I should like to bring a matter affecting a group of citrus farmers in the Western Cape to the notice of the Minister. The Citrus Board has drawn up a plan to bring all the citrus-growers of the country under central control in a single-channel marketing system. In asking for this the Citrus Board is supported by the overwhelming majority of citrus-growers in the Republic who would like to have this single-channel marketing system. But now there is a small minority of citrus-growers whose interests are seriously threatened by this and whose case I therefore want to put before the hon. the Minister.

When a single-channel system for citrus is put into operation, it will mean that all citrus which is not exported and which is therefore sold on the local market will give the farmer approximately 18 cents per pocket. As against that, the farmers in the Western Cape produce out-of-season oranges and limes for which they get anything from 60 cents to Rl per pocket. If, therefore, they are forced into this singlechannel and single-pool system, they will simply be ruined.

Now we had some experience of this a few years ago when the Deciduous Fruit Board also established a single-channel and single-pool system just after the last war. It soon appeared that this system was very unfair towards certain producers, and consequently the system was abandoned because one of its consequences was that a large amount of grapes landed on the black market. When the public wants a certain product out of season, it is willing to pay considerably more for it than the floor prices. If that out-of-season product is then forced into the single-channel system, the effect is that this product simply lands on the black market. The Deciduous Fruit Board then evolved a new system of fortnightly pools which met the requirements of all the producers, with the result that there is no longer a single price for grapes right throughout the season, but that the price varies from as little as 2 cents per lb. to as much as 6 cents per lb., and that complies with the requirements of the differentiated market.

The question now is what will happen if the Citrus Board forces all producers to comply with its scheme. It will simply mean that also the out-of-season oranges and limes will be marketed at the height of the season, which will then make the supplies accumulate further during that time, and eventually these out-of-season producers will be completely eliminated. They will simply have to make a living in a different way. In view of the fact that new wine production quotas have now been granted in the Western Cape by the K.W.V., it will mean that those farmers will simply take out their citrus trees and switch over to the production of wine, with the further result that the public will be deprived of this service which it has enjoyed for years. We want to avoid that at all costs, that this special service which these farmers render as the result of years of experience should now disappear because it has become quite uneconomic for them to produce out-of-season citrus.

If I am asked what the solution of the problem is, I want to point out that there are three possible solutions. The first is, of course, that these farmers who produce out-of-season fruit should be completely exempt from control. The second possible solution is that dates should be fixed, and not capriciously by the Board from year to year, but that fixed dates should be set by the Minister after which citrus will then be out of season. I want to suggest that in the case of navels this date should be the last Saturday in June, in the case of limes the last Saturday in July, and in the case of Valencias the last Saturday in September. If this is done, the interests of the citrus-growers in the Western Cape will be sufficiently protected and they will be able to continue producing this out-of-season citrus and comply with a great demand.

The debate thus far has been about the problem of production costs and about the farmer being unable to to make a living, and about our dealing with too small farming units, or uneconomic units. The solution is continuously being sought more and more in the direction that we should see the agricultural industry more in the light of a factory in which not only capital is invested but in which one also needs knowledge and the ability to organise. I want to plead in a different direction to-day. What causes me concern is that we tend to regard agriculture more and more as a factory. Because we do that, we tend to go increasingly in the same direction as that taken by industry in other spheres, namely that the unit should be increasingly bigger to make it more economic. The fault I find with that is that if we regard agriculture as a factory which should assume ever-growing proportions in order to reduce costs, then we must, as it were, industrialise the whole of the farming industry. It would be a pity if that development went too far, because if one regards agriculture merely as an industry it will mean that the cream of the population, the farmers, will become an industrial population, and will no longer be what they were, the cradle of the culture and language of the Afrikaner.

There is also another aspect of the matter. We have just received a report suggesting how uneconomic farm units can be prevented, but I also want to point to another phenomenon in our country which is as great an evil. I find it particularly in my own province, namely farms which are too large and lie there without being put to full use. That is as great an evil, because land is not only purchased for what one can make out of it; it is also bought because one wants a safe investment for one’s money, and there is no safer investment than land. The Minister has already dealt with the matter, but the fact remains that we now have these large purchases of land and we see that much of that land is to a great extent not utilised. Most of those farms are occupied by Bantu only. In this regard I want to say that last year we passed an Act dealing with Bantu labourers on the farms in the White area, and I want to make an appeal to the agricultural industry that the farmers should ask that this legislation should be applied to the whole of the farming industry in South Africa, so that we may determine what the labour requirements of each farm are, in order to combat the process of the rural areas becoming increasingly black. If that is done, every farmer will have to see to it that he utilises his labour properly, which is not the case now. There are many farms I know of on which there are 60 or more Bantu families and no Whites. Squatting takes place on a large scale. Those evils can be eliminated by the application of this Act we passed last year right throughout the country. It will also militate against the excessive acquisition of land which is not properly utilised. If a person is forced to use a certain number of labourers on his farm, there will also be a need again for the White man to go back to the land. I should like us to think along those lines, that these large farms which lie there unused and which are only occupied by Bantu should be utilised, because this constitutes just as great an evil for our people and our country, particularly from the point of view that the farm, which is the cradle of our civilisation, should not merely become a factory, but should still remain the cradle of the Afrikaner.

I can agree with the last speaker when he says that the platteland is the cradle of the civilization and the culture of the Afrikaner, but I cannot agree with what he says in regard to these labour bureaux. I do not want to argue with the hon. member about it, because it does not fall under this Vote, but I just want to point out one thing to him, and that is that the platteland has not become blacker because the White man has left it entirely, but because certain farmers bought more land and, therefore, need more labourers.

That is not so.

It is true. The hon. member will get his ten minutes in which to talk. I do not want to waste time. I listened to this debate carefully yesterday and then I took the trouble to go through the agricultural debates for the past four years. I came to only one conclusion, namely that on the part of the Nationalist Party this is a sort of “switchback” debate.

The one person says this and the other says the opposite. So we had the hon. member for Christiana (Mr. Wentzel) telling his old story that the drought had caused all these problems, but I find that four years ago, in 1961, the hon. member said precisely the same thing. Then the hon. member for Gardens (Mr. Connan) asked whether we then had a perpetual drought in South Africa. The hon. member went further and said that the Marketing Act was there to achieve stability and not to be used to give the farmer a good price and that, if we talk about production costs plus a reasonable profit, it is nonsense. I was then interested to hear the hon. member for Somerset East (Mr. Vosloo). He said, by way of interjection, that the provincial councillor for Beaufort West had now been kicked out because he had pleaded for the farmers.

No, that is nonsense. I never said anything of the kind.

The hon. member now denies what he said, but, at the same time, he had this same theme as all the other hon. members, namely that if there is a higher price for dairy products that money would have to come out of the pockets of the taxpayer.

Or of the consumer; one of the two.

The hon. member did not make his speech properly yesterday, and now he wants to make it over again. The hon. member for Ladybrand (Mr. Keyter) had the same story to tell. He said increased subsidies would have to come out of the pocket of the consumer. The hon. member for Harrismith (Mr. J. J. Rail) had a long story to tell. He said that, because there was over-production, the prices of dairy products had to be reduced. [Interjections.]

Order!

Then the hon. member gave statistics in regard to the interest earned on capital invested in certain areas, all to prove that the argument we advanced on this side, that the farmer receives only 2.1 per cent interest on his capital, is not correct. Now I want to ask the hon. member this: How much butter or milk does one get out of one gallon of statistics? Of what use is all this to the consumer or to the producer? Then we had the Minister. He made an absolutely wonderful speech. He first tried to prove that so many farmers did not really disappear from the land. He said that it was not farmers who disappeared, but people who were economically active in agriculture, and then somebody said: “They are sharecroppers.” He then asked what was to happen to the small farmer with a small bit of land who kept 100 cattle and who had to sell 20 cattle per year in order to live? Is that all the Minister knows about farming? Which man will start cattle farming on a small bit of land? Particularly beef cattle.

You do not know what is going on in the country.

I suppose the Minister was referring to the places where people feed cattle, and then he calls them small farmers. I suppose he was talking about the people who buy cattle to feed them, but that is not a small farm. Then the Minister said that if that farmer could earn R3,000 in the city, how would the Government keep him on the farm? But the Minister is beginning to do what the Minister of Bantu Administration does. He is beginning to live in a dream world; he goes into orbit. He is imagining these things. Where can an unskilled worker, such as a farmer is when he goes to the city, earn R3,000?

He may have a B.Sc. or an M.Sc. degree.

And then he still cannot get it.

Fie! The poor member for Somerset East (Mr. Vosloo)! I should compare him to the hon. the Deputy Minister, because his arguments are precisely the same as those of the Deputy Minister. Sir, it is a ridiculous argument. The Minister says that the Government’s policy is clearly to keep the farmers on the land; he says that what is happening at the moment is quite a normal change. He says that the farmers are not leaving the land because of the Government’s price policy, because the prices of agricultural products have increased considerably. He says the general conditions in the country are the cause of the reduced production—he should really have said increased production, although there is perhaps reduced dairy production. The Minister adduced the argument that producers’ prices had increased more than production costs. He says that a few years ago there was a surplus of dairy products, but he says that time will not arrive again, even though he increases the prices of fresh milk, industrial milk, cheese and butter. His reason for it is this: He says that meat prices are too high and, consequently, farmers will concentrate more on meat production and on milk production or on other dairy products. He says he is extremely concerned about the dairy industry, but then he makes a statement which is best of all: He says we should not say that the farmer merely makes 2¾ per cent profit on his capital investment, because that farmer probably bought his land cheaply ten years ago. Sir, does that not apply to industry also? Just as farmers perhaps bought their land 30 years ago, industrialists established their industries 30 years ago. Surely the profit of the industrialist is calculated on his present capital structure. That is the sort of argument the Minister advances! Sir, for once in my life I have had the satisfaction of hearing the Minister admit that every increase in producers’ prices has come about as the result of pressure exerted by this side of the House.

Where do you get that from?

The Minister said so clearly here. He practically pleaded with the Opposition not to talk every time about commodities for which the farmers want a higher price, and not to talk every time about farmers who are in difficulty. By that he admits that he does not realize that farmers are in difficulty unless it is pointed out to him by this side of the House. I have gone through the Hansards for the past five years, and I find that every time it was members on this side of the House who pointed out that the farmers were badly off. It was, as the result of that, that prices were increased, i.e. as the result of the pressure exerted by this side of the House. [Time limit.]

The tragedy of hon. members opposite is that they are launching attacks from urban constituencies on the Government’s agricultural policy. Politically they have fled from the platteland and to-day they represent urban constituencies.

Who represents an urban constituency?

The hon. member for Drakensberg (Mrs. S. M. van Niekerk) is the exception, but the other hon. members opposite who have taken part in this agricultural debate represent urban constituencies.

And who do you represent?

We represent rural constituencies. We represent the farming community of South Africa. [Interjections.]

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

I just want to take this opportunity to-day to express to the hon. the Minister and to his Department . . .

Your thanks.

. . . my thanks. I have reason for thanking them. I want to thank them for the fact that, at the time of the catastrophe which struck my constituency last year, the great snowfall which affected five districts, the Minister and his Department assisted the farmers by making helicopters available to them, as the result of which thousands of head of stock were saved. On behalf of all the farmers there, I want to express my thanks to the Minister and to the Department.

Mr. Chairman, the object of the Marketing Act is, firstly, to achieve price stabilization, and not to ensure farming income on a definite level. The difference between us and hon. members opposite is that they want to maintain agricultural income on a definite level in spite of bad crops or bad climatic conditions. That simply cannot be done. Farming conditions vary from year to year, and that is why prices have to be reviewed and adapted from year to year. The decrease in the percentage contribution of the agricultural sector to the national income is simply due to the fact that other sectors of the economy have developed faster than agriculture. It is a recognized economic phenomenon in the process of development of most under-developed countries that agriculture flourishes while the other sectors of the economy do not develop so fast. Here in South Africa the other sectors, including mining, have developed fast; hence the fact that there is a decrease in the percentage contribution made by agriculture to the national economy.

The hon. member for East London (City) (Dr. Moolman), who, unfortunately, is not here to-day, yesterday read a quotation from the annual report of the Secretary for Agricultural Economics and Marketing, and for record purposes I just want to read the full quotation. The hon. member read out the following extract—

That is where the hon. member stopped. He did not read further. I then asked him to read further, and he said I could do so myself. Therefore, I now want to read what the hon. member refused to read—

That gives a completely different impression from the picture painted here by the hon. member. It is our grazing areas which are suffering as a result of the drought. The hon. member for Drakensberg will agree with me that the whole of Natal, Griqualand East and large areas of the Transvaal are drought-stricken; hence the fact that there is, e.g., a milk shortage in Durban. It is not due to a short-sighted policy on the part of the Government that there is a shortage of dairy products; it can only be ascribed to this serious drought. The hon. member for East London (City) also made another allegation here. He said that we wanted to get rid of all the small farmers. That is not true. We do not want to get rid of the small farmers. The Minister stated very pertinently yesterday that we want to get rid of all uneconomic farm units, and that is quite a different matter. The point I want to make is this: This Government has come forward with a dynamic policy and, for the first time in the history of South Africa, the Government was not daunted, but continued applying a sound agricultural policy. Whereas previous governments, e.g., discriminated against the young farmer, or the small farmer, this Government applies a completely different policy and puts agriculture on a sound basis. No, instead of making politics out of our farmers we should rather all get up here to-day and praise the farmers for what they have done and suffered in this difficult period through which they are passing. In spite of the serious drought, they have held on, and they deserve our praise. In spite of trying to make political capital out of the position of the farmers, we should rather try to assist them in all kinds of ways to put agriculture, the cradle of our civilization, on a sound basis.

I want to refer to a recent remarkable incident which took place in the South African agriculture. I refer to the occasion when on 5 May this year, Mr. Andre du Toit, the chairman of the K.W.V. unveiled a commemoration plaque to mark the opening of the wine cellars of the Stellenbosch wine-growers at Wadeville in Germiston. I believe the erection of the first wine cellars in the Transvaal was a historical occasion in the South African agriculture. On that occasion Mr. Andre du Toit said the following— I quote from the Burger of 6 May, 1965.

I think that is generally welcomed. Previous speakers have already referred to it that we must be careful that the price of liquor does not increase out of all proportion. The wine cellar which has been erected at a cost of approximately R6,000,000, has a production capacity at the moment of 5,000,000 bottles per annum and it is expected to increase it to 20,000,000 within the next 15 years. We think this is a remarkable occurrence, in this sense that, in the first place, the Stellenbosch wine-growers have been the first to set foot in the Transvaal as far as this industry is concerned, and we want to congratulate them on that achievement. In the second place, it is a wonderful achievement on the part of the wine-growing industry in South Africa, but, in the third place, it is also an achievement on the part of the K.W.V. as the body which controls the product of the vine in South Africa, and in that, we also see the power of the idea of co-operative societies, because it is generally known that the co-operative movement is something which the farmer has built up for himself on his own initiative. There is evidence of the success the agricultural industry has attained in that direction. However, as hon. members know, the South African farmer is known for his ability to adapt himself to changed circumstances. As is generally known during the past three centuries the Western Cape Province has been the traditional home of the vine. Where the Transvaal is now in the fortunate position after 300 years to be able to benefit from the experience the wine farmer has gained over three centuries in the Cape Province. I think it is only right that we pay tribute to the pioneers in this industry which is now being extended to the northern province. From information disclosed by Mr. du Toit on that occasion and from statistics contained in the annual report of the Department of Agricultural Economics and Marketing, it is clear that the wine industry has made tremendous progress in our country. In 1918, for example, the total production was 12.3 million gallons, but it is already estimated that the production for 1964 will be 90,000,000 gallons, which has been a phenomenal growth. In 1945, the Republic consumed 12.4 million gallons, and 34.1 million gallons in 1964. It is significant to notice how liquor consumption has increased in the Transvaal as a result of legislation passed in this House and as a result of publicity campaigns which have been launched to change our drinking pattern. In 1962, the Transvaal consumed 11 per cent of the total wine production, and 16.7 per cent in 1964 which is a remarkable increase. Let us see what the percentage increase in the consumption has been. Since 1962 the consumption has increased by 112 per cent in the Transvaal and only by 52 per cent in the Republic in general. We are on the threshold of tremendous expansion in the wine growing industry. When we compare these consumption figures with international figures available, we find that the consumption in France is 29 gallons per annum per capita, 25 gallons in Italy, and only 1.85 gallons per capita per annum in the Republic of South Africa. I also want to point out how the people of the Transvaal have in recent times, during the past ten years, adopted a more sympathetic attitude towards the industry as such. The position in regard to table grapes is as follows: A total of 82,000 morgen is planted with table grapes in the Cape Province; ten morgen in Natal, 122 morgen in the Orange Free State and 512 morgen in the Transvaal. We, therefore, have twice as many table grape vines in the Transvaal than in Natal and the Free State together. What is significant is the fact that more than half the table grape vines in the Transvaal have been planted in the constituency of Groblersdal. According to the 1960-1 statistics 255 morgen were under grapes in that district. According to the most recent estimates more than 300 morgen are under grapes in that district.

