Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs is indisposed and cannot be here this afternoon. Accordingly I move—

Agreed to.

Revenue Vote No. 15 and S.W.A. Vote No. 5.—“Labour”:

Mr. Chairman, may I begin by expressing the regret of this side of the House at the indisposition of the hon. the Minister of Foreign Affairs. I sincerely hope that it is nothing serious and that he will soon be able to resume his duties in this House.

Sir, we have now reached the debate on the Labour Vote, and I must say to the hon. the Minister of Labour that as this debate unfolds he will find that the theme we intend to discuss with him this afternoon is that we consider that a complete reappraisal of the labour position in South Africa should now be taking place. We are not suggesting that the hon. the Minister should undertake this, we say that we hope he has already undertaken it, because in the last six months he has had ample notice of the unrest in the labour sphere in this country, and I am sure that if he had listened to comments from this side of the House in various other debates and if he had listened to the contribution of the hon. the Prime Minister in the No-confidence Debate, he would have realized that a duty rests on him on behalf of the Government of the Republic of South Africa to reappraise the whole labour situation in this country. We believe that we are not making proper use of the labour resources which we have available to us in this country and that there is a changing labour pattern of which cognizance must be taken, and unless the hon. the Minister is prepared to take cognizance of the changing labour pattern we are going to run into tremendous trouble in this country of ours in the near future. It is imperative, Sir, that we should make better use of all the available labour. I want to hasten right away to tell my hon. friends on the other side of the House that I am not pleading this afternoon that non-White workers must take the place of White workers. I do not believe that we have sufficient Whites in South Africa to provide the skills which are necessary to keep the wheels of industry, of mining and of the other enterprises in this country turning. I believe that the time has come for this hon. Minister and his Government to accept that amongst the Black people of this country we have got people who can and will be responsible workers and who can do skilled work. The hon. the Minister knows the situation in the border industrial areas and I refer particularly to my own area, Hammarsdale, where it has been proved by the industrialists, through the work that they have given the Bantu to do, that these non-White workers, the Black workers particularly, are responsible and can be responsible, I must pass on to the hon. the Minister this afternoon certain thoughts which have come from industrialists in that area, where through the steady increments which are paid to these people, the stage has been reached where the wages of many workers have become such that they can no longer afford to lose their jobs, and all of a sudden they have become responsible workers. Where a labourer is working for R3 or R4 per week —and unfortunately this is still the situation in certain industries—it just means another packet or two of cigarettes to him if you give him an increase of 50 cents or even R1 a week; it means nothing to him. But when that person has progressed and has reached the stage where he is earning between R15 and R20 a week—and it is somewhere in that region that we have found that this change takes place—then all of a sudden you find that he becomes a responsible worker. He looks after his job because a demand has been created in him for that particular wage and he knows that if he loses that job he is going to have to go back to a wage of R5 or R6 a week, which is all this Government expects employers in that area to pay. The worker therefore becomes a responsible worker and looks after his job.

But, Sir, even more important than this is the fact that these people have demonstrated to us that they are capable of learning the skills which are necessary for our skilled workers in this country. I am sure that the hon. the Minister is aware of jobs which are being undertaken by Blacks in the Hammarsdale area. I am sure he is aware of the skilled work that they are doing in those factories as choppers out, pattern makers’ machinists and operatives in various spheres. This work is being done today by Black workers who a few years ago were totally unsophisticated and knew nothing about this sort of thing. Today after two or three years in-service training in those factories, thanks to the industrialists who provided that sort of training, they are doing these responsible jobs; they are doing the skilled work which is necessary to keep those industries going, skilled jobs for which we have not got enough White hands. It is as simple as that, Sir. There are not enough White hands in South Africa to do all the work which is necessary, and that is why we say to the hon. the Minister that he must undertake a complete reappraisal of the labour position in this country.

In the few minutes that I have left I want to allude briefly to the strikes which took place in Natal, and particularly to those strikes which took place in Hammarsdale, where for two days we had every single Black employee out on strike. There was not one worker left in any of the factories in Hammarsdale. I want to talk particularly of the situation which developed there, a situation which could have been explosive—and I am extremely glad that the hon. the Prime Minister is here to hear what I have to say. A delicate, explosive situation developed, and I want this afternoon to pay tribute to two sectors, the one being the Black workers themselves and the other being the South African Police. Both of those sectors kept their heads in this time of emergency where we had gangs of workers numbering up to 250-plus marching up and down the street, taunting the Police, taunting the authorities, taunting the employers, but, Sir, because of the strict discipline which the Police officers exercised over their men, we had only one minor incident, where the confrontation which these people sought, the confrontation between the Black leaders of the strikers and the Police, took place, and the Police had to use tear gas. But I want to say this as far as the Black workers are concerned, to give some idea of the nature of these people and the fact that they have the interest of South Africa at heart, that even after the tear-gas was thrown, within 50 yards, when I spoke to some of those who were nearest to where the canisters dropped, with tears streaming from their eyes, they laughed and said “Hau! Basi tela ngo pelepele”—that pepper had been thrown at them. I want to say that this was the attitude of the workers, and thank God it was the attitude of those workers, because we faced an inflammatory situation, a situation which I sincerely hope we will not face again in this country, I believe it is up to that hon. Minister of Labour and the Prime Minister to see that such a situation should not develop again in South Arica. I believe it is in the hands of the hon. the Minister of Labour, but he must go a bit further than the action he has taken. He must not merely request a review of wages in certain categories, but I believe there must a total review of all wages paid in all categories to all non-White workers, for a start, and thereafter we should continue to negotiate with these people, to talk with them and to talk with their employers, and most of all, to talk with the representatives of the Black workers in this country. It was amply demonstrated during this time of crisis that this Government was not prepared to take action against the strikers because everyone of those strikes was illegal; and I commend the Government for not having taken action because I believe that any such action might have sparked off and ugly incident at least, and I commend this to the Government because I believe it is in the hands of this Minister to see that it does not develop again, because while I hope that we will be as lucky again I cannot say that I believe we will be as lucky if such a situation developed again. [Time expired.]

I suppose the hon. member will not take it amiss of me if I do not follow him, because he has said nothing. I want to indicate how the United Party jumped at every possible opportunity this session to advocate the amendment of our existing labour set-up and labour laws whenever labour was discussed; in other words, how they applied themselves throughout this session to having the colour bar abolished as far as our labour laws were concerned. They jumped at every opportunity, whether it was the No Confidence debate, the Budget debate or the Prime Minister’s Vote. Every United Party speaker who rose here and spoke about labour—and here I include the Leader of the United Party, the hon. member for Yeoville, right down to their speakers on the back benches—spoke about the Bantu workers only. Never once did I hear any United Party speaker rising and pleading for the protection of the White worker in this country. On each occasion their pleas purely concerned equalization between White and non-White. I say that as far as they are concerned, there is no such thing as a White worker in South Africa.

Nonsense.

I say that as far as they are concerned, the White workers are worthless in this country and have never yet contributed anything towards the survival of this country. [Interjection.] What pleasure did these members not try to derive from what was said by the Minister of Finance in his Budget Speech, and what did they not try to make us believe was inferred in it and what did they not try to read into it? The hon. the Minister of Finance referred to the cardinal importance of higher productivity, and as an example he referred to the pre-service training of Bantu factory operatives—and I stress “operatives”—and industrial workers so as to meet the needs of border area industries and industries in the homelands. That was the accent which the hon. the Minister placed on this. In that process he referred to increased productivity and went on to say—

This is where the emphasis lies, and it was put very clearly, but then the United Party came along, the one speaker after the other, and accepted that the floodgates of heaven were being opened and that Bantu artisans would fall now from heaven like manna. [Interjection.] I shall prove this. In the first place I want to show up the hon. member for Parktown. Do you know what he read into the words of the hon. the Minister of Finance? What he read into them, has been recorded in Hansard. He said that the hon. the Minister and the Government accepted that job reservation was meaningless. What an absurd deduction! The National Party has consistently stood by job reservation, and we repeat today that section 77 will not be repealed. [Interjections.] I shall go further. The hon. member for Maitland—I cannot roll my r’s as he does … Mr. Chairman, I apologize for that word; I hope you do not take it up the wrong way. He reads into this that the Bantu artisans will have to become trade union members and also be put on the lathes. Then we had the hon. member for Jeppes, and what does he say? What does he read into the speech of the hon. the Minister of Finance? He says “pre-service and in-service training” is a form of apprenticeship but the words are camouflaged. The expression “pre-service training” is a “camouflage” and it really means the training of people as artisans. That is what each of the hon. members read into the Minister’s speech.

The hon. member for Transkei even had a question on the Question Paper. But each hon. member now wants to do better than the next one. According to his question he wanted to know whether Bantu receiving training in terms of the pre-service scheme announced by the Minister of Finance in his Budget speech, were being trained to fill the posts of skilled artisans. He also wanted to know whether they would have to undergo trade tests and then he wanted to know whether these trade tests would be the same as those for Whites or Coloureds. I do not know whether he wants a lower standard for them. The answer to that was very clearly and unambiguously given to him when the hon. the Minister replied that skilled artisans would not be trained in terms of the scheme mentioned in the Budget Speech. It was also clearly emphasised in that reply that the intention was to provide pre-service and in-service training to Bantu workers for industrial categories of work which they are allowed to perform in terms of the law. It went on to say that the jobs they would be trained for were those for semi-skilled workers and operatives.

Then, however, the hon. the Leader of the Opposition went much further. He made a statement that there were not enough artisans in South Africa for maintaining productivity or improving the standard of living, and that we would therefore have to train Bantu artisans. Then he said that if we should do this, we would also have to create political bargaining machinery for those people, otherwise we would have industrial unrest and strife. Then he came along with his so-called three-tier system. The first one is for those who fall into the category in which full trade union rights will be enjoyed. He pleaded for full trade union rights for the educated and the highly skilled Bantu. I ask the hon. the Leader or any other member, what is an educated Bantu? Does he have a degree, has he passed Std. 10 or Std. 8? What is a highly skilled Bantu? Is he an electro-mechanic? Is he a welder? Is he an operative? Is it clear now what nonsense this is? Then he came to the second category, and in that we find the affiliated membership of existing trade unions. The Bantu who will be involved here are those who are not so highly skilled and not so highly educated. Now, are these the Bantu who have passed Std. 2 or Std. 1? What Bantu fall under that category which will deserve affiliation? Then he came to the third category, the works committees. The tribal Bantu who does manual labour and unskilled labour, is involved here. I now ask under what category the highly educated and the highly skilled tribal Bantu will fall? This is surely the most ridiculous suggestion I have ever heard in my life. Where have you ever seen such an impractical suggestion? Can one imagine the position of an employer who will have to deal with up to three kinds of bargaining machinery in his business? The hon. the Opposition are the people who are objecting on moral grounds to race classification, but now they want to come along with classes A, B and C and classify the Bantu on that basis. Have you ever heard a more ridiculous, a more unpractical suggestion? After all, there is no such thing that one can do anything of the kind. The hon. the Leader of the Opposition is trying to out-Harry Harry, because he now wants to get ahead of him. That is why he has been coming up with a new policy every second day. Those hon. members are suggesting that nothing is being done as far as the training of Bantu is concerned. The hon. member for South Coast kicked up a fuss here and asked why we were not making greater use of the Bantu. He had an attack of the trembles when we used a Bantu as a patrolman, but what about those 6 028 Bantu who have already been registered in the building industry? I call to mind a place such as Sebokeng, where they have built more than 1000 houses and where they are now building a hospital which will have 750 beds. What about those people?

What about them? You tell us.

As far as the training of the Bantu is concerned, how many children were at school at the time when they were in power? From 1948 to 1972 the number of Bantu pupils at school increased by more than 270%. Then those hon. members are the people who want to accuse this Government of not doing enough for the Bantu! I leave them at that.

In conclusion I would like to make an appeal. I want to bring this to the attention of the hon. the Minister of Labour and ask him whether the time is not ripe to ask the National Apprenticeship Board once again to institute an investigation into the training of apprentices and the period of training. Should a definition of tasks not be made anew? In some of the trades there are perhaps tasks which could be separated and moved to the level of operatives. I want to leave this matter to the hon. the Minister. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, may I ask for the privilege of the half-hour? I listened with great attention to the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark because he and I seem to cross swords quite frequently on matters of labour. He concentrated all the good sense in his speech in the last 30 seconds, when he asked the Minister and the Government whether the way in which we are using our Blacks and the way in which we classify them for jobs should not be reviewed. For the rest, his speech was the sort of speech we all make from time to time; his was outstanding propaganda for the Nationalist Party, but not very helpful for a nation which finds itself in a state of crisis as far as its labour relations are concerned. Therefore hon. members will forgive me if I do not follow him and try to answer him at a purely party-political level as one politician to another. I want to devote the little time at my disposal this afternoon to talk to the hon. the Minister in a serious vein.

I think the hon. the Minister will agree with me that we face a serious situation in South Africa. Whatever the talk may be about “toenadering”, we have a considerable degree of sympathy and understanding for the hon. the Minister in the very difficult task he has to perform and in the very complicated and weighty decisions that he and his department will have to take in the near future in the interests of South Africa. We can only hope that the hon. the Minister will have the courage to look at the situation as it obtains in South Africa today with an open mind and that he will then be ready to take decisions which are based upon principles and upon the facts as they exist in South Africa. He should not be deluded by my hon. friend for Vanderbijlpark and by the history of his party into thinking of party-political advantage first and the interests of South Africa second, or—let me put it in a different way—the immediate party-political interest first and the long-term advantages for South Africa second.

My hon. friends opposite do not have a happy record as far as labour is concerned. They have spoken in many, many voices. I can remember, because I had a part to play, in the 1943 election when they distributed pamphlets all over the Witwatersrand calling for the nationalization of the gold mines. They like to forget that, but this is what they did. I can remember one of the most eloquent speeches I have ever heard or reported—I reported it for a newspaper—made by the present hon. Minister of Transport. Before the 1943 elections he published the labour charter of the Nationalist Party. What a glorious charter! Holiday resorts for the workers, seats on the boards of directors of all companies, almost unlimited leave and participation in profits. If the hon. the Prime Minister had to consider that speech and then had to make the speech which he made here a few days ago about the undermining of private enterprise to bring about a socialist state, he would have spoken with much more conviction than he did when he addressed my hon. friend, the hon. member for Parktown. I can remember the Industrial Conciliation Act of 1956 with its sections 4 and 6 dealing with the separation of trade unions, and section 77 creating job reservation machinery in South Africa. That was a wonderful Act; and this was a wonderful piece of ideological injection into one of the finest Acts on the Statute Book of South Africa. Very little has come of that; we still have a large number of mixed trade unions in South Africa; job reservation is limited to about 2% of our population and is breached, legally and illegally, in every quarter in South Africa, because job reservation does not take into account the facts of the situation as it is in South Africa.

It is just an ideological gimmick.

To give you an example of the problems that the Government has. Sir, I wish to remind the hon. House of two statements made by my friend, the hon. the Minister of Labour, during this session. The first statement he made on 5th February, when he participated in the No-confidence Debate. He claimed that if we increased the wages of our Black people generally, it would lead to disaster in South Africa; to the closure of factories and mass unemployment. He asked us to be careful and not demand this. Then what happened? On 20th February. 15 days later, he announced that the Wage Board had been instructed to launch a special inquiry into the wages of unskilled workers in the main urban areas of South Africa with a view to increasing the wages of these people as quickly as possible. When I asked him how long it would take, he promised that it would not take longer than two months. It is now the end of April and we would like to see some results from the promise of the hon. the Minister. But that is typical of the Government, namely that as the wind blows, so they trim the sails of their labour policy.

I think the time has come that those who are concerned with our industrial development and industrial health should be given an opportunity of joining with the Government in order to determine a labour policy that will meet the needs of the second half of the 20th century in South Africa. To the best of our ability we have warned the Government, adjured them and exhorted them to take up a different attitude but we have been treated with scorn. Interestingly enough, on all sides and from time to time in the most remarkable fashion the Government has had to make concessions to our point of view, either piece-meal or by allowing things to take place under the table. We have, for example, the fact we all know that thousands upon thousands of Black men in South Africa are doing work today—I am not talking about Indians or Coloureds, but about the Black man— which under the policy of the Government should be done only by White people, but they have no protection arising from the application of the rate for the job or anything else. There are the subterfuges that are used; we know that in some parts of Natal building workers are doing work that should be reserved for White people, but because they use wooden instruments instead of steel instruments, it is called a different type of job. We know this is happening.

I think the time has come that, in the interests of our country, we should seriously consider what the real needs of South Africa are and how they can be met. We have had, to quote one authority, the recent report of the Reynders Commission of inquiry into the export trade. The commission asked that attention should be given by the Government, trade unions and employers to the whole question of job reclassification for Africans and to the improvement of the technical training of the African labour force. It asks that attention should not only be given to improving African labour, but also to the apprenticeship system and management training. If the Government would accept that recommendation, I think we could hope to achieve something, and I will make a suggestion about that in a minute. Why does the Reynders Commission really make that recommendation, and why do I come today and reproach the Government more in sorrow than in anger for negligence and for playing politics in the past years and for not looking at the real interests of South Africa? We do that because we face a very serious situation in South Africa, and unless we are prepared to take the blinkers off our eyes and look at these facts realistically and honestly—I know that essentially the Minister is an honest man, and all I ask of him is to apply his honesty to this problem—we will find that we cannot go on with the shibboleths and the prejudices, the slogans, the reservations and the making of political capital that have marred the labour policies of the Government in the past.

For example, it has been estimated that in the immediate future 113 000 new Bantu work-seekers will be coming forward every year. I think we must just consider that; 113 000 new young Black men and some women will come on to the labour market every year and will demand from the economy of South Africa the first right of a human being, namely the right to work and to earn a living. What I ask today, and I make no reproaches, is that we look at the facts. Are we convinced that we can continue to satisfy that demand under our present policies indefinitely?

I want to refer to the hon. the Prime Minister. I do not support him in many things, although I find that I can support him in many more things than in the case of his predecessor, but that will have to wait for another debate. I certainly support him in one very famous, very true and very stark statement he made recently when he was referring to the Black people of South Africa and said: “If they do not eat, we cannot sleep.” I want the hon. the Minister to tell us whether he is satisfied that under his present policy we can be assured that 113 000 Black workers will find their jobs year after year. The number will prow as our population grows and as the demands upon our economy increase. Of these 113 000 it has been calculated that about 60 000 will come from the homelands and about 53 000 from areas outside the homelands, which in the parlance of South Africa means from the White areas of South Africa. Can these people all be absorbed in the homelands? This figure of 113 000 relates to the immediate present, 1973 and 1974. Can we hope to absorb 113 000 new work-seekers in the homelands? We know that through various agencies like the Bantu Development Corporation, the Industrial Development Corporation, the Bantu Mining Development Corporation, the Xhosa Development Corporation, and all the others, we are creating about 7 000 new jobs on the borders of the homelands and in the homelands per annum—I am not talking about existing jobs that become vacant—when the new arrivals and the new demands for work are 60 000 from the homelands alone.

We are creating these at the cost of R7 000 per job. In his reply the hon. the Minister must tell us today how long it will take with the present progress the Government is making before at least the 60 000 new job-seekers coming from the homelands will be accommodated in jobs inside the homelands or on the borders of the homelands. On that depends another important question, namely, under Government policies as they are today, how many of the balance of 76 000 new work-seekers can be accommodated in the White areas of South Africa, in our present industrial cities and in our new industrial cities arising in the White areas of South Africa? That is the question. The second question we have to face—and I hope the hon. the Minister will react to this as I am dealing with it, objectively, taking into consideration the facts—is that projections have been made by various experts since the last census and since figures supplied by the Department of Statistics have become available. The gist of them is that South Africa’s present population of 23 million people will double by the year 2000.

When one sneaks of the year 2000, people think. “Oh, well. I need not worry —that is a long way off.” It has the same reaction as when people tell you that the sun may cool off in another 4 000 billion years: “Why should I worry about it?” But the year 2000 is not so far away. The year 2000 is 27 years away. My doctor tells me that, if I lose a bit of weight. I may even be alive at that time. My children and your children will probably be alive. In 27 years’ time, our population of 23 million will have increased to 46 million, or 50 million—because these statistics have a way of growing, as medical science improves, people live longer and fewer babies die. So we can bargain for a population of about 50 million by the year 2000. Twenty million will then be economically active. Twenty million will be working, to create the necessary wealth, develop the necessary resources and supply the food for us all to stay alive. Judged by the precedent and the model set by other industrial countries, five million of these 20 million people will be needed in managerial, planning, organizational and administrative occupations, and another six million in technological trades and skills, such as technicians, artisans— many semi-skilled workers. These numbers make for a total of 11 million. The people who make the projection of what South Africa will be like in 27 years’ time tell us that by that time the White population will have grown to about six or seven million, and that out of the White population, we will be able to supply an absolute maximum—I personally cannot see it happen, but we are told that this would be the absolute maximum—of two to two and a half million people in the managerial, planning, organizational, administrative, technical and skilled classes; which means that by the end of the century, if we want to maintain a reasonable rate of progress in this country, if we want to ensure that we have a standard of living in this country which will enable people to live human lives, we shall be short of nine million people in the managerial, planning, organizational, administrative, technical and skilled classes. This is why I said to the Minister at the start that he has our sympathy and understanding. He has a colossal task. He has a tremendous responsibility, and he will require unlimited courage to meet this problem. He only has one advantage which we, when in power, would not have: He has a responsible Opposition, who will be willing to understand and even to help to bring about the necessary changes in South Africa. That is the vital difference. But I want to ask the Minister, if we want to continue to grow in South Africa, if we want to maintain the growth rate as is planned, according to the Economic Development Programme, of 5 to 6% per year, where are we going to find the nine million people in these occupations which the White people will not, even with a strong immigration policy, be able to supply by the time our children take over the responsibility for South Africa from us? Where are they going to come from? I want to suggest, whether we go forward in the next 27 years with the policy of so-called “separate development” or a policy of federation, that we will only find these nine million people among the human beings whom Providence has placed in South Africa. Today the Whites, and to a lesser extent the Coloureds and the Indians, can supply these people, but the Blacks are debarred by a number of conventions and statutes from doing their full share. Somehow or other we will have to plan now, for the sake of our children, to train our Black people to do the work that will be required to be done at these levels. We shall have to find ways and means of absorbing them into our economy, whether it is an economy based on separate development or whether it is one based on federation, while still maintaining industrial peace and the standards achieved by the White man in South Africa. Those, in spite of what my friend from Vanderbijlpark says, are pre-requisites to any future policy for South Africa. We want to retain our standards and especially the standards achieved by the White people; we want all the people of this country to progress, but we want none to progress at the expense of those who have achieved certain standards in this country already. Those are the problems.

Now I come to what I think is one of the tragedies of South Africa. That is that the politicians of this land, and particularly my friends sitting opposite me, have over the years, right back to the 1920s, but with great accentuation on the period since the war, created a psychological block in the minds of many South Africans against the essential, necessary, inescapable changes that will have to come about in South Africa. Somehow or other we have to break down that psychological block. For that purpose I would say that the responsibility of my friends opposite is ten times greater, infinitely greater, than the responsibility of those of us who sit on this side of the House. With all our sins, Sir, we have not been guilty of creating this psychological block.

In view of the reports we are getting from experts, in view of the projections being made by demographers and economists, and in view of the suggestions made on our export trade by people like Prof. Reynders, I want to suggest today that the time has come when a national commission should be appointed to investigate the necessary changes that should come about in South Africa and to investigate the problems that will surround the effecting of those changes in our lives. I am not thinking in terms of a political commission of politicians; I suggest a commission that will consist of representatives of the Government, of employers, of employees, both Black and White, even of representatives from the homeland Governments, if the Government wishes that, and of people with academic backgrounds and experience. Let them get down to it and investigate the position so that they can advise us on this problem. I think that their terms of reference should be wide, because such a commission of experts should not be hidebound by political considerations; they should have only the human and economic interests of South Africa’s future at heart and they should meet together in an atmosphere of academic impartiality and calm, so that they can study the facts. It must bé part of the terms of reference of this commission to investigate the situation of labour now and for the future, area by area and industry by industry. The manner in which people can be trained and in which the White skilled workers can be brought in to help us to give these people the necessary training without feeling themselves threatened, should also be examined. The commission should examine, too, what form of consultation and co-operation should ultimately be developed between the White workers and the representatives of the Black workers to prevent unfair competition and the dragging down of the standards of our White workers. The commission should be asked to look at these problems under three chapters, if I may call them that. The first should be the chapter of human relations and under that heading I find extremely important the problem of communication between Blacks and Whites as workers and as human beings. This commission should attempt not only to determine what their needs and aspirations are, but also to find ways and means of developing a higher degree of mutual respect among the peoples of South Africa.

I was surprised recently when I met some of our Black leaders to find what small things that we seldom think of as Whites really hurt them deeply. Let me give you one example, Sir. I do not think this is petty. One is amazed to see how deeply they feel about the fact that an adult worker in a factory with considerable experience and a record of loyalty—possibly a westernized Black adult—-is called “Boy” even by the youngest apprentice in that factory. They feel that it is an insult to their human dignity and to their worthiness, and when they point this out to one, one immediately has to accept that they are right, yet it is strange that one never stops to think how these things affect one’s fellow human beings with whom one associates.

Sir, the second chapter should be the economic chapter, that is to say, how our labour units, if I may use that term although I do not like it myself very much, can be helped to become more proficient and more productive. We all agree, Sir, that ultimately the standards achieved by groups of workers depend upon their efficiency and their productivity. I want to suggest that in particular this commission should be charged to investigate what the responsibilities of management are in bringing about greater productivity on the part of the labour of South Africa. We tend in South Africa and all over the world to make the demand, when people ask for higher wages, that they must become more productive before they can get higher wages; we tell them that they must earn their higher wages through higher productivity. But I put the question to my hon. friends in this House whether the responsibility for higher productivity is not to a much larger extent the responsibility of management rather than the responsibility of the individual worker, or even organized workers. It is management that can bring into being educational facilities; it is management that can employ the services of experts like production engineers to devise more efficient methods of work for these people. Theirs is the prime and the first responsibility, and I think such a commission could really devote worthwhile attention to this economic factor in our future labour relations in South Africa.

The third chapter under which the terms of reference of this commission should be formulated is the legal chapter, that is to say, how one can protect the rights of workers in a multi-racial work situation. The hon. the Minister will agree with me— I know the hon. the Minister of Transport does agree with me—that whether we have federation or whether we have separate development, we will still have Blacks and Whites. Coloureds and Indians, working together in the same industries, in the same undertakings, for as long as either they or I or our children are alive in this country. It would therefore be in our interests if we could investigate how best the interests and the rights of all workers of different colours can be protected, and especially how we can protect the standards already achieved by the White workers. Because, Sir, politics apart, let us face the fact that if you want to bring about successful changes for the better, successful changes in the interest of the future of this country, you will not succeed unless you gain the co-operation of the White workers. I am sorry to see that I was misreported in one of the newspapers. I spoke at Blyde River over the weekend, and there I warned that if we go in for changes in our labour pattern in South Africa and we do not obtain the full co-operation of the White trade unions, we may face another 1922 in South Africa, and I believe that, Sir.

You cannot even convince Harry; how can you convince me?

Who is interested in convincing you?

Sir, this is a very serious thing to say but there is no doubt that the strike of 1922, in a strange way, had beneficial effects for South Africa, because it led to the Industrial Conciliation Act of 1924 and changed our labour relations in South Africa. But I do not want us to obtain changes, that are inevitable in any case, at the expense of further disruption and riots and unhappiness and misery and perhaps death in South Africa. I do hope this Government, and specifically the hon. the Minister of Labour, will accept this challenge, that he will accept this suggestion by the Opposition, which is made in the interests of South Africa and for the sake of ensuring a just and happy land for all our people in the future when, as I said before, we have to hand over to our children.

Sir, in the few minutes left to me I would like to remind you of a speech made by my hon. leader in this House two years ago, when he indicated what it could mean to South Africa in the future if we could make full and wise use of our human resources together with the natural resources with which we have been blessed. He pointed out that if, and we would then be much more modest than Japan or Western Germany, we could achieve a growth rate of 8% or 9%, we would in 1990 have a national income in South Africa not of R13 000 million or R14 000 million as we have today, but one of R90 000 million, which would make South Africa one of the ten top trading nations of the world. This would bring certain advantages to South Africa which should become an ideal that we want to strive for with all that we have got. Those consequences will be, firstly, that we shall not have to be begging the world outside for essential armaments for South Africa. We shall be strong and wealthy and skilled enough to make our own armaments. And the second will be that we will have more friends in the world than we have today because we will be one of the ten top trading nations of the world, and it will pay a great number of other nations to be friendly with us. Thirdly, we will have the wherewithal, the material means, to do justice to all the peoples in this land without fear that justice to the one will mean injustice to the other. I suggest that this is a prospect that we should face with vision, imagination and keen anticipation in South Africa. I also suggest in all sincerity to my old friend, the hon. the Minister of Labour, that the first step to bring about what is necessary to achieve this may be the appointment of such a fact-finding commission of all the interested parties to sit down, even if it takes a year or two, to find out what each other’s problems are and what the difficulties are and what the prospects are, and to come back to Parliament with suggestions which we can all support for the sake of a greater, a happier and a safe South Africa.

Before replying to the hon. member who preceded me, I should first like to make an appeal to the hon. the Minister in regard to the Unemployment Insurance Act and the Workmen’s Compensation Act. I should like to ask the hon. the Minister whether the maximum wage level could not be revised again, so as to include persons who previously fell within the ambit of the Act, but as a result of a wage increase in the interim, no longer qualified for the purposes of the Act. The Act lays down that it is not only the basic salary of these people which should be taken into account, but also that their overtime payment should be taken into account in calculating that maximum emolument. What I want to ask is whether the Act could not be so amended that overtime payments need not be taken into account. Usually overtime payment offers no security and, in addition, it can sometimes be of an uncertain nature. And in that connection I should also like to ask the hon. the Minister whether the benefits paid in terms of the Unemployment Insurance Act and the Workmen’s Compensation Act might not also be revised again in the light of the rising cost of living.

Sir, we listened here to the hon. member for Yeoville and if we were to believe the sombre picture he painted here of what lies ahead for South Africa and what is already happening here, one would say that everything in the way of industry in South Africa has already almost ground to a halt and that South Africa is already on its knees economically, but the truth is of course that South Africa has never in its history been stronger economically than it is today. Listening to him, one would say that there is large-scale unemployment here, as much as can be found in the whole world, and that we must now provide jobs for all those people. Sir, we have become accustomed to that picture being held up to us. Twenty-five years ago they predicted that there would be insolvency and unemployment in South Africa, predictions which of course did not materialize. The hon. member came along here and suggested that a commission of inquiry be appointed. Now I just want to tell him that he should put these commissions out of his head. This Government, this National Party, is capable enough to take care of all these problems and find solutions for them, because excellent solutions to those problems he has referred to, are being found within the framework of this same National Party policy.

In the first place he spoke about human relations. It is in this very sphere of human relations in which our policy is so clearly spelled out, because in accordance with our policy human relations must be such that we have racial peace here and that, in South Africa, every population group will have its place of existence. He referred to the protection of the rights of the worker. But this is precisely what the National Party stands for. It is those very rights of the worker which are being protected by us at present, those rights they want to destroy. The commission he wants, already forms an integral part of the policy of the National Party, and I think that we should rather leave this matter in the capable hands of the people who are giving attention to it.

That is where you are wide of the mark again.

I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate the hon. the Minister and his department. I want to thank them for their wise and considerate behaviour at the time of the strikes we had at various places in our country over the past few months. Notwithstanding the panic in the United Party, notwithstanding the fact that unture stories came from their side, stories which were even spread in the House about plundering which was alleged to have taken place, this hon. Minister and his department acted calmly and decisively.

I wonder whether the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District is gradually taking over the position of shadow minister concerned on that side, because it was after all he who introduced this discussion today. Whereas he said, inter alia, that if they were to come to power, they would protect the White worker so that no White would be replaced by a non-White, I find in that an occasion to thank the hon. the Minister for the way he acted during the recess when a few White workers were discharged on the Witwatersrand and non-Whites were employed in their places. The hon. the Minister immediately reinstated those White workers in their jobs. I want to ask the next speaker on that side of the House to tell us what they would have done under the same circumstances. Would they have approached the employer and told him to reinstate those White workers immediately and made it clear to him that he is not allowed to discharge a White worker to the benefit of the non-White worker? I would like to have an answer to this from the other side.

The hon. member for Yeoville said only 2% of our workers in South Africa were being protected by job reservation. I want to ask him what he is complaining about if the Act does not apply to 98% of the workers? Why is he complaining about 2%? I cannot understand the arguments they are advancing. Is he perhaps objecting to the fact that certain work which was previously done by Whites is now being done by non-Whites? Is this a reproach against the Government or is he pleading that more of those White workers be replaced by non-White workers?

May I put a question to the hon. member?

No, I do not have much time left. They do not want to give us an honest standpoint on their policy. Exemptions are granted and additional exemptions will perhaps be granted in future. However, this will be done after our White trade unions have been consulted and it will be done in a responsible manner. Our policy on the White workers is very clear and we shall protect our White workers against the non-White workers with their low standard of living. Let them now tell us what they would do in respect of work reservation if they were to come into power. It has been said repeatedly that they would do away with it. I want to ask them a further question today. The next hon. member who is going to rise on that side can in all justification towards his own party and towards the workers outside furnish us with these answers so that we may know. Since we are now discussing the abolition of job reservation, will this apply, in accordance with their policy, to the public service, the provincial services and the local authorities? Are they going to allow White and non-White to work shoulder to shoulder in our public service? Let me mention a simple example. Will they allow, and is it their policy, that a Bantu magistrate may be appointed in a White town?

What is the position in Soweto?

Do they say that there will be no job reservation that the “rate for the job” will be applied, that the same pay for the same job will apply and that the floodgates will be thrown open? They must tell us today so that our people in the public service may know. If they are not prepared to do what I have mentioned, I want to say that they are dishonest, that their policy is immoral and that they want to make a distinction between first class and second class workers. Then I want to say that they want to regard those people who do manual work in our industries, as second class workers, that these people need expect no protection from that side of the House if they were to come into power, and that it is only the white collar worker who would benefit. If they really want to be honest in their policy and if they want to be honest in regard to job reservation which they want to abolish, hon. members will have to tell us today that they will throw the manual labourers to the wolves and only protect the other workers. I want to make it clear to them that as far as this side is concerned there is no question of there being any first and second class workers. To us on this side of the House this includes all the White workers, whether in the public service or in industry. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member put to us certain questions regarding our attitude towards job reservation and related matters. The hon. member knows or ought to know what our attitudes are, but I think it would be most appropriate if we were to put some of these questions to a very senior member of the Cabinet, the hon. the Minister of Tourism. The hon. the Minister of Tourism is on record as having condemned job reservation and many of the particular policies that are at the moment applied by the Government. I, in fact, would like to ask the hon. the Minister of Tourism whether he has changed his mind or whether he still holds the views he held on job reservation and on the decentralization of industry, border areas and related matters. I think it would be of great interest for us to know.

My hon. colleague the hon. member for Yeoville has put a most responsible and statesmanlike suggestion to the hon. the Minister. I would like to request the hon. the Minister to respond to it in an equally responsible and statesmanlike way and in fact I would like to suggest to him that if it is at all possible he should come in next in the debate to indicate to us what his views are on this particular matter. If we leave this debate to be run in the way it is being done at the moment by some of the hon. members on the other side, we are just right back to where we were. We will certainly make no progress whatsoever in the kind of direction that my colleague, the hon. member for Yeoville, has suggested.

The hon. the Minister, of course, finds himself in a real predicament, as has been suggested. We have every sympathy with him. He is hobbled by the history of his own party and by the attitude that they have inculcated over the years. Is it not that particular party that went from platform to platform to say:

Now that it is necessary to make adjustments and now that it is happening every day, he comes up against resistance because of the basic attitude that for political purposes he has inculcated over the years. As a party they sought to play on the worst fears of our White workers and now they are reaping the benefits of that short-sighted approach. In any case we will not make any progress in this direction if we get the kind of speech that we have just had from the two hon. members who have just spoken, the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark and the hon. member for Boksburg. All that we got from them is that this side is not interested in the future prospects of the White worker and all that we want to do is “om die sluise oop te trek”. This does not get us anywhere. The “sluise” were pulled open years ago. When 80% of the workers in the manufacturing industry are non-Whites and 90% of the workers in the mining industry are non-Whites, it is nonsensical to talk about “sluise ooptrek” or “toemaak”. They were opened years ago. There is nothing left in the dam. It has run dry.

What hon. members do not seem to understand is that we are equally interested in the future security of the White worker, but that we say that this can only be done by running it differently, i.e. by having a more rapid growth rate and by creating a bigger economic cake so that each and everyone can have a bigger slice of it. What sort of safeguards do that side of the House provide for White workers? It has been indicated here that non-Whites are coming in every day to take positions previously occupied by White workers, yet the White workers are not protected by the payment of the rate for the job. The hon. member makes a great fuss here about industrial representation for non-White workers. He says that we want to create this in South Africa. But what is the Government’s alternative to that?—to have full-blooded Black trade unions operating from the Black homelands. I can think of nothing more calculated to disturb the industrial situation in South Africa. Already we have had a Minister of the Zulu Authority recently during the strikes saying that no Black workers will go back to work until he has given them permission to do so. What sort of situation are we going to create? We will be held up to ransom there. What protection does that provide to the White workers?

Let us get back to the point made by my hon. colleague, the hon. member for Yeoville. Let us talk sensibly on what ought to be done with regard to this particular situation, because at the moment things are going wrong. My hon. colleague quoted figures for the year 2000. I want to convey exactly the same sort of sentiment but I want to look two or three years ahead. Let us look at the situation in South Africa as it will be in 1975. The whole character of the labour force is changing; it must no longer be seen as a triangle with a vast undifferentiated, untrained, mass of workers at the bottom. The modern industrial work force looks more like a diamond. In fact, in South Africa at the present time, probably less than 8% of our workers are completely unskilled. The belt of skilled workers has moved up and the problem we face here is one of very considerable magnitude. In the year 1975 South Africa will need close on 2,5 million skilled workers. Where are they going to come from? To contend that they must be supplied by the White section of our community is nonsensical because there are fewer than 3,5 million Whites in this country and only 38% of them are economically active. If my arithmetic is correct, 38% of 3,5 million is only slightly more than one million workers. In other words, the Whites at best could supply only about one million of the skilled workers that we will need in the country.

At the very best.

