I move—

I may just say that it is not usual to make a speech at this stage in regard to a Bill which a member of the House wishes to introduce. But this Bill is of such importance that I feel I would be neglecting my duty to a certain extent if I did not say something about it, and that for this reason: I have heard that certain members of this House, the group which represents the Natives, are going to oppose the Bill even at this stage. I hope those members will show a greater sense of responsibility towards the House, and will follow the usual procedure of the House and will not divert from it, and that they will not oppose the Bill at this stage. Let me just say this: they may think that if they do so at this stage they will perhaps achieve a reputation for themselves outside the House, but I want to tell them that they must not lose sight of the fact that they only represent certain voters, and they will find that if they go about things in this way other members will also avail themselves of those methods, and then things will go very hard with them and with anything they bring before this House. I therefore want to make a special appeal to those members not to oppose the Bill at this stage. Let me say this, as the Act stands to-day it is an antiquated law, dating back to 1856 and 1879. It is an antiquated law, and conditions of to-day are entirely different from what they were in those days. The law has to be amended. There is naturally also a tendency in this House to feel that the law instead of being amended because it is antiquated should be entirely removed from the Statute Book. Let me say in this connection that I have on previous occasions stated in this House that the time had come for the Government of the day to assume the responsibility of bringing that law into line with the customs of the people, and I say that if ever there was a time when it was necessary for the Government to do so, this is the time. I want to make a special appeal to the Government to bring in a consolidating measure under conditions prevailing to-day if they find that they cannot see eye to eye with me. Then we also have this position to-day, and I want to give hon. members the assurance that that is so, that labourers are drawn away from the farms as they are being recruited for the war, and that being so it is even more necessary than it was in the past that we should come to the aid of the farming population. And may I also be allowed to say this to the House, that it is not only the farming population which should be assisted, but we are also concerned with the housewife on the platteland as well as in the town, as those people are experiencing great difficulties with their servants. The position is an extremely difficult one. We do not know where we are, and for that reason it is more necesesary to-day than ever before to introduce an amendment to the existing law. I therefore want to express the hope that members on the opposite side of the House—and I make a special appeal to them —who know what the conditions are on the platteland, and who are conversant with the difficulties with which the farmers have to contend, will realise that they must cooperate with the platteland, because if they fail to do so the time will come when great friction will arise between the inhabitants of the platteland and the inhabitants of the towns. If there is one thing which we should try to avoid it is that there should be a clash of interest between the platteland and the towns. The people of the towns cannot expect the farmers to be satisfied if they are from time to time stopped and interfered with by our trying to look after their interests. To-day this Bill is needed even more than ever before, because it is a fact that the war position has brought about such a condition of affairs that people are taken away from the platteland, with the result that the farmer finds it extremely difficult to obtain the necessary labour. I therefore ask in those circumstances, and I want to make an appeal to the Native representatives, not again to make these old irresponsible allegations which they made in the past. The hon. member for Cape Eastern (Mrs. Ballinger) stated on a previous occasion that the farmers should do more to provide diversion in order to make them attractive to the labourers. I want to express the hope that she will at least get some knowledge of the conditions of the country, and that, now that she has gone into the position, she will no longer hold the views which she held in the past, and will not in that respect criticise this Bill in that way. I want to make an appeal to hon. members over there not to oppose the Bill in those circumstances at the present stage, but to allow it to be introduced, and every member of the House can thereafter express his views on it. We shall then be able to ascertain what are the feelings of the majority of the House.

I second.

The hon. member for Prieska (Mr. Geldenhuys) has already announced the intention of members of these benches to oppose his motion. I should be sorry to disappoint him, and I shall explain in a few minutes why we are opposing his motion.

I take it the hon. member opposes this motion.

Yes.

I wish to refer the hon. member to Standing Order No. 40, which states the order in which notices have to be set on the Order Paper, and says—

If the hon. member will accordingly confine herself to a brief statement I shall then put the question and leave it to the House to decide whether the debate should be adjourned or not.

It was my intention to confine myself to a very brief statement knowing that the main business before the House is the Notice of Motion of the Leader of the Opposition. I know it is not usual to oppose motions of this kind, unless one’s feelings are deeply engaged on the matter. On this matter my feelings are deeply engaged. I feel it is not the sort of motion which should come on the Order Paper of this House at all. That is my reason for opposing it at this stage. It is a motion which is singularly objectionale to the people I represent. I regard it, in addition, as a serious slur on the character of the employers of this country, and I believe also that it is a slur on the members of the Party to which the hon. member for Prieska belongs. I also believe that it contained a serious reflection on this country. Those are the points which I hope to argue on a future occasion.

Mr. SPEAKER put the question—

Agreed to.

Debate adjourned; to be resumed on 7th February.

I move:

It is not necessary for me to explain the position in regard to this motion. The second reading of this Bill was passed last year with only seven dissentients. I trust therefore that the House will pass this mtion.

I second.

Mr. Speaker …

Does the hon. member oppose the motion?

Yes.

Then the hon. member must follow the example of the hon. member who opposed the first notice of motion and give a brief explanation, after which I shall put the adjournment of the debate.

I shall be very brief. As the hon. member for Newcastle (Mr. Nel) has already said, this Bill was read a second time with only seven dissentients, but the majority of the members of the House did not appreciate the implications of this Bill, and as an enquiry has been made since that time it has been found that there are certain provisions in this Bill which will be to the greatest detriment of a large number of small Afrikaans business concerns which are already in existence. The reason why I oppose the Bill at this stage is because I have repeatedly made attempts to induce the hon. member to accept certain amendments—I tried to do so during the last session, but he consistently refused to accept those amendments. I therefore want to inform him that unless he expresses his willingness to accept certain amendments in part 1 of the Bill a large number of members on this side of the House, and a number of members on the other side of the House, will oppose all the various stages of this Bill.

The provisions to which I refer are contained in part 1 of the Bill, and if the measure is accepted without amendments it will be known as the Mutual Aid Act of the Attorneys. I feel, therefore, that for the sake of those Afrikaans business firms which find it difficult to make a living, and which do certain work in connection with estates and wills, certain provisions should be deleted. I hope the hon. member will accept the adjournment of the debate so that this matter may be discussed fully at a later stage. There is a very important motion on the Order Paper, namely, the vote of no confidence, and I am sure the House wants to start off with that.

Mr. SPEAKER put the Question:

Upon which the House divided:

Ayes—47:

Badenhorst, A. L.

Badenhorst, C. C. E.

Bekker, S.

Bezuidenhout, J. T.

Boltman, F. H.

Booysen, W. A.

Bosman, P. J.

Bremer, K.

Brits, G. P.

Conradie, J. H.

De Bruyn, D. A. S.

De Wet, J. C.

Du Toit, C. W. M.

Erasmus, F. C.

Fullard, G. J.

Grobler, J. H.

Hirsch, J. G.

Hugo, P. J.

Labuschagne, J. S.

Liebenberg, J. L. V.

Lindhorst, B. H.

Long, B. K.

Loubser, S. M.

Louw, E. H.

Malan, D. F.

Naudé, S. W.

Olivier, P. J.

Pieterse, P. W. A.

Pirow, O.

Schoeman, B. J.

Strauss, E. R.

Strydom, J. G.

Swart, A. P.

Van den Berg, C. J.

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

Van Nierop, P. J.

Venter, J. A. P.

Viljoen, D. T. du P.

Viljoen, J. H.

Vosloo, L. J.

Wallach, I.

Warren, S. E.

Wentzel, J. J.

Werth, A. J.

Wolfaard, G. v. Z.

Tellers: J. J. Haywood and P. O. Sauer.

Noes—81:

Abrahamson, H.

Acutt, F. H.

Alexander, M.

Allen, F. B.

Baines, A. C. V.

Ballinger, V. M. L.

Bawden, W.

Bekker, G.

Bell, R. E.

Blackwell, L.

Botha, H. N. W.

Bowen, R. W.

Bowie, J. A.

Bowker, T. B.

Burnside, D. C.

Christopher, R. M.

Collins, W. R.

Conradie, J. M.

Conroy, E. A.

Davis, A.

Deane, W. A.

De Kock, A. S.

Derbyshire, J. G.

De Wet, H. C.

Dolley, G.

Du Plessis, P. J.

Du Toit, R. J.

Egeland, L.

Faure, P. A. B.

Fourie, J. P.

Friedlander, A.

Geldenhuys, C. H.

Gruckman, H.

Goldberg, A.

Hare, W. D.

Hayward, G. N.

Henderson, R. H.

Heyns, G. C. S.

Hooper, E. C.

Howarth, F. T.

Humphreys, W. B.

Jackson, D.

Johnson, H. A.

Kentridge, M.

Klopper, L. B.

Madeley, W. B.

Marwick, J. S.

Miles-Cadman, C. F.

Moll, A. M.

Molteno, D. B.

Mushet, J. W.

Naudé, J. F. T.

Neate, C.

Nel, O. R.

Oost, H.

Quinlan, S. C.

Reitz, L. A. B.

Rooth, E. A.

Schoeman, N. J.

Shearer, V. L.

Smuts, J. C.

Solomon, B.

Stallard, C. F.

Steyn, C. F.

Steyn, G. P.

Steytler, L. J.

Strydom, G. H. F.

Sturrock, F. C.

Sutter, G. J.

Theron, P.

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.

Van Zyl, J. J. M.

Verster, J. D. H.

Wares, A. P. J.

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

Question accordingly negatived.

I want to say something at this stage on the subject now under discussion, but I want to be very brief because I want the motion of the Leader of the Opposition to be dealt with, and I must say that I am very sorry the hon. member was unable to accept the adjournment of the debate. I still hope, however, that the hon. member for Newcastle (Mr. Nel) will be prepared to accept a few amendments which are not of great importance, in the Committee stage. They are not of a drastic nature. I only want to add, however, that if the hon. member is going to force this Bill through with the aid of the majority which he may perhaps be able to obtain, it will be a blot on him and on the hon. members who support him, especially members of the legal profession, because it will amount to this, that they are helping themselves—mutual help. I hope the hon. member will think over this matter, and that when we are in Committee he will accept certain amendments which affect the first part of the Bill only, because the second part of the Bill is excellent and should be passed.

