from J. W. Sowarsby, S.A. Railways, for leave to contribute arrears to Pension Funds.

from F. Colesman, formerly foreman train lighting electrician S.A. Railways for relief.

Report and recommendations regarding refund of certain members of the South African Railway Superannuation Fund of difference between 6 percent. and 3 per cent. contributions.

These papers were referred to the Select Committee on Pensions, Grants and Gratuities.

asked the Minister of Railways and Harbours: (1) Whether he is aware that one John Forrest Gray has issued an election address to railwaymen asking them to return him to the Railway Statutory Commission; (2) has any official notice been given notifying the men of the election and asking for nominations; (3) will the Minister give ample time between the notice calling for nominations and the closing day of nominations?

(1) No; nor is the General Manager aware of such an address having been issued. (2) No. The machinery for carrying out this election, which is elaborate, has been in preparation for some time and the necessary notice for publication in the “Union Gazette” is now in transit to Pretoria. A circular to the staff will be issued in the course of a few days.

(3) Nominations will be accepted until the 14th April. The date of the election has not yet been fixed, but this is a matter for the Returning Officer, Mr. Walter E. Gurney, Controller and Auditor-General, to decide. The entire control of the election is in Mr. Gurney’s hands. The previous election arrangements were carried out by him to the entire satisfaction of all parties, and out of 24,471 qualified voters 21,381, or 87 per cent., recorded their votes.

said he wished to move the adjournment of the House to consider a matter of urgent public importance—the summary dismissal of a large number of labourers from the Salt River Works.

This is not a matter of such urgency or importance as is contemplated by Standing Order No. 29.

said he adhered to the ruling he gave the other day, that when the clauses were once passed he could not allow any discussion on the schedule.

moved that the clauses stand over until the schedule had been disposed of.

The motion was agreed to.

moved the deletion of the item “Loan to the Union Industries, Ltd., £1,000.” He said that the country had already voted some thousands to this particular little bantling.

explained that the undertaking, which was located at Parys, O.F.S., manufactured condensed milk, and when it was started it received some assistance from the Government, but owing to very severe drought in the Free State, it had been found impossible to conduct operations successfully. Government found it necessary, therefore, to make a further advance in order not to lose the sum of £4,000 previously given to this undertaking.

asked if they expected ever to see a penny of this money back. He had not the slightest doubt that the money was pretty well thrown away, and the country would never get it back. It was very strange to advance money from year to year to an industry which was not on a sound basis.

moved to reduce the item, “Salaries and expenses of the Department of Defence. £177,000,” by £1,000. This expenditure was primarily brought about by the mistaken industrial policy of the Government, and the ill-guided administration of the railways. The reason he brought up the matter once more was that exactly the same thing was going on again. This morning they were informed that a large number of labourers had been summarily dismissed and thrown on the streets. This £177,000 was but a small part of the cost the country had to pay; it had also to pay in an acute condition of distress and unemployment. Some of the dismissed men had several years’ service.

What connection has this with the vote for defence?

said this vote was caused because the Government had to call out the Defence Forces in connection with the industrial unrest, and this was a small part of the bill the country would have to pay if the House passed this vote without entering a protest against the policy the Government was still pursuing. They wanted to try and prevent a recurrence of this expenditure by pointing out that the Government were still pursuing a policy which had involved us in such an expenditure in the past.

said that, in regard to the loan of £l,000 to the Union Industries, Ltd., he would like the Minister of Finance to tell the Committee by what right money was advanced to private concerns and where the line was to be drawn. This business was just as much a Union industry as his own, and no move, with this difference, that one paid and the other didn’t. (Laughter.) The Minister had no right to give State money to private concerns. It was a gross misuse of public funds, and the explanation given that other money had been advanced to private concerns did not hold water for one moment. He should vote for the deletion of this amount. The Government advanced £1,000 to a concern that did not pay, a concern that, he thought he was perfectly right, in saying, never had paid and never would pay.

said that, following up the remarks of the hon. member for Jeppe, 31 notices had been issued to men in the Railway Department, who had been thrown on the streets of Cape Town, absolutely without food and money. The Superintendent of Stores said that he knew nothing at all about it. The order had been issued by a subordinate, and the men were out on the street. He had in his hand one of the notices, which ran as follows: “I have been instructed to inform you that your services are being dispensed with as from 5 p.m. on the 25th inst. You are hereby, therefore, given 24 hours’ notice as from 4 p.m. to-day. I shall also require your workman’s ticket and sick fund card, if any, by 3 p.m. tomorrow. J. H. Bernard (?), timekeeper.” The hon. member added that he was there to challenge the right of any one State department to inflict such an injury as this upon the community as a whole.

said he thought it would be as well if he made a brief statement in regard to the facts of this case. It only showed how mountains were made out of molehills. The fact of the matter was that 37 labourers in the Stores Department had had their services dispensed with. These men were dismissed yesterday, because they had been engaged—he believed they were both white and coloured—to do some temporary work, and the temporary work was finished. (Hear, hear.) They were engaged at 24 hours’ notice to do temporary work, and the temporary work being finished, the department had dispensed with their services.

said he was sorry to contradict the Minister, but he had to do it on railway matters every time the hon. gentleman stood up in that House. These were not temporary men. How could they call a man a “temporary man” when he had been regularly employed for three years, four years, and, in some cases, longer? (Hear, hear.) Even if these were temporary men, he must repeat that the Railway Department had no right, no moral right and no national right, to put these men out on the streets for the general community to support or they must starve.

said it seemed to him that this was an important question, and he did not know that the Minister’s answer was a sufficient one.

He could not for a moment subscribe to the doctrine that the State, through its departments, should not be entitled to discharge men employed for a specific purpose when that purpose was completed. But if it were true that men permanently engaged for three or four years were given 24 hours’ notice now on completion of this specific piece of work, it seemed to him an extraordinarily hard thing to happen. The Government must be entitled, if they saw fit in the interests of the State, to get rid of men whose services were not useful or could not be retained The hon. member referred to a case which he had brought under the Minister’s attention of a man whose wages had been reduced from 6s. to 5s., and he complained that the Minister had not vouchsafed any explanation to him. They were told, he said, that this kind of thing was not happening here and there, but everywhere.

When it was stated that the department was trying to lower wages, and the department stated that it was not doing so, and actual cases of this sort were brought to one, then what had one to say? There must be something wrong, and to a certain extent the remarks of the hon. member for Jeppe linking the matter of the £177,000 up to this question, he thought, were justified. The Government must see by what had recently happened at the ballot-box that there was grave dissatisfaction with the administration of this country to-day.

said he welcomed the support of the hon. member for Newlands, as far as it had gone. They did not want to go into the principle of any State department discharging men or taking them on. He wanted this Committee to listen carefully to the merits or demerits, if there were any demerits, of this particular case, and he would recommend the Minister of Railways to go a little more into the details of his department than he did, because he was as singularly ill-informed on this matter as he was on most of the details of his department. These men had been discharged, and some of them at least had been offered employment again by the department which had discharged them at a less wage. Some of them had been earning 4s, 4s. 6d., and 6s. a day. The department were willing to take them back if they would accept 3s. a day. He was informed that 21 had been offered 3s. a day. Evidently they were required to do certain work or the Government would not have offered them re-employment, and he wanted to remind the House in this connection of the statement of the Minister himself, made only a week ago, that, subsequently to January, as instancing the popularity of the railway service, he had received 5,000 applications for work. They had also the report of the Labour Bureau in Cape Town that 2,700 men who had applied for employment had not been placed. He asked the House where they were going to and, continuing, said that when he asked the Minister the other day to grant relief to sufferers of the recent crisis, he was told that £2,000 had been granted to the Rand Relief Board.

said that the hon. member was not to go wide of the mark. He must keep to the point.

The ramifications of an action such as this go throughout the whole country. Continuing, he said that the Board had asked the Minister for fresh assistance.

said that the hon. member must not continue on that point.

proceeding to refer to the cases mentioned by the hon. member for Roodepoort, said that the work these men did was not of a temporary character, and pointed out that some of them had been offered work by the department at lower wages. The Minister had not only been discharging white labourers, but under the plea of re-organisation he had been discharging practically wholesale from the Stores Department men who had 11, 12, and 13 years’ service. He asked the Committee to record its protest against such a policy.

who rose amid Labour cheers, said that as representing a constituency largely composed of railwaymen, he thought he would be failing in his duty if he did not raise a protest against what had taken place. When he went home last night one of these men came to him. This man told him that he had been at work in the service of the department for four years, receiving 4s. 6d. a day. This man had a wife and six children, who were going to suffer as the result of this action on the part of the Minister. The man had practically no means of support, and had told him (Mr. Maginess) that men who had been in the service of the Government from six months up to four and five years had been dealt with in the same way What did all this mean? these men were thrown on the streets to join the ranks of the unemployed. Their wives and children were going to suffer. They, on those benches, knew what unemployment meant, for they went into the homes of the people, and he appealed to the Committee not to stand by and see these men thrown into the streets and do nothing to help them. He appealed to the Minister to look into the matter. He did not believe that the Minister knew the true circumstances of the case. He did not think the Committee knew the circumstances, or they would not stand by and see these men thrown on the streets. They knew that the workshops were chock-o-block full of work, and surely the Minister could find these men some work to do in the meantime instead of sending them on the streets to starve. He appealed to the Minister to open up some other avenue of employment and give aid to these men.

said that the hon. member for Roodepoort had merely made a general statement.

I have given the facts.

The hon. member did not specify the case.

But I read the letter.

He did not tell us how long the man had been there. There was no evidence.

He said three or four years.

He said that some of the men had been there for that period of time.

I wish to

The hon. member must read the letter or sit down

having read the letter, observed that he had said that some of the men had been in the employ of the Department for three or four years.

The hon. member did not tell us how long this particular man had been in the Service.

Four years.

said he did not see how the Minister could say that these were temporary men.

