I move—

The Minister of Finance yesterday challenged this side of the House to repeat in this House all the scandals we are so fond of spreading about on the countryside. It would be a pity to disappoint the Minister of Finance, but before I do so I would like, on behalf of this side of the House, to say that we are becoming tired of the sneering way in which the countryside is constantly being referred to in the House. The countryside is spoken of as if one were dealing with a lot of illiterate people, to whom you can pass on anything at all and who will immediately believe it as gospel. We are now tired of that, and I would just like to tell the Minister and other hon. members who are so keen on speaking contemptuously of the platteland that these people exhibit a far sounder judgment and taste than other parts of the country. The best proof of that is that they reject the Government on the other side, root and branch, with all its works.

What about the majority?

Certainly not from the countryside. Let the Government go to the country. Now, with regard to the challenge, I just want to tell the Minister that he must not be impatient and nervy. Next week the Minister will get just as much as he may wish for. This morning I just want to tell the House, and I feel it is my duty to draw attention to it, what the precise position is in connection with irregular conditions in the Department of Defence. It seems to me that most hon. members in this House are not aware of the position. We are dealing with £60,000,000 which is at stake, and there are irregular conditions which may easily develop into a public scandal. A few days ago the annual report of the Controller and Auditor-General was laid on the Table. I see that extracts from the report appear in this morning’s newspapers, and there are also extracts in connection with the Department of Defence. Now I think that the impression is created, and that the impression exists in this House and in the country outside, that all the irregularities which are committed in the Department of Defence are published in the report of the Controller and Auditor-General. I think that that is the impression which this House and the country outside has. The impression is that the Auditor-General exercises the same control and makes the same enquiries and makes his report in the same way on the Department of Defence as he does in connection with other departments of state. The hon. member for Krugersdorp (Mr. M. J. Van den Berg) spoke yesterday, and he also tried to create the impression. He is a member of the Select Committee on Public Accounts, and ought to know better. I want to tell the House that although the Department of Defence has the disposal of £60,000,000 per annum, the observations, the criticism and comment on the Department of Defence, which appear in the report of the Auditor-General, are first of all censored by the Secretary for Defence. It is a serious thing to say that here, in public, but the fact is that most of the hon. members and the public do not know about it.

Where do you get that from?

I will give the chapter and verse. Everything that appeared in the report of the Auditor-General about the irregularities that have taken place in the Department of Defence have first of all to be submitted to the Secretary for Defence, and only after the Secretary for Defence has made no objection to the criticism and comment does the Auditor-General report to this House. The Chairman of the Select Committee on Public Accounts (Mr. Blackwell) asked how I can say such a thing. I now want to quote a resolution passed by the Select Committee on Public Accounts, and then the House can itself judge of the position.

Was it before the war or since?

It is the position to-day.

What is the date of the resolution?

That has nothing to do with the matter.

Was it before the outbreak of the war or after?

It seems to me that not only is the Minister of Finance becoming nervy, but that other hon. members are also commencing to become nervy. Just let me read out a part of what the Select Committee on Public Accounts agreed upon on the 3rd June, 1937.

Ah.

That is correct, 1937, but I want the country to know that in regard to the irregularities that are taking place in the Defence Department, which to-day has control of £60,000,000, need not be brought to light. The Auditor-General’s comment is subject to censorship. It was an unsound state of affairs when the department only handled £2,000,000, but as it is now handling £60,000,000 it is necessary for the country to take notice of it.

It refers to war supplies.

That is the practice which is being followed. It was followed in 1938. What happened then? I read on—

What do we find now? During recent years, as we know, supplies have been bought costing millions of pounds, and the most serious scandals have taken place in connection with the purchase of supplies. I have already told the House on a previous occasion that people who support the war policy of the Government poke fun at the way in which it is being done. The Auditor-General can make no comments on it, unless they have first of all been censored.

How do you arrive at the censor?

He may not make any comment except after it has been submitted, first of all, to the Secretary for Defence. The public are therefore under a wrong impression. They think that all the comment of the Auditor-General and all the criticism in regard to irregularities are contained in his report, and the public do not know that the Secretary for Defence, in accordance with a resolution of the Select Committee for Public Accounts, on which the Government has a majority—first examines and censors the comment of the Auditor-General. What was the position in the past? If irregularities took place then the Auditor-General, just as in the case of other departments, could report directly to Parliament in his annual report. He can now do so no longer, so far as the Department of Defence is concerned. He has first of all to go to the Secretary for Defence and ask permission to publish something. The Secretary for Defence is the censor. He can delete whatever he wishes. It is indeed true that what he does delete comes before the Select Committee for Public Accounts in typescript, but the typed copy has to be returned to the committee clerks, and we cannot use it. That is to say that a few men on the Select Commitee on Public Accounts know of the irregularities that take place, but it cannot go any further. The thing is locked up there in the Select Committee, and it is decided what is to be done in connection with the scandals. I want the public to know that that Select Committee, on which the Government has a majority, can cover up the worst scandals.

Come come!

That is the position, and I think that in view of the enormous amounts which are at stake, Parliament should see that other means are found so that the public and the country can have information about the scandals. Now everything has first of all to go through the hands of the Secretary for Defence. He can exercise censorship, and decide what is to be left out. Then it comes to the Select Committee of Public Accounts and that committee, with its Government majority, can decide that nothing should be made known to Parliament. Scandals can be suppressed, smothered completely. I say that that is not a sound state of affairs. Millions of pounds sterling are involved.

Now you are talking nonsense.

Of course, the hon. member for Krugersdorp (Mr. M. J. van den Berg) likes that way of doing things. It suits him. He is a member of the Defence Force, and he ought to be the last to try to conceal these things.

You know that you are now misleading the House.

I am only showing what the practice is which is followed, because it is not generally known. Everything that is unpleasant for the Government can be hushed up, according to this decision. Everything that the Government to-day does not want to come to the notice of Parliament and the public can be suppressed.

That is not so. I will in a moment prove that it is not so.

I have now discharged my duty to publish the wrong state of affairs.

I will point out in a moment what you have published.

Now I want to address a few words to the Minister of Finance. The Minister of Finance became personal and angry yesterday. That is a pity, because it is not proper. The Minister said that I was distorting his words, that I had become a master distorter of words. In regard to what did he make that statement? That I am supposed to have said that the Minister, in his budget speech at the beginning of the year, was supposed to have promised the country that it would be a “pay as you go” war for that year. Now I want to-day to invoke the evidence which is above all suspicion, as far as hon. members opposite are concerned. I want to appeal to the Cape Times. Here it is. Here I have the comments which the Cape Times made on the 29th February, that is to say, the day before the budget speech. I am accused of having put words into the mouth of the Minister, of giving an interpretation to his words which could not be read into them. The Minister made his budget speech on the 28th February, and I have here the Cape Times of the 29th February, and there above the full budget speech of the Minister, you have in big capitals “Mr. Hofmeyr: Pay as you go.” If I am distorting, if I have given an interpretation to the Minister’s words which cannot be justified, then the Minister ought to call the Cape Times to account. We are not concerned here with a hostile newspaper, but a newspaper which is well-disposed towards the Minister, and that newspaper interprets to the people what the Minister said in his budget speech, and that newspaper tells the public that the Minister promised to pay cash for the war in respect of that financial year, 1940-’41. Here it is. It is not what I am saying. It is the Cape Times. The newspaper interprets what the Minister said, and interprets it to the public in the way that the Minister promised to pay cash for this year, 1940-’41. Will the Minister continue to accuse me of distortion? What am I to say about it?

Just what you wish.

It is so stated here. The Minister promised to pay cash for the war, according to the interpretation which the Cape Times placed on the Minister’s words. Now we have come to the end of the financial year. What has become of the cash payment? The “chickens come home to roost.” Instead of paying cash, we have now heard where we stand to-day. The Minister said that I did him an injustice, that I misled the public. I would like to dwell a little longer on this point.

What does Hansard say?

The point is that the Minister promised, on the 28th February, to pay cash for the war. Did he make that promise bona fide? Did he really believe that in 1940-’41 we would only require £14,000,000 for the war, and that we would be able to pay cash for the war? This is an important question. Did he make the promise bona fide?

Why do you not quote from Hansard?

I did quote Hansard, but the Minister was not satisfied with it. Now I produce a source in which hon. members opposite have even more confidence than in Hansard, namely the Cape Times, their Bible. They do not doubt that. When the Minister made the promise on the 28th February, did he then bona fide tell the people what he felt at the moment? Surely the Minister knew what modern hostilities meant. The hon. member for Kensington (Mr. Blackwell) always says that we are not fighting with horse commandos to-day. The Minister knew on the 28th February in what way war was being conducted to-day. It is a mechanised war, with tanks, armoured cars, aeroplanes. Did the Minister think that he would be able to pay cash for everything? The Minister also knew what the position of the Department of Defence and of the army was at that time. They are constantly telling us that there was nothing. The Minister knew that an army had to be built up from below, in one year, quickly. Did the Minister think that he would only need £14,000,000 for the purpose? What did the Minister say? He said “We can therefore claim that up to the present we have been able …” That is what the Minister said “up to the present.” He was talking about the year 1940-’41. He wanted to pay cash for that year. What was in the Minister’s mind when he used those words? This is an important question. Did the Minister make the promise to the country when he knew that the £14,000,000 would only be a first instalment of the whole amount that was required for the year? I would like to know what he meant. He required much more money, that was only a first instalment. If the Minister realised that, it was misleading the public. They were afraid of shocking public opinion. “Break the news gently” was their slogan. That is what I said. When I criticised these supplementary estimates for the first time, I said that the Government was deliberately following the tactics of notifying the war expenditure to the public in instalments. I revealed two conditions. The first was that the Government had the power of preventing the public from knowing anything about the scandals that were going on in the Department of Defence. That the Government can do through the Secretary for Defence, and secondly, through the Select Committee on Public Accounts. He can prevent the public knowing about the scandals. Secondly, I have now appealed to the Cape Times to confirm that the Minister of Finance created the impression that he would pay cash for the war during the current financial year, and I pointed out that the Minister must surely have known that he would require more money. He misled the public.

The hon. member for George (Mr. Werth) has been endeavouring this morning to fill the role of the fat boy in Pickwick—he has been trying to make our flesh creep by all kinds of insinuations as to what may happen with the Auditor-General’s report on war expenditure. Now let me give the House the complete history of this particular matter. In 1927 the Public Accounts Committee passed a resolution.

In 1927 or in 1937?

In 1927. The Committee passed a resolution that in future the Auditor-General’s criticisms of defence expenditure should not appear at all in the annual report of the Auditor-General. And from that date, from 1927, the practice in the Public Accounts Committee was this, that the Auditor-General’s criticisms were presented to the Public Accounts Committee in manuscript or typescript form in a secret and confidential report. Shortly after I took over the chairmanship of the Public Accounts Committee, some five years ago, I noticed, and other members of the Public Accounts Committee noticed, that at least three-quarters of this so-called confidential stuff could be published without any apparent injury to the public weal. We felt that therefore it should go into the public report. Up to 1937, for ten years, all the Auditor-General’s criticism was kept out of the Auditor-General’s report and nothing appeared.

That resolution was taken during the days of the Pact Government.

Yes, that resolution was taken by the Public Accounts Committee during the times of the Pact Government, but it appeared to us it was going too far, that much of the criticism could be published without injury to the public weal, and therefore, on my initiative, on a resolution proposed by me, we decided to alter the practice. It seemed to us obvious, however, that there might be confidential stuff which could not be published without grave injury not only to the Department of Defence but to the public welfare of this country. Some machinery, therefore, had to be decided upon to establish what could be and what could not be published. The only test we could think of was to say “Let the Auditor-General draft his report, his criticism of the Defence Department,” and place the onus on the Secretary for Defence to say that “Such and such paragraphs in my opinion could not be published without injury to the public weal,” in which case those paragraphs and those paragraphs alone would be withdrawn from the printed copy. It did not mean that they would not reach the Public Accounts Committee, but they would only reach that Committee in manuscript form. Therefore, in 1938, we adopted the resolution which my hon. friend has referred to. Let me read this in English—the hon. member has read it in Afrikaans. Under the heading “Unpublished Report, Defence Department,” the following appears:

This was a resolution taken in 1927 at the time the Pact Government was ruling this country, and I think the Chairman of the Committee was either Mr. Tom Naudé or Mr. Ben Pienaar.

The Pact Government under the chairmanship of either Mr. Tom Naudé or Mr. Ben Pienaar, had removed the whole of the Auditor-General’s report on stores from the printed report. We in 1937 restored it. So far from going in for a policy of secrecy we reversed that policy.

In other words, everything was to be printed except where the Secretary for Defence said it was of a highly confidential nature, and then it was to be typed and sent to us. Now, who were the members of the Select Committee in 1937 which consulted the Defence authorities and passed this resolution—and passed this resolution unanimously. I am going to give the names of the Select Committee of 1937 which passed this resolution unanimously. I shall read some of the names. Mr. Du Plessis, the hon. member for Vryburg; Dr. N. J. van der Merwe, who in those days led the Opposition on matters of finance; Mr. D. T. du P. Viljoen, Mr. J. H. Viljoen—and—I want hon. members to note this—Mr. Werth. So this awful resolution calculated and designed to draw a veil of secrecy over the operations of the Defence Departement, was unanimously adopted by a Committee on which my hon. friend sat. And the first word of criticism which we have heard of that resolution was to-day when the hon. member got up and sought to raise another gogga. We are greatly indebted in this House to the hon. member for George. He cannot rise in his place without providing ammunition of a most devastating character for these benches. Do I understand the hon. gentleman to deny that he sat on that Committee on that date? I shall give him chapter and verse. Let me turn to the minutes of the meeting of the 14th September, 1938. “Present, Mr. Blackwell, Chairman.” And then follow the names of the members. The last name of those present is that of Mr. Werth. It says here: “The Chairman submitted draft resolutions on the subject of the Committee’s enquiry in respect of the various documents referred to it,” and there is another heading “Draft Resolutions” and one of those resolutions is headed “Unpublished Report, Defence Department.” And then it says “The Draft Resolutions were considered, put and agreed to.”

On a point of order, has the hon. member the right to say that if the Committee agreed to it is was done unanimously?

Of course.

There is no minute of a division.

I have the minute here. On some of these resolutions there was a division. Some of them were not agreed to.

Oh, no.

My hon. friend knows that at the end of the final sitting of the Finance Committee the Chairman presents drafts of resolutions. I have the minutes here. My hon. friend does not seem able to make up his mind about it.

No, I remember it.

Was my hon. friend asleep?

I know too much about it to have been asleep. I know that we opposed it.

My hon. friend is saying that which is not true. These are the official minutes published in this House, presented by the Committee. And then let me go on. “On a motion of Mr. J. H. Viljoen— who was then a member of the Opposition— it was resolved:

Do not put in the word “unanimously” if it is not there.

Where is it shown that you objected?

There was no division and no dissent. And then my hon. friend returned to his old stunt, this “pay as you go” Budget of the Minister of Finance. He has entirely failed in his reference to Hansard, he has failed to show a single word in the Minister’s speech as recorded in Hansard —which is the official record of the speeches of this House—to show that the Minister ever used a phrase “pay as you go,” or that the Minister said anything which could be interpreted in that way. What the Minister said was “So far we have been able to meet war expenditure out of revenue.” My hon. friend has persistently and deliberately ignored the change in war conditions. He knows now that our expenditure is £65,000,000 since the outbreak of war, and he knows that it would be preposterous to suggest that the whole of that could be met out of current revenue. He is now falling back on some headlines in the Cape Times.

The “Cape Times” beats me.