I don’t want to hold up the House, but I do want to make the position perfectly plain as far as this Bill is concerned. It is divided into two parts. The second part deals with the Law Society, with which we are not concerned, but the first part cuts right across the functions of trust companies, and has been a matter of great consideration and interest to many of us. Last April, when this was first discussed, there was a very definite arrangement made between ourselves and those responsible for the Bill, upon certain lines. I am now told by those responsible for the Bill that they are casting aside that arrangement of last April. Under these circumstances I have no option but to oppose this Bill at every possible stage.

Surely the hon. member who is responsible for the Bill intends to reply to this charge. Here my hon. friend who sits next to me has made a deliberate statement that the hon. member is trying to trick the House into taking this Bill at the same stage as it reached last session, and has gone back on the agreement with the trust companies, which was one of the conditions upon which the Bill reached the stage it did last session.

It is perfectly untrue.

If the hon. member will allow me to continue, I was just pointing out to the hon. member, who seems not to realise the position in which he is involved, my hon. friend here has deliberately made that charge against him, and it is not right that this House should proceed to vote on this matter until the hon. member has answered the charge.

Original motion put and agreed to.

House to go into Committee on the Bill on 21st February.

I move—

Mr. J. M. CONRADIE seconded.

Agreed to.

House go into Committee on the Bill on 7 th February.

I move—

Mr. Speaker, the wording of the motion which I am moving is that the House expresses its non-confidence in the Government. You will observe that the wording is not negative, it does not say that this House has no confidence or not sufficient confidence in the Government, but the motion is positive, and it definitely expresses non-confidence in the Government. I believe that, all things being taken into consideration, the wording which I have chosen for the motion is completely justified. I do not think that there can be circumstances which could justify the motion of such a kind more than the position in which we are to-day. Moreover, I believe that this motion comes at a very appropriate time. After what took place on the Witwatersrand last Friday night and last Saturday night, and especially after the extremely unsatisfactory statement which was made in connection with that by the Prime Minister yesterday, I believe that a revealing light has been thrown on the whole position in our country in connection with conditions in the country generally. Taking everything into consideration, this motion and the debate in connection with it, comes at an extremely suitable moment. I shall come back again later to what I said a moment ago. I would also like to give the House the assurance that we are not dealing here entirely with a party manoeuvre. I believe that this motion expresses what a large section, if not the largest section of the population of the country, feel, and I do not for a single moment doubt that if the feeling of the people were to be tested on this point, that the majority of them would support what is contained in this motion. When you look at the speeches from the platform, then this Government boasts about the great support is has not only for its war policy, but also for the way it is conducting the administration of the country. Then they make out that they not only have the support of the public, but that the support on the part of the public is beginning to increase. When they make that statement they forget they have systematically refused from the very commencement to go to the country on this point, that they have systematically refused, in connection with this most serious matter, which affects the whole future of the people closely, to make an appeal to the country and to get a mandate from the country. I say that in my opinion it is nothing else than boasting, and that in reality the people, as a whole, or rather the majority of the people, feel as hon. members on this side of the House feel in regard to these matters. Recently a test was made in the Free State, more particularly with regard to this question. That test, so far as it affects our side of the House, was made under the most unfavourable circumstances, so far as we are concerned, and I think that the Government were not only, so far as the result of the matter was concerned, bitterly disappointed with the result, but that it also, taking all the circumstances into consideration, cannot regard it as anything else but a clear indication of the feelings of the public in regard to this matter. I want, in passing, just to point out that during every war there is always a section of the population who, when you are faced by the outbreak of war, and you would face them with the choice of whether they would vote for the war, whether they would be in favour of the war, whether they are in favour of the country plunging itself into such a war, which would in that case express itself in favour of keeping out of the war, which would vote for a policy of neutrality. But when once the war is going on, then they will take up the attitude, although originally they were against the war, that they are now prepared to assist the Government in any respect in regard to the conduct of the war, and not to hinder it. They take up the attitude that they will assist in seeing the war through, but that they will settle with the Government after the war. In spite of the presence of such a section, undoubtedly in South Africa as well, the position is as I have here described. If the Government thinks that it is acting so much in conformity with the will of the people, then I want to point out to the Government that after such a war the reaction comes inevitably. I want to remind him of the fact that after the World War not one of all the governments which were in office in the different countries during the war, whether the war was lost or the war was won by those countries, remain in office. All of them disappeared from the scene within a year, and I prophesy that after the end of the war the same fate will befall this Government.

So far as South Africa is concerned, that did not happen after the last war.

With regard to South Africa I admit that my statement is not quite correct, because the government of the day remained in office, but it only remained standing on one leg, and to continue in office it had to go and borrow another leg to stand on, the leg of the Unionist Party. The reply which I shall undoubtedly get in the course of the debate on this motion will once more be the one whether it would be wise and desirable to introduce a motion of no confidence at this time, whether then I am forgetting that we are at war, and whether in war time it is necessary or desirable to move motions of this kind, criticising and attacking the Government, and in that way to handicap the war effort of the Government. The answer that I would like to give on that point is this, in the first place, that it is not my view that a motion of no confidence, a motion like this, is out of place. If no criticism or no thorough criticism worthy of the name can be made of the Government in war time, then it means nothing less that in time of war the Government can just mess up things as it pleases. A time of war is just the time that the people, and especially the Opposition in Parliament, should keep a watchful eye over all the acts of the Government. At such a time the Government possesses more powers, is entrusted with more powers by Parliament and the people than at any other time, and as the Government have more powers, it is necessary for a watchful eye to be kept over the way in which the powers are used. That is the time when passions are aroused, when feelings run high, and when feelings run high then the appreciation of right and wrong is often dulled amongst the public; then the public all too easily have a blind eye to the real and permanent interests of the public themselves. It is therefore just in time of war that it is necessary for an Opposition to keep a watchful eye over these things, and for the Opposition to criticise the Government. We not only have to think of the necessity of exercising criticism on the actions of the Government, but I think that it is especially necessary at this time for us to look further than that, further into the future. The war is a temporary thing, war will pass, but the people will remain, and it is necessary that at such a time it should be asked whether the Government is acting in such a way that the permanent interests of the people will not suffer damage, possibly irreparable damage. Every war, including the World War, showed us that any war has its sequelae. For years on end the nations, especially those who took part in the World War, spoke of the “aftermath of war.” They had to deal with problems which were born out of the war. So also shall we, in turn, have our inheritance from this war. The question, however, is not only the new problems which will arise in consequence of the war, but we in South Africa already had to face problems which were almost insoluble, and this Government is now engaged in spending enormous sums of money in connection with its war policy, with the result that we shall not be able effectively to tackle the great and the old problems, of which more than anything else the salvation and welfare, and the future on our country and its population, depend. I do not want to say much about the fact that we have been dragged into this war. That is a matter which, since the 4th September, has already been debated in this House on several occasions, and I do not want unnecessarily to occupy the time of the House with it, but I do want, in the first place, to say this, that in connection with this point that we have been drawn into the war, there is a duty resting on us to protest, and to protest again, and not to weaken our opposition in any respect. For this reason: That on the 4th September, when the resolution was passed by the House, it was revealed that there was a deep-seated and unbridgeable difference between this side of the House and the Prime Minister and his followers on the other side.

War was declared, not as a matter of expediency. The attitude which we took up was not a matter of expediency. We did not regard it from that point of view, but there was between the two sides a deep and unbridgeable difference of point of view, and that led to our attitude on that day.

On our side also, on both sides.

Precisely, that is what I am saying. There was exhibited in connection with the matter the same deep, unbridgeable difference which has unhappily run right through the whole of our history in this country.

Who is the cause?

You can plunge the country into war for the sake of England, or because England is at war, or for the sake of France, or for the sake of Poland, which was the immediate cause of the war.

What about our own interests?