Mr. Chairman, that brings me to the marketing position. We find that during the months November and December, when the Cape grapes are not yet on the market, a total tonnage of 53 tons of table grapes marketed in Pretoria in 1963 and 43 tons in 1964; 367 tons in Johannesburg, in 1963 and 222 tons in 1964. That gave that area of the Transvaal an income, from table grapes alone, of R476,000 in 1963 and R333,000 in 1964. I am quoting these figures to prove to the hon. the Minister that a new industry is beginning to develop in the Transvaal and in view of these facts and bearing in mind that the wine industry is a sensitive and highly specialized industry, an industry which calls for a large capital investment, I want to request the hon. the Minister to give instructions that an economic investigation be made to ascertain what the possibilities of development in this specific area are so as to ensure that this industry developes in an orderly fashion and according to economic laws. We hope that the Department of Agricultural Technical Services will do the necessary research in this field in order to be able to give the farmers in that area the correct guidance.

I want to discuss another matter, namely, our kaffir corn industry. It is true that we recently had the unfortunate experience of a drop in the price of kaffir corn but we know what caused that. However, on this occasion we want to thank the Minister for having agreed to it that kaffir corn can be added to the list of subsidized stock-feeds in the drought-stricken areas. We believe that will stimulate the consumption of kaffir corn. We want to ask the hon. the Minister whether he will not give instructions that a particular research project be embarked upon with a view to stimulating the consumption of kaffir corn on the local market for various purposes. At the moment the consumption is limited in the Republic and unless the consumption is increased by means of a special publicity campaign we can expect further problems in this industry. We want to point out that during recent years Northern Transvaal has not yielded its normal production. We appreciate the fact that when the Northern Transvaal is in full production, bearing in mind the fact that other areas have recently concentrated on kaffir corn production in particular and are perhaps in a position to produce kaffir corn at a lower cost structure, we can expect the market position to be much more difficult in the future and that the kaffir corn farmers, who have traditionally found themselves in the Northern Transvaal, will experience greater problems in regard to the marketing of their product. We, therefore, ask the hon. the Minister to have a special publicity campaign embarked upon as is being done at the moment by the Mealie Board in the case of mealies. [Time limit.]

I associate myself with the plea made by the hon. member for Groblersdal (Mr. M. J. H. Bekker) to the hon. the Minister, but if he will forgive me I wish to discuss another matter. Sir, the Minister was at great pains yesterday to point out that the price factor was not the only factor which tended to drive the small farmer off the land. The Minister pointed out that a big farmer could also be an uneconomic unit if the farmer was inefficient in his farm management and farm planning. It is interesting also to note that in the report of the Minister’s Department there is quite a big section dealing with research and farm planning. It is quite clear that if the small farm has to remain an economic unit in South Africa, considerable research will have to be undertaken in order to find some balanced method of farming for the small man. It is also interesting to note that last year the Minister was not even aware that this section of farm planning fell under his Department.

Don’t be stupid.

Sir, the Minister is on record as having said that this section of farm planning did not fall under his Department. A plea was made here to the Minister last year that there should be greater co-operation as far as research is concerned and that—I quote from Hansard—“other balanced means of farming economy can be established in areas but it cannot be done without adequate research”. Sir, do you know what the Minister interjected? He said this: “That does not fall under me.” When the question of basic research into the economy of the small farmer was raised and a plea was made that there should be a further extension of this farm planning research in certain other areas of the country the Minister replied that that did not fall under him. He considered that it fell under his colleague. Sir. it is clear that the basic object of any research must be to try to establish a sound economic basis for the particular farming unit concerned. Sir, hon. members on the other side throughout this debate have alleged that this Government has done everything possible to keep the small farmer on the land. If that is so then I hope that hon. members on the other side will support me this afternoon in the plea that I propose to make to the Minister in respect of two areas of the country. I am sorry that the hon. member for Rustenburg (Mr. Bootha) is not here this afternoon, because he delivered a ten-minute homily to this side of the House in respect of all the wonderful things that were being done by this Minister and by this Government as far as the small farmer in South Africa is concerned, and he did not utter a single word about the difficulties experienced by the small farmer in his own constituency and that of the hon. member for Marico (Mr. Grobler) who so far has not raised his voice in the interests of the small farmers in South Africa. Sir, the Minister of Agricultural Technical Services, some three years ago, initiated a scheme, as far as small farming units are concerned, in the Western and Northern Transvaal, for the development of mutton sheep so that the small farmer can get away from the one-crop subsistence economy. In other words, in the case of small farming units producing tobacco, the farmers were encouraged to produce mutton sheep. If hon. members refer to the report of the Minister of Agricultural Technical Services they will find that he had a great deal to say about the introduction of mutton sheep in the heart-water veld of the Northern and Western Transvaal in order to establish a balanced farming economy in the case of small farming units. Sir, what has happened? The Minister says that he has done everything possible for the farmers; that this Government has done everything to look after the interests of the small farmers. I want to ask the Minister whether his Department at the present time is paying a subsidy to those farmers who followed the advice of the planning and research section of his Department, who followed the advice of his colleague, the Minister of Agricultural Technical Services and who introduced small stock farming in the heartwater areas of the Transvaal. The plain fact of the matter is that no small stock farmer at the present time in the Northern and Western Transvaal is entitled to claim a subsidy in respect of the small stock that he introduced on his farm. In other words, the effect of the drought in these areas in the Western Transvaal is going to be the complete disappearance of these mutton sheep that were developed at considerable expense to the small farmers, a complete disappearance of part of the capital assets of the small farmers of the Northern and Western Transvaal, because obviously the grazing of these sheep cannot be maintained without a subsidy for the purchase of fodder to maintain the stock in even reasonable condition. It is very interesting to note that the hon. the Minister’s colleague, when these matters were discussed under his vote indicated that in fact no subsidy was being paid and that we should discuss this matter with this Minister. I want to ask the hon. members for Marico and Rustenburg, in whose constituencies there are small farmers who embark on this scheme on the advice of the Department and of the Minister of Agricultural Technical Services, whether they are going to support my plea that these farmers should be given a subsidy on the same basis as the subsidy paid to cattle farmers. Will the hon. member for Marico rise and support my plea to the hon. the Minister for a payment of a subsidy to these small farmers?

I will put forward my own plea; I do not need your assistance.

You see, Sir, these are the great fighters for the small farmers of South Africa! We will see whether they have the courage this afternoon to get up and to support my plea.

I come now to another aspect of farming in South Africa. Sir, the vast bulk of the tobacco crop in South Africa is produced by small farmers. There are very few big farmers who produce tobacco in South Africa. In fact, the small farmers in the constituencies of the hon. members for Marico and Rustenburg produce together more than 60 per cent of the entire tobacco production of South Africa, on farming lots not in excess of ten morgen. What does this hon. Minister do to assist the small farmer as far as their crops are concerned? I am sorry that the hon. member for Brits (Mr. J. E. Potgieter) is not here this afternoon because I am sure that he will support me in my plea. We find that under the new agreement we are importing flue-cured tobacco from Rhodesia, free of duty, at an average purchase price of 41c a lb., but we do not stop there; we are importing something like 4,800,000 lb. of tobacco at a price of 41c from Rhodesia. What do the South African producers get? The average price paid to a producer of tobacco in South Africa is the following: I quote from page 37 of the Department’s report: In 1963 5,200.000 lb. of Rhodesian flue-cured tobacco was imported into South Africa at an average purchase price, paid to the Rhodesian producer. of 41.5c per lb. But what is the highest price paid to the South African producer, the small farmer? For flue-cured tobacco they received an average of 26.73c a lb. in 1963-4; for light-air cured tobacco they received 32.47c a lb. But what was the highest price at which the board sold these various classes of tobacco? The highest selling price obtained by the Marketing Board for the tobacco producers in South Africa, for flue-cured tobacco, was 39.6c per lb. In other words, in no single instance is the South African producer getting anything near the price which is paid for the imported article from Rhodesia—41.6c as against 22.47c!

Do you want a lower price for Rhodesian tobacco?

I want South African tobacco to be used in place of Rhodesian tobacco which is a plea the hon. member for Brits (Mr. J. E. Potgieter) made to the hon. Minister of Economic Affairs the other day. That will place the South African producer in a better economic position.

You want Rhodesian tobacco to be sold at a lower price in South Africa?

No, I want the South African producers to get a better price than they get at the present moment.

And Rhodesian tobacco at a lower price? I am putting a question to you. It is a plain simple question; why can’t you answer it?

I don’t want Rhodesian tobacco to be imported when South African flue-cured tobacco is available. Why should we import it when the South African market has a surplus of something like 13,000,000 lb. of tobacco on which the producer is still continuing to pay. Of the 22.47c a lb. that he gets he has to pay a subsidy on this tobacco of 3.85c per lb. towards the stabilization fund. [Time limit.]

I do not intend following the hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant). I raised a matter when the Budget was discussed which I think really falls under the Vote of the hon. the Minister of Agricultural Economics and Marketing. I should like to discuss this matter with him because I think the milk farmers of the Western Cape Province are very anxious to get a reply from the Minister in this connection. I said at the time that experiments were being carried out in regard to a new method in the milk industry. Where very expensive stables were built in the past, stables which accommodated between 100 and 200 cows, the farmers have now gone over to the milk-parlour system.

We spoke about the “parlour” system at the time but I think the “melkkamerstelsel” is better Afrikaans. The system also involves a machine but the room is smaller and only from four to 16 cows are milked at the same time. Those farmers who have carried out the experiment say that their milk production has been increased up to 10 per cent. They say that where all the cows stand in the same stable and you start milking the cows all give their milk down. If you do not milk them at once they withdraw the milk and we all know that a cow does not give her milk down a second time. They maintain that by employing this method of milking a smaller number of cows the milk production is 10 per cent more per day. That new system will involve each farmer in a capital outlay of between R5,000 and R7,000 while they are all saddled with those expensive milking stables they had had erected. Another advantage inherent in this system is that it brings about a 50 per cent saving in labour. Every farmer who instals such a milking machine can manage with 50 per cent less labour. As we all know it is mainly Bantu who work in the milk industry. It is our policy to remove the Bantu from the Western Cape and I think the State can make a start with that system and see how it works. In that way it will be possible to remove far more Bantu than are being removed at the present time.

The farmers say that where this will involve further capital investment of between R5,000 and R7,000 in buildings most of them are not in a position to invest that capital. Their request is, therefore, that the hon. the Minister and his Department should consider advancing short-term loans to the milk farmers. When I talk about short-term loans I have in mind a period of five years, and, from the nature of things, I also have in mind a low rate of interest. I think it is in the interests of the country as a whole that the hon. the Minister gives his attention to this matter. There is a milk shortage and the production can be increased by means of this system. We can also achieve another objective and that is to reduce the number of Bantu in the Western Province, not only in the Western Province but in the whole country. I, therefore, want to ask the hon. the Minister to give his serious attention to this matter and to devise a scheme whereby short-term loans, at low rentals, can be made available to those farmers who are interested in changing over to this system.

I think it is really for the Minister to reply to the hon. member who has just sat down. In passing I just want to say that that only shows in what a bad position the milk farmers are if they have to ask the hon. the Minister for special loans when they want to build a different type of stable. The Minister will probably be able to reply to the hon. member and tell him whether it is indeed true that you get more milk when you milk fewer cows at the same time. I as a practical farmer do not believe in that but the hon. the Minister will probably reply to the hon. member.

I want to talk in more general terms. If I understood hon. members opposite correctly the farming community ought to be very happy to-day because according to hon. members opposite this is really the best Government the farmers have ever had in this country. It is also following the best agricultural policy that can be followed and for the rest the farmers now have three Ministers as against the one they used to have in the past. The difficulty is, of course, that the farmers apparently do not realize in what a fortunate position they are because we find that they are moving from the platteland to the cities at a temt>o never before experienced in the history of South Africa.

The same old story.

We have to come with the same old story until the Government realizes that it must do something about it. We want the Government to do something about it and that is the whole purpose of my speech. Between 1951 and 1960 the White population on the platteland has decreased by nearly 10 per cent, in other words from 535,000 to 507,000 and the process is still going on. Hon. Ministers themselves have said that a process is going on whereby we are going to lose 2,400 farmers per annum from the platteland. All the argument is about at the moment, however, is apparently that they say it is not necessarily the small farmers who have to leave the platteland. That is what the whole argument is about.

Are you a small farmer then?

No, I am not but I do not intend leaving the platteland. Generally speaking, I should say it is the small farmer who, as a result of economic circumstances, has to leave the platteland. That is a purely academic argument; whether it is the small farmer or not in practice it is the small farmer who has to leave the platteland. And the Minister knows it as well as we do.

What about the future? When we look at the economic development programme which the Government holds out in prospect for South Africa we notice that it is expected that the number of White workers on the platteland will decrease from 112,000 to 100,000 during the next five years. That means a decrease of 12 per cent. One must take it, Sir, that the population on the platteland will decrease proportionately. Hon. members opposite, including the Minister, defend this depopulation of the platteland by saying it is a world-wide economic tendency about which nothing can be done. But the hon. Minister knows as well as I do that what is happening in South Africa is not that the platteland is becoming depopulated but that it is getting blacker because for every White person who leaves the platteland a number of non-Whites flock in. That is not the process you have in America and France.

Give us the figures.

I shall give the figures: the hon. member must just exercise a little patience. According to the economic development programme it is estimated that during the period 1964 to 1969 the demand for White agricultural labour will decrease by 11,500 and that the demand for non-White labour will increase by 158,000. What is happening on the platteland is that for every White labourer who leaves 15 non-White workers come in. The ratio between White and non-White is already 1 to 15. The disparity will still become greater.

What is the period please?

Between 1964 and 1969. According to the economic development programme further depopulation will take place and there will be an increasing flow of non-Whites to the agricultural industry on the platteland. Where will the process end? We are continually told that the non-Whites will start to flow back to their homelands in 1978. I should like to ask those hon. members, who make so many interjections, when the depopulation of the platteland will come to an end as far as the White population is concerned. They must give us a date. If they can see 13 to 14 years into the future and tell us when the non-Whites will flock back to their reserves they ought to find it very easy to give us a date on which the depopulation of the platteland will stop as far as the White people are concerned.

This process is going on and then hon. members opposite tell us it is their policy to keep South Africa White. It is obvious that when it comes to the platteland they have no policy how to keep South Africa White. They say this process of the depopulation of the platteland, as far as the Whites are concerned, must simply go on. In actual fact the Whites are becoming more and more dependent on food produced by non-White labour. That happened in the past and it is obviously the policy of the Government that that must continue to be the position in future. While the Government is still making an attempt to keep the cities White, at least at night, they obviously have no policy whereby they can keep the platteland White. One speaker after the other tells us—we heartily agree with them— that the platteland is the cradle of any civilization in the world. What is happening to the cradle of our civilization in South Africa? It is becoming blacker and blacker. How can we maintain White civilization if that is what is happening to our cradle of civilization. The Minister, of course, advances the excuse—he will again do so—that it is a relentless economic process.

And the drought.

Yes, and the drought too to a certain extent. But it is not only during drought years that the platteland is becoming depopulated. The process is going on year after year.

What did you do when you were in power in connection with the matter?

It is already 17 years since we last governed this country. I can tell that hon. member one thing and that is that if the United Party were to come into power today we shall see to it that the platteland no longer becomes depopulated. I shall also tell you what we shall do if you would just give me a chance. The excuse is that it is a relentless economic process; that the platteland should simply have fewer and fewer but bigger and bigger farmers employing more and more Bantu labour. That is what the policy of the Government amounts to. Do hon. members opposite not realize what sociological consequences that will have on the platteland? As long ago as 1956 this Government appointed a commission under the chairmanship of the late Mr. Frans du Toit. Unfortunately I only have the English copy of the report here. They said—

This commission reported in 1960 and I just want to read one paragraph. They already warned the Government in 1960. I want to read paragraph 563—

That was the advice to the Government as long ago as 1960 and what has the Government done about it in spite of the fact that they always pretend that they want to maintain White civilization in this country? They were given a definite warning in 1960. Mr. Chairman, if you study the recommendations contained in this report you will find that the Government has not carried one of them out. This report has simply been pigeon-holed. It has been filed away and not another word has been heard about it. This report has not given rise to any action on the part of a Government who is always telling us that it is its policy to keep South Africa White.

The towns on the platteland are in danger of losing their high schools. At a place like Rouxville, where I went to school, which has had a high school for the past 30 years, the matriculation class has become so small that there is a danger of that high school disappearing. [Time limit.]

