better co-operation. They have also shown much concern about the lot of the poor man and it is strange to me, as a new member, that they talk so much about those poor people but they did so little for them when they were in office. I feel obliged moreover in connection with the native question to mention something which was said by the Opposition during the election. We felt on the countryside that the native question could not be regarded, as some averred, like a mist which will disappear before the sun, in other words that for us on the countryside, and especially for the Afrikaner, it is one of the most burning matters. If hon. members opposite thought that it was only an electioneering cry on our part then they are again making one of the mistakes which they so often do, namely, in undervaluing the opinion of the countryside and of the electors. They undervalued it so much that they are to-day sitting on the Opposition benches. We hear what good work they did as an Opposition and I think they are well left there because it looks as if they have only done something for the country when in opposition. We on the countryside feel particularly that there are too many points of contact between the Europeans and the less civilized class of native. As one coming from the interior I am astonished that in Cape Town this contact can be so patently permitted. To me it is something repulsive that a badly dressed and uncivilized Xosa can travel by tram on the same seat as one of our noble women. If we allow that we shall one day have to pay a price that I would not like to be responsible for. I think that in the interests of civilization and the white race that it should not be tolerated.

[inaudible].

The hon. member possibly does not feel so strongly about the matter but to us it is a question which may result in the disappearance of our civilization into a black pool of barbarism. I am here, however, to fulfil another duty, namely, to look after the interests of the people of Lichtenburg whom I represent. The hon. member for Namaqualand (Dr. Steenkamp) has drawn a rather sad picture and I think that mine has even a little more sad colour as a fact. It is a fact that a great accumulation of poor people from all parts of the country earn their living at Lichtenburg. I can assure hon. members that the conditions under which the people live and work are most deplorable. We have heard in Cape Town about the housing conditions of coloured people, natives and other poor people, but I can assure the hon. members that the condition of slums in any town or village in the Union cannot be sadder than that to be found on the diggings. It is certain that something must be done for these people and the sooner the better. It has already come to the point of issuing rations to some of the families. The question is not whether it is so or not, but what can or must be done to assist the people. It is of course one the factors in the great problem of our poor white question and I do not want to make any reflections on any policy in connection with the poor white question. It is said that the number of poor whites has diminished in the villages and one of the causes of that reduction is that the poor people have gone to the diggings. In the beginning when the diggings were fairly rich those people made a living but now the position has changed and we find the capacity of the field is not adequate for the thousands of people living there. Today there is a cry from the people there to hon. members of this House for assistance, not by way of gifts and alms which have to be doled out, but the people say “Give us work.” I can say that it is a class of poor people on the fields who want to work and are not afraid to roll up their sleeves and do a hard day’s work. I think the Minister of Labour would be well advised to recruit the labour on those fields for Government work, whether afforestation, irrigation or other work. I suggest and I must say that at public meetings there it found general approval that the Minister should establish an information office on the fields. The fact is that there is such an information office in all the large towns but on the fields where people are accumulated in thousands it does not exist. Complaints have come to my notice that the right class of unemployed are not always used for Government or the relief works. It happens that the young son of a farmer or a bywoner who would be useful on a farm makes use of the opportunity of leaving the land and so becoming a burden on the State. Without casting any reflections I want to say that it is not exactly a sound policy, when such work is to be done, to give the opportunity to the class of men we call bywoners. The farmers cannot do without bywoners and there they do reproductive work. By giving those people the opportunity of leaving the land we take the responsibility on ourselves and must in future always give work to them. In the same way young boys who can still make a living with parents on the farm are also given the opportunity of leaving. Perhaps it sounds unfair to say that it ought not to be permitted and it may be said that the bywoners and young boys also have the right of trying to develop on other lines and to find a way out, and of making a living, but I say that it must be prevented as long as there are many other people in sadder and worse conditions of life without any prospects of work whatsoever. Conditions on the diggings demand immediate action and I hope that the Ministers concerned, when a deputation about that policy calls upon them to-morrow for effective action, will be prepared to grant relief as far as they can. This class of people is worth the trouble of saving and they are well fitted for hard work because most of them use the pick and shovel from early morning to late at night. The result is that they are accustomed to manual labour, more so possibly than any other section of the country. We also feel that more effective attempts must be made to keep the dwellers on the countryside—the farmers—as far as possible on the land. Even if it is very difficult it will be a better policy giving the man assistance then before he leaves the land than in subsequently assisting him back to the land. Of course it depends on the man on the land. There must be more progressive and scientific methods and this brings me to another point of great importance to Lichtenburg. I understand that on previous occasions requests have been made for an industrial school at Lichtenburg. In my opinion it is a very important matter and Lichtenburg is very well suited to the purpose. It is only too true that Lichtenburg in comparison with other places has been much neglected in this respect. That is at any rate what we feel there. I hope the Minister of Education will listen favourably to this appeal. The land and many of the buildings are already available and by a small additional expenditure the institution could be established there. In my opinion it will be a great improvement for the whole neighbourhood. Although we have some of the most progressive people in that district there are a little further off many backward people—not more backward than in many other parts of the country—but so backward that if they are not taken in hand in time many of them will also be forced by circumstances to leave the countryside and still more increase the army of unemployed in the towns. I therefore hope that this appeal for such an institution there will be considered by the authority concerned. There are further possibilities in the Lichtenburg district. I do not say that it looks like the Jordan in Bethlehem as an hon. member for the Free State described his district, but there are great irrigation prospects. We have the Molopope River there and the great and small Harts Rivers and if irrigation is started the farmers’ lot will be improved and the bearing capacity of the ground increased. There is another great interest in connection with the diggings which I feel obliged to emphasize, namely, the condition of the market for alluvial diamonds. We heard recently that the alluvial diamond market had dropped, and our diamond dealers, diggers, and other persons who can talk authoritatively about alluvial diamonds have of course tried to find out what the cause was. The conclusion we have come to is that the alluvial diggings cannot compete with those who have the control over the Namaqualand diamonds. I hope the Government will do all in its power to assist the alluvial diggings seeing the Government can control the market. It is impossible for individual buyers to maintain the prices in the markets opposite to the Namaqualand diamonds. It is of the greatest importance that the Government should assist us here especially if we adopt the attitude that the diggings are actually an asset—which conflicts with what some people think, namely, that the alluvial diggings under the circumstances were not beneficial to the country. There was a time when the alluvial production meant a direct income to the country of between £600,000 and £700,000 a year and to-day it still is a big factor, much money is circulated by the alluvial diggings and the factor is the more important when we remember that the income from the diggings for the most part is actually produced by the people who possibly belong to the poorest section of our people. The money which is circulated by them in the western Transvaal is responsible to a great extent for the general welfare which has become visible during recent years and is still visible to-day. As therefore the diggings are a great gain from the point of view of the State it is now the duty of the Government not to treat the need of the people lightly when they are in need, but to lend a willing ear to the people and the Government will doubtless do so. A very sore point with the small, poor digger on the fields—and again I do not want to criticize but merely point out necessary things—is the Act 44 of 1927. The Act was certainly necessary at that time and is still necessary to-day to control production and to maintain a good market but possibly the regulation goes too far here and there and unnecessarily heavy burdens are laid on that section of the population which least can bear them. We feel therefore that the time has come to ask the Minister of Mines and Industries for relief. I just want to mention one thing, it may appear small but it is important. Formerly the diggers always had to pay one shilling a month for their licences, now it is five shillings. That is a small increase but it means a lot to the small man who has no income and has toiled month after month without finding diamonds. It is therefore a thing which makes his existence impossible sometimes, if he has to find five shillings to prevent his losing his claim. The Minister knows what the position is and it would mean a good deal if he could merely grant the concession that for the first two claims of an individual there should be a rebate. I feel that Lichtenburg for the rest has merely the same interests as other districts whose representatives have spoken and I will just end with the hope that this Government will further succeed in solving the poor white question so that it shall no longer be an important social question to us and that the electors will enable them for long years to continue the work which they have commenced so well during the past five years.