Yes, at the very best, but we need twice this number. Quite clearly they must come from the non-White groups. We want to ask the hon. the Minister what his plans are to cope with the situation. There is a sort of complacency that we cannot understand at all. Surely the Government must have a policy to cope with the situation? In the meantime they put formulae before us, the kind of Riekert labour ratio formulae of 2½ to 1 and that kind of procedure; that is an economic absurdity. In a modern industrial society you cannot run your industry on formulae of that kind. Quite clearly the situation is now becoming dangerous. Things are going wrong. Recently we have had examples of labour unrest. We have now reached the situation where we must make major adaptations. We cannot continue to play politics as the two hon. members have done who were here a minute ago but who have now seen fit to leave. The views that we held on the labour situation five years ago have now become completely untenable, because the situation is changing so dramatically. Look at the figures which were supplied to us recently on the question of improvement in productivity. The economic planners plan for an improvement in productivity of some 2,8% per year. Last year, in fact, the productivity increase in the national output was only slightly more than 1%. In the manufacturing field where in fact much of our economic growth should stem from there was net decline in productivity. Surely, that should alarm the hon. the Minister and gentlemen on the other side, and that is why we are making them this offer and making the suggestion to them. We have a pretty good idea of what ought to be done. Have we not spoken for years about the stabilization of a modern industrial work force? Have we not talked about the migratory system that must be reviewed? Have we not talked about training and creating avenues of advancement for non-White workers and for White workers? What we are doing now, and we are giving him an excellent opportunity to handle the situation, is to ask him to take it out of the political arena and to appoint the kind of commission to which my hon. friend from Yeoville has referred.

What we do not understand about this Government is why it won’t take the steps that ought to be taken. Right at the moment I understand there is a departmental committee looking at training. Surely, if you want to handle such an important issue as the training of industrial workers, you should bring in the very best expertise the country have available. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member who has just resumed his seat, omitted to reply to a very important question put to him by the hon. member for Boksburg. He purposely avoided it, and that question therefore still remains unanswered. We would like to know what their attitude is in respect of the question concerning the appointment of the Black magistrate.

We saw a very interesting phenomenon here today. The United Party, which has always taken the stand that it has an answer to every question which could possibly be asked in regard to every problem, is pleading here today for a national commission which is supposed to investigate this question of labour, etc. It is not my task to react to that, but all I want to ask is whether the hon. gentlemen who have spoken about that matter, have permission to serve on such a commission. I ask this in the light of the experience we have had in other spheres and about which there is considerable doubt today. The members of this United Party are the people who claimed in their booklet “You want it; we have it” that the workers wanted a policy which would work. They went on to say, “Do you want security in your job? Vote for a practical United Party.” Today they are pleading here for a national committee or commission, which is an admission that they do not have a policy in the field of labour with which they can go to the country. This is what is being suggested here. We cannot let them get away with this, namely that they have now come along with a new idea and that from now on they will be able to say to the voters at elections, “Look, we would like to find a solution.” Because what are they carrying around in their hearts? They must not be allowed to get out of this. The moment of truth has arrived for them in that respect. What are they carrying in their hearts in respect of the position of the White workers? The White workers want to know exactly where they stand with the United Party. They want to know where they stand with the United Party, because when the hon. member for Houghton pleaded here for Bantu trade unions earlier this year, the United Party pleaded for a scheme of affiliation of those trade unions with the White trade unions. But two months later the hon. the Leader of the Opposition pleaded for what my hon. friend for Vanderbijlpark referred to, namely a tree-tier system of trade unions for skilled non-White workers with affiliation for semi-skilled non-White workers and works committees for the unskilled. Up to this stage we have had to accept that this is the policy of the United Party, because this is what the Leader of the Opposition said. But what is more interesting is that before he said this in respect of labour, he also said the following in this connection at the congress of the United Party (translation)—

If one relates this statement made at that congress with regard to their federal policy to what their leader said here in respect of the labour situation, it is time the White workers of our country became gravely worried. If one is to accept that the skilled worker, according to the United Party, is a full artisan, then, by virtue of his artisanship and his membership of a trade union, he should after all have the right to be elected to the executive committee of trade unions. They would have to have the right to serve on industrial councils, where they would not only be able to negotiate and discuss their own fortunes and affairs …

[Inaudible.]

Surely the hon. member for Salt River does not understand what is involved here. He should rather keep quiet.

You are talking rubbish.

The hon. member now says that I am talking rubbish. But if that is so, surely this is the most immoral party imaginable. Then, surely, it is very clear that they are intent on pulling the wool over the eyes of the Blacks and tricking them. There can be no other explanation for it. If they want to be consistent and make the concessions to the Black man which the hon. the Leader of the Opposition pleaded for, then the Black man would after all have to be able to serve on the industrial council, where he will negotiate, not only in regard to his own affairs, but also in regard to the affairs of the White worker. Once they have come to that stage of this kind of trade union membership, would the position not arise—and, after all, we know what certain trade unions are like—where they would be able to give money to political parties? And who would stop them? It would be their money—they would be able to do with it what they liked. By those means they could try to bring about the position, in an artificial and improper manner, where one political party, which might be prepared to put up with this kind of conduct and attitude, would have the right to govern this country. But, what is more, with the help of that political party they could paralyse the country economically; because then they would be able to call strikes. After all, if a person is a member of a trade union, then he can call a strike. The Opposition must tell us whether they, in accordance with what was said by the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, would be prepared to give these rights to the Black man when they give him trade union rights. But the semiskilled, to whom they initially want to give affiliated membership only, would, in terms of our existing industrial legislation, in due course also be able to qualify as skilled workers. What would the position be in respect of the White man within the trade union should the trade union eventually be flooded by Black trade union members? The moment of truth has arrived for the United Party. They owe it to the White worker in this country to say what they are prepared to give him. But they also owe it to the Black worker to tell him, “We are not prepared to give you everything which is implied by what we said we would give you.” As against this pernicious plan of the United Party the policy of the National Party is very clearly outlined, not only in theory, as is the case with them, but also in practice. Only last year the hon. the Minister of Labour mentioned three matters here on behalf of the National Party. Firstly, the National Party creates full working opportunities for White and non-White in order to make all of them happy. What is the position at present? At present there are only, 62% unemployed, in respect of Whites as well as Coloureds, which is a splendid achievement. Unemployment, in other words, does not exist. But employment is not the only thing that is being created. Harmonious co-operation is also being created. In this connection it is interesting to note that last year, in the case of Whites and Coloureds, there were only six strikes, which involved only 354 Whites and eight Coloureds. In respect of the Bantu there were 16 strikes, which involved 3 374 Bantu. This is a proof that in practise the workers in this country are satisfied.

There is just one matter which I would like to bring to the attention of the hon. the Minister. This is in respect of the facilities at Westlake. I really want to ask whether there is not a possibility of extending those facilities to the north. I do not have the time to discuss that now, but I just want to point out that there are great opportunities for establishing a strong Westlake in the north. That is the one matter. The second matter … [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member who has just sat down reflects the general attitude of members on the other side of the House. They have some inordinate fear that the rights of White workers will be taken away from them or supplanted. That, of course, is a lot of nonsense because nobody in this country, no matter which side of the House he represents, intends anything of that nature. What the hon. member for Yeoville asked for is that the hon. the Minister of Labour should reappraise the entire situation to see what is taking place in South Africa, more particularly with regard to its tremendous growth potential and the importance of growth in this country, in order to enable the entire community to play its part in production in this country, to be able to live in this country, and to be able to contribute to the wealth of this country and to their own well-being. With that objective in mind, he also asked for the maintenance of good relations and harmony. That is the whole purpose of the hon. member’s appeal. Hon. members must not try to draw a red herring across the trail by suggesting that there is any intention to supplant the rights of White workers, or to flood trade unions in such a way that they are dominated by certain races, because we do not approach the question of the rights of the worker from the point of view of colour. We are not alone in this point of view; this point of view has been expressed over the years. There are eminent people in this country who have constantly drawn attention to the importance of having more labour units in this country, and to the training of such labour units, if we are to maintain growth in this country. One only has to look at the statement which Mr. P. E. Rousseau made in 1971 at a meeting of the Productivity and Wage Association. He made the following very simple statement—

He goes on to say—

Further on he says this—

Then he goes on to say with regard to the non-White South African—

Then he goes on to say—

Sir, he is not the only one who talks this way. There are men like Frikkie Meyer, who, according to a report, stated the following rather interesting point of view in 1960—

Sir, the opinion of these two gentlemen is merely indicative of the wealth of thinking that has gone into the necessity to provide the trained manpower for our future requirements. If the hon. the Minister takes the trouble to read the report of the Reynders Commission on exports, to which the hon. member for Yeoville referred, he will find that in their submissions and recommendations they suggest that there should be a getting together of employers, of trade unions, of the Government and of the representatives of workers, including Black workers, if necessary, in order to discuss this whole question of the emergence of more and more trained workers in industry. Sir, you only have to look at the reports of people who occupy senior positions in labour. In this connection I would refer you, Sir, to a paper delivered not so long ago before some workshop institute by Mr. Scheepers. In this paper he says—

I would not be surprised if the figure today is over 80%. Sir, the greatest contributor to the continued growth of this country is secondary industry; it is no longer the mining industry. The continued economic growth of South Africa lies in the constant development of our secondary industry, and our secondary industry today is permeated with and depends basically on non-White labour. Sir, we are not pleading the cause of non-White labour for the sake of non-White labour per se; we are pleading that cause because we believe it is essential for us to take note of the reservoir of labour we have and to make proper use of that reservoir of labour in an orderly way in the best interests of the future of this country, so that none of the fears mentioned here by the last speaker will be of any validity at all. Sir, there is no fear in this country that the White workers will be replaced by Blacks. We must dispel this fallacy once and for all. It is an idiotic, ideological gimmick which hon. members opposite use, and unfortunately I must include the hon. the Minister of Labour for often making use of it himself. It is the biggest lot of nonsense imaginable that the White workers in this country will be replaced by Blacks. There is so much work requiring to be done that we cannot displace anybody in this country. Sir, this is the whole purpose of our appeal today: We must look at this whole picture not as we did 10 years ago, or even as we did five years ago. We have to look at this whole issue in the light of what has happened in the last three or four months. Here, in the last three or four months, we have had the most remarkable upheaval in labour. Here we have suddenly discovered a situation which we warned the hon. the Minister against, and when I say “suddenly” I mean in an evocative sense. In a provocative way we have discovered a situation where one of the largest sections of employment in this country has been considerably underpaid and completely neglected and has had its productivity wasted and its value wasted because there has been no training and no communication and no interest and no concern. For years the Wages and Productivity Association, a self-established body by employers, has lectured, has written pamphlets and has held seminars in order to educate in an evolutionary manner the employers to know how to deal with labour. That is what we require. I do not blame the Government. I only blame the Minister for not having taken a lead on any occasion. He has sat in this post for over 10 years and he placidly sits in that office administering laws and sticking to a certain narrow ideology. If I were in his position, as I hope the hon. member for Yeoville will be shortly, I would adopt a different attitude. I mean that quite sincerely. I am not saying this in order to make it a laughing matter, because the Lord alone knows to what heights a man can aspire in his lifetime. But I want to say this, that if the hon. the Minister of Labour wants to mean anything as far as his aspiration for his lifetime is concerned, he should give a lead. The duty of a man who is dealing with human relations in this country is to give a lead. For the first time in the many years that I have known the hon. the Minister he has decided to review wage determinations which are barely two years old. These reviews should constantly go on. Our appeal is this: Get organized labour, get the employers, get trade unions, get Black representatives—and there are quite a number who have reached the standard of education where these matters can be discussed with them—instead of leaving it to the emergent homeland governments to put their noses into the business, as was the Minister’s experience recently. [Time expired.]

In the first place I want to reply to a few specific requests which were addressed to me. I want to begin with the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark who requested that the period of apprenticeship be reviewed. I want to inform the hon. member that this is a matter to which we are of course constantly giving attention. It would interest him to know that almost all the apprenticeship committees have succeeded over the past two years in revising their training conditions and introducing shorter periods. In other words, shorter periods have been introduced in most trades during the past two years. This is a process we are continuing, to keep on urging the apprenticeship committees to review these conditions. You may rest assured that we are giving constant attention to this matter.

The hon. member for Boksburg asked whether we could not improve the benefits in terms of the Unemployment Insurance Act, and also in terms of the Workmen’s Compensation Act. As far as unemployment insurance benefits are concerned, I could just mention that the wage limit is again under review. The Unemployment Insurance Board is preparing proposals for us in this regard, and I want to express the hope that I will shortly be in possession of these proposals of theirs so that we can effect the desired improvements in this connection as well. The hon. member also put questions in regard to the provision in the Workmen’s Compensation Act as far as overtime is concerned. He presented a plea in regard to the calculation of overtime in that connection. The interpretation attached by the Workmen’s Compensation Commissioner to overtime is that it should in fact be included if it is a constant amount. If it occurs constantly, it should be included. But I still think the hon. member raised an important matter here, and I shall ask the commissioner to consider this again. We are constantly urging our people to work harder and increase productivity, and I believe that when they react to this, we should at least give them the necessary recognition and encouragement as well. I shall request the Workmen’s Compensation Commissioner to consider this matter in that light.

The hon. member for Springs pleaded for an institution, similar to the one we have at Westlake, for the North; that is to say, an institution for the training of adults as artisans. Our experience gained in this connection has not been very encouraging. There was a time when we did have such training centres in the North, at Olifantsfontein and Kimberley. Those two centres had to be closed down, not for lack of sympathy on the part of the Government, but simply because of a lack of applicants at those places. We have a great task ensuring a proper enrolment at the training centre at Westlake. We are advertising in all kinds of ways. Recently we increased the allowance once again, and this is now very encouraging, but in spite of that we are struggling to get a full enrolment at this training centre. In view of this experience and the absence of a really significant demand in the North, I am afraid that I will not be able to comply with this request, no matter how well-intentioned it was.

I come next to other matters which were raised by the hon. members for Yeoville, Hillbrow and others opposite. I shall begin with the question of Bantu wages which is of course a matter of real importance to us in view of everything which has happened, and also in view of the investigation by the Wage Board. I hope that it will be possible for the report of the Wage Board to be submitted to me for approval within the next few weeks. I think that it will be possible to approve of the recommendations of the Wage Board within a few weeks. In regard to this important matter I think that we as Parliament should hold very level-headed views in regard to it. One should take very careful stock of the facts of the situation, and it is no use our allowing ourselves to be stampeded in regard to this matter by emotional slogans or agitations within or outside South Africa, for after all we have to manage our affairs in such a way here that we offer our people, White and Black, a permanent livelihood here, and so that we will ensure them permanent employment opportunities. Consequently I think that one must realize that we cannot increase our wages, whether of Whites or non-Whites, too rapidly and too drastically without incurring the risk that our economy could be disrupted. Our economy could be disrupted in various ways. It could be disrupted through inflation getting entirely out of hand. Consequently that is the major issue at the moment. During all these debates which we have had, and even in the debate of the Vote of the Prime Minister, we have had to listen to a great deal being said about inflation. It is true that the question of inflation is probably this Government’s greatest problem. It is not only our greatest problem; I think it is also the greatest problem of Mr. Nixon and Mr. Heath. It is a world-wide phenomenon, and for that reason we can be certain that over-drastic wage increases will have a very serious effect on this inflationary situation. It is no wonder the hon. the Prime Minister took it upon himself the other day to issue a warning in regard to unrealistic wage increases. Before I go any further I should just like to straighten the hon. member for Yeoville out in regard to this matter. The hon. member for Yeoville quoted from memory what I had allegedly said here the other day in regard to this matter. He said that I had allegedly stated that if wages were going to be increased, it would cause unemployment. I am very sorry the hon. member did not quote the actual qualifying words, for that would have been much fairer, and for the sake of the record I am going to do so now.

I would be glad if you would do so, for I was quoting from a newspaper.

I shall not give it to the hon. members as I said it, and I am doing this for the sake of an authentic record. According to column 49 of Hansard of this session, I said—

I still adhere to this statement today. In this regard it is still to my mind the logical hypothesis today.

Where, as a result of the recent events, are unrealistically high wages being paid?

Some of the employers to whom I referred previously, who were unwilling in regard to the investigations of the Wage Board and even in regard to the pleas of the Bantu Labour Board to the industrial councils for adjustment, and who then refused to pay higher wages, suddenly doubled their wages in some cases after the strikes.

But still, they are not bankrupt.

They did not go bankrupt, but is the hon. member aware of what a disturbing situation could follow on that? I now want to refer to this. Some of those entrepreneurs are now cutting down drastically on their Bantu staff. This is, in other words, precisely what I said here, i.e. that they are now dismissing them and rendering them unemployed. This creates another sociological problem for us. I am not only going to quote what I said; I am going to quote a person who was once the bench-fellow of the hon. member for Yeoville when he was still sitting in the back-benches. The hon. member will know him very well. A certain Mr. Oppenheimer sat on that side of the House when I was still a young member on this side of the House.

We were good back-benchers.

That former bench-fellow of the hon. member, who apparently has different political connections these days, discussed the same matter recently. According to The Argus of 30th April of this year he said, inter alia, the following—

Hear, hear!

That is the statement which hon. members on this side of the House and I have repeatedly made, viz. that we have nothing against the increasing of wages, but that it should at least be accompanied by an increase in productivity. Now, there is something else which the former bench-fellow of that hon. member said which I must quote, which I find equally significant. We are constantly hearing from the other side, and from their kindred spirits, about the poverty datum line. In this connection it is also of importance to take note of the standpoint adopted by Mr. Oppenheimer in regard to this matter. According to Die Burger of 18th April he recently said the following in London (translation)—

He asked whether a young recruit should receive such a wage. That is precisely the argument I used on a previous occasion in this House. In fact, I also used it before the meeting of industrialists in Johannesburg, i.e. that this poverty datum line which is based by the universities on a family of five, cannot be applied to a young, raw recruit who has just began to work. Surely it cannot be applied to that individual who is a raw recruit, and surely he cannot be measured by that same criterion, the criterion determined by the University of Natal or the University of Cape Town, or whoever it was determined by. Surely that is totally unrealistic. We should all guard against that unrealistic approach. I am very pleased that a person like Mr. Oppenheimer is also guarding against it, for he is a person to whom even the hon. member for Houghton pays attention. This question of Bantu wages is therefore a matter in regard to which one should act with great discretion. Obviously we have to adjust their wages. It should be done in a realistic way, and if it cannot be done in such a way, I am afraid that we are not only going to harm the country, but also the Bantu themselves. If there should be a rise in the cost of living as a result of these wage increases, it is going to create an exceptional situation. It is going to bring about a situation of inflation which is going to affect not only you and I as Whites. If the inflationary situation here is aggravated, it is going to affect to the same extent the Bantu who also have to buy bread, eat meat and buy bicycles. For that reason this is a matter which one has to tackle with the utmost discretion.

The hon. member for Yeoville referred to the question of the 113 000 Bantu who enter the labour market annually—that is according to the Reynders Report. The hon. member wanted to know what is going to happen as their numbers grow, since they cannot all be accommodated in the homelands. He wanted to know where we are going to accommodate them. Surely that is not an unusual situation for us. As far as they are concerned, we have the position that, according to the economic development programme, an additional influx of 165 000 Bantu per annum is necessary for a growth rate of 5,75% in the country. According to our own manpower surveys—that is to say, the surveys made by the Department of Labour—165 600 additional Bantu were absorbed annually in the Republic’s manpower between April, 1969, and April, 1971. Thus, 165 000 were absorbed, and not 113 000, to which reference was made a moment ago. In other words, South Africa’s economy is able— its homeland economy, its border area economy and its metropolitan economy— to accommodate this increase. Now, one also has constant proposals from the United Party, in this and in other debates, by way of criticism or pleas which implies that the Government is in fact refusing to offer the non-Whites adequate opportunities for employment and advancement in this country. That is an impression which is constantly being created here. We are so fond of referring to an image which is being created. Well, that is the image the United Party wants to create of this side, of the Government: That we are so callous that …

It is an existing image, and we would like to help you change it.

You will really not help us with those exaggerated pleas of yours. I think that the hon. member may find in the light of the following information that it is possible for one to change it in another way, a way which I now want to deal with. One should face up to the actual situation. Before I come to the plea for a commission which the hon. member made, I just want to reply to the question of whether we are really offering our non-Whites such minimal opportunities for advancement and employment? Then I want to refer in the very first place to the Coloureds; those two million people whom the United Party only use when they want to play a little politics. However, it always strikes me in this House—and I have said this on more than one occasion—that the United Party have very little to say about the Coloureds in this House when it comes to employment opportunities for them.

Are they not members of trade unions?

When it comes to non-White labour, the United Party talks mainly, almost exclusively, about Bantu labour, and Coloured labour in this country is neglected in their pleas and almost their entire school of thought.

May I ask the hon. the Minister a question? Will the Minister not concede that Coloureds are members of trade unions?

Yes, they are members of trade unions, but when it suits hon. members opposite to discredit the Government here and abroad about job reservation, then it is told how job reservation discriminates against Coloureds. For that reason I think it is important that one should, against that background, ask right at the outset what the position is now in regard to these two million people, the Coloureds who comprise such an important part of our population. Are we not affording them proper opportunities of advancement? What is the position here in the Cape, where there is such a heavy concentration of Coloureds? In three of the most important and biggest industrial sectors in the Cape, i.e. the building industry, the clothing industry and the furniture industry—these are the three major industrial sectors here in the Cape—the Coloured worker, the Coloured operative and the Coloured artisan are represented up to 95%. Is this an indication now that as the result of the application of our policy we are preventing these people from having their place in the sun? It is not necessary for me to draw attention again to the extent to which we are today affording Coloured women opportunities of becoming counter assistants, and how they are being employed in entire departments of the O.K. Bazaars, for example, from one end to the other. This is being done in terms of this Government’s policy, and in accordance with the policy of equal pay for equal work. They receive precisely the same pay, and surely this is not an indication that they are being prevented by this Government from having a place in the sun. For that reason I say it is really absurd, and not only absurd, but also a disservice to our country, to be constantly creating the impression that we supposedly do not want to afford the Coloured in this country adequate opportunities.

But let me now come to that sector to which the most attention is given in the school of thought of the United Party, i.e. the Black workers. Right at the outset I want to ask whether the United Party is aware that as far as the factory operations in our country are concerned—I am not referring only to the Cape now, but to South Africa as a whole—the position is that the semi-skilled workers, which include the operatives’ class as well as the unskilled workers, today comprise the enormous percentage of 85%. This is a very important fact to ponder, i.e. that 85% of factory operations comprise semiskilled and unskilled work. I shall come back to this in a moment, to deal with precisely what this means with a view to the utilization and the improved utilization of Black labour in this country. The second matter is one in regard to which it seems to me as though the United Party either does not want to know it or just does not feel like recognizing it, i.e. that according to our latest statistics there are 2½ million economically active Black workers in our country. Of these 2½ million economically active …

Is this in the White area?

Yes, it includes of course the border areas because they fall under the White area. Of those 2½ million, 14 million are semi-skilled and unskilled workers, in other words, we have this mass of semi-skilled and unskilled workers, to which I shall refer more specifically in a moment when I come to this commission which was requested. And that means that these 1½ million Black workers are at present doing semi-skilled or operatives’ work. The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District also referred to that when he referred to Hammarsdale—which is of course a border area—and discussed the Bantu who are doing such good work there. It is operatives’ work, semi-skilled work, and is a very important phase in our labour development. This means that during the course of years artisans’ work is reclassified—this is the term used by the industrial councils and the trade union people— which means that at every wage board negotiation it is decided to demarcate certain types of what had previously been traditionally aritsans’ work as less skilled types of work which are then given to the operatives. This means in practical terms that a large part of what was formerly artisans’ work is today being done by Black workers in the country, i.e. those sections which were reclassified.

Fragmentation.

That is correct; that is the process of fragmentation. It is an endless process. The engineering industry is probably the best example in this connection. With every biennial wage negotiation an agreement is reached between the trade unions and the industrial chiefs in regard to what sections of the work can again be reclassified, which means that the Bantu workers are also able to do it. But this is not only the case in the engineering industry; the same applies to the building industry. The building industry is constantly reclassifying its work, and to such an extent that a large portion of what was formerly the artisans’ work of White builders is today being done lawfully by non-Whites.

As semi-skilled workers.

Yes, as semi-skilled workers. Now, there is the charge by the hon. member for Yeoville that this Government has brought about a kind of psychological block which makes changes impossible.

Difficult.

Very well, then “difficult”. As I shall indicate at a later stage in my reply, it is not a question of our having brought about a psychological block in the sphere of labour. What can be said to the credit of the various Ministers of Labour of this Government, all the way from Mr. Schoeman sitting there to myself, who today has the privilege of occupying this post, is that we have created channels for an orderly employment pattern for non-Whites. I think this is the greatest service we have rendered in this country, i.e. to have created those orderly channels for the Coloureds, Indians and Bantu, so that they can in this country, according to the process to which I have just referred, take up their place and make their contribution, and to have done this without disturbing labour relations in the country. For that reason, since a plea has now been made by the hon. member for Yeoville, supported by the hon. member for Hillbrow, for a commission of inquiry in this connection, which should then investigate the skill and productivity of the workers, and sound labour relations, I want to draw attention in the first place to the fact that these are matters which are constantly receiving attention and are constantly being investigated by various bodies in the country. It is being investigated, inter alia, day after day by our 100 existing industrial councils, but it is not only the 100 industrial councils who are thus engaged. Our productivity board, which consists of employers, trade unions and other bodies, are constantly engaged in doing this, and so is our Bantu Labour Board. The Wage Board, probably one of the most specialized Government bodies we have, is constantly engaged in doing this. For that reason there is no need whatsoever for a commission on these matters. We have the necessary know-how and trends which are being indicated. Those trends are in fact going to afford the greatest problem if such a commission were to be established. If such a commission were to be established, the trade unions with their divergent views would have to be represented on that commission. There will be the extreme left and the extreme right opinions, people who are poles apart in their fundamental approach to labour matters. To expect that that commission will come up with any meaningful recommendations, is a complete illusion.

For that reason I want to state that such a commission will be of no use to us, and it is for that reason that I do not see my way clear to considering something like that. What is needed is that we should face up to the facts of the day properly, and the following are the facts which we could all face up to properly, since we are now implementing this policy of ours in this multi-national country. When one refers to the training of Black workers, and one constantly has to hear the reproach, the insinuation, that we are not affording them adequate opportunities for training and that we are not utilizing them properly, it is perhaps a good thing if I were to reiterate briefly what is being done in this sphere for the Black workers. As far as our Black workers are concerned, it is true that they are today being utilized on four different levels in our South African society.

In the first place our Black workers in this country, whether it is in the border area, or in the homelands, or in White South Africa, are being utilized on the professional level. We have Black medical practitioners, Black teachers and other academics. According to our 1971 manpower survey, we had 80 000 Black professional and semi-professional workers in this country. This is an important sphere, a sphere to which the hon. member for Yeoville referred when he asked what was being done in respect of the great demand which exists. With the school and university facilities which exist for Black workers, there are surely very great opportunities for them to undergo training for these opportunities awaiting them.

The second important level of which Black workers are today being trained and utilized, is the administrative level, where they are to an increasing extent serving their own people, whether in their homelands or in the residential areas here in White South Africa, in an administrative capacity. In that administrative capacity, clerical and otherwise, they are serving their own people in their offices. The position is that, as far as the administration in our homelands is concerned, there is a tremendous demand today for Bantu administrative workers. There are simply not enough of them to meet this demand. In the days when I was still in charge of Coloured Affairs, one of our major problems was that we could not find enough Coloureds quickly enough to fill and take over the administrative posts waiting for them. Consequently, as far as the Black workers are concerned, there is no obstacle whatsoever in their way. There is nothing standing in their way. On the contrary, I think my colleague, the Minister of Bantu Administration, and the White workers, the White officials in those various homelands, would be only too pleased if Bantu administrative workers would come forward to take over the work from them more rapidly.

The third level on which the Bantu are being used in this country is the artisans level. That is the level which the United Party is so fond of discussing, and which occupies so much of their attention. The position in this important sphere is that the Bantu can of course have artisans’ status in their own area, and practise their trades. But this is the sphere which the United Party is concerned about. They are concerned about the White areas, and the position of Bantu artisans in White South Africa. The utilization of these people in the homelands has never been of importance to the United Party.

Our economic growth is here in the White areas. That is where the demand is.

Very well; you may use that as one of your reasons. I am simply stating the fact that the concern which you express in debates here always relates to the Bantu artisan in the White area. [Interjections.] I am talking about the impression which the speeches of those hon. members have created over the years. If it is not true, it is high time they now began talking about the need for Bantu artisans in their own homelands for a change. We shall listen to that with interest. Sir, what is the position now in regard to these Bantu artisans in the White areas? This is, according to the hon. member for Hillbrow, where the major growth is occurring. This is the sphere which the United Party is most concerned about. The next question which now arises in this connection, is this: What does the United Party really want, with these constant pleas of theirs for the training of Bantu as artisans in the White area and the White economy? It is a question which, I hope, will be elucidated even further in this debate by members on the United Party side. In regard to this question of Bantu artisans in White areas, I also want to say this to the hon. Committee; We have the position, as the hon. member for Vanderbiljpark correctly said, that, as far as building artisans are concerned, there are more than 6 000 Bantu who have been trained as artisans in this country in terms of the Training Act placed on the Statute Book by this Government. Day after day those 6 000 Bantu artisans are building houses, as well as any other construction one can think of and whatever you may require. They are not building these in the homelands; they are not even building these primarily in the border areas; they are building them in their own townships here in White South Africa. In other words, there are more than 6 000 building artisans, and I think this will do the heart of the hon. member for South Coast good, for he levelled the reproach at us the other day that there was apparently only a single building artisan in White South Africa. I do not know whether I heard the hon. member correctly or not, but I found it very upsetting when the hon. member said that there was only a single Bantu building artisan in the White area. Sir, that is not the case. As I have said, we have these 6 000 building artisans who are doing this work in the White area.

But this brings me to the fourth very important level on which Bantu are today performing advanced work in South Africa in the White area. This is the important sphere of operatives’ work, that work to which I referred a moment ago in my speech, which today consists of portions of the former artisans’ work which were re-classified and demarcated so that they are able to do it today. It is in respect of that operatives’ work that Minister Diederichs stated in his Budget speech and in his reply that the Government is prepared to help with the training of workers. He referred to pre-service and in-service training, so that those Bantu operatives may perform their work more effectively. But, Sir, surely this is no new attitude on the part of this Government. This has been our attitude over the years. In this context I want to quote what I said the other day when I was addressing a conference of industrialists in Johannesburg. It was a joint conference held by the National Development and Management Foundation of South Africa and the Productivity Board, and it took place on 1st March. On that occasion I said, inter alia, the following—

The vast majority of these 1½ million semiskilled and unskilled Bantu workers occupy spheres of employment which are not controlled in terms of work reservation regulations. In other words, here we have a vast mass of Bantu workers who occupy spheres of employment in which very advanced work is already being performed today. Therefore it is really a task for our employers to utilize these people more effectively. This is nothing new. What I am doing as Minister of Posts, to train Bantu as telephone electricians to go and do that work in their own areas and in the border areas, is completely in line with our policy of training the non-Whites to do more of this advanced work. For that reason there is an excellent opportunity here for our employers to make increased use of this opportunity, and when I say “an excellent opportunity”, then I really hope that they will in future, particularly since they will now, as a result of the new wage situation, pay their Bantu workers more in future than in the past, train their Bantu workers more effectively and in that way obtain greater productivity from their Bantu workers. Sir, it is a responsibility which rests mainly on the shoulders of the employers.

Can they then register themselves as artisans?

Did the hon. member not follow at all what I have just said? If he did not follow it, then I have no hope for him. Then he will simply have to go and read what I have said, and then he can discuss this with me again on another occasion.

But what about work reservation? You say that they can train their workers.

Sir, surely I said that a large number of these 1½ million Black workers, who are doing semi-skilled and unskilled work, are performing work which is not subject to work reservation provisions. Did I not put it like that? Surely it is crystal clear. When I made the statement before those industrialists in Johannesburg, at least one of them, if this were not the case, would have told me that they wanted to train their Black workers but that I was standing in the way. Surely that is not the case, Mr. Chairman. It is a responsibility which rests on the shoulders of these employers. In this connection it is perhaps also necessary to issue this timeous warning to our employers with reference to the offer made by the hon. the Minister of Finance in regard to pre-service training, and that is not to hide behind the Government as far as the training of manpower is concerned, for the numbers to whom the State is able to give pre-service and in-service training will of course be limited. After all, we cannot train hundreds of thousands of Bantu workers to become better operatives. The Government can display its willingness by way of these proposed training projects, whether in Bantu areas or elsewhere, but surely these are not going to cover this mass of Bantu workers, and for that reason I really want to make an appeal to our employers to come forward and train more effectively this great mass of Black workers which are available here, and which steps the Government is not preventing them from taking, so that they can pay better, and so that their factories will be properly remunerative.

Sir, I want to conclude at this stage by saying that there is ample opportunity for our Black workers in this country, firstly to be trained to perform a proper life task; there is, according to these particulars which I furnished to hon. members, abundant opportunities to progress to very good levels in the field of operatives’ work and by so doing to be worthy of a good wage; and since this is the case, Sir, I feel that this proposal of the hon. member for Yeoville that a commission should be appointed, is totally unnecessary and obviously unacceptable as well. What is necessary is that we should recognize the reality of our South African labour situation, as I have briefly sketched it here, and that we should all adopt the attitude that one should make the best use of the opportunities which are so abundantly present.

After listening to the hon. member for Yeoville and other members on the opposite side of this House, I came to the conclusion that the United Party had in fact abandoned in part its labour policy of the past. In the past we had the position that every speaker who rose on the opposite side discussed at least two matters. The first was the abolition of job reservation and the second was the rate for the job. Not one of the speakers spoke in that vein today. The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District even mentioned that he did not want to enter the terrain of the White worker and take away his job. The hon. member for Yeoville went so far as to say that care had to be exercised because otherwise, if one were to intrude on the terrain of the White worker, we might run into the problems of 1922 once again.

Do you agree?

Yes. I quite agree. Therefore I say that this is a new tune which the United Party is singing today. It is said, however, that if one is hit by disaster, or if one runs into adversity, one has occasion to improve one’s thinking. Now it is true, and we know this, that the hon. member for Yeoville has been hit by a small disaster and perhaps he has had time to think, and that may be why they are moving in this direction today.

A great deal has been said in this House this year about the strikes in Natal. I do not want to elaborate on that but I just want to mention in passing that to my way of thinking there are various reasons for those strikes in Natal. In the first place I want to say, and this was mentioned by the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District, too, that those Bantu workers who received very low wages, downed tools as one man. Sir, from the knowledge I have of that kind of Bantu, I want to say that that organization did not come from them alone; it came from someone else. In the second place, the unfavourable situation was prevailing that the supply of labour in Natal exceeded the demand, and for that reason it was possible for those people to abuse the situation. In the third place, hon. members opposite are telling us here what to do. I just want to point out that Natal, where those strikes took place, is first and foremost a U.P. nest. I do not want to do anyone an injustice by saying that all the people whose workers went on strike are U.P. supporters, but I do want to say that the vast majority of them are U.P. supporters, and I think hon. members opposite must put their own house in order before criticizing others.

Then there is the question of the minimum wage about which there has been such a hue and cry today. I just want to mention the fact to you, Sir, that there has always been a minimum wage. There has been a minimum wage in the various industries for years. This also applies to the Whites and in passing I just want to mention that the last strike by Whites of any importance, took place in 1947 when there was a strike in the building industry in the Transvaal, because there, too, the supply of workers exceeded the demand for workers and because the minimum wage which that Government allowed, put those people in such a position that they were really unable to live. That was the last strike in their time. As I have said, there has always been a minimum wage. Take the last ten years, when minimum wages have been applicable in the building industry and in all the other industries. It is adjusted every year or two by adding a percentage to the wage in excess of the rise in the cost of living. In other words, what I want to emphasize is that that minimum wage has actually been adequate under the circumstances and I shall elaborate on that in a moment. But you will agree with me, Sir, that we have never yet heard of a Bantu family in South Africa dying of hunger, a family who have had to live on that minimum wage. Those people have always lived well. Therefore I appeal to the Government today to be very careful in the matter of increasing the minimum wages, because this may cause many problems. Here I want to say that the hon. member for Jeppes discussed the Bantu here today and he said, “They are absolutely underpaid.” Sir, sometimes he blows hot and cold. I want to quote what he said in this House on 13th February with regard to the minimum wage. Here I must concede that he sometimes does say something worthy of note. I do so because I want to emphasize that one must be careful how one increases the minimum wage for unskilled labour. The hon. member said (Hansard, 1973, col. 554)—

In this instance I fully agree with the hon. member.

In determining the minimum wage, we determine the wage at which people start. We could call it the commencing salary. A young person takes up employment for the first time and as the hon. the Minister said, he receives that wage. However, there is also the other side of the matter. We find that students from certain universities walk the streets today and when they come across a Bantu, they ask him what he earns, the size of his family and how he makes a living. They then determine a minimum wage for him. Let us take such a Bantu for whom they have determined a minimum wage and let us assume that he has a family comprising a wife and five children. A person like that has no enthusiasm or urge to progress any further in life, because he will always remain at the level of the minimum wage. In any event, that person is usually not worth that minimum wage. Let us be very consistent. In order to receive a minimum wage, every worker throughout the world must do a certain amount of work in order to be able to have a certain production. The employer must draw the value of the minimum wage from the work done by the worker and if the worker does not do that work, then this is a completely unsound situation. We should therefore not simply determine a minimum wage according to which people who do not even wish to work, are paid. One must not be obsessed with the question of a minimum wage. The man who has worked all his life in such a way that he is paid the minimum wage and has showed no progress, should surely be approached from another angle. The Opposition should suggest that we should also see to that man and ensure that he practices family planning. A man who cannot care for a large family, must after all, accept responsibility for himself if he does in fact have a large family. The wives of those people should be satisfied to go to work as well in order to keep the family, just as the Whites also do in many cases. The work a man does must have a certain value.

An hon. member opposite spoke about a minimum wage of R3 or R4. I do not know of any such wage determination. Let us explain the position in respect of those people who earn R10 or a little more. Suppose we give them R20 per week. After all, we know the Bantu and we know that there are some of them who, if they harvest enough mealies to see them through another year, will not cultivate his land the following year. With all respect towards them, I want to say that if such a person gets more than he earns, he will do even less. However, we must also look at the Bantu who displays initiative and works hard and makes progress in the sense that instead of R10 he already earns R15. Now, if that minimum wage is set at R15 and he finds it easy to get by on R15, he will adopt the attitude that he is already being paid adequately. Clearly, he will not tire himself to do more. I do not want to deal with the question of inflation—the hon. the Minister has already done that—but if we were to do anything of this sort, we would be giving inflation a free rein altogether.