Every single man is liable to 24 hours’ notice.

said he did not see how the Minister could call this temporary work. Continuing, he said that the proposition he recently advanced was that if in a certain branch of the department there was a temporary slackness, that should be met by special means. He said that it should be a matter of organisation. If there was slackness it might be met by putting men on short time for a certain period. What he was trying to put to the Minister was that there was an alternative to throwing men on to the streets, because there were no other industries able to absorb this labour. He pointed out that men who got small pay were not able to save and so keep going during a time of unemployment.

said he hoped that the Minister did not mean the remark that he made to the hon. member for Port Elizabeth—that every man was subject to 24 hours’ notice. He hoped it would not go forth that the State as an employer of labour turned men out on the streets in that summary fashion after they had been in the employ of the Department for two or three years. It was a position that no private employer of labour in the country would think of for a moment. Men who had service should not be summarily dismissed, but should have a warning of a fortnight or a month. He recognised the responsibility of such a large Department of State towards the taxpayers of the country, and he recognised that there were times when departments could not be over-loaded with men, but there were times when the State, as the biggest employer of labour, should set an example to the rest of the employers of labour, and not callously and summarily dismiss men with long periods of service at a time of crisis. When his (the Opposition) party was in power in the old Cape Parliament, they took up the attitude in a time of depression, though severely criticised by the right hon. the member for Victoria West, that the State had a duty to the whole community, and should use every means in its power before it turned a large number of men on the streets. They appealed to the railway men, and the men, as a whole, accepted a reduction of 5 per cent in their salary. They found that that was not sufficient, and they put it to the men that they should work shorter hours, in order to avoid their fellows being thrown out of employment. Though many of these men were on the fixed establishment, and had a definite agreement with the Government, they agreed that the works should be closed on Saturdays. To avoid trouble in the future, the Government should deal with this matter in a sympathetic manner. The impression had got abroad that, owing to the recent industrial trouble, very little railway work would be done in the country. He did hope that the Minister would give a denial to that statement. Let the Minister stretch a point in order to keep men in employment at a period like that. He appealed to the Minister to go personally into the whole matter, and even go into the question of reducing hours if it came to such an extremity. He should see, however, that no action of the Administration was misunderstood by the men and the public.

expressed himself against the dismissal of workmen at short notice, and thereby increasing the number of unemployed. But, he asked, was the Government obliged to keep on men whose services were redundant, at the expense of the State? This was a very serious matter, and the taxpayers had the right to ask whether the Government should keep on men whose services were not required. In regard to the item dealing with the Civil Service Commission, the speaker referred to a report appearing in the “Cape Times” of the speech of the Administrator of the Free State. The Administrator had said that Inspector Wessels had been dismissed, but was still drawing salary. How was this possible?

wished to know if the men at Salt River who had been discharged had frequently been taken on and dismissed during the period of their service? If that were so, he was entirely at one in condemning the action of the Government in discharging them at such short notice. We all knew that unemployment could be prevented— (Labour cheers)—and he believed it was the duty of the State to prevent it—(Labour cheers)—more especially when State employees were concerned. In the last extremity, they could adopt the suggestion of the hon. member for Port Elizabeth, Central (Sir E. H. Walton), and cut down the hours of all the men, so that there would be no necessity to retrench men.

said their argument all along had been that a great deal of trouble had been caused by the want of a more sympathetic feeling between employers and employees. As to the Salt River men, there appeared to be some mistake—either the Minister had been misinformed or he was referring to another set of people. During the past year we had borrowed 20 millions—(An hon. member: “Twenty-three millions”)—he took it for the development of the country. It seemed to him an extraordinary thing that if that vast amount of capital had been brought into South Africa, Government should suddenly find it had 37 men too many. He would like to point out to the Minister of Railways and Harbours how easily this sort of thing led to a misunderstanding. Some time ago there was an election of an official to represent the men on a Railway Commission, an election which was not satisfactory to the Government, and immediately there was a threat to whittle down the establishment. We had had another election, and to-day we found that 37 men had been dismissed. He did not say that this was a case of cause and effect, but it had been suggested so by the men.

You are suggesting it to the House.

I think the House ought to know this sort of thing. I merely pointed out very respectfully to the Minister that this does lead to misunderstandings. Some arrangement should be made to reduce the hours of labour and so save men being thrown on the streets, which must lead to starvation.

said he hoped hon. members who had been so anxious to tell the House of their grievances during the strike would remember that these 37 dismissed railwaymen had lost their all. If hon. members were asked to remember that railwaymen were on a different basis to other employees and that if they broke their service they must be looked on as mutineers, and hoped hon. members would not fail to remember a case like this and to let the Government know that they expected it to treat its employees on a different basis to what private employers did. These dismissed men had no financial reserve, but relied solely on the miserable pittance given them. He hoped the hon. member for Jeppe (Mr. Creswell) would not allow the matter to pass until the House had definite facts before it, and not a miserable excuse about 24 hours’ notice. He hoped the Minister would see the error of his ways and agree to take these men back.

expressed his disappointment at the tone adopted by several speakers, who one moment said the Government had borrowed too much money and the next said there were too many unemployed. Did they, perhaps, want the Government to borrow more money? He urged hon. members to be honest and to do their utmost to create better relations between employers and employees. If the employees had any grievances they should try and get them redressed in a constitutional manner. They should, however, understand that if they struck they forfeited the claim to employment and they should not cry when they were unemployed. If the Government kept on more men than were necessary, then further taxation would be required. Who would pay it? Not the members of the Labour Party. He regretted the speech which had been made by the hon. member for Ladybrand, who did nothing but attack the Government.

said that there was no necessity for it, and the country did not need it. The railway workshops had more work than they could possibly do. The Minister of Railways and Harbours had said that more rolling stock could not be made in the South African workshops because it could not be made sufficiently rapidly, and yet they were discharging men. At one time a man had been taken on in the railway service and had gone in at a lower wage than he could have got outside, and refused to be tempted by masters outside, because he knew that in the railway service he had a fixed job, so long as he did his duty. That had been destroyed by the right hon. member for Victoria West (Mr. Merriman) when he was Prime Minister, and the whole idea of continuity had been lost, as a result of which some of the best men would not stay in the service and sought employment outside. In the old days, as the hon. member for Port Elizabeth, Central (Sir E. H. Walton) and the hon. member for Fort Beaufort (Sir T. W. Smartt) had said, the custom was that when the department did not require to work at full strength the men were met and the matter was discussed with them as partners in the railway. He knew of ten men who had been fold that they had been taken back in the service, but who were still walking the streets out of work, and he could mention cases similar to those mentioned by the hon. member for Roodepoort (Mr. Haggar) about men having been given 24 hours’ notice. These were the things which were causing unrest and dissatisfaction.

said that he hoped that the Government would realise what their action meant. Thirty seven men were thrown out of employment who earned 4s. 6d. a day, which came to less than £3,000 per annum, which was not the salary of a Cabinet Minister until the reductions had come in. Taking the average family as five, that meant that 186 mouths were dependent on these men to be fed. They had heard of loyalty to the State, and was that loyalty to be only one-sided? Had not the State to be loyal to the men as well? (Hear, hear.) These men had no tenure of office, and surely the Minister was not going to get up and say that the exigencies of the service demanded that that great business, concerned with £13,000,000 per annum, was going to be affected by £3,000 per annum—which meant 186 starving mouths. These things were not pin-pricks to men who had a family of five to keep, when the weekly wage was not brought home, and he hoped that the Minister’s humanity and sense of justice would be roused. The hon. member for Oudtshoorn (Mr. Schoeman) had said that the railways did not pay, but that was not the case. The railways had paid for years past, and if they did not pay then the rates ought to be raised, but let them not have starvation. He was satisfied that the trouble they had gone through was due very largely to a want of humanity and sympathy with the men.

said that what he wanted to draw attention to was the waste of time going on in that Committee. If the Minister had any answer to give, why should he not get up now and give that answer?

said that that item of £177,000 had been incurred by calling out the military in regard to the strike, and that strike had been caused by the dismissal of 37 men. There were many of them on that side of the House who had defended the Government strongly on the other occasion, because they thought the Government was right on that occasion, but there were many who shared his view that if they had sufficient evidence they would not be able to exonerate the Government in that connection because there had been maladministration somewhere. The trouble had not passed over yet. Only two days ago one of the best known agitators in the world of Labour had landed on these shores, and he had not been 24 hours there before they had given him some material to work on. If the Government persisted in the course it did in regard to the men, he could assure them that very few hon. members on that side of the House would support the Government again, because under existing conditions it was the duty of the Government to stay that unrest and that amount of poverty and distress throughout the length and breadth of the land at the present moment. He felt that the Government could look for little support from that side of the House if they persisted in a policy of irritation, and he thought this was a policy which savoured of revenge. He thought there was a great deal of ill-will at the back of it, and that the Railway Department were largely responsible, and he was afraid that the Minister had not that knowledge of the department that he should have in a matter of such grave importance to the country. If the Government wished to count upon the support of a good many members on that side of the House, then they would have to alter their attitude at a time when it was necessary that they should display some benevolence and some good feeling, when they knew that these men on going into the street had to face poverty and, in many instances, starvation. (Hear, hear.)

said he must congratulate hon. members on the Opposition benches on at last awakening to the gravity of the situation. (Hear hear.) Had those hon. members shown last session such an interest in the railway workers and others, that strike which they had in July would never have taken place. (Labour cheers.)

The position was a most paradoxical one. The hon. member for Braamfontein put it very well. Here they were asked to vote £177,000 mainly incurred in putting down industrial trouble, industrial trouble which was precipitated and brought about directly through the retrenchment of some 57 men. No sooner was the storm subsiding, no sooner were they in calm water again, than the Government for some reason or other went deliberately out of their way and threw 37 men on the streets, which was likely to precipitate further trouble. When the Minister was asked for an explanation, one of his officials sent down a little piece of paper to say that these men were only engaged on temporary work, that there was no need to make a fuss, that the temporary work was finished, and the men were retrenched. Now this word “temporary” was entirely a misleading term. (Hear, hear.) Did the Minister of Railways and Harbours know that these men who were earning up to 4s. 6d. a day could never become permanent hands under the rules of the Department until they reached 5s. a day? As a matter of fact, on June 1 last there were engaged on temporary work in the Union 3,750 men who had served over two years, and who were still classed as “temporary men.” The men in question had been given 24 hours’ notice, when it was perfectly well known that there was more work in the shops and yards than could be coped with. For the Minister to say that they were engaged on work of a temporary nature was begging the question altogether. If they wanted proof of that, they had only got to take the men’s own statements Some of the men were in the Gallery listening to this debate. (Cries of: “Order.”)

I would draw the hon. member’s attention to the fact that he should not allude to people in the Gallery. (Hear, hear.)