The hon. member for Jeppes (Dr. Cronje), who has just sat down, attacks the Government because there are fewer Whites in the rural areas now and because there has been an increase in the number of non-Whites in those areas. But if the policy of the party on the other side had to be carried out in South Africa, it would not merely be a question of a proportionately greater number of non-Whites in the rural areas, but all the Bantu whom we want to remove to the Bantustans would be there too. They are talking of the integration of the non-Whites in industry and the necessity of their labour every day. I find it strange that hon. members on the other side should talk about the Bantu in the rural areas, because their policy is not only to have more Bantu in the rural areas, but to have more Bantu in the White part of South Africa as well. That is the policy which they stand for. When the Vote of the hon. the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development was under discussion, they asked that that should be done, because the labour of the non-Whites was required to ensure a higher standard of living for the Whites. That was their whole argument. When it comes to the industrial complex, they say that Bantu labour should be allowed in order to increase the standard of living of the Whites, but when it comes to the rural areas, they complain that the number of Bantu in proportion to the number of Whites is increasing. I cannot understand such illogical arguments. The hon. member talks of the decrease in the number of Whites in the rural areas, but the pattern throughout our country is gradually changing. The rural areas are becoming smaller and smaller. There are large complexes in South Africa which were rural areas in the past, but which are no longer rural areas to-day. The entire Port Elizabeth complex, which was a rural area a few years ago, is becoming less and less of a rural area. Then there are Vereeniging, Vanderbijlpark, Sasolburg, and so forth. In those areas the people are being incorporated in an urban complex more and more. Welkom on the Free State Goldfields has developed in that way. All those things are happening, apart from the fact that people in agriculture are being drawn to the cities by better wages. That is so; no one denies that. But I say that it is not the Government’s price policy which is responsible for that, as hon. members on the other side want to make out. There are other factors which are jointly responsible for that. To fix the price of every product in such a way that all the people in the rural areas will be kept there cannot possibly be justified. That is our whole standpoint.

The hon. member for Drakensberg (Mrs. S. M. van Niekerk) again allleged this afternoon —and other hon. members did so too—that I said yesterday that if a man had to sell 20 head of cattle a year in order to make a living and he could get a position of R3,000 in the city, he would rather accept that position. The hon. member tried to ridicule that statement. The hon. member for Drakensberg reminds me very much of my years as a farmer. I had a few tractors, one of which had already reached an advanced stage of wear. When we began sowing in the mornings we used to take this tractor with a wagon down to the lands and then it would stand there idling. While working with the other tractors we forgot to switch it off. When we switched off the other tractors to go and have lunch, the old tractor would still be standing there idling and making all the strange sounds which are made by such an old tractor. The hon. member for Drakensberg reminds me precisely of that old tractor. At every occasion she accuses hon. members on this side of saying the same things year after year.

It is only a bad farmer who allows a tractor to stand idling.

That may be, but I have never yet earned only 2¾ per cent interest on my investment. Then the others who are better farmers than I am must earn much more. In all the years I have been sitting here the hon. member for Drakensberg has come along with the same story every year. What else does she expect? We get the same story about the same matter year after year. All that varies is the commodity in respect of which the farmers ask for a price increase— which is granted in most cases. It is maize, meat, milk, and so forth. It just depends which one has not yet been dealt with at the particular stage. One can just change the name of the commodity every time and then the speech is exactly the same.

I just want to repeat the example which hon. members tried to ridicule. I said that if a man had a 100 head of cattle and he marketed 20, and he could go and work in the city for R3,000, why should he market 20 head of cattle and remain on the farm? The hon. member for Jeppes markets many more cattle, but with his ability it is much more profitable for him to stay in the city than on his farm. He also stays in the city. Why should a farmer who has a farm which is large enough to carry 100 head of cattle not earn R3,000 in the city?

That is not a fair comparison.

Why is it not a fair comparison? A son may inherit land from his father. That farm may be able to carry 100 head of cattle, but that son may have had agricultural training or some other kind of training. Do hon. members now expect him to go back to the farm and sell 20 head of cattle per year, or should he accept a position in the city? Surely it is a very simple comparison. I always assume that when one draws a comparison such as that, one can expect a little intelligence from the other side and that one need not explain it in detail.

The matter which was raised by the hon. member for Malmesbury (Mr. van Staden) was one which he had already raised before. My Department of Agricultural Economics and Marketing is of course not a Department which grants loans, but I have already discussed the matter with the Manager of the Land Bank, and I hope to hear from him shortly whether it is possible for the Land Bank to meet that need.

The hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant) spoke about the subsidy for small stock. This matter of the subsidy on fodder has nothing to do with small farmers and large farmers. It is not only the small cattle-farmer or the cattle-farmer in the northern parts of the Transvaal who gets the subsidy. All farmers who qualify for it get it. The hon. member now says that the sheep-farmer is not being subsidized as far as fodder is concerned, or that the small farmer is being excluded and not assisted. That is absolute nonsense. When one introduces such a system it will not only be the small farmer who is assisted. The reason why that is not done is that the ratio in the case of fodder for sheep is a totally different one as compared with that for cattle, because sheep can be brought in from other parts and, in the second place, because it is not a sheep-farming region. If rains should come and there is an opportunity to develop in this direction, the farmers will of course go in for it if it is profitable. There are many farmers who go in for sheep-farming in those areas. But we cannot make the subsidy an unlimited one. For what reason would one grant it in the Northern Transvaal and not in the other areas which also suffer from drought?

The subsidy applies from district to district, particularly in the heart-water areas of the Transvaal. Why cannot the subsidy apply on the same basis as far as sheep are concerned—in the heart-water areas?

For the simple reason that the principle cannot be extended to include sheep. The reason is this: Cattle very soon consume their own value in fodder, while that is not the case with sheep.

The hon. member for Paarl (Mr. W. C. Malan) spoke about oranges. The Marketing Council has of course been requested to place this matter under strict control. The Marketing Council has met the producers in the areas concerned and we are now awaiting a recommendation from the Council before we go into the matter further. I shall take into account what the hon. member said to-day.

Then there are the representations which were made by the hon. members for Albany (Mr. Bennett) and Ladybrand (Mr. Keyter). They spoke about flour-mills which come to be owned by large cartels and large companies to an ever-increasing extent and then eventually exercise control all along the line, even down to the bakeries in the smaller towns. The policy is to have rationalization in the industry as far as possible and to reduce the costs as much as possible. This problem not only exists where a commodity is subject to control and where a special policy of rationalization is pursued under a board, but it is a problem which arises in the case of all the large businesses in the country, in that they become larger and larger. We find it in the case of the beer companies, we even find it in the meat trade to a certain extent; we find it in the poultry industry, as was pointed bout by the hon. member for North-East Rand (Brig. Bronkhorst), and we find it in the case of bakeries as well. I have already given instructions to the Marketing Council to investigate the registration of the Wheat Board in view of the problems arising from that. We do not know to what extent the registration policy, the policy of rationalization, promotes this trend. We are all deeply concerned about it. If things continue in that way, steps will necessarily have to be taken. Where prices to the producer and to the consumer are fixed, these things cannot cause the consumer any harm from an economic point of view, because one does have control as far as the fixing of prices is concerned. But irrespective of that I do not think it is a sound development that the milling industry, and eventually the bakery industry, should fall into the hands of a few people or perhaps ultimately into the hands of one large company. Another problem which arises—I just want to point that out to the hon. member for Albany—is that under the bakeries registration system new bakeries are sometimes admitted. Bakeries as well as mills are established at high costs to-day; it is not possible for just anybody to start a new mill or a new bakery. As soon as a licence has been granted, the person concerned approaches these large companies with a view to marketing his concern. He then offers his bakery to those large companies, because he knows that he is now in a position to compel them to pay a higher price for the bakery than he paid for it or than it cost him. It has been our experience in the past that in cases where one grants a licence in an area where there is no competition and where one would like to create some competition, the bakery concerned is soon bought out or granted a loan by one of the great millers. Then that bakery in turn becomes a tie of that large house. That is something which has caused me concern for a long time already and in connection with which I have warned in the past that if these things did not remain within certain limits we would have to take steps to try and prevent the entire milling and bakery industry from falling into the hands of one large company.

With reference to what the hon. member for Parow (Mr. S. F. Kotzé) said yesterday about the central market, the marketing of vegetables and the high costs of marketing, I just want to say that those matters, of course, have also caused us concern for many years already and that they are very difficult matters to handle. One is faced with the position that one is dealing with highly perishable products which are transported over long distances and which are also difficult to control. In the case of such products it is difficult to make a com promise between the producer’s price and the price which the consumer has to pay and to ensure that the price is reasonable in proportion, because there are so many costs, in addition to the high degree of perishability, which affect the ultimate price. We have of course had another phenomenon in recent years, and that is that on the municipal markets which are more particularly used for the purposes of marketing such products and where the auctioning system is still of major importance as far as the general distribution of perishable products is concerned, new tendencies have developed as regards the whole pattern according to which the products are marketed. One has had the development of the chain stores and the development of control boards which sometimes try to lay down fixed prices, and one has also had the development of certain companies and co-operative societies which market directly. In that way a state of affairs has developed in which there is in certain respects a tendency to by-pass the markets and to sell products outside of the markets, whether through boards or through co-operative societies or through producers directly to the large companies or chain stores, with the result that the local authorities which have to provide the markets are already developing a sceptical attitude to the matter in many respects and are beginning to ask whether they are really in a position to make available the funds and to risk developing the markets further. It is true that the experience in the case of a new market such as the one at Cape Town is that both the producer and the consumer are generally much more satisfied with the marketing of the product, because the facilities have been provided there for both the producers and the consumers. But then one finds other areas where the markets are out of date and where new markets have to be built. The local authority has to find the money, and it is not always clear to the local authority what the future trend is going to be. They argue that they might be making a large investment, while the market facilities would not be used. For that reason I called together the various interests which are concerned with markets for a discussion a few weeks ago, the municipal associations, the local authorities, various control boards, as well as the Department and other parties interested in this matter, and I have decided to appoint a commission to investigate and report upon the reasons why there is a tendency to market fruit and vegetables domestically through channels other than central markets, and furthermore, to make recommendations in regard to (a) the facilities to be provided at central fresh-produce markets in order to meet the needs of interested parties under the changed circumstances, (b) the body which should provide and finance such facilities and services, and the way in which that should be done, and (c) the steps deemed necessary to implement control over and management of central markets, the extent to which and the way in which the markets concerned should be protected by the authorities, and any other related or relevant matters. The composition of the Commission will of course be arranged by the Minister; it will consist of certain members appointed by the Minister and others appointed by the municipal associations, and I just want to mention that, with the approval of the Administrator of the Cape Province, we have got Mr. Slater, the former Provincial Secretary of the Cape Province, to act as chairman of the commission to investigate and report upon these matters. In view of the problems to which I have referred, we want to endeavour to place this whole matter on a sounder basis.

With reference to the speech made by the hon. member for Namib (Mr. de Wet) I should like to make an announcement in connection with the report of the commission which instituted an investigation into abattoirs and abattoir facilities in South Africa. You know, Sir, that a few years ago a commission was appointed under the chairmanship of Dr. Francois J. de Villiers, and that commission submitted a report in 1964. The Government has considered the report and has decided to accept certain recommendations made by the commission. Its first recommendation was in regard to “unitary control in the management of abattoirs”. The decision we have reached is that unitary control over all physical activities in abattoirs by abattoir owners, as far as it is practicable and can be reconciled with the existing marketing scheme and commercial practices, is essential.

Hon. members can appreciate that divided control and the variety of interest groups which carry out the various functions in abattoirs are not conducive to the efficient management and functioning of abattoirs, and lead to, inter alia . uneconomic utilization and facilities, increased costs, particularly because of injudicious use of labour, and a lowering of standards of hygiene. The provision of modern abattoirs requires specialized equipment, which under the present set-up is used by other concerns to their own advantage. That inevitably leads to slowness in conforming to modern abattoir practices, standards of hygiene, and marketing requirements as well.

A further recommendation which has been accepted is that the establishment of new abattoirs, as well as the enlargement and improvement of existing abattoirs, should be preceded by an objective technical and economic investigation in order to determine whether in any particular area—

1. (1) it fits in with the development plan for the country in general and for the area in particular, especially in the case of urban and peri-urban areas; and
2. (2) it can be justified on a sound economic basis.

Hon. members will realize that, particularly in the larger densely populated areas, modern abattoirs have to a certain extent outgrown their function of being purely local establishments and frequently have to serve a much larger area than that of the local authority by which they are established. In addition the functions of abattoirs have also changed considerably, and an abattoir is no longer merely a slaughtering-place with particular emphasis on hygiene, but is under the present set-up, inter alia, a market for slaughter-stock and meat. Hence the large capital investment which is required and the necessity to have due regard to all the factors involved before proceeding to establish or enlarge or improve abattoirs. With these developments in the field of abattoirs the considerations which count have changed and have also become much more complicated. Moreover, it has become necessary for the planning of abattoirs to be carried out on a national basis.

Then I come to the recommendation regarding the establishment by means of legislation of a small, separate “abattoir commission” of three members which will be responsible to the Minister of Agricultural Economics and Marketing. That recommendation has been accepted by the Cabinet. All matters connected with the provision, erection, management and operation of abattoirs and related facilities in the Republic will be dealt with by this commission.

The abattoir industry is a highly specialized one and is sufficiently large and important to merit particular and effective attention. As a matter of fact, the principle that there should be a co-ordinating body for the industry was accepted by the Government as long ago as 1950, when the function of acting as such a coordinating body was assigned to the Meat Board. On the basis of voluntary co-operation the Meat Board achieved a large measure of success in the field of designing, planning and constructing abattoirs, but as far as rationalization in the industry is concerned it has been hamstrung by a lack of statutory powers.

There are a few points that I want to make clear. In the first place it is by no means the idea that the permanent abattoir commission which is being contemplated will itself erect abattoirs or take them over from existing owners left, right and centre. The approach will be that the right of local authorities themselves to erect and to operate abattoirs within their municipal boundaries is to be fully respected and maintained. It is only when a local authority is no longer prepared to incur large capital costs in order to provide a new abattoir—and there is at least one such local authority already—that it will be the responsibility of the commission to take the initiative in finding someone else to tackle the undertaking. For that purpose the commission has to have wide powers to negotiate with interested parties and, if necessary, itself to agree with a private company or a consortium of companies upon the conditions upon which such an undertaking may erect and operate an abattoir. In exceptional cases it may even be necessary to authorize the commission to have an abattoir erected and operated by means of a special utility company.

In the second place, the commission will in all cases have to act in the closest consultation and collaboration with the Meat Board, local authorities and all the other bodies and persons concerned in the marketing of slaughter-stock and the distribution of meat.

In the third place, the policy of the commission will be laid down by the Government, and the commission will be responsible to the Minister of Agricultural Economics and Marketing.

Another recommendation relates to the admission of private undertakings, and return on investment. The recommendation that provision be made for the establishment of abattoirs by private enterprise under particular circumstances and on specific conditions has also been accepted. Consequently entrepreneurs in the industry will be allowed to earn a reasonable return on investment.

In terms of health legislation local authorities have been entrusted with the duty of providing slaughtering facilities. Basically, however, the above-mentioned decision does not embody a totally new principle, because there are already private abattoirs in existence in the Republic. It remains the general approach that local authorities will continue erecting and managing abattoirs, under the general supervision and guidance of the abattoir commission, but specific provision is being made that, with Ministerial approval, private enterprise may also be allowed to erect abattoirs where it is in the best interests of the industry and the community.

There is a further recommendation, and that is that the health provisions relating to abattoirs, the health control which at present rests with the Department of Health, will be transferred to the Veterinary Division of the Department of Agricultural Technical Services. That recommendation has also been accepted by the Government.

I have only mentioned a few of the main points, and legislation to give effect to these recommendations will be introduced in due course.

I think I have now replied to the various points as far as possible, but before I conclude, Mr. Chairman, you will allow me, where this is the last Session of Parliament in which the Secretary of my Department, Mr. de Swardt, is present here as an official in the Officials’ Bay, pending his retirement, to thank him, on behalf of Parliament—I think I am speaking on behalf of all sides of the House—very sincerely for the services he has rendered to the country. He has served the State in various capacities for 38 years, but always in the interests of the agricultural industry, and we wish to express our appreciation for the very important contribution which he has made over the years in the interests of agriculture in South Africa. If we look back over that period of 38 years we find that when he entered the service the Department of Agriculture was still a small Department and that the organization was still in its infancy, and Mr. de Swardt has grown up along with the agricultural industry. On behalf of all of us I want to thank him very sincerely for the great work he has done and to wish him a happy and pleasant period of rest in his retirement. In saying that I know that I am speaking on behalf of all hon. members.