What is more, if I already had workers in my employ who were being paid the minimum wage but who were earning too much, I would obviously get rid of them and that would cause unemployment among them. It is therefore extremely foolish just to follow the stream and introduce wage increases which do not keep pace with the value of the work offered by the worker in exchange for the wage. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I am afraid that the hon. member who has just sat down has been preaching some very outmoded theories, some very mediaeval theories indeed as far as Black labour is concerned. If he knows anything about urban Blacks he ought to know that the whole standard of demand amongst urban Blacks has risen beyond the wildest possible dreams of say 20 or 30 years ago when people used to talk the way the hon. member is talking today, and that is that the minute a Black man earns any sort of reasonable wage he stops working because he does not want any more. I do not believe it is even the case today with rural Black people. Consumer demand has increased among them, they see what consumer goods are offered and like any other individual Black or White, they want to earn more in order to be able to live better and to reach a higher standard of living. The other point he made is that when the minimum wages are raised it will lead to unemployment. In certain cases this may well be so. Certainly employers will attempt to make a more rational use of labour if they no longer have the “cheap labour” they had at lower wage rates. Nevertheless there is no doubt that over the years, Wage Board determinations have not been keeping up with the rise in the cost of living. The very fact that we have had the hon. the Minister giving an urgent injunction to the Wage Board to investigate the determinations in five of the major industries employing unskilled workers is, I should think, indicative of that. I think all of us know that the wage gap is too great and that it must be narrowed. It has now become official Government policy, although the manner in which they work out their percentages does not correlate with the aim and object of narrowing the gap. When they give a 17½ increase to Black workers and a 15% increase to certain state-employed White workers it does not narrow the gap; if anything, it increases the gap. But let us leave that aside. It is now officially recognized that the wage gap is too great.

I want to say that I am hoping that the investigation into the Unemployment Fund is going to lead to a change not only in the higher levels but also of the floor, the lowest level. At the present stage Black workers who are earning less than R10-50 per week are not allowed to contribute to this Fund and therefore they are not allowed to get unemployment insurance. I think that this is hopelessly inequitable. As it is large classes of Black workers are excluded from the Unemployment Insurance Fund, workers like domestic workers, mine workers, farm workers, Government employees, etc., and I believe that it is quite inequitable that the lowest level of our industrial workers should also be excluded. I hope that the hon. the Minister will review the lowest level at the same time that he reviews the ceiling for beneficiaries of the Fund reserves of which at the present are standing at an enormous figure.

The hon. the Minister has stated that we must face the realities of the labour situation in South Africa. I couldn’t agree with him more. I must say that it is an optimistic sign that practically the whole of the hon. the Minister’s speech this afternoon was devoted to the recognition of the permanency of Black labour in the White areas. This is something which I would have said was a reality many years ago. At last it appears as if the Government is able to appreciate this as well. The Minister’s entire talk was on the number of Blacks employed in operative jobs, the number of Blacks employed in artisan jobs in White areas and doing work for Blacks in the White areas—presumably Blacks living there permanently—and the number of Blacks in professional jobs. As far as I am concerned this is an obvious fact, but it is encouraging to find that the hon. the Minister is also recognizing this as a reality of the situation.

I personally agree with the hon. the Minister that we do not really need another commission of inquiry at this stage. I believe that we already have all the relevant facts. We have the facts and the situation of the wages and we have recently had the latest manpower survey. It is true that it is two years old as it is based on 1971 figures, but we know all about the shortages of labour, of White labour, of Coloured labour and we know how short we are of, for instance, mechanics, building artisans, etc. I think the facts of the labour situation are today well known, and we can certainly increase the figures which the manpower survey has revealed to us. All of us are aware that the major problem facing us is the shortage of workers in the skilled levels. It is true that re-classification is going on all the time and that fragmentation and “de-skilling” is taking place. This famous South African word “de-skilling” means, I believe, that certain aspects of skilled jobs are handed down and then Black workers are able to do this work at lower wage rates. Nevertheless there is an overall shortage of skilled workers. The major problem, as far as I am concerned, is not to have another commission, be it composed of politicians or non-politicians—at least the suggestion this time is that they be not composed of politicians—but to get on with the job of training Black workers to fill this void which is holding up growth. The hon. the Minister of Finance tried to lay the emphasis on training in his Budget Speech. We have already lost years and years by not training Blacks and by not basically educating them so that they can take advantage of technical and vocational training. I do not think that even the interdepartmental committee, the Van Zyl Committee, which I think is due to report in a few months’ time, is going to tell us very much that we do not already know, such as how to get on with in-service and pre-service training. Unless we get a move on, we are not even remotely going to be able to provide the figure which has been suggested by Prof. Wyndham of the Chamber of Mines, namely that 50% of skilled jobs in South Africa will have to be done by Black people by the year 2000. That is not very far away in terms of the industrial development of a country. I believe that what we need in the tackling of this problem is urgency. It is no good the hon. the Minister telling us that they have trained 6 000 building artisans, when we know that we are thousands of artisans short and that there are not White apprentices coming forward to take on those artisan jobs in the future. And I wish the hon. the Minister who talks about “the realities of the labour situation” would stop going from Nationalist Congress to Nationalist Congress promising White workers the penultimate in protection and again reiterating the old, outworn theories that no White man is going to lose his job and that he is going to see to it that no Black man will be allowed to replace him in a job. He knows perfectly well that it is only the hopelessly inefficient and lazy White man in South Africa today who cannot get a job. The hon. the Minister should not be promising protection to that type of worker. He knows perfectly well that even with the entry of Black men into the semi-skilled fields and into operative jobs the White men have not in fact lost their jobs, but have moved into other occupations which are practically always higher paid. What benefit is it then to the country, except perhaps to gain a few votes here and there for the hon. the Minister’s party, for him to go around still making the same sort of speech that Nationalists were making 20 years ago when there was still some lurking fear of the recurrence of the poor White problem in South Africa which should have been dispelled long since? It is upsetting to find an hon. Minister, who talks about the realities of the situation and indeed today has revealed that to a very large extent he understands those realities, who cannot resist saying that he is going to see to it that no White man ever takes an order from a Black man and that there is not going to be racial friction because he is not going to allow a White man to be replaced by a Black man; that is the sort of speech he has made at party political meetings at East London, Port Elizabeth, Pretoria—I have cuttings of all of them—and no doubt Windhoek too. I am sure that when he buzzes off to Aliwal North he will again be making the same speech there. I must say I think it is time that the hon. the Minister adopted a new psychological approach to the White workers of South Africa. In the position which he holds, he as the Minister of Labour should set the tone and should start disabusing those White workers who still have any lingering fears about losing their jobs or being replaced by Black men. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, what I want to say about the hon. member for Houghton applies also to the official Opposition. One is surprised that they could so casually forget the history of the National Party’s labour policy. To say here that steps were taken solely because of the poort White question, and that that is now past, is an over-simplification of reality.

When listening a while ago to the hon. member for Yeoville’s proposal in connection with a commission, I also thought of the history of the National Party’s labour policy. One involuntarily thought of the fact that the United Party has now been sitting there for 25 years and coming forward with all kinds of criticism. If I am not mistaken, the theme of their speeches about a year or two ago was something like a national convention. But what is it that is actually pinning those people down? It is frustration. They are now no longer telling us they have an alternative policy to put forward in the labour sphere. They are now saying: “Let us work together and let us work one out.” It should like to ask hon. members opposite whether they have then forgotten that one of the biggest reasons why the National Party won the election in 1924 was the chaos in the labour sphere which the old South African Party landed the country in. Have they then forgotten that the National Party Subsequently remained in power with its well-known Civilized Labour Policy? Have hon. members then forgotten that it was necessary, early in that Government’s period of office, to adopt the colour bar? The courts at the time overruled certain provisions written into the regulations on the Mines and Works Act, 1911, and which had already been in operation for 12 years at the time. Those provisions protected the White worker. It was then necessary for the National Party Government to again undo this in 1924 and to adopt the coloure bar. Had hon. members opposite then forgotten that? Apparently they had, because during the years 1934 to 1948, when they ruled, they did things to create a situation that enabled the National Party to come into power in 1948. When the National Party came into power in 1948, the chaos in the labour sphere was as great as it had been prior to 1924. Subsequently we came along with various pieces of legislation. With their conduct prior to 1948 the United Party offered the White worker little protection, with the result that the White workers were partly driven out of certain occupations and partly left voluntarily because there was so much unrest in certain industries, unrest created by mixed trade unions, those spheres were communism was rife. It was under those people’s policy, even though they did pass some small piece of legislation or other, to which the hon. member for Yeoville likes to refer, and rightly too. However, it still did not correct the attitude of the Government of the time as far as the White worker was concerned. This resulted in its rejection by the White worker. Now they come along today and request a commission of inquiry and study and research, or whatever they want to call it. I want to tell hon. members that the same trend of thought that brought the National Party into power in 1924, the same trend of thought that brought it into power in 1948 and the same trend of thought which is still keeping it in power after 25 years, has also, inter alia, under-lied its labour policy throughout the years, from the beginning up to the present time. Until just recently we have had to listen, as in one of the debates, to how hon. members, inter alia, the hon. member for South Coast, became impatient because we did not speak about our policy, but wanted to know what their policy is. For that reason, as far as this particular subject is concerned, I should today like to quote what is contained in the Programme of Principles of the National Party. I want to quote from section 15 of the Programme of Principles of the National Party. That section reads—

It reads further—

These are followed, as far as I am concerned, by four very important points—

Thirdly, the National Party endeavours—

And fourthly—

That is recorded in the Programme of Principles of the National Party. The hon. member for Houghton is absent at the moment, but she spoke a while ago of hackneyed and sterotyped statements. But these principles have already been recorded for 25 years, and for 25 years we have been stating them from public platforms. For 25 years various Minister of Labour have been elaborating these last four points by laying down a variety of measures and legislation. Over a period of 25 years we have had not only labour peach and stability in this country, but at the same time we have also built up a strong economy with the same labour force White and non-White. It is true that there is concern. After all, we hear this in the debates when we are speaking about economic and industrial matters. The hon. the Minister of Planning has said in this debate that there is an unrealistic increase in salaries. The hon. the Prime Minister also mentioned this, but the Minister of Planning quoted specific figures here to prove how an unrealistic increase of salaries has taken place in relation to the scant increase in productivity, in the production per manhour. Now hon. members act as if more efficient training is the only solution. Sir, this Government has created the basis for training. This Government has brought the ability to read and write, which are the basic requirements, within reach of the non-Whites; something which the Opposition neglected. That is why we can do much more today with respect to training in industry.

I have specifically mentioned this matter in order to ask the hon. the Minister something. The impression is being created that the Government supposedly works only for the Bantu or, if it suits the Government, only for the Whites. I would be glad if the hon. the Minister would make use of this debate to tell the White and non-White workers again that this party will go to meet the coming election with this same Programme of Principles. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, this afternoon we received an appeal here from the hon. member for Hillbrow for us to get somewhere now with this labour policy and the labour situation. I agree with him wholeheartedly that we should now get somewhere with the labour situation in this country. The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District, who opened this debate, said: “A complete re-appraisal of the labour situation should now take place.” I quite agree that something should now happen; not that there should be a “complete re-appraisel” of the labour situation, but that that side of the House should now adopt a standpoint in connection with this matter. The hon. member for Yeoville spoke here of a serious, compounding situation; the hon. member for Jeppes waxed emotional about all the possibilities that lie ahead as a result of this proposed labour convention between all interested parties; about the fine golden baths and the bags full of dividends we would be able to obtain if we could all come together. That is the image we have thus far obtained from that side of the House in this debate. Sir, in this connection I want to refer you to the United Party men’s old policy booklet in which they point out their problem in this brief sentence—

Sir, that is still the fear of the White worker, and it will remain so. The National Party will ensure that that fear of his is without grounds as long as we remain in power. Sir, this debate has put me in mind of a speech of the hon. the Leader of the Opposition in which he set out a brand new approach to trade unions, according to which one would have a so-called “white collar” Bantu trade unionist, a middle-class Bantu trade unionist and then Bantu trade unions consisting of the ordinary workers. In this connection I should like to refer to what the hon. member for Johannesburg North said in the Budget debate. I am sorry he is not here, but I would be glad if the next United Party speaker would tell me what the hon. member meant in the last paragraph of his speech. I quote from col. 4064 of Hansard—

I should like to know what the hon. member meant by that. What does the United Party want to achieve with their policy in connection with trade unions? Are these trade unions of theirs part and parcel of their federation plan, or are they not? Where do they fit in? Sir, I leave the matter at that.

In the time at my disposal I should like to express a few ideas about another aspect, i.e. the history of disease in industry. We began as an agricultural country; later we developed into a mining country and from a mining country we developed further into an industrial country, but no clear dividing line has been drawn between the diseases one encounters in mining and the diseases on encounters in industry. With the passing of the Workmen’s Compensation Act of 1941 we already achieved a great deal for both the prevention and the treatment of injuries and also with respect to the compensation payable to those who had incurred injuries while carrying out their work and we are grateful that provision was later made, in terms of Act No. 77 of 1967, for the inclusion of additional diseases in the list of diseases for which compensation is payable. Other substances detrimental to the body were classified as compensatable diseases in terms of that Act. Later we found that diseases, which we had only associated with mining in the past, also occur in industry. I am referring to diseases such as silicosis, asbestosis, haemosiderosis, etc. Thus new diseases are continually cropping up in industry, diseases which we previously only encountered in the mining industry. It is therefore that I gratefully want to say that I have just seen in the Government Gazette that another disease has been proclaimed under the Workmen’s Compensation Act. This is the disease bissinosis. For hon. members who do not know what this means, I want to say that it is a disease that is contracted as a result of dust that is inhaled in the textile industry where one encounters linen and cotton material. Thus we find that certain conditions that we originally encountered in mining, are now also being found in industry. Twenty years ago there was no such thing as bissinosis, but today it is an acceptable disease. Therefore I once again want to advocate that the Department of Labour, in co-operation with the Departments of Mining and Health, should again put their heads together for a spell and consider the possibility of including diseases, accidents and conditions, which develop as a result of a person’s work, jointly under one single piece of legislation. This would also be of great benefit to us with respect to the research done on diseases and the following up of symptoms, particularly in respect of persons changing over from mining to industry. Their cases can then be followed up, because many conditions which began in the mining industry only reveal their symptoms after the person has left and is working in industry. Then conflict arises as to who is responsible for them. Likewise, as far as research is concerned, it would be of tremendous help if there were a co-ordinating unit doing research on a certain condition from its start to its finish. It would also be of great value for the necessary training of industrial doctors if there are not separate facets for diseases in mining and industry and again a separate facet to health conditions outside. Wherever you may be, and whatever you may be doing, you remain the same person. In conjunction with that, it is also a good thing for us to think in terms of a standard pre-employment examination. It does not matter whether a person is working in the mines or in some or other industry, there must be a standard examination. That person is a labourer and it does not matter where he is working. There must be a pre-employment examination that can be followed up throughout his career, regardless of where he ends or where he began.

I should like to exchange a few ideas with the hon. the Minister of Labour, but before I get round to him, I cannot simply let the hon. members for Westdene and Brentwood get away like that. The hon. member for Westdene holds an exceptional position. I believe he is the information officer of his Party, and one therefore expects his information to be correct. He told us in this House of all the things we had forgotten about, but he was also forgetting a few very important key events in South Africa when he was giving us an account of those events. He said, for example, that in 1924 the Nationalist Party came into power as a result of the shocking conditions that prevailed on the labour market under the old South African Party rule. But he forgot to tell the House that in 1924 the legislation was born which still stands in the labour field today as the foundation for everything we are building on, i.e. the Industrial Conciliation Act. That was created in 1924, not by his party, but by the South African Party, the forerunner of the United Party. The hon. member forgot that. He also forgot about the date 1943. He forgot about the fine document which saw the light then and in which mention was made of holiday homes for the workers and the “sharing of profits” and everything that was promised to the workers. Nothing much came of that. At the time the Nationalist Party presented the perfect socialist system for South Africa. However, the hon. member for Westdene has forgotten that.

He then made a tremendous “song and dance” about the question of labour peace. We must, however, be careful in our use of this expression. In the times we are now living in, it is true that there is no unemployment as far as the Whites are concerned. It can therefore be expected that we would have labour peace as far as the Whites are concerned, because everything considered, they have the necessary labour machinery and there is bargaining. They get what they want and they have work. What must they then fight about? However, when we get to the Black man, we must remember that he has no say. He has no bargaining machinery.

Why are you now telling him what to say?

He is not allowed to strike. The result is that not only do we have peace, but absolutely nothing is going on. However, there are signs that peace may not last much longer. My hon. friends must not forget that. The Bantu is becoming aware of his position in South Africa’s labour field, and the time may perhaps come when he will use his position. I therefore want to advise my friend, the hon. member for Westdene, to be very careful in the use of the expression “labour peace in South Africa”.

The hon. member for Brentwood told us of the fear of the White worker. He forgot, of course, to listen to the hon. member for Yeoville when he very clearly said that we realized the mental state of the White worker only too well and that we therefore say that when we want to come along with a new labour dispensation in South Africa, we must take the White worker along with us. If hon. members had listened, they would have heard the hon. member for Yeoville specifically requesting that the trade unions should also be represented in the commission. By doing this one creates a position in which the trade unions would also be consulted when one comes along with conditions that have to be modified.

It is true that conditions are rapidly modified. I must congratulate the hon. the Minister on having said a few things this afternoon which I shall come back to later. He would be the first to acknowledge that in the last few years radical adjustments have been made in the labour field. In his other capacity the hon. the Minister is the Minister of Posts and Telegraphs, and he does know, after all, what is happening in that department of his where he is creating specific openings for the Coloureds and the Bantu. His colleague, the hon. the Minister of Transport, has made similar adjustments in the labour field of the Railways. The whole spirit in which the hon. the Minister conducted the debate today, was an excellent example to numerous back-benchers of his who came along here to play party politics. I do not agree with the hon. the Minister about everything, but his speech exuded a very sober spirit, and indicated adjustments that are significant as far as the White area in South Africa is concerned.

However, what I hold against the hon. the Minister is the fact that he so easily overlooked this question of the national commission that was proposed. That is really not quite fair. After all, this matter was thought out before we came here with it. We are now merely taking a few examples to indicate, I respectfully say, how shortsighted the hon. the Minister was. He boasts about that and says he has 6 000 Bantu construction workers who are all hard at work, like red ants, building houses for Bantu in the White areas. I have no argument with him; I am glad that is so. But what the hon. the Minister does not notice, what he refuses to see, is the fact that we have a flagrant shortage of construction workers in South Africa. The question that arises is what we are going to catch up on that shortage with. Speaking as we now are of construction workers, and taking a wider tack in thinking of South Africa’s labour, in every sphere of which there is a shortage today, we arrive at the figures which the hon. member for Yeoville mentioned. He mentioned the figure of nine million workers who have to be trained over a period of 27 years to meet the normal economic requirements of South Africa. However, the hon. the Minister says nothing about that, nothing at all. The hon. member for Brentwood asks what our policy is, but he does not say a word about what the Nationalist Party’s policy is for combating this self-evident question.

May I put a question to the hon. member?

No, I have only a few minutes at my disposal. The hon. member can make his own speech later on. Our problem is what I have just stated. The hon. gentleman told us that he places in jobs all the Bantu who become available on the labour market in the course of the year. He mentioned the number.

It is 165 000.

Had the hon. the Minister taken a slightly wider look he should have furnished us with another figure. The figure he should have furnished us with is that of the Economic Advisory Council. In its projection for the five-year period from 1972 to 1977, the Economic Advisory Council came to the conclusion that in 1977 there would be a shortage of job opportunities for 300 000 Black people. The hon. the Minister told us nothing about that. Thus I could go on mentioning one figure after another, all indicating that we have specific “bottlenecks” that exist in the South African economy and which we are doing nothing about. What is going to happen now? I can already foresee what is going to happen. We are simply going ahead with the shortages. On the one hand the hon. the Minister of Finance says that we must have growth and production. I foresee the time when we shall again have to call a halt as far as growth is concerned because we do not have labour for the economy. What is the hon. the Minister going to do then? Is he again going to put a damper on the economy? After all, we now know what the position is. What is the growth rate target figure we must have? It is 5,75%, but we are now growing at 3% per annum. Even now there are shortages of White workers. What are we going to do with the nine million workers which the hon. member for Yeoville mentioned? No answer is given to that. I believe it is of cardinal importance, but what is more, if one wants to provide for that need there is only one way out, and that is to make use of Black labour. There is no other way out, otherwise a damper will have to be placed on South Africa’s growth to the detriment of everyone in South Africa, both Whites and non-Whites. If we must make use of the non-Whites, the immediate situation that arises is that there should also be a change of heart on the part of the White worker. That is why we are requesting the appointment of a commission to view the matter in conjunction with the White worker and all interested parties. The commission could also put the matter in perspective for the White worker by telling him: “Man, look, we are not fighting for the Black man; we are fighting for growth and for prosperity for everyone; for the White worker as well.” I want to put it in these terms: My Nationalist friends are continually afraid that unemployment could develop amongst the Whites. If a time were to come in modern South Africa in which a reasonable degree of unemployment were to occur amongst Whites in this country, South Africa’s economy would have had to topple completely. If a time were to come in which Whites were unemployed. I hesitate to think what the position of the Blacks would have to be, the thousands upon thousands of Blacks who would also be unemployed. What would then become of labour peace? We are now giving the hon. the Minister an excellent opportunity. We want to argue quite objectively with him about the matter and we are coming to him as someone who occupies an extremely important position in the State set-up. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I do not believe that we differ from the hon. members of the Opposition at all where they are advocating the training of skilled Bantu labour. I think that in his speech the hon. the Minister has pointed out that we in South Africa, in the process of development in respect of the homelands, the border industry areas and Bantu areas within a White area need a great deal of that skilled Bantu labour. The question hanging over this debate has been put by the Minister, and that is: What does the United Party want to do with that skilled Bantu labour, that more sophisticated Bantu labour which is to meet the shortage of skilled labour in the White industrial areas? That is where our problem lies. That is what this whole argument is about. The hon. member for Maitland again advocated the commission. I would infer that what he really wants to do with this commission is to say to the White worker in South Africa: “Pardon me, man, excuse me, I am not going to use Bantu to oust you from the various categories in which you already are.” In this way he wants to butter up to them, or something like that. This side of the House, as the hon. the Minister has said, cannot agree with that. But, Sir, the United Party is always playing its usual role with regard to the White worker in South Africa. What it wants to do with the Bantu, is very vague. The hon. member for Yeoville has said before that the trained, skilled Bantu worker should be free to sell his labour in the market where he wants and as he thinks fit.

To my mind our legal provisions, our industrial law in South Africa rests on two pillars: Firstly, we want to preserve industrial peace in the country and, secondly, our industrial laws recognize the multiracial set-up in our country, also in the labour field. Our Industrial Conciliation Act of 1956 recognizes and affords protection to what one could call a conventional colour bar which has developed over the years. I think that none other than the hon. member for Maitland on a previous occasion in this debate admitted that such a convention existed in our labour arrangements in South Africa. No one could deny it or think it away. Our White workers in South Africa are extremely sensitive on this aspect. It is precisely this type of convention the United Party wants to disparage, that is, inter alia, the measure which makes provision for the reservation of work for persons of certain races. I am referring here to section 77 which was on various occasions disparaged by the Opposition in this House. Where the United Party’s standpoint is always that they want to discredit and disparage job reservation, and where they want to create doubt in our workers corps, I should like to ask them whether they are in favour of mutual racial competition in South Africa. Does the United Party by the introduction of Black skilled labour in our industries want to create a greater labour supply, in this way to lower the wage structure in order to create larger profits for the industries? To what extent must the so-called Black trade unions, the white-collar Bantu that were mentioned here by the hon. member for Brentwood, be integrated in our industrial life? To what extent are they going to compete with the existing White trade unions? Is the United Party serious about this matter? Do they want to price the White man with his higher standard of living out of certain labour fields in that process? They must answer us on these questions. The United Party therefore cannot say that they are in favour of such a conventional colour bar in South Africa, because, when such a convention is admitted, provision for it has to be made in one’s legislation, as was proved in our Industrial Conciliation Act. But by way of argument for the abolition of job reservation, that is section 77, the United Party says from time to time that it affects only 2% of our labour force. This small percentage proves the very fact that it serves as a deterrent to industries wanting to exploit the labour market at the cost of the White worker. This measure has always served as an instrument for the White worker and as an additional protection measure to negotiate with the necessary authority when negotiating on an administrative level with industrial boards or through his trade unions with employers about the delimitation of work between White and non-White. That is why most of these deliminations take place on an administrative and not a statutory basis. This serves as a means of guaranteeing and fortifying the position of the Whites in South Africa. The ability to negotiate therefore always depends on the authority that trade unions have. This measure gives the White worker that additional authority to be able to negotiate. That is why by far the majority of delimitations take place by way of negotiations, i.e. administrative job reservation. In this case I should like to quote an authority. I am referring here to a statement made in Die Transvaler of 17th July, 1969. in which the following was said (translation)—

That is what was said by the chairman of the confederation, Mr. L. J. van der Berg. I also want to refer to a further document,

a circular on job reservation issued by Mr. Van der Berg as chief secretary of the South African Iron and Steel and Allied In dustries Union, which was sent to the branch committee members. In this circular he said the following (translation)—

This, basically, is the fear that exists among most of our White workers. That is why this section, this principle incorporated in our industrial legislation, is extremely important to industrial peace in South Africa.

I should like to refer to another matter, and that is the question of job reservation in respect of certain categories of work in our mining industry, and here I am referring specifically to samplers. I see that recently there was an article in The Mine-worker saying that after the job of sampler had been reserved under section 77, it turned out that no White workers had applied for these posts. [Time expired.]

The hon. member for Bethal was talking about job reservation almost in lyrical terms. I wonder whether the hon. member was really being serious. We have some quite vivid memories of job reservation and the way in which it has been applied from time to time. I remember very clearly when the then hon. Minister of Labour, Mr. Alf Trollip, came to Durban just before an election. He was going to safeguard the position of the White workers in Durban. He was going to make sure that White workers were not put out of their jobs by non-Whites— good old Nationalist Party policy! He reserves the job of barman in Durban bars for Whites. Mr. Chairman, I am not a person who frequents bars, not in Durban or anywhere else.

Why so modest?

I do not. But I am quite certain that hon. members who do, will find, if they go there, that every single application for an exemption to enable him to have an Indian barman in Durban, has been successful. I took the trouble to check up and I found that some friends of mine who have interests in the hotel business have had absolutely no difficulty whatsoever from that day onwards. In other words, the Government came with a big deal: “We will safeguard the White workers in Durban; we will make sure that Indians will never take away their jobs as barmen,” knowing as well as we do that the number of White barmen in Durban is very very small indeed, and that throughout the whole of Durban this work is done nearly exclusively by Indians. So I think that we must take all this talk about job reservation with a very big pinch of salt when it comes to the practical application in industry. It is a political gimmick which is relied on by the Nationalist Party time after time to try to impress upon the White workers that they are going to safeguard the position of the White workers, whereas exemptions are available virtually on demand from the Minister and from his department.

The hon. member for Yeoville today suggested the appointment of a commission which would be able to investigate and look into the developing labour pattern in South Africa. I want to stress the point that it is the developing labour pattern which needs investigation. In some way or other we are going to have to find a way of fitting in all the pieces of the puzzle that is developing; and it is a puzzle. The labour pattern of every industry in South Africa is different. In industry after industry you find Blacks doing certain skilled work which in other industries they are not allowed to do, and so on. What we want to see, is a commission which will be able to take this question out of any kind of sionate look at what is going to happen, political atmosphere in which it seems to reside, and have a calm, impartial, dispas-Nobody on that side of the House denies that it is going to happen: The White worker in 20 years’ time is going to be like gold. There will be hardly any White workers left in 20 years’ time. What we want, is a commission which will be able to look into the future and perhaps even to identify certain trades in which we know there will be a shortage. If one thinks of the advent of television, for instance, in this country—there is going to be a shortage of technicians to do that kind of work. There are many spheres of activity in which we know there are going to be shortages. The answer which the hon. the Minister has offered up to now, has been to fragment the skills. But what is going to happen to this skills themselves? Which skilled workers are going to be left one of these days to give instructions to make sure that the skills and the levels these people have had in the past are going to be maintained? I read somewhere that the average age of the White building workers is something like 45 years of age. When all these people have reached 60 years of age and have retired, who is going to be left to set the standard for artisans, the standard which for centuries has been demanded before a man can set himself up as a trained person, and who, on the basis of his training, can demand a certain rate for the work that he does?

Or to build White homes.

Yes, that is another point. Who is going to build the White homes? The hon. the Minister says that they are now building homes for Black people surrounded by White areas; but we have, I think, a very real problem developing here, the one mentioned by the hon. member for Hillbrow.

As long as they use white bricks it will be all right.

Sir, I am sure the supply of white bricks will run out a long time before that comes about.

They will wear white overalls.

The problem that we face is that the Nationalist Party have set their faces against trade union organizations for Black people. I think the Minister will agree with me that that is what they have done. They have set their faces against trade union organizations for Black people for the reason that they think that such organization can be used for a political purpose. I think the hon. the Minister will agree that that is what has happened.

It is one of the reasons.

Well, it is admitted that it is one of the reasons; I appreciate that. It is one of the reasons for the Nationalist Party deliberately breaking down skilled trades into component parts and watering down the skills that have been demanded from people in the past. Sir, there is nothing that I know of in the legislation of South Africa to prevent Black unions being set up in the Bantu homelands. I would be interested to know whether there is a provision in our law which says that those people cannot pass legislation setting up Black unions in their own homelands.

No, it is the Minister’s policy.

Sir, I would like somebody on the other side to deny that those people are enabled to draft and to pass legislation which will set up Black unions in the homelands, Black unions which will control all Black people coming from those homelands to work in the White areas. Sir, the hon. the Minister himself has recognized the difficulty because we have had a draft Bill which has been published for discussion and which deals with the concept of the works committee. Mr. Chairman, I want to draw to the attention of this Committee to the fact that the works committee was introduced into our legislation, in the original Act, on a motion of the Labour Party, by Mr. Norman Eaton, who has since joined the United Party, in an attempt to get round the refusal of the Government to set up negotiating machinery whereby Black workers could have their opinions heard and make their voices heard. Those works committees, Sir, were set up and they were made part of our law. They were not really acted upon, because there were only 17 or 18 operating just very recent. But, Mr. Chairman, I want to draw the attention of the Committee to a certain thing which worries me, and I am not trying to be scarry; I am not saying that I am against the idea of works committees, but I do have a complication in connection with work committees that I would like to draw to the Minister’s attention. I have a book here which is called Russia in Revolution. Sir, anybody who reads this book quietly and calmly can see a very close comparison between Russia, between the years 1905 and 1917, and South Africa today. Sir, one of the things that came out of that Russian revolution was the labour movement which developed totally differently to any other labour movement throughout the length and breadth of Europe, because throughout Europe the labour movement developed through the means of trade unions. Sir, I want to say that the trade union basically is a conservative organization. It is an organization designed to protect the rights of its members against everybody else, preventing them from doing that work for which those members are organized and for which they get paid a specific rate, and I think that we are losing a trick here if we persist in regarding trade unions, in which Black people will be involved, as being only political and not rather an economic weapon which those Black people themselves will enforce against other members of their own race who try, by undercutting them, to do the work for which they, the members of the union have been trained. Sir, what happened in the case of Soviet Russia was that these work committees developed into what are known as Soviets. The whole pattern of the revolution in Russia depended upon these works committees, and I say to the hon. the Minister that he would be very well advised to see that the work committees which it is proposed to set up are tied into the trade union organization so that you avoid that local, specific, special interest which a small group of people in one factory, open to intimidation and open to exploitation, are liable to have in that factory and which they will identify only with their own factory rather than with the broader protection that a trade union to which they are locked is going to give them. [Time expired.]

The proposed wage commission, suggested by the hon. member for Yeoville and supported by the hon. member for Mooi River, is totally unnecessary. The wage situation in South Africa is secure in the hands of our Minister and the Government. But I will tell these friends where they can assist us. It will help if they would realize, as we do, that as far as the labour strikes during recent months are concerned, there was much ill-will behind those strikes, that there are many types of people—such as those we saw revealed as a result of the Wilgespruit investigation, and so forth— and similar people were behind those labour strikes during recent months. This is true, and I shall be glad if the hon. members will realize it. Recently the hon. members opposite have indicated that they mean well with the prosperity and the security of South Africa. I want to tell them that labour peace and labour quiet is as important to any State as internal security. During recent months, as I have said, we have seen how people who have no knowledge of the labour situation in South Africa, have maliciously incited our peaceful Bantu labour force to go on strike in demand for higher wages. We are proud of our labour achievements in South Africa and of the labour relations between our creative White people, who create labour opportunities, and our Bantu workers. Labour peace was born from those sound relations and South Africa became economically prosperous so that all her people, White and non-White, could share in the prosperity and are still sharing in it and, we believe, will continue to share in it in future.

It was not the Bantu workers so much who asked for and expressed a need for higher wages; this was done by people from outside, the agitators to whom I referred. Our Bantu workers are basically contented. It was done by the internal agitators and by people outside our country. I want to quote to you what a London newspaper editor said (translation)—

A survey conducted in Pretoria, indicated the following, and its title reads as follows (translation)—“Wages of South African Bantu the best”. It reads—

Sir, dockworkers in Sweden went on strike recently because, according to them, Bantu dockworkers in South Africa earned too little. The comparable picture there is as follows. South African Bantu dockworkers earn R80 per month, dockworkers in Mauritius R40, in Kenya R40, in India R35 and in Bangla Desh approximately R25 per month.

We come to the standard of living. The outside world, and these people who are so concerned about the alleged unrealistically low wages earned by our Bantu— how does the standard of living of our Bantu compare? I mentioned the following to you. According to recent surveys, in Bantu households in the urban areas, 48% owned a radio, 38% owned sewing machines, almost 46% were regular consumers of instant coffee, 42% of tea, 38% of canned fruit, more than 63% of canned fish, 93% of soap powder—not even soap, but soap powder, i.e. the more expensive commodity. Almost 65% use face cream, and 28% deodorants, while more than 52% of the women use cosmetics regularly. These then are the people who are starving, people who, after seeing to their basic food needs as required by the Bantu way of life and culture, had enough money for these things. It is a good thing and it should also be the case that Bantu women work to supplement their husbands earnings. However, we find that the majority of Bantu women refuse to work became their husbands are already earning enough.

What will the implications be if we grant unrealistic, drastic wage increases? In South Africa we employ 2 561 923 Bantu workers in industry, mining, etc. In agriculture we have approximately 1 250 000. In households we have approximately 250 000. This gives us a total of approximately four million Bantu who are employed in White areas. If each of these Bantu were to receive an average increase of R125 per year, it would mean that we would have to pay out R500 million per year on higher wages, which would come from the White sector.

We have two kinds of industry in South Africa. We have those factories which are manufacturing for export purposes. If such a factory had to pay unrealistically high wages to its employees, it would not be able to compete on the export market. It would not be able to compete with Japan and other countries and therefore it would fall behind on the export market and the factory would have to close down. The Bantu workers, about whom hon. members and other people are so concerned, will be the first to suffer.

We also have the other kind of industry in South Africa, the industry which produces for the local consumption. What would the implications be if the workers in this industry had to receive drastic wage increases? I will tell you who will have to pay for it. Not the factory owner, but the consumer, you and I, will have to pay for it. I refer particularly to the building of houses. If the workers in the cement industry and those who work in the stone quarries as well as those in the factories which manufacture doors and windows, tiles, and so forth, were to receive a wage increase of only 10%, it would mean that the suppliers or the manufacturers of those building materials would go to the Price Controller and make out a case for a higher price for their commodities. They will succeed in asking for a higher price. What would that mean? The young married couple who want to build a house to the value of R10 000 will have to pay 10% more for that house. That house will therefore cost them R1 000 more. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, at one stage of this debate I had some hope that we were at last going to see some sense emanating from the Government ranks in regard to the question of labour and the labour problems in South Africa, but the speech of the hon. member who has just sat down has, to put it quite frankly, destroyed any hope I had in that regard. He started by talking about the danger to the internal security of the State and for some strange reason he was able to introduce the goings-on at Wilgespruit. [Interjections.] If hon. members do not know the area I am talking about, they have obviously not read the report. Be it what it may, I want to say to the hon. member who has just sat down that he frightened me with the remarks that he made when he asked what would happen if we increased salaries in South Africa, and when he asked what would be the effect on the economy. I would like to ask that hon. member and the hon. the Minister what the effect would be if we did not increase salaries in South Africa. I am not asking what would happen if we do increase salaries, but I am asking what would happen if we do not increase salaries. If we do not, all the dangers to the internal security of the State will become something very real. It will not be caused by outside influences or by people in certain organizations, but by the workers themselves who will find that they cannot eat on the amount of money that they are paid. In this respect I would like to refer to an hon. member who spoke a little earlier. He said that the minimum wage could not be all that low because he did not know of any Bantu worker who had died of starvation. I was scandalized by this callous remark. Unfortunately it epitomizes so much of Nationalist Government thinking that I am now more concerned than ever before. At the beginning of my speech I said that I had had some hopes that the hon. the Minister and his party were beginning to see the light in this respect. The hon. member went on and gave us a list of the various incomes earned in other parts of Africa. He said that our workers in South Africa were not all that badly off. I want to remind that hon. member and other hon. members on that side of the House that the workers in South Africa, Black and White, Pink and Yellow, judge their standard by what they see around them. It is no good saying to the Black worker in Johannesburg that he earns R10 per week while in Ghana his counterpart is earning R2 per week. He judges his standard by what he sees around him and not by what happens in other parts of Africa, parts of Africa which he probably has never heard of. I would like to appeal to hon. members opposite in all sincerity to realize that this attitude of the 19th century, which brought all the difficulties and problems in England with the emergence of trade unionism there, will not pay us in this country. We will have to face these facts surely and squarely; and we will have to realize that trade unionism for the non-White workers in South Africa is beginning to emerge whether we like it or not. I would say to the hon. the Minister, and I must plead with the hon. the Minister, to try, if he can, to ignore the type of speech we had from the hon. member who has just sat down. It bodes no good for South Africa …

Are you agitating now?

The hon. member says that I am agitating, but if that is agitating, it is exactly what I am doing. I am agitating on behalf of him and on behalf of every White South African, to realize that we just cannot go on in the way in which we are thinking at the moment. The workers in South Africa, regardless of their colour, deserve to be paid what they are worth. For too long they have been exploited. The hon. the Minister has made some very nice noises as to what should be done and I agree with him entirely, but I think, too, that he should set his own house in order. As I have said in this House before, over 8 000 of his own employees in the Department of Posts and Telegraphs earn less than R50 per month, which is recognized as well below the poverty datum line. Surely, if he wants to set an example, he should see that in his own department, the department he controls, that this ceases to exist as soon as possible.

I can remember the hon. the Minister’s remarks over the years. It was not so very long ago that this hon. Minister was reported in a speech as saying:

That is what he said a couple of years ago. I would like to ask the hon. the Minister whether he believes that we have industrial peace in South Africa today. If he does, I would say that he is certainly not taking cognizance of what is happening around him. The time has come that we must train our non-White labour; we have no alternative, whether the members on the Government side like it or not. But, they accept that they must be trained, so one can drop that there. Having trained them, they must ensure that frustration and bitterness are not built up by restrictions placed on them by reserving certain jobs for certain people in certain areas. Better training will mean more demand, and more demand will mean greater taxation on the Minister’s ability to meet the situation. I would suggest that the strikes in Durban were only the beginning of our difficulties, unless drastic changes come about in the thinking of the hon. the Minister and of his own party.