The fact remains that these men are here to-day to see if we cannot get some measure of justice for them, and we are doing our best for them, thanks to the assistance of many members on this side of the House. Here is the cloven hoof. The Minister himself the other day stated that if the Government were guilty of retrenching men and then offering them work again at a lower rate of pay, it was a devilish and diabolical policy. (Hear, hear.) We have got the statement of these men that, out of 37. 21 have been offered work, not at the 4s. 6d. a day which they were getting, but 3s. a day. I don’t think the Minister of Railways really knew about this till we mentioned it. Proceeding, the hon. member said that as a result of the recent disturbances there were something like 200 railwaymen, with their wives and families, on the streets looking for work, and now a further batch of 37 had been added. He would appeal to the Minister to satisfy the House and the country that the Government were not going to be vindictive. On the mines the men were subject to 24 hours’ notice, but they were not looked upon as temporary men. The Railways and Harbours Service Act, in referring to temporary employment, stated that these men “may,” not “shall,” be put on the permanent staff at the end of two years, and, looking further at the regulations, they would find that the men could not be put on the permanent staff until they got 5s. a day.

said he thought in this instance the Minister ought to cancel the order which had been given. The term “temporary employment” was a misnomer. Men engaged on temporary work in the Railway Department were not in the same position as men who had been engaged for a specific job by a contractor. The hon. member pointed out that he had formerly been at the head of a department in Port Elizabeth which employed a good many men on what might be called temporary service, and that when slack times came, instead of throwing the men on the street, he had followed the policy of reducing the hours of work. What, he asked, was the use of dispensing with these men in an endeavour to make the railways pay, when a fraction of increase on the rates would prevent all this? Who gained the benefit? If the tariff were out too fine, who felt it? Certainly not the consumer. The increase of rates that would be necessary to avoid retrenchment of this kind was so small that it would hardly be noticed. He hoped the Minister of Railways would see his way, as a matter of grace, to cancel the order which had been given.

said that members on the cross-benches had said that this was the second time an attempt had been made to reduce the number of men on the railways. He thought that any difficulty of this kind had been solved by the South Africa Act, in laying it down that the railways should be run on business principles. It had been said by members on the cross-benches that these men had been turned out of employment, in order that the Railway Department might take them on again at a lower rate of pay. He could not for a moment conceive that this could be the motive of the department, seeing that these men were only getting 4s. 6d. a day. At any rate, he said it was a different question when it was a matter of discharging men who had been in the service of the department four or five years at 24 hours’ notice. He said that, having taken on men and allowed them to continue in the service for such a period of time as to make them feel that they were secure it was a wrong policy to dismiss them in such a summary fashion. He thought, however, that something should be done to stop this continuous irritation, and he would be glad to hear from the Minister that this had only been a misunderstanding and that the trouble was not so great as it had been made out to be.

said it was true that these men were subject to 24 hours’ notice and that there was no legal obligation on the department to give them longer notice, but he was impressed by the remarks of the hon. member for Liesbeek with regard to the case that he had quoted. Surely, if these men were on temporary work it would have been possible to have foreseen some time back that the work would have come to an end and longer warning given them. No private employer would do a thing of that sort, and it was the duty of the State to set the example to the country. He would not say it was the duty of the State to stop unemployment, but it was their duty to minimise it as much as possible. In view of the fact that there might be a shrinkage in railway revenue in future, he suggested to the Minister that instead of discharging a large number of men during a temporary depression the rates might be raised.

said that the point at issue in the debate was the manner of the dismissal of these men. They had heard the version of the Minister. With regard to the 24 hours’ notice, a similar state of affairs existed in the mining industry, and it took many many years of preaching to get a check put on it. He considered that the insecurity of tenure had more to do with the recent unrest than anything else.

said that the discussion that afternoon made him despair of that Parliament being able to govern the country. (Laughter.) He agreed with the remark made by the hon. member for Greyville at the beginning of his speech. (Hon. Members: “What was it?” Laughter.) Hon. members would remember what it was. (Laughter, and cries of “What was it?”) It made one wonder, after hearing the speeches of men who had at other periods occupied responsible positions in the government of the country, and these remarks made it almost impossible for the railway management to do its duty. He considered that there was too much nationalisation. He felt it would be better if the work were done by contractors, and suggested that the Government should call for tenders. (Laughter, and a Voice: “That is Syndicalism.”)

said that the hon. member could not raise that point at that stage.

said that members on the cross-benches alleged that these men were dismissed in order that they might be taken on again at 3s. a day. Was it possible in that country to get white men to work at 3s. a day? And when he heard that statement he wondered whether they were white or coloured. (A Labour Member: “Both.”) He was inclined to think they were coloured. (A Labour Member: “What does that matter.”) If they were coloured men the pictures that had been drawn would fade away. (Labour cries of “Why?” and “Have they no right to live?”) They have a right to live—(Labour cheers)—but he would point out that the requirements of the coloured man and his family were not so great as the requirements of the white man and his family. He asked the Minister to consider whether the Railway Department was not inclined to nationalise the work of the country too much.

said the speech of the hon. member for Umvoti led one to regret very much those unhappy circumstances which led to a change in the Portfolio of the Minister of Commerce and Industries. The hon. member (Col. Leuchars) was going to put forward a new gospel. He (Mr. Fremantle) thought he was going back to the 17th century and suggest that they should farm out the taxes. (Laughter.)

requested the hon. member to confine his remarks to the vote under discussion.

I quite agree with you that the hon. member’s speech is not worth further attention. (Hear, hear.)

Continuing, Mr. Fremantle said he was very glad that the House had awoke to the sense of the real cause of the trouble, the striking at the sense of security by the Minister and his advisers. The Minister had been using his legal powers, and in the spirit of Shylock he had been demanding the last pound of flesh from these unhappy men. No large employer would do what the Minister was doing—dismissing men at 24 hours’ notice. The Minister’s action had brought incalculable calamities on the country. There should be distinction between temporary men and men engaged on purely temporary work.

asked the hon. member to confine his attention to the 37 men, for he could not allow a general discussion on railway policy.

My point is this, that men had been dismissed who were not merely temporary men, and I want to call attention to a return showing the large number of men on the Fixed Establishment who have been dismissed.

The hon. member will have some further opportunity.

said a serious mistake was being made, and the discontent of the railwaymen was largely due to the mismanagement of headquarters.

said it seemed clear that the principal factor in the spread of the railway strike in the North and the steadiness of the men here, was that under the Cape system the men were on the Fixed Establishment. But the Minister’s policy in having large bodies of men merely as temporary workers was conducive to strikes, because if they were not on the Fixed Establishment they had nothing to lose. The Railways and Harbours Servants’ Act showed that it was never the intention of Parliament that men who had been employed for a long time should be regarded merely as temporary employees. But men could not become permanent railway servants until they received 6s. a day. Parliament never contemplated that a large number of men were to be employed continuously at less than 5s. a day. It seemed to him that the object of the Government in paying these railwaymen 6d. a day less than 5s. was to prevent them becoming permanent servants. No doubt these dismissals were quite within the law, but they were very bad policy from a public point of view and simply encouraged the idea that it always paid the men to have a row with the Administration because they had nothing to lose. If men were not given more rights in regard to pensions and permanent employment the present steadiness of the Service would be undermined.

said that when the Minister made his reply he was struck with the emphasis he laid on the word “labourer,” implying that the men were low down in the scale. Then the hon. member for Umvoti (Col. Leuchars) made it perfectly apparent to the House that if these men were coloured labourers absolutely no consideration should be given to them. Some of these men were coloured, but hon. members did not speak less feelingly on that account. Were these particular victims among the railway men we heard so much about a week or two ago? In that case, what a reward for loyalty! If, on the other hand, they were loyal to the other side, then it looked very much like victimisation. The hon. members for Berea and Jansenville had complained that this discussion was wasting the time of the House. He agreed that it wait not desirable that these matters should take up time day after day and week after week, when they could be quite easily—and much more satisfactorily—settled outside the House. The solution was this: that the men’s Union should be recognised, and all these matters should be threshed out between the Administration and the Union, and only as a last resort come before the House. Sooner or later this would have to be done.

said that they had come to a pretty pass in that House when Parliament could have held over its head, by way of threat, or influence, the presence of exservants of the Government in the gallery—

I rise to a point of order Is the hon. Minister not referring to the Gallery of the House?

The Minister is referring to the remarks made by two hon. members.

He is referring to a remark which you have ruled out of order-labour cheers.)

said that the truth of the matter was that there had been a number of speeches made for the purpose of being addressed to the gallery. If the hon. members wished to do the men in question a real service, they would have come to his office and seen him about it instead of rushing to the House and making a public demonstration. It would then have been possible to go into the matter quietly, and to make an investigation. Quite a different complexion would have been, given to it if that course had been pursued, instead of making that public demonstration. They found the suggestion made, and the insinuation made, that the Government of the country had done what had been done as an act of revenge for what had happened at the Liesbeek election. He scorned to discuss that thing for a single moment, and it was a scandalous thing that such a suggestion should have been made in that House. (Ministerial cheers.) If it was the wish of that Parliament that he should keep every man in the railway service, whether his service was required or not, he would be glad to do so, if the House gave him those instructions, and he would carry them out. But his duty to the public of that country was to see that money was not unnecessarily thrown away. (Ministerial cheers.) What arguments had been advanced in the House that afternoon? Apparently that they must not allow any temporary men to be engaged by the Railway Administration. It had been stated from various quarters of the House, and the hon. member for Cape Town, Castle (Mr. Alexander), had crowned the argument, that they ought to promote every man to the fixed establishment, and give every man security of tenure, and all their troubles would be at an end. Their troubles in one way would be at an end, but before long they would get into railway bankruptcy. They employed a man temporarily, and employed him, say, at a particular job for six months. There were few people who would say that they must tell him to go after that particular job was finished, but because they gave the man employment for six months on another job, instead of dismissing him, he was apparently placed in the position that he had a vested interest in the post. If they kept him a year longer, his position became practically impregnable, according to the arguments of some hon. members over there. The longer they kept on a temporary man, the more difficult it was to get rid of him apparently. All he could say was that, if that was the policy that was to be carried on, he said, perfectly frankly and boldly, they were not business principles, and it was bad business for the country. (Ministerial cheers.) It was not business, and it was not finance.

Don’t you think a man is entitled to more than twenty-four hours notice?

I will refer to that in a moment. That is quite a detail, and the hon. member will see it as well as I do. What difference does it make to a man whether you tell him to go to-morrow or next week—as far as his financial position is concerned? (Labour laughter.) Continuing, Mr. Burton said that the result of that discussion in Parliament would be that no man would have to be employed on temporary work unless that man would be made liable to 24 hours’ notice, and they would be subject to the fluctuating conditions in the Railway Department. They would be forced to adopt that attitude.