I should like to associate myself with what the hon. the Minister has said in regard to Mr. de Swardt and the services he has rendered to agriculture in the 38 years during which he served as an official of the State. I am perhaps in a particular position to pay a tribute to Mr. de Swardt, because when I started as a junior official of the Department of Agriculture I began working under Mr. de Swardt, and I perhaps realize better than most members of this House what a conscientious official he was and what valuable services he rendered the country. We on this side of the House also associate ourselves with the good wishes expressed by the Minister for a pleasant and happy period of rest after his retirement, although he, as an old war-horse, will sometimes long for the smell of the powder of these agricultural debates.

The hon. the Minister, in order to make excuses for the depopulation of the platteland, unfortunately mentioned a very weak example. Instead of admitting it frankly, he tried to defend it. How many farmers have left the land because they could market only 20 head of cattle a year? If that were the only problem we would not have had the great depopulation of the platteland. I am sorry the Minister did not frankly admit that the problem was much more complicated and goes much deeper. Unfortunately the Minister has again proved that when it comes to an agricultural policy this Government simply abides by the inevitable economic rules. They simply say: “This is the law of economics and there is nothing we can do about it.” They quite forget about the sociological aspect of the matter. I have set out to the Minister and to hon. members opposite the sociological implications as contained in this report in regard to the depopulation of the platteland. If hon. members have not listened attentively, I can read out a few further paragraphs dealing with the conclusions arrived at by the commission. They refer here to the sociological consequences on our civilization and our economy of the depopulation of the platteland, which this Government now completely brushes aside by saying: It is an inevitable economic process and we can do nothing about it. Listen to what the commission said in paragraph 570—

All this is ignored by the Government and it is said that it is an inexorable economic process and nothing can be done about it. But the same Government, when it comes to border industries, says through the mouth of the Minister of Economic Affairs that we should not regard border industries merely as an economic process because it is also a sociological process. This is what I also want to tell hon. members opposite: The depopulation of the platteland is not merely an economic process but is also a sociological process. But I want to go further. Somebody asked me what our policy would be. I tried to explain what our view of the future was. I think the unfortunate thing about this Government is that they are not even economically correct when they say it is an inexorable process which has to continue on economic grounds, because I think in the long run it is an uneconomic process to allow the platteland to become depopulated, and I should like to give my reasons.

I merely said that one could not remedy the position by means of the prices of products only.

The Minister and the Government have a short-term view. When one is dealing with something which is organic like agriculture, one should not look into the future for one or two or four years, but for ten, 20, 30 or 40 years. What is going to happen to the soil? The unfortunate part is that the whole policy of this Government is based on the supposition that the most economic form of farming is that of fewer but larger farm units on a relatively extensive basis.

Nonsense!

I am mentioning a fact. That is what is happening. More and more extensive farming, and fewer and fewer farmers. Sir, the Minister was not in the Chamber during the first part of my speech and now he says it is nonsense. If he had listened, he would perhaps not have spoken so much nonsense in the beginning of his speech. If one looks at most parts of the world, one finds that the most stable form of agriculture is that consisting of units of average size with well-qualified farmers who keep highly productive animals and practise agriculture on a scientific basis. If one looks at the few parts of the world where they have succeeded in really stabilizing agriculture and the soil, one finds that it was not done on the basis of extensive, large-scale farming, but one finds there a relatively intensive form of farming on average-sized farm units where the farmers are highly qualified and keep highly productive animals and farm on a scientific basis.

There we agree.

If you agree, why do you not apply it? But that is not the policy of the Government. Their policy is that the platteland should be further depopulated— fewer farmers, more extensive farming.

Then why are we training the young people?

If that is the policy of hon. members opposite, they are definitely not implementing it. If they want more intensive farming, they should ensure that all the farmers are better qualified and farm with a better type of animal and on a more scientific basis. Then we can maintain a much larger White population on the platteland, and a relatively higher standard of living, which will not lead to the depopulation of the platteland and the flow to the cities. The Minister knows as well as I do that nine out of ten farmers who go to the cities have to do unskilled work there. And there is not even a scheme to assist them at the moment. Hon. members opposite always say this is a process one sees throughout the world. But in other countries, like France and America, where we have the same phenomenon of people leaving the rural areas, they at least have large-scale schemes to teach these people certain skills before they go to the cities. But we on this side say that the White population on the platteland in South Africa has already been so diminished that we cannot allow this flow to the cities to continue further if one wants to have a stable agricultural industry in South Africa.

In what areas can there be intensive farming?

There are large parts of the Transvaal, particularly the Eastern Transvaal, and large parts of the Eastern Free State and of Natal where intensive farming can be practised, much more intensive than is the case to-day. I go so far as to say that unless we have a more intensive form of farming, as I have described, we will not succeed in stabilizing the soil and in stopping soil erosion. It is as simple as that. That is the kind of farming which will lead to the greatest production in crops and stock. We know how fast our population is growing, and we know that if we continue with the system we have to-day we will not have enough food for the population in ten or 20 years and we shall have to import food, unless we adopt a different course and ensure that our farmers are well qualified and that they keep highly productive animals (which is, of course, also part of their education). We should raise the technical level of our agriculture. That is the only way in which it will be possible to produce enough food in the long run for our fast-increasing population. I go even further and say that we are looking for export markets. When we see what is happening in the world, we must realize that one of the cheapest methods of investment speedily to increase exports is by investing in agriculture.

There I agree with you.

Yes, you agree with our policy, but you do not apply it. I say that any Government which is really interested in preserving our soil and our civilization should take active steps to stop the further depopulation of the platteland as far as White people are concerned. I do not say this for any racial reason, but it remains a fact that for generations to come only the Whites will have the necessary technical efficiency to farm in a modern, scientific way. Only they will be able to farm intensively on a scientific basis. What do we find? In spite of the recommendations of the Commission which investigated the depopulation of the platteland, this Government has not taken any positive steps yet to implement those recommendations. That Commission recommended that we should expand our technical services tremendously and ensure that our farmers are better qualified. They made certain taxation proposals. Not a single one of those proposals has yet been adopted. [Time limit.]

I deplore the fact that the hon. member for Jeppes (Dr. Cronje) now wants to take an example the Minister used to illustrate something in order to prove that the Minister said that a man who can sell only 20 head of cattle is the one we want to retain on the land. I deplore it.

You were not even here when we debated that.

Let me now analyse the matter a little. The hon. member’s first complaint is that we did not train the farmers properly and that we did not give them guidance. Therefore, he says, they leave the land because they are not trained farmers. I now want to tell the hon. member that in the past four years we have spent more than R78,000,000 alone on technical guidance, an amount which is not recoverable. It was spent on research and technical guidance in order to enable the farmers to become more technical and to farm intensively. To that I want to link the hon. member’s statement that agriculture is really the sector which should export, and unless we export agricultural products agriculture will deteriorate and the farmers will leave the land. Let us investigate that a little. In regard to deciduous fruit, such as, for example, citrus and fresh fruit, do we not export everything we possibly can? In regard to grapes and grape products, are we not fully in the export market? Do we not export as much sugar as we possibly can and also wool? The hon. member should not try to say that because agricultural products are not being exported, the platteland is becoming depopulated. On the contrary, our export products are of the best.

Now the hon. member says that we need not adopt the recommendations of the du Toit Report and we are not promoting intensive farming. What else are these settlement schemes which are now being initiated on a large scale than plans for intensive farming? Look at the area in the Makatini Flats, the Pongola Poort Dam, the Orange River schemes, the Sand-Vet settlement. They are being planned for intensive farming. That is why, e.g., we have extended the experimental period for the probationer tenant from two to three years so that the man may become properly qualified and so that he can prove that he can farm as a qualified farmer. Then whence the complaint that we only want to farm extensively in South Africa? Do all the steps we have taken not prove the opposite? Now the hon. member immediately wants to link that up with soil conservation and soil erosion. But let me ask him this.

Does he want us to allow unqualified, untrained farmers to try to farm intensively in an extensive area like the Kalahari, the North-West and the Karoo? Is that what the hon. member asks for? Let us just look at the Eastern Province. There ground has been cut up to such an extent that farmers can farm with approximately 800 to 900 sheep. But then they have to farm intensively. They must keep the best type of sheep and they must provide the necessary winter grazing for those sheep in the form of pasturage and silage, and after one year’s drought the whole of the Eastern Province, Molteno, Dordrecht and Queenstown (partially) are in such a position that we have to assist them and carry them by means of State advances and other measures. Just ask the hon. member for Albany (Mr. Bennett). We must carry them as the result of the fact that they want to farm so intensively on extensive units that the units are becoming too small to farm economically on them. Does the hon. member want us to have a peasant farmer system in South Africa? Is that what he advocates?

What is that?

A system of tenant farmers. That is obviously what the hon. member wants. In years gone by, during the depression, we gave land to people who could not find work, and that is why the units were cut too small, with the result that to some extent we had over-population of the platteland. But now I want to ask the hon. member what income he must derive from farming to stay on the farm instead of living in the city as a director of companies? Are we to have such a price basis that small farmers can farm intensively on small units, and then we still get people like the hon. member for Maitland (Mr. Hickman), who said yesterday: You cannot increase prices; the consumers cannot pay it. The hon. members should not want both things. If they want us to apply intensive farming and to drive back from the city to the land a man with initiative who can earn a good salary in the city, by raising the level of his prices, then they must at the same time tell the consumers that they will have to pay those increased produce prices. No, the hon. member should not try to make out such a case. I proved yesterday that from 1946 to 1950 3,625 people left the land annually and that it systematically decreased to 1,000 per year. I proved it by statistics and I pointed out that in this respect one should also take the employees into consideration. Those hon. members should not come along with the hollow cry of the depopulation of the platteland. The depopulation of the platteland is often due to the economics of sound agriculture, to the fact that a farmer is so successful that he buys his neighbour’s land in order to expand. Nowhere in trade and industry or in any other economic sector did we set limits to the development potentiality of people. Do those hon. members want us to tell a farmer that he may not expand; that he may not buy more land and develop it? Is that what they want? The hon. member says it is due to the uneconomic position of agriculture. Let us test it by a few things. The hon. member for Gardens yesterday mentioned the arrear Land Bank loans as a reason why people have to leave the land. What does the report of the Land Bank say this year?—

In other words, the arrear interest amounts to 1.66 per cent and the arrear capital payments to .843 per cent. Let us compare that with commerce and industry and the rest of the industrial development, and we will find that the arrear interest and the arrear capital installments there are far higher than in agriculture. But the hon. member gives this as the reason for the depopulation of the platteland, because agriculture is not so prosperous and does not share in the prosperity. No, I want to say very clearly that the hon. member has not proved his case in this regard. But let us look at the few farmers who are in economic difficulties. [Time limit.]

It is my pleasant duty in the first place to express our appreciation to the hon. the Minister for his references to the Commission and the discussion which took place recently in connection with the marketing of perishable products. I listened with great interest and pleasure to his announcement of this step which is a further proof that, contrary to the accusations which have been made here, the hon. the Minister is a person who accepts responsibility for the future and plays his full part in planning and keeping pace with changed circumstances and tendencies, and was doing so before the United Party prophets gave any indication that they had any ideas at all in this direction. I think that this announcement alone is sufficient to prove the practical sense, insight into and interest of the hon. the Minister in his task. We have experienced a position recently in which the producers of fruit and vegetables have voiced their objections more and more to the restrictions imposed by those people who have to handle their products on the municipal markets. In the first place there was the problem of ineffective distribution; in other words, the creation of canals along which the product should reach the consumer, and also the arbitrary way in which the products of the producer are often handled by his representatives on the municipal markets. I shall personally view the further developments in this direction with great interest and I hope and trust that we will be able to arrive at a solution as soon as possible so that the producer can be spared the unpleasantness and inconvenience of himself having to break through the wall, which has been built around the municipal markets, so as to ensure that his product reaches the consumer without delay and without all the stumbling-blocks in this regard. There are already tendencies in this direction and the time has come for the producer to realize that the longer he can remain master of his own products, both practicably and realistically, the better it will be for himself and perhaps too for the consumer.

I would be neglecting my duty were I not on behalf of this group of farmers to express our recognition and thanks to the hon. the Minister for this healthy insight which he has shown and for the measure of responsibility with which he has approached this extremely difficult and delicate problem. Before proceeding to my next point I cannot neglect to refer to the objectionable and almost painfully lighthearted manner in which the Opposition have participated in this debate up to the present. I want to refer to the shallow examples and arguments used by the hon. member for Jeppes (Dr. Cronje) in connection with the depopulation of the platteland. The best example in this regard is he himself. Is he himself a proof of an illiterate person who has left the platteland? He comes along here with great sentiment and almost with tears in his eyes and tells us that the high schools on the platteland are rapidly emptying. Where are his children, or is he one of the land barons who can afford to enjoy the riches of the cities and yet derive benefit from his farm? Is he an exception in this regard? No, I should rather say in pursuance of this argument and his share in this debate that he would have done a great deal better if he had joined the group who are still aware of their duty in regard to the platteland and their functions in regard to the development of our civilization in so far as that facet of the community is concerned.

The hon. the Minister referred to changed conditions and to the number of small farmers who are connected to-day with developments at Phalaborwa, Vanderbijl Park, Vereeniging, Sasolburg, Welkom and Odendaalsrus, but not because they have been forced off the platteland. How many of those 2,000 or 2,400 people per annum are people in that category? I go further. Because of the development of their own capital, their ability and organization, how many of those farmers leave the platteland because they have organized their business well and can easily control it from the nearest town or city? How many of them did not feel in prosperous years in the past that they had acquired sufficient capital and that they were going to retire because their task on the platteland was finished? No, for the sake of convenience these truths must be hidden from the public because hon. members opposite want to make political capital out of these matters. I find this particularly irresponsible and it worries me, as do the arguments of the hon. member for Drakensberg (Mrs. S. M. van Niekerk) who referred here in an almost blasphemous way to the heavy Hand of the Most High in the shape of natural conditions falling heavily upon a Government and a group of people who are trying to fulfil their responsibilities. Which Government with the means at its disposal has ever done as much in the history of our country to meet this problem? Is this not adequate? I cannot associate such a train of thought and attitude with a person who comes from the platteland and gives us to understand that she is looking after the interests of the platteland. That is definitely cheap politics. But we do have this advantage—and this is the bright spot in one’s view of the whole matter—that although the essence of democracy is to have a free right to criticize, it appears to me that the essence of democracy is that a weak Opposition not only has the right to criticize a strong Government but also in the fact that by its poor criticism it makes a strong Government even stronger. This is what we have experienced here to-day.

I want to come to my next point. I should like to say a word in the interest of the milk farmers in the peri-urban areas. We have had certain indications from statements made by the hon. the Minister in this House personally and also in the Press, that consideration is being given to the question of relief particularly in regard to prices of dairy products, but I want to draw his attention to the problem of our milk farmers particularly. We have this practical problem that although they have also been affected by the drought, the milk farmers to-day have to compete in a limited market as far as fodder is concerned—and I am referring particularly to a fodder like lucerne which is in short supply and of which one cannot obtain one’s full requirements in competition with people in the drought-stricken areas who receive subsidies, people whose need for that fodder may perhaps be even more urgent than one’s own. The result is that no matter how much the milk farmer wants to obtain that fodder to maintain his production, it is not so easy for him to do so. Notwithstanding the fact that as a result of the meat shortage many head of dairy stock have already found their way to the abattoirs and the fact that when these milk farmers want to purchase additional stock they have to do so at very high prices, they do not have the advantage of increased prices but they also have the disadvantage that in the dry periods they do not have the opportunity to produce grain-food. Many of them can only make provision for a small quantity of silage and they are now dependent upon the black market for fodder . . . [Time limit.]

When my time elapsed yesterday afternoon I was discussing the prices and the grading of wheat of the past season. Before I continue I want to ask the Minister what the prices of grain are to be for the 1965-6 season? The announcement is already late and the farmers are very anxious to know what the prices will be. I trust the Minister will tell us.

I was saying yesterday that the highest B grade wheat is 62 lbs. per bushel. The next grade, B.2, is 60 lbs. per bushel, on which the price is 8 cents less, and the B.3 grade is 58 lbs. per bushel, which drops 27 cents on the price of B.l, and 19 cents on B.2. Now if the wheat is even 64 lbs. or 65 lbs. to the bushel, no extra price is paid by the miller for this much higher quality wheat. So if a miller buys 1,000 bags weighing 611 lbs. per bushel and 1,000 bags weighing 62£ lbs. and mixes them together, he averages 62 lbs., which is a B.l grade, and he makes 8,000 cents on the second 1,000 bags of wheat he bought. Some millers buy hundreds of thousands of bags and they make a big profit, because by mixing the two you bring up the grade. You buy some wheat which is well over 62 lbs. and mix it with wheat which is just below 62 lbs. and thereby you bring the whole lot up to the high grade.

The miller is not selling the wheat.