In saying this, I also want to say to the hon. the Minister that he alone is not blameworthy; there are too many employers in South Africa who are hiding behind the Government’s reluctance to move in this matter. I was scandalized during the recent strikes in Durban to find that a number of well-known organizations admitted, in this day and age, that there was no communication between worker and management. I am not blaming the hon. the Minister for this, but I am blaming him for not seeing that this is rectified immediately. Fancy having to admit in the 20th century that there was no communication between worker and management—and these are not small companies, but companies employing thousands of employees !

But those are your people!

The hon. member says it is my people. Here in Cape Town just a couple of days ago a company admitted that they paid what was laid down in the Industrial Conciliation Act, but they also admitted that this was already years out of date. What are these people trying to do? They have a responsibility and, if the Government is reluctant to exercise it responsibility, I believe the employer of labour at least should show his responsibility to South Africa and should ensure that his workers receive a decent wage. We have this sort of comment coming from an employer: “We cannot afford to pay cream-line wages.” That is a new word! “We are catering for the lowest of the low.” I suggest that even the lowest of the low need to eat. They also go hungry and I would suggest that this type of employer is one we could well afford to teach a lesson. It was also suggested that an increase of 3c per hour in this particular organization was a reasonable increase. I would like the hon. the Minister to work out just what 3c per hour is worth, particularly in view of the ever-increasing cost of living. If we go on in the manner in which we are, the recent increases in Durban, given however reluctantly, will be a drop in the ocean in the next six to twelve months because the cost of living is rising at such a rate that these pittances of increases, given merely to try to satisfy these workers, will mean that they will come again in the next few months asking, in my view quite rightly, for a living wage. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, with reference to what the hon. member for Port Natal has just said in connection with the increase of salaries, I think it has already been repeated time and again that we are also in favour of an increase in the salaries of non-White workers, provided that it complies with certain conditions, namely that there must be a corresponding increase in productivity, and that it must be gradual. It must also be accompanied by better training.

*Before I proceed to deal with certain other aspects mentioned here by hon. members, I just want to refer the hon. the Minister to a terrible disaster which took place at Brakpan on 24th November, 1972. On that evening there was a fun-fair, with its entertainments, in Brakpan. A so-called dive-bomber had been installed which stood on a wide base which had apparently not been properly squared. A Bantu whose qualifications were not very clear tried to correct this by means of a wooden pole. This caused the dive-bomber to topple over. A little girl, Anna Dormehl, aged 11, and a little boy, Natsos Papas, aged 13, died in that accident. Several bystanders, too, were seriously injured, including a teacher, Miss Annemarie Wessels, who has just recovered and resumed her activities. In this regard I want to pay tribute to the mayor and the city council of Brakpan, as well as to the fire department and the police, who acted at once and put an immediate stop to the activities of this fun-fair and also seized the dive-bomber. This was followed by an investigation by the Department of Labour. The results of that investigation have not been published yet and I understand that the reason for this is that certain witnesses still have to be located. Appeals have been made to them in the Press to come forward, but so far some of them have not come forward and consequently finality has not yet been reached in regard to this whole matter. But in the process it appeared that in circumstances of this nature there are apparently no Government regulations to provide that this type of apparatus has to meet certain requirements before it may be used. Hon. members will know how widely this kind of fun-fair apparatus is used in our cities and at our pleasure resorts and how many thousands of people make use of them, especially young people. We have just seen again at the Goodwood Show how widely these apparatus are used. There are no requirements nor are there certificates authorizing these people to use these apparatus. I want to appeal to the hon. the Minister to go into this matter and to try to lay down requirements which have to be met, in this regard before these things may be used.

Job reservation was mentioned by speakerss on the United Party side. The hon. member for Hillbrow said that section 77 of the Industrial Conciliation Act was only a bluff. Apparently the United Party, or the hon. members on the other side who took part in the debate today, are not aware of the extent to which ingenious employers are still attempting to evade the provisions of job reservation, whether statutory or administrative. My hon. friend of Bethal was explaining the way it happened in the mines. He referred to The Mineworker. The Mineworker of 14th and again of 28th March set out how attempts had been made to evade this job reservation. Certain jobs such as sampling are reserved for Whites, but the wages for these are so low that no Whites come forward to do this work. There are cases, for example, of vacancies arising as a result of Whites leaving the industry. Then it is alleged that there are no Whites who apply for these posts, in which case Bantu workers are then appointed in the place of the Whites. If the hon. member for Houghton or other hon. members on the other side are not aware of this, I can testify that I frequently receive complaints of this nature in my constituency. In this regard I want to commend the very good work done by the labour inspectors in investigating these complaints. But I also want to tell the hon. the Minister, that as rapidly as these complaints are investigated and irregularities straightened out, the factory and mining magnates develop methods for evading the provisions. In one case, for example, the premises were fenced in and a person who was on duty with the watchman at the gate informed those inside by means of the bush telegraph system that the factory inspector was on his way. Then, when the factory inspector entered, everything was in order, and it appeared that no offence was being committed. [Interjections.] I want to give the hon. the Minister the assurance that our workers are very much impressed by the good work being done by his inspectors. We are aware of the fact that these inspectors are a constant guarantee that our National Government will not suffer our people to we exploited or erosion to set in in respect of the security of our people.

The hon. member for Yeoville mentioned the fact that in order to develop a successful labour policy one had to obtain the co-operation of the Whites and the White trade unions. We agree with him wholeheartedly. This has also been emphasized by speakers on this side of the House. Then it was said that the National Party was creating a psychosis on the part of the Whites that they would be pushed out of their jobs. I want to fling that accusation right back at the United Party; for it is they, and they alone, who have caused our workers to fear that when, or rather if, they come into power—for they will never do so—the security of our White workers in South Africa will be threatened.

[Inaudible.]

Does the hon. member want to ask a question?

Who suggested it to them?

I am speaking of the United Party’s attitude in saying that they will abolish job reservation, and the attitude they displayed here this afternoon by refusing to reply to the challenge addressed to them by my hon. friend for Boksburg, to say whether the United Party will also do what the hon. the Minister did in Germiston and on the West Rand, when the security of the Whites was threatened. Will the United Party act in this way, and will they act as forcefully as the Minister did? They would not do so, for they have committed themselves completely to growth, at the expense of the security of the White worker.

Mr. Chairman, I can allay the hon. member’s fears by saying that the United Party will not follow a policy which would undermine the livelihood of the White worker in South Africa. Let that be clear now to all hon. members opposite. This does not mean that we do not also want a well-paid and well-trained non-White labour force in South Africa. Sir, one thing is very clear from this debate, and that is that the labour policy of that side of the House has become exceptionally fluid over the past year or two. Whereas previously they were obdurate and hardened and narrow-minded in their labour ideology, it seems to me as if their policy has now become more fluid, so much so that even the secretary of the White building workers’ unions, Mr. Gert Beetge, rejected job reservation in large parts. This is really a reply to the argument which the hon. member for Brakpan has just used, because we find in the building industry in Newcastle that Bantu are employed to do work which was normally done by Whites in the past; we find that the hon. the Minister of Transport, who is in charge of the Railways, was compelled by sheer necessity to say to his colleagues in the Cabinet. “Look, I need non-White labourers; I cannot do without them; I cannot give in to the ideological pressure exerted on me.” Sir, sometimes we know what goes on in the Cabinet. We are seeing the same thing in the Post Office, too. Here the hon. the Minister has shown greater flexibility; here as Minister of Labour, he did at least see to the creation of greater opportunities for the training of non-White workers in the Post Office. If the Minister of Labour would only take a leaf from the book of the Minister of Post and Telegraphs, then we would have made considerable progress towards solving our about problems. But the hon. the Minister, instead of concerning himself with the major issues affecting the labour of this country, is still too much of a politician. He is still too fond of going from platform to platform and saying, as he did in Epping Gardens, according to a headline report in one of his own newspapers (translation)—

I do not know whether the hon. the Minister was reported correctly, or whether he was just as out of touch with reality there as he has been here today.

What are you quoting from?

It looks to me like Die Transvaler or Die Vaderland. Sir, in thinking along these lines, the hon. the Minister is out of touch with the real development in the economy today. Instead of this I would rather like to see him adapting himself to the more fluid labour policy which ought to be followed today.

†Mr. Chairman, I did want to raise one issue of greater importance with the hon. the Minister, and that is the problem of finding sufficient workers for the television industry whom we shall need in the next four or five years. One thing is quite clear, and that is that there are not sufficient trained technical workers, trained artisans and trained semi-skilled workers in this country to carry the whole television industry in all its aspects, and it is the duty, or part of the duty, of the hon. the Minister as Minister of Labour to see that all restrictions which may be standing in the way of industry and in the way of institutions which train non-White workers as well as White workers are diminished and ultimately removed. Sir, we must realize that there will be a great need for trained workers for the television industry.

Order! The hon. member must come back to the Vote.

Sir, I am talking about the need for trained workers in industry and the need for the training of non-Whites in industry, including the television industry. My colleague, the hon. member for Yeoville has spoken about the commission that we suggest to find out what our manpower requirements will be and, if you will forgive me, Sir, I am stressing the manpower needs in one aspect of industry, namely the television industry, which I feel will need investigation by the commission for which the hon. member for Yeoville has asked.

It has been pointed out that the manpower requirements of many associated organizations will have to be met, such as the manufacturers, the distributors and all those who are responsible for the installation and the maintenance of receiving sets. This is a new industry which will be starting, and we will need the workers. We will have to have the necessary rules for them to see that they fit into our labour pattern. That is what I am trying to say.

That falls under the Minister of National Education. The hon. member may raise it there.

The question, I take it, of the educational training falls under the Minister of National Education, and also the different faculties at the universities and the higher technical institutions, the training facilities there, but the manpower problem itself, whether it is in the Post Office or on the Railways, is a problem of the artisans, of the workers, and the relationship between the Whites and the non-White workers; and the hon. the Minister of Labour, just as he will be responsible for laying down the rules and regulations for other industries, will also have to lay down rules and regulations for the workers in the television industry as he does today, I believe, in regard to industrial agreements when it comes to workers in the present radio industry. In the same way as we have the radio industry, where there are regulations which have to be laid down, regulations will have to be laid down for the television industry. I am only speaking in regard to the hon. the Minister’s duty in that particular connection.

It will be mainly education.

Now I am at issue with the hon. the Minister. The hon. the Minister says it is mainly education. Then I am entitled to ask him where are the bodies themselves coming from. Where are you going to find the workers themselves? Because it has been said by experts that nearly the whole of the television industry will have to be run, as far as semi-skilled and unskilled workers are concerned, by non-Whites. Does the Minister realize that problem, and has he made the necessary arrangements to see that the White and the non-White, skilled and the unskilled, can fit into this new industry? That is important. There will be workers’ organizations and there will be workers’ bodies who will be negotiating under the Department of Labour in regard to television, and the Minister must think of this problem which lies ahead, because it will affect thousands of new workers. But I will not go into that particular aspect. I just want to know what the hon. the Minister is doing in this regard. He must realize that there was a technical committee which was appointed by the Minister of National Education.

Order! The hon. member must abide by my ruling. I have ruled that this falls under the Minister of National Education. This Minister has nothing to do with the staffing of the television.

With respect, there was a technical commission appointed by the Minister of National Education, but on that I believe there are also representatives of the Department of Labour. Am I correct?

No. I am there as Minister of Posts and Telegraphs.

Well, that is a shocking state of affairs, if the Minister of Labour is not represented on that particular committee.

Order! The hon. member must abide by my ruling.

May I then ask the Minister to see that he is represented on that particular committee? Sir, there are dangers in this regard, unless we can solve this problem, and the Minister will be faced with this difficulty that from our Public Service and also from his Department of Posts and Telegraphs he will find that trained people will be going into this other industry. That, too, is a problem which the Minister will have to face. You may correct me. Sir, if I am out of order in this, but I believe it is a major national problem, having these people in the Post Office and the Railways and the Public Service, trained people, who might be taken away by the television industry without the necessary provision being made by the hon. the Minister, who is responsible for a large part of this, to see that he has a fully-trained and well-equipped force. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, it would be almost impossible for me to follow the hon. member for Orange Grove, for according to your ruling he had some difficulty in confining himself to labour. The hon. members of the Opposition have probably spoken more about labour this session than about anything else. In the course of all these speeches there has emerged a line of thought, a philosophy on which they have based their views as stated fragmentarily by them. I believe that I can in all fairness to them formulate this philosophy as follows: The philosophy of the United Party, as I understand it, is that the labour force of the entire South Africa should be seen as a whole and that the economy should be enabled to utilize and develop this labour force without any restricting measures, and, they say, if we allow this, there will be unprecedented economic prosperity, so much economic prosperity that the White worker need not be concerned. There will be sufficient economic prosperity to meet the needs of all workers.

I base this formulation of the philosophy of the labour leaders of the Opposition on the pronouncement, inter alia, of their hon. Leader when he complained in the No-confidence Debate that we were not prepared to make drastic changes in our labour pattern. I also base it on the fact that the hon. member for Hillbrow made certain statements on 4th April this year (Hansard col. 4101), when he gave us a blue-print of how South Africa could be saved from the road to perdition along which the National Party was allegedly leading it. He made three statements on labour. What I want to read will sound strange because he first made other points which did not concern labour. However, I shall read it as it is recorded here. His first statement on labour was the following—

I suppose I may infer from this that he definitely advocates the abolition of all job reservation. Secondly he states—

Again there is the all-embracing view of “work force”. In the third place he says in regard to labour—

From this I may infer that their philosophy is the one I have formulated.

As opposed to this the philosophy of the National Party’s labour policy was stated clearly again this afternoon by the hon. the Minister. This policy is that we see the good of all workers in South Africa in the implementation of the policy of separate development, in the labour field as well.

Where is the separate development?

Within the framework of the policy of separate development we shall lead the non-Whites to full development in the labour field as well, but in such a way that the stability of the White worker in his work situation will not be threatened. That is where the Opposition fails.

Words, words, words!

I want to test this statement of mine against a practical analysis of the situation that will exist if their policy is implemented. I want to do this in the light of the question: What will become of industrial peace if their policy is in fact implemented in practice? I am choosing industrial peace, because this is fundamental to the labour situation, because it is fundamental to economic prosperity, to good human relationships and to the essence of every individual’s daily existence, his source of income. Industrial peace is fundamental to the well-being of all workers.

If we were now to implement their policy, how should we arrive at industrial peace? I believe that it would lead to the greatest labour unrest this country has ever known.

Oh, those are merely speculations.

Let me state it on the practical level. If the policy of the hon. members were to be implemented in practice, there would be, after a possible period of transition, a situation in which every employer would be entitled to employ without restriction any employee who is qualified for the work and trained to perform it. In the second place there would also be sufficient non-Whites trained as artisans and they would be allowed to work anywhere, so that the employer would have a free choice as to whether he wanted to employ a non-White. In the third place there would be a situation in the trade union, whether in the same one or in another one, in which it would be possible in practice for the non-Whites to achieve the majority in a particular trade. Therefore a situation could arise in which the non-White would be in a position through his trade union to bargain, in terms of our present bargaining system, for a minimum wage which he would find satisfactory but on which the White’s could not subsist even for a day. In that situation the White leaders in labour will be absolutely compelled to stir up labour unrest, because there will be no future for them anymore. The hon. member for Hillbrow is looking at me with a cynical expression on his face, as if what I am predicting here were farfetched, but let me tell him what is happening in my constituency, in Vereeniging, even under the strict measures of control we have at the moment. Under the United Party there would be no measures of control, because they say that the economy, growth and prosperity, is the solution to everything. In my constituency job reservation is now being evaded to such an extent with a view to employing cheaper non-White labour instead of the more expensive White labour that …

It is your policy.

It is being evaded in such a way that the employer follows an employment policy which creates an artificial shortage of White workers in a particular occupation. So they give out that there are no Whites who are able to do the work, while they are turning down White applications and hiding them under the table. In two years’ time, when the new agreement has to be negotiated, they say that they do not have Whites for that particular occupation and that they must be granted permission to employ non-Whites. They have only one motive for this, and that is to get cheaper labour to do the same work. The good of the White worker and of the non-White worker is to be found in the policy of the National Party, for the uncontrolled situation which would prevail under the United Party and which would play into the hands of the capitalist, of the rich man and of the big employer would make it impossible for them, even if they wanted to, to balance effectively the interests of the various groups and to ensure industrial peace in that way.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member who has just sat down is a young member who represents the industrial seat of Vereeniging. He made a remarkable speech, one which one would have thought could have been made round-about 1918 or somewhere roundabout those years.

No, he is on the ball.

I suppose he is trying to keep his seat somehow and may be that hon. member is doing the same. On listening to this debate this afternoon, we witnessed a negative approach to a constructive suggestion that was put forward by this side of the House. What is remarkable is that after the hon. member for Yeoville had put forward his suggestion to the hon. the Minister, it was not the hon. the Minister that refused to have a commission or anything of that kind; it was one member after the other. They decided for the Minister that there shall not be a commission. He himself did not make any decisions at all. They all decided that there would be no commission and he had to follow them. I shall come back to other hon. members later as I would now like to refer to some of the remarks which had been made by the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark in regard to apprenticeship training and the shortening thereof. The latest report we have gives an outline of what is being done to shorten the training period. I would like to point out that one does not train an artisan in five minutes. The suggestion here is that the period can be shortened through an intensive course at technical colleges prior to being trained. This may bring about a certain amount of saving in time, but you cannot cut training down by a year and produce a first-class artisan. Admittedly they have to undergo a trade test, but just cutting down the training period as was suggested by the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark, is not the answer. Some years ago a committee worked on the whole question of the training of apprentices. I am not saying that we have not got to the stage where we should review it because I think we should. I think it is time that we review the whole system of training apprentices in view of the changing circumstances in industry and the necessity of training technicians to a very much higher standard. Perhaps our apprentice system has become a little out of date, but I can tell you that the artisans which it has produced, are really first class, as we have heard here this afternoon. Some of the finest technicians and artisans in the world operate in this country.

The report of the Department of Labour made sad reading as far as the building trade is concerned. They say here that during the holidays they were actually taking children, boys of 15 years of age, and students to assist in the various trades. There is something wrong there. This rather gives the lie to what we have heard here this afternoon. Also, I would like to express my disappointment at the results of the artisan training schools. We have a first-class set-up at Westlake, but it is just not getting off the ground. It is certainly not doing the work it should be doing, although we have the staff and the facilities. I wonder whether we are not demanding a very much higher education than this particular course is geared to. What type of person do we envisage will go there? As far as the training of a motor mechanic is concerned, you may have a fellow who has been driving a truck and doing his own maintenance work on that truck, who has got to the stage where he would like to go a bit further. He is more or less an unskilled labourer while he is driving the truck. He may be working for a road department or in other spheres, and has never had the opportunity of serving an apprenticeship, but under the Artisans Training Act he has that opportunity. Unfortunately, such individuals, and one can feel sorry, for them have not got the education background required. In other words, they may just be able to produce a Std. 6 or Std. 7 certificate. I must accept that a certain educational standard is required but I am not sure whether we are not demanding too high a standard. Perhaps we should alter our training system and train them academically. We as well as the practical. We may attract more recruits to this type of training because, in order to make up the deficiency of trained artisans in this country, this unit could serve a wonderful purpose. I am only sorry that it has not had the success it should have had so that we could have seen more of these centres all over the country.

I want to get back to the suggestions put forward by the hon. member for Yeoville. He suggested that a commission be appointed and stated the terms of reference which would inquire into the serious labour situation which has developed in this country. We have got to the stage where we must look at the whole of the labour pattern in this country anew. One cannot do this across the floor of the House and not with the speeches we have heard here today. One does not want to have the Nationalist Party philosophy recited to one because it is terribly out of date as far as labour is concerned. Anyone who knows anything about labour, just smiles because one realizes that the workers themselves are far in advance of the Nationalist Party’s philosophies at the present moment. It is all right for hon. members to get up on platforms and say that what the United Party is going to do is to put a Black man in the job of the White man and that, as a matter of fact, Black men will be sitting on their trade unions and will decide on your wages, but those members will not get up and tell them that they are going to establish border industries and will employ Black artisans so that, in fact, they will be able to undercut the White artisan. They will not tell them that! They won’t tell you that in the Bantu areas factories are being set up that could cut the White areas to pieces; they will not tell them that a steel works could be established there. We do not know whether the whole Bantu area outside Johannesburg may not be declared a Bantu area. That could happen and what is going to happen then? If the industry in Vereeniging decides to recruit Bantu from that area and train Bantu artisans in the new area, what are the White workers going to do? They do not tell them that. They do not tell the White workers of all these border industry areas that are being established all over the country and that there is no protection for the White worker. They do not tell them either that the White worker is going to train artisans in those Bantu areas. I cannot use the word, because you will rule me out of order, Mr. Chairman, but there is a very suitable word to use for that sort of thing. Let us be quite honest. We have reached a stage in this country—and I think the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark and other hon. members who live so close to industry realize this—where there has to be a realignment. We have to take a new look at things. The hon. member for Vereeniging was talking about the under-cutting of wages and so on. Of course, that is so much rubbish. If he had had anything to do with negotiating industrial agreements and saw how hard the average worker is when he negotiates, he would realize that that could not happen. I see the hon. the Minister of Sport and Recreation is in the House now. I think it was he who warned the Mine-workers’ Union that if they did not improve their productivity, they might even have to see changes in their labour pattern. He will remember the speech he made and the White workers know it. There must be an ascendency as far as the White workers are concerned. It is not a question of this side changing its policy. We realize, and accept our responsibility in this respect, that South Africa, with the events that are taking place and the changes made by this Government, must have a completely new look at the whole of our labour policy in this country with the coming in of the Bantu, Coloured and other elements into industry. The only way you can do it is not across the floor of this House or with a decision in a caucus or at a congress, but by an impartial commission that will consist of the workers concerned and the employers to arrive at a solution which will put South Africa back on the prosperous road where it should be.

Mr. Chairman, I think it is quite a good idea of the Minister to revise the apprenticeship law, because I think anyone of us who has experienced the services given by garages in Cape Town will agree that the garage owners are sponging on these poor apprentices and on the motorcar owners judging by the excessive prices which are charged, for work which was never done by an ordinary apprentice. Apart from that they are really parasitising on these poor non-Whites working in those garages. If you ask the worker in the garage what he earns, the poor non-White, who is really doing the work and crawling under the cars, he replies that he gets R15 or R20 per week …

Or R80 per week.

The accumulative effect of all this is that the garage owner is making a terrific profit on the work which is done by the poor old non-White and the underpaid apprentices. I therefore think it was quite a good suggestion which was made by the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark when he called for a review of the apprenticeship law.

As far as Westlake is concerned, I do not think the Government can be blamed for the situation which obtains there, for the simple reason that the Government has shown its goodwill towards the people of the Peninsula and of South Africa as a whole.

*However, I would like to deal with another point. The hon. member for Vereniging gave a fine exposition of the two policies here. To that I just want to add that, if one further analyses the points raised by the United Party as well as the hon. member for Houghton, it is clear that it contains a feature which is actually a shocking thing for our political economy. It includes the seed of agitation for further representations for higher wages and strikes which can, in fact, harm the whole of our economy. For instance, the hon. member for Port Natal says—I am sorry he is not here—

Could you imagine anyone being a greater agitator?

Order! No, the hon. member is not allowed to say that.

Order!

Order! I am in the Chair. The hon. member must withdraw that word.

Mr. Chairman, I withdraw it. [Interjections.]

Order! If hon. members will not leave the maintenance of order to me, I shall have to warn them that if they do so again, they will be asked to leave the Chamber.

Sir, I say the discussions of hon. members opposite contain the seed of agitation. I think this is to be regretted. There has never been any suggestion …

[Inaudible.]

Various questions have been put to the Opposition this afternoon, and none of them have been replied to. Now I want to put another question to the hon. member for South Coast. Can the hon. member for South Coast tell this House whether any of these people agitating for increased wages have ever come forward and said: “Look, we are prepared to produce more in this country; are you going to pay us more?” In no instance has that ever been done. Under no circumstances can anybody tell me that increased production has followed on increased pay. It has never been experienced, not in the Civil Service nor anywhere else.

Oooooo!

Nobody can tell me that it has been the case anywhere, because I have been all over the world, and I have seen it myself.

Where is Connie?

Who is your Connie? He is the “hon. the Minister”.

Order! Did the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District not hear me?

I did, Sir.

Well, please obey my ruling; otherwise I shall have to take other steps.

With regard to the question of training, the Government always gets the blame. Sir, I can assure you that you can go to any farm in South or South-West Africa and you will find that non-Whites are being trained there. Training takes place at every mine. The industries, the agricultural industry and the mining industry each undertakes its own training. For instance, I am thinking about what Anglo-American does. They have a special training centre for the non-Whites.

Business interrupted in accordance with Standing Order No. 23.

House Resumed:

Progress reported and leave granted to sit again.

Mr. Chairman, I should like to point out that hon. members opposite have not done their homework properly. They carried on quite a bit about the question of the growth rate, but I am still saying they did not do their homework. They should, for example, have taken note of what a man like Paul Streeton said. During a symposium, “Aid to Africa”, from 13th to 21st August, 1970, held by the “United Nations Economic Commission for Africa” in Geneva, he said the following—

That, I think, is a great compliment for South Africa. And then the hon. member for Hillbrow speaks of a “decline in productivity in South Africa”! about which he had a great deal to say, and he criticized the low growth rate in South Africa.

In the history of the mining industry in Africa, Kwame Nkrumah, when he came into power, let his emotions run riot and tried to show the English capitalistic owners of mines in Ghana something. He laid down the minimum wages in Ghana, but he pegged them at too high a level, with the result that many of those mines had to be closed down. As a result of that there was an economic slump. Some of those mines have not yet been opened up again to this day. At the time this caused great unemployment in Ghana.

Here on the local scene there are quite a few of our young people, students, who have as yet made no contributions at all to the development of the country, and who keep themselves busy with political matters. They parasitize on the community, which is doing everything possible to maintain the growth rate in the country. When all is said and done, Sir, there are actually too many people in South Africa who are doing too little. Comparatively speaking I want to relate the agitation for higher wages by these groups to what is happening elsewhere in the world. Reference has already been made to wages elsewhere in the world, particularly in the Western world. I shall confine myself to the position in a few communist countries. Here I have, for example, a pamphlet published by the “Wages and Economic Commission, University of the Witwatersrand”. In it we read the following—

What is being displayed here is the same kind of spirit the hon. member for Port Natal displayed yesterday evening. I shall quote further from this pamphlet—

There is continual agitation in this connection. Here I have another pamphlet issued by the “Young Progressives, P.O. Box 1475, Cape Town”. In it we find the following—

I also want to refer to a report in the Transvaler of 12th April of this year, which reads as follows, inter alia (translation)—

In my opinion it is nonsense. But I shall continue. Here is a further article in the same newspaper under the heading “Servant wage should be at least R54” (translation)—

Sir, by way of comparison I now want to quote from an article written by James Michener, which appeared in the “Reader’s Digest” of August, 1972, when Michener accompanied Pres. Nixon to China, because China has recently come very much to the fore. With a view to this fixing of wages by these amateurs of the universities of the Witwatersrand and Cape Town, I want to refer to what Michener has to say in connection with wages since he travelled, inter alia, through various work locales in Peking and consulted the workers. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Etosha covered a very wide field and, because my time is very limited, I do not intend reacting upon what he has said. I wonder why hon. members on that side of the House are so sensitive and so touchy whenever we on this side of the House raise the very important and very crucial issue of Bantu wage levels and the more productive use of Bantu labour in the interests of the South African economy. Sir, we had this type of reaction in the No-confidence debate: we had it in the Budget debate; we had it again in the debate on the Vote of the Prime Minister, and we certainly had it again under the Vote of the hon. the Minister of Labour. I can only come to the conclusion that hon. members on that side of the House react in the way which they do because they feel that they are very vulnerable on this particular issue. Sir, as an instance we had the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark yesterday devoting almost his entire speech to attacking hon. members on this side of the House because he believed that we raise the question of Bantu wage levels too often. The hon. member for Vanderbijlpark went even further; he took the greatest exception to the fact that we did not rise more often in this House to plead for added protection for the White worker in South Africa. All I can say is that one wonders how naïve an hon. member can be, because surely the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark knows that the rights of the White worker in South Africa are fully protected.

By this Government.

He knows that those rights would be even better protected under the policy of the United Party. [Interjections.] The hon. member for Vanderbijlpark knows that White workers in South Africa enjoy the protection of their trade unions. The hon. member must surely know that the White worker, at any time, can raise a grievance in the first instance with his own member of Parliament, who in turn will raise the matter with the relevant department or in this particular House. Surely the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark must know, too, that the White worker in South Africa can use his democratic rights to lodge his protest against any Government through the ballot-box. I want to say to the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark and to any other hon. members on that side of the House who think as he does that the difference between that side of the House and this side of the House is that we believe sincerely that the Bantu worker or the non-White worker is an integral and permanent part of the South African economy. We believe that he is making a major contribution to the overall welfare of South Africa and it is for these reasons that we on this side of the House will use every possible opportunity to raise matters on behalf of non-White workers when we believe that they are in the interests of those workers and of South Africa as a whole. Mr. Chairman, I want to say to hon. members on that side that if they believe that the type of reaction which we have had during this debate will divert us from that course, then they are really wasting their time.

Sir, with that I leave the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark. I want to say that now that the wave of illegal and very costly strikes which we experienced in South Africa over the past few months has subsided, there is an understandable feeling of relief that a potentially explosive situation has been contained, largely due to the fact that all the parties involved acted with the greatest possible restraint. Having said that, I want to say that the position leaves no room for complacency because we know that under the surface there is still a great deal of dissatisfaction and we know that each and everyone of us will have to do our best to see to it that the non-White worker in South Africa is brought to the position where he earns at least a liveable wage. It is against this background that I want to ask the hon. the Minister of Labour whether he feels satisfied that the Government is doing everything in its power to prevent similar situations from arising in the future. Here, in particular, I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether he believes that the Wage Board, for instance, is approaching the whole question of Bantu wage levels in South Africa with the necessary urgency. I say this because it would seem that there was a disappointing reluctance on the part of the Wage Board to set the pace or give a lead in regard to raising wages for non-White workers in South Africa. This has become very apparent when we examine the recommendations which the Wage Board has made over the past 10 years. When you examine these recommendations, Sir, you can only come to the conclusion that South Africa’s lowest paid non-White workers can expect very little relief from the Wage Board. Having said this I want to say immediately that I do not for a moment suspect or doubt the sincerity of the members of the board. But it is an unfortunate fact that the Wage Board seems to be tormented by a peculiar and what I believe a completely unwarranted fear that a living wage for all of South Africa’s workers will ruin the economy of the country. You see, Sir, the Wage Board is after all appointed by the hon. the Minister and they have a great responsibility in determining whether or not non-Whites should receive higher wages. I think that this particular statement made by a former chairman of the Wage Board typifies the whole attitude of the board towards the whole question of non-White wages. This statement reads as follows—

Sir, obviously on the basis of this assessment, the Wage Board have come to the conclusion that it cannot recommend a living wage for South Africa’s lowest paid workers. The board seems to have made up its mind that however worthy or desirable it might be to recommend higher wages for South Africa’s lowest paid workers … [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I shall reply at a later stage to the hon. member for Johannesburg North in regard to certain statements made by him. Any Minister holding the Labour portfolio, will always have difficulty because the problems are going to grow in magnitude in future. Because the hon. the Minister is doing his best and has achieved a great deal of success to date, I want to thank him for what he has done for the White worker as well as for the non-White worker of the Republic of South Africa.

In recent times we have heard a great deal about the narrowing of the gap which exists between the income of the White and that of the non-White. This is an idea which is easy to express, but is it as easy to apply in practice? It is easy for one to say that the non-White should be paid R150, R200, R250 or even R400 per month. However, I want to point out that there is a tremendous difference between the standard of living of the non-White and that of the White and that many concessions are being made to the Bantu and other non-Whites which do not apply to the Whites.

I want to ask hon. members opposite what the income of the White was in the years 1933 to 1936. What was it? [Interjections.] Were they, when they governed the country at that time, concerned about the income of the Whites as they are today about the income of the non-Whites? [Interjections.]

You are the biggest old scandal-monger in Natal.

Order! The hon. member must withdraw that.

I withdraw it, Sir.

We accept that strikes have taken place in recent times and we also accept that certain people were justified in taking this step because they were prejudiced. However, a finger is always pointed at the Government and it is said that it is the fault of the Government that those non-Whites who participated in the strikes were justified in doing so. However, there are many people who went on strike after the employers had decided to grant increases. The fault, therefore, does not lie exclusively with the Government and consequently certain bodies have effected major improvements in the salaries of non-Whites. I should like to quote what the hon. the Prime Minister said in this House on 9th February this year (Hansard, col. 346)—

That is true. Everyone belonging to this people with its deeply Christian background, realizes that when someone is hungry, when someone goes naked and feels cold, he must be cared for when he goes to work. To narrow the gap is easily said, but asking a great deal. I want to concede that there may be many instances deserving of this, but there are also many instances where this would be quite impractical. The productivity of the non-White must be drastically increased. It is easy to hold out both hands, as is the custom among the Bantu—they never hold out one hand, because they always want a lot. His productivity must be increased, and since he has now been offered liberal increases, it must be seen to that he also does better work. I say to hon. members that it is dangerous simply to say that the gap must be narrowed. I cannot see my way clear to doing that.

Then we heard the idea of the main speaker of the Opposition, the hon. member for Yeoville, that a national commission should be appointed on which all the various races should be represented. He said that such a commission should be established to solve all these problems. I want to say to hon. members that I will have nothing to do with such a monstrosity nor do I believe that the hon. the Minister will take any notice of it. I want to say to the hon. member that the non-White has wide bargaining powers at his disposal. A large number have already been mentioned. For example, there are the section inspectors, the Bantu labour officials, the works committees, the co-ordinating committees, the regional committees, the Bantu Labour Board and the Wage Board. Various bodies have been established to help the person who is unable to negotiate, if he wants to make any representations to the State or to whatever other body or person he may wish to make representations. That is not what the Opposition is after. What they are striving for, is to have trade unions established for the Bantu or to ensure that the trade unions of the Whites be thrown open so that the non-Whites may also belong to them. This is a monstrosity and the person who talks after me can deal with that. I say that this cannot be done, but if it were to be done, where would we be heading?

I want to know whether the hon. the Opposition is being sincere when expressing these ideas; I doubt it. I want to know whether the Whites in South Africa or the Whites in Africa are guilty of the fact that the Bantu, an inhabitant of South Africa, has leeway to make up. Are the Whites to blame for that? I am no authority on the Bible, but I assume that these people were probably created at approximately the same time by the Almighty. Why, then, do the non-Whites have leeway to make up? Have we ever asked ourselves that question? I believe that if he had done his duty from the time when the world was created, then we would have found him here as an independent nation and then we would not have come here. [Time expired.]

The hon. member for Rustenburg.

Mr. Chairman …

Mr. Chairman …

Order! Is the hon. member for Houghton representing Rustenburg as well?

I am sorry, Mr. Chairman, I did not know that you saw the hon. member for Rustenburg.

Mr. Chairman, I would be very glad if the hon. member for Houghton would resume her seat to give me a turn to speak. [Interjections.]

Order!

There is no love lost between the hon. member for Houghton and I, and I hope that the situation remains just the way it is. [Interjections.]

The hon. member for Johannesburg North and the hon. member for Port Natal speak with one voice and sit in the same bench in this House of Assembly. The hon. member for Johannesburg North spoke of “potentially explosive complacency” and in respect of all the situations which require calmness at this stage, could easily create the opposite outward impression. According to an unrevised Hansard report, the hon. member for Port Natal said yesterday—

Since we are at present dealing with strikes, it is very clear to me that this hon. member for Port Natal cannot resist placing all the blame on the Government. The employers, who are directly concerned, are not told to review their wage systems. I want to urge that notwithstanding the fact that we are aware of the shortcomings in the wage structure in the private sector, the Government cannot be blamed for that. We must warn against an exaggeration of the present situation. The Americans learned their lesson, and it is a pity that the hon. member for Port Natal does not want to learn his.

What lessons do I have to learn?

The hon. member has many lessons to learn, for example about being a good citizen of South Africa. In yesterday’s Star a report appeared under the heading “South African wages—statistics contain shocks for Americans”. [Interjection.] The hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District is not impressing anyone. I have exactly eight minutes at my disposal, and the hon. member must now give me a chance. Statistics will also shock the hon. member for Port Natal. In that report the following is stated—

We in South Africa have never been opposed to a minimum wage, or to an increase in wages. When one reads this report further, one finds something else that is interesting—

We concede that it is a good thing that wage increases are taking place, but if wage increases take place without a concomitant increase in productivity, this would lead, to unemployment and to greater inflation in South Africa. It is very easy to say that we must pay our Bantu higher wages. The annual amount of the national economy that is paid out in wages for non-Whites in South Africa, is R2 200 million. A 1 per cent increase in the wages for non-Whites is R22 million. I have nothing against Bantu earning higher wages, but then they must be prepared to contribute a greater share to greater productivity in South Africa. But what is the position? In an attack on the Minister and this side of the House, this Opposition cast a reflection and left the impression that we are living in economic chaos in South Africa, in an economic situation which is perilous. The hon. member for Yeoville spoke of a “psychological block” as far as the Whites are concerned. These are gross words. The impression has clearly been left here that the economic situation in South Africa is in a chaotic state. This contradicts the actual state of affairs, however. Over the past ten years the real growth in South Africa was greater than that of any other Western country. Over the past two years it was, notwithstanding the decrease in growth, comparable with that of any other country in the world. It is, therefore, not only a reflection on the Government of South Africa, but also on South Africa’s workers when it is said that there is no efficiency because the Government is not prepared to employ more Bantu. The fact that we could maintain a real growth in South Africa comparable with that in the rest of the world is irrefutable proof of the efficiency of our workers in South Africa. What is the position? The position is simply that in South Africa, where we are dealing with a multi-national set-up—and not a multi-racial setup which the hon. member for Johannesburg North spoke about—A very dangerous situation would be allowed to develop if we were to say that we are not prepared to continue implementing work reservation. The hon. member for Port Natal advocated having it lifted. Is that correct?

[Inaudible.]

He says “yes”. He advocated that there should be no work reservation in South Africa. If that were to happen, you would be causing the greatest possible unrest in the South African labour market that you have ever caused. Compare South Africa with the rest of the world. Compare it with Great Britain. The hon. member spoke of the fact that they came along with their trade unions in the nineteenth century in order to get out of their precarious position, but what is the present position in Great Britain? There are many more strikes than there are taking place in South Africa. Strikes in England have become chronic. The hon. member is aware of that. Though the Bantu are not equal to the task of realizing and accepting the finer technical benefits of responsible trade unionism, he wants to force upon the Bantu in South Africa the fact that they should also become a part of the trade unions. The Bantu would then be exposed to tremendous exploitation. The Whites are further advanced and that is why trade unions are basically sound in South Africa as far as the Whites are concerned. They are essentially sound in the sense that trade unions in South Africa act responsibly. This has been proved repeatedly. That is why we do not have chronic strikes in South Africa.