We do it now.

said that if the hon. member opposite knew how much pains had been exercised by the Railway Department in order to avoid turning out men who had been for some years in the railway service on a temporary basis, he would not have been so ready to say, “We do it now.” They did not do it now. All he said was that if every time a servant had his services dispensed with, and a man who was liable to dismissal was dismissed, Parliament was to be used as a machine for the administration of the Railway Department, they would make the proper administration of the Railway Department impossible. In regard to the statements that they were deliberately curtailing work in order to dismiss men and reduce expenditure and do as little work as possible in South Africa, he had already told the House, and pointed out more than once by means of figures and clear and definite statements, that so far from reducing work done, or proposed to be done, in South Africa, the steady tendency had been to increase that work; but that had nothing to do with that question. It was said that they might curtail the hours of work, but had hon. members who suggested that endeavoured for a single moment to think out what that would mean in the present case—to reduce the hours so that 37 men who were not required could be kept on? Upon whom were they to place the shorter hours? Was the whole service to suffer because 37 men were to remain in? Was it to fall upon Salt River—or what portion of Salt River? That was not a case of general retrenchment, and but for all the agitation which had arisen it would never have been heard of. (Labour cheers.) It had gone on for years past in the railway service; but they lived in different times now—(Labour cheers)—and not a single instance was allowed to go by without making full use of it for purposes of advertisement. They lived in an age of advertisement, and not an occasion was allowed to pass without full use being made of it for the purpose of advertisement.

The hon. member for Boksburg (Dr. MacNeillie) had asked him whether these men had been employed from time to time. That was a question he was not able to answer just now. He had drawn no distinction in the position of the men concerned, but as a matter of fact the actual position, as he had ascertained, was that 10 white men were concerned and 27 coloured men. He had used the word “labourer” because they were of the labourer class. He thought it was probably true that these men had been more than two years, some three, some possibly four years in the railway service—(Labour cheers)—but it had been said that they were in a different position and should have been safeguarded. These men had been employed on temporary work from time to time, as he had been informed—on the reorganisation of the stores, which had gone on for two years, and if that work had not been necessary they would have been dismissed two years ago, because their services would not have been required.

Proceeding, he said there happened to be special work which enabled the Department to retain the services of a certain proportion of the men. Therefore for something like two years those men and other men had been engaged upon temporary work which was now finished. Endeavours were made by the “unsympathetic ” Department to utilise the service of those men in other portions of the railway service, and strange as it may seem, they did succeed in finding work for a number, otherwise the number of men for whom there was no work to do would have been much larger. As they were found to be redundant they were ultimately told there was no further work for them. The mechanical engineer at Salt River informed the Stores Department and the Administration that he could not fit in any more, and that he had taken all that he could take. The Railway Administration, as a matter of fact, had been busy in doing all they could to try and find places in which to keep those men on, but they had come to the end of their resources, and they could not keep them on any further. He regretted that he could not give any such undertaking as had been asked for. If that was the way the railway affairs were to be managed the sooner the present system was altered the better.

There were two points, however, which were not quite clear to him, one complaint— and he thought a very substantial one— was the shortness of the notice, but he would not make any statement with regard to that until he had heard what the responsible men had to say. He would look into the matter. The other point which he thought was worth while inquiring into was the allegation that a number of those men after being dismissed from the employment they were in—employment of a purely temporary character—were offered re-employment in the Railway Department at a lower wage. So far as he was aware for the moment—he did not want to mislead the House—they had not been offered re-employment by any department of the Railway Service. It might be he did not know, but still it was possible, that the white labour department may have offered those men work, more out of charity than anything else, but he would inquire into that matter also. As far as he was aware no branch of the Railway Service had offered them employment.

said he was sorry the Minister had not given them some assurance, and had referred to those matters as details. It was not a detail to dismiss men at 24 hours’ notice. That was a policy which no respectable private employer would endorse. He felt strongly on that matter, and they should get a definite statement from the Minister after he had made full inquiry. In order to give him full opportunity without haste to do that, he would move that the vote stand over.

said the hon. member could not do that until the Schedule had been disposed of. His only course would be to move to report progress.

accepted the Chairman’s ruling, and in order to allow the Minister to get the necessary information to bring before the Committee, he would move to report progress, and ask leave to sit again.

said while he did not see that any harm would be done by reporting progress, he wanted to say a few words with regard to the attitude of the hon. member

pointed out that the hon. member could only speak on the motion to report progress.

said the attitude of the hon. member for Fort Beaufort was a most unreasonable one. To ask that the Bill should stand over in order that information might be got on matters that had nothing to do with it was most unreasonable.

said he did not understand how the Minister could say that the debate had nothing to do with the question before the Committee. He had not spoken on the main question because it seemed to him that they were taking up a great deal of time before the Minister had made his reply. But the two points upon which he was going to make inquiry were the two points which weighed with him (Sir Henry). The discussion must have been relevant or the Chairman would not have allowed it to take place. It was perfectly relevant, and because so much depended upon the information which the Minister was to obtain, it was perfectly correct for the Committee to insist upon having that information before they voted any of the money. For those reasons he hoped progress would be reported.

The motion to report progress was then put and the “Noes” declared to have it.

called for a division which resulted as follows:

Ayes—40.

Alexander, Morris

Andrews, William Henry

Berry, William Bisset

Blaine, George

Botha, Christian Lourens

Boydell, Thomas

Brown Daniel Maclaren

Chaplin, Francis Drummond Percy

Creswell, Frederic Hugh Page

Crewe, Charles Preston

Duncan, Patrick

Fremantle, Henry Eardley Stephen

Haggar, Charles Henry

Henwood Charlie

Hull, Henry Charles

Hunter, David

Jagger, John William

Juta, Henry Hubert

King, John Gavin

Macaulay, Donald

MacNeillie, James Campbell

Madeley, Walter Bayley

Maginess, Thomas

Meyler, Hugh Mowbray

Nathan, Emile

Oliver, Henry Alfred

Quinn, John William

Rockey, Willie

Runciman, William

Sampson. Henry William

Schreiner Theophilus Lyndall

Searle James

Smartt, Thomas William

Struben, Charles Frederick William

Van der Riet Frederick John Werndly

Walton, Edgar Harris

Watkins, Arnold Hirst

Woolls-Sampson, Aubrey

H. A. Wyndham and J. Hewat, tellers.

Noes—66.

Alberts, Johannes Joachim

Bekker, Stephanus

Bezuidenhout, Willem Wouter Jacobus J.

Bosman, Hendrik Johannes

Botha, Louis

Burton, Henry

Clayton, Walter Frederick

Cronje, Frederik Reinhardt

Currey, Henry Latham

De Jager, Andries Lourens

De Waal, Hendrik

De Wet, Nicolaas Jacobus

Du Toit, Gert Johan Wilhelm

Fawcus, Alfred

Geldenhuys, Lourens

Graaff, David Pieter de Villiers

Griffin, William Henry

Grobler, Evert Nicolaas

Grobler, Pieter Ger Wessel

Harris, David

Heatlie, Charles Beeton

Joubert, Christiaan Johannes Jacobus

Keyter, Jan Gerhard

Krige, Christman Joel

Kuhn, Pieter Gysbert

Lemmer, Lodewyk Arnoldus Slabbert

Leuchars, George

Louw, George Albertyn

Maasdorp, Gysbert Henry

Malan, Francois Stephanus

Marais, Johannes Henoch

Marais, Pieter Gerhardus

Merriman, John Xavier

Meyer, Izaak Johannes

Myburgh, Marthinus Wilhelmus

Neethling, Andrew Murray

Nicholson, Richard Granville

Oosthuisen, Ockert Almero

Orr, Thomas

Rademeyer, Jacobus Michael

Schoeman, Johannes Hendrik

Serfontein, Hendrik Philippus

Serfontein, Nicolaas Wilhelmus

Smuts, Jan Christiaan

Smuts, Tobias

Steyl Johannes Petrus Gerhardus

Steytler, George Louis

Theron, Hendrik Schalk

Theron, Petrus Jacobus George

Van der Merwe, Johannes Adolph P.

Van der Walt, Jacobus

Van Eeden, Jacobus Willem

Van Heerden, Hercules Christian

Van Niekerk, Christian Andries

Venter, Jan Abraham

Vermaas. Hendrik Cornelius Wilhelmus

Vintcent, Alwyn Ignatius

Vosloo, Johannes Arnoldus

Watermeyer. Egidius Benedictus

Watt, Thomas

Wessels, Daniel Hendrik Willem

Wessels, Johannes Hendricus Brand

Whitaker, George

Wiltshire, Henry

H. Mentz and H. C. Becker, tellers.

The motion was therefore negatived.

wished to call the attention of the Committee to the attitude taken up by the Minister of Railways and Harbours. He (Mr. Creswell) was afraid it was a case in which evil circumstances were corrupting good manners, and he could not think but what the Minister of Finance, with his autocratic methods, was somewhat corrupting the Minister of Railways. He (Mr. Creswell) had always been led to believe that the Parliament of the country was supreme. But the Minister had taken a high and mighty tone and said that if this sort of thing was discussed in the House it would be the worse for the Railway Service. The Minister had tried to show how a mountain had been made out of a mole hill by stating that the dismissed men had been employed as temporary hands and that they were in the same position after dismissal as when the Department first employed them. Then the Minister, finding himself completely in the wrong, had sheltered himself by saying that Parliament must not discuss such matters or it would be the worse for the railways, and that, as the person responsible for the conduct of the railways, he (the Minister) warned the House that if they discussed these matters, it would be the worse for all concerned. If it was so, that the Minister was responsible for the conduct of the railways, then that House was responsible for the conduct of the Minister, and the sooner he (the Minister) realised this, the better it would be for the country. The Minister had said that hon. members would not justify his action if he did not dismiss men for whom there was no work. The Minister had held that men must not be employed if there was no work for them. But it was being recognised that there was another principle, which should be more inviolable than that: that men in this world, if they are going to live, must have food to eat, and clothes to wear, and a roof to live under.

What!

The hon. member for Umlazi is very comfortable himself, but through what?

Through work.

said it was about time that the House recognised the fact that workmen were not going to remain content if there was lack of security with regard to employment. He wished to reiterate that the first economic factor was that a man had got to live. With regard to men being employed at 3s. per day, the Minister stated that it was possible that these men were employed at that rate in order to find work for them. If there was work for these men to do, then they should have been paid the ruling wage. One could fancy in one’s mind going cap in hand to the Minister, and laying one’s grievance before him, and praying him not to bring the matter before Parliament. (Laughter from the cross-benches.)