No, he sells the flour and he pays less for the wheat he buys which is of lower grade because there is more bran in it, and therefore if it weighs 60 lbs. a bushel he pays 8 cents less than he does for a 62, but he does not pay any more for wheat above 62 lb. per bushel even if it is 64 or 65 lb. per bushel, and if he mixes the 64 even with a 60 he brings the whole lot up above the 62 mark, and he pays less for the wheat. I feel that a gap of 2 lbs. per bushel is too big. The grade should vary by 1 lb. per bushel because the present difference of 8 cents between B.l and B.2, and 19 cents between B.2 and B.3, and 35 cents between B.3 and B.4, can make all the difference between a profit and a loss to the farmer. In every case the dice are loaded against the farmer, and that is what I object to. We hear from the other side that they are the friends of the farmers, but it seems to me they are the “boerehaters”. Compare the profit in ratio to the capital involved and the risk run as between the miller and the farmer. Show me a miller whose balance sheet shows that he has made a loss in the last year. But I can show you dozens, if not hundreds, of farmers who definitely made a big loss in the last year. I can mention farmers who have lost so much in one year that it has jeopardized their financial position for many years to come. Farming is rather like trying to run a factory without a roof on it; you are entirely at the mercy of the elements. You can do nothing if you get drought or too much rain. Yet we are always told by the Ministers that farmers must reduce the costs of production and that the price of land is too high, yet in every case the dice are heavily loaded against the farmers by the Government and by its boards.

I will give another instance of what I mean. The Minister said yesterday that prices had risen quite a lot, but here is something I have raised again and again. The price of wheat is fixed on the yield per bag sown or the yield per acre as compared to yield years old per morgen. The procedure was in the old days to sow wheat and then oats and then to fallow, and then wheat and oats again, and where you sow wheat you can sow barley, but barley and wheat take the same elements out of the soil, so you can alternate the two, but you cannot sow wheat on wheat or barley on wheat. It was always the policy to have wheat and then oats and then fallow. So in five years the farmer got four cash crops. Now the farmers after four or five years of growing wheat or grain of any kind put down grasslays or dry land lucerne, and the pasture lasts for a minimum of four years or even up to eight or ten years before it is ploughed and put under wheat again. Then the farmer reverts to the original rotation and sows either wheat or barley and then oats and then fallow. After the land has rested for five to eight years the crops grown on it of course give a much higher yield. So in ten years under the old system a farmer got seven cash crops, but now in ten years he gets four cash crops and five years of pasture. Admittedly you must credit the wheat side of it by what the farmer gets out of running sheep on the pastures, but that is beside the point for the moment. I am talking about basing the price of wheat on the yield per bag or morgen. Naturally after five years of rest the four crops will give you a higher yield, but they do not bring in the same amount of cash as the seven crops did, even if the yield of the seven crops was a bit lower per morgen. But the price of the grain is based on the high yield secured on the basis that the land has rested for some years, and that must be taken into consideration. In fact it gives a lower return over a period of ten years. So false deductions can be drawn if the price is fixed merely on the high yield per bag or acre without considering how long that land has rested. That is where the experts who fix the price of wheat make the mistake. They say: Years ago the farmer only got 15 bags from one bag sown and now he gets 20. That is true, but the fact is that you only get that higher return after the land has rested from five to ten years. So naturally you get a bigger yield and I say it is quite wrong to base the price of wheat on the extra yield, because had the farmer continued with the old rotation he had in the old days he would have had a cash crop four years out of five, whereas now there might be only four cash crops over, say, ten years. Therefore I say that is the wrong basis for fixing the price of wheat if it is based on the yield, regardless of how long that land has rested. It must be based on the true cost of production and not merely on the higher yield.

I rise to reply to the attack made by the hon. member for Turffontein (Mr. Durrant) on myself and the hon. member for Rustenburg (Mr. Bootha). It appears to me that the hon. member has an obsession about making attacks upon us. He would be better advised to make appeals in the interests of the voters of Turffontein whom he represents. I have not once heard him step into the breach for his own voters but it has happened on various occasions and specifically in the dying hours of a debate that he has taken the opportunity to make an attack upon the hon. member for Rustenburg and on me, hoping that we would have no further opportunity to reply to those attacks. What did his attack amount to? That the hon. member for Rustenburg and I had not made an appeal for the small sheep farmers and that the interests of these farmers in Marico and Rustenburg, which had been heavily hit by the drought, had been neglected. But that is quite untrue.

I asked for your support.

The interests of the sheep farmers and those of the cattle farmers in those districts are being looked after by the hon. member for Rustenburg, by me and by other hon. members who represent drought-stricken constituencies. We have done this along the correct channels and not in the way in which the hon. member has done so, which was quite ineffectual. If an M.P. wishes to make representations to a Minister, there are better methods to follow than the pugnacious method followed by the hon. member. Instead of making a motivated appeal in the interests of these people, he transformed his remarks into a personal attack upon the hon. member for Rustenburg and me. He has received no mandate from Marico. We are responsible for Marico and Rustenburg. We have liaison with a special drought committee which has made submissions to the hon. the Minister and the Department in connection with every facet of the problems of the stock farmers in these particular constituencies, and with particularly good results for the stock farmers. I should like to quote for his information only one paragraph dealing with the fodder loans which are of application to stock farmers (translation)—

This has been done as a result of our representations and not as a result of those of the hon. member for Turffontein who is continually sticking his nose into our business. Anyone who has any knowledge of small stock will know that a sheep and a goat are able to withstand drought conditions more easily than cattle, particularly in those parts where the hon. member also has a small farm. There was still a certain amount of grass in the southern parts of the Swartruggens and Marico, even during the drought, and the Department was initially not inclined to apply special emergency measures to the whole of this region. They were restricted to specific soil conservation districts. I made representations and asked for the wider application of these measures. This request was agreed to with effect from 9 April 1965 and the hon. member for Turffontein can also lay claim to that assistance in respect of his sheep.

But I should like to come to the hon. member for Maitland (Mr. Hickman) who attacked the hon. the Minister in regard to the tremendous gap between the producer prices and consumer prices for agricultural products. There is nobody who will deny this and who is not concerned about it, but the position was far worse during the period of office of the United Party. This is a problem which the agricultural industry has had to face since the first farmer marketed his products. I know of a farmer who took ten magnificent fully-grown, heavy slaughter oxen to the market during the 1940’s, and what did he receive for them? He was paid £10 each. If he had marketed those same ten oxen under this Government he would not have received £100 but R2,000. I was a citrus farmer at the time and I marketed citrus. I sometimes had to nay sales expenses on up to 50 bags sold at Newtown, Johannesburg. I marketed green beans at id. per lb. and I bought them back on the same day for 9d. per lb. We are continually fighting against this profit-robbing gap between producer and consumer prices. The agricultural unions and the Department of Agricultural Economics and Marketing are all trying to narrow that gap. It does not help to blame the hon. the Minister for the gap which already existed during their period of office. Let them rather suggest ways and means of removing that gap completely. I myself would like to ask that more attention be given to that gap which constitutes one of our most real marketing problems. I appeal for continual attention to be given to the legion of risk factors which the farmer has to contend with and which result in the fact that his economic position is not always what it ought to be. This causes concern not only among the producers but also on the part of the Government. But I believe that the hon. the Minister will continue, as in the past, to keep a watchful eye on these matters. [Time limit.]

Vote put and agreed to.

Loan Vote O.—“Agricultural Economics and Marketing”, R 1,000,000, put and agreed to.

Revenue Vote No. 32.—“Agricultural Economics and Marketing (General)”, R44,632,000, put and agreed to.

On Revenue Vote No. 33.—“Lands”, R2,060,000.

I rise to make a brief speech about the acquisition of land along the Orange River at the Van der Kloof and Verwoerd Dams. During the last two years or more I have had a lot of experience in regard to farmers who are very dissatisfied about the way in which that land was purchased. It is alleged that a firm policy is not being followed in regard to the acquisition of land. I want to mention a case here which was brought to my notice where a farm was divided among four heirs and where the valuations differed greatly. I know this particular farm well. For practically the weakest part of the farm, the person concerned received R100 per morgen, and for that part which was clayish and had many lands on which there was a high yield, the valuation was R65 per morgen, i.e. a difference of R35 per morgen for land on the same farm. I will admit that there was a much better house on the land which was valued at R100 per morgen, but the yield of the farm valued at R65 per morgen is much higher than that of the other farm. I want to ask the hon. the Minister in my own interest and also in the interest of the Department that a firm policy should be followed so that we will not have a repetition of what happened at the Verwoerd Dam. Fantastic stories are being told about what happened in regard to the valuation of the farms. I would rather not repeat those stories here because they were not nice stories. I want to ask that a firm policy be followed in regard to the valuation of, e.g., lands under lucerne and lands which have been cultivated for the sowing of oats, wheat or barley. The prices paid to-day by the State for lucerne lands are much too low, in my opinion. I have a fair amount of experience of lucerne lands and I know that it costs a lot of money to clear land, particularly along the Orange River. Where the soil is deepest, there is of course a large number of bushes and also thorn trees, and the best lucerne land is where the thorn trees grow. Hon. members will understand that it is practically impossible for a farmer to take out a thorn tree with an axe and a pick; he must get contractors to pull out those trees with tractors, and there are deep sluits which have to be filled up. I am informed that it sometimes costs from R600 to R800 per morgen to clear the land, and if one takes that into consideration and compares it with the price paid to the owner for lands under lucerne, it is clear that that price is far too low. The Minister and the Deputy Minister are both practical farmers and I want to ask them to ascertain what the yield of a morgen of lucerne is, and that that should be taken into consideration when an offer is made to the owner of the land. I do not wish to voice criticism, but I want to make the position easier both for the Minister and for myself, because I receive many complaints in this regard.

I now come to grazing. I accept that there are valuators who have no knowledge of the value of grazing in the Karoo. Sometimes valuators come along who do not know what the carrying capacity of the soil is. There are certain farms in the Karoo where one needs three morgen for one sheep, and then there are other farms which have to be bought where one needs two morgen for a sheep, and there are others where one needs only one morgen for a sheep. I am told that it is the policy to offer R28 to R30 per morgen for grazing, which in my opinion is wrong. This policy was applied throughout when farms were purchased at the Verwoerd Dam, according to my information. The Minister may deny it. A start is now being made in regard to valuing farms which have to be bought at the Van der Kloof Dam, and in order to prevent a repetition of what happened at the Verwoerd Dam I want to ask that persons who know the vicinity should be consulted when determining the value of the farms. There are extension officers in every district; they know the carrying capacity of the land. Let them be consulted. It will be found that many of the valuators, when valuing farms near the Van der Kloof Dam, will adopt the attitude that the soil is not valuable and that it only contains a lot of ironstone, but that is not the case. My personal experience is that mountain veld has a bigger carrying capacity than ordinary level veld, because mountain veld is less subject to being trodden out and washed away. I therefore ask that the person who is sent out to value the land should at least have some knowledge of land in that vicinity. I had to lead numerous deputations to Pretoria, and I had quite a number of deputations here in Cape Town, and I received hundreds of people on my farm who came to complain to me. The impression is eventually created that I am the person who values the land. People are inclined to blame me for the fact that they receive a bad price for their land. I think a policy should be laid down in terms of which a certain amount should be paid out for a certain type of soil. Let us first find out what the carrying capacity of the soil is.

Find out what they pay for Bantu land.

No, I have nothing to do with that. We shall then have fewer problems, and the Minister and the Deputy Minister will also have fewer problems.

I now come to the last point I wish to make. Many of these farmers whose land is expropriated do not want to stop farming; they look around to see whether they cannot buy land elsewhere on which to farm again. Many of them are young men who are anxious to continue farming. A farm perhaps falls vacant and a farmer whose land was expropriated buys that farm. He takes an option on the land and the seller tells him that he wants the purchase price in two or three months. In the meantime that person does not receive his money from the State and must consequently borrow money from the bank. The bank is willing to advance the money to him because he knows that the State has expropriated his farm and that he will get the money some time. But he has to pay 7 per cent interest on the money he borrows from the bank. I do not want the Minister and the Deputy Minister to be placed in the difficult position where they are approached every day by farmers asking to be exempted from interest on that loan. What I want to suggest is that the man should be paid as soon as his farm is purchased. Give him the money owing to him so that he can continue farming. In that way this man will be kept on the land. [Time limit.]

I wish to raise with the hon. the Minister a matter upon which there has been prevarication and hedging over some period of time, and I hope that now that we have a new incumbent of this portfolio, it will be a case of a new broom sweeping clean and that the hon. the Minister will make a clear statement on the matter that I wish to raise with him. I refer to an inter-departmental committee of inquiry which his predecessor set up in 1961, with terms of reference which included the following—

1. (a) the possibility of making available compensatory land in exchange for Bantu reserves 1, 2, 13, 15, and 16;
2. (b) the possible changing of the boundaries or the exchange of Bantu reserves Nos. 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 10 for other land;
3. (c) the provision of a passage through the southern portion of Bantu reserve No. 14 to ensure access to Sordwana Bay;
4. (d) the making available to the S.A. Native Trust as much as possible, of the approximately 300,000 morgen of land which, according to the Act, is still to be obtained by the Native Trust in Natal, and
5. (e) any other aspect concerning State land and Bantu reserves which may be of public interest.

Sir, that committee was appointed 3 years ago, in November 1961. It sat and heard evidence from interested bodies all over the Province of Natal. Municipalities, farmers’ associations, the Parks Board and everybody you can think of gave evidence to this committee. Sir, you can see from the terms of reference that its findings, depending on what they are, are likely to affect thousands and thousands of square miles of land and equivalent large number of people of all races affected by the areas which came under the consideration of this committee. This committee reported to the hon. the Minister’s predecessor in April a year ago, that is to say, over a year ago. According to the Press we had a statement as far back as August of last year from the hon. the Minister of Bantu Administration and Development that the findings of the committee had been made available to the Government and that they were being studied by the Cabinet at that time. Sir, nine months have passed since that statement was made, quite sufficient time for the report to have been digested by the Cabinet and for the recommendations or some of the recommendations of the committee to have been made public, or for a clear statement to be made by the hon. the Minister of Lands as to what the intentions of the Government and himself are as to the findings of this committee. As I say, it is a matter of public concern, because a great many representative bodies and local authorities gave evidence before this committee, and a great many people are likely to be affected by any recommendations which might have been made by this committee. I think it is high time the Minister either made available to this House the recommendations of the committee, or that he made a clear statement as to the Government’s intentions with regard to the recommendations of the committee. I may say that there has until now been a complete shroud of mystery covering this whole thing, but because of the widespread nature of the committee’s terms of reference and because of the importance of any decision which that committee might have come to, it is high time, now that a suitable period has elapsed, for the recommendations of the committee to have been properly digested by the Government, for the hon. the Minister to make a statement in this regard so as to give us clarity one way or another. I now sit down to give the hon. the Minister an opportunity of giving us clarity in this matter.

I should like to make use of this opportunity just briefly to bring a few matters to the notice of the hon. the Minister in connection with the Olifants River settlement at Lutzville. I have noted the fact that the Minister’s Department is at present instituting an investigation into uneconomic units at our State settlements, including this particular settlement. Sir, we were told on a previous occasion by the hon. the Minister’s predecessor that the Olifants River settlement was one of the poorer settlements. As far as I know this settlement was established by the United Party Government, and I can well understand therefore why it is one of our poorer settlements. We have the position there that people were placed on holdings of 10, 12, or 15 morgen and even smaller holdings. I want to express the hope here to-day that this investigation will be completed as soon as possible because there are people there who have been told for some years past that it is the Government’s intention to do something in connection with these uneconomic holdings, and they are hoping that they will be given some sort of relief. But it is not only a question of the allocation of holdings which were too small originally; people were also allocated land which should never have been allocated, land which is altogether unsuitable for irrigation and economic cultivation. I am convinced that the hon. the Minister will consider this matter very seriously and that relief will soon be given to quite a number of these settlers.

Arising out of this I also want to discuss the question of the communal pasturage which comprises thousands and thousands of morgen of land and which is utilized on a communal basis by the various settlers in this irrigation area. I have often heard it said by these settlers that the utilization of the pasturage on a communal basis is entirely impracticable, particularly in the light of modern methods of soil cultivation, soil preservation and soil utilization. There are people who have been on that settlement for a long time and who feel that the pasturage ought to be subdivided on a planned basis, or that some sort of basis should be worked out which will make it possible to protect and to conserve the land properly and thus to make it more valuable to the settlers. I also want to ask the hon. the Minister to give his attention to another aspect of this communal pasturage and that is that portions of the land adjoining the settlement are being overgrazed injudiciously while other portions are not being utilized at all because there is no proper water supply and because of the fact that the good grazing that is available is too far away for the stock to make use of it.