You are able to do so on that side, we on this side were not in a position to prevent it. Once and for all we cannot approve of it, and the reason for that is that with us there is a completely different point of view, a completely different outlook with regard to this matter, with all the affairs of our country. We regard them from the point of view of South Africa’s interests and South African nationalism, and you on the other side of the House regard them chiefly from the attitude of British Imperialism. I believe that, taken as a whole, there is no one in this House and no one outside of it who does not long for what is usually described as national unity. National unity is in the interests of South Africa, something desirable, something to be wished for, something to acquire which we ought to use all our powers of attainment. There will, however, be no national unity in the country as long as the difference which runs right through the history of South Africa, continues to exist in the country. While that lasts you will not get it. There are only two ways to get it, and the one is that we should all take up the attitude of the British Imperialist, that we should all also identify ourselves with the interests of a nation or a country overseas. If you do that then it means that South African nationalism will either be dwarfed or it must die. Only then will you in that way on that basis get national unity in the country. And the other alternative for getting national unity in the country is that everybody should take up the attitude that everyone should accept South Africa’s own nationhood to the fullest degree, and not only accept it in words, but should, as a matter of fact, live it out in practice. If everyone accepted that attitude you would also get national unity. I think, however, that experience in South Africa has taught us this—all the experience that we have had: That you will never get it as long as British Imperialism in South Africa can get a firm footing, as long as the British connection exists, and as long as by virtue of the British connection it can on each occasion be argued that there shall happen what happened here on the 4th September and thereafter. If you do not get the length in South Africa of seeing that the British connection, with all its implications, as interpreted here by a section of the population and by the Prime Minister and his followers, is broken, then the apple of discord in South Africa between one section and the other will remain. Then you will never get national unity here, but South Africa will then be doomed to eternal discord —unless the nationality minded section of the population is prepared to sacrifice the self-respect of South Africa. There can be no peace between nationalism and imperialism, and there can be no compromise of any kind. On the 4th September you on the other side, your Government, chose the Empire and we opposed it, because we took up a sound South African attitude, and because we did so, we opposed you. In connection with the arguments which are being used to justify the attitude of the other side of the House, especially the argument that they believe that they made the choice because it was in the interests of South Africa, I want to add the following: I think that I am saying here, without objection on the part of any unprejudiced impartial person, that if South Africa had not the British connection, if South Africa had not been linked up with England, then no one, no responsible section in the country when the war broke out, would have dreamt of being in favour of South Africa also taking part in the war. In addition, we do not believe in the view which you on your side hold as to what is actually our duty at the present time. Your idea of what our duty is is apparently this: That if there is anything wrong, if there is anything largely or radically wrong in any other part of the world, provided England also is concerned in the matter, then we must also interest ourselves in it, then we must also go and put right or assist in putting right the thing that is wrong. That you regard as our duty, just imagine! A small white population of 2,000,000, barely 2,000,000, living in a new and to a great extent still undeveloped country, a small population with big problems and questions looking it in the face, and a tremendous task to carry out, a task to maintain the white civilisation here, in South Africa, must solve the difficulties in other parts of the world! We in South Africa have that tremendous task, and the great questions stare us in the face, and we have a large section of the population living below the bread line. Just imagine! It is the duty of this small population to go and put everything right in the great world. And that while even England, as far as you can judge, is not prepared to go and put right what she decided and solemnly undertook to go and put right. England disapproved, and strongly disapproved of the annexation by Russia of three small states, Lithunia, Estonia and Latvia. I believe that there is no longer to-day any question of the giving back of their freedom and independence to those countries. We do not hear a word about it any longer. There was also Poland, the immediate cause of the war, and a solemn undertaking on the part of England to guarantee Poland’s independence. Poland was cut in half. Germany got one part and Russia got the other part. I would like to know from the Prime Minister—I have not yet heard it in a statement by one of the English statesmen—whether it is going to be an aim or object of the war that Poland should be made free, not only from Germany but also from Russia. I fear that in this case things will go as happened in the judgment of Solomon, where the pretended mother made the announcement: I am prepared if I get my way—and she would not even get her way—to see the baby divided in two. We do not believe that this war is being waged in the holy name of democracy and Christianity. It remains to be seen when this war is over what will remain of democracy even in England. We must not forget that England, as is already the case, but much more so at the end of this war, will be a completely exhausted country. There is no doubt about it that the propertied classes, and more particularly the middle class in that country, will be completely eliminated, and in those circumstances what will remain of the old institutions in that country? Will England, in those circumstances, remain on a democratic basis, and do so after she has experienced to the full in this war, how effective and how efficient another sytem is? That is the question, and apart from the question whether England will remain a democratic country, there is the cry of Christianity, that that is the reason why we must carry on the war. This is the first time that I have heard that Christianity needs to be protected to be benefited by the sword. The most un-Christian principle to follow is the idea that Christianity is to be protected or promoted by the sword. Christianity does not need the sword. On the contrary, if Christianity has to be protected or promoted, or if an attempt has to be made to benefit Christianity by the sword, then it has always yet appeared to be a hopeless failure, and, what is more, to test the honesty with which these arguments are used—if England has got its way to establish the state of affairs which she tried to create by all the means she had in her power, then you would have had not only, as is actually the case now, that in this struggle for Christianity the whole of Jewry in the whole of the world at war, and giving every support, but you would also have had the Turks and the Russians, who have made history during recent years, of the un-Christian point of view, of an anti-religious State policy, which had become a tradition with them. Just imagine, Christianity must be furthered, and you fight shoulder to shoulder with the Jew, with the Turk and with the Russian. I do not believe that war was ever entered into by any Government in such a frivolous way as by this Government, and t hat it has been carried on in such a useless way as by this Government. If a Government plunges its country into war, then that in itself is a matter about which it should think twice, ten times and a hundred times before resolving on that step, and especially a war like this one, with its great devastation which is so serious, and, in addition, a war which involves enormous expenditure, paralysing expenditure, to a country like this. A government has to consider a long time before it goes to war. This Government did not hesitate for a moment. This Government undertook the task in spite of the fact that they knew that they were not dealing with a unanimous population, but with a population which was deeply divided on the subject, and a population which was almost equally divided on both sides about this war. I say that for any government to go to war with a people which is divided in that way is nothing else than committing a crime against its people. But what has so far been effected in connection with this matter? The war has lasted a year and a half. During that time precious little has been effected after all the costs that have been incurred on the war. You have fought more in the country against rosettes, against buttons, against beards and against jukskeis than you have fought against the enemy abroad. And even if the chances of the war were to turn, if the Prime Minister had the good fortune of putting Haile Selassie on the throne again at the cost of this country, then I still say: What is the good? What is the benefit? It is a well-known fact that the war will not be decided anywhere in South Africa. The war will and can only be decided in Europe. If the Prime Minister is not au fait with affairs so far as this point of view is concerned, then I ask him to read the news or consult with Mr. Churchill, who emphasised the point over and over again when the chances of the war took a certain turn in North Africa, that that did not affect the actual danger to England at all. The decision of the war is in the future, and the decision of the war will take place in Europe. While I am on the question of the war, there are a few things which it is necessary for this House and the public to know, and I hope that the Prime Minister will give us a little information in connection with those matters. The first is: What is the war aim of the Government, not only in co-operation with England, but what is the war aim of the Government in connection with Africa? I put this question because all kinds of loose statements have been made by one Minister or the other, but I think that it is necessary that there should be an authoritative statement on this question by the Prime Minister, as soon as it is possible. I ask this question because there are three sections in the country which, in my opinion, have a vital interest in the question, and what it stands for. The first section who put the question are the farmers. The farmers had in past years to fight against the deadening competition from the North, and they made an appeal to the Prime Minister to protect them during the former period of his Government. He refused to do so, or he only did so hesitatingly and under compulsion. If certain schemes are carried out in consequence of this war, and there is development towards the North, then the farmer asks how he will be able to live and how will he himself be able to retain his own market in his own Union, so that he can make a profitable living. He asks that question and he asks it anxiously. He is so strong on this point that he even sometimes objects to the incorporation of the native territories in the external boundaries of the Union. The other section which puts this question is the Afrikaans-speaking Afrikaner. The Afrikaans-speaking Afrikaner belongs, to a great extent, to the poor section of the population. It will then be held out to them: Support that policy, support it because there will be opened up for you far up in the North an opportunity for settlements and to make a living. That will be so. But what is coupled with it? We know at the same time that the Prime Minister also followed yet another policy in the past which he preached to us at that time, and that was that we should out of the Treasury of the Union spend at least £1,000,000 every year to introduce immigrants from overseas? Why? Because we have no suitable settlers in our own country. In other words, they want to know: Are they going to be driven out or enticed out of the Union of South Africa, and sent to the North to go there as pioneers, while strangers have to come here in large numbers to take their places in their father-land? That is the question they put. The qustion is how it would affect the racial relations in the country; how it would affect the chances of our own nationhood being maintained in the country, bearing in mind that up to the present it was practically only the Afrikaans-speaking Afrikaner who was the creator of a nationhood of his own in South Africa, and the guarantor of his own nationhood in the country. The question is, how will it be affected? A further question which is put by a different group is this—it is the group which takes an interest in the question of South Africa being and remaining a white man’s country—that the white Christian civilisation shall be safe in the country. And their question is this: If it is going to be realised as a war aim, of the Prime Minister’s as well, because he has in the past preached the same policy that South Africa’s borders are to be extended up to who knows where—we are already now hearing that the boundaries are the Equator and even beyond that—then those people ask, and I also ask—they ask anxiously, are we going to make a white man’s country of South Africa and keep it so, or are we going to make a colossal native compound of South Africa with a white patch at one end of it? I think that it is necessary for us to have an answer to these questions. There is another question which I would like to put to the Prime Minister, and that is in connection with the relations between England and America, in so far as we may ultimately be drawn into them, the relations between ourselves and America. I want, as a foundation for what I am going to say here, to mention a few facts which must not be lost sight of. The first fact is this, that Mr. Churchill at one time stated that he would defend England even if he knew that it would turn England into a heap of ruins, because even if England became a ruin then the British Navy would still be here, and then the struggle would be carried on from outside, from America with the assistance of the British Fleet. That was his statement. Our Prime Minister was immediately to the fore, and gave his blessing to it, and also his approval, on behalf of the people of this country. That is fact No. 1. Fact No. 2 is this, that America has said that the British Fleet is essential to her. That is her first line of defence, because if the British Fleet, as they say, were to be destroyed and to fall away, then the power of America to defend herself will be entirely insufficient, because she would have to protect herself on two oceans, in the North Atlantic Ocean and in the North Pacific Ocean. But because under the Monroe Doctrine she also has responsibility for South America, she will also have to be armed in order to protect South America, and that means in the South Atlantic Ocean and in the South Pacific Ocean. That is fact No. 2. The third fact is this, that England, with the assistance which is being given her by America, is always becoming more and more dependent on America. It has been made known throughout the world by England herself that she is financially exhausted. She cannot buy supplies abroad any longer. The Government must sell its financial investments abroad, and especially in America, and transfer them in order to obtain funds to buy supplies. England is becoming more and more financially and otherwise dependent on America. Coupled with this is another fact, that Americ a already has certain possessions of England, has taken over bases in American waters, and America has conducted negotiations with the consent of England whether England has negotiated jointly in them or not, with Canada, and I also understand with Australia, in order to take certain obligations on herself in order to take certain responsibility on herself towards those countries, which of course in regard to those countries also means certain undertakings to America. All that has come about recently, notwithstanding the fact that America did not come into the war, and I do not think that there are many signs that America will declare war. She will go on in the way she has acted hitherto. But she has nevertheless given notice that, when peace comes, she will not consider herself bound by the peace which is concluded, if it is concluded without her participation. She demands to have a say in the peace, and also to state her own terms. The conclusion to which I am coming from all these facts is that America is bearing carefully in mind the fact that England may lose the war, and she is serious in that view. This is proved by the accelerated tempo with which she is offering assistance, and what is still more obvious is this, that America, in view of the facts which I have mentioned, will argue in this way: If the British Fleet is essential to me, then I must eventually have the British Fleet when it can no longer have any use for England, and if England accordingly loses the war, I must try to take over as large a part of the realm of the British Empire as I possibly can take over. That is the direction things are running in, and I do not doubt that those are the demands which America will make if a peace has to be concluded in those circumstances. If this is so, then this question arises in our minds: What, under such circumstances, is to be the attitude, and what the future of South Africa: Are we simply to be handed over from some kind of authority, directly or indirectly, by one country in Europe to precisely the same position in respect of another country in America? Now I say if that happens then there will be just as strong a protest in South Africa on the part of the section of the population which sets store on its own nationhood, freedom and independence, as the protests which we are now making against British imperialism.

Do you want to have Germany here?