He wanted to point out that the real moral of this discussion was that which had been mentioned by the hon. member for George Town. He (Mr. Andrews) agreed that it was certainly a clumsy way of ventilating these things that it should be necessary to constantly bring them up in the House, but the only way to minimise this was for the Minister of Railways to recognise once and for all that, by working harmoniously with the men’s societies, he would be able to have a great deal of these things that came up in the House threshed out, consumed in their own smoke in the railway service, between him and the Unions. He would again draw the Prime Minister’s attention to the question which he had asked with regard to the statement made in the House of Commons by the Secretary of State.

said he hoped that the Minister of Railways would endeavour to get his department to adopt the practice of ordinary industrial employers. In the case of men who had been six or twelve months in their employ, what would have happened if they had been in private employ was that the foreman would have approached them and given them as long notice as he could, perhaps a fortnight, or possibly a month or two months, so as to give them an opportunity of finding other employment.

I do not know what has happened. Something of this sort may have been done.

No; it is not the practice of the Railway Department. I told the Minister the other day of a case where notice had been given to a man who had 17 years’ service, and who was given ten days’ notice.

said that it was not owing to any lack of courtesy that he had not replied to the hon. member for Jeppe, but the speaker had been so busy with other matters that he had hardly had an opportunity of giving him the answer. He wished to say that the Government had not had any communication with the Secretary of State or with the British Government on the matter mentioned. Nor did he know of any statement made by the Secretary of State. All he knew was what he had read in the newspapers, and, of course, he had nothing to do with the report published. There had been no communication between the British Government and the Union Government. The law was passed by Parliament, and was promulgated—that was all.

reverting to the item of £1,000, Union Industries, Ltd., said that the Minister of Finance had not given a satisfactory explanation in regard to this matter. What right, he asked, had the Minister to make that advance at all? There was no law in the land which authorised this. He had done it entirely off his own bat. His hon. friend had already advanced £4,000 to this private concern. He would give him a bit of advice based on business experience. When he had got a bad debt he should have done with it and not throw good money after bad. He was told that this concern was for the manufacture of condensed milk. As a matter of fact, to-day they did not produce sufficient milk in the Free State.

asked the Minister of Finance what security he had for the advance of £5,000. what rate of interest the company were paying, and what was the period of the loan?

said he admitted there was some considerable difficulty about this item. It was one of those old matters in which it was rather hard to blame the present occupant of the Treasury. Hon. members knew that this particular concern was a favourite child of the late O.F.S. Government, and that they gave a bonus of so much for jams that were being made. This continued till after Union. After Union, the bonus was discontinued. It was then found that the jam-making industry was not in such a flourishing condition. Then a step was taken which possibly was wrong. An advance of £4,000 was given to this company, in order that it might reconstruct and go in for the manufacture of condensed milk. (A laugh.) This was a loan which was secured by all the assets of the concern, and he thought they had ample security for it. It was represented to the Government of the Union that there were very large numbers of poor white people who were dwelling at the place and, if the concern were brought to a conclusion suddenly, these people would have been thrown on the street and probably come to the Government for assistance. That advance of £4,000 was given on security of a bond over the assets of the company, and he was informed that the security was fairly ample. He did not know what the rate of interest was, but it quite covered the Government.

How?

By bringing the company to an end. If this company comes to a standstill and cannot be sold as a going concern, it is likely that we should incur a heavy loss. Proceeding, he said that he would not have made this advance but for the fact that they were already committed and that they had to protect the interests of the State in making the advance. It was not a case of the general Government policy. The company must get along, and if they did not get along, he did not know what was going to happen. He was strongly against these advances, but they had to make this advance in view of possibly and probably the mistake they made before.

said that his hon. friend asked how these people were to get along without £1,000 from the Treasury. How did anybody get along? They had to set to work and find the money somewhere. Here was an institution started, he was credibly informed, with a large number of tins—that was the genesis of this thing—imported for jam. It was found unsuitable to jams, and having these tins, some of their friends said: “Hello! here are the tins; let us have condensed milk.” (Laughter.)

It reminded him of the story of the Minister who went to buy a cow, and when he was asked why he wanted to buy the cow he said, “To eat the grass.” (Laughter.) Here the Government had paid a thousand pounds on the chance that on some future date there might be some condensed milk. Was it right to go flinging thousands of pounds in this way? There were hundreds of people in that country ready to start enterprises, but they had to do it on the only safe foundation, and that was to find the money. As long as they went on doling out grants nothing would be a success.

said he would like a promise from the Minister that the amount would not be repeated.

said that when the matter was discussed some years ago the hon. member for Umvoti who was then the Minister of Commerce and Industries, assured the House that that would be the. last grant, and the vote was passed on that understanding. Would the hon. Minister admit that not a single tin of condensed milk had been turned out? The Minister had said that if a grant were not made the inhabitants of Parys would be thrown on the streets, but were the inhabitants of Parys more important than the inhabitants of Salt River and Wood stock? Why should they go on spoonfeeding this business while people in the towns were thrown on the streets at 24 hours’ notice?

said that the Minister gave as his reason for making the grant that there had been a terrible drought in the Free State. He found that very little had been done in the way of irrigation in the Free State, and when asked why nothing had been done, he was told that they could not get the money for irrigation schemes. What was the use of bolstering up a dairy business when they did not advance money for irrigation works which were essentially necessary before the dairy business could succeed?

said that when the last £1,500 advance was made, the hon. member for Umvoti who was then the Minister of Commerce and Industries, said that the money bore interest at the rate of 5 per cent, per annum, was being repaid in certain instalments, that the amount was absolutely secured, and that within two years the factory would be exporting butter from the country. He was curious to know how much of the £4,000 advanced had been paid back. He thought that if they passed that vote they would be letting the Minister off lightly, and he thought the trouble was that the Minister tried to do too much.

asked whether the money had already been paid over.

Yes.

Then it is a case of condoning the Minister’s action. Continuing, he said that he had heard nothing from the Minister which would justify the House voting the money.

said he had some conversation with the men who had been dismissed, and it might interest the Committee to know something of the circumstances. The Minister had told them that the work on which these men had been engaged had been finished. It might astonish the Minister and the Committee to know that in the case of one of these men his service had extended over a period of seven years. An important point was that the men in a body went to the superintendent of their yard, and asked him why they were being discharged. They were told that the financial year was about to end, and that men had to be retrenched. So there was no question about the work being finished. He pointed out that the saving effected was a matter of £2,358 15s. a year, and in order to effect this saving the Administration was prepared to throw 175 souls on the street. He pointed out that some of these men had been offered employment at 3s. a day. He was glad to see that several members had taken an interest in the matter, and they had asked the Minister why he did not reduce the hours. He (Mr. Madeley) wanted to tell those members that the Minister did not want to reduce hours. The Minister dare not reduce hours, because if he did so the Department could not possibly cope with the work.

Practically every Department was choked with work. He had the name and address of a man in the Stores Department who had been employed for 11 years, but who had been discharged.

Is he one of the 37?

I presume so, because he is under notice at this moment. He was engaged at the Harbour, and was called over the coals for not doing certain work, and his reply was that it was absolutely impossible for him to do it thoroughly because the work was too much for one man. He was removed from the Harbour Department and sent to Salt River, and now he had been discharged. He was a married man with a family, and had been thrown on the streets at a time when work could not possibly be found. How could the Minister sack a man so lightly? The Minister had no claim on these men’s loyalty. He (Mr. Madeley) did not notice any of them among the strikers, so he presumed they were loyal. What was the Minister’s idea of loyalty to these men to sack them at 24 hours’ notice? Why were they not given the hint a month or so before to look for a fresh job? It had been said that retrenchment was necessary, but when they compared the amount the men were paid with the Minister’s salary of £2,000 a year—

That comparison has already been made this afternoon.

Pardon me, sir. (Ministerial cries of “Order.”) How interested hon. members are when they think one of the Labour members is being “downed.”

Order. If the hon. member does not submit to my ruling, I shall ask him to sit down.

I have not transgressed your ruling.

The hon. member is doing it all the time.

I have referred to the way in which hon. members have received your ruling; I am not transgressing. The pay of the heads of the Railway Department amounts to £11,500, and all of them are clashing with one another.

Order. The hon. member must confine himself to the point at issue.

I am, sir. If retrenchment is required, we can very well, do without one of these three heads, and, preferably, without the Minister. I don’t think he is worth his money. These men have been discharged as part of a policy of revenge and vindictiveness, and ultimately with the desire to reduce the wages of railwaymen all round.

said the dignity of the House was being dragged down by the tone adopted by some members on the cross-benches. The argument that men should be kept on if their services were not required was ridiculous. It struck him from the way in which some hon. members spoke that they did not represent any taxpayers. In regard to the advance of £1,000 to the factory of Parijs, he expressed regret that they should have to make an allowance of this kind.

said that if the hon. member (Mr. Creswell) wanted to test the feeling of the House, let him put down a definite motion. He (Mr. Fremantle) was not prepared to vote for this, and did not regard the vote at all as a test of feeling.

said he would be charmed to accept the suggestion, but it was difficult to put down a motion on the only day the Oriental despots allowed private members, and thus it frequently resulted in great difficulty in a motion coming to a vote. The present was clearly a part of the same blundering policy of the Government.

The amendment of Mr. Creswell was put, and declared negatived.

called for a division, which was taken.

As fewer than ten members (viz.: Messrs. Andrews, Boydell, Creswell, Haggar, Madeley, Maginess, Meyler and H. W. Sampson) voted in favour of the amendment,

declared the amendment negatived.

then put the amendment of the hon. member for Cape Town, Central, and declared the “Noes” had it.

challanged a division, which was taken with the following result:

Ayes—33.

Alexander, Morris

Andrews, William Henry

Baster, William Duncan

Boydell, Thomas

Chaplin, Francis Drummond Percy

Creswell, Frederic Hugh Page

Crewe, Charles Preston

Duncan, Patrick

Fawcus, Alfred

Haggar, Charles Henry

Henderson, James

Henwood, Charlie

Hunter, David

Jagger, John William

Juta, Henry Hubert

Madeley, Walter Bayley

Maginess, Thomas

Merriman, John Xavier

Meyler, Hugh Mowbray

Oliver, Henry Alfred

Orr Thomas

Quinn, John William

Rockey, Willie

Runciman, William

Sampson, Henry William

Schreiner Theophilus Lyndall

Smartt, Thomas William

Van der Riet, Frederick John Werndly

Walton, Edgar Harris

Watkins, Arnold Hirst

Whitaker, George

H. A. Wyndham and J. Hewat, tellers.

Noes—58.