Then I should like to draw the attention of the hon. the Minister to the fact that at the time a number of farms were allocated to farmers along the boundaries of the settlement area on long-term leases. Most of the farmers in question were given two units of 3,000 morgen. It became evident over the years that where a farmer had been given a unit of 3,000 morgen it was not an economic unit and that those people were unable to make a good living there. But where farmers were given two units, that is to say, 6,000 morgen, they demonstrated over the years that they were able to make a good living in spite of the low rainfall. The position is that these people have been lessees now for more than 30 years. They feel that they are the step-children of the State. When one asks them why they continue to hire the land, their reply is this; “We were given this land at the time when land was allocated to the settlers in this area; in due course they were either given ownership of the land or longterm leases; we were kept on a string firmly believing that the State would treat us no worse than it treated these other people and that sooner or later we would also acquire ownership of the land.” Sir, these people are very honest, hard-working people, and in addition to that they are people with large families. One often finds families with six or eight children there. One finds that they drilled for water at their own expense, and on their own responsibility, and that they built homes for themselves at their own expense. Sir, these people urgently request that serious consideration be given to their position. They are very anxious to have this land on a firm basis so that they can bequeath it to their children. I had a letter the other day from a certain Mr. de Klerk in which he says that he is very pleased to learn that an inquiry was now being instituted by the Department; he says that he is firmly convinced that the State will do something but he goes on to say, “It is a great pity, but for my neighbour who died last week it will be too late.” I hope that the hon. the Minister and his Department will approach this matter sympathetically and will try to help these people. I want to conclude by inviting the hon. the Minister and the hon. the Deputy Minister very cordially, since they took over this Department comparatively recently, to pay a visit to this settlement. I am convinced that not only will they immediately appreciate the problems of these people but that they will be only too willing to lend a hand to solve their problems.

I am just getting up to reply to the few matters which have been mentioned by hon. members. I want to begin with the hon. member for Zulu-land (Mr. Cadman), who referred to the report of an interdepartmental committee which investigated the whole complex in Northern Natal, the question of State-owned lands and the development of that complex. That report was submitted by the committee in August or September last year. It is, of course, a report by an interdepartmental committee, and consequently is available to the Cabinet only, and not to the public. A study is being made of the various aspects of the report. It is of course the position that the report does not affect the Department of Lands alone; it affects the Department of Lands only in so far as State-owned land is concerned. The general recommendation covers a very wide field in connection with Bantu settlement, lands which have to be cleared, what, for example, is to be done with certain game reserves in which animals are protected, harbour development, and so forth. It is a report which has far-reaching implications and the Government is still considering which recommendations of the committee can be implemented.

The hon. member for De Aar-Colesberg (Mr. M. J. de la R. Venter) spoke about the expropriation of land in the Orange River complex. He pointed out that there was a great deal of dissatisfaction about the expropriation, and he asked that certain basic standards should be laid down when land was being expropriated. The hon. member is, of course, aware of the fact that the expropriation is done on the basis of valuations made by the Land Board. It seems to me that the hon. member is making the same mistake as his constituents are making; they think that he is expropriating the land and he in turn thinks that I am responsible for the expropriation. The position is, of course, that the land is being expropriated by the Department of Lands. Moreover, the Department from time to time appoints sworn appraisers who make those valuations on behalf of the Land Board. Where there has been dissatisfaction amongst various people whose lands have been expropriated, they have also been allowed to appoint their own valuators in order to obtain a valuation of their properties. It is, of course, very difficult to lay down a fixed policy and to say that irrigation land is worth so much and lucerne land so much and grazing land so much, because it is obvious that the various lands may differ in nature and quality. Any particular valuation therefore has to be made by someone who can assess the value of the land on its merits. It is possible, of course, that the different owners of a subdivided farm may be offered different prices, as there may be far more improvements on one property than on the other. [Interjection.] Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Drakensberg (Mrs. S. M. van Niekerk) makes me lose all hope; she sits there and pulls such a face that it is really not pleasant to look at her. The fact remains that improvements have to be taken into account when the value of a farm is assessed. In addition the inconvenience suffered by persons whose land has been expropriated also has to be taken into account. It may very easily happen, in the case of two persons on adjoining properties, that it is much more inconvenient for the one to move from his property than it is for the other to move from his. I am just mentioning one of the various kinds of problems that arise. However, I want to agree with the hon. member that where lands are expropriated it can create many problems if a certain pattern is not followed and if the valuations are not made at more or less the same time. For that reason we have already decided that where expropriations are made in the case of the new dam the valuations will be announced to everybody at more or less the same time on a stipulated basis in terms of which we want to try to eliminate all this moving to and fro.

May I ask the hon. the Minister a question? Is it then no longer the policy that the valuation is made by the Land Board members themselves as they did in the past?

Of course that is the policy. As the Act reads at present, the Land Board is the valuating body at the moment, but that does not prohibit them also to call in other valuators to make valuations, as is in fact done from time to time. Where any dispute arises the Land Board frequently makes use of the services of a valuator other than the Land Board itself, and the owner is also entitled to appoint valuators, and on that basis the owner is made an offer even before the case is taken to court. But we now intend to announce all the offers simultaneously on a basis which is the same for all. The hon. member referred to cases in which persons whose land has been expropriated buy land in the meantime and then have to pay interest on the purchase prices of that land. But the hon. member must appreciate that a person whose land is expropriated has the right to go to court, and what happens is this: When the offer is made the owner has a year in which to go to court; in the meantime the Department is prepared to give him three-quarters of the purchase price, but the owner has not yet agreed; he has not yet sold his farm; after all, one does not know what the actual amount is which has to be paid to him. If that money is given to him in the meantime, he must obviously pay interest on it, because he is still the owner of his farm at the same time. I want to give the hon. member the assurance that we have had as many problems with expropriation as he has had, and we want to eliminate these difficulties in future as far as possible.

The hon. member for Piketberg (Mr. Treurnicht) spoke about the position of settlers in his constituency, where there are some uneconomic holdings. That, of course, is a problem which occurs not only in his constituency, but also in other parts of the country where settlements have been established and where for various reasons the holdings are perhaps not economic ones. The policy is to enlarge such holdings as far as possible when land becomes available. The fact that a holding is uneconomic is often attributable to the person occupying that holding. On many settlements one finds that the holdings are of exactly the same size, that they have exactly the same potential, but that one settler makes a good living while another cannot earn a livelihood. Where land is available we try to establish the settlers on an economic basis as far as possible. The investigation about which the hon. member inquired has already been commenced at the settlement to which he referred. I think the hon. the Deputy Minister would be very glad to accept the hon. member’s invitation to visit that part of his constituency.

Mr. Chairman, where Mr. Spies, the Secretary to the Department of Lands, has intimated that he will retire shortly and that this is his last Session, you will allow me on this occasion, on behalf of myself and, I take it, on behalf of the whole House, to express our appreciation for the long years of service which he has rendered to the State in various capacities, the last number of which has been spent in the service of the Department of Lands. I think you will agree with me, Sir, that during the period Mr. Spies has been Secretary of Lands he has rendered of his best services to a department which from the nature of the case is beset with very difficult problems. On this occasion I want to thank him very sincerely, on behalf of the Government, for the service which he has rendered to the country. Where he is due to retire from the service shortly, we wish him a happy and pleasant period of rest.

On behalf of this side of the House I should like to associate myself with the sentiments just expressed by the hon. the Minister in regard to Mr. Spies, the Secretary for Lands. Our experience over the years always was that in Mr. Spies the Department had a particularly helpful public servant, and official who not only served his Department to the best of his ability but over and above this was also a great tower of strength when it came to the interests of the farmers of South Africa. It gives me great pleasure, therefore, to associate myself and this side of the House with the words expressed by the hon. the Minister and also to express the hope that Mr. Spies will enjoy to the full his years of retirement.

Vote put and agreed to.

On Vote No. 34.—“Deeds Offices”, R867,000,

I wonder whether the hon. the Minister can tell us something about the solution of the problems which have been facing the deeds registries throughout the country for some years now, particularly with regard to staff. We are aware of the fact that for some years they have been contending with some very difficult periods. In the last year or so we have had constant reports of delays in the registration of documents due particularly to the fact that the staff position has made it impossible to keep pace with the volume of work that has accentuated itself during the last 12 or 18 months.

I see that there is an item which provides for the purchase of office equipment and mechanical labour saving devices. I think the objective has been for years to try to improve index systems, filing systems and to bring the equipment more up to date. I must say that in some registries there has been some measure of success but we are actually on the threshold of even greater development in this field. Because of pending legislation and because of the general upsurge in the property market, which I don’t think shows any signs of cessation, the deeds for the deeds registries are going to become more voluminous and they will require more and more personnel.

There is also the question of the training of personnel because this type of work is more of a technical nature. It is the type of work which requires not only experience but also a fair amount of knowledge of the subject. A number of the staff qualify in the law certificate examination in order to keep themselves fully knowledgeable on the legal position and also abreast of what is taking place in the country generally. I am sure that the House would be very interested to know what the hon. Minister’s activities have been in this direction; what interest he has taken in this particular field and what he has done to solve some of the serious problems which have faced the conveyancing fraternity in South Africa and also the purchasers and sellers of property. We have always prided ourselves on our system particularly we have always been able to keep the time-factor down to a minimum with regard to the registration of deeds of transfer and other deeds. It is important to the business life of the community that the deeds registry should not only be up to date but that it should always be in the position to meet any pressure of work so that there is no time-lag which can hold up very important transactions. That affects not only the estate agents but almost the entire financial market. It also plays an important part, even in the domestic field. I hope, therefore, that the opportunity which presents itself to-day through the avenue of this Vote will enable us to learn something from the hon. the Minister as to what he has been doing recently in this particular field and what he has done to alleviate the position with which people have been faced for some years. The Minister could, in particular, enlighten us, firstly, as to whether there is the shortage in regard to which there are complaints, the steps which have been taken to relieve that shortage of staff and, secondly, as to whether provision has been made to ensure that the staffing of positions, such as senior examiners and prospective assistant registrars, is being fully cared for and that it is something which is receiving the attention of the Department.

It gives me pleasure to take up the cudgels for the Deeds Office because I know the Deeds Office well and because I know that the Deeds Office is probably one of the most efficient offices in our entire administration. This is not simply the case because we have a very effective system for the registration of land but it is also so because the Deeds Office staff, because of circumstances which have arisen, have always shown that they work as hard as anybody can expect any public servant to work. I think I can safely say that there is no other State office where harder work is done than in the Deeds Office. We are concerned about our registration system and over the past while we have noticed that the effective system which we have had up to the present has been altered here and there. We are proud to say that this is probably the most effective system in the whole world. We should like to retain that effective system. That is why I want in the first instance to make an appeal to the hon. the Minister to ensure that nothing is done which will detrimentally affect this effective registration system that we have in the slightest. We are very proud of it and we should like to retain it as it is.

We have in the past spoken about delays in the Deeds Office. When we discuss this matter we do not blame the staff because we know that there is a staff shortage; we know that these people are doing their best to keep the registration up to date and we also know that they are overloaded with work as a result of the particularly good economic conditions prevailing in the country. Those conditions result in more work for the Deeds Office. We should like to see a solution to this problem. Two years ago we brought this matter to the attention of the House and we see now that certain changes have been effected in the number of staff being appointed. We see, for example, that for the year 1965-6, provision is being made for eight assistant registrars instead of three as in the previous year. The number of administrative officers is being reduced and the number of senior administrative officers is being increased from 32 to 43. I think that this is a step in the right direction; this is what we asked for previously because any officer in any Department likes to have the opportunity for promotion in the future.

I should like to go a little further and ask hon. members whether they know how much knowledge is required to-day to make a good official in the Deeds Office? If an attorney wants to become a conveyancer, he has to write a special examination. The officials working in the Deeds Office have actually to be better equipped than the attorney who registers documents because they have to ensure that the conveyancer does his work well and that no mistakes are made in regard to the registration of those documents. It takes years of training to become a good official in the Deeds Office. There is the Deeds Act and the regulations. Not only has all this to be done but the Deeds Office is in effect the safety-valve of numbers of our State Departments. They have to supervise the question of insolvencies; they have to supervise estates; they have to supervise the Group Areas Act and numbers of other laws. When we pass an Act dealing with land, we say: “The Deeds Office must ensure that it is carried out.” I feel therefore, as a result of the special knowledge which these officials need, that we should no longer view the staff of the Deeds Office as ordinary officials but as specially trained officials. As such, they must not be treated in the same way as is the ordinary public servant. I think that the time has come for us to view our Deeds Office staff as people who have had special technical training and to recognize the fact that, as such, they should receive the necessary credit for that special training as far as the application of their salary scales and other facilities are concerned. I think that this is the direction in which we should work in the future. It will also act as an incentive to people to join the service of the Deeds Office.

I want to express my appreciation for the fact that there has been so much improvement in the Deeds Office here in Cape Town. Previously, there has been a delay of more than three weeks in the registration of deeds. I understand that it is now only two days. I am grateful for this but I want us to ensure that we retain the good registration system that we have and that we always have the right officials to do that work.

I agree with the hon. member for Ceres (Mr. S. L. Muller) in regard to the service the Deeds Office personnel renders. The hon. member did say that he did not know of any group of people which worked as hard as the group in the Deeds Office. I think the personnel deserve to be congratulated on the efforts they do put in. But it would appear from the Estimates that there is a shortage of staff. I don’t want this opportunity to pass without pointing out, as I have done on other occasions, that there need be no shortage of staff in any Government Department.

You are flogging the same old horse.

I shall continue to flog the same horse until you realize that that horse is not a dead horse but a very much alive horse; a horse that can pull you out of your difficulties, if you would only use it. The legal men in this House will agree with me that this is the one Department in which there should be no shortage because of the amount of money involved. The hon. member for Ceres will agree with me that if there is one or two days delay in the registration of a particular deed it may cost the person involved a lot of money in interest. The hon. member nods his head; he agrees with me. If you multiply the losses caused by one day’s delay in registration by the number of late registration you will realize that it can cost the purchasers thousands of rand, Mr. Chairman. I see the hon. the Deputy Minister is looking at me. I want to tell him that I know more about this than he knows about farming. The hon. Deputy Minister must realize that he is in a completely new field. If the Government has to rely on the hon. Deputy Minister to reply to this debate on the Deeds Office Vote we shall have to help him because I don’t think he would know what he was talking about.

I notice from the Estimates that there is to be an increase in senior administrative officers. I can appreciate that. But then there is a decrease in other staff. I want the hon. the Minister to tell me whether there is in fact a shortage of personnel in the Deeds Offices throughout the country. There are Coloured attorneys in the Cape; they come to the Deeds Office; there is no apartheid in the Deeds Office. There is no reason why Coloured clerks and Coloured typists cannot be engaged to relieve the staff position. That will save thousands of pounds to people who have to pay interest on bonds because of late registration because of the shortage of staff. The Minister can make a name for himself in this regard. I appeal to him to forget all about colour prejudice and to engage Coloured people in the interests of the country.

In the first place I want to thank the hon. member for Ceres (Mr. S. L. Muller) very heartily indeed for the fine way in which he has put the problems of the Deeds Office. I want to tell the hon. member immediately that we have already arranged with the Public Service Commission for special training for this staff and also, that we will not look upon these staff as ordinary administrative officials. They are going to receive special training.

Because the hon. member for Ceres has pointed out that we have already achieved this level of efficiency and that we shall have to be careful in the future that this standard is maintained, I should like on my part to make an appeal to the attorneys of South Africa not to regard our Deeds Office as the training centre for the staff which they require. We have to contend with this problem—that all the good young men whom we train are enticed away from our service by attorneys’ offices. The hon. member for Boland (Mr. Barnett) is very concerned about the colour bar and has asked us to remove the colour bar in the Deeds Office, but I want to ask him and those who think as he does, to employ those trained Coloured persons in their offices and not to deprive us of our trained staff.

Because the hon. member referred to the decrease in staff in the one respect and the increase in staff in the other respect, I want immediately to say that this has been as a result of automation. As the hon. member for Florida (Mr. Miller) has raised this matter I want to say that it is true that in January of this Year in Cape Town we were five weeks behind with registration. But because of our country’s phenomenal development, the Deeds Office, just like any other State Department and just like any private undertaking, is experiencing a shortage of manpower. Unfortunately, this shortage is continually being felt because we train staff and then the attorneys entice them away from us. Whereas we were five weeks behind in Cape Town, we are today not more than two or three days behind. This, I think, is due to better methods of organization and also—I want to say it frankly -—to the fact that the staff have been prepared to work overtime, and sometimes till late. The staff realize, as do hon. members, that very large amounts of money in interest and so forth may have to be paid if there is any delay. That is why we can be grateful to them for working as hard as they do.

There are seven Deeds Offices in the country, besides the one which falls under the Department of Mines, with 352 staff members. I want to say that they are doing the utmost to dispose of the work as swiftly as possible. I think that hon. members who have a great deal to do with postal votes will know how negligent an attorney is. Numbers of attorneys make mistakes in their documents which they send to the Deeds Office for registration. It is the task of the Deeds Office to ensure that every document which is sent in by an attorney’s office is in order from start to finish because we cannot allow one mistake to slip through. In other words, the delay is often due to the fact that attorneys do not draw up their deeds properly. [Interjections.] It seems to me as though the guilty parties find that the cap fits, Mr. Chairman! It is our task not only to handle deeds but also to play schoolmaster and to correct the deeds sent in by attorneys.