Let us assume, however, in my hon. friend’s favour that the Minister did say so. Supposing he did say so in February, 1940. He knows as well as I do the complete change which came over the situation, and if he did say so he would only have been referring to the position at that time, at the utmost he could have expressed a hope for the future, but the change in the war situation rendered that position impossible. We had to intensify our war efforts as he knows. Let me give my hon. friend this advice—before he brings any more of these goggas out of their musty hide holes, let him be a little more careful about his facts.

I do not know whether it is necessary to say much more to the hon. member for George (Mr. Werth) after the way he has just been dealt with by the hon. member for Kensington (Mr. Blackwell). But I just feel that it is possibly necessary to add something in connection with the matter which he referred to in the first instance, namely the question of procedure in the Select Committee on Public Accounts in regard to the criticism of the Auditor-General on the Defence vote. In the first place, I just want to say this, that the hon. member for George was a member of that Select Committee. I do not know whether he, after this morning, will again be prepared to serve on that committee. But if he does in fact serve on it then it is in his power to move an alteration in the procedure there. He can do so there, and in the meantime he need not complain. What is more serious is this. The hon. member’s speech which will probably be blazoned throughout the length and breadth, of South Africa, has created the impression that there are actually scandals which are being covered up. It is not enough to answer that by saying that he was jointly responsible for that procedure. That impression would continue to exist. I want in that connection to make a statement, and I do it on the authority of what has been told me by the Secretary for Defence, that there is absolutely nothing which has been kept back by him of the remarks of the Auditor General, which in the slightest degree has any trace of abuses, malpractices or scandals. I want to give that assurance to the House and to the country outside of it, and if my hon. friend is not satisfied with that then he can in the Select Committee of Public Accounts, if he serves on it again, put further questions to the Auditor-General and the Secretary for Defence. I want to make this definite statement to the public and to the House. All that took place is that the Auditor-General was asked not to publish the details in connection with the position of artillery and aeroplane replacements, and the machine gun replacements, and the reason why those details were not published is clear. It is not a question of scandals and malpractices and I think we can leave it at that. With regard to the other point which was raised by the hon. member for George—well if my hon. friend really wants us to take him seriously as the chief financial mouthpiece of the Opposition, then he must give signs of more responsibility, and then we do not expect childishness from him, such as he has exhibited here to-day. We are considered to be responsible for what we have said, as reported in the Hansard report, and sometimes also as it has been distorted by our political opponents. But now we hear that we are also being held responsible for the headlines over our speeches in the newspapers. I challenge my hon. friend to prove that I had used the words “pay as you go.” He could not prove it. I explained the position, and I want to say here that even the headlines in that newspaper are not a promise. They only give the impression that I said that up to that date we would pay cash out of revenue funds. My hon. friend, the hon. member for George, now asks whether I knew at that time that I would have to ask the House for additional financial provision. Of course, I did not know it. That estimate was made on the basis of the then available facts, and on the basis that the war would continue on the lines on which it was being conducted at that time. If that had happened then that provision would quite probably have been, more or less adequate. But as I explained to the House on the 28th August, the whole tempo of the war has changed. An alteration has come in the position in Europe, and what was still more important from the point of view of our own country, Italy entered the war and brought the war over to Africa: I did not know in February last year that that would happen. I did, in fact, consider it possible that it would happen, as we all thought it possible. We all knew that if Italy were to enter the war, that the war would be brought over to Africa, and then it would actually be necessary for us to ask this House to make additional financial provision. We could at that time only base the estimate on the then existing conditions. I clearly said that I was making provision on that basis of estimate, and on that basis up to the present, up to that stage, it was possible to make the necessary provision out of revenue funds without borrowing money, and pledging our successors.

Motion put and the House divided:

Ayes—72:

Abrahamson, H.

Acutt, F. H.

Alexander, M.

Allen, F. B.

Baines, A. C. V.

Bawden, W.

Bell, R. E.

Blackwell, L.

Botha, H. N. W.

Bowie, J. A.

Bowker, T. B.

Christopher, R. M.

Clark, C. W.

Collins, W. R.

Conradie, J. M.

Davis, A.

Deane, W. A.

De Kock, A. S.

Derbyshire, J. G.

De Wet, H. C.

Dolley, G.

Du Toit, R. J.

Egeland, L.

Faure, P. A. B.

Fourie, J. P.

Friedlander, A.

Gilson, L. D.

Gluckman, H.

Goldberg, A.

Hare, W. D.

Hayward, G. N.

Henderson, R. H.

Heyns, G. C. S.

Hirsch, J. G.

Hofmeyr, J. H.

Hooper, E. C.

Howarth, F. T.

Humphreys, W. B.

Jackson, D.

Johnson, H. A.

Kentridge, M.

Klopper, L. B.

Long, B. K.

Madeley, W. B.

Marwick, J. S.

Moll, A. M.

Molteno, D. B.

Mushet, J. W.

Neate, C.

Pocock, P. V.

Reitz, L. A. B.

Rood, K.

Shearer, V. L.

Smuts, J. C.

Solomon, B.

Solomon, V. G. F.

Stallard, C. F.

Steyn, C. F.

Steytler, L. J.

Sturrock, F. C.

Stuttaford, R.

Sutter, G. J.

Trollip, A. E.

Van Coller, C. M.

Van den Berg, M. J.

Van d. Byl, P V. G.

Van der Merwe, H.

Van Zyl, G. B.

Wallach, I.

Wares, A. P. J.

Tellers: G. A. Friend and J. W. Higgerty.

Noes—54:

Badenhorst, A. L.

Bekker, G.

Bekker, S.

Bezuidenhout, J. T.

Boltman, F. H.

Booysen, W A.

Bosman. P. J.

Bremer, K.

Brits, G. P.

Conradie, J. H.

Conroy, E. A.

De Bruyn, D. A. S.

Du Plessis, P. J.

Du Toit, C. W. M.

Erasmus, F. C.

Fullard, G. J.

Grobler, J. H.

Haywood, J. J.

Hugo, P. J.

Kemp, J. C. G.

Labuschagne, J. S.

Le Roux, S. P.

Liebenberg, J. L. V.

Lindhorst. B. H.

Loubser, S. M.

Louw, E. H.

Malan, D. F.

Olivier, P. J.

Oost, H.

Pieterse, P. W. A.

Pirow, O.

Quinlan, S. C.

Schoeman, N. J.

Steyn, C. F.

Strauss, E. R.

Strydom, G. H. F.

Strydom, J. G.

Swart, A. P.

Theron, P.

Van den Berg, C. J.

V. d. Merwe, R. A. T.

Van Nierop, P. J.

Van Zyl, J. J. M.

Venter, J. A. P.

Verster, J. D. H.

Viljoen, D. T. du P.

Viljoen, J. H.

Vosloo, L. J.

Warren, S. E.

Wentzel, J. J.

Werth, A. J.

Wolfaard, G. v. Z.

Tellers: J. F. P. Naudé and P. O. Sauer.

Motion accordingly agreed to.

Bill read a third time.

I asked the Minister last night for certain information as to what kind of scheme he wanted to bring forward, and whether the scheme would be on the same basis as the Government schemes which had been entered into by the municipalities. I also asked the Minister how many Europeans and how many non-Europeans were in the service of the Electricity Supply Commission. The Minister did not reply to any of these questions. I do think that they were fair questions which I put to him. I now want to move an amendment, and it is as follows—

If this amendment is agreed to, then it will have the consequence that houses can only be built under this scheme for European persons. I have, during the last few years, argued a great deal that the housing schemes did not make provision for the poor people in the country, who would like very much to have their own dwelling. I pleaded, for instance that the man should be able, in the first instance, to get an advance for the purpose of buying his own land, because he had to own the land before he could make a start with the house. At the moment that is not possible under the municipal schemes. The person has, first of all, to get hold of his land, and only then can be apply under the scheme under which he will fall, the one under the Act of 1920, or that other scheme in connection with which the insurance companies are helpful. I further stated that the people ought to be entitled to buy their own houses. There are many places on the countryside which people leave and houses are cheap. Under the existing law, when the Government lends money to the municipalities, the municipality is not entitled to advance money to a man to buy a cheap house. No, he must build a new house. And now the Minister comes along with this Bill, under which a scheme is possible, which will give all these things to the people who are in the service of the Electricity Supply Commission, and it is made available both to Europeans and non-Europeans. I asked the Minister how many Europeans and how many non-Europeans were in the service of the Electricity Supply Commission, but he did not reply to me. I now want to quote to him from the 17th annual report of the Electricity Supply Commission, at page 12. There they say—

That is all half and half. If this Bill passes in that form, then it means that it is possible to advance money to a non-European, and not even on his land only, but also on other security, such as his wages, his pension, or some other thing. This means that the coloured person or native can get an advance to buy his land and build his house, and I got up here year after year and pleaded that that should be done for the people who were working on the dams or on other works in our villages, and who were anxious to build their own houses. But the Minister replied to me that that would be a hopeless economic transaction. And here he comes and introduces a Bill which gives the Commission a free hand to do all those things and even more. If a person buys a house which is worth £1,000 and he pays £1,500, then they can take over the bond, although I do not believe that they will do so. In principle, I am in agreement with this Bill. I would like to see every man possessing his own house, and that people should receive more facilities than those which the existing law provides. But here the Minister comes before us without a worked-out scheme being submitted to us, and he asks us to authorise this investment of money, and that for Europeans and non-Europeans, while my constituents cannot get the privileges for which I have already been pleading for so long. I move my amendment. The reason I am moving this amendment, is in order to insert the word “European.” If then there is to be a scheme over which the Government has no control, then let it only be for Europeans, and not for non-Europeans.

I want to say a word or two about the remarks of the hon. member who has just sat down. It is a noteworthy feature of his remarks that he betrayed his usual amount of colour prejudice, but, in addition to that, he displayed an extraordinary degree of ignorance in regard to the conditions and the laws of this country. The powers given here to the Commission will not enable anyone to buy land who could not buy it before. The hon. member gave figures to show how many European and non-European employees there were. He read out these figures and pointed out that half the employees of the Electricity Supply Commission were non-Europeans. What he did not tell us was what proportion of these non-Europeans were natives, and that, presumably, is very relevant because, as he should know, the native is not allowed to buy land at present, and therefore could not benefit from any of these advances which are to be granted. The probability is that the vast majority of these non-Europeans employed by the Commission are natives whom the existing laws prevent from buying land.

What about the coloured people?

I wanted to know from the hon. member what proportion were coloured, because the hon. member specifically mentioned natives as well as coloured. Perhaps I had better withdraw what I said about ignorance, because he probably does know that the native cannot buy land in this country except in certain areas which are quite outside the scope of what we are dealing with here. Therefore, I can only assume that this is another case of proposing an unnecessary colour bar in order to give the hon. member an opportunity of giving vent to his feelings on this subject. As a matter of fact, I do not limit my opposition to this amendment to the fact that the vast majority of the employees of the Commission could not in any case take advantage of these facilities. I am quite prepared to meet the case on its merits. The main section of the Act says that for the purposes of the Commission in so far as it may be necessary or incidental to the performance of its functions, the Commission shall have the following powers, and so on. Now this Bill seeks to add other powers to those which the Commission possesses—the power to make loans. There was not a word in the hon. member’s speech indicating why, if it was reasonably necessary or incidental to the powers of the Electricity Commission, they should not make loans to non-European employees. So far as the hon. member is concerned, the mere fact of their being nonEuropean is sufficient for their being cut out from these particular facilities, even though it may be necessary or incidental to their employment—

I know what is taking place in my own constituency.

This clause should apply to any employee of the Electricity Commission except that it would have no application to natives who, as a result of mistaken policy of this country, cannot buy land. The hon. member did not tell us why this should be limited to a particular class of employee.

The hon. member for Albert-Colesberg (Mr. Boltman) possibly does not fully understand the position of such an undertaking as the Electricity Supply Commission. Let me in the first place say that that Commission has capable persons at the head of it, and if the hon. member looks at the powers of that Commission he will see that they are very wide. These powers have been entrusted to them all these years, and they have not abused their powers, as the hon. member can see from the reports. Now I want to draw the hon. member’s attention to one point in connection with the housing of the non-European. If we are in favour of industries being developed in the country, then the first requisite is that we should take care that our economic policy is sound, and if you give natives or non-Europeans six months’ or nine months’ training in an industry, then they have become of some value to the industry; if then there are no houses for them, houses in which they can live with their families, the result is that they leave, and the industry loses all the experience which those people have gained. Consequently, the employers will try to make provision to house the non-European workmen, and to retain them, because otherwise they will have to train new people. If there is no housing they lose the workers with their experience. Not that the non-Europeans are being given anything at the expense of others, or more than what is being given to Europeans. The provision, however, is necessary in order to keep the workers. Then I want to say something else to the hon. member. He now wants to know where the houses can be built, and whether there are not Government schemes which can be made use of. As the hon. member knows, there are many municipalities which unfortunately do not avail themselves of the Government scheme which we hoped they would do. Possibly there are members of municipalities who themselves have houses to let, and that is the reason why they are not arxious to make use of the housing schemes. Possibly there are other reasons, with the result that the industries find that there are not sufficient houses for their workers. The industries are dependent on the workers, and are therefore trying to make arrangements to build houses for them. Money is advanced which is repayable by monthly instalments. When a man has his own home he feels safer; if he only hires a house he does not look after the place as well as when it is his own property. The Electricity Supply Commission wants to go to work in that way. This Electricity Commission has been trusted for all these years with millions of pounds.

You are not replying to his objections.

That is how I understood him He wants to know if this scheme is not the same as the Government scheme. The Electricity Commission will use its own discretion and do the best in the circumstances. They are using their own money.

The Government’s money.

They no longer owe the Government a penny. All the money that was advanced by the State has been repaid, and they are using their own money to grant loans to the people.

The money of the shareholders.

Of course, it is not the personal property of the Government, of the members of the Commission, hut of the shareholders. The shareholders of any company choose a board, and this acts in the interests of the undertaking. We must assume that people are elected who look after the interests of the undertaking. Because the municipalities do not make sufficient provision for housing, the Electricity Commission has to make its own arrangements. Where there are municipal schemes they can possibly be made use of, but in other cases they can under this Bill make arrangements and advance money at a cheaper rate, money which is repayable over a long term. That also reduces the rents in a particular place. If houses are supplied for the workers in the undertaking, other houses, in which they used to live, are at the disposal of other lessees. That is a way to reduce the rent of houses in a normal way. We are dealing here not with a reckless Commission which could or would abuse its powers. The Electricity Commission has shown in the past that it conducts its own operations in a capable and in a businesslike manner. The hon. member, therefore, has no need to be uneasy.

I am sure the Minister will not accept the amendment of the member for Albert-Colesberg (Mr. Boltman) not only because in reality it does not apply to these people who also should have something done for them, to have houses provided for them, but for many other reasons as well. The non-European section of the population certainly requires housing facilities just as much, if not more than, as the European section of the population because the non-European section are financially in a much worse position than the others. They are not able to acquire property or land and buildings. The hon. member showed that the employees in the Electricity Commission were constituted half of Europeans and half non-Europeans. I only want to say that if my friend would use his influence with those people who support him in the country, and see to it that agriculture should have more or less the same quota of whites and coloureds employed we should go a long way towards solving our poor white problem in South Africa. I want to deal with the point I made on the second reading. While this clause, as it stands, is very good, it will only help certain sections of the employees. The average worker may find great difficulty in acquiring land and building a house under these provisions, both on account of the expenditure involved and the amount of interest to be paid, and the amount to be paid for redemption of capital, and the result will be that only a small section will derive an advantage from a provision of this kind. And that is why I ventured last night to suggest that the Electricity Supply Commission should be given additional powers under which they could build houses themselves for renting to their employees, certainly to such employees as could not take advantage of the provisions of the clause. I know that there is a difference of opinion, whether the Commission has the necessary power to do that. Personally I am inclined to think that they have not got the direct power to enable them to build houses for the poorer section of their employees, so that those poorer people may rent houses at a lower rent than they would otherwise have to pay. The Commission could build on a larger scale and would therefore build more cheaply and the rents could be smaller. In order to make sure that the Commission shall have such powers I want to move an amendment to this clause. Yesterday I understood the Minister to say that he was advised that they did not have these powers.