The training of Bantu is important, the dialogue that must be carried out is important, and the liaison between the department and the Bantu is important, but the employer’s responsibility is just as important. What is the present set-up? Let us take the Industrial Conciliation Act which was amended in 1969 to present an opportunity for a training fund. In that connection I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether this training fund is being fully utilized by the employers. The employers have a responsibility in South Africa to bring about greater productivity. The employers have a tremendous responsibility, but the hon. Opposition also has a responsibility to stop unleashing fear amongst the people about this just being the beginning of further rioting in South Africa. It is irresponsible for such things to be said in this House as were said by the hon. member for Port Natal, i.e. “the strikes in Durban are only the beginning of our difficulties unless drastic changes come about”. What drastic changes must the Government bring about? The Government acted responsibly in respect of these strikes. The Government has repeatedly proved that as a government it is prepared to pay higher wages to the non-Whites of Government departments. This has repeatedly been done, but the private sector, and the people who belong to that party, are the biggest sinners in that respect. The biggest sinners come from Natal. There is also the hon. member for Houghton with her Union Hotel. Here she kicks up a fuss, but in actual fact she is paying her Bantu workers in the Union Hotel less than our people would pay them. That is the position. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I want to refer to what the hon. member for Stilfontein said about the wage gap. Apparently he justifies the wage gap by saying that the Bantu and members of the other non-White groups have a lower standard of living than the White man. Surely the standard of living depends entirely in the wages received. It is not the desire of these Black people to live as they are; they cannot do better. I think that the hon. member’s argument falls away as far as that is concerned.

I want to support the hon. member for Yeoville in his plea for a national commission I hope the hon. the Minister will accede to our request because changes are taking place so quickly in the labour field in South Africa today that he himself cannot keep pace with them. It was only a very short time ago when he still was one of those who subscribed to the idea that a Bantu would never become skilled in this country as long as he could manage to keep them back. He was one of the people who wanted the Blacks only for unskilled labour. Today he pleads for more skills to be given to the Black man and they must be given by the White man to the Black man. These changes are taking place so quickly that he has to accede to this request of the hon. member. If not, he is going to be left wondering what is happening outside. The people themselves want these changes. He must therefore agree to this investigation.

While he is doing that I wish he would investigate the Unemployment Insurance Fund. This fund at the moment has a colossal amount of money in its coffers. If my information is correct the reserve fund today stands at R158 million. I should like to know what he intends doing about this. He replied to the hon. member for Umbilo on the 13th March to the effect that he was having talks with interested parties in relation, I take it, to the Unemployment Fund and the Workmens’ Compensation Fund. That was almost two months ago and we want to know from the hon. the Minister when he replies whether or not he can tell the House how far he has come with these negotiations. When he deals with the Unemployment Insurance Fund, irrespective of what was said yesterday, I want him to raise the ceiling of those people who can claim from the fund. It is unrealistic today when you take into consideration the value of the rand that the ceiling should be kept at the present level. That is one thing that has to be raised in relation to the present cost of living.

When he makes changes, and I hope he will make changes, I trust that he will not come to this House with a new Act or with an amendment to the present Act. Surely he can arrange for this to be done by way of regulation so that those people who are going to become affected can derive some benefit from any changes immediately and not have to wait till Parliament sits again. They should be able to get these benefits when they need them. The way things are today it takes six months for a Bill to become an Act after it has been piloted through Parliament. Then benefits are delayed almost invariably until the 1st October of that year. It is far too long.

As far as the Workmens’ Compensation Act is concerned, I feel that this is an Act which should be made applicable to all workers irrespective of their income. Accidents are not confined to one specific group. If a person is prepared to pay his insurance under this Act, he should be covered by the Act. As things stand at the moment, this is a discriminatory Act. Only certain people are entitled to get compensation under that Act. I think that has to change. People working in factories may have accidents but people working in offices and executive people can also become involved in accidents. I don’t see why the Minister should limit the compensation that is payable to only a limited group of people. I feel that he should do one of two things. Here again he must raise the ceiling of those people who can be covered by the Act or he must cover everybody. He in fact does that in the case of public servants. Why should a person in industry or in commerce be subjected to discrimination? If it does apply to people in the Public Service why should it not apply to those people in the private sector? The hon. the Minister must surely look at this Act again to see whether he should not revise the present workmens’ compensation ceiling. Here again the amount that is given for compensation is quite unsatisfactory. It is quite unrealistic to think that the compensation paid today in respect of either accidents or unemployment can really meet the demands of a family. The hon. the Minister must not forget that particularly in accident cases it is the breadwinner of the family who cannot go to work. At the best of times such a person finds difficulty in keeping his household going: how can he possibly keep it going when he has had an accident and is receiving only a percentage of his normal earnings? Surely the time has come for a revision? How long can the Minister delay this? People want the effect of such a change now. They are not prepared to say: “I shall be satisfied with the change in two or three years’ time”. It is today that the people need this change.

Compensation as a whole must be reviewed, and it has to be far more realistic than it is at present. While on this subject, I may say that I am very perturbed about those people who are receiving compensation now. I think it is quite unsatisfactory that those people who are receiving compensation based on past findings should have to continue receiving that compensation whether it is in the form of a pension or not, forever. There is no hope for these people ever to get an increase; they have to live today on an amount which was fixed ten, or sometimes even 15 years ago. They have to try to make ends meet on that basis. We must have the views of the Minister on these matters. I hope that the Minister will be sympathetic towards these people. One only has to look at the amounts lying in the coffers of the Workmen’s Compensation Fund. They are quite staggering. There is an amount of R97 million standing as an investment in South African registered stock. These are the figures the hon. the Minister gave me. In 1971 the amount was R93 million. If you subtract all the commitments against this fund, there is still a vast sum of R37 million left. What is paid out of this fund? In compensation R8 million was paid out. This is not a static fund. More and more money comes into the fund all the time. With every person who becomes occupied in industry or in commerce, the fund swells and yet, in past years, the Minister has not done anything to increase the compensation paid to person injured while at work.

In the minute or two left to me, I want to appeal to the Minister to have another look at the amount paid in compensation. He should start now and he should not distinguish between conditions on the mines and conditions in factories, which are not covered by the Mines and Works Act. I want to ask the Minister whether he can justify the fact that a miner who suffers from pneumoconiosis receives a higher compensation than a worker outside the mining industry who contracts pneumoconiosis. Both of them work in a dusty atmosphere. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, at this stage I want to reply to a number of matters that have been raised here up to now. I shall start with the hon. member for Brentwood, who raised a matter to which the hon. member for Rosettenville also referred in the last part of his speech, i.e. new industrial diseases caused by dusty conditions. The hon. member for Brentwood asked me whether it was not possible to have a greater measure of co-operation in this regard between the departments of Labour, Health and Mines. I should like to give the hon. member the assurance that that co-operation does exist; that an interdepartmental committee was in fact established; that this interdepartmental committee has already gone into the matter very thoroughly, and that certain officials of the Department of Health have already been appointed as factory inspectors. In that manner, therefore, overlapping is being eliminated. To a certain extent, therefore, this is also a reply to the hon. member for Rosettenville, who also spoke about this matter.

But what about the difference in compensation?

That is a matter which must also be ironed out for us by this interdepartmental committee. They may make recommendations in that connection. It is an interdepartmental committee which affects the three departments that are concerned with compensation, and I think it is up to them to make recommendations to the relevant Ministers in that regard.

The hon. member for Brakpan referred to the accident which occurred at the funfair in November as a result of one of the funfair’s dive-bombers crashing down, a fatal accident in which two children were killed and four other persons were injured. This activity very definitely falls under the Factories Act. The Factories Act very clearly lays down safety regulations which ought to be complied with by the user of such apparatus. This matter was investigated by my Department’s inspectors. They submitted a comprehensive report on it to the Attorney-General, and we are now waiting to hear what steps the Attorney-General intends taking in this regard.

The hon. members for Heidelberg and Etosha and Johannesburg North referred, amongst other things, to the question of Bantu wages, and in that respect I want to express my appreciation, in the first place, to the hon. member for Heidelberg and also to the hon. member for Etosha—the hon. member for Stilfontein also referred to this matter—for their plea that we should display a realistic approach in this regard and that realistic wages was an absolute requirement for our country’s economy and therefore for the livelihood of the Bantu as well. In this regard the hon. member for Johannesburg North said that the Wage Board ought to have a different approach in regard to the recommendation of wages in that they should also take into account the personal needs of the people. The Wage Board is, of course, tied down by the Wage Act itself, and I think it is fit and necessary for me to read out to hon. members the two basic provisions of the Wage Act so that we may know what the two legs are on which the Wage Board as a whole stands and on which all wage determinations are effected in this country. Section 7 of the Wage Act provides that the board shall, before it makes any recommendation, take certain factors into consideration, and I am now going to quote paragraphs (d) and (e), which are the two basic points to which regard must be had here—

1. (d) the ability of employers in the trade concerned to carry on their businesses successfully should any recommendation proposed to be made by the board, be carried into effect, regard being had to distance from markets, cost of transport and any other relevant circumstances;
2. (e) the cost of living in any area in which the trade concerned is being carried on; …

These are the two basic requirements which the Wage Board must take into consideration. It goes without saying that it must take the cost of living into consideration, and it must also take into consideration the wages that can be paid by the trade concerned, for it would be foolish to prescribe wages which are so high that the factory would be forced to close down, with the result that its employees would become unemployed. If that should happen, one would be faced with a wretched position three times worse than the low wages which are being paid to those employees at the moment and with which we are not satisfied, but which can only be remedied in a gradual and realistic manner.

The hon. member for Rosettenville also pleaded for the same matter for which the hon. member for Boksburg asked me yesterday, namely a revision of the unemployment insurance benefits as well as the benefits of the accident fund. Both of these matters are, as I stated in my reply yesterday, under consideration at the moment. In the course of this recess we shall probably be able to give a decisive answer about those matters, which we hope will lead to an improvement.

May I ask whether that investigation will include the floor as well as the ceiling?

The hon. member for Houghton referred to what she called the floor, and perhaps I should reply to her at this stage. The position, of course, is that the Black workers in the lowest wage groups are largely migratory workers. Vast numbers of them come from other parts of Africa; they are not South African workers. One can mention the mines as one of the best examples in this case. These workers, of course, have been excluded from the application of the workmen’s unemployment fund in this case. Apart from that, Sir, it would be very difficult indeed to administer the Act if it were applied to migratory workers. Another reason which is linked with that is the distinct possibility that such workers, if they were required to contribute to the fund, would not be able to receive benefits from that fund. But the fortunate aspect today is that due to the pay increases which Black workers in South Africa have received and are receiving and will be receiving, the large bulk of them will be coming within the ambit of the unemployment fund.

*Sir, the hon. members for Mayfair and Heidelberg referred here to the strikes and the elements behind them. A moment ago the hon. member for Johannesburg North also referred to the underground currents in this regard. One finds it rather disturbing, now that the matter can be investigated calmly after the strikes, to learn from the lips of responsible Black leaders what elements were behind these strikes. I have just received a report from the Durban regional labour committee, which consists of Bantu only. They had talks on the strikes and looked back on them in order to investigate its causes, etc., and at those talks the Bantu members of that regional committee said that they found the conduct of the Zulu during those strikes to be strange, that the way in which those Zulu workers acted was inconsistent with their nature as they know their own people. This reminds me a great deal of what the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District said here yesterday. He referred to the attitude of the striking Zulu and said to their credit that they had behaved themselves very well—good-naturedly—during these strikes. This regional Bantu labour committee also found that there had been many other elements behind these strikers. They had no hesitation in mentioning by name the Students’ Wage Commission of the University of Natal as the people who had been responsible for a great deal of the incitement in this regard. We had the case where, during one of the Wage Board sessions that took place, it happened that a crowd of 400 Bantu arrived at that session. The bulk of them did not even know what was involved; but they came because groups of Bantu had been brought there in buses of Putco, which had presumably been hired specially for that purpose. Large numbers of students were present there and, as this regional committee very clearly stated, the members of this Students’ Wage Commission did not confine themselves to the urban areas only; they also went out into the rural areas in order to inform the people that they were not getting enough money. The finding of this regional bantu labour committee of Durban is that the moment there was trouble, the students disappeared into the background. It is no wonder that one found in a newspaper such as the Rand Daily Mail an article which extended over many columns and was entitled “Black Wages: Students taste Success”. These are the elements that are behind it. The Government is fully aware of this, and you may rest assured that the Government will definitely take action against agitators.

The hon. member for Salt River referred to the training centre at Westlake, and in effect he said it was a pity that the educational qualifications were, supposedly, so low. The position is that although Std. 8 is the entrance qualification in the motor car industry, this qualification is Std. 6 in the case of Westlake. The reason is that persons do of course receive the most intensive training there, and experience has shown that those apprentices of Westlake, who arrive there with their Std. 6 certificates and receive the most intensive training in motorcar repairs, are so well grounded there that employers are actually over-eager to have them, and I will not be surprised if the hon. member for Salt River, who is also a big motor-car dealer, definitely has experience of those good products.

Then I want to come to another matter to which the hon. member for Mooi River referred yesterday as a “political gimmick” and to what the hon. member for Hillbrow referred as a “big bluff”, namely the question of job reservation. These are, of course, mild descriptions. Over the past two years we have had in this House, from the lips of United Party members, much more outspoken descriptions of the question of job reservation. In this regard it is rather interesting to note that it has taken the United Party years to become as outspoken as they are nowadays. In previous years— and we have, after all, been in this House for a long time, since 1953—my experience was that the United Party always avoided stating explicitly that they wanted to abolish job reservation. They explicitly avoided doing so until approximately two years ago, when the Leader of the Opposition stated for the first time, in reply to a question which I had put to him across the floor of this House, that the United Party would repeal it; and since then the hon. member for Hillbrow has also stated this very positively here … [Interjection.] … and so did the hon. member for Wynberg. One therefore finds the interesting position in the United Party that, on the one hand, they are swinging so far to the right that it is almost impossible for one to recognize them any more, and, on the other hand, that they are still competing with the leftists for a leftist honorary position. That is why one finds today, as far as this matter is concerned, this outspoken standpoint in the United Party, namely that job reservation should be abolished because, as the United Party speakers also said again yesterday, it is unnecessary and useless since it only covers 2%. Incidentally, the exact percentage at the moment is 2,9% of the labour force.

After you have allowed for exemptions?

I understand that you want to speak later on; then you can discuss exemptions as well. I say that in the first case the United Party tried to get away from the matter. Over the past two years they have been rejecting it in an outspoken manner, and in that attempt to have it rejected, it has to be ridiculed, as the hon. member for Mooi River tried to do yesterday, or one has to try to make it out to be useless. I want to ask today what the United Party are envisaging now with their insistence on the abolition of job reservation. Does this only involve this approximately 3% of the labour force covered by statutory job reservation? Does this mainly involve, as far as the United Party is concerned, the training and the employment of Bantu as artisans in White areas? Does this, as far as they are concerned, only involve these issues, or does it involve other issues which are much wider in scope? No, as far as the United Party is concerned, it goes much wider than that. It does not merely involve the question of constant pressure being exerted by them for Bantu to be trained as artisans in White areas—not as operatives, but as artisans in White areas; not as Bantu artisans in the building trade doing building work in their own Bantu townships, no, but in the whole context of South Africa. That is not all it involves; it goes much wider.

[Inaudible.]

In a moment the United Party will see its own reflection in a mirror. The hon. member for Salt River should listen attentively now, and in my next few words he will see himself and his party reflected very clearly in a mirror. To him and his people the point at issue is not only the abolition of the statutory job reservation which affects 3%, including the exemptions behind which the hon. member for Yeoville is so fond of hiding. That is not the only point at issue. The point at issue is also the non-statutory part of our labour pattern, for if one should abolish statutory job reservation today, our whole labour pattern, our whole traditional labour pattern in South Africa, would immediately be landed in the maelstrom. The first group of workers who would be affected by the abolition of statutory job reservation, as embodied in section 77 of the Industrial Conciliation Act, would be that multitude of workers in South Africa who are maintaining their employment position today under the unofficial job reservation pattern.

Is that for the Railways?

Before I come to the Railways. I want to mention to you a very outstanding example in the private sector.

Television?

I refer to the iron and steel industry. The iron and steel industry is definitely an outstanding example of this.

It is the biggest industry in our country. The employment pattern in the iron and steel industry is the pattern of job reservation, but this is not the position because of a statutory job reservation provision. This is the position because of a non-statutory job reservation provision. When the industrial council of the iron and steel industry negotiates wages every two years, the trade unions represented on that industrial council ask and demand that the wages and the categories of employment be determined in such a way that they as White workers will be protected in certain spheres of employment. Therefore that determination is in fact the non-statutory job reservation. At the previous reservation, when they held 80 meetings in the iron and steel industry and could not come to an agreement, the steel workers feared that this unofficial job reservation pattern would fall away. At the time they made one request to me after the other, inter alia, through the hon. member for Vanderbijlpark, who represents a large percentage of them. The workers said they were afraid because it seemed as though the employers did not want to recognize this standing unofficial job reservation pattern. At that stage it was necessary for me as Minister of Labour to issue a statement and to say that if the employers did not want to agree to the continuation of the unofficial pattern. I would instruct the Industrial Tribunal to effect job reservation in accordance with the statutory pattern.

May I put a question to the hon. the Minister. Could the hon. the Minister tell us why the iron and steel industry does not want to abide by the unofficial job pattern? Why did they want to change it?

But, surely, you have just heard it.

I do not know what the hon. member is referring to.

Why did the bosses of the iron and steel industry want to act in such a manner that the workers were afraid that it would jeopardise their position?

Whether it is employers in the iron and steel industry, or whether they are employers in the furniture industry or employers in the motor car industry …

Or in the electronics industry?

Yes, irrespective of the industry concerned, they are keen to make the biggest profits possible. That is the case with all employers all over the world. It is inherent in the profit motive in every industry. Those people think that if they can employ non-Whites or Black workers instead of White workers, they can pay them less; in that way they can then make bigger profits. This is characteristic of employers. I see that this is, after all, penetrating to the hon. member for Maitland. It will be difficult to get through such a U.P. cordon, but, who knows, perhaps it is starting to penetrate; one should merely keep heart. It is for the very reason that this is the selfish attitude of employers, that it is necessary for job reservation to exist and for it to be implemented statutorily or non-statutorily. If one did not have statutory job reservation, what grounds and what authority would the White workers in the iron and steel industry then have for negotiating that the classification of jobs should remain the way they traditionally want it to be? If this were not done, surely they would have absolutely no grounds on which they could negotiate this.

This is unskilled work.

No, this is work for semi-skilled operatives. Those people would then have no grounds for negotiating that. That is why the existence of one’s statutory job reservation, is determined by section 77 of the Act, is an absolute necessity for those workers and also for the other spheres of employment. This does not only apply to spheres of employment in the private sector, such as in the iron and steel industry. An hon. member referred to the Railways a moment ago. Yes, this applies in a much wider sphere than to the iron and steel industry only. This unofficial job reservation which is being implemented administratively, applies in the Public Service, in the Railways, in the Post Office, in banking and in the insurance companies. It is a traditional job reservation pattern and is precisely the same pattern as the one that also applies in a country such as England. To a certain extent one even finds this pattern in the United States, for all its integration measures. It is for that reason that demands are continually being made in the United States for discrimination to be abolished.

May I put a question to the hon. the Minister? Does unofficial job reservation also apply in the electronics industry, in the radio industry? Will it also apply in the future television industry?

Yes, as long as the National Party governs South Africa. [Interjections.] As long as the National Party governs South Africa, that pattern will be retained in the sphere of labour in South Africa. That brings me to the actual basic difference between the National Party and the United Party in this important sphere of labour. The basic difference is that the United Party, as they have stated, wants to abolish job reservation. They want to abolish it statutorily, and consequently they want to be saddled with the consequences which this will have in the unofficial sphere. This abolition of job reservation, along with their much vaunted crash training programme, which they announced here two years ago and about which we have heard a little less this year, is the programme of the United Party. With this programme the United Party is intent on opening the floodgates— the terms they do not like very much, but there is no change in the meaning. They want to open the floodgates to the inflow of Black workers into White spheres of employment in South Africa. This would simply be the inevitable consequence, and whether or not the United Party likes this bald-headed description of its policy, is immaterial to me. I think it is necessary that the truth be stated in this House. As against this standpoint of the United Party, as against this policy of theirs, with its ultimate consequences, the National Party and the Government stand for a policy of controlled employment of non-Whites in White areas, and now I am not even referring to the non-White areas. This is our policy, a policy of controlled employment of non-Whites in White areas, with all due allowance for one’s traditional pattern and way of life. In practice this means that the Government was able to announce through the Minister of Finance the other day that we wanted to encourage the training of Black workers as operatives, as semi-skilled workers, that this was encouraged in the Budget and that the work which could gradually be allocated to Black workers, to which I referred yesterday with the help of statistics, had to enable them to do that work well—in other words, better than they are doing it at the moment. That is why the Government is prepared to take these financial steps so as to encourage this. But in this regard there is a basic matter which the United Party simply cannot or does not want to grasp, namely that in this country we can only use Black workers in this manner, i.e. to an increasing extent as semi-skilled workers and as operatives in our industries, as long as we do not undermine the feeling of security of the White workers. The moment we do this in a manner which undermines the feeling of security of the White worker, we can forget that this Government, or any other government for that matter, will be able to allow this evolutionary process to take a proper course.

Who is doing that?

If that feeling of security should be affected, which is what the United Party’s policy would necessarily and inevitably lead to, if that should happen in just one industry, it would, in our experience, have repercussions in all spheres of employment. We have had the experience in this country that when the 26 000 White mineworkers start getting afraid about their position and start rising in revolt as a result, that revolt does not remain confined to those 26 000 White nimeworkers only, but snowballs until it includes all workers in the country; then everybody rallies round them in sympathy. It is for these basic considerations which I have stated here that, on the one hand, we want to afford the non-Whites and, to be specific, the Black workers the opportunity to make progress in this country so that they may do more and more semiskilled work, and that, on the other hand, we should preserve the feeling of security of the White workers and enable them also to give that guidance to the Black workers. In order to achieve these two objectives simultaneously, controlling machinery is required, and job reservation is the controlling machinery through which one can achieve these two objectives simultaneously in this country. That is why one can, in a council or in debates such as these, discuss the implementation of this policy and why criticism can be levelled at it at all times, but when it comes to the question of upholding this policy, and retaining job reservation as this instrument, then a decision has to be sought far outside this House. Earlier on the hon. member for Johannesburg North said in his speech that the White workers now had the democratic right to exercise this at the polls. However, I want to say to the United Party that if they want to change this policy of the Government, if they want this job reservation to be abolished, if they want this means of control to be abolished, the opportunity they can seize for this purpose is the general election in 1975. There they can have this trend changed. That is why I want to say that our White workers are therefore aware that only a change of Government in this country, a U.P. government, can bring about a change in this labour pattern. That is the only thing that can bring about a change, but our White workers are also aware that as long as this party, the National Party, governs South Africa, the White workers in this country will be protected. [Interjections.] Since the hon. member for Westdene asked me yesterday that we should state over and over that the National Party was living up to its programme of principles, I want to tell him with the greatest pleasure that the National Party and I, as a Minister, are proud of our being able to go on implementing it now, tomorrow and the day after. In conclusion I want to tell these people who are continually campaigning so for the abolition of job reservation and the opening of the flood-gates, that they may perhaps think that this would bring bigger profits, but there is one important matter which these people can definitely bear in mind, namely that in order to enhance the capacity for work or productivity of people, it is necessary for them to have the right attitude. If the attitude of one’s workers is not right, one may come along with the best mechanization and methods and one will not be able to get the necessary results from those people. In a time such as the present, where we are experiencing this tremendous economic development, industrial development, and where one has this constant reclassification of jobs, so that Black workers are doing parts of skilled jobs that were previously done by Whites —this is a continuous process—the retention of job reservation is essential for South Africa and its economic development. I want to express the conviction that, especially in a time such as the present, the retention of job reservation is essential when we want to retain the goodwill of the workers. Whereas this matter is so important to us from a practical point of view and, above all, whereas it is such a fundamental matter for us because it affects the whole pattern of our society, it is a matter which the United Party will only be able to change by bringing about a political change in South Africa. To that political change at the next election, I now want to extend a very cordial invitation to the United Party.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Minister has made a very fine electioneering speech, but it does occur to me that for him to talk about traditional patterns of labour utilization in South Africa in the same breath that he tells us that more and more Blacks are being used in operative jobs and in those fragmented jobs that were formerly done by Whites, is so much nonsense. There is no such thing any more as a traditional pattern of labour utilization. It is changing all the time. If the hon. the Minister feels that the White labour force requires the psychological assurance of section 77 of the Industrial Conciliation Act, he can bluff himself in that way. The labour pattern has changed and will continue to change in South Africa despite everything he says and it will do so for one simple reason, namely that economic forces are stronger than political slogans. The change is therefore going to continue, whether the hon. the Minister likes it or not. I also want to say to him that it is not only the White worker who needs reassuring in South Africa; it is also that other very important cog in the machine of economic development, namely the employer who also needs reassuring. Despite what the hon. the Minister of Finance said about the requirements for economic growth, the employer is not going to invest hundreds of thousands of rand into expanding his industrial enterprises unless he can be assured that he is going to have a labour supply. The hon. the Minister should remember that there are two sides to this question: There is not only the need to reassure the White workers; there is also the need to reassure the White employers and to give them the climate in which they feel they can go ahead and invest and expand in South Africa.

I want, now, to turn to a subject about which I feel there is really a conspiracy of silence in this House. We have heard a great deal about Black workers and their wages since this session began this year, largely because of the Durban strikes. It is ironic to note that it apparently took the strike of 61 000 African workers in Natal to awaken the Government to the low wage rates being paid in industry in South Africa. It took just that, although there have been speeches made in this House year in and year out by myself and others and although the trade union movement, Tucsa, has pointed this out over and over again and although organizations like the Institute of Race Relations and other investigating organizations have shown that for years the wage rates have lagged behind the poverty datum level in South Africa. But there is one group of workers about which we have heard nothing although they are also the responsibility of the hon. the Minister of Labour. That is a group of workers that numbers something like 3½ million Black people and their dependants, i.e. the Black farm workers in South Africa. I am referring to the Blacks that work on White farms, of whom there are about one million who are gainfully occupied— if one could use that term—and on whose eranings something like 3½ to 4 million people are dependent. Nothing has been said about those people. They are totally unprotected. They are excluded from all wage determinations. They obviously do not fall within the ambit of the industrial conciliation laws.

Will you reply to a question?

No, Sir, I have exactly six minutes left and I will not reply. The hon. member can stand up and make a speech if he wants to. They are excluded from all wage regulation machinery.

That is not so.

They are excluded from minimum wage regulations. Now, Sir, these people are also bound to the land. They are bound to the land by the Masters and Servants Act which prohibits them from leaving the employment of their masters.

That is not true.

Mediaeval laws I might say which can only obtain in a country like this where those people have no vote. They are unable to move because the homelands are already grossly overcrowded and there is no available land for these people. They are also unable to come into the industrial areas legally though many thousands of them come in illegally through sheer force of economic circumstances. They are unable to come in legally to seek work. They are literally a helpless, unprotected lot of people. I think it is high time that we had a proper inquiry— and if ever an inquiry was needed it is for these people—into the conditions of work and the wages that are paid to farm labourers in South Africa. The latest figures that I could get relate to an agricultural survey which was done way back in 1970. It refers to wages which were probably paid say in 1966 or 1967. I am therefore quite prepared to admit that since then wages have probably gone up to some extent. According to the survey the usual wage paid was something like R8 to R12 per month in cash, plus, of course, the usual bag of mealie meal, firewood, the use of a hut and the right to graze a few head of cattle, the so-called fringe benefits. Some farmers, of course, give a ration of meat and some farmers of course give hand-outs to their labourers. [Interjection.] Well, it depends. There are farmers who treat their labourers very well indeed. There is no doubt about that. There are also farmers who do not.

Who made that survey?

This agricultural survey was an official survey. I will give the hon. Chief Whip the reference to the minutes. It was the second report of the Commission of Inquiry into Agriculture. The wage for casual labourers is something like 20c a day, with no rations and no wages in kind or anything like that.

Now, the obvious repercussions are ill-health, malnutrition and so. I might say that these repercussions are also to be found in our gaols where thousands of these people eventually find themselves because they come into the towns illegally and are arrested under the Pass Laws. I therefore say that it is urgently necessary to have an inquiry into the general wage level and hours of work of agricultural workers. Some of us will remember seeing a report about a labourer who was hauled up in court and who was found to be earning R6-50 a week, in cash, all found. He earned nothing else; he earned no wages in kind. He was hauled before the court because he had not turned up for work. It appeared that he did not have another pair of trousers to wear. His one and only pair had got wet in the rain the day before, and was still wet. He was found guilty and was fined. This person announced in court that he worked seven days a week, every week of the year. In other words, this man had no leave-pay and no leave whatever.

I believe that the general conditions regarding leave-pay are pretty appalling throughout the agricultural areas. There is no such thing as sick-pay, although farmers do announce very proudly that they take their labourers to hospital if they are sick. Whether they pay them or not, is another matter.

I also want to mention, in this context, the position of Coloured farm workers in the Western Cape. They too, of course, are excluded from all the benefits of collective bargaining, from any unemployment insurance and from any wage determination. To their difficulties is added the fact that, when they come to look for work in the towns, which they can do since they are not hindered by influx control and pass laws, they find themselves greeted in the cities by a tremendous shortage of housing. Hence we have had, as the Minister of Coloured Affairs will surely know, a tremendous increase in overcrowding and the lack of housing for Coloured workers in the Western Cape. Apparently there are something like 120 000 Coloured farm labourers in the Western Cape. No doubt, if one multiplies this by the normal family size, one will find that something like 400 000 or 500 000 people are therefore dependent upon the earnings of these Coloured farm labourers. A recent investigation revealed that the average wages are something like R5 per week in the vineyards and the orchards of the Western Cape. Eight rand a week is considered a fairly good wage. The women, during the picking season, are paid between 60c and 80c a day. The men are paid between R1 and R1-20 a day. They are not given food; no rations are included in this. They do get housing of a sort. Some of it is very inferior and some of it is of a better quality. Of course, added to the cash wages, one must include the “tot” which is given as part of the wages in kind. This revolting system, which is traditional in the Cape, has, I believe, been largely responsible for the tremendous alcoholism which one finds among this class of worker in the Cape. Only last night there was an article in The Argus, written by a consultant paediatrician in Cape Town, who stated that a direct reflection of the low wages of Coloured farm labourers, the poor housing and the chronic malnutrition, was to be found in the number of seriously ill Coloured infants and children who came to the Cape Town hospitals with all the diseases normally associated with poverty, namely TB, kwashiorkor and gastro-enteritis. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I want to tell the hon. member for Houghton that what she said here is out of date, that the information she obtained about farm workers is completely out of date. Heaven knows where in the world this is being done as she claims it is being done, I have never come across it. I come from the platteland and I have a reasonable amount of contact with the platteland. I think the hon. member should be very glad that there were no strikes in the Union Hotel.

I listened very attentively to the speeches that were made, particularly by hon. members opposite. It was interesting to note that a few things came very clearly to the fore. From their speeches the following facts came to the fore, inter alia: That they have completely deviated from the old Smuts view, the so-called segregation policy, and that they have now become pure integrationists. The second thing, which has come very clearly to the fore, is that though they now have a policy of integration, they themselves have no faith or confidence in that policy, hence the request that the Minister should institute a national convention or a national commission to determine a policy.

What does Jaap Marais say of you?

Sir, I want to refer to the hon. member for Yeoville. His speech is, in my eyes, the clearest possible proof that the Opposition refuses point blank to see South Africa as it is developing at present; that they want to see South Africa as consisting of 11 different countries. They continually want to see South Africa as a unit state in which everyone should live under one umbrella, in which everyone should have the same rights and in which everyone will be included, integrated in the economy; this is in line with their federal policy. To their credit I must concede that they go all the way, because what do they want? From their federal policy it emerges quite clearly that they want to federate, i.e. they want to integrate. This argument of theirs that Bantu should now be trained in White South Africa to be employed in White South Africa as artisans, as skilled tradesmen, and that those people must also be able to establish trade unions in South Africa—on three different bases I will have you know—indicates to us very clearly that they want to integrate politically and that they also want to integrate economically. Sir, I want to state very clearly that the Bantu in the White urban areas—and we do not want to frighten them—are there of their own free choice. As long as they want to be there, and as long as we need them in the labour field, they will be there, but they are guest labourers. Just as the 362 000 foreign Bantu in South Africa are guest labourers, so those Bantu in the White urban areas are also guest labourers.

Guest labourers?

Call them migrant labourers then, if you want to. Sir, we shall train these Bantu as far as it is humanly possible. We shall have Bantu trained in the homelands and we shall help to train them as far as it is humanly possible, so that these people can serve their own people. Sir, I have said that the United Party is an integrationist party. Apart from the fact that they want to abolish work reservation, apart from the fact that they want to delete section 77 of the Industrial Conciliation Act of 1956, they also, in the words of the hon. member for Yeoville, want to delete sections 4 and 6, which deal with the colour-bar in the trade unions. I say that the United Party would very much like to succeed in making its feeling for integration a reality, and that is why—because they themselves are half-hearted and have no faith and confidence in their own policy—they now want to flee from the electorate and make another plan. Now they are asking the Minister to appoint what was previously a national convention and is now a national commission. That is because they are uncertain of themselves. The question is on what basis do they now want to constitute this convention? Do they want to do it on the basis of numbers, because they now say the Bantu workers must also be represented on it, or do they want to do it on a basis of the degree of skill attained by the Bantu? On what basis do they want to do it? It boils down to the same thing as their so-called federation policy. There is dishonesty as far as someone is concerned.

Another question one can ask oneself is: What would the function of this commission be? Must it now decide between integration and work reservation? Must it now give finality as far as that is concerned? What is the function of this commission, except that it must, of course, determine a policy for them, which they do have, but which is ambiguous and half-heared. Sir, I am afraid the Opposition does not have the courage of its convictions to go to the electorate of South Africa and say: We say we are abolishing work reservation; the Bantu in South Africa are not only permanent in White South Africa, but they will also obtain permanence in White South Africa; in other words, they will obtain all the citizenship rights which the Whites have in the urban areas. They are afraid of that, and now they come along here with an escape method to get away from their own policy by asking for a national commission to investigate these matters now. But I just want to tell them that the National Party knows where it wants to go and what White South Africa wants. The National Party has its various councils which keep it abreast of matters. We have the manpower surveys that are done and we have the productivity councils, the industrial councils and the wage boards, and thus machinery has been created to keep the National Government abreast of what is happening in the labour field and what ought to be done there. [Time expired.]

On the one hand it is a pity that one has to extend this debate, but developments in the last few minutes make it absolutely essential for us to reiterate the standpoint of this House in clear terms. I listened with interest to the contribution by the hon. member for Houghton. She helped me to see very clearly the difference between her standpoint and the standpoint of the Government and the standpoint of this party. She made it very clear in the first part of her speech that she felt she had to speak in this House on behalf of the employers. I do not take it amiss of her, because the employers do have a standpoint which must be put. The Minister, again, spoke with great compassion of the interests of the workers as though the interests of the workers were being threatened by one and all and only the Minister, like a knight on a white charger, stood between them and misery. Then the thought occurred to me of how different the standpoint is of the party I have the honour to represent. We stand for the employers as well as the employees; we consider in the first instance the interests of all the people in South Africa and the future of South Africa, and the interests of the employers and of the employees are to us part of the interests of South Africa as a whole. We are South Africans; we are not sectionalists. Therefore it is so interesting to me that the hon. member for Houghton made this plea today for the non-White workers on our farms. This is a good thing she did, but why is she so prejudiced and why is she blind to reality, to the fact that if a person takes into account all the benefits which the employees on our farms enjoy, they are not worse off than the majority of employees in South Africa? For example, I was amazed when she referred to what someone wrote in the newspaper last night about the Coloureds coming to the Cape Town hospitals, Coloureds suffering from kwashiorkor and other diseases which result from malnutrition. But they are inhabitants of Cape Town; these are not the people from the farms who come to the hospitals with those diseases.

Nonsense …

I am very sorry. She must go and have a look at the hospitals in our rural towns.

The article is about farm children.

Order! The hon. member for Houghton must give the hon. member for Yeoville a chance to make his speech.

We cannot both make a speech at the same time. The greatest incidence of those diseases is in the cities, where the employees are her people and my people. I hope that she will take the lead in future when, perhaps, the farmers may have further increases in the prices for their products, in making it possible for them to pay better wages, and that she will take the lead in defending those steps and that she will not say in the urban constituencies what a bad lot of people we in the Cape are because we only look after the rich people and neglect the interests of the workers.

(Inaudible.)

Order! I have repeatedly called the hon. member for Houghton to order. I now warn the hon. member.

Now I should like to come back to the hon. the Minister because he and the hon. member for Hercules advocated more or less the same point of view. The Minister omitted to do one thing, particularly in his first speech, not in the second speech. In his first speech he displayed a responsible approach to the labour problems of South Africa, but I have one point of criticism and that is that throughout his speech he saw the situation in South Africa as a static situation, as an unchanging situation, when he refused to accept our idea of a national commission on the future of labour. From that it was clear that he is not worried about what the position is going to be in South Africa in ten, 15 or 20 years’ time. We mentioned witnesses here whom the Government cannot disregard—witnesses such as Prof. Riekert, who pointed out that within a few years’ time there will be a shortage of employment opportunities for 300 000 non-Whites, and that by the end of this century, less than 30 years from today, we shall have the problem that 11 million people will have to be found to fill skilled, administrative and technical posts, and the Whites will total only six million or seven million at that time. Where will those 11 million people come from? While the Minister was responsible in his first speech, he also made great play of the fact that there had been progress under the Nationalist Government, that there were 6 000 Natives who were doing building work within the White areas. But they are not building White houses and the Whites are struggling to find houses. He mentioned that 95% of the building industry in the Western Cape was manned by Coloureds today. We thought that the Minister was now beginning to make progress, but then he stood up this afternoon and spoke just as though the prevailing situation in South Africa yesterday would be the situation for the next 50 years. I want to say to the Minister in all love that one cannot take it that we in South Africa will remain as we were in the days of the Great Trek. We are living in a dynamic age, in an age of inevitable change, and anyone who thinks that we in South Africa can continue to exist as Whites, with the civilization and the standard of living of the Whites, without taking into account that the situation could change in a flash, is living in a fool’s paradise and on the eve of great misery in South Africa. Of what avail would it be if the Whites in South Africa were to continue with short-sightedness and with the attitude reflected by the hon. member for Hercules, a completely obtuse attitude towards the realities of South Africa. If we were saddled with an artificial shortage of White labour, and if we forced the standards of living of the Whites ever higher, and if we created a situation, through shortsightedness, where we could no longer meet the needs of a population which could increase to 50 million people in our lifetime, where would that get us! We would not be able to meet their needs while the White man, as a result of his exclusiveness, had negotiated a tremendously high standard of living for himself while ever greater and increasing poverty would exist among the majority of the many millions of other people in South Africa. For how long could we expect the White man to be able to survive in a peaceful South Africa and to be able to maintain his position in peace? I do not want to paint a saddening or terrifying picture of the future in South Africa. I want to be realistic and I want the hon. the Minister to be realistic with me, because he and I have one thing in common. We do not have many things in common, but we do have one thing in common and that is that we wish South Africa everything of the best in the future. We want a good future for South Africa. However, we shall not create a good future for South Africa if we think that because of the exclusiveness of the White man and his exceptionally high standard of living in South Africa and with the denial of the aspirations of the majority of the many millions of other people in South Africa, we shall be able to maintain ourselves.