I want to conclude on this note. As re quested by the hon. member for Ceres, we are engaged in amending the Act in order to streamline this matter and to enable the work to be disposed of much more swiftly.

Vote put and agreed to.

Revenue Vote No. 35.—“Surveys”, R2,350,000, put and agreed to.

Revenue Vote No. 36.—“State Advances Recoveries Office”, R490,000, put and agreed to.

Loan Vote H.—“State Advances Recoveries Office”, R6,000,000, put and agreed to.

On Revenue Vote No. 37.—“Defence”, R229,400,000,

Sir, may I have the privilege of the half-hour? I want to commence this afternoon with a word of appreciation to the all too small hard-core of our defence, those officers, non-commissioned officers and men, the men we term the professional soldiers, sailors and airmen of the Republic’s Permanent Force. Many of them have very valuable war-time experience who, with their trained comrades in the Citizen Forces, have, by their devotion to duty and the hard work that they have put in, done so much in moulding the Republic’s defences into the formidable organization into which it is steadily growing. They often work under very difficult conditions in a swiftly changing world where science is bringing about so many completely drastic changes in the techniques of warfare and they deserve full credit for the work they are doing. I want to make it clear that in any criticism which I shall make with regard to particular points on which we think improvements can be effected that criticism is aimed at assisting those men in their task and in no way an attempt to detract from the value of their services.

In view of the heavy defence expenditure which the country is facing, expenditure which the taxpayer is called upon to pay and which appears quite unlikely to diminish, and in view of the widespread impact of defence requirements on the country as a whole, it makes it more and more important that defence spending should be regularly and carefully examined in order to see that the Republic is receiving security value for the very large expense we are incurring for that security. The Opposition is not quibbling about any necessary expenditure to provide national security but there is evidence that the defence expenditure is, what we term, unbalanced. It is unbalanced as between the cost of material, i.e. weapons, equipment, munitions, administration and so forth, on the one hand and in providing the training and retaining in the Permanent Force the number of experienced officers and men we must have in order to get the full security value from the costly and powerful equipment we are obtaining on the other hand. Without that balance, Sir, we are not getting full value. We say again that the Republic is not getting that full value mainly because the Government is refusing to face up to the fact that pay and service conditions in the Permanent Force as well as to some extent also in the Citizen Force are quite unrealistic in relation to the highly scientific and technical responsibilities which fall to these people and the high level of training they have to achieve before they are capable of running the Defence Department as it should be run.

That goes right down from the highest to the lowest in rank. The Government also fails to take into account the tremendous wage and salary changes these advanced techniques have produced in the outside world, in the ordinary industrial and commercial fields. It is no use for us sitting back in Parliament wringing our hands and saying that defence cannot compete with commerce and industry. There may be a certain amount of truth in it, but there are ways in meeting that competition, ways which are not being tried, and I propose to try and show a few of those ways which should be tried. Sir, we have to face realities. If the Republic is to receive the full security for which we are paying and which we can get from a balanced expenditure of its Defence Funds, then more positive steps must be taken to restore that balance as between manpower and equipment. I propose to deal with this aspect in some detail, especially in regard to certain fringe benefits which will materially help to restore that balance. Benefits which are internationally accepted by practically all countries running defence organizations of their own. In doing this, I shall deal mainly with this matter from the angle and viewpoint of the Permanent Force. The matter of the Citizen Force and training will be dealt with by other speakers.

Recently, the hon. Minister of Defence has made two important defence statements, first at George some few weeks ago, when the hon. Minister gave the figures of what the armed forces of the Republic could put in the field in the case of emergency and also the number of men which, also in cases of emergency, could rapidly be moved from one point of the country to another. I think the hon. Minister’s figures were that at the present juncture we could put some plus or minus 200,000 armed men very quickly in the field and we could move again plus or minus 200 or 250 men to any point of the country within a couple of hours. At Malmesbury, last week, on 21 May the hon. Minister told his audience that he had decided on a tremendous increase in the South African Navy’s striking power.

That was wrongly reported. I spoke about an “appreciable increase”.

Well, I was taking his words as reported, but he also added, as again reported in the Cape Times, that fortunately the Republic could afford to pay for an increase in the Navy’s striking power. Now I want at once to give the hon. the Minister the assurance that as far as the official Opposition is concerned, we support him in this very desirable aim. But at the same time from the viewpoint of national security, and in order to guarantee that the Republic is in fact receiving adequate security value in return for the costly burden of defence expenditure, it is necessary to subject both of these assurances to the most critical examination we can make with the facts at our disposal, and those facts are not very extensive, as the hon. Minister knows.

We have repeatedly warned the hon. Minister and this Government that with the highly technical complicated and scientific nature of modern military and naval equipment, it is imperative that fully adequate numbers of well-trained and experienced officers, noncommissioned officers and men, are available in all branches of the service, not only to “man” and “fight” the powerful modern equipment the Republic’s defences are receiving, but also to maintain adequate reserves to make good the wastage and provide the replacement personnel which must be available to maintain maximum defence and security value from this equipment. I believe the hon. Minister will agree that it is not wise to lull the country into what may be a sense of false security by statements which are not fully substantiated by the official evidence available. Whilst we should all have a just pride in the valuable progress achieved in the Republic’s defence resources, it is equally important that as a small nation we should not lose our sense of proportion in these matters in dealing with a phase which may materialise when we are opposed by an aggressor with large resources which we cannot hope to equal. Trained, experienced military and naval manpower is absolutely vital to the security of the Republic against any form of external aggression, experienced, and kept in close and regular association with the modern scientific equipment and weapons they will have to use if we are attacked. The whole character of modern warfare and modern weapons has so changed that valuable as part-time units and citizen forces have been in the past, and valuable as they are to-day in dealing with certain phases of emergency, particularly in relation to internal security, or in providing the reserves for training to move up into the front line, valuable as those are, the brunt of front-line defence, whenever it comes to that, has to be and can only be successfully maintained by a fully-trained, well equipped permanent force, both experienced and familiar with the new age equipment weapons they will have to use.

Comforting as the hon. Minister’s George and Malmesbury statements might appear to be. and in fact they are when taken in relation to internal security, they are not borne out when judged by the hard facts of realism in regard to any external aggression.

The Permanent Force (the Air Force, the Land Force and the Navy) is not being built up and maintained to the numerically trained strength demanded and imperative under existing international conditions.

Mr. Chairman, in the present Estimates provision is made for a total permanent force of 20,000 officers and men of all ranks in the three arms of the fighting forces, after eliminating the civilian, administrative and other essential but auxiliary services.

Replying to one of our defence questions on Friday, last, only four days ago, the Minister of Defence stated that Defence in that field was then short of 5,784 officers and men, roughly over 25 per cent of the strength approved by Parliament in its Budget; the Air Force was short of 1,755 officers and men, the Navy was short of 1,537 officers and men and the land forces short of 2,492 officers and men.

With reference to external aggression, it is not a bit of good the hon. Minister including total numbers of officers and men on reserve, who in many instances have been there so long that they are completely out of touch with the modern type of technical warfare and modern weapons. Some of these people who have only recently gone on the reserve and who have been called up for refresher courses may be of value, but in the main, you cannot include the bulk of our reserves as being front-line men; they would fall into the category of “home defence”. They are unacquainted with and untrained in the type of weapons they now have to use.

The wastage of trained men from the Permanent Force is even more disquieting than the overall shortage disclosed by the Minister’s figures. Only last Friday, in reply to my question on 20 April, the hon. the Minister stated that in the year ended 31 March 1965 no less than 1,868 officers—non-commissioned officers and other ranks—have left the three arms of the Forces, and of these 943 had over three-years service experience. In other words, there was a very serious wastage of the experienced personnel that we should be striving to retain. Half of these trained personnel had gone from the Navy and the Air Force, the two branches of Defence most urgently in need of such men, particularly as a large proportion of them were technical types of people. Sir, 1,106 of these officers and men had resigned and left of their own accord. I think that alone merits very close inquiry, as to why a man who has taken up Defence as a career leaves at a time like this on his own accord. It merits enquiry apart from the enticement offered in the form of higher wages in industry and elsewhere; 70 per cent of those people, it would be a fair thing to say, have each cost the taxpayer anything up to R4.000 to R5.000 to train for Defence service.

The Minister’s statement recently said that there was to be a tremendous increase in the Navy’s striking power and that the Republic could afford to pay for such an increase . . .

I spoke in Afrikaans and said “aansienlik”.

That I accept, but the principle is the same. If the Republic is to get true value out of the “Mirage”, the “Buccaneer” and “Canberra” aircraft, the helicopter squadron and the improved and modern naval fleet, on which we are spending many millions of rand, then it must also be prepared to face up to the cost of adequately paying the officers and men of its Permanent Forces who have to use this equipment and who have to serve the country in case of hostilities. We have to see to it that the men on whom we have to rely are paid adequately and that we provide conditions of service which will not only attract men of the standard required to the service, but which would retain them in the service as a career and not use it as a stop-gap to obtain the knowledge and experience and then move out, get a higher salary elsewhere and capitalize in on that experience elsewhere.

Despite repeated warnings by the Official Opposition, the Government and the Minister have failed to provide such conditions as are essential if the Republic is to derive the maximum security from its heavy expenditure on weapons and equipment. The defence manpower position is being crippled by the red-tape control applied by the Public Service Commission, designed for more orthodox standards of employment in the State Departments, , quite unsuited to apply to people in the fighting forces who live an abnormal life, a life quite apart from the ordinary persons in employment throughout the country, a control quite unsuited and unrealistic when applied to the conditions governing defence activities under these conditions.

I mentioned the question of fringe benefits. If the hon. Minister and the Government feel that it is not possible to raise the basic salaries of the defence personnel up to a level where they are able to compete with outside industry, then I would ask him please to consider reviewing fringe benefits which every other nation applies to its defence forces and which in a very large measure help to off-set the disparity between the rates of pay inside and outside the forces. As it is at present, when one studies what is happening, one is forced to the conclusion that the Citizen Force and military trainees are used to a very large extent in order to make up the short-fall in the Permanent Force. They have to be used in the Navy for instance in order to take some of the ships to sea. They have to be used in other branches of the service in order that they can function, and it appears to us, that in a large measure one could say that defence is being compelled to use cheap labour in order to keep the Permanent Force up to strength.

Dealing with the fringe benefits, I want to touch on several which to my knowledge do affect the feelings of the people who are serving and would help to provide a much better spirit and the retention of men.

Until about the end of the last war, shortly after the end of the last war, any man in uniform, military, air force or navy uniform, travelling on the ordinary railway services could do so at a reduced rate. He did not have any concession form or anything else. The fact that he was in uniform when he went to the ticket office gave him a uniformed person’s ticket at a substantially reduced rate compared to the fee paid by an ordinary traveller. The hon. Minister has a large number of trainees in Simonstown—I use it as an example. Some of them have their homes in one of the districts around Cape Town. On their leave period they take a train and come to Cape Town. That one trip into Cape Town costs those boys practically one day’s pay. The train fare is roughly 45 cents and his day’s pay, before deductions, is only 50 cents. So it costs them a day’s pay to come into Cape Town and see their parents. I believe the Minister will agree that we should try and encourage them to visit their parents when they get a day off. It is part of the buildup of the lad itself. I would like the hon. the Minister to go into that matter and to consider whether it is not possible to restore that concession to all men in uniform, who are sacrificing a tremendous lot for their service towards the country. It seems something we could well afford to grant them.

Then I come to the uniforms. Again I quote the Navy, a service I know well. The hon. Minister’s predecessor built up quite a reputation with regard to his satorial tendencies and he produced a naval uniform which, while it is quite a natty uniform to walk about in, is not the best of uniforms when a job of work has to be done. It is an expensive uniform to maintain in good order so that the chap appears in a smart manner. Men joining the Navy are served out with a uniform when they join. They can stay in the Navy for 20 years, but they never get another one. They have got to buy any further uniforms. Most services have a definite period, after fair wear and tear, when a replacement takes place so that the personnel are kept smart, kept as they should appear when they go ashore, but they do not have to pay for that replacement unless there is some reason as to why the uniform has been unnecessarily damaged and that they are culpable in any shape or form. Uniform replacements are quite a drain on the man’s pocket. If the petty officer comes along and ticks him off, or the sergeant-major in the Army ticks him off for the state of his uniform and orders him to get this, that and the other, as they have the right to do, and as they do do to keep their units smart in appearance, the individuals have got to pay for it. But surely, again the country is in a position financially to see to it that our chaps are kept smartly dressed. I commend that also to the hon. the Minister. Failing that, the alternative is to pay the personnel a reasonable uniform allowance out of which they would be expected to keep themselves kitted up. It will be something that will be appreciated by all those who are serving. Again, in the Royal Navy and the United States Navy you have the position that officers and men are treated differently to the Army because as you know the men serving in the Navy go away from home for long periods. They are separated from their home-life, and in the Royal Navy and in the United States Navy wives are paid a separation allowance which is paid to the family when the husband is away on service at sea. In South Africa we do not have these long terms away at sea, but our ships are away for periods and the same principle still applies. Again I would commend it to the hon. the Minister. It helps to keep the home contented and the chances are it helps to keep the men in the service.

You pay the wife to take her man away?

No, you do not pay the wife to take the man away. You give her compensation for the loss she suffers by his absence when her husband is away, and you help to make them contented and it will help to keep your man in the service. It has been proved in other services, and we might try it here.

I come to the next point. The Navy, Army and Air Force have supplied a number of houses for their personnel where they are housed at a very low rental. I am very much in favour of that. But you can only house a certain number of families and it stands to reason that there must be quite a big percentage who cannot get a house, because you have not got sufficient houses to house them. Immediately then there is a disparity in the pay of two people of equal rank, the one living in a service house at a low rate of pay and the other one forced to go out in the open market and rent a house at the rents which are being charged to-day. Oftentimes they have to travel quite a distance to get to their homes. One accepts that the State cannot immediately provide all the houses needed. But there again, I would like the hon. the Minister to give consideration to what is done in other countries, and to pay a reasonable housing allowance to those people who would be entitled to a house if one were available for them but cannot be housed because the necessary accommodation is not so available. It would restore the balance between the man who is housed and the man who is not housed. I believe there again we have one of the fringe benefits which would go a long way towards helping to keep people in the service. I know it is a matter which is causing considerable feeling. I would ask the hon. the Minister to review the basis on which houses are allocated. I know personally of a case where a man and his wife and two children had not been able to qualify for a house on points of service and points of family. They had been on the waiting list for three years, in one case I know of. Somebody else joined and got satisfactory accommodation in the town itself; he has five children and within one month he was moved into a service house, while the other chap with two children who had already waited a couple of years could not get a defence house. Those are the sort of things that lose you men, and these things can be put right.

Sir, the South African naval leave allowance is probably the worst of any navy in the Western world. It needs very early improvement. Most navies, after return from a cruise, or even at week-ends, at all possible times, grant special concessions of leave to people who can rejoin their families as most other people can do and spend some time with their families. We do not go to that extent. We have certain annual leave, Christmas leave and that type of thing, as well as long-service leave, but there are a lot of other leave periods possible. I think the hon. Minister might do well to investigate what is being done in the other naval services, and see if there are not features there which could be applied here in our Navy. I am referring to the Navy as an example, but the same principles apply in respect of the other branches of our forces where similar conditions prevail. I would like the hon. Minister to study that practice because it is a fringe benefit which will also help to keep men contented.

Then I come to what to me is quite an idiotic idea. When a man is drafted to a ship, to go away on sea service, after having been in a shore establishment, he immediately gets an abatement of his pay to cover the cost of rations, whereas in most navies, they pay an additional amount to add to the service ration in their messes, but we apparently deduct from their pay because the fellow goes to sea doing his service.

I could give many other examples, but I do not want to take up more time now with that. I want to deal with another matter, but these are suggestions I would like the Minister to study. I believe they are a part of the answer, but the main answer must be a definite improvement in basic salary conditions.

I want to touch, from the defence aspect of it, on the pitiful blunder which was recently made in regard to the visit of the United States Aircraft Carrier Independence. As I say, I want to deal with it purely from the defence point of view, because although it was then dealt with by the hon. Minister of Foreign Affairs, the incident is so closely related to the wide range of defence and security of the Republic, that in that regard it must be dealt with from the Defence viewpoint. From Press reports, it is clear that there are already defence repercussions which are detrimental to our own security. I want to ask the hon. Minister whether he was consulted before that decision was made, before the statement was made in regard to the landing of non-White personnel of the aircraft carrier. I want to ask the hon. Minister if he agreed with that statement if he was indeed consulted? To me it seems quite incredible that any Cabinet Minister, at a time like this, could have been so utterly foolish as to attempt to apply the Government’s, what I term “Luxurama” colour policy to a goodwill visit of so important a nation as the United States. One wonders just how foolish we can get in these matters. [Time limit.]