His advice is wrong.

I am anxious that the clause shall be sufficiently clear to make it possible for the Electricity Supply Commission to build such houses and rent them at a low rental. I move as an amendment—

I said last night that the Electricity Commission did indeed, in my opinion, have powers to buy land, and to put up buildings on it, and I would like, in connection with that, to read what the clause actually says. It says—

1. (d) to acquire by purchase, lease or otherwise, land or right or interests in or over land, water rights, rights to coal, and to property of any description whatsoever, and to work or otherwise beneficially use any property or rights so acquired.

It is quite clear that the Electricity Supply Commission actually had the powers, but inasmuch as the Minister has a doubt about it, I am prepared to support the amendment of the last speaker. I think that a good many of the people in their service are possibly unwilling to accept such a responsibility, or are people who do not possess the money to pay the instalments, because if you borrow money to build a house, the amount which you have to pay back is so high that some of the poorer persons are possibly not able to pay it. Therefore I think it is necessary for the additional powers to be given to the commission, as proposed in the amendment. I also listened to what the hon. member for Vereeniging (Lt.-Col. Rood) said. He says that there were very capable people at the head of the undertaking. That may be so, but I think that it is unfair to give those people such powers without any limitation. The present board may be a perfectly good one. I have no reason for doubting it. But they will not always be there, and people may get to the top who are not so competent, especially if they are, elected by shareholders. Shareholders are not always able to judge whether the people whom they select are the best possible people. As we are dealing here with a semi-Government body, the Minister ought to have a say in connection with the spending of money. It is necessary for the Government to keep a watchful eye over the funds, especially as the Minister says that the money will be taken out of a fund which is set aside for their pensions. If a man buys land to build a house, and the loan is deducted by instalments from his salary, then it possibly creates a dangerous position, especially when the full purchase price is borrowed. If such a man dies or something else happens— possibly he is not in a position to pay— then the commission, because they hold the bond—will be obliged to take the house back. It will possibly be said that they will be careful, but I visited Smithfield a year or more ago. There they had, for example, borrowed money for a housing scheme, and they advanced money to certain persons who drew a considerable salary—I think they were teachers—in the main. These people eventually accepted appointments in other villages, and left the houses vacant. The houses could not be let to other persons, and the teachers were not able to pay the interest and instalments. Consequently the municipality was left with the houses on their hands. Here you will create the same position, and I want to guard against it. The company will possibly be saddled with the houses, and I think that the State should exercise supervision. Moreover, employees will often not be prepared to take such a responsibility upon themselves. They will have to pay more than the ordinary rent. It may also happen that the rent at such a place is low, because there are too many houses. Then they will not want to make use of it. I think that we ought actually to be a little careful, and in view of that I want to move as an amentment—

I do not want to hold up this debate; I merely want to support the amendment of the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge). If the Minister will accept it I shall sit down at once. If there is any doubt about the position let us make it clear. It will clarify the position. It is merely permissive and not obligatory. I am in favour of a man having the funds purchasing his own house. There I agree with the Minister. The Minister referred to what was being done on the Railways. If there is any analogy with what the Railway is doing then certainly the Minsiter should accept the amendment of the hon. member for Troyeville. There is no centre in the Union of any size which has not a tremendous number of houses belonging to the Railway Administration occupied by employees of the Railways, to their definite benefit. Not only are the buildings accessible and near to their work; they are let at rentals which would be uneconomical for private concerns, or in the open market. This is a tremendous convenience to the lower paid sections of the employees of the Railway Administration. No one could possibly contemplate an extension of that particular scheme to all spheres of life. Now I feel that if there is any doubt about the position of the Electricity Supply Commission it should be made clear, and that it should be laid down definitely that the Electricity Supply Commission shall be allowed to build houses which they can let to their employees. What we are suggesting here is complimentary to the principle which the Minister himself has advocated, and in the circumstances I want to support the amendment of the hon. member for Troyeville.

It is curious to note how the bias of the hon. member for Albert-Colesberg (Mr. Boltman) against any alleviation of the lot of the coloured worker enter even into this Bill so that he objects to their participating in any benefits that may possibly accrue to the worker under it. Let me remind him that this is a matter of housing and that bad housing has a direct consequence in the spread of disease. Let me remind him also that disease knows no racial limits; that disease germs spread from coloured to white with splendid impartiality without reference to a colour bar! So in his own interest even the hon. member’s amendment is bad. The Commisssion has come to this House to ask for powers to advance money to its employees for housing purposes and it seems to me that any distinction which is sought to be drawn as between its white and its coloured employees is a bad one. If this House is going to grant the powers asked for then I am opposed to the amendment introduced by the hon. member for Albert-Colesberg. As regards the amendment of the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) I feel this, that if in fact as the Minister has said, there is any uncertainty as to whether or not the Commission has the power to build houses for letting, then, inasmuch as we are dealing with the housing powers of the Commission, there is no doubt in my mind that the Minister would be taking a wise step in accepting that amendment so that any doubt which may exist shall be removed, and the Commission be empowered to build houses to be rented by its employees. I particularly commend that because it seems to me that if all big corporations in this country undertook a system of either building houses, and letting them to their employees, or of advancing money to their employees, for the purpose of building their own houses, we should go a long way towards improving both the health and the status of the working classes. Good housing is a first essential of civilised living, and I feel this Bill will be a step in the right direction. There is another point I should like to make. I am uneasy about the statement of the hon. member for Vereeniging (Lt.-Col. Rood) that the Commission will be empowered to grant the full amount desired by the employees. I am one of those who hold the view that if the employee does not get the full amount but something like say 90 per cent. or 95 per cent., as was laid down in the Act whereby the Government advances money at special rates of interest to the building societies to help the poorer people to put up their own houses—if some such limitation were put in— I defintely feel that this Bill would serve a more useful purpose. If the employee gets the full amount he asks for he will not have the same sense of responsibility as if he were to put up some money of his own as well and so have a definite stake in his house from the beginning. I certainly urge on the Minister that he should consider the advisability of putting some such limit on the amount to be advanced by the Commission. If the employee were made to put in 5 per cent. of the money it would be a step in the right direction, and I want to ask the Minister whether he would accept an amendment on those lines.

The hon. member for Vereeniging (Lt.-Col. Rood) put up an argument here in which he wanted to make out that I was opposed to this Bill. I want briefy to submit my own words to him, as they are stated in writing here. I said last night—

Here I expressly say that I am in favour of the Bill, and I added that the Electricity Supply Commission got the right to advance money to their employees on precisely the same basis as that for which I had been pleading all these years, namely, that they could, in the first place, buy their land, and could then build a house or that they could buy a house. Now the hon. member for Vereeniging wants to make out that I am against the Bill. It is just because I had pleaded all these years for these facilities, and the Minister refused them, that I am keen on seeing that this should be a good scheme, and so the hon. member must not say that I am opposed to this Bill. I pointed out that this Bill makes the scheme applicable to Europeans and non-Europeans. These non-Europeans, therefore, get a preference over my own constituents. The hon. member for Vereeniging and other hon. members said that the Electricity Commission was master in its own house, and that it was not public money. In the same report, No. 17, from which I quoted a moment ago, I find on another page that they expressly say—

This is a semi-State undertaking, which this Parliament has created, and to which the State advanced £8,000,000. It is on the same basis as the Land Bank, to which we advanced money at 3½ per cent., and then they lend it in turn to the farmers at 4½ per cent. And now those people want to argue that the State has nothing to do with the undertaking. It is a semi-State undertaking. Accordingly, I want to support the amendment of the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Warren), and say that I am not opposed to these people being assisted. I am in favour of it, but I do not lightly want to have this thing put on to a loose basis. I do not want a person to buy a house which is worth £1,000 for £1,500, and for the Commission then to take over the bond. I want the thing to be done on business principles, and one man must not be given a preference over the other. We agree to it provided the scheme is approved by the Minister concerned. We are not opposed to the principle, but just because we want these facilities to be extended, as I have advocated all these years, I do not want to allow this thing to be wrecked by people who possibly are not sufficiently meticulous in order to make a success of it

I should just like to reply to one or two of the points made. The hon. member for Colesburg (Mr. Boltman) wants to know what is actually intended by this scheme. As far as I understand the class of scheme which the Commission would institute, it is on the lines of the Government schemes as applied to individuals. The Government scheme, as you know, applies partly to direct loans to individuals and partly to complete building schemes by the Municipality.

That is not what the hon. member for Vereeniging says.

That does not worry me; I am replying to the hon. member for Colesburg. Now the hon. member for Colesburg wants me to put in that this scheme shall only apply to white employees of the Commission. I do appeal to the hon. member to be a little bit more generous— just a shade more generous; as I see it there are 500 white and 500 non-European employees. The bulk of the money will be used by the European employees because under the conditions it is very likely they will be of such a nature that it will be impossible for them to be fulfilled by any except the higher class of coloured employees. And surely a coloured employee has just as much right and requires an equal degree of shelter and decent living conditions as others. I should like the hon. member to reconsider the question of putting that amendment because it can only do harm if it is put. I also want to point out that under the Government scheme there is no colour bar. The coloured man has just the same right under the housing Act as any white man has. Then the hon. member seems under the impression still that this money is coming from the Consolidated Revenue Fund, that it is coming from the same source as housing loans. It is not doing anything of the kind. They are simply using money which they at present have in their own coffers. It is not an expenditure; it is an investment. The money will continually be coming back to the Commission. Then there is a suggestion that there should be a limitation as to the percentage value of the land and building that should be allowed to be granted. Surely we can leave it to the Commissioners to see that they are covered. We have handed them ten or twelve million pounds and given them the right to do as they like with the money; yet when it is a question of £150,000 being spent, then the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Warren) wants the Miinster to step in. If you have to do it in regard to the £150,000 then the whole Act of 1922 should be scrapped and it should be a Government Department with a Minister in charge. The thing is so unnecessary. As I pointed out the Chairman is probably among the five cleverest commercial men in South Africa.

Will you guarantee that he will always be there?

No, I cannot guarantee that. The hon. member suggested that there might be a change in the membership of the Commission. I can assure the hon. member that there is no intention on the part of the present Government to change the membership. And I do not see any likelihood for a great many years of any other Government coming into power, and I think we can leave the matter there. As regards the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) I am prepared to accept that. There is no doubt the Commission has the right to build in areas contiguous to their work—and they do build there. For instance they put up an electricity undertaking, and they build houses adjoining it, for the superintendent or the caretaker. But the hon. member wants to go a little further, and wants to put up houses for lease, perhaps some miles away from their work. Now I would not like them to adopt a policy of building all over the Union.

Business suspended at 12.45 p.m. and resumed at 2.20 p.m.

Afternoon Sitting.

When the sitting was suspended I was replying to one or two points raised by hon. members. I do not think I need deal any further with the hon. member for Swellendam who still believes that the Bill is unnecessary and that the Commission already possesses the requisite powers. At any rate I do not propose that there shall be any work for the lawyers there. Then the hon. member is rather afraid of the likelihood of loss. Well, in practical experience there is very little likelihood of loss as far as the Commission is concerned. I have had twenty years experience of almost similar conditions and the losses have been almost infinitesimal.

We do not know what the conditions are.

They are going to make the conditions themselves. The Government is not gong to lay them down. Then the hon. member suggested that they should not be able to act without the Minister’s consent. They can spend about £8,000,000 without my consent so it seems unnecessary that they should be subjected to the necessity of applying to me when they want to advance £1,000 to any man for a domestic scheme. So I cannot accept that suggestion. Now, as regards the amount and the proportion of value of the property that should be advanced, we can depend on a body of business men not to advance anything beyond what they can recover if the debtor does not fulfil his obligations. As far as I am concerned the larger the proportion they advance the better. I have cases in the Cape Peninsula where we have advanced up to 95% and we have never lost a penny. So it is ridiculous to be afraid of that class of person—the person who is going to get these advances is not the class of person who is going to give you bad debts. As a matter of fact these advances to members of the staff of the Commission are even sounder than the advances which we make to men we know nothing about, who are not in our employ— we do not even know in whose employ they are. The Commission knows their men, the men have regular jobs, and every month the indebtedness is decreased by the monthy payments, so in a very short time there is a large margin of security and there is no necessity for the hon. member to think that the members of the Electricity Supply Commission are going to be so foolish as to throw their money away.

I am very sorry that the hon. the Minister does not see his way to accept this amendment. This is the position. I can tell him as a business man that he in his business career has never given people money and told them that they can use that money as they please. The Minister gets up here and he does not know what the scheme is going to be and whether the advances are going to be 100% advances. One of his front bench members said that the advance would be 100% of the cost of the house. It may perhaps be 150%, and when we drew attention to that fact he tells us that the Chairman of the Electricity Supply Commission is a clever man, one of the cleverest men in South Africa. I interrupted him then and I pointed out that this Bill is not merely being passed for to-day but for ever. It is not being passed merely for the time that the very clever man will be there. That clever man will die one day and then the work will still have to go on.

You can rely upon the Government always appointing good men.

He says we can depend on the Government always appointing the right people; if only that were so. This Government, and other Governments as well, have made appointments—well, appointments which no sensible man with a reasonable amount of intelligence would ever be able to defend. Now, this is how the Minister argues. He says “Look here, we have to give those people all these rights, we have to give them this money, and the Commission must be placed in such a position that it can do as it pleases with this money.” Then the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) comes along suggesting that the Commission should also have the power to build houses for those people. The Minister tells us that he does not feel disposed to give them those powers. He has no real objections to doing so, but he does not feel inclined to do it. In the one respect he trusts the Commission, and in the other respect again he does not. For that reason I feel that the attitude adopted by the Minister is not a fair one; he cannot simply give those people the power to do as they please. The man who is at the head of the Commission may be a very clever man, but we can expect him to be capitalistically disposed, and it is quite possible that an amount of £6,000 may be advanced to one man to build a house, while another man may be refused an advance of £500. The Minister has the services of experts in connection with housing at his disposal—people able to judge about schemes of this kind, and that being so it seems reasonable to me to make it a condition that any proposed scheme shall meet with the Minister’s approval before it is put into operation. The Minister cannot on the one hand refuse to place confidence in those people, and on the other hand place the fullest trust in them. He has told us that under the scheme which he controls he had lost practically nothing. Well, it was his money, and I can quite understand that he did not lose anything, but here he is placing the powers in the hands of other people to use not their own money but money belonging to that particular enterprise. They may be very clever people, but it is quite wrong not to place any restrictions on them. Is there any semi-Government body in existence which has the power and the right to do as it pleases in connection with any particular matter? Let hon. members look through our law dealing with the Electricity Supply Commission and they will find that even the rights of the Electricity Supply Commission are circumscribed by the law. That being the case it was necessary for the Minister to introduce this Bill in order to extend the powers of that body. I am afraid that certain people will be favoured and that others will have nothing done for them. The man who draws a large wage and who is able to pay will derive the benefits from this scheme, and the poor man who is taking a back seat and who draws a small wage will not be able to benefit at all. Why does not the Minister take the responsibility on his own shoulders to approve of the scheme? The Minister is afraid to take that responsibility; he told us that he did not want to assume the responsibility. He knows that if he were to do so then we shall be able to criticise him here so far as the scheme is concerned. It is for that reason that the Minister wants to place the full responsibility on that body.