I rise very reluctantly, because I feel I shall be twitted with being the member for Hottentots, but I have neither Hottentots nor Bushmen in my constituency. I should, however, be failing in my duty if I did not draw attention to the deplorable condition of the wine industry. Since the passing of the wine Act last year our sales have been falling off tremendously, a prospect which was contemplated by you, Mr. Speaker, because you opposed the Bill at every stage. To-day the merchants have in stock 400,000 proof gallons of brandy under maturation, 600,000 proof gallons of ordinary spirits, 15,000 leaguers of maturing wine and a large stock of young wine. The Cooperative Wine Growers’ Association have 375,000 proof gallons of brandy under maturation and 700,000 proof gallons of spirits. The farmers are faced with a new stock next February, and at the same time the wine experts are advising people to plant vineyards! If something is not done next year to grapple with the position I see poverty staring us in the face. Some hon. members would like to see the wine industry “scotched,” but they should remember that although we have only 4,000 wine farms over 100,000 people live on the wine farmers on their farms, this being exclusive of the licensed victuallers and general dealers, etc. Further, the Western Province is the hinterland of Cape Town. We hear a great deal about overcrowding to-day, but what will happen when these 100,000 people drift into Cape Town. The hon. member for Bethal (Mr. Roos), whom we all sympathize with in his illness, spoke truly last year when he said that the Act would prove unworkable, and that he will bring in amendments next session. During this session deputations will await on the Minister of Justice on this subject, and I hope he will give their requests his most favourable consideration. We hear a great deal of the cry, “South Africa first”; let us apply this principle to the wine industry. All motor spirit used in France has to contain 10 per cent. of alcoholic spirit. If that example were followed in South Africa it would help the wine farmers to dispose of their surplus stocks. Natal would also benefit, and perhaps more than the Western Province, because it produces a spirit which is a bye product. Natal is to-day making what is known as a Union motor spirit, which I believe has met with every success, and I hope it will be used in all the Government motor buses and lorries. We have an excellent Government Research department, and this subject should be referred to it for investigation and report. I now come to the Government’s irrigation proposals. I was widely criticized last year for saying that all the Karroo irrigation schemes in their present state were failures. I made that statement because in some cases the irrigation rates were too high, and in other cases there was an insufficient supply of water. Irrigation boards held meetings and asked me to resign, but several members of the Government agreed with what I said, and time is bringing public opinion round to my side. For instance, the Fish River people at the end of May resolved to ask the Government to erect two further irrigation dams to relieve the pressure on the lower irrigations who had insufficient water. I heartily support that request. Then there has been a request from Oliphants River for additional storage. I support that request also. The Minister of Irrigation, before he tackles any new scheme, should put all the existing schemes on a sound financial basis. I understand the existing irrigation works cost the Government between £6,000,000 and £7,000,000. If we have to write off £2,000,000 of that amount, don’t let us hesitate to do so. The Irrigation Commission was appointed five years ago. I understand they were appointed to investigate all these schemes, but what have they done? They have recommended a few schemes to be sold, but the big schemes have not been tackled, and I think it time the Irrigation Commission was gingered up a little to bring reports on these big schemes. These rates are hanging like mill-stones round the necks of these people. I know one man on the Fish River whose rates were in arrear £2,000. Coming back to Fish River, the accumulative water rates are anything from £3 to £4 10s. per morgen, but in addition to that they have first to buy, clear and level their land. It would not be very high if they had the requisite supply of water, but some years they have one irrigation, some years two, and sometimes none at all. Once they are in arrear they never seem to get out of it. Six years ago we were actually offered by a well-known farmer in Robertson 100 morgen of his land. I was a member of the Land Board, and the Minister sent the papers to me. I read in the margin, “You must be very careful; this asset might become a liability,” and that is what has happened. I am pleased to hear the Minister of Irrigation is tackling the Orange River. I have purchased land there myself but not under the scheme. I think the Government might well take note that they buy all the land that is going to fall under those schemes which can to-day be bought at prairie value. The remarks I have made about irrigation also apply to land settlement, although, in this case, the Government have written off large sums. The report of the Lands Department for 1927 shows that nearly £1,000,000 has been written off since 1917. But we should be careful not to overdo that. It can also be overdone, because there are some people who, if you give them a present of the land, cannot make it pay. There are others who are always wanting you to reduce the price of the land and to add the arrears to the purchase price, but then they are in the same position as before. I appeal to the Minister to write off where necessary, but he must be careful not to overdo it. Let us put all our land settlement schemes on a sound financial basis. I would like to appeal to the Minister of Finance to put a larger sum on the estimates for land settlement. In my opinion railway work will not solve the poor white question. It certainly relieves it, but it does not solve it. They should have the poor whites on the land. The hon. member for Namaqualand (Dr. Steenkamp) very ably and very dramatically laid the position of Namaqualand before the House, and, as one who knows those parts, I can assure the House that he is not exaggerating. The hon. member for Prieska (Mr. C. H. Geldenhuys) also tried to paint the picture, but neither of them told us the cause of the poor white problem. As a medical man, the hon. member for Namaqualand knows you must diagnose a case before you can give medicine. I will tell the House what produces the poor whites. It is the want of water up in those parts. It is purely a case of that. The land is good and it has great possibilities. The hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Mr. Hockly) has been up there, he has seen the land and has purchased land and he has demonstrated what can be done. But what has the Government done? There are never any drills available for the north-west. I remember three years ago, when there were only five drills in the whole of the north-west, and there were ten working in one district alone in the Transvaal. Is that fair towards the north-west? I say it is not. We have a big stretch of land in Namaqualand known as the Government Game Reserve. It was cut up seven years ago. We subdivided that reserve into twelve farms of 9,000 morgen each. They are lying there to-day with nobody in occupation. The same applies to 8 farms on the border of Kenhardt and Calvinia. They were sub-divided and they are lying there unoccupied—for want of drills. I do not think it is right, and I am surprised the Auditor-General has not drawn attention to the money wasted on surveys without getting any returns. I would like to mention a case that came before me in Kenhardt about six years ago. The board advertised 10 or 12 farms and among the applicants was an old man of over 60. He and his wife assured me they had been on the piece of land for which they applied for 25 years. The old man told me: “My wife and I made a well 130 feet deep. She let me down in the morning and when I loosened sufficient stone she pulled me up and I let her down, she filled the bucket with stones and I pulled it up.” And to-day they have a well which waters 500 sheep three times a week. You can’t allow these men to go; they are monuments to the country. About 18 months ago there was another case, and I asked the man what he had done, and he took me around. He had sunk seven boreholes and five wells, but to-day he has no water. He appealed to me and said he did not care what we did with him, but we must look after his wife and children. We should not ask such a man to pay; we should pay to keep him there; it is impossible for him to pay unless he has water. I understood the Minister of Native Affairs to say that the hon. member for Namaqualand (Dr. Steenkamp) wanted to raise the Olifant’s River dam four feet.

Fourteen feet.

Probably that would give irrigation down below, but not four feet. To-day there are not 5,000 morgen scheduled of which the Government has only 600. The scheme has not sufficient water. I believe that in the Doorns River, a tributary of the Olifant’s River, a scheme can be built to augment the present scheme. Let us add another £500,000 and make it a success. The Government can put another 5,000 morgen under irrigation.

During the course of the debate a good many points have been raised in connection with my administration, and various criticisms have been brought up and suggestions of all kinds made, but these points were more or less of minor importance, and for that reason I do not think it is necessary for me on this occasion, while I do not wish to take up the time of the House unnecessarily, to deal with these matters. There will be another opportunity, when the House goes into committee on the estimates, to deal at length and exhaustively with these various points. But there was one particular question which loomed very largely in the discussions during the course of this debate, and on occasion overshadowed even other very important questions which were under discussion—and that is the housing question. I think it is only right that I, as the responsible Minister to deal with this matter, should make a statement to the House in regard to it. I propose to do so now and to confine the few remarks I have to make exclusively to this particular question. Before I go further I think I owe a word of appreciation to several hon. members on the other side of the House who have spoken on this particular question for the way in which they dealt with it; I more particularly refer to the hon. member for Cape Town (Gardens) (Mr. Coulter) and the hon. member for Newlands (Mr. Stuttaford). I think we all agree when I say that they approached and dealt with this question in a non-party spirit. I think they realize, knowing the facts and the figures, that no case can be made out against the present Government, and, more than that, they also realize that here we have to do with a very complicated and important question—one which really touches the life and the healthy existence of the community, and that on such questions it should be possible, if goodwill is shown on both sides of the House, to come to some solution along the lines of co-operation. These hon. members confined their remarks to picturing to the House and to the country the existing needs, and to make suggestions as to a solution of this great and burning question. I am very sorry that the good example which has been set by these hon. members has not been closely followed generally, and I more particularly regret that has certainly not been the case with the Opposition press, more especially here in Cape Town. If I read the remarks of these papers aright, I think they are definitely out to create an impression in the country that the conditions, especially in Cape Town and other places, are not only very serious, but that these serious conditions are due largely to the inactivity and neglect of the Government. These newspapers have evidently gone what I would call a-slumming, and evidently they hope, after they have dived into the underworld of poverty and misery, not only to bring back first-hand information, but also, as far as possible, votes. In the first place, I wish without fear of contradiction to say that, on the basis of the existing legislation, the present Government has carried out to the full that responsibility which rested on its shoulders. I say: “On the basis of present legislation.” I do not say that the present legislation is at all ideal; personally, I do not think it is, and I think it could very well be amended; but if anyone is dissatisfied with the existing legislation, he must not forget that it was framed by the previous Government, and that during the recent election campaign hon. members on the opposite side of the House showed that they were very proud of that legislation, and, certainly from many platforms, they trotted out this piece of legislation as one of their very greatest achievements. The fundamental principle underlying the existing legislation is that the responsibility for better housing in urban areas rests not on the shoulders of the Central Government, but on the shoulders of the local authority, and behind the local authority, on the shoulders of the provincial administration. The responsibility of the Central Government is merely to provide financial facilities and assistance to them to enable them to carry out their duty. In every case where local authorities have applied to me in recent years for the assistance and the guidance of the central housing board, I have always been ready to give consent to the housing board to visit such centres to report upon the situation, and if the situation was such that financial facilities had to be afforded by the Central Government such assistance was always forthcoming. Further than that, when the period of three or four years for which the previous Government had made provision by way of housing loans was coming to an end, I approached the Cabinet, and the Cabinet decided that another £1,000,000 would be provided by way of housing loans to finance local authorities to do their duty with regard to the improvement of housing conditions. That £1,000,000 which has been provided by the treasury has proved more than sufficient for existing needs, again, I say, on the basis of the existing legislation. The provision which we have made was, in fact, so ample that the local authorities concerned were, in most cases, not able to utilize all the funds that were provided. I wish to give the House more or less an idea of how the funds provided were allocated. Out of the extra £1,000,000 Cape Town got no less than £600,000, Port Elizabeth received £175,000, Durban £120,000; Bloemfontein £30,000, and Uitenhage £15,000, leaving £60,000 to be allotted to all the other centres in the Union. This sum of £1,000,000, new money, is not the only amount made available by the Government for this particular purpose. By way of the repayment of loans which were previously made, a good deal of money is coming back every six months into the treasury, and that money which has accumulated by way of repayment of funds formerly provided, has now reached a sum of no less than £350,000. It amounts to about £80,000 every six months. That money which came back from previous loans was added to the £1,000,000 of new money, and was also made available for housing purposes. As hon. members will see, on the loan estimates before the House, provision is again made of £300,000 out of the £1,000,000 new money, and in addition to that another £80,000 will be available, so that for the coming year a sum of no less than £380,000 will be available for this purpose. Now, taking these centres where the need is greatest, and in connection with which we have had most complaints—Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and Durban—I would point out that Cape Town was allotted £600,000 of the new money. In all, out of the housing loans which have been available from the beginning, Cape Town has had a big share, not less than £865,000. Out of that sum Cape Town has so far utilized only £474,000. That leaves a balance still available for Cape Town of no less than £391,000. To Port Elizabeth was allotted a sum of £175,000 new money. The total which has been allotted to Port Elizabeth from the beginning amounts to £455,000. Port Elizabeth still has available for housing purposes the sum of £103,000, so far not utilized. Take again the case of Durban. Durban has been allotted a sum of £120,000 out of the new £1,000,000 made available. A sum of £50,000 was specially earmarked by the Central Housing Board for the improvement of Indian housing, which was admitted to be very bad both in and around Durban. Of this money little, if anything at all, has been spent by Durban, and I cannot but say that the chief reason for that is that the general attitude of the municipality of Durban cannot certainly be described as very sympathetic. With regard to Durban, the position is even such that I am considering the question as to whether a loan which has been allotted to a municipality like that, which is not made use of after the lapse of a considerable time—a considerable time has elapsed since that application was made—whether that allocation of the grant should not be withdrawn. Judging by these figures and facts which I have given, I think I am right in saying that on the basis of the present Act the Government has certainly done its duty in providing the necessary funds for housing.

Were these sums not spread over five years?

Four years. Let me further state that the present Government is certainly acquainted with slum conditions which exist in a good many areas to-day, and is dealing with them much more effectively than the previous Government has done. I think I am right in saying that the first attempt to better the slum conditions was made by the present Government—if by the previous Government slum conditions were touched upon at all.

The last Government?

No, the one before the last, the South African party Government. No doubt slum conditions were touched by the measures of the previous Government only as far as the fringe was concerned. Most of the funds which were made available by Parliament in the time of the previous Government went to the erection of the better class of houses. Loans were made for houses up to a cost of £1,500, exclusive of the value of the land.

Pinelands?

The new money of £1,000,000 was all earmarked for housing the poorer classes of the community. It is quite true that the previous Government made money, loan monies, available for building purposes at 4 per cent. per annum, which is economic, but it is questionable whether it was justifiable at all to make money available for a man who can help himself, and who is able to pay an economic rental. Coming to the present position, I wish to point out that 9,000 houses are being provided under building schemes under the Act. 9,000 altogether, at an expenditure of a little under £3,000,000. Now I come to the causes of congestion. The causes of the congestion in urban areas are to some small extent due to the concentration of railway men in certain centres.