I am now coming to the internal conditions in regard to this war, and the first thing I want to say is this: We cannot be otherwise than disturbed because it affects our deepest interests in connection with the costs of the war, and the great proportions which they have assumed. I shall not enlarge much on this, because there are other hon. members who will do that. But I just want to say this: As I understand, there are other dominions, namely Australia, which considered it necessary when the war took this course, which was not expected at the start, in order to declare that their war efforts would have certain limits, their war expenditure would have a limit. Up to the present the war expenses and expenditure have been unlimited with us, and as £60,000,000 has already been voted, and as the speed of expenditure is always being increased and as, if the war lasts somewhat long we must bear in mind the possibility that we may have to lay a burden of £150,000,000 or £200,000,000 on the shoulders of this country, then the question is very rightly put: Where is all this going to end, and what will be the consequences of it to the country? You have managed up to the present to lay the burdens of the war at any rate on the present generation and also on the shoulders of posterity, but at any rate by finding and borrowing the money in this country itself. You succeeded in putting it in this generation on the shoulders of those who can bear it the least, and in some cases on the shoulders of those who were the most opposed to the war. There were two favourite slogans, even if you did not have the courage to put it that way publicly, in accordance with which this Government acted. The first was: Spare the mines, so far as taxation is concerned, and tax the people. We had the proofs of this last year. There was an increase of about 71% in the taxation of the public, but the increase in the case of the mines was 2%. The other question is: What is taking place in regard to our farming population? If there is one section of the population which has asked for assistance of the Government during recent years and which was justified in doing so under the conditions under which it was living, then it was the farming population. It was that section of the population which needed help the most. During the last World War the cost of production in farming rose tremendously, but the farmers were able, by means of the increased prices which prevailed at that time and were almost excessive in some cases, to reimburse themselves in some respects for the increased costs of production, and to do more than compensate themselves for it. That was the position so far as the farming population was concerned. What is the position to-day? In spite of the rose-coloured prophecies on the part of the Minister of Agriculture about the lying and rotting, the farmers are to-day producing at high cost, and their produce has, to a great extent, to lie and rot. Forgive me if I say this, that it seems that the Minister himself is in a position in which he said that the produce of the farmers would be. The farmers are not able to export their goods, or at any rate only to a limited extent. But the cost of production has gone up. There is not the least doubt of that. The rise has been considerable, but the farmers can no longer compensate themselves for the increased cost. The prices of farm produce are being restricted. The price is restricted by the Government, as in the case of the wheat farmers, with one object, and it is done in such a way that the farmer is worse off than he was before the war. He is worse off because the increased price which he is getting for his wheat is not in proportion with the increase in the cost of production. Why is the Government meddling in the matter from outside, outside of the Board of Control of the wheat industry: why is the Government out to keep the price low? Simply because it knows that an increase, that a proper reward to the farmer would affect the cost of living in the country, that the cost of living would rise, and that the Government would be asked for higher wages and higher salaries. Because they do not want to be asked for higher wages and higher salaries, they are assisting the Treasury at the expense of the farmers. In other words, the farmers are being asked to pay the war costs of this country. You have managed to do that, and to make the public bend under the financial disaster which is being prepared for our country in the future. You are distributing money wastefully in the country on a scale such as has never been known before. When anyone goes to fight in the war, it is always understood as a rule, that he will be prepared to make sacrifices. His patriotism causes him to go and fight for his country. What is happening in our country on a large scale to-day is that people go to the war because they not only have to sacrifice nothing so far as salary and wages is concerned, but because with the allowances for their families and otherwise, they are able to make more money than before. I do not want to go into the frightful waste of money that is taking place. During a case in Johannesburg only a few days ago, it came out that money was being wasted. Someone was charged with having obtained a grant for a family which was not his family under the pretence that he was in the army and his wife and children had to be maintained. It was stated on behalf of the Government on that occasion, that that was not an exceptional case, but that that sort of thing was going on on a large scale in the country to-day, and the same public prosecutor said that he had 150 more similar cases. That shows the way in which financial matters are controlled by this Government. You succeded as far as the finances are concerned, to cripple the people so much financially, that their big problems will not be able to be solved by them in the future. There are three things we would like to have in the country. Without them we cannot be satisfied. The first is that the farming population must be rehabilitated. Secondly, there must be a dividing line in residential areas between white and non-white in order to release the white population from the humiliating state of affairs, and to make sure of the white civilisation. Thirdly, we must make our country economically independent. If we were to use this money which you are spending on the war for those three things, then we should be able to carry through a redemption scheme in respect of farm mortgages, and be able to save the farming population from over-capitalisation.

A thing you never wanted to do.

You would further make it possible to carry out a scheme of separate residential areas for Europeans and nonEuropeans, which is an urgent need in our country. You would be able to make South Africa economically independent to a great extent. You would be able to give not merely a trifling amount for the establishment of an industrial corporation to put up industries, which you are not even certain whether they will continue to exist when the war is over, but you would be able to do what America is engaged in doing. The English financial investments in America are being paid out by America, and what used to be English industries on American soil are becoming American industries. Here in our country there is money invested by England, and I think that the amount invested in that, that is to say in our industries, is between £500,000,000 and £750,000,000 at least. We could have paid off the money, and assisted England in that way, and for that purpose we would then have turned our industries into South African industries. We would have gone a long way in making South Africa economically independent. My chief complaint is this, and that is what I commenced with, that this Government has created in our country during the last year and a half, since the outbreak of the war, what you can describe as nothing else but a tyranny. We have a tyranny in the country, and the tyranny is aimed against a section of the population. It is especially aimed at the Afrikaans-speaking Afrikaner. There is a background behind this process of persecuting the Afrikaans-speaking people which I would just like to mention here. The first thing is that you and your newspapers have for a long time been engaged in characterising just the section of the population which is the oldest section of the population, that section which created and to-day guarantees that South African nationhoood, as the unpatriotic sections of the population, and the aliens which have come here, and whose hearts and interests are overseas, and who still always regard themselves as a part of an oversea people you regard as the patriots of the country. I say that it is nothing else than a gross insult against the Afrikaans-speaking section of the population. The second is that this Government is apparently acting on the idea that if a crisis arises in the country, then they bear in mind the sentiments of the English-speaking section of the population, even if they are in the minority, and tread underfoot the sentiments of the Afrikaans-speaking section.

That is untrue.

He did that on the 4th September, when South Africa was faced by the choice of taking part in the war or not. You knew then what the feeling was of the Afrikaans-speaking section of the population. You paid no attention to it, but merely asked what the English-speaking section of the population desired, and what the English-speaking section would do if you remained neutral. The sentiment of the Afrikaansspeaking people apparently does not count. At this time, this time of all times, you have come and you, without being asked to do so, have changed the franchise laws of the country, and you altered the say which that section of the population which lives on the countryside had, and reduced their say.

That is not true.

You further connived at compulsion being exercised in this country on a large scale just upon the Afrikaansspeaking section of the population, to force them to take part in the war against their convictions and conscience, because they as the poorer section of the population were in a dependent position. But the worst of all is that it is no longer safe in this country for the Afrikaans-speaking people with the convictions they hold. That brings me to what happened on the Witwatersrand on Friday night and Saturday night, and to the statement which the Prime Minister made in the House yesterday in regard to the matter. And now I want to say, first of all, that the Prime Minister’s attitude astonished me, and I think the rest of the country. He, in his statement, maintained his absolute innocence, that he was quite ignorant of everything that was going on daily in the country. One would say from his statement that when the news came from Johannesburg, that it was the first that he had ever heard of troubles of that kind. One would think that he had never before heard of soldiers who had got out of hand and assaulted members of the civil population. One would say that this was the first indication that he had got of that. According to what he said, this is quite an extraordinary thing, and he made a panegyric on his army. On the whole, he disapproved of the fact that they had got out of hand on that occasion, but for the rest he uttered a hymn of praise which looked like a justification. He said that their conduct on the whole was so good, and that they came from the best sections of the population. Let me frankly say that I do not doubt that a large section of those who are in the army come from the best part of the population. I do not doubt that there are thousands in the army that you cannot describe otherwise than as men of good class and honour, but, on the other hand, I want to say this, that I think the way in which the Minister of Defence, our Prime Minister, described it, was a gross exaggeration. Let me just tell him that in this connection I remember a case in Court which was disposed of recently at Graaff-Reinet. It came before the Circuit Court. A certain Rademeyer was brought before the Court because he had held himself out as a detective, and he had collected quite a lot of money for himself by means of false pretences. He was brought before the Court for theft, and the Court convicted him. He was found guilty. But what happened then? Just because in his evidence he said that he intended to join up with the army, the judge said: “See here, this is a serious case I have had before me. I would have sent you to gaol for a time, but if you now promise that you will quite quickly join up with the army, I will make it a suspended sentence. You are free.” That is what happened at Graaff-Reinet, and it throws a light on the quality of many of the people who are in the army of the Prime Minister, and who, I do not doubt it, were responsible for the acts which the country is now calling a disgrace. I want to ask the Prime Minister whether he is so ignorant that he does not know what took place on another occasion at Johannesburg. It was on a smaller scale, but it was of the same nature. I want to ask him whether he has ever been told what trouble passengers constantly had to experience, especially if they wore a beard. For quite a time ordinary respectable people, and especially women, simply hesitated about travelling by train. They were afraid of being molested because quite a number of people had been molested, including members of Parliament. I want to ask the Prime Minister whether he does not know what is constantly going on in the streets, how Afrikaners, innocent people, are being assaulted. I want to know whether he has heard of certain buildings like the Werda Club in Johannesburg, which was attacked by soldiers, and to which considerable damage was done. Does he not also know of the soldiers who got out of hand at a place like Oudtshoorn? Does he not know of what happened at Potchefstroom, or is that a brand new occurrence to him? I also want to ask whether he is quite ignorant of the fact that in the streets of Cape Town, in consequence of the midday pause, there are still scenes of following and insulting and assaulting people taking place, day after day? Does he not know that, and does he not know that in most cases the lead is being taken in all the assaults by soldiers of his army? In connection with the midday pause, I want to remind the Prime Minister of the fact that he was approached to put an end to it. What happened further in connection with the midday pause not only throws a light on what his army is doing, but it sheds a light on what he is doing, or rather on what he is not doing. This matter of the midday pause was during the past two sessions brought in a very direct way before Parliament. The Prime Minister sat there and did not say a word about it. He went from here to the Senate, and there the same question was brought up for discussion. There he spoke. What was his answer? He said that he admitted that the midday pause in Cape Town was a mistake. He said there: “Why do they not act in Cape Town as has been done in Port Elizabeth? In Port Elizabeth they also instituted a pause for prayer in the first instance, but it led to all kinds of disorder, and the Town Council of Port Elizabeth was sensible enough to abolish it, and I advise them in Cape Town to do the same thing.” The question was then put to him by one of the senators: “Have you the power to put a stop to it?” He said, “Yes, we can do so under the emergency regulations.” The next question was “Will you do so?” The answer of the Prime Minister was, “I will do so if those riots and disorders and attacks upon people in the streets do not stop.” That was a solemn promise on which the public relied. What happened about it? The Prime Minister did absolutely nothing. He cannot plead ignorance in connection with what is still going on daily in connection with it. I presume that he reads newspapers and is informed. If it is not the Knights of Truth who enlighten him, he can surely get his information from his Department of Justice and from the detectives. He simply did nothing. This proves what the undertakings and promises of the Prime Minister in connection with these matters are worth. But he did nevertheless do something. What was it? When there was a repetition on a larger scale, when serious disorders on the part of his troops were committed, and when university students of an institution which occupies a large place in the heart of the people and which fills a big place in the lives of the people, was attacked, he then appointed a commission of enquiry in connection with the matter. And what was the finding? The finding was that it was a serious matter. Their report says that 26 students were injured, and that 16 of them had wounds in the head. Amongst those that were injured in that way there were nine women students. Damage was done to the building to the extent of about £1,000, just under £1,000. Two of the buildings—even if they were of corrugated iron—were injured to such an extent that it is no longer worth while to repair them. The report did not mention a single case where the students had molested or attacked the soldiers, not one. It was further found that the attack came from the side of the soldiers. And what was the reason. What actually is the excuse that was made? It all amounts to this, that the students are opposed to the Government, and do not conceal that they are opposed to the Government. The students are republican in sentiment and do not conceal the fact that they are inclined towards a republic, and that is what gave offence to the soldiers; that is to say, the students—and this was one of the most important things that was mentioned—managed to succeed to induce a theatre or bioscope to cease playing God Save the King, because the audience was so divided on the subject that it was not considered desirable. God Save the King is not a national anthem of this country. It bel ongs to a different country. The students induced the owner or the manager of the cinema no longer to play that anthem. But then the soldiers came, and they induced him to re-introduce it and to break his promise to the students. The students strongly protested against God Save the King being played again. They did nothing else, caused no trouble, but then the soldiers came and insulted and humiliated them. That was what caused the bad feelings there. With regard to the action of the soldiers, the report is nothing else but full of excuses for them, and in this respect the report is nothing else than a scandal. I think any impartial man would be ashamed to put his name at the foot of such a report. The commanding officer of those soldiers, who is in control of them, or should have been, did indeed go to them. When the disturbances were going on he appeared on the scene, but he could not get to the main point. He was delayed, and then he lost his way. He could not find the place where the soldiers were marching to, and although it is stated in the report itself that the military camp, where I presume the commanding officer is stationed, was only a stone’s throw from the university college. He lost his way. He did not reach it. He then eventually found his officers and the troops marching back, but some of the soldiers had turned off, and the commanding officer, when he saw that they were going in a different direction was again unfortunate in finding the Normal College at Potchefstroom. He could not reach that either, but he did anyhow still get there in time while the soldiers were still engaged in causing trouble there. What did he do? Did he immediately give the order to leave the place and to go back to the camp? No. he remained there and he took part in assisting the soldiers to force the students to sing God Save the King and to humiliate them further. That is mentioned in the report merely as an excuse, or at any rate without a word of really effective disapproval. Now I want to say this to the Prime Minister: After he had found out what had happened, after he saw how the rights of the Afrikaners were being trodden underfoot, and what disorders his soldiers were guilty of, and according to the report not one single soldier was punished, as far as I know, and he comes here and claims credit for himself that the position at Potchefstroom has much improved, that the worst that was said in the report about the soldiers and their conduct was that their feeling of camaraderie was stronger than their feeling of responsibility. This is what the report says, the essence of the report: “Their spirit of comradeship was stronger than their feelings of responsibility.” It remained at that.