The hon. members over there are very inconsistent. The hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Warren) complains that the men who most need assistance will be excluded. Yet his colleague (Mr. Boltman) proposes that the poorest of the poor, the people at the bottom of the scale, shall be excluded altogether from this scheme. The Minister has pointed out that it is only the coloured man who gets the higher scale of pay who will be able to benefit from this. There is no justification for the proposed colour bar. The amendment proposed by the hon. bember for Albert-Colesberg (Mr. Boltman) is entirely inconsistent with that moved by the hon. member for Swellendam. On the one hand the amendment of the member for Swellendam (Mr. Warren) aims at getting the consent of the Minister before an advance can be made, so that the smaller wage earner shall also get the benefit of the scheme, and on the other hand the hon. member’s colleague proposes to exclude the poorer section altogether. I hope the hon. member will not press it. The Electricity Supply Commission can be trusted with the discretion to see to it that the most deserving cases receive assistance. If you want to prevent loans being made to anyone then you must pass an amendment such as that of the hon. member for Swellendam, setting up a sort of a bureaucracy. I think this is a very useful little measure and I am pleased the Minister has accepted the amendment of the hon. member for Troyeville (Mr. Kentridge) which extends the scope of the Bill and gives additional powers which are not clearly within the scope of the Act on the Status Book at present or in the Bill as introduced. With these additional powers this will become a very useful measure.

I only want to say a few words. The Minister made an appeal to me asking me to withdraw my amendment He told me that I should be generous and that I should not begrudge the coloured people the right to have their own houses. I want to say this to the Minister, that he wants the coloured people to have those conveniences, but he does not want to give them to the poor whites. That is the difference between us. I have repeatedly asked the Minister to provide greater housing conveniences to the poor class of white people, and he simply refused to do so. To-day he comes along and he grants those better facilities to non-whites. That is the difference between us. He says that I am not prepared to give those facilities to nonwhites, but he does not want to give them to whites. I am prepared to withdraw my amendment on one condition, and that is that he will give the same facilities, which he wants to give the non-whites, also to the whites. We have a law, and the Minister is in a position, by means of that law or by means of an amendment of the law, to make provision so that the white people can be provided with housing facilities. The hon. member for Cape Town Central (Mr. Bowen) stated that I was not consistent because on the one hand I asked for more favourable conditions for the poor people, while on the other hand I was supporting the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Swellendam, and he gave the House to understand that we were out to favour the rich and well-to-do people. It is the Minister who is inconsistent in the Bill he has proposed. On the one hand he refuses to grant those facilities to the white people, but on the other hand he extends them to the coloured section of the community. If hon. members look into the position they will find that under the housing schemes more provision is made for non-Europeans than for Europeans. The municipalities in the large towns look after the non-Europeans, but the Europeans, the poor whites, are unable to obtain those facilities. I believe that hon. members will find that 18,000 houses have been built for non-Europeans, and 13,000 for Europeans under the Government schemes.

Amendments proposed by Mr. Kentridge put and agreed to, and amendments proposed by Messrs. Boltman and Warren put and negatived.

Remaining Clause and Title agreed to.

House Resumed:

The CHAIRMAN reported the Bill with amendments.

Amendments considered.

Mr. SPEAKER put the amendments in Clause 1, which were agreed to, and the Bill, as amended, adopted.

Bill read a third time.

When the House adjourned yesterday we had been listening to the Minister of Railways and Harbours, who had introduced this Bill. So far as this Bill is concerned, certain amendments are proposed, which we on this side of the House are prepared to accept. There are other amendments which to my mind are unnecessary, and then there are some amendments proposed which I think are wrong. The right time to deal with those points will in the circumstances be in the Committee stage of the Bill, and that being so I have no intention of detaining the House for any length of time. I only wish to say, however, that the Minister has apparently lost sight of what the object of the original Act was. That Act was passed in 1930, and I believe it consisted of 23 clauses. In the ten years since 1930 two or three Bills have been introduced to amend all the original clauses with the exception of two clauses. I think in the circumstances the Minister would have done better if he had come along to the House with a new Bill. The fact that there have been so many amendments and the fact that the matter is so involved, has caused the Minister to issue a memorandum of sixteen pages. That memorandum was placed here before hon. members after the dinner hour last night. The Bill itself we saw for the first time only yesterday morning. That being so, the Government cannot expect that when such complicated legislation is brought before the House—while the Government itself has been busy for months, perhaps even for years, considering the introduction of an amending Bill—we should be able in such a short while to study this complicated Bill and properly prepare ourselves in order to be able to discuss the matter. I feel that I must protest against the manner in which this Bill has been placed before us. We sit here from 10 o’clock until 11 o’clock at night and we have not had the time to go carefully into everything. In those circumstances I feel that the position is not a reasonable one so far as we are concerned. We shall have to go into the various points as much as possible during the Committee stage. I have tried in the little time at my disposal to go into this Bill and to study it, but I must admit that I have not been able to do my work thoroughly. I am afraid the Minister has lost sight of the object with which the original Bill was framed. The Bill was originally drafted with the object of protecting the Railways against unfair competition. Our Railways are a State concern, and there were people owning vehicles which they could run more cheaply, and which only carried certain goods which fell under the high rated tariffs. In that way the Railways suffered losses. In order to get control of that traffic, and in order to be able to control that unfair competition, the present Act was passed at the time. But now it would appear to me that our existing legislation has not been confined to a protection of the Railways, but it would seem that it is now also being used for the purpose of imposing taxes. The pool transport riders who have to make their living out of transport driving now have to pay money every time they come and ask for exemptions. The Railway Administration always boasts of the fact that they run their enterprise on business lines, but if that is so why should they always tax the poor transport riders? If the Railways were able to carry all the goods in a particular district, to undertake all the traffic, it would be a different matter, but they are not able to do so, and as a matter of fact it would not pay them to do so. Is it fair in those circumstances, therefore, that a transport rider should have to pay £1 2s. 6d. or 10s. for an exemption? What right has the Railway to demand that that money should be paid to them? I hope the Minister will go into this question, and that he will amend the present position. If a charge has to be made, make it 1s., but why £1 2s. 6d. or 10s. ? The poor man is finding it quite hard enough to make ends meet, and he cannot pay these heavy charges. As the hon. the Minister knows, many difficulties cropped up in my own constituency. I have had to approach the Minister on several occasions, and deputations have also had to wait on the Minister. In a wine-growing district where wine has to be conveyed from one part to another, special difficulties are met with. One cannot convey very much at one time, and it has to be moved quickly. Concerns have been established in my constituency as a result, consisting of people who have lorries, and who do the transport riding. All those are poor people, and the competition among themselves is fairly sharp Hon. members should understand that not every farmer can have his own lorry—he cannot afford it, or perhaps the quantity of stuff he has to send away does not justify the keeping of a lorry for that particular purpose. That is the reason why contractors doing that class of work have come into being, and they are entitled to make a living. Now the Minister comes along and says, “Well, the Railways have never yet stood in the way of any place where there is special organised or adequate transportation arrangements.” The Minister’s memory is rather short. I just want to point out what actually happened, and what the Minister should know. The Road Transportation Board has laid down certain rules and regulations for certain dorps. They have laid down a minimum transportation fee. In other words, they give contractors in a dorp or a district certain rights for the carrying of goods, but they lay down the minimum tariff. Those people are not allowed to do the work below that tariff. In the district of Montagu there are certain road motor services. Now the Railways have even diverted from their route, and have undertaken to carry goods from the farms. We have no objection to the Railways doing this if they do it for everybody, but they do this work only for a certain area. The transport riders thereupon came along and said: “They are killing us, we cannot carry these goods at 6d. per ton as the Railways are doing.” We do not want to stand in the way if the Railways do the work of carrying goods for the farmers cheaply, but if they do that they must carry everything. When I went to see the Minister he agreed with me that it was not fair that the transport rider should be tied down to a minimum, and that the Railways could come and do the work at any price. The Minister realised that that was not fair. Then the Minister’s clerk came along and said “It is laid down in the tariff book”. We appealed, and the decision given was that the Railways could do the work at any price, however low it might be, but the lorry drivers were not allowed to carry goods below a fixed price. The Minister will realise that that sort of thing is wrong and that the position should be changed. But when we went into the matter we found that the Railways also had to get exemption, but that they had done their work of carrying goods in the Montague district without holding a certificate entitling them to do so. I then thought that the Government would be brought before the courts. If a lorry driver loads up a bag of flour at the station and takes it to his neighbour’s farm, which he is not entitled to do under the law, he is brought before the court if he does not hold an exeption certificate. Lorry drivers are prosecuted for trivial offences, and I was surprised to see that the police did not take any; steps against Government officials. They did the work of lorry drivers and they should have had a certificate which they did not have, but nobody made a fuss about it, and nobody took any action. So that the matter came to nothing, but if the poor lorry driver does it he is brought before the courts. Under this law people are deprived of their rights, their rights are curtailed, and all this gives rise to a great many difficulties. Naturally we do not want to see any unfair competition with the Railways. They are our Railways and we are prepared to protect them wherever necessary, but surely one should be reasonable and just. Now I want to bring to the Minister’s no tice the case of a farmer who lives ten, twenty, thirty or forty miles away from a dorp or a town. That farmer is not in the same position as the man living in the dorp or the man living in the town. The man in the dorp is close to a shop and is able to obtain his requirements there without any trouble. But when the farmer needs food, or clothes, or farming implements, he has to send to the dorp or to the town for whatever he needs. A man who has his own lorry is able to carry whatever he needs, but if his neighbour asks him to be good enough to bring him a bag of meal or wheat from the dorp, and he loads up a bag of meal for him, he may land himself in court. Now the Minister lays it down in this Bill that farming requirements shall be exempted. I should like to know what farming requirements are? The Minister is anxious to avoid cases being brought to court, and that is why I want to ask him what this term implies? If a farmer gets a bag of flour for himself or clothes for himself, will those be regarded as farming requirements? If not, then I believe that every farmer who has a lorry will have to get an exemption certificate and will have to pay for it, because he will then be carrying goods which he has no right to carry. I should like the words “farming requirements” to be substituted by “requirements of the farmer”. If that is done this difficulty will be removed. Then I want to put a further question to the Minister. The idea of the original law was to protect the Railways against unfair competition. Say there is a hotel keeper on the platteland who is a few miles away from the station and he has a lorry for the purpose of carrying passengers from the station to the hotel. Under this Bill the Minister wants to deprive him of that right. He also has to get exemption in order to carry those people. Now I want to ask the Minister to what extent that constitutes competition with he Railways? There is no railway line from the hotel to the station. Those people require conveyance and I do not see why the Minister now wants to interfere with those hotel people who run a lorry, and I want to know why this amendment is being introduced? It does not seem fair. I go even further. If a farmer wants to sell his products in the town, he is allowed to deliver them to the people to whom he has sold his products, provided he has not got a shop in the town or the dorp. But should he have a small shop he is not allowed to deliver without first of all having taken out a licence. That sort of thing seems to be very illogical. In the one case the man is allowed to do it while in the other instance he is not. The Minister in his memorandum says that this is done in order to cut out competition. It sounds illogical. If a man has his own lorry he is allowed to convey the goods to the town and to sell and deliver them, but as soon as he has a small shop it is suddenly regarded as competition with the Railways. I fail to see where the competition comes in; I fail to see why it is competition in the one case and not in the other. Farmers are in many respects exempted from certain legislation. Even during the last session we laid it down that where a farmer had a “stall” where he sold his goods, and that stall was on his farm, he was allowed to do his business there, and that was exempted from the prohibition of having shops along the road, but in this case simply because a man has a small shop in the town, he is taxed. If a farmer goes into the street and sells his products there he does not require a certificate, but if he sells his products in a shop he requires a certificate. I do not understand it at all. I further want to know why the Government concerns itself with competition between lorry drivers. The object of the law was to protect the Railways, but now the Railways are interfering with other matters. I notice that Col. Creswell has now been appointed as chief of the Roads Board here. I do not know why that appointment has been made. He is an old man; as regards officials in general we can say that they have always assisted us. They naturally are subject to certain rules, but otherwise they meet us in every possible way. I do not know why the Government, why the Minister, when he was drafting this Bill, did not give us the opportunity of placing our views before him. We also have amendments which we are anxious to get passed. For instance we feel that it is not reasonable that the lorry drivers, who as a rule are illiterate people, should every year have to fill in a complicated form and why they should have to send it to Cape Town with their cheque; why cannot they be allowed to go and pay at the magistrate’s office. All the other taxes are paid there, why not in this case? It is very inconveneint and it leads to a lot of delay. I know of the case of a man who sent his money off in December and who has not yet got his certificate. It is perfectly true that he got a receipt and that that is in the meanwhile serving as a certificate until he gets his certificate, but it is assumed that the certificate shall be pasted on the front of the lorry, and that man may possibly be prosecuted. I want to say again that we are anxious to be helpful to extend reasonable protection to the Railways, but we feel that if the Railways are unable to provide a full service, and private lorries are able to look after the transport required,—and so far they have always done so—no difficulties should be placed in the way of the lorry drivers. I fully realise that there must be control and I am prepared to grant that to the Government, but if we look the way in which things are being done to-day then it appears as if the position of those people is not taken into account at all. The Minister told us that the Railway Department knows nothing about this Bill and that it emanates from the Road Transportation Board. I have not his knowledge of the officials of the Railway Department, but I want to tell him this, that the officials who advise him have known for a long time about this Bill, and they know exactly what is contains. If they had had any objections to the provisions of the Bill they would have placed their objections before him. Even though this Bill emanates from the Central Road Transportation Board the Railway Department knows all about the amendment, and it is not reasonable for him to come and tell us that we should be satisfied with the Bill because it emanates from the Central Road Transportation Board. The Central Road Transporation Board stands between the Railways and the lorry owners, and we know that if the lorry owners approach the Transporation Board with some matter or other, they first of all ring up the Railways to find out whether the Railway Department has any objection to their suggestions. For that reason I feel that we cannot be expected to accept the Minister’s statement that every proposal contained in this Bill is fair and reasonable because it emanates from the Road Transportation Board, and the Railway Department has nothing to do with it. Finally I want to say this; we are not going to vote against the Bill in its present form but we are of poinion that a great many improvements can be effected to the Bill and we shall try to introduce those improvements during the Commitee stage. I hope the Minister will allow us a fair amount of time for the Committee stage, and that he will not simply adjourn the Committee stage from 11 o’clock in the evening until 10 o’clock the next morning when we have to come back to the House. That is what happened with the second reading of the Bill, and I put it to the Minister that we have had no opportunity of studying the Bill. We hope the Minister will now give us the opportunity of studying the provisions of this measure so that we shall be in a position to propose amendments. I am prepared to hand my amendments to the Minister for his consideration before introducing them. We are willing and prepared to assist the Minister as far as we can do so; we want to have a law which will protect the Railways wherever i t is necessary to do so, but we do not unnecessarily want to cause trouble to the Transport riders and to the lorry owners. I want to point out again that in many respects the farmer in order to be able to carry on his work is dependent on the lorry owner, and we should like the farmer to be protected right through.

The hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Warren) was wrong when he said that the Minister had introduced this Bill without sufficent notice. As far back as November 11th, this Bill was published in the Government Gazette, and detailed information in connection with the Bill has been published in the press throughout the country. In connection with this memo. I do want to compliment the Minister on having prepared it, it will be of considerable use when the Bill is in the committee stage. One has felt on many occasions when Bills of a most intricate nature have been introduced, that it has been most difficult to follow just exactly what the Government intended. This white paper gives a very clear indication of the purpose of the Bill and what amendments will be effected in the original Bill. Not only did notice of this Bill appear in the Gazette but its principal provisions, were recommended in the report of the Central Road Transportation Board of 31st March, 1939. I am glad to hear that as far as the Opposition is concerned the principle of the Bill, which has already been accepted three times in this House, will be accepted by them, although no doubt amendments will be proposed in the Committee stage. I want to deal with the original Bill as it emerged from the Select Committee, and was introduced into this House by the late Mr. Malan. It then contained provision for compulsory third party risk insurance. This clause dealing with compulsory third party risk insurance was left to a free vote. The House and Mr. Malan’s own supporters voted against him, and that particular clause was expunged from the Bill. Now there is no indication in the present Bill that the Minister intended to introduce this third party insurance, but I was glad to hear from the Minister this morning, in reply to a question by the hon. member for Jeppe (Mrs. Solomon) that a Bill embodying this principle will be introduced later, though not during the present session. We have had a tremendous amount of information about the risks that are run and the tremendous loss of life that has taken place during the number of years this matter has been before us. The loss of life by motor accidents has been enormous and in every week-end paper one reads of more and more motor accidents and deaths as a reseult of the accidents. I am glad the Minister is dealing, in this Bill, with the illegitimate taxi traffic, which not only the Railway Board but the Transportation Board has dealt with in reports year after year. This will give you an illustration that is within my own knowledge of the menace which these illegitimate taxis are on the road. The Minister, in his white paper, refers to what happens in Natal. I want to tell the House what takes place to-day between East London and the Transkei, where you have large numbers of taxis owned by natives, and which are running illegally between East London and the Transkei. They are run as motorcars, but they take up from anything from 12 to 15 people. They are second, third and even fourth-hand vehicles, and the owners have not been able to pay cash for them, but get them on the hire-purchase system. These vehicles have become an absolute menace to the travelling. Every half mile on the road during the week-ends one finds broken down motor-cars driven by Natives, either tyres, tubes or other repairs being done. In most cases the steering is erratic or the brakes inefficient. In the report of the Central Road Transportation Board this road that I refer to is commented upon, and the fact that there is no control at all over these natives taxis. Let me give an illustration of what happened just a few months ago. A lot of schoolboys were going in a lorry from East London to play football. On their return one of these native taxis bumped into this lorry and took off the arm of a lad 14 years of age. No compensation whatever was possible to be obtained, as die driver of the taxi possessed nothing. All that he had was this car on the hire-purchase system, and the result is that this poor lad has to go through life minus one of his arms and with no prospect of compensation. I do feel, sir, that a very strong case is made out for compulsory third party risk insurance, particularly for public vehicles. Provision should definitely be made not to allow them on the road plying for hire, unless the owners are prepared to take out insurance against third party risk. It is this point that I wish to emphasise, and I hope the Minister will very seriously consider the question of protecting the public against this menace by people who possess nothing in the world, but who are allowed on the public ways and do a great deal of damage without the least chance of anybody getting any compensation from them. The public are entitled to be protected against this menace. I may mention that a regular railway bus service does run on the greater part of this route.

I want to remind the Minister of a few words which he uttered last night in introducing this Bill, when he said that a position had arisen in which the railways were left with the bulky low rated traffic, while the cream of the traffic from the coast was taken by motor transport. What is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander, and the position has arisen on the South Coast of Natal and in Durban, where the country storekeeper is in very much the same position as the railways. During recent years exemption certificates have been issued permitting motor vehicles to carry retail orders which are touted for by travellers who go as far afield from Durban as Illovo River, to places between 20 and 25 miles from Durban. The country storekeepers who formerly enjoyed the trade of their immediate communities had now been displaced practically by the bazaars and other firms in Durban who carry on this practice, and the consequence is that their shelves, which formerly were full, are to-day practically empty. The firms in Durban get the cream of traffic for cash, while the country storekeeper is left with the bulky traffic and trade on which there is very little return and has to give credit. Now I want to refer the Minister to Section 9, Sub-section 3 (a) of his memorandum, which reads—

Now, Mr. Speaker, the power of the Road Board to limit this devastating provision is embodied in that, and if the Board will only regard those words as referring to wholesale purchases, something may be done. It was never intended by this House, I am sure, that this should apply to retail purchases. The position to-day is that these travellers go round and take orders for a pound of butter, a pound of tea or bacon, right through these areas along the South Coast for a distance of about 25 miles, thereby cutting out the country storekeepers and skimming the cream of the trade for cash, leaving the poor country storekeeper to bear the burden of the bulky goods, upon which there is very little profit. What we would like is that the Board will alter the regulation relating to the area of exemption by substituting “Umlaas River” for “Illovo River” as it appears to-day, or by introducing an amendment to Clause 9 which will make it perfectly clear that the reference is to wholesale quantities, and not to retail quantities of goods. I hope the Minister will take this into serious consideration.

I am not rising to oppose this Bill, although the Minister has made it quite clear that one of its purposes is to remove from the business of public conveyance numbers of non-Europeans who are making their living from that trade. I realise most fully that to this, as to most questions, there are two very distinct sides. In this case, there is the side of the man who makes his living by providing transport, and the side of the man off whom he makes that living. I realise that there is a possible conflict of interests between the non-European who runs a taxi service in this country, and the people whom he serves. And that conflict is quite a serious one in view of the absence of any compulsory insurance against third party risks on the part of the drivers of the taxis. I fully appreciate the point that has been made by the hon. member for Queenstown (Mr. van Coller), that the taxis that serve the particular areas to which he referred do so at considerable risk to the people whom they carry. For that reason I am quite prepared to accept this Bill, the purpose of which is to limit, if not to entirely wipe out this business and the people who are now operating it, even though I do so with a certain misgiving, because I dislike being associated with any move that will limit the few opportunities open to non-Europeans to make a living in this country. But there are two other points I would like to mention while the matter is under discussion, and they are these. At the present time, the taxi services operating in these areas are at least providing a service of some sort when transportation apparently offered no attraction to other more responsible people who might have entered this field; that is to say, these areas offer very little attraction to European enterprise. I should like, therefore, to be assured that the needs of these areas in the matter of transportation are not going to be overlooked when there is a tightening up of control by the Transportation Board, and the provision of services passes into the hands of public authorities or European transport drivers. That is, I trust that when we put off the road the taxis that are now providing the transportation services for these areas, the people to whom the opportunities of rendering services is going to be limited under this Act will be induced to provide services of that kind, and that these areas will not be left without any service at all when they lose the services now available to them. Secondly, I commend to the consideration of the Minister the fact that the services now operating do provide transportation to the people who use them at rates that are commensurate with the earnings of these people. That is an important economic factor in the situation. The people who are using these taxi services are using them at fares which they can afford to pay, and it is possible that the proposed controls will mean increased fates and the people will again be penalised. These are matters of very great concern to those who realise the dependence of the native population on transport, and the failure of this country so far to provide the ordinary facilities that are given to the rest of the country outside predominant native areas. I would be glad to know from the hon. Minister that he will use the powers given to him under this Act to ensure the continuation of services to non-European areas at rates that do bear some relation to the capacity of the people to pay.

I want to associate myself with the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Warren). We feel that we have to congratulate the Minister on having introduced this amending Bill. It is a Bill in the right direction. We do not in any way want to water down or to render the Bill useless, but at the same time I want to say that if matters are to go on in this way the platteland will undoubtedly be affected, and in certain directions the difficult enterprises carried on on the platteland will be curtailed. If this Bill is put into practical effect it will to a large extent interfere with the interests of the farmers, and particularly on this point; in clause I (c) for instance we find this:

I wish to mention an instance to show how this will conflict with the farmers’ interests. In my area hundreds of morgen are covered with vineyards which are there specially for the purpose of producing raisins. Those grapes ripen simultaneously. The one farmer cannot possibly release a single worker in order to go and help another farmer. But we have these large reserves in Namaqualand where there are hundreds of people without work, and those people are at a loose end at that time and are able to go and help the farmer. The farmer has to take his lorry, has to equip it specially as a bus—he has to travel 100 miles, and then he is allowed to pick up seven people. We feel that that is impracticable, and it is particularly in this respect that the Bill is going to interfere with us. What difference does it make to the Railways if, when the farmer goes to fetch those people, he carries seven or more people? A lorry like that as a rule can take thirty people, large and small. But now the farmer has to travel 100 miles and then he is only allowed to take seven people in addition, to which he has to incur the expense of having his vehicle equipped as a bus. Everything will be lost by the time he is ready to go and work in his vineyards. And then he has to be the owner of that lorry; it has to be his own property failing which he is not allowed to do that work. He and his neighbour help each other every day. He has not got a lorry and his neighbour is kind enough to send along his lorry for the purpose of fetching those people for him. Under this Bill that will not be allowed. But surely that does not interfere with the Railways, and I shall be very pleased if the Minister will take note of these minor points. We are definitely anxious to co-operate and we feel the need for amending legislation of this kind. I also know that this side of the House, as well as the other side of the House, are interested in this matter. It is to their interest just as much as it is to ours, and we are anxious to see amending legislation passed which will provide for all aspects of our business, and which will prove a success. For that reason I shall be pleased, as the hon. member for Swellendam has said, if the Minister will allow us during the Committee stage to come along with some small amendments, and if he will meet us on those points.

Like the hon. member who has just sat down, I congratulate the Minister on having brought in this very useful piece of amending legislation to tighten up many of the evasions and difficulties that have been encountered in the working of the principal Act. I wish however, that the form in which the hon. Minister introduced it had been different, and that it had taken the form of a consolidating Bill rather than that of a third piece of legislation, which has to be read in connection with the principal Act of 1930, and its amendment in 1932, by anyone who wishes to ascertain what his rights are in regard to motor carrier legislation. While agreeing with what has been said by the hon. member for Queenstown (Mr. Van Coller) as to the helpfulness of the memorandum which the Minister has seen fit to make available to members of the House, I do not want to make the point that it would be far more advantageous from every point of view if the House were favoured with a general consolidating measure which contained within one enactment the whole of the relative legislation relating to the subject. A good deal has already been said about provisions in the Bill that concern certain pirate taxis. I don’t want to take up the time of the House by repetition, and I will only say as coming from a province where this particular aspect of the problem is very severe, that the observations and the arguments contained in the memorandum are no under-statement. They represent a menace which should have been tackled years ago. These taxis which are predominantly non-European, are very queer craft, many of them entirely un-roadworthy, and a very real menace to road safety. That has been the case in Natal for years, doubtless also in the other provinces. And not only that, but as the memorandum shows, the operations of these pirate taxis constitute a very real and substantial unfair competition with the established transportation agencies who have been loyally observing the existing legislation. The point I wish to make in connection with the pirate taxi is that it is one thing to tighten up the law but it is equally important to ensure that there is adequate machinery for enforcing the provisions of the law. I understand that there are at present about fourteeen inspectors operating in the motor carrier transportation service. And that of those about three operate in the area with which I am most familiar—Durban. I suggest that this is not enough and that the Hon. Minister might consult with the Central Transportation Board and others as to whether it is not advisable at this stage to increase the personnel of the inspecting and supervising staff so that there may be adequate enforcement. Those of us who have had occasion to appear in proceedings before transportation bodies must have been struck with the frequency with which charges are made against this or that person of over crowding, and various other evasions of the Act, and it does appear that the Act would be much more thoroughly administered if the staff who are charged with inspecting the traffic were more substantial. While there can be little quarrel with the general provisions of this measure before the House there is one section which causes me real disquiet, and concern. I refer to the draft new section 33 bis, that is the section which deals with the duties of transportation boards on receipt of an application. I feel that the section in this question is misleading and vague, and may easily be misconstrued. Now, that draft clause provides shortly that where a board has an application to consider, that where the transportation to which that application relates can be co-ordinated with the existing Railway, Tramway or Trolley Bus service, and the Board feels that such co-ordination would be in the public interest, the Board shall afford the local Authority or the Authority concerned an opportunity of applying for a certificate for such service. The Minister in his speech the other evening mentioned that one of the objects of the Bill was to give a fair preference to existing operators, that is to give an opportunity to those already operating under a certificate to extend their service, rather than that extended service should be given to newcomers. With that there must be general agreement; but for that there is already reasonable provision in the existing Act. The present clause 13 provides under (D) that the Board shall take into consideration when they are dealing with applications the question whether transportation to which the application relates will adversely affect or assist any other transportation facilities, or whether it can be co-ordinated in a manner which offers sound advantages to the public. So that already in the Act there is provision directing the Board to consider the possibilities of advantageous co-ordination of the proposed services with the existing services. And I submit that there is already in the Act a sufficient indication that the Board in considering any application will give a preference to the existing operator, whether he happens to be the Railways or a Municipality, or a private individual. And furthermore, in the same section, the Board is directed to take into consideration the views on any matter referred to in the sub-section of any Local Authority, within whose area of jurisdiction the transportation to which the application relates will operate. So hon. members will see that the Board is already under a duty to consult the Local Authority on subjects primarily like the possibility of co-ordination with the existing services. And it does seem to me that so far as local authorities, other than Railways, are concerned—and my disquiet in regard to the section does not apply to the Railways because I agree with the Minister that, by and large, as the Americans would say, the Central Board and the local authorities have administered this legislation during recent years, without unfair discrimination in favour of the Railways, and I can see a certain amount of justification for the section in so far as it relates to legitimate provision of feeder services to existing Railway services. But I am afraid that as this section is worded it will be taken, I feel quite unintentionally, so far as the authors of the Bill are concerned, to load the dice unfairly in favour of a Local Authority as against a private individual who may be a competing motor carrier transportation provider. I do suggest to the Minister that if he desires that section to remain he should at the least agree to the addition of some further provision to make it quite clear that it is not intended by this section to give to a Local Authority the virtual power of creating a monopoly through the development of its trolley bus service, or from tram service, within this area. The Minister knows that the Local Authorities have very great powers in regard to prescribing along what routes within their boundaries transportation may take place, and it is quite conceivable, to take a hypothetical case, that in a small municipality somewhere there might be individuals on the Local Council who might themselves be interested either directly or through friends, that someone who holds a certificate to operate along a particular route—it might be possible for a municipality to invoke this clause, I think wrongly, in order to ensure the turning down of an application by some other private individual who wants to start a service, on the ground that the municipality might at some time in the future want to co-ordinate that particular route with one of its own routes. The point I want to make is this: that it should be quite clear to a local authority that a section of this sort merely gives the municipality a right to present its own case at the same time with an application made from outside for the grant of a particular route, and that when that application is considered, it shall be squarely considered on the respective merits of the outsider who is applying, and of the municipality which hopes to co-ordinate its serv ices in some way with other services, and that there shall be no bias, no preference to the municipality as against the private individual. In these matters, as any hon. member who has had the opportunity of appearing professionally before transportation boards will agree, there is naturally a very strong rivalry between the usually powerful local authorities and the outside private individual who is seeking to be granted a motor carrier certificate, and anything which tends, as in my submission this draft clause does, to load the dice in favour of the local authority, is, I feel, in conflict with what the Minister has in mind. As will be seen from other sections of the Act the dice are already loaded in favour of the Local Authority against a private individual. Hon. members know that local boards consisting of three members have one of these three members appointed to the Transportation Board by the municipality in the area concerned. Thus on the tribunal which has to decide on the applications in the first instance one member is specially sent there by the Local Authority or by the Town Council as a representative of that authority. With the best will in the world, with the best intention to be impartial and to do his duties fairly, such an individual cannot in my submission be entirely free from a sub-conscious bias in favour of his own Local Authority. I realise it is probably not practical politics to suggest an amendment at this stage of the way in which these local boards are constituted. But bearing the above facts in mind, it is to my mind very invidious in the legislation which we are now putting through to allow any clause to remain which might even seem to load the dice any further in favour of the Local Authority. I do put that point to the Minister in the hope that he will consider whether it will not be as well at this stage to add a provision to make quite certain that it is not intended to give the Local Authority anything more than a right to be present to put up its alternative schemes, and if there is no intention at the time to start a service which the private individual is asking for, it should be laid down that the Board should then go and grant a certificate to the private individual, rather than put his application off until such time in the future as the Local Authority deems fit to start a service of its own.