To a small extent.

That is more particularly the case in Jeppes-town and Durban. With reference to housing of railway servants, I can safely leave that to my colleague the Minister of Railways. These men usually come and go, and on that account it is rather difficult to provide proper housing for inhabitants in urban areas. For that reason it is very difficult.

For that reason it is impossible.

It is not impossible, but it is very difficult to make provision for the housing. I think the Minister of Railways should deal with that matter when he replies to the debate. A second reason undoubtedly for the congestion of urban areas is that the influx of natives is not always under proper control. The municipalities have been slow in bringing into operation the Urban Areas Act, and the administration of that Act is undoubtedly in many cases very lax. That has been the case for a considerable time in the Cape Peninsula, but now, besides that in an urban area like Cape Town, there is a change slowly coming over this particular community. The coloured man is gradually being supplanted by the native who comes to the Cape Peninsula undoubtedly in increasing numbers. The coloured man who was formerly housed on the premises of his employer, is gradually being displaced on these premises by the native, and that is undoubtedly one of the reasons why there is great congestion in these areas in the Cape Peninsula, which are more particularly occupied by the coloured people. There is another cause of congestion which exists in certain centres—notably in Cape Town and Port Elizabeth—and that is, the remarkable industrial expansion, the provisions of housing for employees in those areas certainly failing to keep pace with the industrial expansion. The employment in those urban areas acts like a bait to the man outside, who, frequently failing to find proper housing, is caught in the deathtrap of the slum.

One result of the Government’s white labour policy.

Under the Housing Act dwellings have been provided in sufficient numbers at an economic rental, and the housing loans granted by the previous and present Governments have very considerably improved the position. But that has not been the case with the poorer classes of the community, and for this there are two reasons. The first is that the slum landlord is shy of investing any further money in slum property. Not that slum property does not pay handsomely, but the landlord is not sure that he will be allowed to go on drawing his income for long from these slum dwellings. Slum property pays handsomely only as long as the owner is enabled to fill a room built for two persons only with five times that number. The slum landlord knows that he has public opinion against him and the moral set sentiment of the nation against him; he certainly fears the Rent Act and public health measures, and he also dreads the competition of better housing which is supplied in urban areas by means of Government loans. Therefore, we find that, although slum dwellings are a very handsome investment, the slum landlord does not extend his operations, confining himself to over-crowding well-built houses. There is a second reason why there is congestion in some of the urban centres, notably Cape Town and Port Elizabeth; their municipal councils are rather inclined to shirk the responsibility under the provisions of the Housing Act. They are eager enough, generally speaking, to utilize the money made available for the erection of better-class houses, because for these places they are sure of their tenants and of their rent. But they shirk their responsibility in connection with housing for the poorer sections of the community. Besides that, municipalities, after all, represent the ratepayers, and a good many of those ratepayers are property owners, and as such they do not like the competition which comes from better provision for housing for the inhabitants of such an urban area. The question has, therefore, become an entirely new one. It is not a question of the provision of more money for housing purposes, but it has become a question whether the law is sufficiently an effective instrument to deal with the existing want of housing accommodation in urban centres. The Government has not had the time or the opportunity since the general election to go into the whole question of the possibility of a change in the law, and therefore, all I can say at this juncture is that the Government will consider the question of altering the law very seriously during the recess, and I think that when Parliament meets again I will be in a better position to inform Parliament as to what the Government proposes to do in connection with this matter. Perhaps without binding the Government, or without committing myself to any particular plan, I should on this occasion say a few words with regard to some suggestions which have been made to improve housing conditions in our urban areas. I wish to say, first of all, that the proposal must be ruled out altogether that the state should, as a state, undertake to provide housing for the population. It is certainly not the duty of the State to provide any man with a good house. The provision of proper houses must be left, in the first instance, to private initiative, and if private initiative fails, then it becomes, first of all, a municipal obligation, and behind the municipalities we have the obligation resting on the shoulders of the provincial administration. I think the principle underlying existing legislation is on the whole a sound one, and I think that principle should largely remain in operation. After all, we must not forget that if proper housing conditions obtain in a municipal area, that particular municipality stands to gain a great deal by that. They benefit in rates, and not only that, but the trade of that particular centre is very much improved, and in every way the municipality benefits by better housing, and, therefore, the responsibility should primarily continue to rest upon their shoulders. They cannot reap the benefit of better accommodation for the inhabitants, and at the same time evade their responsibility. I think it is worth while to touch on some of the other suggestions which have been made for the improvement of existing conditions. First of all, I mention here the possibility of providing houses, built under the Housing Act, of a less expensive type than has been customary to build so far, utilizing less expensive material. With regard to this, I can say this is a question to which the Central Housing Board has given a good deal of attention and thought, but so far they have found no alternative to brick and mortar. They find that every scheme that has been brought forward is certainly not an improvement on what we have now, and does not take proper account of the climatic conditions with which we have to do in South Africa. Another suggestion has been made from time to time, and that is that we have to provide for the existing need by the “mass production” of houses, as it is called. Personally, I must say that does not attract me very much. It may be somewhat cheaper to produce houses on a somewhat large scale, but on the other hand the monotony that goes along with that is undoubtedly killing. The worker, the poor man working in the towns, has a life of much monotony—monotony in his daily toil, monotony especially in certain trades and occupations where he has to confine himself to mechanical movements from morning to night. I think it would be a bad thing if that man, going to his home, should find long rows of houses of exactly the same type. The monotony will continue, and I say that is killing in spirit. I very much prefer the plan which is followed in Holland and in other places, of combining, as far as possible, individual with communal interest—providing accommodation on the outskirts of towns, where there is plenty of room, by way of flats with many of the amenities which belong to any house in common with those living in that flat. These are all matters which can be carefully gone into during the recess, and I think on a later occasion I will be in a position to inform the House what we are able to do in that respect. There is a further suggestion which has been made, which is the possible reduction of building costs by means of a slight departure from trade union principles. It has been represented to me that the labouring classes in England have agreed to relax the application of trade union principles somewhat in the case of building operations for the poorer classes, where houses are provided at a sub-economic rental. I have not been able to investigate the position in England with regard to that matter, and I cannot say whether that is or is not so. If we have a precedent to go upon in England, I think it certainly ought to be investigated, and we ought to consider whether it is possible, in this country, to do anything in that direction; but if that is done the employment of semiskilled labour should be allowed, in my opinion, only in connection with houses which are being built for the occupation of the poorer classes at a sub-economic rental, and only in connection with houses which cost very little.

What about the materials—timber and bricks?

What about the Minister of Labour?

I say I am going to investigate what is being done in England.

What about the materials—timber and bricks?

What about the Minister of Labour?

I say I am going to investigate what is being done in England. Now there is another remedy which has been suggested, and that is that money should be provided by the central government at a sub-economic rate of interest. With regard to that I cannot at this stage say more than that it is a subject which the Government may consider. I should say that money at a sub-economic rate of interest should be provided only on two conditions. The first is that it should not apply to the type of house which is now being built under the existing law, and under the existing conditions of the loans. We do not wish to arrive at the position that municipalities which are carrying out schemes now may stop these schemes in the hope that they may be able to get the money from the Government at a sub-economic rate of interest. Therefore I say that if we are to consider this matter it must be on the definite understanding that money so supplied shall not apply to houses which cost above a certain sum. Further, I should say if we consider the question of providing money at a sub-economic rental that it would be only reasonable that the Government should have the power to compel the municipalities to eliminate the slum areas. The slum is undoubtedly a menace to the public in general, and because it is a menace to public health it may he argued that the central government has an interest as well as the municipality in removing these blots on many of Our towns. Now I say if money is provided at an economic rate of interest along with that should go power to the central government to compel the municipalities to remove these blots from the urban areas. There was another suggestion which has been made, and this is strongly pressed by some of the municipalities of the country, that power should be given to the provincial administration to expropriate slum areas. If such powers could be given I think they would go very far to remove some of these blots from our cities and towns. The idea would then be that when any particular house in a slum area, or whenever the whole area is condemned as unfit for human habitation, the municipality would have power given by the provincial administration to expropriate the site of the particular dwelling in the slum area, unless the owner of that property is willing to rebuild his house in such a way that it would become fit for human habitation. The idea is that if we take any steps in that direction that these slum areas should be expropriated, not on a basis of the income which the owner of the property receives in the way of rent, but on a site value. If that could be done, much would be accomplished to remove these blots on our towns and on our civilization. I may say that I consider that the slums in our urban areas should be removed, not only on account of health and because it is a danger to the health of the community, but because in my view the slum is a very important factor in the unfortunate process of emigration from the country to the urban centres. It has often been said that if we made housing schemes in the urban centres then there is always the danger of attracting people from the country districts into the towns, for there they can get good and cheap housing. I do not share that view. I think the slum is a much greater attraction than when proper houses are built for the working classes there. When a man goes to a town he goes there in order to make a living in that particular town and he will go if he thinks there is some backdoor through which he can slide to remain in that centre and make a living, if he can save sufficient on housing, if he can hop into the underworld of the slums. For that reason I think that the existence of the slums in our towns and cities is a greater attractor of people than the production of better class houses to the working people ever would be.

Business suspended at 6 p.m. and resumed at 8.6. p.m.