Alberts, Johannes Joachim

Bekker, Stephanus

Bezuidenhout, Willem Wouter Jacobus J.

Bosnian, Hendrik Johannes

Botha, Louis

Burton, Henry

Clayton, Walter Frederick

Cronje, Frederik Reinhardt

De Jager, Andries Lourens

De Waal, Hendrik

De Wet, Nicolaas Jacobus

Du Toit, Gert Johan Wilhelm

Fremantle, Henry Eardley Stephen

Geldenhuys. Lourens

Graaff, David Pieter de Villiers

Griffin, William Henry

Grobler, Evert Nicolaas

Grobler, Pieter Gert Wessel

Harris, David

Heatlie, Charles Beeton

Joubert, Christiaan Johannes Jacobus

Keyter, Jan Gerhard

Krige, Christman Joel

Kuhn, Pieter Gysbert

Lemmer, Lodewyk Arnoldus Slabbert

Louw, George Albertyn

Maasdorp, Gysbert Henry

Malan. Francois Stephanus

Marais, Johannes Henoch

Marais, Pieter Gerhardus

Meyer, lzaak Johannes

Neethling, Andrew Murray

Nicholson, Richard Granville

Oosthuisen, Ockert Almero

Rademeyer, Jacobus Michael

Schoeman, Johannes Hendrik

Serfontein, Hendrik Philippus

Smuts, Jan Christiaan

Smuts, Tobias

Steyl, Johannes Petrus Gerhardus

Steytler, George Louis

Theron, Hendrik Schalk

Theron, Petrus Jacobus George

Van dar Merwe, Johannes Adolph P.

Van Eeden, Jacobus Willem

Van Heerden, Hercules Christian

Van Niekerk, Christian Andries

Venter, Jan Abraham

Vermaas, Hendrik Cornelius Wilhelmus

Vintcent, Alwyn Ignatius

Vosloo, Johannes Arnoldus

Watermeyer, Egidius Benedictus

Watt, Thomas

Wessels, Daniel Hendrik Willem

Wilcocks, Carl Theodorus Muller

Wiltshire, Henry

H. Mentz and H. C. Becker, tellers.

The amendment was accordingly negatived.

urged that the House ought not to pass the schedule until the Opposition had had another opportunity of expressing an opinion. The leader had moved to report progress at an earlier stage because there was not sufficient information, and the Minister might give the House the information on that identical point—

called the hon. member to order, pointing out that that question had been disposed of by a vote of the House and the Minister could not give the information.

deprecated any further waste of time.

The schedule, as printed, was passed, and the clauses agreed to without discussion.

The Bill was reported without amendments.

The third reading was set down for to-morrow (Friday).

moved that the Bill be read a second time.

Agreed to.

The Bill was accordingly read a second time.

moved that the Committee stage be now taken.

The motion was agreed to.

(Fort Beaufort) moved to omit sub-section (1) and to substitute the following new sub-section: (1) To a servant of the Administration belonging to the classes, other than those classified under Superintendence in the Estimates of Expenditure, who in the opinion of the Minister remained, during the period of the strike, faithful to the conditions of his service in any of the Provinces of the Union, there shall be paid a bonus equivalent to five days’ pay of such servant.

To omit sub-section (2) and to substitute the following new sub-section: (2) The Minister may in his discretion, in respect of any employee who was a contributor to any superannuation or pension fund referred to in the Service Act and was intimately connected with the working of trains in any locality and who in the opinion of the Minister then rendered meritorious service, order that in addition to the privileges which may be granted to that employee under sub-section (1) of this section an addition of one year shall be allowed in respect of the service on which but for the provisions of this Act any pension or gratuity to which he may be entitled on retirement from the service would be calculated.

The mover said he regretted that the Minister of Railways and Harbours had not accepted the amendment when the clause was discussed on a previous occasion. He (Sir T. Smartt) thought it was undesirable to have such a clause as clause 2 in the Bill as everybody knew it was in possible to give holidays in the Service as proposed within the time mentioned.

drew the attention of the mover to the fact that the amendment would increase the expenditure.

said it was for that reason that he submitted the matter to the hon. Minister for consideration. The Minister had stated when replying to objections to the clause, that he would consider the proposal and allow it to be discussed. He (Sir T. Smartt) hoped the House would now have the opportunity of discussing it.

said that he was not in a position to accept the amendment. Continuing, he was understood to say that he undertook to give facilities for the discussion of any amendment involving additional expenditure that he felt he might be able to check.

said that without perhaps intending to do so, the Minister might have affected many other votes of members when they were faced with the two amendments having for their object the reference of the Bill to a Select Committee. He was understood to say that the Minister said that it was unnecessary to send the Bill to a Select Committee, as all these amendments could be discussed in Committee of the Whole House. If the Minister had been as clear then as he was that night, he felt sure that the fate of one or other of the amendments might have been different. The hands of members were now tied, and it was impossible for anyone to alter the childlike proposal that they found in clause 2.

pointed out that the proposal of the Government was to allow four days’ leave on full pay, and in some additional cases, three days’ further leave on full pay. Four days and three days made seven days. It was an open question whether the amendment of his hon. friend involved more expenditure than what was contained in the Bill.

said that the proposal would involve additional expenditure.

said that if that was the case he could only say that clause 2 was a make-believe. He was even prepared to go so far as to make it four days instead of five. He put it to the chairman whether his proposal of four days’ pay would involve additional expenditure.

said that in order to ascertain that he would have to go into extensive calculations, and he could not spare the time. There was, however, an amendment by the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg, North, which seemed to cover the case.

moved: In sub-section (1), line 22, after “Act,” to insert “and under General Manager's Notice No. 539 dated the 23rd day of November, 1911.”

then moved that at the end of clause 2 the following words be added: “Should the exigencies of the service prevent the taking of such leave, the Minister may authorise pay in lieu thereof, to be granted.” He pointed out that it might not be possible for men to take this leave within the prescribed period, and his object was to secure them pay instead of the leave granted.

said that much as they on the cross-benches would like to secure the railwaymen every consideration, they felt that this policy was a most degrading policy. The men did not approve of it. The men did not want to gain anything at the expense of their fellow-workers. If the hon. member for Fort Beaufort described the proposal of the Minister as a childlike proposal, he (Mr. Boydell) could only say the same of the proposals of the hon. members for Fort Beaufort and Pietermaritzburg, North. It was even more degrading to ask the men to accept money instead of leave. He wondered how many railwaymen in the constituency of the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg, North, would take this money? They would not take it, and he referred to the case of a man who said he “didn’t want four days’ scab leave.” What the men wanted, and what would put an end to a lot of discontent, would be the establishment by the Minister of a satisfactory Board of Appeal, in which the men could have confidence and from which they could get justice. That would be far more valuable and far more satisfactory than the awards proposed in that Bill. There were many ways the Minister could reward the men without following this degrading policy.

He knew, the Minister knew, and the Committee knew, that at the present time there were 6,000 railwaymen who were not earning a living wage. He guaranteed that all those men who were nearest the top of the ladder and who were entitled to these rewards would be perfectly satisfied if they had the assurance of the Minister that he would give the men at the bottom a living wage. He (Mr. Boydell) did not mean 3s. or 3s. 6d., or 5s. a day, but a standard wage sufficient for them to live upon. If the Minister did that he would be doing a service not only to the men of the railway, but to the country generally. If the Minister wanted suggestions for rewarding the men in a less degrading fashion than was proposed in the Bill, he (Mr. Boydell) would refer him to the report of the Grievances Commission. The Commission had called attention to the bad way in which apprentices were treated. Well, let the Minister see that better terms were given these apprentices, both while they were serving and after they had served their time. He thought that would satisfy all the men concerned. Then let him touch on the question of long hours. From the report of the Grievances Commission, he learned that men were receiving 3s. 6d. a day for working an 84 hours week. Why did not the Minister say that he would reduce the hours of labour for those who were working excessive periods at the present time? With regard to the loyal men, he would point out to the Minister that while many of these men might have been loyal in body they were not loyal in spirit. In the spirit these men had been loyal to the men who went out on strike. These men had said that the strike was inopportune, was ill-advised at that time, and was not properly organised. He (Mr. Boydell) knew of cases of men who came out on strike, noted the organisation of the strikers, said “This is not a properly organised strike,” and went back to work the next day. According to the Minister, 23,000 men were going to receive the reward, while about 5,000 were going to be punished. He did appeal to the Minister not to pursue this policy of giving this additional leave, which the men themselves disapproved of. It would be far more satisfactory for the House to say it would tackle one of the real grievances and put that right, and thus earn the confidence of the men. He wanted to give praise where praise was due, and he congratulated the Minister in some respects, for having put down amendments similar to amendments which he (Mr. Boydell) had put down on the paper. These amendments he Mr. Boydell could not have carried, owing to the fact that additional expenditure was involved. He would withdraw his other amendment of the omission of the words, “under the regulations made under the Service Act, is entitled to leave of absence.” He moved instead, in line 23, after “absence”, to insert “and was not taken on during the strike period”.

said that he could not accept the hon. member’s amendment, as it would increase expenditure.

said the main object of the Bill was to make some acknowledgment to the men who helped the country in a time of trial, whether the hon. members on the cross benches called them “blacklegs” or “green legs.” (Laughter.) Some of the hon. members on the cross-benches might not like it, but that could not be helped. These men did their duty to the whole of the country, and that should be acknowledged by the whole of the country. He would suggest the insertion of the words, “Such leave not having been taken.”

said he did not like the idea of giving the men a money payment. (Hear, hear.) A holiday would be given to the bulk of the men who simply proceeded with the work during the strike, but did not render any special service. The position with regard to leave had been very much overstated, and from his inquiries he found that the position was entirely satisfactory. East London and Durban reported that the position with regard to this matter was entirely satisfactory, and at Johannesburg there were only four cases of leave outstanding. In Cape Town, too, the position was quite satisfactory, but there had been a delay in granting applications made by signalmen for leave because a number of additional signal boxes had been opened. In the Stores Department several men had not had leave for some years because they had not applied for it, but in the Mechanical Department there was not a single man entitled to leave who had not been able to obtain it. He did not call leave a reward, but some little mark of recognition. There was a precedent for giving a holiday in Natal where, after the railway strike, the men were given seven days leave, But if he accepted the suggestion of the hon. member for Fort Beaufort, he would have to ask the House to vote another £60,000.

Do you mean to say that they have not saved the country many £60,000?