That is the intention.

That intention is not faithfully reflected in the clause, and I suggest it should be cleared up in Committee. There is one further point. The Minister has claimed in his speech, and I feel with justification, that on the whole this legislation has throughout the years worked well, and that the attitude taken up by the Central Board and the Local Authorities has been such as in the majority of cases to give generous treatment to other and conflicting forms of transportation. Those who are concerned with transportation matters would, I feel, be unanimous in saying that the present attitude of the Central Transportation Board towards its duties, and the general policy has been one of impartially carrying out the Act, and that attitude has met with general approval, and on this I am glad to be able to adduce an entirely outside impartial authority in support of the Minister. In his book quite recently Dr. Biljon, writing on State Interference in South Africa—

Who is he?

He is a distinguished student of economics in South Africa. In the course of his examination of the operation of this legislation he says this—

That augury, I am certain, is shared by members of this House, and if the Minister will agree in Committee to a few of the amendments which have been suggested, then this Bill should mark a forward step in carrying out what is the real and better view of the duties of the Central Transportation Board, namely, the fair co-ordination of transportation of every kind. There is just one last point. In the Bill there is an amendment proposed to section 19 of the Act. That is the section which empowers the making of regulations to put the Bill into operation. These regulations, the existing regulations, are naturally not before the House. But it is common knowledge among those who have had to do with the procedure of local or central boards that the present regulations are very unsatisfactory, are very cumbersome, or rather chaotic. They involve a tremendous waste of time in the hearing of applications. There are a great number of these applications to be heard, and this fact makes it almost impossible to insist in all cases on the procedure being carried out as it should be. For example, the provision that evidence before the boards, or before the Central Board, should be given on oath, cannot always be insisted upon. I realise it is not practical polities to suggest that as it would lengthen too much the hearing of the very great number of cases that have to come before the Local Board. But the position, as I am sure the Minister can confirm, is very unsatisfactory. The Central Boards, when they deal with appeals from Local Authorities, are often faced with having to hear an entire case afresh, all the evidence that has been led in the court below has to be brought before them again— much of it is unreliable, and all of it not under oath. The suggestion I would make to the Minister in this regard is that the existing regulations should be drastically overhauled, and that the Central Transportation Board should be invited to submit to the Minister a fresh draft of regulations embodying very much needed reforms in procedure, and among those I would suggest that there be included a provision that the Central Board, when hearing appeals from a Local Authority, should have the power to insist that evidence adduced before it be given on oath. The number of appeals in proportion to the number of original cases before the Local Authorities is very few, and the introduction of this safeguard would be a very beneficial one. Subject to that, subject to an improvement and overhaul, of the regulations affecting motor carrier transportation, and to the Minister’s sympathetic consideration of some of the points which have been put to him in the course of this debate, I hope that the Bill as eventually passed by the House will mark a very substantial improvement in the working and regulation of motor carrier transportation.

There is just one point which I should like to raise. When the original Act was passed considerable damage was done to quite a number of private individuals without their being given the opportunity of rehabilitating themselves. As a rule when a man’s livelihood is interfered with, or when his land is expropriated, compensation is paid, and when a post is abolished compensation is usually paid to a certain extent. Under this legislation which we have to-day damage is in some cases inflicted on particular individuals. It does not happen very often to-day but it does happen sometimes that as a result of the action taken by the Road Transportation Board an individual may lose his means of livelihood and his business. He is stuck then with a lorry in which he has invested the whole of his capital; that lorry may have become quite valueless to him, and he has no means of livelihood left. I want the Minister to give consideration to the question of no longer inflicting that injustice on that class of person. That class of person is unable to help himself. There are other classes who can look after themselves, and who are sometimes able to bring pressure to bear on the Government, sometimes even through Parliament, and who are able to induce the Government to pay compensation for losses: but here we are continually coming across instances where, by the institution of certain services, by the actions of the Transportation Board, people have lost their means of livelihood, and now I am anxious to see that even if it should be to a small extent yet sufficient provision shall be made so that those people whose means of livelihood are lost will be paid compensation. In the past efforts have been made to employ the people who have lost their means of livelihood in that section of the service which has been responsible for their losing their means of livelihood, but unfortunately that has never been given effect to. The idea was that they were to have been employed in one or other section of the Service which has deprived them of their means of livelihood. That has not been done. In the beginning there naturally were hundreds and thousands of cases of that kind, but to-day there are still unavoidable instances where damage is inflicted on that class of person, and I am anxious to see provision being made for cases of that kind.

There is a matter of considerable moment to which I want to invite the Minister’s attention, and that is a communication he must have received from the Farmers Club of Mid Illovo with reference to the operation of the Motor Transportation Act in regard to the carrying of customers for Native trade, by Indian storekeepers. I have received a letter from the secretary of the Club which I should like to read to the Minister to recall to his mind a communication which he must have received from this club. This is what it says—

To my amazement I find that the Minister of Railways and Harbours so far from putting a stop to this practice is altering the law so as to legalise and render licensable a practice which everyone must agree is an attack on fair trade. The time was when the courts gave judgments dealing with the question of fair trade. The protection of fair trade seemed to be one of the legitimate functions of a court, but here we have the Minister altering the Act so as to render it legal for a taxi or motor vehicle licensed under this Act to engage in carrying these passengers for the purpose of furthering any industry; why should present offenders against the Act be provided with this protection. The Minister’s amendment will raise a storm of protest against this provision. Already I think the facility with which Indian taxi drivers have used their licences for the evasion of the Act is the subject of much unfavourable comment in the Province from which I come. There is no doubt that far too little care is taken in the licensing of these antequated and diseased vehicles by the licensing authority and in many cases the people who get away with it are Indian taxi owners. I hope the Minister will agree when we reach the Committee stage of the Bill to drop the proposed amendment which is printed in heavy type in his memorandum at clause 1, paragraph 2 of the Bill. The words objected to are “Or for the purpose of furthering any industry.” His comment upon that in the memorandum indicates what the purpose of that amendment is.

Are you not reading that the wrong way round? All the restrictions will now apply to anyone carrying passengers to their stores. That will now be regarded as carrying passengers for reward, and it will require a certificate.

They have the certificate to operate on the route in question, but the Minister is now extending its scope to cover a hitherto illegal activity. The farmer is opposed to those people being allowed to carry passengers free as now contemplated for the very purpose of robbing the competing storekeepers of their trade. That is what they protest against. They do not want the Minister to legalise and render licensable the free carrying of customers by Indian storekeepers—they want this to continue to be an illegal practice. And surely it is essential otherwise you will have an immoral state of affairs. The objection is to the powerful Indian storekeeper who owns a fleet of motor cars and buses carrying purchasers from the front doors of other people to their own stores. You have the practice here indulged in by these Indians of carrying natives out of one magisterial district into another area to ensure that they may get their trade, and to take that trade away from their competitors. That is the objection which is raised, and it is hoped the Minister will not make that practice one which is necessary to be licensed, but that he will abolish it altogether by making it illegal and punishable. There is enough of that kind of thing going on without our giving our sanction to it. In this case I want to make it clear that the protest is against permitting this attack on fair trade to continue. Where in the past a native has been in the habit of going to any store it should not be possible for a competing storekeeper to come along and offer him a free ride, take him miles away from his home and employment to ensure that he should deal in his store. That is the point I wish to make quite clear. I hope the representatives on the Central Transportation Board will not be carried away by the flattery that is being used in this House in regard to their administration. We who are farmers, sir, and who live alongside the roads upon which many of these decrepit diseased and unwholesome vehicles are used, are astonished at the facility with which Indian proprietors obtain licences for such undesirable vehicles, and the facility with which these people can infringe the law. If it is true that an Indian has a fleet of taxis in a small place like Mid-Illovo and a bus as well, it is a matter for surprise to everybody there, because the railway runs from the main line to Mid-Illovo. Some years ago when respectable people wanted to operate a taxi along that line, the idea was scouted by the board as one which would not be permitted because the railways served the interests of the people there. It has been suggested here this afternoon, upon the authority of a Professor Viljoen, that the Board is no longer swayed by the railways in granting licences. So far from that being the case, we as farmers have been obliged to recognise that the railway is practically the licensing authority. If we, as producers, want facilities for carrying our goods, other than the antiquated facilities provided by the railways, we have to go direct to the railway system manager and tell him that the provision which he makes is quite insufficient, and we have to ask him whether he will permit the running of a lorry to carry the produce to market. It is only then, if he gives his permission, that it becomes feasible for us to put in an application. There is no doubt that on some of these branch railway lines the service is completely out of date. Those who live 25 miles from Maritzburg have in some cases to wait a full week for the delivery of small consignments from Maritzburg, a matter which if freedom of carriage was permitted, they could deliver the consignment by motor vehicle in three-quarters of an hour. I do not want the representatives of the Central Transportation Board to go away with the idea that no duty lies upon them to put these matters right. The producer is being impeded in his work, and it is a matter of considerable grievance to him that the railway is still antiquated, while the restrictions on motor transportation are very severe. I hope the Minister will give consideration to the points I have raised at the instance of the Mid-Ilovo Farmers’ Club.

As one who has fought for years to get compulsory third party risk insurance on to the statute book, it came with the effect of a pleasant surprise to hear all sides of the House stressing the need for it, at least for taxis. And it certainly does seem to me that in view of the complaints that have been made on all sides about these illegitimate taxis, there is an opportunity in this Bill to compel these taxis at least to take out third party risk insurance. I want to remind the Minister that in the Transvaal taxis are already compelled to take out third party risk insurance, with the result that the reports of local boards from the Transvaal while complaining of the competition of these taxis do not term them and do not find them quite the public menace which the local board in East London and Natal find them. In my own view not only do these illegal taxis set up severe competition with legitimate transport, but they do constitute a grave menace to the safety of the travelling public in the rest of the Union, because not being compelled to take out third party risk insurance, the service being poor, the vast majority, in fact practically all of them, do not bother to do so, and if and when they do have an accident such as that described by the hon. member for Queenstown (Mr. van Coller), they cannot afford to pay compensation. It does seem to me, therefore, that the Minister should seize this opportunity and compel these people to take out this insurance. Let me remind him that when the Bill originally emerged from Select Committee, to which it was sent in 1930, it contained a compulsory insurance clause, but the hon. Minister of that day having considerable pressure brought to bear upon him from the platteland, left the matter to the free vote of the House, and it was debated with the disastrous results that are now visible in the complaints from various districts that the travelling public are not protected. Now I personally am very much against piecemeal legislation. I would very much prefer it if the Government would introduce into this House a general Bill for compulsory third party risk insurance. But in view of the unsatisfactory nature of the Minister of Finance’s reply to my question this morning as to when he proposes to introduce third party risk insurance, in view of the general vagueness of his reply, I would like to urge on his colleague, the Minister of Railways, to at least give the country the half loaf by including compulsory third party risk insurance for all taxis in this amending Bill that he is now introducing. It can be done quite simply, I think, by adding to this draft Bill the clause contained in the Transvaal ordinance. That is an ordinance which has worked very well, it would create no difficulties, and the Minister need have no fear of the consequence of introducing that scheme. I feel that he should grasp this opportunity, the travelling public in this country should not have to endure a condition of things such as is described in his own memorandum at the top of page 13, where he quotes from a Natal paper, which reads—

Now, sir, are we to continue to leave the travelling public who use these taxis without the protection that can be afforded by third party risk insurance? It seems to me, sir, that it is highly unfair to the travelling public, and I do beg the Minister of Railways to seize the opportunity and at least introduce this half protection for the travelling public.

This Act has been amended so often that it has become a very complicated measure, and the Bill now before the House is also a complicated measure. I must admit that fairly extensive powers have been conferred on the local Road Transportation Board in order to meet the requirements of people. We have had a Road Transportation Board in the area which I come from, and also where the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Warren) comes from, which realised our difficulties. When in the grape season we start conveying our grapes we met with difficulties along a large number of our local roads on account of the fact that they run parallel to the railway line, and we have found that when we come into touch with the local Transportation Board and ask for exemption certificates in those parts where the grapes have to be conveyed, they are sympathetically disposed towards us. But the Railway Department also sends out people who have to look specially after the interests of the Railways and who have to protect those interests, and I must say that in that respect they have answered their purpose very well in pleading the cause of the Railways. But they are inclined to lose sight of the difficulties which the farmers have to contend with. We have repeatedly had instances where the local Road Transportation Board have been willing to help us, but where the Railways opposed and were not willing to agree to the Road Transportation Board assisting us. We have had one case in my area where exemption was granted to the lorry owners to proceed ten miles in one direction. They were half a mile beyond a certain station then. That is where the ten-mile area ends. For another 2½ miles along that road there are other farmers and they are not allowed to have their goods conveyed by that lorry. They have to deliver their goods at the station because the law lays it down that their goods have to go to the nearest station from which it is sent away to the town. Our difficulty in Worcester is that some of the factories have sidings, but at one of the factories there is no siding, and if the grapes have to be carried by rail it means that they first of all have to be taken to the station, and when they arrive at Worcester by train the grapes have to be carried by lorries or other conveyances to the factories. This involves unnecessary handling of the grapes, which in that way are bruised and consequently deteriorate, especially when they are required for the manufacture of grape juice. That is the difficulty we experience throughout the whole of my constituency. In those days we had as the chairman of the Local Road Transportation Board a man who was in that business in those areas, and who was thoroughly conversant with every detail of the farmers’ difficulties in those respects, and that is why he took up a sympathetic attitude towards the farmers. To-day we have a chairman of the Road Transportation Board—I do not want to condemn the man in anticipation—but I know that he is not conversant with the difficulties the farmer has to contend with in the way the previous chairman was. I admit that they have always tried to meet our position as far as possible, but I also want to associate myself with the hon. member for Swellendam when he said that the exemption fee was unduly high, and that the transport fee undoubtedly must be producing a tremendous amount of money for the Road Transportation Board. In addition to that we find that the Railways to-day are not in a bad financial position, but that as a matter of fact they are making-tremendous profits. The people who are making a living as transport riders by using lorries and carrying the farmers’ goods to the factories, are in most cases poor, and they carry those goods at a relatively low price, so much so that it would never pay our farmers to buy their own lorries, even though they might have the necessary means to do so. Even if I had the money to buy a lorry I would not buy one because if I think of the licence and other expenses, I prefer to use the services of a man who makes it his business to ride transport. Then there is another point in connection with the exemption certificate for the carrying of grapes. The man drives an empty lorry when he goes to fetch the grapes, but he is not allowed to carry the requirements of the farmer and take them to the farm. A complaint has also reached me that about eight miles away from the town, almost parallel with the railway line, sand, which people require for building purposes, may be obtained. These lorry owners, however, are not allowed to go and fetch that sand because them exemption certificate only permits them to carry grapes. Do hon. members know what that means? I can tell the House that there is a way out of this difficulty. A farmer makes a plan. Some of those people have said that if they can’t do it any other way they are going to evade the law. The man has a lorry registered in his name but none the less he pays for leasing it, and when the grapes have been carried, when the season is over, the registration is again transferred. Our people are being compelled to do things which are not really straightforward and honest. I have also come across the type of case quoted by the hon. member for Swellendam. The farmer has his own lorry which he can use to carry his goods to and from the town. If his neighbour requires a few things from the town he is not allowed to carry those things for his neighbour even if he does it free of charge and without being paid a penny for it, because he is then regarded as a transport rider, and he has to take out a transport licence to allow him to do so. I hope the Minister will allow a little latitude in cases of that kind. I admit that in certain cases it may give an opening for dishonest people to abuse the position, but cases of that kind would be an exception. The main thing is that this man would be able to render a service to his neighbour. He would do so without getting any compensation, but he is not allowed to do it. I hope the Minister will see his way to meet the position of those people. We also had a case in our constituency where the road runs parellel with the railway line for about 20 miles. We obtained exemption from the local Transportation Board as the Board was sympathetically disposed, but if we had to get permission from our Railway friends they would look after themselves first. We were only able to get this exemption through the sympathetic attitude of the local Board, and I want to say here to the Railway Department that they should be more sympathetic towards the farmer, and if another case crops up such as that which was raised by last year’s deputation, they should bear in mind that the people who come to them are fully conversant with the circumstances of the case. We do not approach them with a view to doing down the Railways, but our object is to get the farmers’ products conveyed in the quickest and most profitable manner. Possibly the Railways may be able to carry the goods more cheaply, but the damage caused by the continuous handling of the products is such that the Railways really do not constitute the best means of conveyance so far as grapes are concerned. I simply wish to raise these few points, and I hope that in Committee, when amendments are proposed, the Minister will show himself sympathetic towards our interests, because it is not only the lorry owners who are concerned in these matters. As I have said before they are not rich people. They are people who have to make a living out of this work, and every penny that is added to the cost has necessarily to be borne by the man who has to pay for the transport. It must necessarily fall on the farmer, and the farmer cannot bear any further burdens above those he is bearing to-day. We have to try and keep everything as low as possible.