When the House rose I had nearly completed all I had to say on the housing question, and I cannot do better than summarize some of the points I tried to make. The first point was that all the money that was required under the existing law by municipalities had been provided to such an extent that they had not been able to utilize all the funds available. The present Government has really made the first attempt to deal with the housing of the poorer classes. The previous Government made available large sums of money, but the great part of that was spent on the better class houses. The maximum amount laid down by the previous Government was £1,500, but all the money provided by the present Government was lent on the definite understanding that it had to be used for the housing of the poorer classes, and to ameliorate slum conditions as far as possible. We reduced the maximum to £1,000 and afterwards to £800, and later on we allowed loans of £650. To show how far we have carried out the intention of the new loan of £1,000,000 I will give the House the following figures: Houses between £700 and £800 in value, 12; between £600 and £700, 18; between £500 and £600, 24; between £400 and £500, 41: between £300 and £400, 77; between £200 and £300, 287; between £100 and £200, 174; and houses of £100 and under in value, 589. Unclassified houses between £250 and £561, mostly in Cape Town, are 446. That is the new money. That shows very clearly that we have made a real attempt to grapple with the question of housing for the poorest classes. I further made clear that the present law in spite of the facilities which have been made available by the Government has broken down. And there is no doubt about it that the position has been much relieved so far as the better class houses are concerned but it has not been materially relieved as far as the housing of the poorest section is concerned. The reason is that the slum landlord, though very well satisfied with what he has, is not disposed to invest more money in slum property. He confines himself now to hiring houses which are well built and which under the present conditions he is able to overcrowd and in that way get his profit. On the other hand municipalities are very much disposed to shirk their responsibilities so far as the housing of the poorest section is concerned. They are willing to get the money which, when they invest, they can invest at an economic rental and in that way get back their money, but they are not eager to invest money in housing where they are not sure they will get an economic rental. The real problem of the housing of the poorest classes has hardly been touched. Various suggestions have been made to tackle this question in future. I may be quite clear that, so far as I am concerned, and so far as the Government is concerned, we are not going to depart from the fundamental principle underlying existing legislation, that the Central Government is not going to assume responsibility for providing houses for the population. The responsibility rests and must continue to rest upon the local authority. Further, I stated that there are matters which, during the recess, I am willing to go into and when Parliament meets again, to make a statement to the House in how far we have been able to adopt entirely or partly any of the suggestions which have been made in the House. First of all, there is the question as to whether cheaper material could be used in the building of houses and in that way building costs be reduced. Another is whether other designs than those adopted now could not be found for cheapening the building of houses. I also mentioned the fact that it has been represented to me—and it is a matter which I would like further to investigate—that in Great Britain among others building costs have been reduced because the labouring classes have agreed to relax the application somewhat of trade union principles where houses of the cheaper variety are built and at the sub-economic rate of interest. I cannot judge about that because I have not got the facts, but I said that during the recess I would like to investigate that matter and tell the House exactly what the position is when the House meets again. A further point was the question of the possibility of providing money on the part of the Central Government at a sub-economic rate of interest to local authorities. I said that was a matter which of course the Cabinet alone has the right to decide. We have not discussed the matter and I cannot make any promise at this stage, but all I can say is that I personally hold the view that, if the Government should decide to provide money for the less expensive type of houses for the housing of the poorest classes, in that case, the Government ought to take power to compel municipalities to do their duty in connection with the elimination of slum conditions within their areas. The last point I made was that slums are undoubtedly a blot and a menace to the community and that therefore I think the Government ought to consider the question as to whether legislation should not be passed empowering provincial administrations under certain conditions to expropriate slum property. The slum owner should be given the choice either to improve buildings and make them fit for human habitation or otherwise to hand them over to the provincial administration, not on the basis of the income which they yield but on the basis of their site value. These are the points which I made and I would just in conclusion add this, that I think we all realize that we cannot deal with the question of housing in cities and towns altogether as something apart. We must not forget that the ultimate origin of the influx to towns and the congestion in towns is the country, and we cannot improve conditions in urban areas especially by providing better houses and then think we have done our duty and that we have solved the problem. The ultimate origin of the housing question in towns, I say, is largely the conditions in the country among the farming population, and therefore the improvement of conditions in the towns and the improvement of conditions in the country districts ought to go hand in hand. We cannot slam the door in the face of poor people leaving their country districts for the urban areas and then further leave them to their lot. We must improve farming conditions generally in such a way that the farmer can live and can live economically on his farm. We must improve conditions in the country by better educational facilities and more especially by providing better facilities, among others, for agricultural education. It is only in that way that we can to some extent stop the influx from the country to the larger centres. I hope when the House meets again next year I shall be in a better position after we have considered these matters to tell the House exactly what the Government is able and is not able to do.

I propose like the Minister to confine (myself to the question of housing. When considering the points I wished to put before the House I intended to deal with it not on lines of which party is responsible or not; I intended to approach it rather from the point of humanity and what I would call enlightened self-interest, than from the point of who is responsible or not for the present condition of affairs. So I regretted that the hon. member for Carolina (Mr. W. H. Rood), the hon. member for Boksburg (Mr. McMenamin), the hon. member for Ladybrand (Mr. Swart) and one or two others chose to use the occasion to level attacks either at the last (or South African party) Government or at Cape Town. It seems to me to be such a pitiful red herring to draw across the trail, with regard to one of the most momentous things we can discuss. I do not know why the Minister of the Interior should above all others set an example in making a provocative speech; although portions of it we received with applause. But he was provocative in claiming credit for his party and throwing discredit on the South African party for what he said they had not done, and in attacking Cape Town. Is that the best means of endeavouring to get at the solution of a matter of this kind, to which we should devote goodwill and the best of our intellects so as to arrive at a solution? He alleged that the press of Cape Town made attacks which suggested that these serious conditions were very largely due to the neglect of the present Government. I do not wish to develop my argument on those lines, but I would like to ask the Minister in all fairness to give one instance in which this was done by the press of Cape Town. On the contrary, the press of this city has gone out of its way to get hon. members of the party on the opposite side of the House—eight or ten of them, and some of them very strong party people indeed—to examine the conditions in Cape Town. Would the press have chosen them in order to provide them with material for the purpose of making an attack on the present Government? I do ask the Minister to do away with these petty considerations. Then he said that the present Government had done everything that the existing legislation required it to do, but of course this legislation was of the wicked South African party Government. Yet after five years of administration of that law the Minister says he entirely endorses its principle, and that the State has no responsibility whatever in providing houses. I think that is a very lamentable conclusion to come to, and I hope the Minister will take that point also into consideration before next session, and to rule out the idea that the State should not have anything to do with the providing of houses. There are other matters in which the Government can also assist apart from the provision of housing loans. There are other matters which I submit should be enquired into not merely by the Cabinet, but I would ask the Government to appoint a commission to examine the position of all the big cities in the Union where bad housing conditions are prevalent, and that it should consist of representatives of all sorts, half a dozen to ten people whether versed in building, architecture and housing, accountancy, economics or otherwise. There should be no members of Parliament sitting on it, and the members of the commission should enquire into the true position the State should occupy with regard to this question. The Minister said that one of the reasons for congestion was the influx of natives, and he proceeded to make an attack on Cape Town, suggesting three or four times that Cape Town had not done its duty in regard to the natives and had not taken up the money it could have taken up under these loans. Does the Minister realize what Cape Town has done under the Urban Areas Act? This was passed in 1923. Two or three years ago Langa Location was opened, which cost Cape Town close on half a million pounds, and I think I have the right to say that the expenditure was provided on purpose to deal with natives under that Act. I should be very surprised indeed if the Minister can justify any of his allegations and attacks on Cape Town for having failed in its duty, in regard to these natives, or having been lax in regard to them. I do not say that Cape Town has done all it should have done, but what Cape Town has done should at least be put to its credit. Except for the fact that the Minister has promised to give consideration to two or three points which are of vital moment. I do not think he will consider that he has done himself the justice, which he might have done when he spoke this afternoon. I do not think his speech did justice to the subject or to the Minister himself. He said: “We are the first Government which has dealt with the slum proposition,” and he has claimed that by reason of the lower limit up to which persons can obtain money out of the housing fund. That limit was only a maximum; and whether the maximum is higher or lower has not affected the question of building smaller houses. But the Minister has by altering the limit done nothing in the direction of enabling more small houses to be built. The Government has done nothing in that direction. The solution of the housing question is to be found by dealing more with the poorer classes. I hope that what the Minister meant by his speech was that he has had a change of heart, that there has been a change of heart on the part of the Cabinet, although he was careful not to commit the Cabinet to it. When you look back on the history of this housing loan, the original money, i.e., three millions, was voted by the late Government, and the new money—the £1.000,000 of new money—was what was voted by the present Government. Yet we came within an ace of not having that new money at all, for I remember when a couple of sessions ago the Minister for Finance took up the attitude that the whole of the responsibility was the municipalities’, and there was no duty on the Government to find money for housing purposes for municipalities, and I took up the attitude that that was very unfair. I wish to ask the Minister to consider this subject on its merits, and not to raise the eternal question of party. I would like to mention one or two facts with regard to Cape Town. The question is not what Cape Town has done only, but what Cape Town is trying to do. I think a little credit might be given to those courageous large-hearted people who for years have pressed on this question in Cape Town, and to those who consider that the question, no matter what bodies of people are here, or what the publicity, ought to be forced into prominence, and should be dealt with on its merits. The Minister does not do justice to Cape Town. Let him look at the report of the medical officer of health of Cape Town, a medical officer who has been very devoted to his work. The town council has spent close on half a million in dealing with the slum question by making provision for the natives, because the natives were crowding into the slums, to the menace of the health, life and morals of the community. That was a very great piece of work which they did. If the Minister will look at his own housing board’s reports he will find that the municipality of Cape Town has also spent something like a quarter of a million of its own money under powers which they have under a Cape Provincial Ordinance of 1920, and that is quite irrespective of the Government loan. Does the Minister know that the municipality has spent close on £150,000 on housing its own employees? I am mentioning these figures to show what has been done in Cape Town. I believe I am correct in saying that there has been £3,000,000 used from the Government Housing Fund over the whole Union. Out of the £3,000,000 so used, of which £2,000,000 has been taken by the Cape Province, £1,000,000 has been taken by Cape Town alone in developing housing schemes. I think a little credit might be given to Cape Town, even if it has not taken enough. That £600.000 out of the £1,000,000 “new money” which the Minister speaks of is for four years at £150,000 a year.

They do not utilize to the full extent.