Do you disapprove of the comradeship?

When during the previous World War, in consequence of the sinking of the Lusatania riots took place and buildings were destroyed and burnt, and devastation caused not by soldiers but by the populace in the streets, a certain highly-placed person said at that time, “Don’t do it again until next time.” The present Prime Minister, in connection with this noonday pause, in connection with the Potchefstroom disorders, has taken up the same attitude. He says, “Don’t do it again—it is wrong—until the next time.” And the “next time” has come. In the meantime there has been on the part of the Prime Minister and his colleagues, and especially of his newspapers, a constant stirring up of feeling against the Afrikaners. That incitement has sometimes taken the form of being directed against the police. Why? Simply because such a large section of the police are Afrikaans-speaking, and simply because such a large section of the police refuse to put the red tabs on their shoulders. Talk about newspapers inciting? The newspapers which support the Prime Minister in the case of any riot that there is and where the police have to take action, cannot at the end of it find any other charge than that it was the fault of the police who acted too harshly. That is nothing else but direct incitement to arouse a grudge against the police. In addition, there was the constant incitemant against the Ossewa-Brandwag, and that incitement has already been going on a long time. What has appeared now in connection with the Ossewa-Brandwag? That although it is a mighty organisation which counts between 300,000 and 400,000 members, there is sufficient discipline to-day, even if it may not have existed before, that the Ossewa-Brandwag has formed a pleasant and surprising contrast in connection with the riots which took place in Johannesburg on Friday and Saturday. So far as I have heard the state of affairs there on Saturday night might very easily have led to revolution, or at least to a massacre, the more so as the Ossewa-Brandwag had, close by, a meeting of about 30,000 of its members. And yet, when the soldiers of the Prime Minister got out of hand and attacked innocent people, and destroyed property, then that powerful force of 30,000 men, disciplined as they are, not only said that they would maintain order amongst themselves, but they assisted to maintain order elsewhere without one single person being attacked. Talk about the Ossewa-Brandwag? You have also stirred up feelings by your threats amongst the soldiers, but you had better leave the Ossewa-Brandwag in peace. The fact that already between 300,000 and 400,000 people have joined the Ossewa-Brandwag proves what place it has taken in the hearts of the public, and I tell you that you must leave the Ossewa-Brandwag in peace, and not act towards the Ossewa-Brandwag in the way that you have done. Owing to the action of the Ossewa-Brandwag, which we noticed, they caused a pleasant and surprising contrast with the action of yourself and your army, and I say that the people of the country will feel that it is safer with the Ossewa-Brandwag than it is with you and your army. I am not going any further into this. What I have said here is enough to support my motion, that we have no confidence in this Government.

I want formally to second the motion, and to reserve the right to take part in the debate at a later stage.

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition has introduced a serious motion and he pleaded his motion in all earnestness. I listened in all earnestness to him in order to find out on what grounds, on what specific grounds, he asked this House to express its lack of confidence in the Government, and I must say, Mr. Speaker, that after having listened to him for an hour and a half I do not yet know what are the specific grounds on which he asks this House to pass a vote of no confidence in the Government. The hon. member, the Leader of the Opposition, started by expatiating at length on what happened on the 4th September, 1939. But he left out any reference to, and did not speak a word about the decision which was taken on the 4th September; he did not say that that was the decision of the Parliament of the country. If one listens to the accusations made in connection with that occasion one would say that that decision was a decision come to by individuals or groups, that it was a number of small cliques which cast the country into that difficulty.

It was a clique.

It was the sovereign body of the country which took the decision on that occasion. It was the Prime Minister of the day who himself submitted the matter to Parliament, and the decision was taken. Why to-day, eighteen months later, this House should be asked to express no confidence in the Government for that reason knocks me flat. After that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition proceeded to put certain questions to me. I can easily answer those questions; they are questions concerning our policy so far as Africa is concerned, our policy so far as America is concerned, and our policy so far as the Great World is concerned. They are questions which are perfectly reasonable and I have no objection to them, but they are questions which I have not yet replied to. In spite of that the hon. member mentions those questions as a reason for no confidence in the Government. He should have waited until he had got my answers to those questions before expressing no confidence in the war policy of the Government on those points. After that he proceeded to make an attack on the Government’s financial policy. I feel that I can make bold to say that if there is any matter of policy in connection with the times through which we are passing, in respect of which the Government has every reason to be proud, then it is the financial policy which we have followed.

To spend £60,000,000 on the year.

You are whistling now like the man who is passing a graveyard.

The hon. member says “the mines have been spared”; “the farmers are being taxed, and they are being ruined.” The hon. member at length went into the sorrows and the troubles of the farming community. If there is one section of the community which has been saved, which financially and economically has been saved by the Government’s policy, it is the farming community.

What do the wine farmers say about that?

Hon. members can take any branch of farming and they will find that to be the position.

The fruit farmers, for instance.

Hon. members will find that the Government has placed the country in a position which is better than that of almost any other country so far as the farming community is concerned. I think that if that is adduced as a special reason why lack of confidence should be expressed in the Government, then it cannot come from the side of the farming community. It would be the grossest ingratitude from the side of the farmers. But it does not come from the farmers, it comes from the benches opposite. We had the case of the wool farmers—in this House the Government’s wool policy was being condemned, but in spite of that the Government was getting one resolution after the other from the farmers outside, and from representative bodies thanking the Government for the policy pursued by them. And so we can go from the one point to the other.

It was nothing but party politics with them.

Order!

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition further said that the farmers’ costs of production had gone up but that the prices of farming produce were controlled. But he forgot to say that the increase in the cost of production was taken into consideration when those prices were controlled.

The farmers do not say that.

Go to the wine farmers.

Impartial bodies have ben appointed to investigate the position and to see that the prices are properly fixed and where there has been an increase in the costs of production proper account has been taken of the increase in costs in the fixing of prices. That has been done. Investigations have been made in every case where prices have been fixed, and those investigations have taken proper account of the increase of costs. No, I think the hon. member has entirely missed the point if he thinks that we are open to attack on the ground of our financial policy, and on account of the financial position of the country. If he things that we can be attacked on those grounds in consequence of the policy which we are pursuing in these times of war, then he is entirely missing the point. It has been the Government’s concern day and night throughout all the months since the outbreak of war to protect the interests not merely of the people in general, but particularly of the farmers, in all kinds of ways. I think I can say with every justification, that our farmers have every reason to be satisfied if they compare their position with that of other countries of the world—they have every reason to be satisfied with the economic position in which our country finds itself. The hon. member thereupon fell back on the irregularities which have taken place, and he devoted most of his time to what had occurred at Potchefstroom—an event which has long since been disposed of.

No, not at all.