I wish to avail myself of this opportunity to express my views about the work of the Road Transportation Board in general. I know, and I think the House as a whole has agreed, that it is the right policy to protect the Railways. But to my mind this Railway protection policy has up to now been carried too far altogether. I do not believe that there is any question in regard to the policy of protecting the Railways. In that respect we wholeheartedly support the Minister, but that protection policy, so far as the Railways are concerned, has in its practical application and effect led to something else—not only are the Railways being protected, but the whole of the public, the interests of the public, have to be subjected to, and have to be interfered with from time to time, merely in order to protect the Railway interests. That policy has been carried altogether too far. Apart from the fact that this Railway protection policy has been carried to such lengths that not only are the Railways protected, but in many respects the public interest is necessarily being sacrificed for the sake of the Railways—irrespective of that exaggerated policy, I feel that the Road Transportation Board is also going too far in its policy of restriction. The original object was that the Railways should be protected. With that we agree, but to-day the function of the Road Transportation Board is not merely that of protecting the Railways. It has now also become their function to suspend certain certificates and to hold them back, and the result of that policy is that in many respects not only are the farmers suffering damage, as has been shown by members opposite, but the whole of the public is suffering, and business in general is being restricted and interfered with. I say that that was not the original intention of the law. Travelling facilities as well as transport facilities throughout the country are faulty, and when I say that I am not referring to the buses on the platteland. Those services render a useful purpose, even if they are run at a loss, and the Government is fully justified in keeping them going. But what do we find in the large centres? There the bus services are only available in certain streets, and it is impossible to secure them in other parts. What do we get to-day? The Road Transportation Board is so punctilious and so careful about issuing certificates; they do not merely look at the question of how far the Railways have to be protected and to what extent the Railway may be interfered with, but they go to the length of going into the question of how many similar certificates there are. In other words, they are not merely concerned with the protection of the Railways, but they are also out to protect certain holders of certificates. Hon. members who are conversant with the position will agree with me that many of the people holding these certificates are not people who exclusively make their livelihood out of this kind of work, but they often represent organised capital. And we are not entitled to say that any individual who in the past had a donkey cart or an ox wagon which he used to ride transport shall no longer be allowed to do so, because he has substituted his old conveyance by a lorry in order to make his living in the same way. If a man lives in Bloemfontein or in any other part of the country, what right have we to tell him that he is not allowed to live in the town where he makes his living? That is what is happening in practice. Those people are told, “We are sorry, but we cannot give you a certificate, because there are already so many certificates, and we are of opinion that there are enough.” And in most cases those people are wrong, and their findings are not based on a practical knowledge of the areas concerned, as members opposite have shown. In most cases their opinions are exclusively based on what the gentlemen sitting round the table think, and not on a knowledge of the practical difficulties of a particular area. To my mind, the Minister should avail himself of this opportunity not merely to tighten up the law and the regulations in view of the contraventions which have taken place here and there—that is not the only obligation resting on him. It also is his duty so to amend the regulations that the man who can only make a living out of the vehicle he owns shall not be told that he has no right to make his living by means of motor transportation in a particular area. The same argument which I have mentioned here on behalf of poor people concerned in other business enterprises also applies here. Everything done under the Motor Transportation Act is being done under the guise that we have to protect the Railways. Mr. Speaker, you will not allow me to discuss the question of the Railway rates, but a good many years ago I showed that one of the results of this protection policy is that the Railways are sometimes protected to such an extent that they are not even able to compete properly with the donkey cart. There are yet a number of areas where large quantities of petrol are carried by donkey wagons, and if those petrol distributors are of opinion that it suits them better to have petrol carried by donkey wagons, then everyone will agree with me that there must be something radically wrong with our Railway rates. Hon. members on the other side of the House, and also on this side, are always complaining about the interests of the farmers, but there are certain farming products which are conveyed from the platteland to the towns, on which the Railway rates are three times as high as the value of the article. Surely that is not protection of the interests of the Railways? I am not opposed to the Railways being protected, but surely it is an unsound position of affairs if conditions of that kind are allowed to prevail. If they must be protected, then the rates should be amended in such a manner that the transport and distribution of articles which go from the platteland to the towns and vice versa shall not cost three times as much as the value of the article. Those who have had experience of matters of that kind know that that is the case. As the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Warren) says, the man who wants to convey his products has to contend with great difficulties, and now a man is not even to be allowed to carry on his lorry something which his neighbour requires. It is a contravention of the law to do so. The kind of protection which is now being given is impracticable in many instances. It is no use forcing anything which is impracticable down the throats of the public. It should not be our object to protect only the interests of the Railways. First of all, we should provide the best possible means of transportation and distribution of products in this country, and the Railways should be equipped with that object in view, so far as rates, etc., are concerned. Secondly, I want the Minister to amend his restriction policy, particularly in the large towns, so far as means of conveyance are concerned. Rather let there be more competition. Do not protect only certain people. I fail to see how one can possibly disapprove of a man who owns a vehicle making his living out of that vehicle. That vehicle may perhaps be the only thing he has, and it is unfair that he should be prevented from making his living-out of that vehicle. Organised capital often succeeds in securing protection from the Government, but under this Bill the poor man who is struggling to make a living as a contractor—and perhaps he is not even making a living—is prevented from making a living, and the man who is not asking the Government for protection, but who is only asking for the right to make a living, is prevented from doing so. That sort of thing is not fair. Efforts have, of course, been made here to make the House and the country believe that this is a bit of modern legislation, and that from this time onwards all means of transport so far as tramway and bus transports are concerned will be perfect. Yes, on paper, and round about the table of the House that may be the case, but it is no use try ing to bring pressure to bear on people and to try and restrict people in an impracticable manner. I am afraid that sort of thing will give rise to other difficulties. Applications are turned down every day which to my mind should be approved of, and vice versa. I do not say that every application should be approved of, because if that were the position one would very soon get companies who would have the whole transport system of the country in their hands, so that all competition would later on be cut out, but I am quite convinced that there are many applications which should not be turned down. I hope that all of us will next year, and in subsequent years, meet here again, but I think it will then be found that all this big talk which we have heard here to-day and all the great expectations of this Bill will not have been fulfilled.

The hon. member told us that this Bill was really not being introduced by him in his capacity as Minister of Railways, but only at the request of the Road Transportation Board. In spite of that statement of the Minister’s I am unable to ossociate myself with the idea that he, as Minister of Railways, has not kept in mind the interests of the Railways in connection with this Bill. Surely we are all convinced that when in 1930 the Bill was introduced it was introduced with the special object of protecting the interests of the Railways. There may perhaps have been a reason for it at the time, but it was at the same time proclaimed to the country that only where the interests of the Railways conflicted with the interests of Railway transportation would action be taken. Now I feel that in certain parts of the country that principle is not being adhered to. There are parts of the country where there is no competition, and yet the Railways, or rather the Transportation Board, has stepped in and has proclaimed those areas as areas where the law must be applied. I do not know what may be the reason but in my part of the country, in those far distant parts where there are no railway lines, the Act has also been applied. I feel that it is very unfair that in those far distant parts where the public are dependent on motor transportation the law is also applied, in spite of the fact that there is no question of competition with the Railways. An extraordinary attitude is taken up there. Let me give an instance. The nearest station to my town is about 75 miles away, but the town is situate in a different direction, that is to say the station takes one further away from Cape Town. The nearest station, the most convenient station, to send our goods to Cape Town, is a little more than 100 miles away from my town. Now the road Transportation Board comes along and in a very unfair way says: “We cannot allow you to go to the town which is the most convenient, the most effective, and the easiest, but we are going to compel you to go to another station.” That means that our products have to be carried about 100 miles further so far as the Railways are concerned. In other words, the people in those areas are compelled to pay on the larger mileage basis for the transport of their goods. I do not think that that sort of thing is just or fair, and the Minister will also admit that that was never the intention; that the intention of the Act only was that where there was motor transportation which competed with the Railways, that transportation should be controlled. Consequently, I want to ask the Minister to take this into account, that where there is no competition with the Railways such areas should not be proclaimed and should not come under the Act. It interferes with the people in every respect, and it is not fair and not just. It is not the Railways which are protected by that sort of thing, but certain private interests. Private interests are protected and monopolies are created in that way which are not in the interest of the country. People there are suffering great hardships, and if the poor man is able to make a living by the transportation of goods he should not be unnecessarily deprived of his livelihood. Do not interfere with him unnecessarily. There are other aspects of this Bill which I am not greatly enamoured of. I believe reference has already been made to the certificates, and to the difficulties connected with the renewing of certificates. The forms are so involved that the poor man is compelled to obtain legal advice as to how he has to fill in those forms— and they have to pay for that. In some instances the holders of licences have had specially to come to Cape Town because the time for the renewal of the certificate has become short. That sort of thing is not right and fair. Provision is made from time to time in this House for the application of regulations, and unfortunately the people who usually deal with these matters are senior officials in the Department, and— they perhaps do not mean it—they are often ignorant of conditions on the platteland. They do not understand that the people there have to go and get assistance in order to fill in those complicated forms. I therefore want to ask the Minister, in consultation with the Road Transportation Board, to try and remove those points of friction. Let the local magistrate have the right to renew the certificate and to deal with these matters. That will help a great deal and it will do away with the necessity of those people having to incur this heavy expenditure. Many of those poor people have not got the money required to renew their certificates, and they first of all have to borrow the money to pay the fee, which is a fairly large one. And what is that fee being used for? It is put into the Railway Funds. It is true that certain expenses have to be met from the fund but at the same time there is a great surplus in the Railway Exchequer, and I want to ask the Minister, who I am sure is sympathetically disposed towards the poor people, to reduce those fees which they have to pay. They have a hard struggle to make a living, and they find it very difficult to pay these fees, and also to meet the expenses connected with the completion and the renewal of the certificates. Then there are many difficulties as well in connection with the exemptions. I want to refer the Minister to clause 8 in which special provision is made regarding exemptions. Reference is made there to farming products which are carried from any particular spot to the nearest town or dorp, or to the most suitable market, or from the nearest or most suitable Railway Station, Railway Siding or Railway Halt, if there is no reasonable opportunity of carrying them over the Railways, or by means of a motor vehicle for which such a certificate of exemption as mentioned has been issued. Now, it is left entirely to the discretion of the Road Transportation Board to say which is the most suitable station. In my special case we brought the matter before the Road Transportation Board as an appeal. What did we find? They again allowed themselves to be led by the local Board, or if I may be allowed to say so, by the Provincial Board, which in the first instance deals with the matter, and as a result of that we got very little satisfaction. The Road Transportation Board is not in a position to be able to judge which is the most suitable station for such an area, and consequently I feel that it is unfair to make a provision in the clause on this basis, that the Road Transportation Board has to decide and not the people living in the area. The Local people surely are best able to judge what is in the best interest of the particular neighbourhood. Let it be left in the hands of the Local Municipality or Divisional Council which surely is the best authority in the area to decide what the people want, and what is best in the interest of the area in regard to the nearest railway station. If the Minister is afraid that every individual will select his own station, let it be left then to local authorities. These are the anomalies in the Bill, and I hope the Minister will meet our view and will try to remove them, and I hope that he will not concern himself only with the matter from the point of view of interest of the Railways. I really want to ask him to consider the position. I also want to associate myself with what an hon. member on the other side has said regarding Railway rates. It should not be the object to remove competition in order to be able to apply high rates. The rates should be so reasonable that there should be no need for the sake of the rates to remove competition. It is a tendency on the part of the Railways at the moment to act in that way. We are pleased that we now have a Minister who is a business man, and I therefore want to remind him of the business principles along which the Railways should be run. If he bears that in mind he will have to fix the Railway rates in such a manner that there will be no need to remove compet ition in this manner by means of legislation. I have pleaded, however, particularly on behalf of those areas which I represent. If we cannot get a railway line, which we have been agitating for years, do not punish us twice by so applying the Transportation Act that we shall also have to suffer under its operation. I hope the Minister will bring about the relief which I have been pleading for.

I do not want to take up much of the time of this House, but I want to say that I am prepared to take it that the existing Motor Carrier Transportation. Act was passed by this House with the sole object of protecting the Railways against unfair competition. I am not able to testify, however, to the fact that the Act has operated in the right manner, at any rate not in the area where I live. On the contrary, our experience is that the law is very inconvenient and unfair, and that it creates great difficulties. When I look at the memorandum handed in by the Minister dealing with the amendment contained in this Bill, then I am afraid that this measure does not bring about many improvements. I feel that a tightening up of the law at this stage is not in the interest of the general public, and not in the interest of the farmers. I feel it is high time that the Railways should be better able to compete with lorries. My objection is based particularly on the way in which the law has been applied in the past. We find that the Road Transportation Board is not always sufficiently conversant with conditions, and we find that so far as exemptions are concerned unnecessary expense is being created. People have to come in to submit their case to the Road Transportation Board, and we find that a man like that often has to bring somebody else with him in order to put the case before the Board, so that exemption may be granted. That is wrong. I feel that if a lorry owner has a good case it should not be a question of how well he is able to present his case, but the question should be how good his case is. The Road Transportation Board should consider these matters on their merits, but I am afraid that that is not always the position. A farmer’s market is 20 or 30 miles distant. He has to convey his products to a station which is eight or ten miles away from the market. There his products have to be loaded into trucks, and then they are carried to their destination; then they have to be offloaded from the truck and taken to the eventual recipient. While the Railways for instance get 3½d. for carrying a bag of wheat, the expenses connected with the dispatch and delivery of a bag of wheat so far as the purchaser, as well as the farmer are concerned, are very much more than 3½d. as a result of this loading and off-loading and so on. A great deal of unnecessary inconvenience is caused and a lot of unnecessary expense. For instance, when the wine farmers have to press their grapes they have to go through one of the most difficult periods of the season, and they have to go and look for exemption for the transportation of their grapes to the place where they have to be pressed. This creates unnecessary trouble, and it certainly was never the intention of the law that that should be the position. We have heard about a great many objections and difficulties, and in view of the fact that this is such a complicated Bill, I want to ask the Minister whether he is not prepared at this stage to send it to a Select Committee. I feel that the Bill should be very carefully gone into if we want it to give satisfaction to the public in general and if at the same time it has to give the necessary protection to the Railways.