The Minister knows perfectly well that a large part was utilized for actual schemes and a large part of the balance would have been used for another scheme which the Administrator in the end turned down on his mere ipse dixit. The Administrator may have been right in turning down this part of the scheme. It may have been a good scheme in a wrong place; it may have been a bad scheme. I do not propose to judge its merits. But the Minister should give Cape Town the credit for having tried to do something with this unused balance. It is not fair to attack the municipality which, above all other municipalities in the Union, has tried to do its best. It has done a great deal and tried to do a great deal more. The Minister should also remember that the Cape Town municipality has done its best to endeavour to get powers to deal with the slum problem by expropriation of slums on prairie value. When the town planning ordinance was before the Cape Provincial Council in 1927, the municipality tried to get powers on the lines of the English Housing Act, 1925, but they were told that the Provincial Council could not give such powers to a municipality, as those powers would be ultra vires. The municipality have failed to get the very powers the Minister spoke of because the Provincial Council held or was advised that it could not give the authority to the municipality. In the same way the Transvaal Municipal Association tried to get similar legislation passed on the lines of the English Act of Parliament, but they also were turned down. The Cape Town municipality have asked every Cape Town member of Parliament to endeavour to get legislation to confer more powers to expropriate slum properties on the basis of the slum buildings being worthless and of compensation being payable on the present site value alone. At one time it was thought it was enough to give the municipality power to make or get closing orders: then it was found that if you closed down one house it might be a menace to the health of the community even if it were no longer used. Then in the report of the Select Committee on the Public Health Act, 1919, you will find that the Cape Town municipality asked for powers to get demolition orders i.e., powers not only to close up a house but to pull it down. Now it is realized that if you want to make a slum area into a decent area you must have power not only to pull down, but power to expropriate on proper terms and power to rebuild, to reconstruct, what was to be dealt with—not a particular house—that is not the point at all. What they want is power to expropriate the area, and they want the powers under the English Act which is the fruit of ripe experience. Under that Act, when it is reported by the medical officer of health that an area is unhealthy, the local authority has to consider it and decide upon it after enquiry. Then he may have to report to the Minister, and the Minister has to set afoot an enquiry after due notice to those concerned, and an opportunity being given to them to be heard. If the report of that enquiry is that the place is an unhealthy area, it is treated as such: as a place to be wiped out and improved. I ask the Minister if he will use his influence to bring about an alteration of the law here to incorporate the English statutory principles of dealing with the position. I ask him to bring forward in the next session of parliament an amending Bill giving the municipality powers, as in the English Housing Act of 1925, to abolish, expropriate, buy up, rebuild and improve, and that you should have an opportunity of dealing with the question. Some of the most beautiful parts of the town are positively wasted, for in some of these parts there are slum areas, e.g., the so-called “lanes” or “steege.” These are places we should have the power to pull down and to reconstruct where necessary. But let me point out that every person who knows anything at all about the housing question says this, before you pull down a house that is crowded with people you must provide room for the people before you take any steps at all. You must make provision for other housing before you take any steps of this kind at all. This makes it impossible for medical officers and prosecutors to look for successful prosecutions in cases of overcrowding. You may get an order clearing out an overcrowded place: and drive the people to overcrowd elsewhere. The municipalities should have their powers clearly defined in an Act of Parliament, so that there will be no quibbling as to what their powers are. Then does the Minister remember that only a couple of days ago the Minister of Finance took up the attitude, “We give the money, and we wash our hands of it. It is the duty of the municipality to deal with the question. All we have to do is to provide the money.” The Minister of the Interior appears to recognize that the Government has to go much further and take some responsibility. The English Act which has, to a large extent, solved the housing problem in England, makes provision for subsidies, and the Minister may provide as much money as he is willing to grant. Experience teaches us that this is a rapidly changing question, and that the solution is in any case an experimental one. Our ideas and our knowledge have crystalized. In 1920, the first housing board reported that the position was a shortage of two classes of houses, one for persons able to provide for themselves, and the second class of persons unable to do so. As to the first class, it was a war result; the difficulty in the second class was caused by war plus the ordinary difficulty of making provision for such persons. While it is a very good thing to increase the housing fund, we have come down to this, that we will not get to solving the crux of the problem unless we make provision, as the housing board points out, in the last report, not for the poor classes, but for the very poor. The distinction now drawn is not as ten years ago between those who are better able to provide houses and those who are not as well able to do so, but between those who can do so, and the poorer classes and the very poor. The slum landlord does not build—he buys. The people we want the Minister to direct his special attention to are the very poor, whose economic position is such that they cannot pay an economic rent. It is not only a question of higher rates of wages. There is no one panacea. But we wan houses built at the cheapest possible rate, and I have suggestions as to what the Government can do to help. First of all I ask for legislation on the lines I have outlined. I also suggest that the housing fund should be administered by a Government department. That is not a new proposition, for I had the honour to be a member of the Select Committee on the Public Health Bill, and I proposed a long resolution providing for the establishment of a Government housing board, among whose duties would be that of bringing to the knowledge of the poorer classes the facilities offered by the Government for the building of homes. The more widely extended is the knowledge of the facilities given under the Act, the more likely is the Act to prove a success. Then I suggest that some economic facilities should be applied to the building of houses of under £300 or even £200; for then a large number of such houses would he built. The hon. member for Newlands (Mr. Stuttaford) suggested that the transfer duty on low priced houses should be reduced.

You do not want to tell the House that again.

I would like to see a commission appointed to enquire into all these things.

The transfer duty is a minor matter.

It is obvious that the Minister thinks in millions. I am speaking for people who have to think in pence. Then the customs duties on building material add to the expense of house construction, among the duties being 20 per cent. on asbestos sheets, etc. (which are largely used), bricks, tiles, and paints, 25 per cent. on doors and windows, and 6s. per 100 square feet on glass. If these duties were lowered or exemptions given in case of the construction of small houses, considerable saving would be effected in the cost of construction of the cheaper houses. The Minister smiles, but we are endeavouring to make a contribution to the solution of a very serious problem. What is there to prevent the Minister, say, making a subsidy to take the place of these duties which add to the cost of small houses? I appeal to the Minister to consider the matter from a humane point of view. As the Minister for the Interior admitted, slums are a blot. They threaten the physical and moral health of the whole community. We ask for subsidies to help to deal with the problem now. An outbreak in a Cape Town slum may have its effect in Pietersburg in a week or two. To combat tuberculosis and certain other contagious or formidable epidemic diseases the Government pays half the cost of the construction of buildings intended for people afflicted with these diseases, half the cost of maintenance, and ⅓ to ⅔ cost of fighting the disease: and may make grants in aid. In matters of this kind the principles of the State concerns in local epidemics and disease is recognized in this way in the Public Health Act of 1919. Epidemics have no boundaries and disease cannot be segregated. But it is surely cheaper for the State to help to build houses with the assistance of subsidies than to fight epidemics or to construct institutions for the care of the victims of epidemics. The Government is as much concerned in the living conditions in the big cities as any other body, and it should consider its true responsibility. Do not let us act the Levite: do not let us brush the matter aside and ask, "Am I my brother’s keeper?”; but let us see how far the State, as a matter of humanity and self-interest, is vitally interested in the solution of the housing and slum property in the big cities.

I have been listening attentively for some days to the budget debate and have come to the conclusion that there is a clear distinction between the two sides of the House. Hon. members on this side have been advocating the cause of all sections of the population so that the Government may justly be called a National Government. It has become clear to me that there are various sections on the other side who have the interests of a definite group at heart. Some members opposite spoke on behalf of the interests of the gold and diamond mines and seek for a lower railway rate on coal. They said very little on behalf of the poor farmers. The hon. member for Newlands (Mr. Stuttaford) did indeed think of the poor man, but what I want to ask him was what he did for the poor man during the world war and what his Government did for the poor man during its fourteen years of office. Then the hon. member for Cathcart (Mr. van Coller) said he was so concerned about the poor of the countryside and that the 15,000 poor people should be brought back to the countryside. He forgot to say that the chance of returning to the land was much easier under this Government than under the last. Under the last regime the poor people had to pay one-fifth of the purchase price of ground in cash and the balance of four-fifths in twenty years, while now they have only to pay one-tenth and the nine-tenths in forty years. The hon. member therefore ought to give credit to the Government for the hundred per cent. better chance they have given the poor man. It is strange that the other side are now so concerned about the poor seeing that they never gave him an indication of it previously. After the election they apparently think that by their advocacy they may get the support of the poor man, but the poor have seen which Government looks after their interests the best, and that is why they have sent back the Nationalist party. The South African party run a great risk of losing some of their members opposite. The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg (North) (Mr. Dean) is so much influenced by his seat on the cross benches that he also is advocating ten shillings a day for the railway labourers. This side of the House is not only concerned about the interests of the poor man but also those of the farmer and the whole population. The interests of the farmers come first with the Government because it knows that a great deal depends on agriculture. The criticism on the budget was so weak, so vague and so without enthusiasm or life that one does not feel inclined to reply to it. The mouth of the Opposition waters when it sees the budget. They now say that the Government made the great mistake of so estimating as to show a large surplus. Would the Opposition be satisfied with a deficit? During the last five years of the Opposition Government, the best and fattest years of our country, there were deficits every year, and the public debt continually grew. Their budgeting was therefore much worse than that of our Government so that they had to resign eighteen months before their time. The country then put this Government in office and four of the Ministers of the late Government got such notions of no-confidence that they are still suffering to-day. The Opposition ought to appreciate the financial policy of the Government, as the public do, judging from the number of members on this side of the House. The Nationalist Government has killed the secession bogey for ever. Hon. members opposite grasped with both hands at the German treaty for an election cry to stir up race feeling, but even that did not succeed. Now the hon. member for Standerton (Gen. Smuts) goes to look for more suitable weapons even if he has to go six thousand miles for them. I want to bring a few matters to the notice of the Government. We know that they have done much and I do not want to blame the Government, but I am doing so with a very good intention. I want to bring to the notice of the Minister of Railways the housing position of the railway labourers. There are many of them who to-day in the great villages and towns have to find dwellings, and sometimes they have to live far away from their work, which is very unfortunate. In some cases foundations were built years ago as at Wellington, but no houses as yet. The people are longing for the completion of the houses. Then I want to refer to the leave of the railwaymen. There are people who have not had a holiday for years. They can get twelve days, but only five with pay, and as most of them cannot afford to lose pay, they let those seven days lapse. The matter must certainly be investigated. Everybody needs rest and a holiday. It gives fresh courage for work, which enables them to do better service. I also want to point out the intolerable position at Huguenot Station. The railway there runs across the highway to the north; Huguenot is one of the busiest stations and the traffic is so great that thousands of vehicles have to cross the line every day. Accidents and great delay which causes loss of money are the result of this state of affairs. Sometimes there are fifty or sixty vehicles waiting to cross the line. If there is one place in the Union which has a claim to a bridge, then it is Huguenot, and I hope the Minister will give the matter his immediate attention. Then I want to call the attention of the Minister of Agriculture to wheat growing. It is a matter which deserves the attention of all. Wheat farmers produce one of the most important foods, but every sensible man must see that no one can pay the high cost of living, and of labour, machinery and fertilizer if a bag of wheat only sells for 21s. or 22s. Unfortunately we still import 2,000,000 bags annually, and therefore great care must be taken that the price of wheat is not made too high by heavy protection, because the poor man is dependent on it for his bread. My experience is that it makes no difference in the price of flour and bread whether the wheat costs 22s. or 25s. a bag. Our market is much damaged by the importation of flour and the position just now is such that imported flour is not much dearer than the colonial brand. The importation of foreign flour at the same time greatly injures our dairy farmers. As they keep the bran there they have the opportunity subsequently of competing with us against our butter, ham and bacon. A change is therefore necessary. Would it not be a good thing to make the protection on wheat higher? Further, does not the Government think it desirable to fix the price for wheat produced in the Union, say, at 25s. a bag, and then to make the customs so high that corn from abroad cannot be sold here under 25s.? This will greatly assist the farmer and not oppress the poor man, because bread need not become dearer. The wheat production will be increased, and in that way the whole country will be benefited. I also want to break a lance for the reduction of railway rates on artificial and kraal manure. The fruit industry also deserves our particular attention. The dried fruit industry is increasing a good deal, but we still find that a great deal of dried fruit is imported. This makes the dried fruit industry unsound, and it is particularly noticeable in connection with raisins. Because there is great competition in raisins the making of raisins has to a great extent discontinued, and more wine is produced; consequently there is a surplus of wine, and this leads eventually to the detriment of the whole industry. We are all sorry that the hon. member for Bethal (Mr. Roos) is not in the House, and we hope that he will soon be better and that we shall see him in his place in glowing health next session. We learn that the hon. member, while he was a Minister, suggested the appointment of a commission to enquire into the working of the new liquor law; I do not know whether the commission will be appointed without delay, but I want to suggest that the commission should enquire whether this is actually the case that no one may give a tot to anyone under twenty-one years, and whether persons of eighteen years may actually buy liquor in licensed premises, and whether there are persons to whom licensees may sell no liquor, but who yet receives it in another way, and whether the different hours of closing have any effect on trade and industry. Those are the things needing attention. There is just one point more to bring to the notice of the Government, viz., the great need of farm telephones in the Paarl district. Many applications have been delayed for years and inasmuch as I see an amount of the estimates for extension of telephone services I hope the Paarl will get its share and that the connections required there will be made. Communication is of the greatest importance nowadays and the farmers must be connected with the markets and the town.