Is that the way to put it? Generous provision is being made for all the men who rendered outstanding services. Why should you send a man in the Karoo who did not go on strike and probably had no temptation to go on strike, why should you send him a cheque for £5 or £10? Continuing, the Minister said that the hon. member for Durban, Greyville, desired to exempt from the proposal every man who entered the Railway Service during the strike, but the country owed a great debt—a debt which many hon. members and the public at large did not understand or realise—to the men who came from outside the Railway Service and volunteered their help at the time of distress—(cheers) —and acted as firemen or filled other dangerous positions. A fuss had been made about the so-called degradation of the men taking a holiday, but their course was very simple—if they thought they would be degraded by taking a holiday, they need not take it. (Hear, hear.) His information— which was received not from departmental sources only—was that a large proportion— he believed a great majority—of the men if they had the opportunity would be only too glad to take a holiday. But if it were not possible to give the men a holiday, then the Department would have the option of giving them money.

said the hon. member for Port Elizabeth, Central, had referred to the feeling in the country, but he (Mr. Creswell) thought they on the cross-benches might claim that there had been recent events which, at all events, cast grave doubt on the proposition whether the hon. member for Port Elizabeth and his friends were so representative of the country as his assertion would imply. (Labour cheers.)

He wanted to point out what he considered the worst feature in that clause. That little reward—he agreed with the hon. member for Fort Beaufort that there was a difference between leave and payment in cash—for those who remained “loyal,” would give rise to the one thing they should eliminate in all their branches. It introduced an element of favouritism. It opened the door to favouritism of the very worst kind, and on that account alone it was thoroughly bad. The hon. member for Fort Beaufort had pleaded in impassioned words for some money payment. With regard to Salt River, he took the view that those 500 or 600 men who could not stand his oratory and went on strike should be penalised. (Laughter.) They on the cross benches believed, in spite of what the hon. Minister had said, that the men who remained in on such occasions as the recent strike were not always by any means the best men. He wanted to ask the Minister if it was not an established principle that a man should be brought face to face with his accusers? Apparently the Railway service did not accept that. He instanced the case of a man, one of those who were looked upon as not to be employed again. This man had been to see him, and said that when he was told that he was not to be re-engaged because he had incited others to go on strike, asked to be faced with his accusers, but that was not done, and when he went to Salt River, found there had been telephonic communication. They were not prepared to substantiate the charges. The method which the hon. Minister was suggesting in granting four days’ leave would end in doing a great deal of harm in the railway service. This four days’ leave given to a large number of railwaymen would mean that 90,000 extra days’ work would have to be done by someone, or else they would have to increase the staff, and they knew the hon. Minister would not do that. He would point out that there was no grudge against those men who did not go out on strike; it was recognised that the strike was not properly organised, but those who did would not thank the House for the suggested reward, and the hon. Minister would be well advised to drop it.

said the hon. Minister prided himself on being businesslike in his procedure, but he had been carried away a few moments ago with his enthusiasm when he spoke of the great debt of gratitude which they owed to those people, and then he went on to say with regard to the proposal of the hon. member for Fort Beaufort that it would cost a large amount of money.

said that those men whom he had referred to were not provided for under that particular clause at all.

said that the hon. Minister was now reducing the matter to an argument of how cheap they could get off in the matter. He did not think the hon. Minister had treated the House fairly. It was indecent and indecorous that they should discuss those matters on the floor of the House. The Minister would do well to let the matter go to a Select Committee. It was not too late. They were in the position of a board of directors dealing with their own servants, and the only businesslike way would be to thresh out a matter of that sort in the committee-room first.

said that he represented 400 or 500 lighter men, daily-paid men, who were not entitled to leave, and he would like some assurance from the Minister that these men would come in under this scheme. They ought to find some level way of recompensing the railwaymen, and if they wanted to settle the unrest they should do something tangible.

said he was unwilling to oppose any offers of reward to be made to the men who remained loyal during the strike, but he questioned whether the Government were adopting the wisest course, as suggested in the clause. He admitted they were under a debt of gratitude to these men, but was it a wise course to mark out these men as a special case? He thought the loyalty displayed by these men was only what they ought to expect of them, and to offer them this reward was something of the sort of a tip that one might offer to a waiter in an hotel. They had done what it was their duty to do. Then, again, the work required to be done during these four days of leave would probably have to be performed by those who got no reward at all. He thought a cash payment would be preferable to what was now proposed. Further, he thought it would have been far better to have confined these rewards to those men who had exposed themselves to special risks, or had performed special service, instead of those who had merely done what it was their common duty to do. He maintained that it was unworthy of a big service to treat these men by tipping them. During the July trouble the Railway Ambulance Corps did extraordinarily good service and ran severe risks. One of the members of this corp had not yet recovered from a gunshot wound he then received. He thought the Minister would be studying the dignity of the service by dropping the proposal contained in the clause.

said he was opposed to the policy that those who had only done their duty should be rewarded. If a man had to be rewarded for doing his duty, then the principle thus laid down should be extended. Members of the Police and Defence Force should then be rewarded as well. They had been called out in critical circumstances, but they got no reward. Telegraphists also had worked extra hours, and received no consideration for it. Nor was the burgher rewarded although the railway servant, who was paid, had to be rewarded. After all, the railway servant contracted with the Government to do something—why should he receive an extra reward for keeping his contract? Why not do something for the white labourers with the money which it was proposed to spend now? Did the Minister know the conditions under which the white railway labourers at Honing’s Nest Kloof, for instance, lived? Their accommodation was hardly better than that given to pigs. These were the people deserving of the consideration of the House. He (the speaker) could not move an amendment to pay rewards to other people who had done their duty during the strike, but he hoped the Minister would see that something was done People who did their duty should receive their pay, but no reward; and those who did not do then duty ought to be punished.

could not understand the members on the cross-benches, who purported to represent the men and to know what suited them best. They had the hon. member for Greyville (Mr. Boydell) bringing in an amendment to the clause which would increase the number of the men to be rewarded, although the members on the cross benches declared that the system of reward proposed by the Government was not acceptable to the men. He thought it was very inconsistent.

My amendment would have the effect of decreasing the number, and not increasing it.

continuing, said the effect of the amendment would be to extend the leave to every individual except those engaged during the strike.

Except those taken on during the strike.

maintained that every man in the Service from the General Manager downwards would be entitled to this leave if the amendment of the hon. member for Durban. Greyville, was accepted, whereas the clause as it now stood confined the reward to the daily-paid men.

said he thought that the hon. member for Jeppe had unintentionally misled the House with regard to the question of leave. He had given the impression that the other men would have to do the work while these men were on leave. The Committee must remember that a large proportion of the men worked in the railway shops and their work could not be done by anybody else.

Overtime.

Why should it be done on overtime?

called the hon. member to order, and said that he must not carry on conversations with other members.

said he was merely endeavouring to clear away this impression. In any case if overtime work had to be done, overtime prices would be paid. He disliked this idea that had got abroad in the House that the men would not accept these rewards. Why should they not? There was nothing dishonourable about it. There was no disgrace to the men accepting the rewards. It ought to be an honour for them to accept the reward. It was like looking a gift-horse in the mouth. He did think the men should accept the reward in the spirit in which it was offered. He hoped that the impression that the men who were being punished would have to do the work of the men on holiday would be cleared away.

said that the discussion that evening had proved, if proof were wanted, that the subject-matter of the Bili should have gone to a Select Committee. It was impossible in a full House to discuss these points, and he thought, had either of the proposals been adopted by the House, an amended Bill would have been brought in which the House would have been ready to accept.

He regretted it, because when the second reading debate closed, he understood from the Minister that the very fullest opportunity would be given to the House, consistently with the mechanical rule that must be followed which would be modified by the Minister so that opportunity would be given to make alterations more congenial to the men. He still retained the opinion that giving them leave was a trivial and unsatisfactory way of dealing with the men, and he felt that if they could not do better, let them turn this leave into something substantial to be presented to the men with some sort of document that they could hand down to posterity. The hon. members on the cross-benches deprecated the reward proposed in the Bill. Well, they had their reasons for doing so. He went on to refer to his hon. and young friend from Greyville, who had been engaged during the strike at Durban in missionary work at the railway gates impressing on the men poisonous ideas with regard to their service, and if he was not mistaken he was identified with a certain clergyman who told these railwaymen one day that the loyal men inside were cowardly and rotten. That was the sort of thing that was indulged in by hon. members on the cross-benches, and they ought to be ashamed of the share they took in the business. In conclusion, he appealed to the Minister to give the men some substantial reward for the services they had rendered the Service.

said he thought it was far better to give the cheques than leave. He was told that when the men at Durban received their first week’s pay after the strike—that was the loyal men—their receipts were stamped, “Stood loyal to the Government.” If the men accepted that then they would accept cheques. Even at this late stage he asked whether it was not possible to send the Bill to a Select Committee. If the Minister would not do that, then he asked the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg, North to substitute “shall” for the word “may” in his amendment.

said the Minister was treating the railwaymen like a lot of children. In considering matters of this kind he (the speaker) placed himself in the position of the people concerned. The spirit of camaraderie would be found in every sphere of life, and naturally also in the life of the workman. The granting of four days’ leave was regarded by these people as a sort of medal for loyalty—in other words, the others who did not get this leave had been disloyal. It should not be forgotten, however, that in most cases these loyal men had been compelled to be loyal and in other cases they had only done what it was their duty to do. On the other hand those men who struck were loyal to their comrades. He (the speaker) thought that in these cases where the men had been, so to speak forced or over-persuaded to go on strike they should be treated mercifully instead of being punished Only in such circumstances could one expect to have a loyal staff.

said the principle they were laying down was a thoroughly pernicious one. He could not imagine anything more pernicious to the prospect of peace in the Public Service than to have a distinction between the sheep and the goats; the men did not desire it, and nothing could be more unjust. Men who were rushed out in the excitement of the moment would be punished under this proposal. The giving of four days leave to the men would represent £50,000.

The other men will have to do the work.

said the proposal was an unjust one. The members who wished to have some special individual reward to be given to the men were going in the wrong direction. Rather let them take the Service as a whole, and give it something it really required. An hon. member who was not in the House then had suggested to him that it would be a good plan to set aside a small sum for the provision of bursaries for the children of the railwaymen. If it were possible to refer the matter to a Select Committee some satisfactory arrangement could be arrived at.

Why did you not support us when we asked for a committee?

I supported it after the second reading.

You could not introduce new matter then.