I said that we should appoint a national commission. One of the reasons I advanced, was that we should try to eliminate the mental bloc which had been created in South Africa. I want to say to the hon. the Minister that if he has ever had doubts as to the mental bloc and its origin, he himself proved, in a speech which he made today, which was a political speech addressed to the voters, with a view to elections and to persuade people to vote Nationalist for temporary gain to the detriment of the permanent interests of South Africa, that such a mental bloc exists in South Africa.

At this late stage of the debate I still want to address an appeal to the hon. the Minister. He need not reply to it now; my only wish is that he should think. From now on he should sit quietly and think. He should take good advice from people in his department and those people who are involved in the industrial life of South Africa. He must determine whether I have not spoken the truth or whether the United Party’s point of view is not perhaps the correct point of view, namely that we cannot advance the interests of the Whites unless we also see to it that, whether we apply apartheid or not, whether we apply separate development or not, whatever the case may be, that in the final analysis, and on close inspection, the security and the standard of living of the White man is bound up with the survival, the security and the standard of living of all races in South Africa. That is all that we ask. [Time expired.]

Votes agreed to.

Revenue Vote No. 18 and S.W.A. Vote No. 8.—“Justice”, and Revenue Vote No. 19 and S.W.A. Vote No. 9.—“Prisons”:

Mr. Chairman, may I have the privilege of the half-hour? In the time available to me I would like to deal with three main aspects. In the first place I want to deal with the attitude of this Government as was expressed by the hon. the Minister of Justice to the restriction of the liberty of the individual without recourse to the judicial process, in the second place to the question of legal aid and, in the third place, the need for a new approach to sentences of imprisonment, particularly short-term imprisonment.

I think we were all astounded in this House to hear the hon. the Minister’s reply to the hon. Leader of the Opposition earlier in this session during a motion for the adjournment of the House to discuss the question of the banning of eight Saso members. Hon. members will recall that the hon. the Leader of the Opposition, who took part in the debate, asked the hon. the Minister certain questions. The hon. the Minister had indicated that the sort of persons that these were the same sort of persons who had made certain speeches. He then quoted from them. Some of the quotations are interesting and I refer to col. 2269 of Hansard, where the hon. the Minister said that one of these persons had said:

I refer to another extract which the hon. the Minister quoted:

Another quotation was: “We must fight the Whites so that we can get the country back.” The refrain of their song was:

Then the hon. the Minister quoted the other refrain:

That is a very extraordinary state of affairs. My hon. leader then said to the hon. the Minister (col. 2270):

He referred to the extracts which I read—

Then hon. members said: “Hear, hear!” Then our hon. leader said:

Then the hon. Minister of Justice said:

This is a most remarkable statement to make. If they have committed an overt act and if you can prove one overt act, that attitude of mind should be prosecuted in the court. If there is substance in it, they should be severely punished. However, the hon. the Minister said that if he had prosecuted them, had taken them to court, he would give them a platform. What he is saying is that he is making a political decision as to whether or not justice will take its course, or as to whether or not someone will be tried in a court of law. He took a political decision as to whether he would deal with them or whether the courts would deal with them. This comes from an hon. Minister who, in the Committee Stage of the Criminal Procedure Bill, said that he did not interfere in the activities of the Attorney-General. What is this attitude? It is worse than interfering in the activities of the Attorney-General. What the hon. the Minister is saying is that he is not going to let the Attorney-General use his powers at all, that he is not going to allow him to use his discretion as to whether or not there is a prima facie case for a prosecution in the court, but that he is going to decide whether any person will go to court at all in this regard. By that statement the hon. the Minister has turned his back upon the courts and he has destroyed the credibility of any action that he may have taken in respect of his powers to impose restrictions. What he is saying by this is that the judicial process, the processes of the Western democracy that we have in our country, should be exercised at the whim of the Government. That is the effect of it. I go further than that, and I say that the implications of the remarks of the hon. the Minister are an insult to the courts of this country.

You are talking nonsense.

The implication of this is that the court will allow the proceed for the political purposes of the accused. What else can it mean? The courts of this country have never allowed themselves to be used for those purposes, and they never will.

Now you are talking absolute nonsense.

I am glad the hon. the Minister is taking an interest in this at last, because he said that he would not take them to court because it would give them a platform. The courts are there to conduct the affairs of the courts and the only occasion in respect of which they could ever use the court as a platform under the present law is if the accused elects not to give evidence on oath, but to make an unsworn statement from the dock instead.

That is exactly what Mandela did and what Fischer did.

If we have the new Criminal Procedure Bill, God forbid, then he will still have that opportunity, but he will have it at the time of plea. As the law is now, that is the only opportunity and it was used by Bram Fischer, for example, who said he would not give evidence and then made a long political harangue from the dock at the end of the State’s case. So, indeed, did Mandela, as was pointed out. But so what? Did that affect the matter at all? They were nevertheless tried in court. The public heard the evidence and saw this happen. Does that hon. Minister then suggest and does the hon. member for Pretoria Central suggest that if the hon. the Minister had been the Minister at the time of the Bram Fischer trial and had known beforehand that Fischer would make an hour-long political harangue at the close of the State’s case, that he would have ordered that the trial should not take place? Is that what he is saying? Is that what the hon. member for Pretoria Central is saying? He is suddenly very quiet. Is the suggestion that a chap like Bram Fishcer would not have been tried because it would have given him a platform, or is it on a selective basis that the hon. the Minister proposes to do this? If it is, we would like to know on what basis he makes the selection. The whole situation that arises from the attitude of the hon. the Minister is absurd. Furthermore, the hon. the Minister by this attitude arrogates unto himself the power to decide whether the will of this Parliament, as expressed in the laws it makes, is going to be implemented, whether the offences set out in the laws will be prosecuted, as is intended by Parliament when it passes laws, and whether the punishment prescribed in that law is to be meted out to the person who is found guilty. The hon. the Minister is going to decide whether they are to go through the due process of law and whether they are to receive punishment from the court. He has now decided that he is going to be the prosecutor, and the judge and the executioner in respect of these matters. I want to say that he has done a great disservice to law and order by that statement, quite apart from the disservice he has done to our system of justice.

Maintenance of law and order in our country depends to an ever-increasing extent upon the public confidence in our law and in our institutions. When I say “public” I mean every section of our population. It is very important not only that justice be done, but that justice be seen to be done. I know that that is an old adage and well known to many people and may be trite to some of us, but it nevertheless bears repeating in the light of the hon. the Minister’s attitude. If the law is fairly and properly applied in open court, it will inspire confidence in those who desire law and order and it will help enormously those persons whose job it is to maintain law and order, and I refer to the police especially in this regard. In the end you cannot maintain law and order without the co-operation and the confidence of the overwhelming majority of the people.

Our Police Force is small in numbers compared with our overall population. Without the confidence of those people, without their confidence in the law, we have no chance of maintaining law and order in our country. The hon. the Minister’s attitude is calculated to undermine this. He talks about a platform; but let me say that he has given a platform to our enemies from which to inveigh against us. His attitude is calculated to further tarnish the image of our country in a field where our judicial system shines like a lighthouse in the desert of darkest Africa; it shines like a lighthouse in the desert of this Government’s policy. It is the one thing which makes of this country a symbol of democracy in Africa, despite having had this Government for 25 years.

I think it is time the hon. the Minister and this Government examined once again the whole question of bannings in South Africa, the whole question of restrictions on the freedom of the individual without recourse to any judicial process. I think one should ask oneself what the object of bannings, of retsrictions, is. One of the objects is to remove the person concerned from the sphere of influence that he has in the society in which he lives. But that does not in fact happen. With the restriction order he remains in that community. What is more, the hon. the Minister is making martyrs of these people when he subjects them to a restriction order without any reason given, without any evidence to support it. He is making martyrs of them both here and overseas, because it is said, when this happens, that they are being punished or restricted for reasons which cannot stand up to a judicial examination. Consequently, they become martyrs. No one knows what they have done. They may have done the most terrible things, but no one knows this. They remain martyrs and they remain in the community. It does not stop them from planning or plotting their nefarious plans, if they have nefarious plans. On top of that, we have to employ a large number of highly-trained security policemen to watch every one of them all the time for 24 hours in the day, to follow their movements and to see whom they talk to or do not talk to. Is it not better that the world knows what such persons have done? Is it not better that the world knows that such acts, as are proved in court, are the acts which society disapproves of and that, if they are guilty, the person should be punished and if necessary removed from society to gaol, but then by order of court? Surely, in the interests of law and order as such, and in the interests of South Africa, you achieve more by taking these people to court, trying them and if they are guilty, sentencing them in court. Surely that is better than the system we now have. Surely it is better for everyone concerned that we do not have these restriction orders.

Restrictions are preventive.

One presumes that restriction orders are not going to be made unless there is evidence of some significant value on which to act. Certainly the evidence should be significant enough to convict them in a court of law. The hon. the Minister owes the House and the country a full explanation of his utterances in the past and as to his policy in this regard. I hope that we are going to get it from him today. We raised this matter under the hon. the Prime Minister’s Vote, but unfortunately there was no time for him to answer it. The hon. the Minister invited us to raise it here under his Vote, which we are doing.

The second matter I wish to raise is the question of legal aid. In 1969 we passed an Act, the Legal Aid Act, and now, four years later, it is very interesting to examine just how far we have got. There is an old maxim in our law: “Ubi ius, ibi remedium”, i.e. if you have a right, you have a remedy. Without the service of legal practitioners, that right is very often illusory. You cannot prosecute your right without legal aid. This is especially so in the civil court. It obviously also applies to the criminal court. There is now a growing need for legal aid in South Africa. There is a growing field in which one is likely to comes before the court. When this was first introduced in 1969, we told the Government that unless they were prepared to spend realistic amounts of money, the administration of the principle of legal aid would become a gesture and not a reality. What do we find? We find that the Government this year has put on the estimates precisely the same amount as last year, namely R210 000, a mere drop in the legal ocean. Legal aid, as I think we all hoped it would be when the Act was introduced, should become an integral part of our legal system. It cannot, unless more money is spent and something realistic is done.

Let us have a look at the means test, for example. The means test is almost ridiculous. The hon. the Minister indicated, in reply to a question the other day, that the means test was now being changed. I should hope so. But as regards White persons, a single White person may receive legal aid if his income is not in excess of something like R80 a month. Sir, I do not know if there are any White people earning R80 a month. I do not think there are.

Pensioners.

Except pensioners. That is the effect of this provision. If the income of a single Coloured person is over R8 a week, he is not entitled to have legal aid. Sir, we are just playing with the subject, if this is what we are doing. It is a most important thing, it is as important to have legal aid as it is for a man to have medical aid. Now, Sir, will the hon. the Minister tell us what that figure is going to be? Because he has indicated that the figure is going to be increased. Now, what else is going on, apart from the fact that the Government is obviously not wanting to take the matter seriously? The board has been convened five times since the Act was passed. I do not wish to criticize the board, because the board can only be as enthusiastic as the master, as the payer of the piper. If there is staff trouble, I wonder whether the Minister will not give consideration to allowing the Association of Law Societies to administer legal aid in terms of the Act, obviously under the supervision of the hon. the Minister’s department. If there is a staff shortage—one can appreciate that there might be—as far as I am aware, the Association of Law Societies has indicated that it might be prepared to take over the administration of legal aid. It would have the great advantage of decentralizing the whole show into all the areas where attorneys operate. I hope the hon. the Minister will give consideration to this.

Now I come to the third point I wish to raise. I may say that all the points that I raise will be elaborated upon, and different angles will be indicated, by other hon. members. I come now to the question of the attitude of mind which we ought to adopt to short-term imprisonment. We have a most incredible prison population. If you look at the report of the Department of Prisons, you will find that our prison population has been increasing. The daily average population in 1962 was 66 000. You will see all the figures on page 9 of the report. In 1966 it had moved up to 73 000; in 1967 to 80 000; and in 1969 to 90 000. It is now, according to the latest available figures, 91 000. The daily prison population has been increasing every year. I think one gets some idea of the comparative size of our daily prison population when one looks at the figures of other countries. I shall mention the figures, per 100 000 of the population, in respect of just a few countries. In the Netherlands it is 25,4; in Norway, 44; in Sweden, 61; in Belgium, 63. In England it is 72 and in Finland 100. The figure in the case of South Africa is a staggering 417! [Interjection.] It is no good the Deputy Minister waving his hands like that; these are the facts of life. There is no doubt that the figure has decreased this year, especially in respect of short-term prisoners. This has happened apparently as a result of the aid centres for the Bantu being established. We shall probably have to hear more of these centres from the hon. the Minister of Bantu Administration. But worse than that is the fact that, when you look at the figures in the latest report, you find that 217 000 of the persons in our gaols last year, or 60% of the total prison population, were under 30. Even worse is the fact that 20% of the prison population was 20 years of age or younger. What that does to your manpower you will hear from the hon. member for Von Brandis at a later stage.

What do you suggest?

I am coming to that. The other factor is the number of short-term prisoners that there are. The Chief Justice of Swaziland said something which I think everyone in South Africa, all the criminologists, will agree with. He repeated something which has been said by Mr. Justice Steyn for years. It is important to take note of what he said. He said that short-term prisoners—and he was talking here about prisoners serving terms of less than six months—are undesirable, for various reasons. In the first place, obviously, it is undesirable because of the administrative burden placed on the officials. It is undesirable, too, because of the lack of time for rehabilitation in the prison. It is undesirable because of the contamination which ensues as a result of contact with hardened criminals, persons whom they would otherwise not come across. Then, too, it is undesirable because of the enormous cost which the State has to bear in respect of these people. You have the added problem in South Africa that, in so far as short-term prisoners are concerned —and here I refer to the Bantu, who form the overwhelming majority of these offenders—this is no longer a social stigma. It is just a nuisance to them, but it is part of their way of life. As I have said, the majority of these people are Bantu.

Now the hon. the Minister asks me what we are going to do about it. He asks every year: “What can you do about it?” I say to him: “You are the Minister; what are you doing about it?” I would recommend that he reads what the hon. the Chief Justice has said in this regard. The hon. the Chief Justice suggested recently that there should be probation, and more probation. He has suggested that more use should be made of fines commensurate with the earnings of the persons concerned. These fines can be staggered and paid over a period. I do not know what the hon. the Minister is going to say about periodic imprisonment, but I hope that he will give us an indication as to what has happened to periodic or weekend imprisonment. The Chief Justice, Justice Hiemstra, Justice Steyn, Mr. Justice Harcourt and others—I could name many others—are concerned about this matter and have made these suggestions. It is no good just saying: “This is what should happen.” If this is to happen, one has to bring about a major change in the laws relating to sentences. In other words, you have to make more commensurate the fines with the imprisonment. We had a case the other day where a penalty was changed from a fine of R100 or six months’ imprisonment to a fine of R800 or two years’ imprisonment. Sir, two years’ imprisonment today just does not compare with R800, whereas it might have compared before. All these suggestions have been made and there is no doubt whatever that the overwhelming consensus amongst criminologists and amongst judicial officers is that short-term imprisonment is not the panacea for all our ills. Just sending someone to gaol because you do not know what else to do with him is not any more, in this modern world in which we live, the panacea for those ills. I hope the hon. the Minister is going to tell us what he and what his department have done about his. I hope he will tell us what attitude of mind there is in the case of the other departments, because he is going to have to co-operate with them. I want to say that I know what the attitude of the Commissioner of Prisons is. One can see it shining through the report. His attitude of mind is that of rehabilitation; but you cannot rehabilitate short-term prisoners. You can only do them harm. I hope that the hon. the Minister will tell us what he is going to do in respect of this crying need expressed not just by this side of the House, but also by persons whose job it is and whose life it is to be interested and concerned about this.

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Durban North gladdened our hearts over the weekend when it appeared that a man such as Dr. Chris Barnard of heart fame had attacked him about a standpoint he had adopted in respect of a plea for amnesty for Bram Fischer. But, while he did gladden our hearts at that stage, we have to point out at once this afternoon that he apparently saw only the one side of the matter. He has only seen half the light. We hope to point out a few things which will enable him and those who are going to follow him, to conduct a proper debate on the first aspect, in particular, touched on by him, i.e. that of restrictions. Let us see this in the true context in which it belongs. The hon. member for Houghton, when she enters the debate, should also keep these matters in mind.

The other matters raised by the hon. member for Durban North, have already been debated in this House at one stage or another. The hon. the Minister has replied to them from time to time and therefore I am not going to dwell on them. I am going to try to relate other relevant facts to the matter raised by the hon. member. The other hon. members may agree or disagree.

The hon. member, together with Mr. Marais Steyn, was attacked by Dr. Chris Barnard on the grounds of their having opposed Mr. Bram Fischer’s amnesty. He made all kinds of allegations against Mr. Mitchell, but the most important thing is that Dr. Barnard, who is a declared and an alleged candidate of that party, said, inter alia, that the hon. members of the Opposition want to outdo the National Party in their conduct towards those who threaten the security of the country.

But answer him now.

The hon. the Minister will duly reply to him. What is more, the fact of the matter is that the hon. member for Durban North had adopted a very sound point of view, up to that stage. But let us now look at Dr. Barnard, who is a declared candidate of those people. The opposite side welcomed him from the Progressive Party and now he is accusing them of trying to outvie the National Party in their actions in the eyes of the voters. What is more. Sir, Dr. Barnard challenged the hon. the Prime Minister and the hon. the Minister of Justice to point out to the public the difference between Bram Fischer and Robey Leibbrandt. He said that he wanted to point out to the public that we were prepared at one stage to grant amnesty to a saboteur, but that we were not prepared to grant it to an honourable, very decent gentleman like Bram Fischer.

What does this have to do with the debate?

Of course it concerns the debate.

You are not the Chairman; I have the right to make an interjection.

Order! Those two hon. members will have an opportunity to speak before long.

Sir, in their acceptance of Dr. Barnard and in their criticism of restrictions, the Opposition must give us a plausible statement of where they stand in regard to Dr. Barnard. We also want to know from that side where they stand in regard to the Sunday Times, with which they have already broken ties, and which they attack in this House. We should like to hear from them where they stand in regard to the combating of Communism. We want to know what administrative steps they propose should be taken by the hon. the Minister in order to prevent communist action in this country. The Minister is not in the first place, a person who is in the shoes of an attorney-general who must decide whether or not legal proceedings should be instituted. His task, in exercising his executive power, is to prevent the creation of disorder in this country. The charge we are levelling against that side of the House is that they are in fact agreeing, through their pleas and the standpoints they have adopted here today, to the release of Bram Fischer, even though they did attack him otherwise. They must stand up and tell us frankly what their standpoint is. Sir, how real is the threat of communism in this country at this stage? [Laughter.] The hon. member for Jeppes is laughing. Does he agree with this, or does he not agree?

I cannot help laughing at you.

Sir, in 1969 the South African Communist Party sent a deputation to the conference of communist parties abroad. They have representation in Moscow. This Party is still operating, its headquarters being abroad. In 1970 a meeting of the central committee was held abroad and in 1971 the Communist Party celebrated its 50th anniversary overseas. The chairmen were J. B. Marks and Moses Kotane at the time, who were also members in 1951 when Bram Fischer was a member. Sir, we want to ask the hon. member for Houghton, in the support she is going to give to appeals for the release of Bram Fischer to bear in mind the fact that it is the standpoint of this side of the House that Robey Leibbrandt obtained amnesty at a stage when nazism had been eradicted; that he was a spineless person at that stage and could do no harm to this country, but Dr. Barnard and the United Party are in favour of amnesty being granted to persons who have real contact with the Communist Party. I have pointed out to you, Sir, how the Communist Party is still active abroad. Sir, on page 440 of the South African Law Reports of 1972 (3), we read that the Chief Justice found the following—

He said he agreed with the conclusion of the trial court that the indictment had been proved with regard to a certain plan—

Sir, we ask the hon. member for Jeppes to take note of the finding in this case, What did they have in mind?

Where did this take place? In a court?

Yes, this took place in a court. We are now discussing the finding of the Chief Justice, not the question of guilty or not guilty, ffrench-Beytagh was found not guilty, if the hon. member wants to make a point of that, but the judge did find that these plans existed in respect of South Africa. Does the hon. member admit that?

He did not even read it; he does not know about it.

Sir, the indictment read as follows—

It was in the third quarter of last year, for the information of the hon. member for Houghton. The hon. Chief Justice found that in the third quarter of last year it was still a current plan of the Communist Party to overthrow the State.

What is the point?

It reads—

And then he lists the stages—

This is all part of the indictment, and what it contains was found by the judge to be part of the plan which, in the third quarter of last year, was accepted as still being valid. The hon. member for Durban North made an attack here on restrictions, but failed to attack Dr. Chris Barnard. I had to indicate to you, Sir, that there was a real difference between the case of Robey Leibbrandt and the case of Bram Fischer. On top of that, Sir, he came along here and pleaded for a matter in respect of which the hon. the Minister had been obliged by the Executive to take preventive measures, and this was in accordance with an act in terms of which the Minister may restrict anyone engaged in activities calculated to further the achievement of any of the objects of communism. And this is the point, that those hon. members on the opposite side of this House are sanctimoniously …

Order! That word has already been ruled out of of order. The hon. member must therefore withdraw it.

I withdraw it. They came along here and made a great show of levelling the charge against us of supposedly having acted contrary to certain views taken by that side of the House; we should rather have taken these people to court. But we have pointed out to you, Sir, what the real difference is. We have pointed out that in terms of the Suppression of Communism Act the hon. the Minister acts in an executive capacity. [Time expired.]

The hon. member for Bloemfontein West said many things here, but it was not clear what point he was trying to make. He tried to make something out of the Bram Fischer story. For his information: That is a matter which was broached by the Progressive Party and by the Progressive Party alone; it is not a matter which carries any weight in South Africa. They did so because they do not have enough things to talk about and now they are trying to fabricate things. [Interjection.] The hon. member for Houghton and her henchmen tried to make a fuss about that case, while in fact no such case exists. [Interjection.] In any event, the attitude of the United Party is absolutely clear in that respect and if the hon. member for Bloemfontein West had listened just the other day to the hon. member for Bezuidenhout, when he gave us a very clear explanation of what was also his attitude, then the hon. member would not have asked us such a bunch of questions which were all rot.

Order! The hon. member must withdraw the word “rot”; it is unparliamentary.

I withdraw it. I also just want to point out that the United Party is the only party whose attitude towards this matter is consistent. The case of Robey Leibbrandt has been mentioned. After he had been found guilty of the most serious crimes the Nationalist Party released him, but now they do not want to release Bram Fischer. When they released Robey Leibbrandt we were against it. Now that there are people who want to have Bram Fischer released, who is in the same position, we are once again opposed to it; we have always been opposed to it and we will always remain opposed to it, because these people were convicted in a court of law and the sentences passed on them were considered by the court and all the facts relative to the case were before the court.

And Jopie Fourie [Interjections.]

Why is the hon. member shouting at me if he agrees with me? I cannot understand it. The hon. member went on to ask us questions about the steps we considered necessary for stamping out communism. He wanted to know what steps we would suggest the hon. Minister should take. But it is such a simple matter to say which steps he should take. In co-operation with the department of the hon. the Minister of Police they must ascertain the whereabouts of those people who are enagaged in these activities. We have piloted legislation through this House which made the promotion of communism in South Africa an offence.

You opposed that legislation.

The hon. member is making a big mistake and he knows it. [Interjections.] They must find out who the people are who are doing this. The case against them must be investigated and they must be brought to court. They must be imprisoned and they must be kept in prison. That is all we want. That would be perfectly adequate for curbing communism in South Africa. [Interjections.]

Order!

I want to pass on to a matter which in my opinion is of the utmost importance to the Department of Justice. I refer to the problems of magistrates within the Department of Justice. When one talks to magistrates, one finds that although they are generally satisfied with their employment opportunities, possibilities of promotion and so on within the Department of Justice, there is still a basic feeling of, as I would like to put it, disconteint, of unhappiness. This arises from the special position in which magistrates find themselves in the Public Service. They feel that mere increases in salary do not give them the real benefit which they want. I believe that the solution to this is to be found in taking into reconsideration their whole relationship with the rest of the Public Service structure.

I have already mentioned the special situation in which magistrates find themselves. I think it would be of assistance if I placed the following on record: A magistrate, before he may occupy that position, first has to further his studies to a considerable extent, and as the hon. the Minister knows, many of them do this after hours. Such study demands great sacrifice and such a person spends three, and, in some cases, five years on furthering his studies. In his work as such, a magistrate takes upon himself a tremendous amount of responsibility, because almost 90% of criminal trials take place in magistrates’ courts. Because of the fact that parties in civil cases may agree to the jurisdiction of a magistrate, we find that civil cases in which extremely high amounts, up to millions of rands, are at stake, place tremendous responsibility on the magistrates as such cases may also be settled in magistrates’ courts.

On account of the present relationship with the rest of the Public Service there are other officials in other departments and even in the Department of Justice itself who fill posts of precisely the same grade and carrying the same salary scales as those of the magistrate, but who do not need to attain those additional qualifications required of a magistrate. The people who fill such posts need not have furthered their studies nor do they carry the same responsibility as does the magistrate. I think that this is the basic reason why magistrates feel unhappy today. I believe that an improvement could possibly be effected. I think the hon. the Minister is thinking along those lines and I should like to know what the point of view of the hon. the Minister is in regard to how improvements may be effected. The commencing salaries in the Department of Justice are not bad, but the problem arises when it comes to the higher posts and the encouragement those people should be given to undertake that extra study and to accept that extra responsibility. I believe that there should be a more substantial difference between their salaries and those in the Public Service and that their relationship with the rest of the Public Service should also be revised. I think we all realize that the situation cannot remain as it is.

The hon. the Minister himself has on occasion spoken about the position of magistrates and he felt that greater horizons should be opened up for them to which they could progress. For example, the hon. the Minister said that it should be possible for them to be appointed to the Bench. We do not agree at all that that may happen under the present dispensation. I think the hon. the Minister should tell us something more about his attitude in that connection.

The hon. the Minister, however, is not the only person to whom we can refer in this connection. The hon. Mr. Justice Kowie Marais made a proposal concerning the reorientation of magistrates within the system. I think his proposal undoubtedly has merit. I believe he made that proposal in all sincerity and not with the object of being contentious. Hon. members will remember that he said that there should be a larger degree of independence for the Bench, particularly with regard to the magistrates since they carried such a tremendously heavy responsibility. He suggested that magistrates should fall under the Chief Justice and that their salary scales should be based on that and not in terms of the salary scales of the Public Service as was the case at present. As I have already said, I believe that the hon. judge did this in all sincerity, that he was not trying to be contentious. I think he did this because he wanted to make a contribution to a serious matter. Surely we all agree that one of the most important elements of democracy is the independence of the Bench. Not only must there be a spirit of independence, as exists in our courts today, but also a true and factual independence. I want to say that the Supreme Court is independent today, but not the magistrates; they do not have that degree of independence.

In what respect?

After all, they are civil servants, and judges are not. I am not saying that there is not a spirit of independence, but I do say that there is not the true, factual independence. “Justice must not only be done, but it must also be seen to be done.” This proposal by Mr. Justice Marais did not imply that magistrates did not give sound decisions; his proposal was to give them that factual independence which was their due. I do not necessarily agree with this proposal, but I do feel that under the circumstances in which it was made, it has merit, and if one takes into account what the proposal really involves, I want to say that I believe that … [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I am doing something which is rather unusual, which is to rise almost immediately after the commencement of the date. However, I feel that I cannot allow the remarks made by the hon. member for Durban North to go unanswered, without responding to them immediately. Since I made that interjection the hon. member has been raising a hue and cry in season and out as though the world were coming to an end. What are the true facts? The true facts are that I simply said: “I do not want to give them a platform,” or words to that effect.

It is the context in which you said it.

The hon. member has referred to it, and I have stated repeatedly in this House, that it is not my function to prosecute people. My function is that of a Minister of Justice who has executive powers. I have also stated repeatedly that when it comes to prosecutions, these are being taken care of by the Attorney-General; the hon. member also referred to that this afternoon. When prosecutions are instituted, the following procedure is adopted: The Police open a dossier and assemble all the facts, which are then submitted to the Attorney-General; the Attorney-General then has to decide whether he wants to prosecute. I have never interfered in that procedure.

What did that interjection mean then?

I shall tell the hon. member in a moment what that interjection meant. The interjection simply meant one thing and that is that the communists and these leftists are taking advantage of our courts of law, in terms of the Act as it reads at present. This is what Bram Fischer, Mandela and the rest of them did. This is what they are doing.

But they were taken to court.

Well, …

And they were sentenced.

Well, so what? Nothing. On 28th March, 1966, Bram Fischer made a lengthy unsworn statement during his trial in the sabotage case. It was reported in the Pretoria News under the heading: “ ‘History will prove me right,’ Abram Fischer says and gives the reasons for being a communist.” In other words, in terms of a right he has under the existing Act he used the court as a platform, and got sensational headlines.

You can bar the evidence given from getting into newspapers.

No.

You stick to medicine. The same evening The Star had the following heading: “Fischer puts his case from the dock—Tf I were to ask forgiveness, I would betray my cause.’ ” The Rand Daily Mail of 29th March published the following heading: “Fischer speaks from dock—court told reasons for joining Communist Party.” That hour-long speech made by Fischer was not only published in newspapers in this country. For example, Mary Benson sent a copy of the speech to the chairman of the Special Committee on Apartheid of the U.N., who in turn circulated it. This was the speech made by Fischer, the Communist, who was brought before the court. Another document bearing the title “Bram Fischer—an Afrikaner in dissent”, was published by Joseph Lelyveld in the New York Times on 15th May, 1966. Nelson Mandela did the same thing when he made a speech from the witness-box on 7th November, 1962. This appeared in, inter alia, The Globe Magazine under the heading: “Black pimpernel indicts White man’s justice.”

So what?

So what!

It was to our advantage at the time that he said so, it shows the world what we do with communists.

Your foot! How on earth can that be? It gives the man a platform; that is my point. In the Rivonia trial on 20th April, 1964, Mandela also preferred to make an unsworn statement which was nothing but a political speech. That is what I had in mind when I said, “and give him a platform”. I meant nothing else. The Attorney-General can always prosecute, and perhaps he is going to prosecute them. Quite probably he will still prosecute them, but it is not my function to prosecute them.

Has the evidence been submitted to the Attorney-General?

I cannot say, because it is not my function to submit it to the Attorney-General. The police compile a dossier and submit it to the Attorney-General. He considers the information, and I do not interfere. It was not a question of my thinking that I was not going to prosecute them and that I would rather impose restrictions on them. They can still be prosecuted even now and quite probably they are going to be prosecuted. The hon. member must please get it into his head once and for all that that was all my statement meant, nothing more. To come along and paint this awful picture as if I am now discrediting the courts and interfering in our administration of justice, is so much nonsense.

Are you trying to say that it was a stupid interjection?

No, I would not say it was a stupid interjection.

No, you are a stupid member.

The other point which the hon. member made, concerned the question of legal aid. He raised a hue and cry about it; one would have sworn that I was to blame because legal aid was not available to everyone. Now, what are the facts? The facts are that the hon. member showed so little interest in legal aid that he did not even know that the annual report of the Legal Aid Board has for several years now been tabled every year. The hon. member asked me about it. He shows so much interest in the matter that he did not even know about all the reports which have been laid upon the Table. That goes to show how interested the hon. member is. I want to tell him what the position is in that regard. He mentions a skimpy amount of R210 000 appearing there. The fact of the matter is that all in all an amount of R812 000 has now been voted. The hon. member must bear in mind that the funds voted for the Legal Aid Board do not have to be surrendered at the end of the financial year, but these funds accumulate and are carried forward to the following year. In this way the board now has R812 000 at its disposal. Up till 28th February the board had spent R243 863. In other words, it still has the better part of R½ million at its disposal. The Legal Aid Board is quite independent. I do not dictate to the board what its means test should be. The relevant Act was passed by Parliament. The hon. member ought to know that.

You told me …

If I had allocated in sufficient funds to them, the hon. member would have had cause to talk. However, at this stage there is sufficient money and the hon. member has no right to say anything now. A representative of the Bar serves on this council. If the hon. member wants to do something worthwhile, he should approach the representative of the Bar and tell him that he thinks they are not doing enough; he should not come and talk to me about it.

But, I am sitting here as a Member of Parliament and not as a member of the Bar.

I simply say this is an independent board and that I have no say over it. I can only give them the money when they ask for it. Up to now they have not asked me for a single cent. As a matter of fact, they have R½ million at their disposal at the moment, money they have not spent. I do not say we are not going to provide any money, because I do not know what the circumstances may be. The fact is that they have not asked for money yet. A judge serves as chairman of the board. The Bar, the Side Bar and the various departments are represented on the board, and it functions properly. I replied to the question put by the hon. member in that regard the other day, and there is no reason to complain in this House and pretend that legal aid is a hopeless failure. The hon. member must bear in mind that, apart from the amount they have at their disposal, we make legal aid available for all cases of capital crime, as the hon. member knows. We make legal aid available for these cases, irrespective of how much these amounts are. The total amount is therefore far more than the amount of R812 000 we have at the moment. The hon. member would have the right to speak to me about legal aid only when he finds out that the Legal Aid Board has asked me for money which I or the Cabinet am not prepared to give. Before this happens he has no right to come and speak to me.

The next point the hon. member made here concerned short-term imprisonment, as if I did not know more about short-term imprisonment than he would ever know! [Interjections.] This is a fact. I know about all the difficulties caused by short-term imprisonment, especially because of the population we have in this country. For example, the hon. member says we should think more in terms of fines. How many fines are not being imposed in magistrates’ courts every day? And what the department is not doing in this respect! The department even gives extension of time in respect of a fine of R100. In this way we have written off R20 000 in the course of the past year in Johannesburg alone. This is not a new idea and we have been doing it for a long time.

The hon. member also mentioned the system of probation as if it were a major discovery made by the Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Hiemstra and others. The hon. member for Wynberg said she was a member of NICRO. I told the hon. member at that time that they should really go out of their way to find people who are prepared to get the system of probation started. Where is one going to find the people today who will take in such a large number of Blacks on probation? Who will take them? It simply does not happen.

The Union Hotel.

The Union Hotel may take one. I am not so sure. The nearest we get to the system of probation is the system of parole.

Change the law.

Change the law to do what?

The pass laws.

We dealt with the pass laws by means of these bureaux of aid that we have. The Department of Bantu Administration and Development dealt with that matter. Because of the composition of our population one simply does not find any people who are prepared to take Blacks and Coloureds under their protection on probation. This simply does not happen. The hon, member can keep on pleading here until he is blue in the face, and speakers outside who talk in theoretical terms, can keep on talking until they are blue in the face. I say it simply does not work in this country. The nearest we get to the system of probation is the system of parole. I apply this system myself. I have two servants on parole in my service. The day they started working for me, I told them: “Look, forget about your ever being in prison.” They had a long record of previous convictions. I told them to forget about that and that I was going to treat them as free people. Neither our house nor our cupboards are locked. During the whole time they were with me I did not miss a single cent. One of them is no longer on parole and is staying on in our service. They are people who have been rehabilitated. We are proud of that record. If those hon. members would do the same they would be doing something practical.

It was asked what became of weekend imprisonment. I do not dictate to the courts what they should do. The most we are able to tell the magistrates’ courts is that they should keep in mind that there is such a thing as weekend imprisonment punishment when they come across an appropriate case to which this can be applied. We are not in a position to tell the courts that they must do this. That is simply not done. The hon. member also referred to certain figures, i.e. 72 in respect of England, 25 in respect of Holland and 44 in respect of Norway. I think these figures are per 100 000 people. That is so. I am acquainted with what is happening in Holland in particular. Holland has a very low prison population. But Holland has an enormously high prison population out on probation. The people are prepared to take them on probation, because they are a homogeneous society. We in this country are not a homogeneous society. For that reason they are succeeding in Holland. To say that Holland has only 25 people per 100 000 is in fact not correct. It has many more, and the large majority of them are out on probation. Our figures in respect of Whites compare very favourably with those of most other countries. I shall not use my own figures: I shall use NICRO’s figures. According to NICRO’s figures there are 86 White prisoners per 100 000 There are also other countries in respect of which the figure is as high as 86. As i have said, it is 77 in the case of England. But let us consider the position in respect of the Coloured population. Out of every 100 000 no fewer than 791 people are in prison. In the case of the Bantu there are 476 out of every 100 000 people in prison. The Asiatics are, in fact, the most law-abiding people; as far as they are concerned, 80 out of every 100 000 people are in prison. Seen from a different angle, out of every 126 Coloureds on any one day at least one is in prison. As far as the Bantu are concerned, one Bantu out of every 210 Bantu is in prison on any particular day. In the case of Asiatics, for every 1 250 of them, one person is in a prison on any particular day. As far as the Whites are concerned, one person out of every 1 163 people is in a prison on any particular day. These figures, as far as the Whites are concerned, compare quite favourably with those of the West European countries, but when one deals with a heterogeneous society such as we have, it compares unfavourably. It is unfair to rise in this House and try to imply that the whole of our prison population is made up of Whites and may therefore be compared with prison populations in European countries.

I want to come back to short-term prisoners. The Commissioner of Prisons has the discretion to release on parole any person sentenced to four months’ imprisonment—I think this is the nearest we come to release on probation—precisely in order to prevent that person from coming into contact with hardened criminals. This is also being done because we know the period is too short for rehabilitating that person. For that reason all those who want to do so, may be released on parole under supervision. Of course, those who do not want to be released on parole stay in prison. I may say that, strange as it may sound, there are many people who want to go to prison. This is particularly the case when winter sets in. A person deliberately commits a minor crime so that he is admitted to prison where he will receive enough to eat and be able to sleep in a warm bed at night. This happens, and this is one of the problems the Department of Prisons has to cope with. For that reason one should not speak lightly about these matters and pretend that they do not exist.

Since I am on my feet, I should like to refer to the hon. member for Florida. Abram Fischer’s name somehow crept into the debate and it was stated how consistent the Opposition was as far as communism and the release of persons were concerned. They did not want to release Leibbrandt, while the latter was released by this Government, and now we have Abram Fischer. They do not want us to release him, and I do not want to release him either. Well, we are at least ad idem on that score. But I want to say that their record in regard to communism and the combating of communism in this country is not altogether an unblemished one; it is nothing to be proud of. Sir, one need only read Hansard and one will find that the Suppression of Communism Act was opposed step by step by the official Opposition in this House. What happened when we wanted to kick Sam Kahn, a self-confessed communist, out of this House? They pleaded for him to be allowed to stay on in this House, and the same thing happened in the case of Bunting. I remember quite well his sitting there where the hon. member for Brakpan is sitting now. At that time the Opposition still occupied the benches up to where the hon. member for Brakpan is sitting now. When we wanted to kick Bunting out of the House of Assembly, they opposed it just as vehemently.