After listening to the debates in this House for more than two weeks, I admit I am feeling a little depressed. We have heard from the Minister of Finance of the new surpluses he is building up in this country and of the great development and prosperity we are experiencing, but on the other hand, we have heard from other hon. members from every part of the House terrible tales of suffering and of the poverty of large sections of our people. We have heard of the difficulties and problems of the mining industry and of practically every industry in this country. As far as the debates have gone, the only industry that has not made itself heard very much or its problems is the farming industry, and it is not that it has no great problems, and that it is in a fair way. It is the great factory of the poor whites in this country, and it is almost entirely due to the farming industry that we have these grave problems. I am pleased to see the Minister of Agriculture back in his place in this House. We have missed him during the last week, and welcome him back. I wish to tell him with regard to the farming industry that we look to him to do something to help us. We are not satisfied with him, or with his department. The present Government has done nothing constructive to assist the farmers to put their industry on a better footing. Whatever good they are doing to-day is entirely due to the fact that they are carrying on some of the good work initiated by the South African party when in power. There is something more needed than carrying on what has hitherto been done. We must advance. I wish to draw the Minister’s attention to the very serious, I may say the almost desperate, condition of the cattle industry. This is a problem that has received less consideration than any other branch of our industry. Nothing has been done to improve it, and to-day it is in a very critical position. All that we have had from the Government so far is advice. The Government and the department have told us that the remedy is in our own hands, and that we must improve our cattle. That advice will never have any beneficial effect. As far as possible, we have done our part. The great majority of the farmers have improved their cattle, and it is not only improvement of the cattle that is wanted. What we require is some means of dealing with scrub cattle. They are an asset, and there should be a market for them. It is up to the Government to provide that market. The Government has told us that we should replace cattle wherever it is possible by sheep, and also that we should keep fewer and better cattle. The farmers have carried out this advice. Sheep are now being kept wherever it is possible, pretty well. We have reduced our cattle, but that has not got rid of the scrub menace. By selling scrub cattle to replace them by better cattle, we simply pass on the scrub to somebody else. That is not a way of solving the problem. We must find some way of absorbing them. The only thing that the Government have done is the sending of the director of animal husbandry, Mr. Thornton, to the Argentine to report on the cattle industry there. Mr. Thornton has come back and presented his report, and, as far as we know, after a period of two years no action has been taken and the position is the same as it was before. Mr. Thornton has since been sent to the native territories to look after the native interests instead of ours. The only thing of real value in Mr. Thornton’s report is that which deals with the question of scrub cattle. After discussing a number of matters, Mr. Thornton says that the future of our cattle industry in South Africa lies in the replacement of our cattle, where it is economically sound, by sheep, and that facilities for canning and extract factories is the solution of the problem of the lower grade of scrub cattle. The establishment of such factories will, according to Mr. Thornton, do much to relieve the depression in our cattle industry. I am sorry to see that the Minister has disappeared from the House. The only possible way of dealing with the scrub menace is in the manner advised by Mr. Thornton in his report, and that is that the Government should make it their business to provide canning and extract factories, and that if they do that we shall have a market for what to-day is a liability to us, but should and would be an asset. I ask the Government to take this matter into favourable consideration. Mr. Thornton, in his report, speaks of factories of this description in the Argentine, and one of those he mentions is Liebigs. Liebigs have large interests in South Africa at the present time. They have ranches in Rhodesia and in German West, I believe, and have many thousands of cattle there. I am given to understand that this strong company would entertain proposals for the establishment of an extract and canning factory in the Union. I ask the Government to make investigations, and to encourage the idea of a factory of this kind. We are told by the Government that the farmers must stand on their feet, and must not expect to be spoon-fed by the Government. I maintain that the farmers do stand on their own feet, and that they always try to do everything possible to assist themselves. With regard to the cattle industry and the improvement of cattle, we have breed societies in this country representing practically every pure breed of cattle in the world, and those societies have done a tremendous amount of good work. They have produced the best type of pure-bred bulls for the use of the farmers, and the work they have done has resulted in cattle being improved in the better parts of the country. With regard to the society which I have been most interested in—the Friesland Cattle Breeders’ Association—years before the Government touched it, we introduced milk-recording at our own cost, and the Government, seeing the good we had done, have taken it over. I am pleased to say that since we have been milk-recording, it has been proved that our dairy cattle in this country compare very favourably with cattle in other countries of the world, even with Australia and New Zealand. We have cows capable of producing ten gallons of milk a day, and 2,000 gallons per annum. This is no mean production in a country like this. We have also as good beef-producing cattle in this country as in any part of the world. The Government cannot expect us to do everything. We are doing all we can, and when it comes to a question of industries that are necessary, like the cattle industry, it is up to them to do their part. A great menace to the cattle industry is the scrub cattle in this country. There is a great deal of our country which is only capable of producing scrub cattle, and we must accept that fact. Where we have the difficulties of uncertain seasons, of dry areas, and where cattle have to forage for themselves, the only kind of cattle which can be successfully kept are the scrub cattle, and if the Government wish to help us they must accept that fact, and they can help us by providing a market. I wish to say a few words on a few other questions in connection with the cattle industry. First of all, with regard to east coast fever, one of the greatest drawbacks to cattle in Natal and the Transvaal province is this menace of east coast fever. For the past 25 years we have been trying to eradicate it, and in doing this we have almost eradicated our cattle. Something better is required than mere dipping. There is no doubt that something more stringent than dipping is required. The only way to exterminate east coast fever is by compulsory slaughtering of the animals whenever an outbreak occurs. Dr. du Toit, the chief of the veterinary department, in dealing with this question, says that the surest way to get rid of this disease is to keep infected farms free of cattle for 15 months, and this is only possible by slaughtering cattle where an outbreak takes place. If the chief of the veterinary department gives that advice, why does not the Government give it serious consideration? We are spending over £100,000 a year on the control of east coast fever, and during the 25 years it must have cost the country £2,500,000. If we were to adopt the system advocated by the veterinary department, east coast fever would be eradicated and the country saved much expenditure in two or three years. I would like to touch upon another point, that of tuberculosis in cattle in this country. From the answer of the Minister to my question, it appears to me that the Government have decided to let this matter slide. They are considering it, and they have considered it for the past 25 years. There is no restriction whatever to the spread of the disease, and the prevalence of this terrible disease is very great in this country. All you members who live in Cape Town are drinking tuberculosis milk every day of your lives. It is only because you have a certain amount of resistance that you are here to-night. Tuberculosis is in this country an increasing disease among human beings, and it is greatly spread by the milk from diseased animals. Twenty years ago the Government did try to do something to eradicate this disease. When they knew of a herd which was infected they tested the herd and destroyed diseased animals, but they have given that up now, and are simply doing nothing. The Government knows that a large part of our purebred herds are affected, and a large number of bulls from these herds are being sold to outlying farms all over the country. The chief reason why the Government does not tackle the position is that it is going to cost money, but by leaving the position as it is now, it is only getting worse, and it will cost more money eventually. At the present time we have a Government with a huge surplus and plenty of money to spend. Why not spend some of it now on this, instead of waiting for bad times to come? I feel that the present Government and the Minister of Agriculture are not doing their duty towards the farmers of this country, and the sooner we bring pressure to bear on them the better. The only claim the present Government have of being a farmer’s party, which they claim to be, is that it was put into power largely by a farming vote, nevertheless, they have done nothing constructive to advance the farming industry. The Government has the greatest opportunity any Government has ever had of placing the farming industry on a proper footing. Anything that the Government brings forward in the interest of the farmers and to further their industries will receive the support of the whole of the House. I appeal to the Government to help us in our reasonable requests.

I am certainly approaching the Minister of Railways to-day with one of the strangest requests any member of the House has ever made. I am the first and only member who is making a request to the Minister who does not ask for more expenditure. The request is one which affects the interests of many farmers in the drought-stricken areas, and hon. members know the farmers in those parts have had very difficult times. They have nearly been ruined, but, owing to the concessions made by the railways, they were able to carry their stock at a much reduced rate. When those farmers returned with their stock from the grazing they had found, their first idea was that they should take precautions against finding themselves again in the same parlous position that they were in before when they had to trek. They returned with very much smaller flocks of sheep than what they had, and they got into financial difficulties. They had plenty of credit with the shops, and the first thing they did when there was not enough water was to sink boreholes; further, they erected jackal-proof fencing, which is the salvation of the drought-stricken areas. The people had debts owing to the drought, and, in order to bore, they had to incur more debt and still more to get the fencing. They incurred the debt to prevent the recurrence of their previous experience. The railways met them by reduced rates, and everyone is very thankful for what the Government did, but when they returned, they were not able to pay the amount of the railway department, because sometimes they had to trek with 3,000 to 4,000 sheep through the Karroo to the neighbourhood of Laingsburg, then to the Transvaal, and then again to the Kalahari, which all costs much money, so that many farmers owed large sums of money. The railway first assisted them by giving, them time for a year and then another year, and in June last the people who have not yet paid received a notice from the railways that they will be given a further extension provided they get a letter from the magistrate in their district saying they are unable to pay. This put the farmers in a difficult position. The farmer does not like to go to the magistrate for a letter to the effect that he cannot pay. On the other hand, the magistrate is in a difficult position. In the first place, he is possibly not aware of the man’s financial position, and secondly, he is possibly a friend of the farmer, and it will be difficult for him to say that he cannot be given an extension. Hon. members will possibly ask whether I am advocating the writing off of the money, but I am not, nor do the farmers wish it, at any rate, the largest section of them. It is the wish of a small group, and that small group which I have met does not support this side of the House, but they are supporters of hon. members opposite. We have heard lots of election stories, and one spread amongst the farmers was that if we got that dear old Government that we had before 1924 the debts would be written off, and the farmers would not be required to pay. Fortunately, the Victoria West farmers were not stupid enough to believe it. Many of the farmers owe the railways a great deal, and the danger is always over them that the department may say that they must pay the money. If that happened their position would be critical. I want to ask the Minister of Railways that the money which is still due by the farmers should be paid back during a period of, say, five to six years, in annual or half-yearly instalments. I think the farmers would even be willing to pay interest on it. If that is done the farmer will know that he must pay definite sums at a definite time, and he will not be in the unfortunate position of possibly having to pay the whole sum unexpectedly. I suggest that it would also be a good principle in the future if another drought comes to say that if the farmers carry their stock and bring them back again, they shall not at once have to pay back the railway charges, but because they have a hard time in the drought-stricken areas, they will have a certain number of years to pay off the money in annual or half-yearly instalments to the department. The position of many of the farmers in the drought-stricken areas was that they found out what it cost to carry the stock by rail, and then they thought their financial position did not actually permit of such transport if they had to pay in the money immediately after their return. As a result, they put things off till in the long run they had lost so many of their animals by putting off the trekking that they suffered greater losses, and were financially weakened, in consequence of which, not the farmers themselves, alone suffered loss, but also the country in general.