I am sorry the hon. member has raised the question of the visit of the aircraft-carrier Independence in this debate because I think that it is a matter which we can discuss under the Vote of Foreign Affairs. For this reason I do not want to say anything in this regard to-day.

It is very important to Defence.

Yes, in a certain sense, but the policy is laid down by the Department of Foreign Affairs.

I want to agree with the hon. member for Simonstown in connection with many of the things he has said and I also appreciate the way in which he has initiated the debate today. We are all concerned about the fact that so many members of our Defence Force resign. There may perhaps be one little ray of light to reassure us in this regard. These people are placed on the Permanent Force Reserve after their training, and this is of great importance. I should perhaps add a rider to this by saying that if we did not have people who resigned, our pool of trained men would very small. The fact that people do resign after they have been trained compels us to train more men, to train a larger number of men. If nobody resigned from the Permanent Force we would, for example, have a very limited number of artisans in the Defence Force. The fact that large numbers are resigning compels us to place those people on the reserve and to train others to take their place, and this results actually in our having a larger pool of people from which we can draw in time of need. I do not want to revive the old argument that our trouble is that we have to compare the Defence Force with the rest of the Public Service. We have discussed this matter often enough. This is something about which I feel very strongly and I think that we should divorce the Defence Force from the rest of the Public Service when considering Defence Force matters. But it is a fact that because of the great machine which the State has, because of all its officials in the various sections, it has to consider the salaries which are paid in the other sections and this creates a problem. I want to associate myself with what the hon. member said in connection with the so-called fringe benefits enjoyed by our Defence Force. He mentioned a few of these. I should also like to mention another one. I think that we lose many of our unmarried young men precisely because we are a trifle too strict in connection with the lodging expenses which we require them to pay. I am informed, Mr. Chairman, that many of our young men living in the State quarters for unmarried men have to pay up to R40 and more per month for board. We must also understand that these institutions in which they live are not always as good as hotels. There are things which they have to do themselves and which may be done for them gratis in other boarding establishments. Many complaints have been made to me in my constituency in connection with the fact that we make our young officers living in the State quarters for unmarried men pay too much for their board. The question of housing mentioned by the hon. member is another sore point with the members of the Defence Force. I know that the Government has adopted the policy of making a 60 per cent provision for the housing of married members of the Defence Force. The ideal which the Government has set itself is to build houses for 60 per cent of these men. We are grateful for what has been done. I want to congratulate the hon. the Minister on the progress that has been made. I know that about 270 houses are being built annually. This was the number built last year and I know that it is the intention to build as many this year too, but I am afraid that because of the expansion which our Defence Force has undergone recently, the programme of seven years will have to be extended considerably in order to enable us to reach our goal, and for this reason I want to express the hope that although I do appreciate the difficulties of the hon. the Minister and of the Department of Public Works, we will be able to do more towards accelerating the building of houses. I am particularly grateful for what has been done at Voortrekkerhoogte thus far. A large number of houses have been built there. There is also the question of rentals. I want to ask for something in this connection which sounds almost unfair. We ask the State to build homes or these people, but although the State has undertaken to provide homes for 60 per cent of the married members of the Defence Force, there are still 40 per cent of the married men who have to provide their own housing. It is very expensive to build a house to-day and rentals are also high. These men not only have the disadvantage of having to pay high prices for houses; there is another disadvantage as well. The man living in a Defence Force house is given State transport to and from his work, while the man living in a private house in the city has to pay for his own transport. I feel that it is perhaps wrong to approach the matter from this point of view but these are the arguments used by the men in the Defence Force. I want therefore to make an appeal for one thing and that is that I hope that the hon. the Minister will appoint a committee to interview every officer or member of the Defence Force who wants to resign, and discuss the matter with him. In the first place this will enable us to discover why these men want to resign. I think that the information which we shall be able to gain in this respect—as to why they want to resign— whether because they want higher salaries or other benefits or perhaps because they want their pension benefits to be paid to them, will be very valuable to us. I think that if we can obtain a list of the reasons for resignations each year, we will actually have a basis on which to work and then we can make plans to give these people something which will keep them in the Defence Force. Many of these young men resign from the Defence Force because they think of the immediate benefits which they will obtain in some other post; they do not think of the advantages of remaining in the Force. I think a fatherly talk by a committee of officers with every man who wants to resign will be of great assistance in bringing these men to their senses.

I think the time has come for us to increase the amount of the purchase of a discharge in certain categories. It costs the State a great deal of money to train these men. I am assured that to train a pilot of one of our modern aircraft costs the State R100.000.

No, R200.000.

Well, just imagine that! It costs R200,000 to train a Mirage pilot! That is a fantastic sum of money, and then we allow these men to resign! Not only do I want to express the hope that a committee such as the one I have mentioned will be of assistance in retaining the services of these members of the Defence Force but I also want to say that I think that a man whom we train must realize what it costs the State to train him. I know that there may be another reaction. Iff we make the amount for purchasing a discharge too high, it may perhaps become a stumbling-block as far as the recruiting of men is concerned. But I do think that we should consider raising the discharge purchase sum in order to place a greater obstacle in the path of the man who is desirous of resigning from the Defence Force. [Time limit.]

The hon. member for Pretoria (West) (Mr. van der Walt) began his speech by saying that if in fact people were resigning from the Permanent Force in large numbers, it was not a complete loss, because after all, those people are placed on the Reserve List. Sir, I think that is a very weak argument. We cannot afford at this stage, when we have such a great shortage of officers and men in the Permanent Force, to lose members of the Permanent Force. For the rest I should like to support the plea of the hon. member for Pretoria (West) for better conditions of service for members of our Permanent Force.

The hon. member began by saying that he did not think that this was the time to discuss the visit or otherwise of the Independence. I am not surprised that the hon. member refuses to discuss this matter, because if my Government had made a similar blunder I too would have refused to discuss it.

Sir, this matter is so closely linked up with our Defence Force that it is a very serious one from a defence point of view. I think the attitude adopted by the Government with regard to this visit can only be described as stupid and impudent and dangerous. It may well give rise to repercussions of such a far-reaching nature that nobody can foresee where it is going to end. I want to say here that all the efforts on the part of the Minister of Information over the years can never wipe out the detrimental effect of this particular incident. What surprises us is that the Minister of Defence, who has done so much for our Defence Force, and our Minister of Foreign Affairs, of whom we expected such a great deal, allowed such a thing to happen; we simply cannot understand it. Personally I regard the attitude of the Government in connection with this matter as nothing but an insult to the United States and a slap in their face. Sir, one does not do this sort of thing to countries with which one is on friendly terms.

On a point of order, is the hon. member entitled to discuss this matter under this Vote?

The hon. member may proceed.

I say that one does not insult in this way a country which can help one when one is in trouble, a country which will have to help us perhaps at some furture date. After all, if the time ever comes when we need assistance we will not be able to say to America that we do not want Whites only to come and help us. One would have thought that this sort of attitude would only be adopted towards countries which are hostile to us or countries which are potential enemies of South Africa, and surely we do not regard the United States as a potential enemy.

Sir, I think if the Government had not poked its nose into this matter and had left it to the people at Ysterplaat, this difficult situation would not have arisen and nothing would have gone wrong. There are officers at Ysterplaat who worked together with American negroes during the last war. In the last war they lived together with American negroes in the desert and in Italy and Europe; they used the same aerodromes; they shared the same messes and, moreover, there were many occasions when they were only too pleased to know that there was a black pilot overhead to ward off enemy attacks. Sir, if we had left this matter to the officers at Ysterplaat, we would have obviated this whole trouble. I think that what happened in this case is tragic for South Africa. I think it is unforgiveable and one is ashamed really to think that this sort of attitude is adopted by one’s own Government.

According to the figures given to us by the Minister, we are at the moment training approximately 20,000 young men every year under our nine-months’ training scheme. I personally do not feel entirely happy about this training. Every single member of this House continually receives complaints from parents. In the main the complaints amount to this that during the first three months these young men are kept fully occupied in the training camps; they are kept occupied with parades and very little time is wasted, but the complaint is that after the first three months the young men are not kept occupied. The complaint is that the training is monotonous and that time is wasted. One also hears the same complaint to a certain extent in the case of the gymnasiums. The gymnasium trainees complain that their training is not properly rounded off. Sir, we must realize that although parade ground training is absolutely essential for soldiers, the training of soldiers does not consist entirely of parade ground work and the handling of arms. The soldier also has to be taught to apply under active service conditions in the field what he is taught on the parade ground and in the classroom.

But surely that goes without saying.

If it is so self-evident, why is it not being done? I readily admit that it is being done on a small scale, but in my opinion there is one method whereby we can teach the young men much better what will be expected of them in the field, and that is by taking them out on large-scale manoeuvres which will necessitate their absence from camp for long spells. It is not only the individual soldier who derives benefit from these manoeuvres; they benefit every branch of the Army—the commissariat, the medical service units, the mechanical transport units and, what is more important, the officers who are being equipped for staff duty. As far as I can find out a certain amount of field work is being done, but it is being done on a small scale. We feel that it should be done on a large scale. We do not know whether it is in fact being done; we are never told whether it is being done or not. If it is being done on a large scale then surely there will be some reference to it in the Press.

In my opinion the one great shortcoming in the Defence Force to-day is the lack of junior officers, non-commissioned officers, as well as men. The hon. member for Simonstown (Mr. Gay) has already referred to the shortages in the Permanent Force. We know that Permanent Force establishments have been laid down and the number of men for whom provision is made in those establishments is the very minimum needed by the Permanent Force to be able to carry out their duties. We find, as the hon. member for Simonstown has already said, that we have a shortage in the Permanent Force of more than 500 officers and a shortage of more than 5,000 other ranks—non-commissioned officers and men. In other words, there is a shortage of nearly 20 per cent as far as officers are concerned and a shortage of almost 30 per cent in respect of other ranks. [Time limit.]

The hon. member for North-East Rand (Brig. Bronkhorst) had a great deal to say about certain matters which I should like to discuss with him and in regard to which we may be in agreement. But I cannot but blame the hon. member for having acted like a bull in a china shop and dragged in the question of the Independence. It is not my intention to follow up his remarks in this regard but I should like to make a few of my own observations in this connection.

You cannot.

We know that it is a difficult matter. The hon. member for North-East Rand and the hon. member who has just interjected will have ample opportunity to discuss this matter. In the first instance the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs made a very clear statement in which he emphasized particularly the fact that where our ambassadors or foreign representatives find themselves in countries whose policies differ from those of ours, they comply with the policies followed in those countries and conduct themselves accordingly there. It is not my intention to comment on the statement of the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs. It is unfortunate that such a thing as this should have had to happen between two countries which have friendly relationships with one another and in whose interest it is that those friendly relationships are maintained in the event of a threat to the Western world.

Two wrongs do not make a right.

It would be better for the hon. member to stay out of this matter. I repeat that it is a thorny problem, a matter which can only be further aggravated by reckless action. I also believe that the proper stage at which to discuss this matter will be under the Vote of the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs. It should not be discussed under the Vote of Defence. If hon. members want to make a fuss about this matter and act irresponsibly, and if it is necessary for us to make accusations against one another, it will be very easy to do so. Then we can discuss the boycotts which are being applied against us in respect of the delivery of weapons, weapons which overseas countries ought to be convinced are not needed for our internal security but which are needed for our external security. We can recriminate one another, but where does it get us? I think, Mr. Chairman, that if we want to act responsibly we must handle this matter carefully and with a sense of responsibility. I do not say that we should try to hide it away or not discuss it at all, but a tricky problem must be handled carefully. Because we act correctly, I should like to make an appeal to other friendly states also to recognize our policy and to conduct themselves in our regard as we conduct ourselves in their regard. I leave the matter at that.

The hon. member for North-East Rand complained about the training which is provided at the training depots and at the gymnasia. We may differ in our views in this regard. From my experience, the bailotees, those at the gymnasia and those at the military academy, are receiving a particularly thorough training. They receive good training; good citizens and good soldiers are being made of them. I am not quibbling with the hon. member in regard to the fact that field manoeuvres are of great value, but I think it is wrong to say that the training which our soldiers receive does not comply with the requirements.

I also want to refer to another matter and that is the fact that the Defence Force is below strength, a fact to which both Opposition sneakers have already referred. We would be pleased if the establishment were at full strength but we just want to point out that the Defence Force is in the same position as all the other services in the country. The manpower shortage which is being experienced by industries in the private sector and by the Public Service is also being experienced by the Defence Force. To come forward now with measures to compete with the private sector by paying higher salaries will only result in a vicious circle. It must not be construed from this that I am opposed to the increasing of salaries or to the improving of facilities. But to think that this is the only method by means of which we can eliminate our manpower shortage is simply to place ourselves in the position where salaries will simply have to be increased again in order to retain the services of these people.

I should like to bring another matter to the attention of the hon. the Minister. I want to make an appeal for the Commandos. I think that the Commandos are rightly grateful for the improved circumstances under which they can continue with their organization, improvements which the hon. the Minister has effected. They are grateful for the clerical assistance which is now being given to them and they accept it with appreciation. The fact that uniforms are also now being issued to Commando members will also I am sure result in their showing the necessary loyalty to the Commando and in their rendering the necessary service. They are grateful to the hon. the Minister for all these improved conditions. But it must be realized that the Commandos are still the members of our Defence Force who do most of the voluntary service and who receive no remuneration in this regard. I am not complaining about the allowances which Commandants receive. I am speaking about the ordinary officers and men. Their transport expenses are high. I am not asking that they be paid transport expenses because they are willing to pay these expenses themselves. When a member of a Commando attends a course he does not do so because of the small remuneration which he receives. These are mostly people who already occupy some or other position and follow some or other calling. They have to make a great sacrifice. But when it comes to matters like the ammunition which is issued to them or which is sold to them, they feel that it is rather a lot to ask them to pay for this ammunition even though they are using it to become better shots and are thus increasing their value from a defence point of view. The free ammunition which is issued to them does not cover their needs for a year. It does help them, but the amount of free ammunition issued to them forms a very small part of the ammunition which is actually used by a member of a Commando during the course of a year. [Time limit.]

When I had to resume my seat just now I was saying that the establishments reflected in connection with the Permanent Force are the absolute minimum required to enable the Army, the Air Force and the Navy to function. When we consider the shortages that there are we find that of the 5,700 shortfall in the Permanent Force, 2,900 are technicians. Our Army, our Navy and our Air Force have to-day to be kept in operation by technicians. The hon. the Minister told us recently in reply to a question that the radar equipment which cost the State R 12,000,000 is not fully manned. I take it that this is because there is such a great shortage of technicians. This is a very serious matter. We have some of the best interceptor fighters in the world but without a sound radar system they are not worth much. They have to practise continually with that radar system, and, what is more, the radar operator has to be absolutely au fait with it. We cannot expect to be able to call people up and train them within a week or a few weeks in the event of trouble. All these things take time. That is why I say that it is such a serious matter that we cannot man these installations.

There are probably other installations of a highly technical nature which are not manned either. This is a great pity. You see, Mr. Chairman, the modern installations are of such a nature that they must be used in order to remain operative. Not only must they be used in order to remain operative, but the people who have eventually to operate them have to remain in constant practice. It is of no help to us to obtain that expensive equipment and those installations if we cannot in the first place maintain them properly and, in the second place, if they do not function, and we do not use them for the proper training of those people who will be needed in time of emergency.

There does not appear to be such a great shortfall as far as the senior officers in the Force are concerned. I think that the hon. the Minister and his Department are particularly fortunate still to have at their disposal a number of senior officers with a great deal of experience. men of great ability, but the hands of these people are tied when there are not sufficient junior officers, warrant officers and men available. To my knowledge, we have been discussing the shortage in the Permanent Force year after year for the past six years and I really cannot say that there has been any improvement in this regard. The position remains the same. I feel that I should strongly support the hon. member for Pretoria (West) (Mr. van der Walt) in asking that the hon. the Minister should appoint some or other committee, or find some method to ascertain why these people are leaving the service and to discover what can be done to prevent their leaving. You see, Mr. Chairman, soldiering is an honourable profession. It is a good life and people who have been trained for this life for years and who have been in service for years will not leave easily. There must be good reasons for this state of affairs. It is not always money. Money is often the reason but not always. I want to support the hon. member strongly in saying that the hon. the Minister must really do something about this state of affairs. It does not help us to come along to this House year after year and say that there is a shortage of men; to throw up our hands and say: “What can we do? We cannot pay as much as is paid outside the service”. We must do something. It does not help to spend these colossal sums of money on equipment and so forth when we do not have the men to maintain them and we do not have the men to make proper use of them should the occasion arise.

Business interrupted to report progress.