I was not here then.

Oh yes, the hon. member was here and I was here too.

They were hand in glove.

He was her spiritual friend.

Sir, this is merely in passing. The hon. member mentioned magistrates. I want to state quite frankly that as far as our magistrates are concerned, they are a group of people for whom I have the highest regard. I wish all the people were like the magistrates. They are well-balanced people and quite objective. I do not believe one could pay the magistrates for the work they are doing; that is the problem; one cannot do that, but we do not forget them either. They are promoted as they pass their examinations and when they obtain the degree, they are given special promotion. When a civil servant qualifies as a magistrate he receives a substantial increase in salary. As far as I know, our magistrates are quite satisfied. They are quite satisfied. If they could get a higher salary, they would of course be glad to accept it because, as the Prime Minister always says, “Who despises money?” No one despises money, but I think our magistrates are quite satisfied under the circumstances, and we are quite grateful for the wonderful work they are doing. Sir, I just want to correct what was said by the hon. member. At no time—we thrashed it out here last year—did I say I wanted to appoint magistrates as judges. I do not want to have another debate on that question; we discussed it at length last year. This came about as a result of a telex mistake made by a young lady in Tsumeb. [Interjections.] Sir, I have now replied to these two hon. members, and hon. members must pardon me for having entered the debate at such an early stage.

Sir, the hon. member for Florida is a young member, and he can still go far in this House, provided he counts his words.

Next time he will be out.

I want to tell him that his insinuation that magistrates are not independent to express an unprejudiced judgment, was a very ill-considered insinuation.

Disgraceful !

The words of the hon. member for Florida were: “Magistrates do not have factual independence,” and his insinuation in this regard was very clear. From this side I want to say that we reject his insinuation with particular decisiveness. We on this side of the House have only the highest regard for all the officials of the Department of Justice and of Prisons. We have the highest regard for their integrity, and their efficiency.

The hon. member for Florida and the hon. member for Durban North again came here and in an extremely superficial and disappointing way dealt with the question of restrictions. Sir, to them it is very simple; restrictions are not necessary. If a crime is suspected, one should quite simply instruct the Police or the detectives to apprehend the people and take them to court. There is no interim stage as far as they are concerned. To them security, and State security in particular, is as simple as that. One simply apprehends the people and takes them to court. But, Sir, I want to inform these hon. gentlemen and the United Party that State security is not as simple as that. They need not take my word for it. I am also a relatively small light as far as this matter is concerned, but I do nevertheless want to quote to hon. members what a person such as Mr. Justice Snyman has to say in this regard. In the first place he says (translation)—

That in the first place, Mr. Chairman; but then he deals with the stage in the planning of a crime which these hon. gentlemen do not take into account; he says—

Sir, it is precisely at that stage that restrictions are the obvious weapon in the sphere of State security—at the stage where there are preparations, where there is the intent to commit a crime; it is at that stage that one has to intervene with restrictions. Sir, let hon. members on that side be honest; let them tell us whether it was not in fact restrictions which in the ’sixties converted a serious situation into a situation of peace and order and quiet in the sphere of State security? But, Sir, I want to go further today in regard to this question of the rule of law. Now that eight White and eight non-White students have been restricted, this is a matter which is being discussed with a great deal of emotionalism, and too little reason and rationality. So, for example, The Cape Times of 27th August asked with a great deal of emotion “Why the rule of law”, in a leading article in which they also attacked Mr. Justice Snyman in a restrained manner on what he had had to say. This newspaper then made this naïve statement—

This newspaper also referred here to the rule of law and said, inter alia—

Sir, in such simple terms these people state the rule of law; it is stated as if the rule of law were an exact, inflexible law or inflexible act or inflexible legal rule, and it is not as easy as that. These people argue emotionally; they argue in a way which bespeaks no legal knowledge whatsoever. Sir, let me quote to them what an English writer by the name of Jennings said in his book, The Law and the Constitution, Fifth Impression, page 60—

He then states further on—

In other words, people think it is a horse which one can simply ride bare-back, but it is not.

But I want to go further in this connection. I want to quote from the Wiechers Verloren van Themaat—Staatsreg, Second Edition, page 124, to indicate how complicated the entire matter is. Wiechers states here (translation)—

In other words, Sir, the most authoritative writer on this matter, tells us here that it is not an exact concept, and that it may be departed from in certain specific circumstances. I am the last person to want to allege that we should contravene the basic concept of the rule of law, and the basic concept is this, that there should not be abitrary exercise of power. I accept that, and we on this side are the last people who would want to contravene that concept. But now I do want to say that the rule of law is an acknowledged Anglo-Saxon concept which is also much contravened. I have already mentioned the case of Canada in this House before. They also have the rule of law, as England knows it, but what did they do? Overnight two people were murdered, a foreign diplomat and a Minister of Labour, and the next morning they suspended the rule of law. Sir, whether one has a rule of law and suspends it, or whether one has a rule of law and one has certain exceptions to it, such as the restrictions in this country for example, where one needs preventive action, in both cases, whether one does it on a temporary or whether one does it on a semi-permanent basis, there are sound and well-founded reasons for a suspension of the rule of law. [Time expired.]

During the course of my reply to the hon. the Minister I may perhaps touch slightly on some of the things the hon. member for Kroonstad said. The hon. the Minister went out of his way, I thought rather gratuitously, to call into question this side of the House’s attitude towards communism. I think it was entirely uncalled for and I would like to say that our record in regard to dealing with communism and in regard to maintaining law and order is second to none. I want to tell him that there is, however, a very fundamental difference between our attitudes, and I am very glad of that difference, and I am hopeful that in time we will bring the hon. the Minister round to our point of view.

You seem to be rather going his way.

This brings me to the other matter which the hon. the Minister dealt with, because I think it illustrates extremely well the differences between us. I refer to the question of bringing people to trial, people who may have committed an offence, or using the weapon of banning. The hon. the Minister let it be quite clear that even though a person could even be convicted—because this was the implication—of an offence, he was in certain cases against their being brought to trial because it would give them a platform and give them publicity. This is the clear implication of what he said.

I never said it.

If it is not so, then I hope he will get up and make that clear.

I never said it.

Well, but that is the clear implication: He would not bring people to trial because, if he did so, they would get a platform of publicity. [Interjections.] We find confirmation for that approach in the fact that he now obviously regrets having brought Bram Fischer to trial. He pointed out that Bram Fischer had made statements and he mentioned how unfortunate it was that it was taken up in the Press here and overseas and that this harmed South Africa. Let me say at once that we stand second to no one in not wishing to harm South Africa in this respect.

Ohhhhhhh!

I challenge that hon. member who is mooing like a cow [Interjections] to deny that what has harmed South Africa more than anything else is the reputation we have got, through this Government, for not bringing to trial people who he believed had committed offences, and because we detain people and restrict their freedom without trial. That is what every hon. member who has gone overseas knows deep in his heart, even if he will not admit it in this Chamber. That is the position.

Let us look at this lack of courage on the part of the hon. the Minister in this matter. Let us examine the reasons he gives. As I say, he says that it gets into the papers. Bram Fischer makes a speech and it gets into the papers. What does it get? He makes a long speech and it gets perhaps 10 or 12 inches of the Press here and I imagine not as much overseas. [Interjections.] I believe that when Bram Fischer said, as he did according to this photostatic copy of a report which has the headline “Fischer tells why he joined communists” that very heading immediately condemns him in the eyes of 99% of South Africans. He has now admitted he is a communist. That is all people want to know. So many of these people, when they make their statements, so to speak, hang themselves. The sort of things which they say in these statements is the sort of thing that we know anybody attempting to incite would say and do say. This is old stuff. Who really thinks that this has any impression? What was, in fact, the effect of what Bram Fischer said in his statements? Did it have any substantial effect? Of course it did not. Will anybody suggest that our society is so fragile that we cannot stand the statement from an accused person in these cases, that it would fall to pieces if it were made? Surely, the hon. the Minister must take some courage. Our society is surely much more soundly and much more fairly based. Even with its imperfections and its unfairnesses there is still a basis of reason and an endeavour to change. Surely, it is strong enough to stand up to such things. I say again that the effect of the hon. the Ministers statement and the implication of that statement about not providing a platform is what will harm our name overseas; that South Africa is not prepared to bring to trial people who it indeed thinks are guilty of offences.

I believe the hon. the Minister, through this interjection, went far further than he meant to go. I was sorry that he attempted to substantiate and defend that attitude when he was taken to task by the hon. member for Durban North. I still hope, in view of what he has said here by way of interjection to me, that he would indicate that, in fact, this is not how he feels on the matter. If he were to say that that is not his attitude, it would clear up what very much needs to be cleared up in this House. [Interjections.]

The question of Bram Fischer has been touched on here in this House. I want to say just one or two words about it by way of adding to the reasons which have already been given by this side of the House. As is known, the view which we take is that Bram Fischer should not have been given amnesty at the time that this application was made. I want to say that I believe all of us have compassion for people; but it is a question of when you exercise and show that compassion. In the case of a man who has been convicted of an offence of this kind, a man who is a sworn communist, who is an unrepentent communist, who shows no sign of change and who has absolutely no inclination to recant, I say that this is not a case where, being at this stage of his life, there should be a question of amnesty. It may be another matter in regard to a crime like murder or rape because such crimes are so often committed on the spur of the moment or because of some special circumstances. In the case of a man who has committed an offence of this kind, it is different because he has shown a state of mind that has indicated a settled determination to continue in this way and I have heard of no recantation whatsoever. After all, our circumstances today remain exactly the same as they were when he committed this crime and was sentenced for it. Let there be no doubt as to the attitude of this side of the House in regard to this matter.

That is also our attitude.

I want to touch on some other matters, and should like to touch on some of them shortly. First of all, I hope very much that the hon. the Minister, when he enters the debate again, will indicate to us whether it is the intention to proceed with the Criminal Procedure Bill which is at present before Parliament. This is a very large Bill and we have only gone as far as clause 55. There are about 300 clauses left and it is most important for the public, lawyers and M.P.s to know if this Bill is going to be taken again this session or that it will perhaps only be taken to a certain stage or not. It would certainly be of considerable convenience to us, apart from the public outside, to know so that we may know how to arrange our work.

I also want to touch on a matter about which I have asked the hon. the Minister certain questions. That is in regard to the work performed by prisoners. I asked the hon. the Minister something about this last year and he virtually found it impossible to reply. I also asked him about this once this year and he found it impossible then also to reply to the question. I accept that the statistics are not available, but I would now like to know what is available. The position is that it certainly was the Government’s policy—they have never clearly departed from it—to remove the Bantu from the Western Cape. We find that there are a very large number of prisoners including Bantu prisoners in this country. The daily average is 91 000 and bearing in mind the report of the Department of Prisons, it is fair to say that about 73 000 people are daily in our prisons following their conviction. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman. I think that in this debate there are three or four things about which the United Party could give South Africa greater clarity. I want to come back to the matter of Bram Fischer. I do not want to go into unnecessary detail concerning this matter, but the hon. member who has just resumed his seat, is apparently also aware of the speech made recently by Mr. David Epstein, a United Party M.P.C., and which was reported in the Rand Daily Mail of 24th April.

Whom do you believe—Epstein or Mitchell?

That is all I want to know from the United Party. Mr. Epstein is a United Party M.P.C. Now the hon. member for Pietermaritzburg District is presumptuous enough to give one of his own colleagues in his own party a slap in the face by asking: “Whom do you believe, Epstein or Mitchell?” He had better settle this matter in his own ranks. I just want to make a further point in regard to this matter and that is that the United Party would be doing this House and to South Africa a favour by going further than the hon. member for Pinelands did this evening.

Going further?

I shall tell the hon. member if he will give me an opportunity to do so. They must tell this House and South Africa what their standpoint is in respect of two things. The one thing is that it was said by Mr. Epstein that the hon. member for Durban North had spoken in his private capacity and not on behalf of the United Party. He was reported as follows—

That is the one matter I want to put to them if only the hon. member for North Rand would give me a chance. The second thing is that hon. members will remember that there are other people in South Africa who have also started asking for amnesty for the so-called political prisoners on Robben Island or in Pretoria, or wherever they may be held Put now a prospective candidate of the United Party comes along, one who is going to get a constituency somewhere in the Peninsula in 1975, viz. Prof. Chris Barnard, and he said the following, according to the Sunday Times of 29th April this year—

That is why I say that I think that this is a matter which the United Party must take up very seriously in this debate. Are they prepared to give these people a more comprehensive and detailed reply than that given by the hon. member for Pinelands? If hon. members do not want to give us this reply, then they must say so. However, I can assure them that if they do not want to give us an indication of the full standpoint of the United Party in this connection, we will most certainly take them to the voters of South Africa about this very matter.

A second matter with regard to which I want to ask hon. members opposite this evening what their standpoint is, is the question of bilingualism in our hotels. In 1970 we had a debate here, and on the evening when I discussed this subject, some members almost had a heart attack. The hon. member for North Rand, in the language of the hon. member for Bezuidenhout, really had the shakes. He imputed all kinds of things to me that evening. Things which were imputed to me included such things as pettiness, that I was displaying an inferiority complex, and this is not only from the hon. member for North Rand, but from the Opposition as a whole. The hon. member for North Rand said specifically, “How petty can one be?” I shall give him the column reference in Hansard, namely 3852. The hon. member for Durban North said that it was intentionally defiant to ask that one’s own language be upheld in a statutory place. That was the background of that debate we conducted in 1970. Arising from this the hon. the Minister contacted the hotels and Fedhasa and told them, “Gentlemen, put your house in order. If you do not do so, I shall have to take action against you.” What happened then? The Minister was obliged to take action. Now there is hedging and in this regard hon. members opposite can tell us this evening where they stand. In the first instance there are members of the United Party, for one, Maj. J. D. Opperman, who I believe is the General Secretary of the United Party …

No, he is not.

Or he is one of the important leaders in the Transvaal …

He is not an important leader.

Perhaps Transvaal does not have any important leaders. I understand that he is not an important leader, Sir, but, in any event, this gentleman has his doubts about this. Newspapers such as The Star expressed themselves very seriously about this, as do newspapers like the Rand Daily Mail and the Financial Gazette. Now the question is where the United Party stands this evening. Are they prepared to take up a standpoint about bilingualism? Are they prepared to say that the attitude adopted by the hon. the Minister is the correct one, or do they want to adopt the attitude of 1970 again? Do they want to approach us again because we talk about upholding Afrikaans? Do they want to reproach us again because we ask that Afrikaans be upheld in public places such as hotels which are statutory bodies, or do they want to adopt the attitude of 1970 once again? Then they must tell us who is fanning the flames of Afrikaner hatred. If their attitude is that of 1970, they must say so in this House. I hope that hon. members will have the courage of their convictions in this debate and take up a standpoint on the question of bilingualism in hotels as it is being applied today, with the fairness associated therewith.

There is a third matter about which I think hon. members opposite should inform this House. I refer to the matter touched on by the hon. member for Florida at the end of his speech, and that is whether hon. members on the opposite side of this House agree with Mr. Justice Kowie Marais in as far as he took up the standpoint that the Bench in South Africa should be divorced from the Minister of Justice and transferred in its entirety so as to fall under the control and authority of the Chief Justice? Is it the standpoint of hon. members opposite—and I do not ascribe this to Mr. Justice Marais—that, as the hon. member for Florida said here, the magistrates and presiding officers in our inferior courts cannot act independently of the authority of the State because they are civil servants? I think that this is an objectionable allegation; I think that the hon. member should know better. He is a person who has often acted in a professional capacity in the magistrates’ courts. He is an advocate of our Supreme Court. I think that the hon. member has no justification whatsoever for such an allegation. After all, the hon. member knows that our courts, and our inferior courts in particular, receive only the most favourable comments even from people who visit our courts from abroad. I want to mention just one example of this as reported in The Star of 10th November last year. It refers to “Prof. Garth Nettheim, professor of law at the University of New South Wales, Australia”. He attended certain cases in South Africa and said the following—

Commenting on the trial of the Dean of Cape Town, who was charged with assaulting a policeman and found not guilty, Prof. Nettheim said although the cause of the trial was political there was nothing overtly political or uniquely South African about the trial.

The report continues-—

I can elaborate on that and quote what Mr. Justice Blackwell and other judges said, but I just want to ask the United Party to take up a standpoint in this House tonight on the question whether they agree with the hon. member for Florida that the presiding officers in our inferior courts are to be burdened with this stigma or whether they agree with this side of the House that says that we have absolute confidence in the independent administration of justice in our inferior courts.

I think that these are three serious matters to which hon. members may give attention in this debate. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. member for Potchefstroom has put a number of questions to the United Party and I shall leave them to deal with him. I would like to say a few words about the Abram Fischer case since I was one of the people who willingly agreed to have myself associated with the plea for clemency that appeared in the newspapers a few weeks ago. This will certainly come as no surprise to the hon. the Minister for he knows my attitude as far as political prisoners are concerned. On several occasions I have raised the question of amnesty for political prisoners in this House. I think that the last occasion I raised it was at the Tenth Anniversary of the Republic when hundreds of prisoners who had committed all sorts of crimes were released from our gaols. It seemed to me that there was no good reason advanced why persons who had committed, as it is technically known, crimes against the State, should not also be considered for remission of sentence; obviously, each case to be considered on its merits. As I say, I associated myself with the plea for clemency for Abram Fischer. At the same time I mentioned that there were other political prisoners who also ought to be granted clemency. As far as I am concerned, such a gesture is in the very best traditions of Western justice and democracy. All countries of the world show clemency to political prisoners. I think that quite recently even the Greek colonels released some of their prisoners. South Africa has a long tradition in this regard. I want to say immediately that I do not put the case of Robey Leibbrandt and the case of Abram Fischer on the same basis. I put them on a different basis altogether

Why?

Why?

I will tell you why; only be patient. Robey Leibbrandt and Van Blerk, who was also in the same category, were both persons who were found guilty during a time of war. Van Blerk in fact actually blew up a post office. A couple of passers-by were killed and he was sentenced to death. His death sentence was commuted and as soon as this Government came in they released Van Blerk and in fact he was greeted as a great hero. Leibbrandt came to this country having been landed on our coasts from a German submarine during a time of declared war. He came here with the purpose of murdering General Smuts and to commit sabotage, etc., and to undermine the war effort. He was captured, found guilty and condemned to death. His sentence of death was commuted by General Smuts. I think he had served five years when the Government came in and released him, not as an act of compassion or clemency, but as a purely political act in the same manner in which they released Van Blerk. It is a different thing altogether. People who are asking for clemency for Bram Fischer, such as Judge Blackwell, Dr. Babrow and others, cannot remotely be connected with communism. They are people like myself who do not agree for one moment … [Interjections.] The hon. members can laugh. If they do not understand the difference between liberalism—and I am a self-confessed liberal—and communism, they do not understand the basic elements of political philosophy. We are not asking for Fischer’s release on the grounds that we associate ourselves with the political views of Bram Fischer, but purely as an act of compassion and an act of clemency. As I have said, I think it would be in the highest traditions of Western democracy for us to have done this. It would have been one of the best things South Africa could have done as far as her image in the outside world is concerned.

I want to say that I am shocked at the attitude of the official Opposition in this regard. I am shocked at the intemperate statements they have made in this regard and I wonder how one can associate that with the so-called compassionate society their leader claimed the official Opposition would like to introduce in South Africa. [Interjections.] A gesture like that would have reverberated around the free world and it would have done great things for South Africa. I do not know anything about Fischer’s recanting but I do not think the hon. member for Pinelands knows either.

Well, there is no suggestion that he has.

No, I do not know. I visited him in prison, naturally with the hon. the Minister’s permission …

Can you say he has?

No, I cannot say he has, but I also cannot say that he has not.

But he said he would never.

After seven years in gaol you change your mind about a lot of “nevers”.

Let him then say so.

And if he said so, would the hon. member for Pinelands then release him?

Let him first say so.

Well, I am asking him: If he said so, would the hon. member release him? I say that we have in this country an extensive system whereby the special branch watches people. We are spending hundreds of millions of rands on Police, Special Branch and Boss systems and so forth. If we cannot watch one released prisoner to make sure that he is not up to any mischief then we are wasting the taxpayers’ money and we can call it a day right away.

Now, I want to say something to the hon. the Minister about a most extraordinary case—talking of reprieves—the Makinitha case. I should like the hon. the Minister to give the Committee some information on this case. This is a case which I believe has caused much adverse public comment and it has done the cause of race relations in South Africa a good deal of harm. I think the hon. the Minister will be familiar with this case. Two men, one a White man, aged 25, named Kenneth Wilson and one, a Black man, aged 22, named Zachariah Makinitha were tried and sentenced to death for murder in May of last year. Last month Kenneth Wilson was reprieved after his sister had written a letter begging for mercy and stating that her brother was psychologically disturbed. He was apparently then examined by a Prison psychiatrist and presumably on a report which the hon. the Minister received, he was later reprieved. The hon. the Minister will perhaps know that. Last month Zachariah was hanged. His sister apparently also wrote a letter which did not arrive in time. It is perfectly true that the African man had a previous conviction for robbery with aggravating circumstances. The White man was discharged on that account, although the court said, “reluctantly”. It is also true that there was apparently no psychiatric evidence to help the Black man. But, Sir, the fact remains that both these men had been found equally guilty of the crime of murder by the court. It was also found that they had acted with a common purpose. The point I am trying to make is that it shows incredible insensitivity, in this case, to have reached a decision to reprieve the one man and not the other. I do not believe the fact that he had a psychological background— the court did not find him insane anyway —should have enabled the White man to be reprieved and not the Black man.

The House knows my attitude about capital punishment. I am against capital punishment. I have pleaded, and will continue to plead, for the abolition of capital punishment, and many civilized Western countries have the same attitude. The British Parliament recently, by an overwhelming majority, decided not to reintroduce capital punishment. My point is that it shows remarkable insensitivity on the part of the executive-in-council—the Minister, or whoever it is who takes the final step—to reach a decision to reprieve the White man and to let the Black man hang. I am not even so interested in what this does to our so-called image onverseas. I know that this did in fact damage it. What I am interested in is what damage it did inside South Africa, as regards the assessment by the Black man of the White man’s justice. I think this is a case where the hon. the Minister should perhaps give us some more details, because I believe, as I have said, that this case showed very great insensitivity.

I want to turn to the question of the bannings. As far as I can make out from the existing figures there were, as at July, 1972, when I saw the last consolidated list, 236 people banned. Not all of them are in South Africa. Some who are on the banned list have already left this country. To that one should add the 16 students and student leaders who have recently been banned. I hope the Committee is well enough aware of my attitude towards those bannings as well. I deplore this step most strongly. I want to know why it is that we in this country, or the Minister at any rate, seems to be continuing to take a particularly tough line on bannings. I think the line he has taken has recently been more tough than the one he has taken over the last year or two. I have noticed that people who are banned are having their restrictions, if anything, tightened. There is the case of a man in Durban, Mewa Ramgobin, who recently had his restrictions tightened in such a way that he now cannot even earn a living. He is unable to enter his office, whereas previously he was at least able to do that. There is the case of a woman named Moodley who has had her banning renewed for a further five years, after having been banned for ten already. Surely, Sir, there comes a time when one no longer needs to go on banning these people, and where one can at least give them a chance to see whether or not they are going to live the lives of law-abiding citizens. Not one of them has ever been convicted in a court of law of breaking a law, but the hon. the Minister thinks he is preventing them from breaking a law. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I want to react to what the hon. member for Houghton said with regard to restrictions. It is true that the Suppression of Communism Act of 1950 gives wide powers to the Minister of Justice. The Minister must use those powers to prevent a situation in South Africa which may be dangerous to the State. He must therefore, in the exercise of his power, use his discretion in such a way that he takes preventive action. For example, he must take action in accordance with the Act against persons who seek to bring about change through riots or disorder, or who aim at this. Then the Minister may also take action against people who aim at certain acts and whose acts are calculated to further communism in South Africa. The words “calculate” and “aim” in the Act point to the preventive nature of the action to be taken by the Minister. The premise is that a threat to internal security exists in South Africa, and I do not think there is any need fur us to argue about that. This point has already been raised here today. The persons against whom action is taken, can be divided into three categories in accordance with the restrictions placed on them. In the first place there are those who are restricted to their homes and who may not leave their homes. We may call these persons group A. In the second place there are those who must be in their home every evening and every weekend. We may call these persons group B. Then there are Group C persons who are restricted; these are persons who have freedom of movement within a particular magisterial district or within several magisterial districts. These people who are restricted—and the Nusas leaders also fall into this category—are usually forbidden to attend meetings; they are forbidden to go to certain places (in the case of the Nusas people, to visit universities), to enter into a court case or to take part in the activities of Nusas. Sir, the action taken by the Government in regard to restrictions has often led to vehement criticism, such as we have heard from the hon. member for Houghton, and it is necessary to pause briefly at this matter and ask the question whether this criticism against the Government is in any way legitimate and fair. For example, The Cape times said—

The Cape Times went on to talk about “student leaders who have in consequence been condemned to a civil death”. The Rand Daily Mail said this—

The Rand Daily Mail also referred to “a movement of repression”. The Sunday Times said—

It is stated as a fact that they had been robbed of their freedom. Sir, I want to state the standpoint that the criticism against restrictions has been excessive and is extremely unfair to the Government, and that it is not the action of the Government as such, but the criticism of these newspapers and the criticism of members of this House, such as the hon. member for Houghton, which contributes to the blackening of the name of South Africa abroad. Sir, I requested the Minister of Justice to obtain certain details in connection with the restrictions; he gave me the details and told me that I could use them here today. In Group A, which I mentioned above, in which a person is restricted to the maximum, there was until recently only one person who had been restricted, and I understand that at present there is not one person who is being restricted in this way. In Group B, the middle group, only 51 people have been restricted, nine of whom are abroad. In Group C, i.e. those persons subject to the mildest form of restriction, which is also the group which the Nusas leaders fall into, only 152 people are being restricted at present, seven of whom are abroad. The total number of restricted persons is therefore the small number of 203 persons, 16 of whom are abroad. Out of a population of 20 million, this is a very small percentage.

What about their people?

*Mr. D. J. L. NEL; In the past year 80 restriction orders have expired, which have not been reimposed by the Government. When the hon. member for Houghton made her unfair attack a moment ago, she did not take these figures into account. One restriction was lifted by the Minister, on application, during the currency of the restriction, and the restrictions on nine persons were, on application, altered and relaxed to some extent by the Minister.

Sir, in interpreting these restriction figures, we can draw the following conclusions.

In the first place, it is very clear that in the exercise of his discretion the Minister has not used his powers to the maximum. Where it was possible for the Minister of Justice to do so, he imposed the minimum of restrictions on people. If it were otherwise, Sir, more persons would have been restricted under Groups A and B and fewer under Group C.

In the second place, when the Minister restricts a person, he acts only in so far as that person is a danger to the State. If we are to take a practical view of this, we shall see that in the case of the restricted Nusas leaders, for example, those people are still being allowed a great deal of personal freedom. They may work and they may earn money. They may move about freely in Cape Town and in certain other municipal areas. Within these municipal areas they may live and sleep wherever they like. They may take part in sport provided that they do so within the limits of the restriction orders. They may relax and in general lead a normal life. They are only restricted in that they may not engage in any activity which would affect the security of the State. Statements to the effect that they have been robbed of their freedom and have been condemned to a “civil death” are quite outrageous and unfair. Even in the case of the 51 people mentioned under Group B, a great deal of person freedom is still allowed.

In the third place, the conclusion may be drawn that the restriction orders issued by the Minister have been very effective. The Government found it possible not to reimpose restrictions on certain people on whom restrictions had been imposed before. In other words, after their restriction the Government no longer regarded those people as an effective threat to the security of the State.

In the fourth place, in the exercise of his discretion the Minister was clearly acting in a judicious manner. This is apparent from the fact that certain representations were made to the Minister, and where the Minister was satisfied that these were bona fide representations and that there was merit in the application, he amended the restriction orders, as requested. In one case the Minister himself lifted the restriction order. [Interjections.] In the case of the students, this I can tell the hon. member, there was no merit or bona fides; one of the two elements was missing.

In the fifth place, allegations implying that the Government, as has already been mentioned to you, was supposedly using this method of restriction to suppress lawful opposition, are totally absurd. This one can infer, firstly, from the fact that so few people are subject to restriction orders at present. But it is also important that the persons who have been restricted, or the vast majority of them, are quite unknown in the purely party-political sphere in South Africa. The political opponents of the Government are the persons who want to oppose the Government at the polls. None of the persons who are actively trying to oppose the Government at the polls, have ever been restricted. Persons who want to bring about a change in South Africa through the medium of the polls, have not been restricted. Even the Nusas leaders, about whom the hon. member for Houghton is so concerned, have never fought the Government at the polls, whether directly or indirectly, and they are not even active in the party of the hon. member for Houghton. The accusation made in this connection, i.e. that political opponents of the Government are being suppressed in this way, is therefore totally unfounded as well.

Finally, if one takes into account that in this regard the aim of the Government with these restrictions is to take preventive and not punitive action, and that in that way the rule of law is in fact being maintained, and if we consider the limited degree to which the Government has in fact found it necessary to take action against certain persons, we cannot but conclude that in terms of sacrificing any possible personal freedom of the individual, the price which we have paid to maintain law and order in South Africa is a negligible and insignificant one. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, I think the hon. member for Pretoria Central has strengthened the view on this side of the House in regard to bannings. He has indicated how few people are banned or restricted. If they are so few, surely there is all the more reason why they should come before a court to be tried.

Nonsense.

If there are so few people, surely the hon. the Minister must have information on which he restricted them. He must have had before him the files and the evidence, and such a handful of people could surely be dealt with by a Minister and a Government as “kragdadig” as this one is. However, I do not want to waste time on the hon. member for Pretoria Central. I want to return to the hon. member for Potchefstroom. I want to deal first with the question of the appeal for clemency by prominent members of the Progressive Party …

And the United Party.

… and the statement issued by Mr. Epstein, M.P.C. The position is a simple one. The hon. member for Durban North, the chairman of the Justice group of this party, issued a statement reflecting the official policy of the United Party. That is the view of the United Party, that is the attitude of this side of the House. That attitude is that we are opposed to the release of Bram Fischer. We are opposed to it for a number of reasons which I do not intend outlining, but one of them is that this man was convicted of seeking to organize a revolution againts the State in South Africa. If one could say that the circumstances of the time in which he was convicted had changed, then one might take a different attitude, but those circumstances still apply today. There are still terrorist threats against South Africa, there is still internal subversion. It would be irresponsible for this party and this side of the House to suggest that the highest office-holder so far identified of the Communist Party, the known leader of planned revolution, should be released in an atmosphere when he has available to him tools to continue his work. Therefore we are not part of the agitation which was started by prominent and known Progressive Party supporters. As far as Mr. Dave Epstein is concerned, he was expressing his personal opinion to which he is entitled.

Repudiate him.

But that is what the hon. member for Durban Point is doing.

Other members of the party are also entitled to express their personal opinion and they do it in their personal capacity as a personal opinion, but the policy of the party is as stated by the hon. member for Durban North. I hope that even to the hon. member for Potchefstroom I have used words short and simple and clear enough to drum through to his understanding what the attitude of the United Party is.

*Mr. Chairman, I now want to come to the other matter raised by the hon. member for Potchefstroom. That concerns the regulations with regard to hotels. I want to state at once the standpoint of this side of the House, the standpoint of the United Party. The United Party is and always has been in favour of and strongly in favour of bilingualism at every level and in every sector of our national life. We believe in bilingualism. Not only do we believe in it, but we try to show it and practise it. The day I see the hon. member for Potchefstroom and other public speakers exhibiting the same spirit, we shall be able to discuss his attitude and view with regard to equal treatment being accorded to the two languages in South Africa. It is this side of the House which proves by its deeds—not by lip-service— and by its practices that it respects both languages. We accept that principle without doubt and without hesitation. We are a party that would like to see every man, woman and child in South Africa fully bilingual. We hope that day will come. What we fear is that the attitude of certain hon. members on that side of the House may lead to such a counter-reaction that it may stem the growth of the South African nation towards bilingualism. The attitude of that side of the House, of the Nationalist Party, is obstructing bilingualism and its realization.

†I want to say that the bitterness of some of the members of the Nationalist Party is such that it is creating a reaction which we on this side of the House are trying to stop and are trying to discourage. It is a sorry reflection upon both languages of South Africa, a sorry reflection on their strength and their place in South Africa, when you have to make their use the subject of a criminal sanction, when you have to make it a crime punishable in court in order to enforce the use of one or other or both of our languages. We would rather see encouragement than ridicule or criminal sanctions. We would like to see the people of South Africa led and encouraged towards greater bilingualism. [Interjections.]

Let me just point to one or two aspects of the respective regulation. [Interjections.] You see, Sir, the sensitivity, I would say the inferiority complex, on that side of the House. They have no confidence in inducement and must therefore resort to criminal sanctions. If there must be pressure, let there be pressure but let us be reasonable. In this regulation to which reference has been made, we are dealing with two groups of people, namely, receptionists and telephonists. In the field of receptionist there are many immigrants. In many hotels they will have a person who can speak, say, German and French and in another someone who speaks Italian and Dutch; they may have another person who speaks English and Afrikaans. In this way they can meet the requirements of all their customers, all their clients. However, the hon. the Minister does not think of the reality of running a hotel; he looks at it purely from the political angle, the legislative angle, and he forgets the reality of the job that has to be done. So I say that we accept bilingualism but we believe that the hon. the Minister could have achieved far more by inducement and by encouragement rather than by making the speaking of his own language or the non-speaking of his own language a criminal offence. He should have done this rather than reflect on the willingness of the South African people to become bilingual. I am not going to oppose this. If the hon. the Minister has so little faith in both the languages of South Africa, he is demonstrating it by making it a crime not to be able to speak one of the two languages. In the Public Service it is not a crime, but you get promotion and a better position if you are bilingual. You have to be bilingual in certain posts, but you are not convicted as a criminal if you are not. However, the hon. the Minister does not have the confidence we have in both the languages of South Africa.

I want to refer to another issue. I hope that the hon. the Minister will give an assurance tonight that he will take action against landlords who are exploiting the sectional titles legislation by trying to get rid of tenants on the excuse that they can be evicted when this legislation becomes operative.

Mr. Chairman, just before the House adjourned for supper, the hon. member for Durban Point repudiated a member of his party, in fact, a provincial councillor, Mr. Epstein, in the most outspoken terms imaginable.

Did you not hear what the member for Durban Point said?

But I say this: Can the hon. member not hear what I am saying? I am saying that the hon. member for Durban Point repudiated Mr. Epstein, M.P.C., in the most outspoken terms imaginable. But Mr. David Epstein, M.P.C., told the Press that the hon. member for Durban Point had spoken in his personal capacity. What was more, said Mr. Epstein, the hon. member for Durban North had made a cruel speech. In other words, what we have here is the situation where one has on the one hand, one of the Transvaal leaders of the United Party—a strong supporter of Mr. Harry Schwarz—saying that a frontbencher, the leader of the Justice Group of the United Party in the House of Assembly, was speaking in his personal capacity, and, on the other hand, that person being repudiated here in the House of Assembly.

What are you gaining by this?

Now I want to ask Mr. Epstein and Mr. Harry Schwarz to tell us tomorrow where they stand; we want to know whether they agree with their parliamentary party or whether they stand for a different policy in the Transvaal. Another question I want to put to the United Party and their parliamentary members, is whether they will continue to accommodate Mr. Epstein, who has taken up such a radical standpoint on an extremely contentious matter, in their party? They can tell us this in the course of this debate.

Just before supper the hon. member for Durban Point also made one of the most moving speeches on bilingualism I have ever heard in this House. He is known for his moving speeches, but I must say that as a pre-adjournment speech on a Wednesday, that speech was one of his most moving speeches. At the Natal Congress the hon. member for Port Natal—who is not sitting in his proper place but directly behind the hon. member for Durban Point —said that if the United Party of Natal were to pass a resolution laying down that the candidates of the United Party for the provincial council and for the House of Assembly had to be bilingual, he would leave the party. Now I want to ask the hon. member for Durban Point why he did not repudiate that standpoint of the hon. member for Port Natal at that United Party congress?

But it is untrue.

Why did he not tell me that three months ago? He did say it.

Which congress was it?

The Natal Congress.

May I put a question to the hon. member?

No, I do not have the time now. [Interjections.] Why do you not make speeches of this nature in your caucus? Why do you not ask your party’s nomination committee to implement this essential principle of bilingualism, which you advocate, so strongly, in the nomination of candidates? For instance, we are still waiting for the hon. member for Constantia to put a question in Afrikaans. After all, that is the United Party’s test of bilingualism, i.e. to put a question in Afrikaans.

Why do you not make your speech in English?

I can speak English and the hon. member for Durban Point knows it.

But you do not want to!

The point at issue is not whether I want to or not. In the course of my election speeches I speak English. I serve all my English-speaking voters in English and, what is more, my voters know it and they are satisfied with me. The hon. member for Durban Point finds it necessary to say a few words in Afrikaans in the House of Assembly every now and then to prove that he is able to do so. There is no need for me to do that I want to tell the hon. member for Durban Point, with all the esteem love and respect with which I regard him, that his utterances on bilingualism before supper tonight were only so many words. His utterances convince no one and impress no one.

I want to come to the hon. member for Durban North. Today he said something terrible with regard to the hon. the Minister. The hon. the Minister is one of the most respected members of this House. He is a man who commands nothing but respect wherever he goes. Today the hon. member for Durban North made a scandalous allegation here with regard to this Minister. He said that the judicial process in South Africa was being implemented according to the Minister’s whims—I think “whims” was the word he used. I want to tell the hon. member quite frankly that neither this Minister nor any other Minister of the National Party interferes in the judicial process in South Africa. But what did the members of the United Party themselves do during the war years? They removed a magistrate, one of the best magistrates South Africa has ever had, from the Bench because he did not return the verdict they sought with regard to someone whom they had charged. That is what they did! Now they are sitting quietly, apparently ignorant of what I am referring to. I am referring to magistrate H. J. S. Johannes. This is how they manipulated the bench 25 or more years ago. This is how they will implement the rule of law, should they come into power again.

Mr. Chairman, on a point of order, may the hon. member refer to the hon. Opposition as “they”? [Interjections.]

Order! The hon. member may proceed.

I forgive the hon. member for that question. It is ten past eight, so I know where that comes from.

That is insulting !

It is one of the easiest things for an hon. member such as the hon. member for Durban North to rise here and to vent his spleen over the words used by the hon. the Minister when he said, “They use it as a platform”. I want to ask him, and I want him to reply to this question in the course of this debate, “whether he approves of an accused, when he is given the opportunity to give evidence —he has a choice whether he wants to give evidence under oath in the witness box or whether he wants to give evidence from where he is standing without his first taking an oath—using the court as a platform to make political speeches? I want the hon. member for Durban North to listen to me. I see he is involved in a conversation with his colleague. Does he approve of an accused—the kind of accused the hon. member for Houghton calls a “political” accused—using the court as a platform to make political speaches? I see that he does not want to listen to me and consequently I accept that he will not reply to this question. I want to ask whether he approves of Mandela having done this. Does he approve of Abram Fischer having done this?