I think we all admit that this is one of the most interesting sessions we have ever had. One has only to look at both sides of the House to see what a process of renewal, yes of rejuvenation the House has undergone during the last few months. I want to heartily welcome hon. members on both sides of the House on behalf of the older members, and after the unusual opportunity they have had of making their maiden speeches during the first few weeks of their first session I want to say that some of our older members will have to see that they do not have to give up their laurels to the new members. I want to say to new hon. members that it was a pleasure to sit and listen to the spirit which was shown on both sides. It is quite clear to me that if it depends on them and if they are not taken off the track sooner or later by the old sinners they will introduce a new spirit into the House. Well I wish them every success with that because everyone of us will agree that there is room for improvement. That indeed things were formerly as bad as some even in this session would make it appear or as the newspapers publish to the outside world—well so serious anyhow it was not. I think that even as regards the old Parliament and the old members we have no special reason for being ashamed. We have indeed now and then spoken with conviction against each other to get our view to prevail but it was not so bad. I am very glad to see the hon. member for Namaqualand (Dr. Steenkamp) and I want at once to explain to him about something I saw of an interview given by the hon. member to a member of the press. I notice that the hon. member is under a misapprehension because on the 30th July he stated in the interview that I was discourteous enough to walk out of the House while he was speaking. The hon. member said that the way in which I left the House struck him very forcibly. If that is so then I am afraid that my hon. friend will yet be struck more forcibly because I can give him the assurance that it is an everyday matter with me to be called out ten or twenty times suddenly to attend to other business. Now I only want to say that on that occasion I did not leave the House because I did not want to listen to the hon. member; I was only too keen on hearing his speech and I was sorry I could not be present but I was called because I had to keep an appointment with the representative of the British Government. I am specially telling him this because I hope he will learn how easy it is to draw a wrong conclusion. Let me say that I subsequently read the speech of the hon. member and according to the report—and one usually does not find the most oratorical part in a report—I must say that I entirely agree with what the Minister of Justice has said. When I read that speech I could not help saying precisely the same thing to myself. With reference to the case of the Louw family, which the hon. member mentioned, I want to say that I believe that there is not one of us in the House—and I might almost say no one out of it—who possesses any heart at all who does not sympathize deeply when occurrences like that happen. I do not believe that there is anyone of us who wants to impose a punishment on any person merely for the pleasure of punishing, and we would all rather see that there were no persons deserving of punishments. I have read speeches in the papers made by the hon. member for Namaqualand which make me feel, however, that the hon. member ought really to understand that it does not become us to make speeches in the country by which we, I do not say praise, but at any rate encourage a crime for which there is actually a severe penalty, by representing the matter in such a way, as if in the circumstances it was not actually a sin but something for which the offender should be applauded. The hon. member must excuse me that I could not ask myself any other question when I read his speech. Now if what I read is correct how far was the hon. member himself responsible for the temptation of the persons by the encouragement his words produced. I ask him to consider that. We cannot make speeches and use words encouraging people to do something for which they may subsequently be punished and then come and lay the sin on the law, the jurisprudence or the Government. Now I just want to discuss a few points which have been raised. May I say a few words about the streaming of boys from the countryside to the towns and villages. It has been referred to and it was said here that they should be taken back to the land? Only to-day we heard that someone had said that the land was the only salvation for these people. I want to remind my hon. friends that it may be true of a part of them but only a part; for that section for which the land is the best place the Government must do its best to take them back there but I want at the same time to point out that it is not a slogan or thesis which can apply generally. We must remember that we in South Africa have fortunately not reached that position when the drift to the towns is coupled with the emptying of the farms. That is not the case in South Africa but just the opposite. While we notice the drift from the countryside to the towns and villages the population of the countryside is still increasing, that is to say, in general, although it sometimes goes slower than we would like. I however think that the drift to the towns is not coupled with retrogression in farming in South Africa. Farming is developing in every respect; take sheep farming, the mealie farming and other branches of the industry. The number of stock is increasing and with regard to other produce the yield is becoming larger sometimes, that of mealies and tobacco, e.g. We therefore have not that position which we usually find in retrogressive civilized parts of the world—what we saw in the case of the Roman empire. If it were so that the drift to the towns went paired with the retrogression of our agriculture I should regard it as such a serious position that every effort ought to be made to take the people back to the farms again. We notice that a large section of the farming families—and this must necessarily be so—do not regard farming as a livelihood for their children but look to the town for their future existence. The farming families are presumably all much bigger than the families of the villagers and townsmen. It is an historical fact observable in all civilized nations and it was ascertained in the past that the towns were always maintained by the farmers in population. It was always from the countryside that the towns got their new life and it will always be from the countryside that the towns will get new life. When we look around us to-day we see young men from the country in the police, in the public service and in the professions. When we look at hon. members here on the front bench are they not sons of farmers, of active farmers? How many of them sit on the benches behind me? I am not speaking of all the farmers amongst us but of those who have become townsmen. In the first place because we cannot expect the countryside to provide a career to suit everybody. If in a farmer’s family of four sons there is one who wants to farm, i.e., one who has a love for it, we ought to be thankful. We must not forget that as against the one career of a farmer there are fifty or a hundred avenues which everyone even farmers’ sons can take and in proportion as industries increase and offer opportunities of a living to the farmers’ sons, they will go to the towns. To send people back to the land who have no flair for farming and are attracted by other occupations would be the greatest folly in the world. The place of people is where they have their ideal, where they wish to fulfil their life’s task. I say again that we cannot adopt the point of view that the farmer’s son cannot go to the villages or towns. We must assume that the majority of a large family will eventually go to the towns but then we must also see to it that our national life on that side is so sound that they can live properly there, and for that reason I attach so much importance to putting our industries on a sound basis. For that reason also I feel so strongly opposed to the hon. the leader of the Opposition with regard to the Wages Board. The history of Europe has taught us in the past that industries were based on poverty and nothing else. The industrial life of Europe was created and grey up on hundreds of people who lived in poverty. For that reason there are still to-day some of our friends opposite—I do not say that there are not some of them on this side of the House—who say that our farmers’ sons must stop on the farms because there is anyhow merely a poor existence to be found in our industries. We shall maintain poverty in the industries and factories of our country if we allow them to develop on the basis in which they developed in the past in Europe and if steps are not taken to give the people a proper wage. For this reason I consider the Wages Act as one of the most beneficial measures which has ever been passed by this Parliament.

Why do you not apply the Act to the farmers if it is such a blessing?

Because the conditions on the farms are quite different: in farming we do not get the starvation wage conditions of the towns and I want to mention a second reason. Where is the farmer who, as a farmer, employs a man whether white or black on condition that he is to work from 6 to 6 every day, or, say, from 6 to 12 and from 2 to 6. Where is he? If there is one employer who knows that work can only be done with intervals then it is the farmer. Show me the farmer who can keep his people continuously and uninterruptedly at work like those in an industry. It is quite clear that the Wage Act is absolutely unnecessary for the farmer. We cannot apply it to him. I repeat that if we did not have the Wage Act we should have the same conditions in South Africa which turned Europe into a curse for the workman in industry. It is possible that sometimes some industry or other may be found, but then it is only by chance. There is no one here who dares to say that the Wage Board is hot out to do what is actually in the interest of country and the worker. I deny that there is one industry that can say to-day that the Wage Board was not prepared to institute a proper and fair enquiry and to do justice according to the interests of South Africa. I want to say a few words about another point. During the debates quotations were made from a certain book which was frequently used during the elections. I refer to Dr. Frankel’s book on Railways. I do not want to go fully into it, but it seems deplorable to me that men like Dr. Frankel and Dr. Malherbe, who are really scientific men and who ought to know how to make scientific statements, cannot do it scientifically without dragging in politics. Just take Dr. Malherbe. I mention this here because the papers were out far and wide to depreciate South Africa as much as possible. Just listen to what he says, “South Africa is a white aristocracy on a black foundation of helots.” Now is that true? It is said by a scientific man in an address to the greatest scientific association known to-day, made in a scientific way. The members of the association have the right to assume that that person had in that way solemnly communicated information; they must accept it and take it back to Europe. But where does this person arrive at his “foundation of helots”? He says that the “helots” are slaves, bound to the soil, to the farm; if the farm is sold, they are sold with it, if he works he must give his master a portion of his harvest. By the slave is indicated the native. It is suggested by a scientific man that the natives are our slaves. The natives are called "helots” or “slaves” by a scientific man in South Africa. With what justice? Well, I can only say that if that is our method of submitting facts scientifically then the sooner the scientists of South Africa preserve silence about it, the better. (Laughter.) Yes, of course, there are hon. members opposite who laugh at it. But why? Because the man commits the further stupidity of saying that it is an illusion with politicians and that in reality it is nothing else but the poor white question. As if when your natives and your Europeans are both put into the position of lying on feather beds with food flowing in the mouths, there would then be no such thing as the native question! As if there would then be a question whether the European or the native should rule South Africa! Well, I can quite understand that there are some of our hon. friends opposite who like to hear such remarks and who do not like me to protest against them. Let me say that I do not know who Mr. Malherbe is, but I feel that the time has come that we must enter our protest against such a thing.

What about Professor Brookes?

As far as I know he is possibly just as illogical—he says things that are not so blameworthy, but the accuracy of which are just as questionable. Now I wish to refer to a remark of the hon. member for Caledon (Mr, Krige). I should have thought that the hon. member had had enough of the German Treaty, like all the Saps during the election. Then one did not hear a word of the German Treaty, except just a little at one place, and then the speaker felt so little at home that he then and there hid himself.

What about Natal?

The case I referred to just happened to be in Natal. Behind the scenes they were making a fuss everywhere even in Natal, but where were they at meetings in Pietermaritzburg, Ladismith and Newcastle? There they did not dare to come out with it. I thought that the hon. member for Caledon had completely abandoned it, but now he comes here and wants to tell us that it is due to the German Treaty that England is now on the point of abolishing preference. Is that really the case? That is the wisdom which the hon. member serves up to us.

I did not say so. Read the report in Hansard.

Did you correct it? No, one thing is certain about me. I take no notes that the speaker does not say. Does the hon. member now withdraw it?

I never said it and I did not says a word about the action of the Government in England—not a single word, because I think that our Parliament should interfere as little as possible with what the British Parliament does. All I said in my speech about the German Treaty was that I did not consider the amendment of the customs tariff in 1925 in the interests of the farmers of the Western Province, the wine, tobacco, or fruit farmers.