It is dead— dead and buried.

It may be so with you but not with us.

It is dead-finished and buried. There was a state of friction which caused trouble between the students at Potchefstroom and the recruits who were in camp there. It lasted a long time, and it resulted in unpleasantness. At the end an enquiry was held and recommendations were made; those recommendations have been carried out, with the result that since that time we have heard nothing of any trouble at Potchefstroom. We have not heard of any trouble, not only from the side of the troops but also from the university and the other educational institutions: all we hear is to the effect that the position is not merely normal but that it is good. Those are things which happened months ago and they are dead and buried, but they are now mentioned here as a reason why a vote of no confidence in the Government has to be proposed.

But you said that you did not know anything about the troubles which had taken place in the past.

And then there was this petty squabbling about the midday pause. This midday pause is being exploited by that Party in order to cause difficulties in the towns. Does it not strike hon. members that for months and months we have not heard anything about difficulties in the streets of Cape Town? But as soon as Parliament comes here, and there is a chance of advertising certain parties and certain cliques we immediately have a recurrence of those troubles.

Shame!

I am convinced that this midday pause is not being treated honestly. It is abused and exploited, and people are found occasionally who either adverstise themselves or the interests they stand for cause trouble. It is a case of deliberately challenging and defying others, and when they get into trouble they cry out “midday pause, midday pause.”

Then why do you not stop it?

If a vote of no confidence has to be passed in the Government based on such trivialities, then we must have lost our senses.

Did you make a promise in regard to trivialities?

No, I made a promise to deal with a serious condition of affairs, not things like that, and then the hon. member finally got back to what happened in Johannesburg. He started off by saying that the motion had been introduced at a fitting time. His motion was introduced, his attack on the Government and his motion of no confidence were put on the order paper days before those occurrences in Johannesburg. That is not the reason why his motion was introduced. I think the hon. member must have been scratching his head to find material for his motion of no confidence, and he was grateful for this occurrence in Johannesburg. To him those riots in Johannesburg came like manna from Heaven. I have said what my feelings are about what happened there. Those occurrences are very reprehensible, and I have expressed my disapproval. I hope things like that will never happen again. All possible steps will be taken to prevent them recurring. What surprises me is that in a country such as this, where our feelings run very high, and where, as the hon. member has stated, the people are deeply divided on cardinal principles, and on grounds of policy, the Government has succeeded in preserving such a degree of peace and order in the country as it has done. Now and then an outburst occurs. I do not say that that is unavoidable, but in the circumstances we have to expect it. And in any case when an outburst took place on a serious scale, the Government immediately interfered and took the necessary steps. And that is being done here again. I have already stated that we did not have the slightest reason to expect an occurrence in Johannesburg such as did take place.

Have you punished a single soldier for the attack on the Potchefstroom University College?

The hon. member should put a question about that in the usual manner, because I cannot remember now who was punished and who was not punished; it is not right to put questions about a special matter which took place months and months ago. My time is taken up by other matters. I cannot have my time taken up with the trivialities with which hon. members opposite concern themselves. If the hon. member puts a question in the right way he will get a reply.

As you promised that the soldiers who were responsible for causing the riots in Johannesburg would be punished, I only wanted to know whether those who had caused the damage in Potchefstroom have been punished.

If the necessary evidence in regard to this trouble in Johannesburg can be obtained, the people concerned will be punished. That is a matter which is left to the police and those responsible for the administration of the law. The Government has practically nothing to do with that, and I have nothing to do with it.

You are trying to cover it up.

We have a serious motion before us, and a number of things have been said and arguments have been used as reasons for this motion which to my mind not only have nothing to do with the matter, but which constitute no justification at all for anything of so serious a nature. I cannot imagine that the Leader of the Opposition is in earnest with this motion. He could quite well have raised all the questions which he has been discussing here, in this House, without moving a vote of no confidence. If one comes along with a motion of this kind one touches the Government of the country, and one touches the question as to what the alternative is. Do hon. members realise that this is a serious question? I ask myself, in view of the position of the parties in this House and in the country, whether there is an alternative? If a motion like this were to be passed, would it be possible to get a Government from the other side of the House? We have a party there which is steadily going backwards, and which is disintegrating. Even now since this motion has been placed on the agenda there has been a …

A skinning off (afskilfering).

There has been a further breaking up. The Leader of the Opposition tried to belittle it and called it a skinning off. Apparently it is a wound, and the little scab has come off. The Leader of the Opposition realises quite well what the position is, but he wants to bring us and the country under the impression that we are dealing here with something of small and minor importance. On the contrary, what he calls a skinning off is nothing less than the deterioration and the eventual breakdown of his whole party.

Have an election, and let us see.

No, they now want an alternative Government to be put in by a party which in the last few days has again lost a large number of its members in this House. The Leader of the Opposition cannot be in earnest, and we cannot take him seriously. No, the party opposite are not going to get into power in the near future. The alternative to which the hon. member is looking forward will never be realised here in South Africa. Sentence of death was passed on that party by their own former leader. Gen. Hertzog said, with all the responsibility resting on him, and with his great career behind him, that along that road on which the Nationalist Party finds itself to-day Afrikanerdom is doomed.

And what did he say on the 4th September?

That party holds out the prospect of forming an alternative Government in this country. They are to-day following a course which will land them in an impossible position, and almost day by day, as matters are developing to-day, we see where they are driving and what the eventual ending is going to be. They have never had a really good chance as a separate party to form a Government. I again want to quote Gen. Hertzog. He said that the Nationalist Party had forgotten it could never form a Government standing alone and on its own feet. They were compelled to combine with the Labour Party in order to form a Government in the country.

Just as you have done now.

I am quoting my authority.

You have three parties now sitting on those benches over there.

I am quoting my authority, and I do not know what kind of authority the hon. member for Riversdale (Mr. Badenhorst) is. I am quoting my authority in order to prove that when that party opposite had achieved the zenith of its power it was still not standing on its own, and now the whole of their effort consists of a policy of declaring war on every section in the country. There was a time when the Leader of the Opposition embraced the coloured community of this country; we are not going to forget the speech he made at Queenstown. There was a time when the Jews were very welcome. The hon. member for Cape Town Castle (Mr. Alexander) can testify to the negotiations that were conducted with him. Now our English-speaking friends may come in as the drawers of water and the hewers of wood and as the bywoners of the Purified Afrikaners. We other Afrikaners, of whom I am one, are looked upon as “hanskakies.”

Hear, hear, that is what they are.

You see, Mr. Speaker, it all amounts to this, that that party is becoming narrower and narrower, and smaller and smaller; they are shrinking more and more, and the possibility of their forming a Government in days to come becomes more and more remote and more and more impossible.

Is that the reason why you are afraid to have an election?

It is a pure racial concern, and they think that they are able to govern. But the further they proceed along that road, the less chance they will have to ever govern the country. The whole attitude adopted by that party opposite renders the position impossible for them. Their idea is that what is wanted is a United Afrikanerdom, as they understand it, which will form one party. One may get something like that under a Hitler, one may get it under a condition of slavery, but in ordinary normal circumstances, and certainly under the conditions of South Africa, one will never get a state of affairs where the whole nation will think alike and form one party. The only basis on which one can achieve co-operation is on the basis of principle. People differ from each other. People take up various attitudes on this side or on that side, but our people are not slaves who will allow themselves to be driven into one camp. One must expect different political opinions to exist, and it is impossible to expect that all will think alike. And that is what the hon. Leader of the Opposition and his party want, and that is the basis on which they want to found a united Afrikanerdom. The United Afrikanerdom must be in one party. They want to drive out all who do not think as they do. They are driving away a section of the Afrikaner people, yet they expect those people to agree with them and with their party. They do not agree even among themselves, and it should be clear to them that they are fighting a losing battle. They are just as human as all the rest of us, and they differ just as much among themselves—I believe they differ even more than we do among ourselves. On the front benches over there there are more aspirant leaders than there have ever been in the history of this Parliament. We have never before had such a large number of aspirant leaders as we see over there to-day. How can one expect such a party to succeed in getting United Afrikanerdom into one party? There are jealousies, there is scabbing, and there is undermining of one by the other; there are continuous efforts on the one side to work against the other clique, and yet they call it United Afrikanerdom! I am convinced that nobody is more responsible for that condition of affairs than the Leader of the Opposition himself; there is no lead in his party. I wonder how many different directions there are, and in how many little groups they are divided. Whatever can be said of our Government Party, we have one fixed and definite course before us. We follow one policy. It may be right or wrong, but throughout all those years we have followed one fixed policy, and we stand by that policy. As against that we continually notice the position of the Purified section becoming more and more impossible, and we must realise that they will never be able to form an alternative Government in this country.

What is the definite object?

I listened to what the Leader of the Opposition said about the Ossewa-Brandwag. He warned me. I shuddered and shook! I am a man who is very nervous and easily scared. But this is what I feel:— With all the weakness and division on the other side and the impatience of the people with the Opposition the Ossewa-Brandwag will yet take over from them. I can well understand that the Leader of the Opposition now wants to pose as the protector of the Ossewa-Brandwag. That protector will later on be its servant, and his party will be the Ossewa-Brandwag Party.

Is that why you persecute the Ossewa-Brandwag in the way you are doing?

No, the Ossewa-Brandwag is on the same road as the Opposition. Even to-day we have all kinds of signs of division, of splits and the skinning off there will be even worse than it is in the Opposition Party. I fail to see how that party, if I have to put the question: “What chance have you of getting to the head of affairs?” can be regarded as an alternative Government. On the road they are travelling now they will never get there. For that reason I do not believe that this motion is seriously intended. Perhaps the Leader of the Opposition only intended it to start a discussion on certain matters which could also have been discussed in other ways.

Did the people elect you as Prime Minister.

I am the Prime, Minister here as a result of a decision of the Supreme Authority of this country. The hon. member need not worry his head about the people outside. The people will decide at the right time. The people have their eyes open and they see what is happening to-day.

Winburg, for instance.