In regard to the Bill before this House. I think it should be borne in mind that we are dealing with a national measure, which is based on the principle of the greatest good for the greatest number — a principle which must in certain cases operate against certain individuals. Under the protection given by measures of this kind, we have built up in our country a very satisfactory and efficient transportation system, and when one realises the tremendous developments in the road motor services of this country, one must appreciate that a great deal has depended on the protection given to these services by the Motor Transportation Act. If the Minister were to pay very serious attention to isolated instances where the Act operates harshly, he might endanger the whole of the road motor services of this country. I am certain that the representatives of the farming community in this House will unanimously acclaim those road motor services as having been of the greatest assistance to the primary producers in South Africa. The object of this Assembly should be rather to strengthen the hands not of the Minister of Railways, but of the Transportation Board under whose jurisdiction this Bill has been promoted. Just one other remark I should like to offer, and that is in connection with the statement made by the hon. member for Krugersdorp (Mr. M. J. Van den Berg), that the Railway charges on some forms of produce amounts to three times the price secured in the market. For a statement like that to go abroad and to be regarded as being of general application would be definitely unwise.

That happens every day.

It happens every day, but it is not due to our Railway tariffs, especially if we bear in mind that they are among the lowest in the world for certain classes of goods, and that they can only operate in South Africa because of the high rates imposed on other traffic which, after all, have to carry, from a financial point of view, the very low rates given to the agricultural community in this country. I say that those low rates are fully justified in the interest of that important section of our community which, after all, has to be protected. I am referring to the farming industry. But I want to add this, that the question of the price of goods upon markets such as Johannesburg is not affected by Railway rates which are in force to-day. Those prices are generally affected by incorrect and unscientific handling of the market. A glut takes place and produce is sold for next to nothing, and then the Railway rates are blamed. It seems to me that a more scientific system of bringing produce from the primary producer to the great markets of this country would result in better returns, and would enable the agricultural community of this country to appreciate more fully the very low tariffs which the Railways grant. No, I trust the Minister will be firm on this point, not only firm in the interests of transportation, but in the interest of the farming community of this country. I hope he will maintain the principle of this Bill, which is intended to apply from a national point of view in the general interest, and particularly that of the primary producers of the country. We have this Central Transportation Board, which holds the balance between the various interests, and if there is any idea that it is out to protect the Railway Administration specially, well, I would say that the Railway Administration needs no such protection from the Central Transportation Board. The Railways are run in the national interest, and the Central Transportation Board is expected to administer and advise in the national interest; and that board will safely hold the balance between the various forms of transportation.

I desire to associate myself with some of the other members, especially with the hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Warren), when he expressed his regret that the little time at our disposal to go into this Bill was so very short. We want to admit the fact that the Bill was published, but in view of the information at our disposal, and the memorandum submitted to us, the time at our disposal was in any case very short. This Motor Transportation Act, of course, was first of all introduced here in order to protect the Railways, and I do not think anyone can object to that. The Railways are here to develop the country and to create opportunities for expansion, and as such we appreciate the Railways. At the same time, however, the Act can be applied in such a manner as rather to overdo things in that direction, and although the Railways are essential the other transportation services are also essential. As the hon. member who has just sat down has emphasised, the Railways provide a protection for the farming community, and that being so the Railways must be protected, but at the same time we have to point out that the farming community can be made to suffer if the Road Transportation Board acts unwisely in the application of the law. May I quote an instance which has already been referred to? On the platteland we sometimes have distances of eight to ten miles over which goods are not allowed to be carried by road but have to be carried by rail at an expensive rate, owing to the fact that the loading and offloading of those goods render their transportation very expensive. In my own constituency I recently had a request made to me, that some amendment should be brought about in that particular regard. Wine is put on a lorry at Groot Drakenstein. It has to be taken by lorry to the station. It is put on the train, and then it is sent a short distance to Paarl station, where it has to be offloaded again. It means a lot of additional handling of the commodity. It is a commodity which is carried in hogsheads, which are very heavy to handle. But, in addition, we have this fact, that if the Railways have to be used for the transportation of this commodity, then we require a great many more hogsheads to do that work than if the article could be carried by road by means of lorries, and in present conditions when barrels are so tremendously expensive, and when there is a shortage of barrels, the present practice is causing a lot of inconvenience to the farming population. That being so, although this Bill is essential, as I have said, we want to warn the Goovernment that if the powers which are being granted here to the Road Transportation Board are applied in an exaggerated manner, the Bill will cause as much harm and discomfort to the farmers as in other respects it may prove beneficial, and it may deprive people of the opportunities to make a living out of transportation services which they have been carrying on in the past. In the past those people have made their living out of the transportation services, and if this Act is applied in an exaggerated manner, their chances of making a living may be interfered with or may be entirely ruined.

I could not help reflecting during the course of the discussion on this Bill, that time brings its revenges. I remember in 1930 fighting to the death my hon. friends opposite because they wanted to place the Motor Transportation Act upon the statute book. I got no sympathy from them, I got no assistance from them. This pretty little child of the then Government, which to-day I am prepared to say is not so unpresentable as I thought it might be, has literally turned and bitten the hand that fed it; there is not a single member on the opposide side who has had a good word to say for it to-day. Well, you did not take my advice then, and you were wrong apparently; take my advice to-day and be right, pass this amending Bill, and at any rate do something to put this very unsatisfactory measure into shape. Well now, Mr. Speaker, I don’t propose at this late hour to delay the House unduly in discusing the various points raised. For the most part those who have discussed the Bill dealt with it rather on the general question of the Road Transportation Board than on the question of the Bill itself, in other words the discussion would have been more appropriate to the vote on the Road Transportation Board than in connection with this actual amending Bill, and I do not propose to deal with any discussion which did not have actual bearing on the Bill itself. I would like, first of all, to make clear that there is an error in the memo, which had been circulated, and I should be glad if members will take note of it. On page 12 of the memo, a reference is made in Clause 4, line 6 from the top, to paragraph “f.” That should read paragraph “g.” It may be very confusing if members do not have that correct. The hon. member for Swellendam (Mr. Warren) applied his criticism to the whole Act, the whole Act from his point of view is wrong, and most of the criticism applied to the whole transportation system in this country. He wants no regulations for the farmers, the farmers he wants to put above the law. Well, the farmers get many exemptions and privileges, but I don’t think it would be reasonable for them to be exempted from the law altogether. Even when you live on the platteland, it is just as well to obey the law, and you can’t expect just because you live on the platteland to be above the law. I think the privileges that the farmers have got are such that they should be well satisfied. It will be a very sorry day for the hon. member for Swellendam and for everybody living on the platteland, if some reasonable form of protection is not given to the railways. He complains about no time being given to him for a study of this Bill.

No, I said the memorandum.

Well, if he had studied the Bill the hon. member would not have needed the memorandum. The Bill was published in November, as the hon. member for Queenstown pointed out, and not only was the Bill gazetted then, but later on a statement was published in the press giving details. Of course, the hon. member for Swellendam has no time to attend to legislation in this House. The hon. member is carrying on the whole work of the Opposition at the present moment, he and about three others, the hon. member, I think, has probably made more speeches this session than any other member of the House, and I understand his difficulty. But if he will hand over some of the work of carrying on the Opposition to some others, he will have a little more time to study the Bill. Anyhow, it is now the week-end, and if he will concentrate on the Bill and the memorandum, he will be able, I am sure, to help us to put this Bill through.

You ought to go to the bioscope to-night.

Well, I have no objection to the hon. member going to the bioscope. If he does. I have no doubt he will come on Monday as well informed as if he spent the night studying this Bill. However, I seem to be striking a contentious note, and that was not my intention. This is a non-contentious, non-party matter, and I have no desire to run it on party lines. I am only anxious to carry out the purposes of the Transportation Act in an equitable and fair way to all the interests concerned. He suggested that we make a larger revenue out of this Act through the large number of fees we make. He suggested that I am very much interested in bringing more exemptions in, because then I will make more “five-bobs.” But I want to tell him that the surplus of revenue over expenditure last year was £80, so he can see that that will not go very far towards meeting the salary of the Minister of Railways.

This is for the protection of the railways and they ought to pay for the administration.

The railways don’t get any more protection than any other transport owner in this country. I know that that has been alleged, but it is not true. Then the hon. member said in regard to these fees that lorry owners generally were poor men and should be exempted from the payment of fees. After all, you cannot do public transport without a certain amount of money, it is not a thing that a man can do without any money; if he does it without any money it is usually to the danger of the public. If, in fact, people are running lorries on our public roads, carrying people or goods, and have no money to keep those lorries up, then they are a danger, and they are the very people we should keep off the roads. I don’t think a fee of five shillings for a lorry owner running for hire is going to ruin him. I think that deals with all the points raised by my friend from Swellendam. We now come to the hon. member for South Coast (Mr. Neate). His criticism is not a matter for this Bill at all, but a matter for discussion with the Road Transportation Board. The hon. member for Swellendam suspects that I interfere with the working of the Road Board in the interests of the railways, and now the hon. member for South Coast comes along and wants me to tell the Transportation Board to extend the free delivery area in Durban.

No, I did not say that.

I suggest to the hon. member that I should not interfere with the discretion of the Road Transportation Board, which is an independent body, and I never interfere with its decisions whether they are for or against the railway. If the hon. member makes his representations to the board they will be sympathetically considered. The hon. member for Cape Eastern (Mrs. Ballinger) raised a point which I think is a legitimate one. She fears that we shall put up the costs against the nonEuropean. Well, I don’t think it needs to do so, but if it does it will only put up the cost by the amount that it takes to ensure public safety, and that need not be very much. In any case it is essential. My view is that if the economic need is there transportation will be forthcoming. The railways themselves do a great deal in that particular way. You know the South African Railways carry natives for two-fifths of a penny per head per mile, and if they take a return fare, for three-tenth of a penny per mile. I think it will be difficult, in any circumstances, to visualise any cheaper fares than those. And we have bus fares which are even on a better basis. The railways run buses on the Rand, and they will run them anywhere where they are needed more or less on the same rates, on the basis of 1d. for 2½ miles if it is paid for in cash, and ¾d. if it is paid for in coupons. So that by bus or by train the railways are prepared to meet the native requirements in the matter of transport on the lowest possible scale, and I don’t think we need worry very much about the possibility of putting certain transport drivers out of business. The hon. member for Namaqualand (Lt.-Col. Booysen) suggested that it would hit the platteland if this Bill went through. I can only suggest to the hon. member, who is not here, that if that is so it has been hitting the platteland for ten years, because we are not only doing nothing more to affect the platteland, but we are really, in one or two respects, giving the platteland relief. If the Act has been hitting the platteland for the past ten years it will not perhaps be quite so bad if he will agree to pass this measure. The hon. member for Zululand (Mr. Egeland) wanted a consolidating measure. Well, we propose to publish the Bill in consolidated form immediately this amending measure is passed, so that the whole legislation on this subject shall be under one cover. In regard to the point he makes, I could not quite follow why he read dangers into Clause 13, but if on investigation I find that his fears are legitimate, I am perfectly prepared to consider an amendment to that clause, so that no special protection is given to public authorities. All that we want to lay down is that where a public authority is running a service and an extension is required to that service, they shall have the first opportunity of extending that service themselves. If they don’t do that when it is offered to them, then the certificate will be given to somebody else. Before the hon. member spoke I proposed to make an amendment by including the words “motor bus” as well. So that if any private owner is doing the service in any area he shall be protected. The hon. member for Graaff-Reinet (Dr. Bremer) dealt with one or two cases of injustice, but I think for the most part, as he will admit, they have now been removed. He was really referring to conditions which applied some years ago. With regard to the hon. member for Illovo, (Mr. Marwick) I think he is misreading the Act altogether. The reason we have put in this addition clause about carrying passengers for reward is to try and control the very thing that he is objecting to. We cannot prevent tradesmen from bringing people to their stores by car if they wish. In the past they have done that by way of taxi cabs and in other ways, and they held that because they are not doing it for reward they are exempt from the Act. We are now providing that whether they do it for reward or merely to bring customers to their shops “in furtherance of their business,” they come within the ambit of this Act, and will require exemption certificates. Whether that will enable the Central Transportation Board to stop the practice I do not know, but it will enable the board to control it. With regard to the hon. member for Jeppe (Mrs. Solomon), I sympathise with her demand for third party risk insurance. That was in the original Act of 1930, but it was thrown out by my hon. friends opposite, and I have no intention of bringing it in in this measure. I think that is a matter which can very well be dealt with in other ways. It would only in any case apply to such transport as were regulated by the Central Transportation Board. If you are going to apply third party risk insurance you should apply it to every form of road transportation. The point made by the hon. member for Worcester (Mr. Wolfaard) is being met in the Bill. We are amending the Act so that you are not confined to sending your goods to the nearest station, but you can now send them to the most suitable station. The Act is being amended in the very way the hon. member wants it. I have already dealt with the 5/- fee. With regard to the hon. member for Prieska (Mr. Geldenhuys), he wants us to arrange that the exemptions shall be given locally. Consideration has from time to time been given to the possibility of doing that. It is an extremely difficult thing to do. There must be one controlling authority, otherwise there will be overlapping and exemptions granted in one area and not in another, and whilst I have a certain amount of sympathy with the simplification of getting exemptions, I have not yet found a practical way of doing that. If such a method can be devised I am prepared to give consideration to it. The hon. member has rather an anti-railway complex, and so far as his complaints about the Railways are concerned I shall see that the attention of the Minister is drawn to them, and I have no doubt he will give them sympathetic consideration. The board controls areas outside the Railways, and the fact that it does that shows that it protects private concerns and is not only interested in the Railways. I have already pointed out that we have only a surplus of £80 in the Road Board’s funds with which to meet charges for certificates. I was not quite sure whether these were the funds to be used or whether the Railway surpluses are to pay for these certificates. If Railway surpluses are to be used then I suggest we would be encouraging an undesirable practice, we would be putting the board in bond to the Railways, and that is not desirable. Let them be as independent as possible. He also complained that this Act had hit private carriers. On the contrary, I say quite seriously that if it had not been for this Act there would have been very few private carriers operating to-day. This Act protects the private carrier. The hon. member for Malmesbury (Mr. Loubser) made the point about the nearest railway station. That is already dealt with in the Act. He also suggested that the Bill should go to Select Committee, but I suggest that it would be better for the hon. member to read the Bill and then he will find that there is nothing to send the Bill to a Select Committee about. I do not think there is any other point that calls for reply. Once more I want to assure the House that I am perfectly prepared in Committee to meet any reasonable amendments that do not interfere with the purpose of the Bill.

Motion put and agreed to.

Bill read a second time; House to go into Committee on the Bill on 3rd. February.

I move—

I second.

By direction of Mr. Speaker,

The following Order, dated the 26th August, 1940, was read by the Clerk, viz.:

1. (1) Government business shall have precedence on Tuesdays and Fridays after notices of Questions have been disposed of;
2. (2) on each sitting day the House shall meet at half-past ten o’clock a.m.; and business shall be suspended at a quarter to one o’clock p.m. and resumed at a quarter past two o’clock p.m. and again suspended at six o’clock p.m. and resumed at eight o’clock p.m.; and
3. (3) Saturdays shall be included as sitting days, Government business to have precedence, but on such days the House (if not sooner adjourned) shall be adjourned at six o’clock p.m. instead of eleven o’clock p.m., and the provisions of Standing Order No. 26 (eleven o’clock rule) shall mutatis mutandis apply.

Motion put and agreed to.

I move—

1. (1) on Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays evening sittings shall commence after the twenty-fourth sitting day instead of after the eleventh sitting day as provided in Standing Order No. 25; and
2. (2) on Fridays Government business shall have precedence and evening sittings shall commence after the sixty-fifth sitting day instead of after the fifty-first sitting day as provided in Standing Order No. 41 (2).

seconded.

Agreed to.