The Minister of Finance now confirms what I said and what I had noted. One thing, however, is certain—I heard it. I can quite understand that my hon. friend when he began to think about the matter felt that it was weak and he forgot it. I accept that he is convinced to-night that he never said it, but for the sake of the future I want to say that the people who talk like that have not the least knowledge of the history of the Labour party in England. We surely must know that the Labour party from the earliest days when Joseph Chamberlain started with protection, stood for free trade, and maintained that there would be nothing else but free trade when they came into power. Even at the previous election in Great Britain there was a fight for free trade and this policy conquered to such an extent if the Liberals are included in the count, that even the Conservatives had to adopt “free trade,” and the preference which was granted was actually granted, so it was stated under a certain formula, which, rightly or wrongly, had been agreed to.

A large number of Labour members voted in favour of preference in 1925.

But the great bulk of the British people and of the Labour party are supporters of free trade, and they have said over and over again, that there would be free trade if they came into power. To come now and say that the German Treaty has anything to do with it —

South African party logic!

The Minister of Finance says that while the member for Caledon was speaking he made the note “what about Canada and Australia?” Did they have a German Treaty as well? It must be so, but they did not inform us! I think we really ought to have an end of such things. It is not becoming in us and not only is it not fitting, but it does not redound to our credit if men say such things in a responsible body like this. It is true that the hon. member for Caledon said, inter alia, that we had damaged South Africa through the German treaty. I should like to ask him what happened to South Africa as a result? Has anything been done either in England or anywhere in the world, which, on account of the German treaty has gone against our fruit or wine farmers or anyone else? I do not mean to say such a statement is nonsense because that might possibly be unparliamentary, but I will say that it is something which does not make sense. It is mere verbiage. If there is a thing which our hon. friends opposite are too often guilty of the use of words, words, words, without any deeds behind them. Take, e.g., also the fact that the hon. member for Caledon, just like the hon. member for Yeoville (Mr. Duncan) could not swallow the appointment of ambassadors. The hon. member for Caledon said: “Well, I am not against embassies in principle, and against the institution of them, but the expense!” Is that not so really Sap? My hon. friends opposite must not blame me, my young friends, at any rate. The old ones have lived for 14 years on nothing else but principles, and never yet were able to put one of the principles into practice. That is just what we have against the hon. member for Caledon and other hon. members opposite that they are entirely with us in principle but when it comes fo applying the principles—oh, no, then it is another thing. Then they say “the time is not yet ripe.” You see it is the old story. They were so angry with me when, during the elections I showed the people that that was their only policy and that they could have no other. Now I want to show the hon. member for Caledon this: See, the National section have not all left the South African party yet—but nearly all have left—and it will put the South African party in a better position if he, if he has any principles, actually would put them into practice. Now I come to the hon. member for Yeoville in connection with embassies. It is very interesting to examine the attitude of the hon. member in this connection because it tallies so exactly with what I have said over and over again and shall have to say again and again in future, namely, that there is a fundamental, deep chasm between the South African party and the Nationalist party in policy—and this, although I saw the other day that the hon. member asked what are the Ministers plenipotentiary to do?

It is a waste of money.

Precisely! And that is a point of view which will not be applauded by any Nationalist, a point of view which can only be approved of by a Unionist. Let us examine the matter thoroughly. The hon. member for Yeoville does not favour it in principle, but the hon. member for Caledon does. That is the difference between the hon. member for Yeoville and the hon. member for Caledon. The hon. member for Yeoville is a born Unionist, but the hon. member for Caledon is a converted one. The consequence of that is that like every convert to a new religion, the hon. member for Caledon always feels a little uncomfortable and is always giving reasons for his new belief, and in his reasons he always reveals that he is a converted Unionist. The hon. member for Yeoville is a born Unionist.

I merely say that it is waste of money.

I am coming to that. We know that the hon. member for Standerton (Gen. Smuts) struck every cord that might raise racialism during the election. The hon. member even said that I was causing racialism because I said of some people that they were Unionists. Do hon. members opposite call it an insult, something offensive if I call them Unionists?

What do you mean by Unionists?

That is a sensible question. I want to repeat what I said on the platform, that there is a great difference between Nationalism and Unionism, that while the Nationalists say that South Africa must be regarded in the South African spirit and that South African problems must be solved in the South African way, our friends opposite say “oh, no, the spirit in which South Africa must be regarded is the spirit of the empire, and the empire, moreover, as a state”! Hon. members opposite, judging by their uneasiness, are feeling a bit hurt, but they need not take it so badly. I hope they will no longer take it amiss in me when I speak about Unionists. They want that in connection with every big question of South African interests, the instructions shall be dictated by British race motives.

No.

We must clearly understand what I meant by " British race motives. ”

Unionists are just as good South Africans as you are.

I am prepared to admit that you are good South Africans, but your policy is not South African. One of my hon. friends said yesterday, or to-day, “we live in South Africa.” Yes, I said to myself, “but South Africa does not live in you.” And that is precisely the difference between the Nationalists and the Unionists in South Africa. Let us just see for a moment what the attitude of the Opposition was in connection with the flag question.

Are you dragging that in now?

I just want to point out what your weakness is. When we said that we must have a flag which would represent the authority and prestige of South Africa, what was the reply? “Why, you have the Union Jack, the Empire flag.” The matter was to be dealt with from the empire point of view. We were to keep the Union Jack here. Why? I am quite able to understand that my Dutch friends opposite feel bad about it, but why my English friends opposite feel bad I cannot understand. I hope that what I am saying to-day will contribute a little to make us all more Afrikaans, and now I want to say to the hon. member for Griqualand (Mr. Gilson) that so far as Afrikaans sentiment is concerned, I rely more upon hon. members behind me than upon those opposite. The hon. member for Mowbray (Mr. Close) always loses his temper so quickly, but —

Is that consistent with the appeal for better feeling?

I am just pointing out what the basis is for a better spirit. We have numbers of proofs that the Unionists, or rather the South African party, do not consider things in the South African spirit as this side does.

Nonsense.

I am just indicating the reasons. I now come to a second. Take the German treaty. When we said that the German treaty was desirable, what was the attitude of the Opposition based upon? Only the other day the hon. member for Cape Town (Gardens) (Mr. Coulter) said that we are dependent on the support of Great Britain, of the fleet, etc. When we were considering the matter from the South African standpoint, hon. members opposite come and say that the German treaty is not in the interests of the empire; that it is against the interests of Great Britain. We heard that time and again.

We did not say so; we said that it was against the interests of South Africa.

But did we not repeatedly hear of “a slap in the face of Great Britain.”? Did the hon. member for Standerton (Gen. Smuts) not say it during the election in Natal?

I called it “window-dressing.”

The hon. member said and admitted it, that it was a “slap in the face of England,” but hon. members opposite are so very sensitive. They must not be so touchy. I can quite understand the attitude of my English friends, and of my English-speaking friends opposite. I do not blame them, but only point out the difference that exists between Nationalists and Unionists. They deal with the motives from the point of view of British interests.

No, South African.

I am glad of that. The hon. member is on the right road, but I hope he will not leave it at theory, but will also put it into practice. Take the appointment of ambassadors. This House has acknowledged and we, including the hon. member for Yeoville, have acknowledged, that we have sovereign independence on an equal footing with England. We Nationalists think then that we should govern as such as well, namely, as a free sovereign country, and that—we may be wrong—South Africa, if it is necessary when its interests demand it, shall act and behave like any free independent country, or government or any free country. Inter alia, this includes the appointment of ambassadors if it is necessary for South Africa and every time that it is necessary.

Send one to China!

I could understand it if the hon. member for Yeoville were to ask why exactly we were appointing an ambassador in Rome or Washington. But did he ask that? No, he asked “what are the ambassadors to do?” Does not the idea lie behind that that throughout the world there are British ambassadors who can act for us? Is that not so?

Is there a special reason for the appointment?

Did the hon. member ask that question? No, he should have asked exactly why those appointments were made, but he asked why ambassadors were being appointed. No, this is once more simply a case of their looking at the matter from the standpoint of the empire as a state.

No, what benefit from the standpoint of South Africa?

That is what the hon. member now asks me, but I am replying to what he said in his speech. His objection then was against any ambassadors. My answer simply is that we, as Nationalists, in the first place started from the principle that, where necessary, we are not going to give up our ambassadors. We go further, and say we are not prepared to always and everywhere go like a poor relation and beg, and that it is not inconsistent with the prestige of South Africa for us not to have such an appointment. When my votes come up, then I should be ready to go further into the matter, but I only want tonight to again call attention to the fact that hon. members opposite cannot seem to realize that we are a free country, and that we have the right to ask of them—of the English-speaking—… Let me rather say, I, as an Afrikaans-speaker, who cannot claim the Union Jack as mine, who cannot appropriate to myself the British ambassador in Italy and elsewhere, and who cannot feel a number of other things in the way the English-speaking do—here I want to say, that they have the right to appreciate that they are a section of the British people—yet I feel that I have the right to ask the English-speaking to put themselves into the position of the Afrikaans-speaking in South Africa, and to feel that they also are men of honour and will often take refuge in one thing or another, e.g., embassies, even if it is not justifiable in every respect, and will say that there are other factors, namely, factors of national pride, which they actually have the right to ask the English-speaking to admit. I only tell you this, you want co-operation. We must co-operate in South Africa, as a people of South Africa, not only as a flock heaped together, but as a people. We shall, however, only reach that co-operation if the English-speaking people show that they are not only in South Africa, but that South Africa is also in them, and inspires them. If that does not happen, then they must not blame us. We have our share, in so far as we can share, in the pleasure you have in being of British descent, and we are prepared, not only to acknowledge it, but to willingly concede it to you. We feel, however, that the time has now come that Afrikaans-speaking people should no longer be begrudged their sentiment. Let me tell the hon. member for Yeoville, as I told him a year ago, that his place is here and not there. It is so. He is undoubtedly a man, who, in all respects, would long ago have agreed with us if it was not for the influence—allow me to say the “evil genius”—around him, but unfortunately, we know how unbreakable party bonds are, especially when a man occupies a position like his within his party. Yet I want to say to him that he must not make such speeches. The speech was not worthy of him. He had an opportunity such as seldom occurs to appreciate this and to say: “I understand quite well what spirit is inspiring the Afrikaans-speaking people. I understand quite well what it is which, in the first place, has induced you to ask for in institution of this kind, but let us see to it in future that we do not appoint ambassadors where it will damage South Africa and let us proceed like sensible men, to make use as far as possible of the channels that exist until such time as South Africa really needs its own representatives there.” Then I would have applauded him, and then he undoubtedly would have exercised a great influence here. The way he has acted, however, has completely negatived any influence of that kind.

Business interrupted by Mr. Speaker at 10.55 p.m., under Standing Order No. 102, and debate adjourned; to be resumed to-morrow.