Imagine! If there is one incident which clearly and definitely proves that the days of that party on the other side are numbered then it is Winburg. It appears to me that this motion is not seriously intendedë nor can I take it seriously, and I do not want to go any further into the points which have been raised here: I only want to deal with the questions which have been put to me. The Leader of the Opposition put a few questions to me regarding our policy in respect of Africa and America. As regards Africa he asked us what our intentions are in regard to the North, are we going to protect our neighbours, are we going to incorporate further territories, what are we going to do with the North? The Government’s policy on that point is perfectly simple. We want to establish the best possible relations with our neighbours in the North. We realise that in view of the changes which are coming about in the world, in view of the curtailment in other parts of the world, there will be opportunities for expansion on the Continent of Africa. There is a future for us and there are markets for us in days to come there, and it is the Government’s policy even at this stage to establish good relations, to establish trade relations and other things, so that we shall be able to extend our trade and our industries and avail ourselves of our relations with those areas. For instance, we have to-day an ambassador from the Portuguese, from the Government of Angola, which wants to establish friendly relations with us, and I hope that this will result in an agreement which will be of great value to this country and which will at least remove the misunderstandings and the fears which exist to-day. The Colonial Minister of Belgium visited us the other day in order to discuss those matters with us, and I hope that this will also lead to an agreement which will be of great use to us. In every possible respect we are trying to create a good spirit and to establish good friendly relations throughout the world.

Also with Italy?

Italy must get out of it.

Have you also got schemes for incorporation?

Of the Native Areas?

Of Rhodesia?

Haile Selassie.

And then the Leader of the Ooposition asks whether, if England is handed over to America, an England which has been destroyed, whether South Africa is also going to be handed over? And that is a serious question put in this House by the Leader of the Opposition. Let me say that undoubtedly our relations with America are going to be friendly in future, very much more friendly than they were before. Our trade relations with America are expanding at a rapid rate. American shipping services to South Africa are expanding fast, and we hope that trade will expand in years to come. We are looking forward to the day when our relations with America will be very much closer and when there will be many more openings for our trade, a greater expansion of our trade, then we had ever dreamt of. But when the hon. member asks me whether we are going to hand ourselves over to America, then I must say that I regard that as a ridiculous question which it is not necessary for me to answer. We are in a difficult phase of our history, not only so far as South Africa is concerned, but so far as the whole world is concerned, and South Africa will have to choose its course without doubt, as things are going. There are today certain groups in the world. There is the Axis Group, consisting of Germany, Italy and Japan. That is one group which aims at world domination.

And what about the British Empire?

We are prepared to warn the people of South Africa against the Axis Group. We do not want to be Nazis, and we do not want to be governed by the Nazi system. Italy, which is a menace—as my predecessor General Hertzog said—the greatest menace South Africa had ever known—we do not want to have anything further to do with that country so far as Africa is concerned. As for Japan, it is not necessary for me to say anything to-day, but there is the Axis Group, consisting of those three powers, in respect of which South Africa will have to be careful on its future course. There is another group, other groups. There is the American group; there is the British group; the Commonwealth of Nations, of which we are a member; and in that friendly circle there will be an opening for South Africa, and there will be prospects for us which may still lead to great things. In future closer bonds will probably be developed between the American group and the British group, between the British Commonwealth of Nations and the Americas. Closer bonds are developing, and it clear to me that in the years to come our course will to a large extent lie along that road. Our course will be a union (verbinding) with the British Commonwealth of Nations and the Americas more so perhaps than with any other people. There our freedom will not be menaced, there no doctrine will be forced on us which is in direct conflict with all the traditions and convictions of our people. There South Africa will be able to develop as a young country in the future, without any compulsion. There we shall be able to develop without compulsion being brought to bear upon us, or without a course being forced upon us which may be dangerous to our country. That is how I look upon the world, and that I believe is the conception of the Government of which I am the Head. I do not think it is necessary for me to go into those matters any further. The allegation of the Leader of the Opposition that we shall yet hand this country over to America is a hallucination, just the same as all the other dreams of his which will never be realised.

I shall at once try and put the Prime Minister’s mind at rest. It appeared to me that he was full of concern that if his Government should fall there would not be an alternative Government to be found in the Opposition. I want to say I agree with him that so far as the official Opposition is concerned it is hopeless, but at the same time I want to put his mind at rest: the Afrikaner Party is here. I want to say, as Leader of the Afrikaner Party, on behalf of myself and my friends round about me here, that we heartily support the motion of no confidence in the Government, proposed by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. But in saying that I at once at the very outset wish to emphasise that the grounds on which I support the motion are partly the same and are partly different from those adduced by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition. Insofar as my grounds for supporting the motion will differ from those put forward by the Leader of the Opposition, they will constitute a charge against him that he has striven for National Unity and that he has wrecked it on a course which will not lead to such unity, but which will only lead to the wilderness. But I shall come to that later. I do not propose to-day again raising at length the same reasons which were adduced in the last two sessions of the House in opposition to the Government’s war policy. The reasons adduced from this side of the House on previous occasions still remain as uncontrovertible as ever. Time has even taught us that the reasons adduced by this side of the House have proved themselves more and more valid, and the reasons given by the Government have proved more and more vain. First of all we had this “lie and rot” story so far as our products are concerned. That story is so worn out that I shall only refer to it in passing. Then there is the question of the Italian menace. How little truth there was in that scare-mongering story has been proved all too clearly by what is happening in Northern Africa. Without one trying to cast any reflection on our troops, or on the generalship of our forces, I only want to point out that so far the only opportunity they have had of defending our country against invasion has been to shoot an old crocodile and to blow up a mine which was set off by an innocent old elephant which without evil intentions was straying about 2,000 miles away from our most Northern boundaries. It may even happen that the Negus of Abyssinia will one of these days again be possessed of his throne before our army of 100,000 men, which has been mobilised for that purpose at an expenditure of £60,000,000, that is to say, £150 for each family of five, has really smelt powder. But whether he gets on to his throne with or without our assistance, I want to know what effect the war in East Africa can possibly have on the final result of the struggle which will not be decided there but elsewhere. It is a needless waste of energy and of money which cannot even stand comparison with the conquest of South-West and German East Africa in the last war. It was then stated that other countries would have put forward a claim to the German colonies and that German West was therefore given to us as our reward. Apart from the question whether that reward may not in the end cost us too much, we must now put this question, whether the intention to-day is to get Abyssinia also incorporated into the Union. And if it is not the intention to incorporate it, whether it is the intention that we should become a Colonial Power, a large power with colonies somewhere in Africa. If that is not our intention, and if the Italians in Abyssinia did not constitute a threat to us, why then did we declare war on Italy, and why then did we make a futile demonstration of war which has caused division and disruption in our country, and which has emptied our Treasury for generations to come? The present Government has followed a policy of interference in European disputes which may cost our people both in this country and outside this country a great deal in days to come. So far as the foreign aspect is concerned, our people may lose their dearly bought freedom, and if that should happen then that calamity will strike us as a divided people which will not even be able to maintain order in its own country. The degree of national unity which existed before September, 1939, could have been increased and extended if the Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister had not decided on the 4th September to drag us into the European war. But, and that brings me to my real point, the Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister could not on the 4th September act otherwise than he did act. His policy, and the policy of his spiritual allies, is a British holistic policy, where the interests of the whole are greater than those of the individual. He is seeking national unity along the wrong road, and he will not achieve it along that course. He has sacrificed the interest of South Africa as a whole to the interests of one of its parts, and he did not have the right to do so. We have two groups of people in South Africa which have been coupled together by history, and the party which dare to ignore that uniting of the two groups and which follows the policy of leaving out of account either one or other of those groups of the people, is doomed. To go and declare war simply because one has a small majority, not even of the people, but of the members of Parliament, means to trample on the rights of one section of the population. By ignoring the feelings of the Afrikaans-speaking people in this matter the support of that section of the population has been lost for ever, and that injustice will have the effect of bitter revenge in a political sense being taken in days to come. What is even to-day the position in the country? The Afrikaans-speaking section are driven to resistance, and the doctrine is everywhere being accepted that because the Government has trampled on the equal rights of the Afrikaans-speaking people as a group, for that reason the Afrikaans-speaking people in turn have to do the same thing to the English-speaking people. It is the doctrine of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, the doctrine which is so keenly proclaimed by my friends on my right. I and my friends have tried to stop that because we saw what a doctrine of that kind must lead to, and that is one of the reasons why we are sitting here to-day in a new Party. The actions of this belligerent Government has in another way too introduced division and discord into our civil and economic life, where there should have been unity. I am referring here to the colours of distinction introduced into the army and into the police. In the army, the police and the Public Service we do not want to have any politics. They should be colourless so far as politics are concerned, but this war Government has continually forced the servants of the State to show colours, in one respect by wearing red tabs; in another respect by having to sign certain forms. We find one of the results of that in what has happened in Johannesburg over the week-end when people wearing the red tabs attacked the police who did not wear the red tabs. The result will further be that thousands of people in self-defence will wear the red tabs, but with a feeling of resentment in their hearts against the Government which has forced them to do so. If matters have reached that stage in our National life, if Afrikaners are quarrelling and fighting among themselves as they are doing to-day, if Afrikaans-speaking people are more and more put up against English-speaking, all as the result of the war spirit, how then is this Government and its Party ever going to achieve National Unity after the war? Then we shall begin to feel the economic consequence of the war, the unbearable taxes, and unemployment on a large scale, as a result of the demobilisation of the army and the stopping of war industries. Will the United Party which will be held responsible for all the misery and division then be able to restore even that degree of National Unity—never mind about being able to extend it —will it be able to restore it? No, Mr. Speaker, not that Party, because it has looked for National Unity along the wrong course, the course of the Empire, the course of domination by the English-speaking section over the Afrikaans-speaking section. It should have looked for it along the only course by which National Unity could be found, and is still to be found, namely the course of taking into account the equal rights of both sections of the white population of South Africa on an Afrikaans National basis. But, Mr. Speaker, having condemned the policy of the present Government as being irreconcilable with South African Nationalism and irreconciliable with the ideal of National Unity, I must ask myself what possible alternative Government can be formed which can realise the striving after National Unity on a National basis? If I want to perform a piece of work and if I find that one particular instrument is unserviceable for the purpose, then I must look for another instrument which I may have at my disposal, and by the use of which the work can be performed. This House already knows that I and my friends have lost all confidence, not only in the Government but also in the present Opposition, as an instrument for that purpose. The country at the moment is faced with two clear facts: the one is that the Government which sits there to-day will never enjoy the support and the confidence of a large section of the population. The other is that a still larger section of the population will never support the present Opposition. As a matter of fact the Opposition apparently does not want any further support. Far from looking for greater support they have been doing nothing during the past 16 months but to try and turn down and alienate the support which they have enjoyed. Instead of seeking the goodwill of those who do not yet support them, they have been busy driving away those who have already supported them. There are two doctrines which I can lay down here with a reasonable degree of safety. The first is that if there had been a general election immediately after the declaration of war on the 4th September of the year before last hon. members opposite would to-day in all probability not have been on the Government benches. Members of the Government are aware of that fact. My second contention at any time after the end of November, 1939, that is to say after the failure of the Pretoria Conference, the Government Party would probably have been returned to this House with a larger majority than they have to-day. Members of the Opposition are aware of that. It is therefore not a question of there being too little opposition to the policy in the course set by the Government. It is much more a question of the incompetence of the Opposition to mobilise that opposition, that resistance. The simple fact is that while a large section of public opinion in the country finds the spirit and the policy of the Government unacceptable, they find the spirit and the policy of the Opposition no less unacceptable. The case against the present Government from a Nationalistic point of view was put clearly and frankly on the 4th September, 1939, in this House, and shortly after that at Smithfield by General Hertzog. His attitude found support and was echoed throughout the whole country. The Right Hon. the Prime Minister will remember that even old bosom friends and supporters of his in the Free State sided with General Hertzog. But it did not take two months before some members of the Opposition Party succeeded in creating such a spirit that not only did those old supporters of the Prime Minister but even a great many old Nationalists begin to feel uneasy. The one after the other started withdrawing his support. Twelve months later an influential portion of the Opposition succeedd even in bringing about such a state of affairs that General Hertzog himself and Mr. Havenga felt constrained to withdraw. Even then the present Leader of the Opposition allowed matters to go on without trying to interfere. Not a solitary serious effort was made to turn the process and to curb the spirit which for more than a year had been busy disrupting the Party. A few months ago the hon. member for Piquetberg speaking in Johannesburg made use of these words—