Yes, it was covered in the short title. It would be better to give nothing than to give these rewards.

moved to omit “Member of the clerical staff of the Administration and substitute “Officer.”

moved that the clause be taken sub-section by sub-section. (Cheers.)

said that as he had already accepted amendments to various sub-sections he could not take the proposal.

moved to omit the word “engage,” and to substitute “Take on.” He also moved the omission of sub-sections 2, 3, and 5. Proceeding, the hon. member said that the sub-section 2 lent itself to much abuse by the various heads of departments. Further than that there was no justification after having rewarded those men as it was proposed to do by 4 or 7 days’ leave, that they should go on rewarding them by special bonuses and promotion; that was a dangerous policy indeed. It meant that men would not be promoted on their merits, but on the recommendation of some foreman, through higher officers, to the General Manager, and the man would get his promotion because of some special service rendered during the period of this strike over the heads of others whose merits entitled them to preference. If the Minister carried sub-section 1, which entitled him to give rewards to those who he regarded as loyal, he ought to let it stop at that. With regard to sub-section 3 that was provided for in the regulations, and was therefore unnecessary. In clause 22 of the regulations a man who had worked temporarily in a grade higher than he was employed was entitled to a higher pay. Clause 3 was therefore entirely unnecessary and ought not to be in. They on the cross-benches agreed with clause 4, which had to do with the clerical staff. Those men had to work a greater number of hours doing their own work owing to the pressure of work arising out of the strike, and they were legitimately entitled to extra pay. The hon. Minister should be satisfied with the first portion, and not go deeper into the mire by attaching those other sub-sections.

said it would not then be necessary for him to move the omission of sub-section 2, but his amendment on the paper was for an entirely different purpose, and he wished to substitute that the Minister “may,” not “shall,” in his discretion add one year’s service, etc. That would not mean increased expenditure.

said the hon. member was not in order.

said he could quite understand the members on the cross-benches trying to get their men off without penalties, but he could not understand their attitude in trying to do away with the rewards of the faithful men who had done faithful service. The essence of that clause 2 was in sub-section 5, because there were men in Johannesburg who took considerable risks in running trains. The clauses as they stood he was perfectly prepared to vote for, for he thought the proposal could not be very much improved upon, and he hoped the House would take clause 2 and all its sub-sections as they stood. With regard to the question of leave, he thought there were altogether too many General Managers of Railways in the House—(hear, hear)—and many did not know what they were talking about.

said he agreed with the last speaker, and would vote for the clauses as they stood, because it was not right to treat the loyal men in the same way as the men who had struck. He hoped the amendment of the knobkerry party would not be agreed to. The only reason why hon. members on the cross benches did not wish to see these awards was because the men whom it was proposed to reward had refused to come out on strike. The hon. member for Fords burg said that those who got no leave would have to do the work of those who did get it, and that friction would result, but he forgot that during the strike the loyal men had had to do the work of the men, who, like a lot of young horses, had gone ramping through the country. As to the suggestion by the hon. member for Uitenhags that a fund for the children should be created, Mr. Vosloo asked how they were going to divide that fund? One man had one child and another was blessed with 12. (Laughter.) The fact was that no matter what proposals had been made, some members would have found fault, and he hoped, therefore, the clause would be adopted as printed.

said, if in order, he would move as an amendment to the whole of sub-section (1) of clause 2, and substitute something else in its place later on. He thought enough had been said in opposition to this sub-section, although it had failed to carry conviction to the hon. member who had just sat down, and who appeared to think that everybody who opposed these rewards was in favour of strikes. Harm, he thought, was going to come to the Service, the public at large, and the Exchequer.

The amendment to the clause in line 22, proposed by the Minister of Railways and Harbours, was then carried.

The amendment of the member for Greyville (Mr. Boydell), to insert the words, “with the exception of those taken on during the strike,” was put, when the “Noes” were declared to have it.

called for a division.

As fewer than ten members (viz.: (Messrs. Andrews, Boydell, Fremantle, P. G. W. Grobler, Haggar, Madeley, Maginess and Meyler) voted in favour of the amendment,

declared the amendment negatived.

The amendment of the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg, North, was agreed to.

Sub-section 1, as amended, proposed to be omitted, was put, and declared carried.

called for a division.

As fewer than ten members (viz.: Messrs. Andrews, Boydell, Creswell, Fremantle, Haggar, Maginess, Meyler, and Van Niekerk) voted against the Question,

declared the question affirmed, and the amendment proposed by Mr. Fremnatle, negatived.

The remaining amendments proposed by the Minister of Railways and Harbours were agreed to.

The amendments proposed by Mr. Boydell were negatived.

The sub-section as amended and clause 2 as amended were agreed to.

On clause 3, Provision as to servants on strike who returned to or made application for employment before certain dates,

moved, in line 30, after “Service,” to insert “and is still in the Service at the commencement of this Act.”

moved that the sub-sections be taken seriatim.

The motion was agreed to.

line 38, after “shall” to insert, “in accordance with the second proviso of section 47 of the Service Act be deemed to have retired himself from the Service as from the time he absented himself from duty; but on the completion of six months’ satisfactory service dated from the beginning of this Act, shall be reinstated in all his former privileges”; to omit paragraph (a). The mover explained that his object was to do away with the most objectionable feature of fines. Government itself could not be acquitted of a certain amount of responsibility in connection with the strike, because of its action last July, when it failed to protect the men at Benoni who went on with their work.

The amendment will mean increased expenditure, and I cannot allow it.

I was one of those unfortunate people—

The hon. member cannot discuss it.

If I cannot discuss it I shall have to sit down.

appealed to the Minister to allow the clause to stand over. This was another example of a gentleman who was misled by the Minister when he said that he would give special consideration to amendments which would incur increased expenditure.

You were not influenced by that.

Whether I was influenced personally by it or not, a lot were. The Minister made a promise to the House which he is not fulfilling.

I hope hon. members will not continue under the impression that the House was misled. All I said was that with regard to any amendment we could possibly accept but which might involve additional expenditure 1 would give the necessary consideration to it.

The Minister indicated that he would treat this as a special occasion.

There is nothing before the Committee.

I will move that the clause stand over on that ground.

Shortly after, Dr. Watkins withdrew his motion.

asked if his amendment, to omit the clause altogether and substitute another: “Notwithstanding anything contained in the second proviso to section 47 of the Service Act any servant who was on strike and who returned to work or made application for further employment on or before the 31st January, 1914, and who on or before the 28th February, 1914, has been accepted by the Administration for employment shall have his services regarded as continuous and shall have the period between the time when he so absented himself from duty and the time he resumed work reckoned as leave without pay and shall in all other respects be treated and regarded as though he had not so absented himself from duty. Such a servant who made application as aforesaid and was accepted for employment on or before the 28th February, 1914 but was not actually employed in consequence only of his services being then not required by the Administration, but who was or may be employed by the Administration at a later date shall, if the Minister so authorises, be entitled to the above benefits and privileges. Any servant who made application as aforesaid, but was not accepted on or before the 28th February, 1914, in consequence of his having been alleged to have taken a leading part in the strike, but who after inquiry has been found not to have done so and has been or may be in consequence accepted by the Administration for employment, shall, if the Minister so authorises, be entitled to the above benefits and privileges,” would mean additional expenditure?

said he had no alternative but to rule it out of order.

Not even with the consent of the Minister?

moved an amendment to delete the date 16th and substitute 27th. The effect of that would be that a number of men, almost entirely in Durban, who were said to be harshly dealt with on account of their not having returned to work as soon as they might have done because they had not sufficient information regarding the progress of the strike, would now be placed on the same footing—with the exception of the men who were not to be taken back at all—as the other men whom it was proposed to punish, and they would be fined for each day they had remained out.

thanked the Minister on behalf of the Durban men for making the amendment. The hon. Minister was wrong when he said he had put those Durban men on the same footing with others, for they started as new hands and had already been heavily fined. He (Mr. Boydell) would suggest that the Minister should put in some small proviso which would enable those men taken back at Durban to get the same rate of pay as they were in receipt of before the strike.

said the amendment would have the effect of putting the Durban men on the same basis as others. He was understood to say if it had not the effect intended by the hon. member he would remedy that.

thanked the Minister, and pointed out that during the past month those men had been losing 4s. a day.

said if the hon. member meant that he should go back and make up that amount, it was asking rather too much.

appealed to the hon. Minister to get on a high platform and remove the fines altogether. He had gone to a certain expense, and they were grateful for it. He ought to go a step further and remove the fine.

said that the Durban men had already been fined, and he assumed the fines would be taken off their pay over a series of months. In that way their wages would be reduced, and when the Administration found they could live on that lower amount they would proceed to lower their wages.

That is an unworthy suggestion.

said that was the effect which the men feared. He would appeal to the Minister to consider what the hon. member for Victoria County had said. They did not want these men from week to week to have these fines taken off their pay. Then there was another point to which he wished to draw the Minister’s attention. It was the question of the men whom it had been decided not to reinstate.

pointed out that this could not be discussed at this stage.

appealed to the Minister to forego the fines, because every time an amount was deducted from the men’s weekly pay the sore would be kept open. He considered it was an error of judgment which would have a grave effect on the men. He was one of those who voted for the leaders of the strike being sent away, and to make that action justifiable it was absolutely necessary to deal with those left behind as men who had been misguided by their leaders. The danger having been removed, it was unnecessary to enforce these fines, as well as undesirable to keep alive a source of irritation. He would say to the Minister, “Let bygones be bygones,” and in this he (Mr. Van der Riet) was sure the House concurred.

said that he agreed with what had been said by the hon. member for Victoria County. There was a growing feeling in the House that the memory of this unfortunate business should be obliterated as soon as possible. They would perpetuate bitter memories if they did not remit these fines.

said that as his amendment had been ruled out of order he would appeal to the Minister to report progress and ask leave to sit again, so that in the meantime he might consult his colleagues in order to see whether anything could be done. He believed that if hon. members could vote outside party considerations it would meet with the approval of the majority of members of that House. If he thought that they would prevent disturbances in the future by maintaining these fines there would be something which would justify their voting for them. But he thought that they would only revive bitter memories.

In the interests of the service and the interests of the country, he appealed to the Minister to take away anything that might carry a stigma in its train. He wished to start with a new and clean sheet. Nobody would find more than the Minister and his Administration the advantage in their own interests of accepting the proposal, which was made from no party consideration, but in the interests of the railway servants and the whole State. (Hear, hear.) He moved that progress be reported and leave obtained to sit again, because whatever attitude the Minister adopted he ought to have an opportunity of fully considering it. He (Sir Thomas) was desirous of doing the best he could for the men and the country.

I am quite prepared to accept the suggestion. (Cheers.) We have had a long day.

The motion was agreed to.

Progress was reported and leave obtained to sit again to-morrow.