To-day he is without General Hertzog but he still talks about re-Union. As Chairman of the Crisis Committee he had a Commission of Enquiry appointed after the trouble in the Free State, but even before that Commission had started its work he himself gave judgment at Winburg when he said that if he had been at the Free State Congress he would have done exactly as the majority did. If the hon. member for Piquetberg allows that kind of “justice” to be done to a leader of the people, who has an unblemished reputation, such as General Hertzog has, can he be surprised at the fact that others who expect less consideration from him than General Hertzog could expect, are afraid to entrust their fate to him? After the New Year message of the Leader of the Opposition, Party members started handing in their resignations in large numbers. In the Transvaal the Afrikaner Union was established by dissatisfied members of the Party. In the Free State less than two weeks ago, at only a few weeks notice, more than 300 delegates from all districts met together and they went to the length of establishing a new Party. One would have imagined that if matters had reached such a stage the eyes of the Leader of the Opposition would have been opened and that he would have done something to try and save his own Party. But what does he do instead? He gaily allows the hon. member for Gezina (Mr. Pirow) and the hon. member for Ladybrand (Mr. J. C. de Wet) to resign as members of the Commission of Enquiry. He abandons that effort, which he has always relied upon to restore unity. By doing that he does away with every hope of finding a solution, and he himself goes to Piquetberg, there to make a speech about the so-called re-union which he has brought about and about my membership of the Native Affairs Commission. During the last fourteen months members of his Party have been resigning. The Chief Leader of the Party has withdrawn in disappointment and despair. Both in the Transvaal and the Free State new organisations have been set up. Fifteen members of Parliament have resigned, and a new Party has been started, and after all these signs of calamity the only thing the hon. Leader of the Opposition is concerned about is the salary which I draw as a member of the Native Affairs Commission! If that is the way in which the Leader of the Opposition handles a Party crisis then I want to know, Mr. Speaker, how they are going to handle a crisis in this country. If such a condition of chaos could be allowed to arise in a Party which is in opposition to the Government and which therefore carries no responsibility, then I should like to know in what condition this country may find itself with those people at the wheel.

Mr. Speaker, is the hon. member allowed to continue reading his speech after you have warned him?

I want to say this, Mr. Speaker, that Nationalistically disposed Afrikanerdom cannot follow the lead of the Prime Minister, because they know what they are to expect from him. A great proportion of Afrikanerdom which is Nationalistically disposed cannot follow the lead of the hon. member for Piquetberg, because they do not know what to expect from him. They know that the Prime Minister looks on South Africa and governs South Africa not as an independent country, but as part of the Empire, and he has to fit in with the interests of that Empire, be they at war or at peace.

But they do not know what the political creed of the hon. member for Piquetberg really is. They do not know what he really believes in. For instance, they do not know whether he really believes that re-union is impossible without Gen. Hertzog, or whether he really believes that he has now achieved re-union without Gen. Hertzog. And while I am now dealing with the political creed of the hon. member I shall at once reply to a charge which was made against myself and my friends on this side repeatedly during the last few days. We are asked in the papers “what is really the difference in principle between yourselves and the reunited Party?” My difficulty, Mr. Speaker, is that I do not know what are the principles of the re-United Party, that nobody outside the Party knows them, and that inside the Party every leader proclaims his own principles, and everyone in his turn assures the country that he is the one who proclaims the principles of the Party. I have to mention only a few instances in order to prove this contention. A short while ago the hon. member for Waterberg (Mr. J. G. Strydom) in a newspaper report in the Transvaal declared that Gen. Hertzog as an honourable man had to resign because of differences in principle with the Party which had made it impossible for him to remain there. A couple of days later my hon. friend, the member for Fordsburg (Mr. B. J. Schoeman) stated that it was unnecessary for supporters of the Hertzog policy to resign, because Gen. Hertzog’s political principles were laid down in the programme of principles of the re-United Party. Who of those two is right? On Friday night the hon. member for Piquetberg in his constituency repeatedly stated that the two sections of the population should have equal rights in all respects. But a few months ago the hon. member for Winburg (Mr. Swart), who now enjoys the distinction of being the leader of the re-United Party in the Free State, spoke at the Bloemfontein Congress of one people, one flag and one language. The hon. member for Waterberg apparently associates himself with that because when, at the Transvaal Congress, certain resolutions demanded that there should be only one language he stated that he agreed with that, but that for tactical reasons that should not be laid down. Now, who interprets the policy of that Party? And whose assurances do they expect the public to depend upon? That Party, Mr. Speaker, is so anxious to go out fishing that they are trying to fish for the support of both sides, with the result that the fish on the one side get scared of the noise going on on the other side, and the result is that they are not catching anything on either side.

Order! The hon. member is allowed in the special circumstances under which he is speaking to proceed, but he must pay attention to the rule which states that speeches shall not be read.

Very well, Mr. Speaker. It is no use my saying “Look at our programme of principles, and see whether there are any differences.” I may just as well say “Behold the programme of principles of the Government Party and see whether they state that they are an Imperialistic Party and that their aim is to promote the interests of the Empire over those of South Africa.” Their programme of principles does not contain that, but on the contrary the programme of principles of the Government Party is of such a nature that the hon. member for Wolmaransstad (Gen. Kemp) and I myself have subscribed to it, yet both I and the hon. Leader of the Opposition say, and quite rightly say, that that Party is an Imperialistic Party. We do not say so because it is stated in their programme of principles, but we say so because that Party acts in the way which gives us the right to say so. Just in the same way our objection to the official Opposition Party is not so much against what is written in their programme of principles but against the manner in which the element setting the tune in that Party interprets it, and against the manner in which they act and speak. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition will excuse me if I say that I do not regard him as the element setting the tune in that party. I want to pay him this compliment: it is not he who has driven General Hertzog out of the party. The official Opposition, Mr. Speaker, tries by its ambiguity to satisfy two conflicting conceptions. They try to satisfy the people who believe in striving for racial domination, and they try also to satisfy those who are Nationalistic in their feelings, but who also believe that striving for racial domination is not only idle but can only lead to a destruction of the Afrikaner point of view, in the country’s body politic. These two points of view cannot be satisfied at the same time, seeing that they are irreconciliable the one with the other, and by trying to satisfy both of them the hon. the Leader of the Opposition will sit on the Opposition benches not just for another ten years but as long as Piquetberg is prepared to keep him in Parliament. The reason must be clear to him. The people who stand for a policy of racial domination are a limited group who can never constitute the majority in the country. Even the hon. member for Waterberg is aware of that fact. Hence his “tactical reasons” at the Pretoria Congress. And the great mass of moderate people who can now be found, or who may in future be willing to support a National policy, are afraid of him, seeing that they have always been afraid so far of the extremist element in his party. They argue that if that element was able to force him to do to General Hertzog what he did do, it would also be able to compel him to do other things which he would be as little in favour of doing as he was of driving out General Hertzog. And with that, Mr. Speaker, I can say in a single word what the difference is between this party and the official Opposition. By their own actions the official Opposition has brought the country under the impression that the choice between the Government and the Opposition is not a choice between Imperialism and Nationalism, but a choice between Imperialism and Afrikaans racial domination. Whether that impression is right or wrong is a matter for the Leader of the Opposition to decide on after he has studied the speeches which some of his chief lieutenants have made, and after he has studied the articles published by some of his papers. All I state here is that that impression prevails throughout the country. And that a party which allows that suspicion to attach to it will never get the necessary support to enable it to lead Nationalism to victory. This party, on the other hand, places itself unequivocally and unambiguously on the basis of Hertzogism. We say to the country, and we are in earnest in saying it, as we have been in the past 28 years, that we ask the country to choose between the Prime Minister’s Imperialism and that South African Nationalism which we stand for. For the rest we shall not allow the rights of the one race to be interfered with any more than the rights of the other race. We shall tolerate domination of the one, as little as we shall tolerate domination of the other. On that basis we make an appeal to South Africa. Because on account of the above-mentioned reasons we have lost faith in the official Opposition in its ability to defeat the present Government, and to lead Nationalism in South Africa to victory, we have created this new and effective instrument. But I want to express my thanks to the Leader of the Opposition for the fatherly advice he gave at Piquetberg. He wanted to give me some well-meaning advice there. May I be allowed to say this to him: he had the opportunity for fifteen months to give advice, and he sat still and failed to do so. Now he comes along and he says that the people must not take the breaking away of the Afrikanes Party seriously, because it is merely a skinning off. Let me tell the hon. member that his trousers are being skinned off, and as soon as he is finished skinning off he will fall to pieces and he will stand naked before the tribunal of Afrikanderdom.

I move—

Mr. FRIEND seconded.

Agreed to.

Debate adjourned; to be resumed on 5th February.