What would you do if you were going to goal for life?

It sounds to me as though the hon. member for Durban North has sympathy with these speech-makers. I want to know from the hon. member for Durban North whether he approves of this. It is very easy for him to speak from where he is sitting. It is very easy for him—and he always does this—to criticize without stating his side of a matter. This is how that party practices politics in this Parliament. They criticize and attack but they never say what they would do if they were in that position. They do not have to say what they would do for they know that they will not be in that position for the next 25 years. Now I want to ask the hon. member for Durban North: If he were to be the Minister of Justice, would he have done anything if the court were to be used as a platform for people such as Mandela and Abram Fischer. It has nothing to do with the judge. That man is ostensibly giving evidence while he is there.

Mr. Chairman, it is very difficult to reply to the hon. member for Waterkloof. He spoke about a great variety of subjects. I believe he started with a tirade about a man called Epstein. Now, he may not know this verse but I think the House will be interested to hear it. It was a verse written about the Steins. It reads—

With suitable variations the hon. member for Waterkloof may find his own solution to the problem of Epstein. Certainly nobody understands the member for Waterkloof.

He is a detribalized Englishman.

The fact remains that when the history books of the future are written, and if there is going to be any reference to the hon. member for Waterkloof, he will only be referred to as the man who tried to reopen the language struggle a quarter of a century later.

You are a detribalized Afrikaner.

Mr. Chairman, the very thing I want to discuss is the issue of using the Liquor Act for enforcing bilingualism in the hotel industry. I want to assure this hon. House at once that as far as the language struggle is concerned, I am one of the advocates of bilingualism. I will not have anyone prescribing to me how I should feel, think or speak on bilingualism. If I have any differences with members on the opposite side of this House, it is simply because I am a person who feels bilingualism should be promoted by means of assistance and encouragement and not by means of compulsion. That is the very problem I am experiencing. The hon. member for Potchefstroom wants to know what our standpoint is with regard to the question of bilingualism, particularly in the hotel industry. My own standpoint is, as I have said, that I am a strong advocate of bilingualism. But I do feel that it should be promoted by means of encouragement and inducement and not by means of compulsion.

Tonight I want to refer to a particular matter and to numerous letters we have received with regard to this matter. I received a letter recently from a woman who teaches Afrikaans and who specializes in training immigrants recruited mainly for the hotel industry. I shall now tell hon. members what happened in her case. She tried to teach Afrikaans to three people, with the very object of their taking up employment in the hotel industry. She went to the magistrate’s office in a part of this city to establish precisely what the standards should be. There she was told that there were no known standards. They were not prepared to discuss the matter with her either. She then drew up her own course. Her course consisted of 1 000 basic words in Afrikaans, as well as a study of simple grammar, and a vocabulary list of all the Afrikaans terms used in the hotel industry. After these people had completed a crash course of approximately three months, she regarded them as suitable candidates for the test. They came before the assistant magistrate, and he gave them the test. The test he gave them was the following: “Here is a copy of Die Burger and here is an article from it. Read the article and then convey to me the meaning of that article in your own words. I had this article brought to me today, and it is entitled “ ’n Bomgrap by De Grendel” (A Bomb Hoax at De Grendel). It includes, inter alia, words such as “bomgrap” (bomb hoax), “huishouding” (household), “pakhuisman” (storeman), “ontplof” (explode), “veiligheidshalwe” (for safety’s sake), “gefynkam” (searched thoroughly), “herehuis” (manor-house), and many other words of this kind. These French people were quite unable to understand the article. They definitely could not give a rendering of its contents. Consequently they failed. The teacher approached the magistrate again in order to establish exactly what standard was expected of these people. She was told that he was not prepared to discuss the matter with her. So she decided to approach the magistrate in Cape Town. There she heard that no standard had been laid down; it was simply at the discretion of the magistrate and he was free to lay down his own standards. Now I want to say this, Sir: It is all very well to promote bilingualism, but if, because of compulsion and uncertainty as to the standards, one is not prepared to help these people, what happens? I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether he would not be prepared to establish the exact standard expected of these people, because an immigrant who comes to South Africa, makes tremendous sacrifices. To some extent he finds himself in a state of uncertainty. He brings his wife and his children along with him. He wants to make a living. He has a contract to come and work in South Africa, and within a few months after his arrival, he is told to take a test in Afrikaans. Very well: he tries his best. Like these French people, he may be intelligent and enthusiastic; he does want to take his test. Then he encounters this problem. He loses his job because the hotel may not retain his services. He does not know what his position is and he finds himself in a state of uncertainty. I think it is a disservice to Afrikaans to treat people in this way; it is a disservice to the hotel industry, it is a disservice to tourism in South Africa, which should become an important part of our economy, it is a disservice to South Africa and it is a disservice to our reputation of hospitality and reasonableness. The hon. member for Potchefstroom said we implemented these measures of compulsion in a very reasonable manner. I took down his words; he spoke of them as measures of compulsion “with the fairness associated therewith”. Now I want to ask the hon. the Minister whether he regards this system of compulsion as a fair one. Does he think he will be able to reach his objective by means of the application of a system such as this? Surely that cannot be. No, Sir, I feel that bilingualism should be promoted and encouraged but measures of compulsion will not succeed. It will have an adverse effect on bilingualism; it will have an adverse effect on our economy, for we need these people. We must encourage them and we must make them feel at home. We must let them feel that we in South Africa are reasonable people with whom they can co-operate. This measure is detrimental to South Africa, to the hotel industry, and even to Afrikaans.

So you are against it? [Interjections.]

Mr. Chairman, the hon. the Minister asks me whether I am against it. I am obviously against compulsion. I am against fines and imprisonment in order to compel bilingualism. I believe in bilingualism, but I believe it can be achieved by means of encouragement and by means of every kind of assistance and enthusiasm. I do not believe in compulsion. I do in fact have the details, the names, the places and the times, in respect of this particular case which I quoted to the Minister. I shall be glad to let him have the details. I was reluctant to mention them across the floor of this House. [Time expired.]

After having listened to the speech of the hon. member who has just sat down, it is very clear to me, in spite of what is being said here about bilingualism, that the whole speech he made here is directed against bilingualism.

Nonsense!

He made this speech in order to defend unilingualism in South Africa.

You were not listening.

No, I was listening. This little examination that must be taken by people who have to serve the public at hotels, is so elementary that any person who has been in South Africa for a few months can pass it. I think it is only fair in a bilingual country like South Africa to require that people who have to serve the public should be bilingual. It is something that would be required in any other country of the world. If I were in France and I went to an hotel, there would at least be someone there who has an elementary knowledge of English. But here in South Africa, 63 years after the advent of Union, we still have to advocate bilingualism in our hotels which are supported by all of us.

Sir, I should like to come to another aspect, and that is the crime rate that was mentioned here. [Interjections.] Yes, hon. members on that side are not keen to hear about this. Sir, the Republic’s prison system can be compared with the best in the world. The trouble is that South Africa is too unassuming to boast of its achievements. The process of adaption which long-term prisoners undergo is almost unique in the world. There is a transfer from prison discipline to a process of adaption to enable persons, who have been in prison for a long time, to adapt themselves in the outside world. That process of adaption is absolutely essential. Sir, not only has crime and its treatment been focused recently, but it will always continue to be focused in future. There is not another social problem which is discussed more, not only in South Africa, but throughout the world, than crime is. We are fortunate that we could succeed, in South Africa, in keeping pace with development in the sphere of prison reform and that our prison staff are efficient and capable for the work they are called upon to do in that connection. We can therefore pay tribute to our staff in the prison service. They are capable and dedicated people. Sir, there may be a difference of opinion about the object of punishment, but all are agreed that it is essential for the protection of the community. Whatever the object of imprisonment may be, we must always remember that not much can be done for a prisoner during a short period of punishment. The necessary work of upliftment cannot be done during a short prison term. Offenders who commit less serious offences and who are sentenced to a short term of imprisonment, could perhaps lose their fear of imprisonment and it could also enable them to acquire knowledge of crime which they would not otherwise have done, and that is why we also have the system of parole. Sir, I know that in recent times it has been emphasized that crime is attributable to certain factors. It is said that it is attributable to the fact that people must live in hovels, back street areas and slum areas, but I have here a report of the “The Fourth United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and Treatment of Offenders”, in which various reasons for crime are mentioned: (1) urbanization; (2) industrial development; (3) population growth; (4) technological changes, and then two other causes are mentioned, i.e. “internal migration” and “social mobility”. It is therefore not correct that anti-social behaviour is solely ascribable to urban slum conditions. However, it cannot be doubted that such conditions do give rise to crime. Sir, I want to quote to you what Judge Steyn said in that connection. He said that it is, in fact, true that there is an accumulation of reasons why crime is caused; and this is a factor that has to be borne in mind when imposing a sentence. Sir, reference has been made here to lifelong imprisonment, and in that connection a plea was lodged here by the hon. member for Houghton and people outside in connection with the case of Bram Fischer. Sir, I want to tell you that in England today sentences are being imposed which, as in the case of Fischer, are actually life sentences. I am referring, for example, to the case of the train robbers in England, where sentences of 30 years’ imprisonment were imposed on persons who had already reached the age of 40 years. They obtain no remission whatsoever; i.e. when these train robbers are released from prison they will be 70 years old. They will obtain no parole; they must remain in prison for the full 30 years, but here, and also outside, there are pleas for the release of a person like Fischer, who was sentenced to life imprisonment and who was not a train robber, but a person who encroached upon the security of this State. Not only did he encroach upon the security of the State, but we are dealing with the fact that the activities which Fischer initiated are still being pursued by his adherents.

What about Robey Leibbrandt?

Sir, I think it has already been mentioned here, by one of the hon. members, that Robey Leibbrandt was released from gaol after the National Party had come into power, but that was three years after the end of the war. There was then no danger of nazism. There was no danger of Germany threatening the world. It was three years after the war. But what is the position now in the case of Fischer? It is true, there is no war that is being fought in South Africa, but here there is a cold war, as there is in the rest of the world. [Time expired.]

I am rising to reply briefly to hon. members. In the first place I should like to reply to the hon. member for Pinelands. The hon. member for Pinelands asked: “What is the position with regard to the Criminal Procedure Bill that is before Parliament?” Now, I cannot do any better than to tell him that as far as I am concerned, we are proceeding with that Bill. We are proceeding with it, and if that is inconvenient for him and for his people on that side of the House—well, it is just as inconvenient to us. There are a tremendous number of amendments we have to study, but as far as I am concerned, we are proceeding with it, and I think that the Bill will come up for discussion again during the second half of next week.

In the second place he asked me about “work performed by prisoners”. Unfortunately, he did not make himself quite clear, but I think I should furnish a general reply to this question. I can inform him that as far as prisoners are concerned, the position is simply that one cannot allow these people to be idle. No person with the slightest knowledge of prisons would advocate that they should sit with folded arms doing nothing. That leads to frustration and to all kinds of outbursts; consequently one cannot do so. That, in general outline, is the position. In the first place we place such prisoners at the disposal of Government departments, among which we also include the provincial administration and schools, where necessary; in the second place we make them available to local authorities such as municipalities. After this has been done, and there are still prisoners left who are willing to go out, they can go to members of the public who are prepared to employ them on a daily basis. The policy there is that the person taking them pays a rate for them worked out in conjunction with the Department of Labour, but which means that it should be more or less on a par with the current rates in that particular area, always taking into consideration of course the fact that they are taken out at seven o’clock in the morning. It takes a long time before they reach their place of work. They have to have breakfast and lunch, and have to be back in the prison again at a certain time. That is the general policy. If the hon. member wants further particulars he can ask me for them, and I shall try to reply to him.

The hon. member for Potchefstroom touched upon the question of Afrikaans in Hotels, and asked a few questions about the standpoint of Mr. Justice Kowie Marais in regard to magistrates, who should be under the control of the Chief Justice and not under that of the Minister of Justice. Concerning the bilingualism issue, there was a reaction to this, in the first place by the hon. member for Durban Point, and also by the hon. member for Von Brandis. I think I should deal with that now, i.e. with the question of bilingualism. This matter goes back a long way. I think that if you want to talk about patience and tact, then I am the person who has evinced both these virtues. This is not something which was sprung upon these people. In the first place I want hon. members to bear in mind, and bear it in mind very clearly, that it is not being laid down as a requirement that a particular person should be bilingual because we want to make a criminal of him or her if they cannot attend to people in both Afrikaans and English. It is the hotel owner who suffers because of that. The hotel owner is prohibited from employing such a person if he or she cannot attend to people in both official languages. Bear in mind that what is involved here is not Afrikaans only, but English as well, and also bear in mind that in the Free State, and in rural towns, it is Afrikaans that is spoken for the most part. There they must therefore be able to speak English as well. Along the West Coast here it is in general Afrikaans that is spoken. They must also be able to speak English there. As the figures I shall mention to you in a moment will indicate, there are also people who cannot speak English. It is not only people who failed Afrikaans. But I should like to recount the history of this matter. It so happened that the history of this matter began in my own town in 1967. There, someone came into an hotel and insisted on being served in his own language, Afrikaans. The young woman at the hotel looked at him askance; she called her husband, who also looked at him askance. There was a Bantu who was busy polishing the floor, to whom they then said: “John come here and assist the gentleman.” That was the attitude. When this was brought to my attention I told the hotel people that it was wrong to adopt that attitude in our country. They said they had a great deal of difficulty in finding the right people. I said: “Very well, I shall allow you to have one White person on the entire premises who could attend to everyone in his or her particular language.” That was my first concession to them. Then, in 1970, it so happened that this unpleasant incident with Mr. Hans Abraham occurred, which we discussed here, and I think Minister Loots was also involved, and an appeal was made to me by this side of the House to do something in this regard.

Did it not begin with the Herstigtes?

No, it had nothing to do with the Herstigtes. I do not want the hon. member to try to distract my attention now with jokes. After the discussion took place in Parliament, I went and asked the chairman of the National Liquor Board please to arrange an interview with organized hotel industry, with FEDHASA. That interview took place on 14th October, 1970, three years ago. The chairman of the National Liquor Board told them of the events that had taken place, that I did not feel happy about the position, and that something had to be done. Sir, the usual thing happened. The usual thing is this: “We are all in favour of bilingualism; we would like to be bilingual, but it is impossible.” In other words, the same attitude as hon. members opposite adopted here tonight. In any case, this discussion went on for a long time, and at one stage the chairman of FEDHASA made this comment: “I suggest that nothing be done in this regard. We will issue a circular; we will put our house in order.” That was the promise which was made, that FEDHASA would see to it that their house was put in order. We were satisfied with that. They said they would send out a circular to their people asking them definitely to do something now. Now I should just like to read out to the Committee what FEDHASA itself said in October, 1970, after that interview had taken place in a very good spirit.

They wrote to all hotels—

They went on to say—

Remember, that was in 1970—

That is what they said; not what I said—

That is what they wrote, and then the circular, which I am afraid I have to finish reading, went on to say—

That is probably from the book—

That is what they said to hoteliers—

They made this appeal to hoteliers in 1970. Hon. members may take it from me now that since 1970, and since this circular was written, nothing has been done by the hotel industry throughout the country to promote bilingualism.

Nothing?

I am saying, absolutely nothing. In November of last year I had representatives of FEDHASA with me again, and they admitted that nothing had been done. There is therefore nothing strange about this. In the meantime complaints had been received, then from these then from those. It was always Afrikaans that was not given equal treatment. I then issued a statement on 15th October to the effect that they should ensure that they have bilingual receptionists and telephonists as from 1st February. Again it seemed as if the end of the world had come. They rushed to see me and pleaded—it could not be done; it was out of the question. Of course they were in favour of bilingualism, just as the United Party is, but, they said, it was out of the question; it could not be done. That was the attitude throughout. That side of the House interprets the standpoint of the hotel industry precisely. However, it so happened that the technical colleges for advanced education then closed for the December holiday, and in view of that I granted a further postponement to 1st April. I think it was very fair, and they admitted that it was. Now I want to quote from the March edition of their own mouthpiece, The Hotelier—

The following is very important:

They themselves made the discovery that the people are more bilingual than was first thought. I quote further—

This is what these people themselves said in March. Now I just want to recount what happened when I made the announcement. The hon. member for Durban Point discussed this matter this evening and he blew hot and cold, but we still do not know where he stands. This was his reaction …

Read my Hansard.

I shall tell the hon. member what his reaction was. I want to quote from one of the Durban newspapers …

Zonk. [Interjections.]

I want to quote from one of the Durban dailies:

Now we are communists because we insist in our own country on the promotion of our own language.

Yes, but this is private enterprise.

The hon. member for Durban North was of course quickly at hand, and had the following to say about this matter—

He went even further and said—

It was, therefore, either Mr. Roux or the Broederbond which insisted on this. The first reaction of the hon. member for Durban North to the statement was: “What damn nonsense!” I quote—

There it is again!

Let me say this to hon. members now: Go to France, or to Germany, or anywhere in Europe, and then refuse to speak the language of that country in hotels; tell them it is “a lot of damn nonsense”, or say it is “communistic tendencies”, or some-something of that nature. It is a disgrace. Here two gentlemen have risen, and so far they have not yet stated whether they are for or against it. They are against it, Sir.

May I ask the hon. the Minister a question?

No, sit down. They will pay lip-service to bilingualism, but when it comes to the push, they cannot do it. We find a person who speaks German, English and I do not know what else, but who, so help me, cannot speak Afrikaans. In addition, I want to tell the hon. member that I know that story of the hotel industry. I have had the same difficulty with the hotel industry before, with the question of classification. They simply did not believe in classification, and said the whole lot would go bankrupt. They wanted to make it clear to the Minister of Finance that the whole thing would cost R30 million, and that he had to put a stop to this foolishness in which I was engaged. The present Prime Minister, who was then Minister of Justice, piloted that Act in question through the House in 1963, and I inherited it in 1966. At that stage the hotel industry were still adopting the attitude of “Oh well, they will not classify”. I then called them together and said that we intended to classify, and warned them. We were fair with them, and today the whole lot has been classified. Some were sold after they had been classified, and the land of some of them was worth more than the hotel was worth, but the actual result was that only 100 hotels fell by the wayside out of a total of 1 300; those 100 hotels received a wine and beer licence.

There were 1 500.

I know the hon. member argues about this, but his figures are wrong. I now want to inform hon. members that precisely the same thing will happen in regard to this matter. I also want to mention now what the tests have so far indicated. Up to 31st March 1471 telephone operators had already been tested, of whom 1 449 passed English, while 31 failed. In Afrikaans 1 379 passed, while 101 failed. Up to that date 3 243 reception clerks had written a test, and of them 3 225 passed English, while 32 failed English. Of that number 3 141 passed Afrikaans, while 115 failed. I am perfectly satisfied with these figures. Now I just want to say what my policy in this regard is. I am not going to send policemen out to every hotel. What I am in fact going to do, as surely as I am standing here, is that when there is a complaint, I shall follow it up, and have that hotel owner prosecuted.

Hear, hear!

I think I have given them a very long time. They have already had from 1970, when they themselves admitted that something ought to be done. I gave them until 1st April, 1973. If they have not yet been able to do this in our own country, they deserve to be prosecuted. That is my standpoint. The hon. member for Durban Point asked me what he could tell his people. He can tell his people that I am not going to send policemen to see what is happening. However, if I receive a complaint, he may be certain that I will take steps against that person. I am not going to take steps against the person directly involved, but against the hotel owner, for he has to ensure that the conditions which have been imposed, are complied with.

May I just point out to the hon. Minister, before he resumes his seat, that I received a complaint about an unfair language test which I brought to the attention of the Minister chapter and verse. Would he please reply to that?

I am very sorry. I forgot to deal with that, and I shall gladly do so now. I know nothing about that particular person; nor that particular magistrate, and I should very much like the hon. member to give me the details in private. I shall tell you what, inter alia, the instructions to the magistrates in this connection were (translation)—

You will agree that this does state that there should be conversations about bomb hoaxes.

I know nothing about that. The hon. member must give me the information in private. I shall read further—

The submission of documents submitted by educationists or institutions at which the persons in question passed examinations in both official languages, does not relieve the magistrate of the duty of testing applicants properly. Such documents carry weight, but need not necessarily be decisive.

In other words, the premise was that what should be involved here was subjects which could apply to an hotel. That was the idea, and if a magistrate did act as the hon. member said, I should like to hear about it—there will probably be more people who will have to be tested in future—for then the magistrate acted incorrectly. I find it almost impossible to believe, for the instructions are very clear in that connection.

I come now to the hon. member for Houghton. She touched upon quite a few matters here. In the first place she asked: Why not a remission of sentence in the case of political prisoners? I want to ask her why political prisoners? We do not grant a remission of sentence for immorality either. The hon. member is not being logical. We do not grant remission of sentence for cattle theft, or for illicit diamond buying. Nor do we grant a remission of sentence in regard to drug peddling, nor do we grant remission in cases where people were driving under the influence of liquor or drugs. So there is nothing strange about this. It is State policy; we simply do not grant it in their case, just as we do not grant it in other cases either. If the hon. member wishes to be consistent, she should plead for the other cases as well.

Of course I do. [Interjections.]

I am sorry, but I cannot hear. I think that an adequate reply has been given by the hon. member for Krugersdorp in regard to the case of Bram Fischer and Robey Leibbrandt. The two differ as day from night. When the National Party Government came into power in 1948, three years after the war, they decided, since there was no longer any danger, to free Robey Leibbrandt.

That was a political gesture.

It does not matter. The circumstances in which that decision was taken were entirely safe. But what is the position with Bram Fischer today? Bram Fischer has not changed his views one iota. In fact, Bram Fischer still says from time to time—whether he says this in a joke or not, I do not know—to people who go there, particularly the warders: “One of these days you will be sitting here and I will be walking about outside.” That is his attitude. Whether the hon. member for Houghton wants to know it or not, we are today in the midst of a far more dangerous war than was the case with the last World War. I am talking about South Africa now. That is the difference between the two.

[Inaudible.]

I am sorry I cannot hear the hon. member.

Does that hold good for all the political prisoners?

There is another matter to which I want to reply. The hon. member mentioned a case which recently appeared before the Executive Council. It was a case where a White man and a Bantu had been charged with and found guilty of murder. After consideration it was decided to reprieve the White man and remit his sentence to imprisonment for 15 years, while it was decided that the Black man should be executed. That day I told the other members of the Executive Council that they would still see the kind of things that were going to be said about that decision. And truly, on the facts before us, it was not possible to take any other decision. If the White man had been in the Black man’s position, precisely the same sentence would have been confirmed. What actually happened? I shall read out to hon. members what the Black man admitted. He said the following in a confession (translation)—

“Bulvang” is apparently a term used when a person is seized and robbed. I shall read further—

It is being alleged that the Black man was under the influence of the White man, but according to what happened here, it was the Black man who played, the dominant role. He is the person who took the watch; he is the person who sold it; he is the person who shared out the money; he is the person who took R1-80 for himself while he gave the White man only R1-20. I am mentioning these things simply to clarify the position.

It is the Black man who struck the blows with the knife.

Yes, the Black man is the one who struck the blows with the knife. I proceed to quote further from this statement by the Black man—

Sir, those were the circumstances of the case. They were both found guilty, but in the court a quo one of the assessors did not want to find this Wilson fellow guilty at all. He said: “No, Wilson could not have known that the Bantu had a knife on him and would use it. He did not know that. Mug (bulvang) does not mean to stab someone with a knife. It means that you hold someone and then rob him.” The record indicates that the deceased was attacked by the two accused. He received two stab wounds in the chest, two in the back and one in the arm. There were five stab wounds altogether. His watch was stolen. Money which he had on him was not taken because there were too many interruptions from passing vehicles. There is nothing on record that Wilson knew that the Bantu was armed with a knife. All the stabbing was done by the Bantu who admitted it in the words I read out a moment ago. Apart from the fact that the Bantu undoubtedly played the dominant role from beginning to end—there is no doubt at all about that—it is also a fact that the Bantu had had a previous conviction of eight years’ imprisonment. He had a previous conviction of robbery with aggravating circumstances. There he also stabbed a White person with a knife. For that a sentence of eight years’ imprisonment was imposed on him. According to his own evidence the Bantu earned R14-42 per week and he was still employed at the time of the murder. According to the evidence the White man was mentally deficient. He was in a school for retarded persons and could only qualify as a metal worker. He had a weak character. He came from a broken home. He had gone through two episodes of mental derangement.

Reference was made to this by a certain Barend van Niekerk, an old pal of mine, and also of the hon. member for Houghton. Barend van Niekerk made all kinds of harsh remarks. I think it was in the Sunday Times and I think the Mail also published a leading article in regard to this matter. At the moment we are having that article which Barend van Niekerk wrote examined. I am saying now that if Barend van Niekerk has given me any cause to do so, I am going to prosecute him. I am going to bring a claim against him. He does not have the right to make such statements in regard to the executive authority, the Executive Council, in this country. Barend van Niekerk’s statements in newspapers have done us a great deal of harm. The hon. member put questions in that regard this afternoon; she was not making a political issue out of it.

She was.

Very well, but I do not want to regard it in that light. However, I am pleased for having had the opportunity of being able to clear up this matter, for it is absolutely cut and dried: If it had been the Black man who seized the deceased, if it had been the Black man who had not known that the White man had had a knife, if it had been the White man who had done the stabbing, if it had been the Black man who had been mentally retarded and if it had been the White man who, on the other hand, had had the stronger personality and who had shared out the money, precisely the same would have happened to the Black man as happened to this White man. That is my reply to the hon. member for Houghton in regard to this matter.

I think that with this I have in fact replied to the hon. members. I owe a word of thanks to the hon. members for Krugersdorp and Potchefstroom for the way in which they replied. In particular I owe a word of thanks to the hon. member for Pretoria Central who made the question of restrictions very clear. He pointed out that we had in fact refrained from restricting quite a number of people this year, and that we had in other cases lifted restrictions. We assess these matters in an absolutely impartial manner, and if it is in any way possible we release the people. That is the position in that regard.

Mr. Chairman …

I beg your pardon, there is another point to which I must reply. The hon. member for Durban Point raised the matter of sectional titles. Sir, we foresaw that people would use the Sectional Titles Act to try to give new buyers the right to get rid of inhabitants and tenants. Consequently we provided specifically in section 39 that a person shall not, on the plea that he has bought such a property, have the right to evict any person falling under the Rents Act. I went further. The other day, on 26th March, I issued a special Press statement, when I found that this was nevertheless still happening. I said the following—

Therefore the protection is there, and I have warned these people again. I think the hon. member ought to be satisfied.

Mr. Chairman, I should like to take up with the hon. the Minister two matters with which he dealt in the course of his replies to the debate. The first relates to the question of bannings. He resented the insistence on his remark that he felt that he could not provide a platform to these people, and that he preferred to ban them. I do not think we can dismiss that lightly, because what he has said has also been said by one or two other members on his side. One of them, for instance, dealt with the difficulty of insisting on the rule of law because in our law a person is regarded as innocent until he is proved guilty. There may be some problem in proving his guilt in a court of law, and on that ground he justifies the principle of banning. The hon. the Minister dealt with the question of providing a platform for publicity for people like Fischer and Mandela. He said that they had made certain statements, not under oath, before the courts and that those statements had gone overseas. But, Sir, those people were found guilty by a judge of the Supreme Court and they were duly sentenced according to our law.

Sir, I come now to the case of these people who have been banned recently. If they are guilty of utterances in contravention of the Suppression of Communism Act, which is very comprehensive in its terms, then they should be brought to trial. The simplest method for the Executive of course, to use is to ban them, but that is not the way in which law is administered in South Africa. I am not interested in the quotations of the hon. member for Kroonstad. We have a well-established legal tradition in this country; we have a Judiciary of which we are proud; we have a standard of justice of which every legal man has always been very proud, and the public has always had great confidence in our system of law. If it was recommended that some sort of action should be taken against these people, then that recommendation must be interpreted as meaning that action must be taken against them according to the laws of this country, and it should not be very difficult for the hon. the Minister to take action in terms of an Act such as the Suppression of Communism Act, which is so comprehensive where people threaten to overthrow the State by revolution, or where they attempt to do so. Why should a platform for these people be harmful to South Africa if we tell the world that they are being charged before our courts of law in accordance with the normal traditions of Western civilization? Sir, that is what is wanted, and our main objection on this side of the House is to this arbitrary form of action in the shape of banning, which is the simplest way out where the Executive feels that it is enjoined to take some action but where it is not sure whether it has the right to take action in a court of law and therefore decides, for some reason known only to itself, to take action by banning these people. While the hon. the Minister himself might not personally have intended to do this, he has obviously given effect to a Cabinet decision. He is a member of the Government, and his remarks cannot be taken lightly because these remarks are indicative of the thinking of the Government. This side of the House has always objected most violently to banning. There are many other methods by which the movement of people can be restricted. They can be arrested and brought before the courts and remanded from time to time until sufficient evidence has been gathered. There are very many traditional methods of dealing with people who are suspected of having committed a serious crime such as an offence under the Suppression of Communism Act. The Minister says that we on this side of the House have read something which he never intended into his remark that he did not want to give these particular people a platform. Sir, these remarsk should not come so easily from the lips of a responsible man, particularly a man like the hon. Minister for whom I, too, in common with his own members, have a high regard as a lawyer with many years of experience.

Then I want to go on to another point, and that is the hon. the Minister’s reply with regard to the question of legal aid. Sir, it is also not so easy to dismiss this whole question of legal aid on the ground that this matter is to be dealt with by the Legal Aid Board. We are well aware of that fact. But I can tell the hon. the Minister that nobody can spend more money than is voted to it by Parliament. In 1969-70 the amount voted was R50 000; in 1970-71 it was R150 000; in 1971-72 it dropped to R50 000; in 1972-73 it was increased to R201 000, and now provision is again being made for R210 000. It may surprise the hon. the Minister to know that in a large city like Johannesburg, the largest city in South Africa, with perhaps the greatest concentration of all sections of the community, there is only one officer who has to cope with all the work connected with legal aid. This scheme, as the hon. the Minister knows, is based on the accepted principle that the poor or indigent person should not be deprived of legal assistance. Where they need it by reason of indigence, just as people require medical aid, they should get it.

The second principle we have to bear in mind is that legal assistance must be meaningful and should not be based on voluntary charitable impulses. It should be based on a proper, well-established system of assisting people and as has been suggested, the spectrum should be a little wider. We cannot leave legal aid to help only the very poor, of whom very few exist, or let the administration of law or the rights of persons be confined to the very rich who can afford to pay. There should be a wider spectrum to enable people in the middle-income group also to have the opportunity of being assisted by legal aid.

Another factor which is of importance in regard to legal aid is that legal aid should assist people not only in criminal work but also in civil work and in regard to the unravelling of the many statutes to which people are subjected in this complicated society in which we live. Just to give an example of how it is working at the moment, according to the figures up to the 31st March, 1972, in the whole of South Africa only 96 persons in criminal cases were assisted by legal aid, of whom 27 were Whites 31 were Coloureds and 38 were Bantu. The figures relating to civil cases were higher. There were over 5 000 cases, those of Whites numbering 3 000-odd, Coloureds 1 200-odd and Bantu 947. Those of the Whites were mostly matrimonial cases, third party insurance cases, breaches of contract, etc. Now it is essential for the Minister not only to leave it to a Legal Aid Board, but to take an interest to ensure that legal aid works satisfactorily, that in big cities you have more than one legal aid officer and that it is known to people that legal aid is provided. Magistrates and even members of the Police Force who arrest people should inform them that they have the right to seek legal assistance and that it is available through the State. It is all very well to say that it is left to the Legal Aid Board, but there must be some direction given to ensure that the hundreds of thousands of people who have to appear in court know about it. For instance, in 1970, 1,3 million persons appeared in criminal courts throughout the country. [Time expired.]

For a few moments, first of all, I just want to give the Department of Justice the necessary praise and I also want to pay tribute to the officials for the work they are doing. This Committee has been dealing with this matter for some hours today, and it seems as if the work being done by the Department of Justice and by the Department of Prisons is simply being passing by without a word. I want to pay tribute to those people. If we look at the annual report of the Department of Justice and, in addition, to the annual report of the Commissioner of Prisons, we find that here there are two departments, under one Ministry, that are really doing great work. These people do not only lock up their problems, they also try to solve their problems by doing the necessary rehabilitation work. The Department of Justice has again, as in the past, kept itself busy with many aspects. In addition to the training courses which were held for prosecutors and where an ample number of prosecutors were trained, not only for the Department of Justice, but also for allocation for service in the Police, it has also been seen to that the necessary officials will be there to do the work, Judicial work was also taught and training courses were held for those who wanted to qualify themselves further. This is something the hon. member for Florida mentioned, i.e. the extra qualifications which Justice officials must have. Courses for interpreters were also held so that they could keep completely abreast of every facet of legal provisions and their interpretation, including the terminology, so that they could do completely excellent interpreting in the various languages. Courses were also held for masters of the Supreme Court. Provincial inspectors were trained. Great work was done for the Deeds Office and also, as has already been stated, for the Police and the Department of Prisons. In addition, academic courses were allowed, and persons were subsidized in order to allow them to qualify themselves at universities for their work in the Department of Justice.

In addition to all these efforts which the Department of Justice is making with a staff of about 6 000, there are, as I interpret the figures, more than 1 100 vacancies or posts filled by temporary staff which the department must make use of. I think it befits us as parliamentarians, and every hon. member who is taking part in this debate, to go to the world at large and say that there is no better calling than to be trained in the administration of justice and then, in particular, to join a department like the Department of Justice to carry out this big task for the country and the people. I think it befits us to state that here is no happier group of people, and that there is no better group of people to rub shoulders with, than the officials of the Department of Justice.

I must, of course, add, as a magistrate told me in my young days, that one would never become a rich man in the Department of Justice, but at least one would always be rubbing shoulders with “gentlemen”. That is the gospel truth. In that respect the officials also have the privilege of frequently coming into contact with members of the Bar and the Side-Bar, thereby also to hone themselves along those lines for the future. We are dealing with this type of person and with this department. We have the highest regard for the department, we have the interests of the department and those of its officials very much at heart and we would like to see them going from strength to strength.

When we are dealing with such a department, and the legal work which must have utmost priority in the country so that law and order will be maintained at all times, we find that adverse comments are sometimes heard, even from hon. members of the House. It did not really surprise me, but it was nevertheless a shock to hear how the hon. member for Durban North attacked the hon. the Minister of Justice. One could perhaps still excuse this, because the hon. the Minister of Justice is here and he can tackle him and give him a licking for the mistakes he makes. But I think it was sometimes tactless and wrong of him to have attacked the hon. the Minister of Justice with utterances aimed at the officials of the Department, those people who cannot get onto a platform and defend themselves, those people who cannot get up in this House and defend themselves. I do not think that oblique references should be made about them, as the hon. member for Florida has also done.

The hon. member for Florida began his speech very well. He spoke in terms suggesting that there could sometimes be discontent and even dissatisfaction, but he also referred to the fact that the officials must have many years of study behind them, that they sometimes work overtime and have to solve many problems in their free time in order to be able to continue with the work the next day. I admire statements like that. But when he says that there is a basic problem, and when he wants to relate the basic problem to an utterance of a certain hon. judge, I find a great deal of fault with that. I do so because I cannot and will not agree with him when that is what he is saying. I think that if he had had enough experience, he would not have agreed with himself that magistrates are not independent. I challenge any attorney, advocate or hon. member to prove to me that a magistrate in this country of ours does not carry out his work absolutely independently, objectively and without prejudice. I think the sting lies in the following: There was a fairly indirect plea to the effect that the officials of the Department of Justice should be a little more independent and that one should possibly do away with the role of the Minister of Justice, who is the highest authority in the Department and who exercises his discretion, as someone rightly mentioned here, soundly and in a judicial manner. The object of that argument was to detract from this basic right, and if one does this one must also discredit the basic principles of the post of magistrate. Magistrates must be independent, but under whose authority must they then be? Must they be under the authority of Parliament or under the authority of someone outside? The hon. members did not spell this out. The real sting came when the hon. member for Florida came very near to the point where he could have said that the solution lay in also declaring magistrates and regional magistrates to be professional officials like many others so that they could then also, much more easily, come into consideration when it came to the appointment of judges. However, he shied away from that because they are not very keen to have that; in fact, he did so as a result of an utterance that was made to the effect that it would never catch on with them. For that reason I say that there is, in fact, some slight praise from their side, but on the other hand they state that some or other damper must be kept on those people, because otherwise they could possibly compete on an equal footing with those in the Bar, from whose ranks judges are chiefly appointed.

Then there is one further matter I want to mention. The hon. member for Jeppes, who has just resumed his seat, spoke here of the activities of the Legal Aid Board. I think that if the hon. member is interested in that, as I have also been in the past, he or I or one of the others could see to it that our people go and do voluntary service on that committee or with the legal aid office’s staff, as has been done in the past. In that way one can ensure that legal aid is given to people in a proper manner. I do not think, however, that he should expect large-scale public advertising to be done. He must also remember that as soon as one does large-scale public advertising, the Side-Bar would say that people are now being advised to go to the legal aid division instead of going through the normal channels of the Side-Bar. Consequently we also have a problem there that will have to be bridged in the future. The fact remains that voluntary aid must be given. [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman, never before in this House, in the past few days, have we seen the bankruptcy of the hon. Opposition as clearly illustrated as when they thought it necessary to devote more than 50 of their speeches to an interjection. If we were to have sunk to the same level, I and the next five speakers would probably have been able to make more virulent speeches about the interjection the hon. member for Durban Point made a while ago. After the hon. the Minister of Justice had said that he would take action against the management of hotels in which bilingualism does not come into its own, he made the following interjection in a cynical tone of voice: “Save South Africa from communists and terrorists.” I am asking hon. members what this has to do with bilingualism. What basic spirit and what basic approach does this reveal in the case of the hon. member for Durban Point in respect of national security and in respect of bilingualism? But we are not so bankrupt that we need to make speeches about interjections of the order and class of the interjection the hon. member made here. Again in this debate, with a great fanfare of trumpets, the Opposition complained about the people who are refused access to our courts. They were effectively and searchingly replied to by hon. members on this side. I also want to speak about the accessibility of our courts, but not the accessibility in respect of people who want to overthrow the existing order in South Africa or people who want to promote communism, for my concern lies with the accessibility of our courts to the ordinal citizen of the country. Thus, for example, there is the person who is involved in a motor accident and must defend himself against a charge of negligent driving, or a person who wants to institute a claim for compensation for the damage he has suffered in that accident. This ordinary citizen is entitled, according to our law, to defend himself in court with or without legal aid, legal assistance or legal representation. He is also entitled to institute a civil claim in a court in connection with his damage. However, far too often he is afraid to do this because he is afraid of the legal costs involved. This fear of legal costs on the part of the public has also rippled out into all spheres of the law, wider than court cases themselves. They are even afraid to consult an attorney to obtain legal advice about a contract that must be signed. I want to request that we adopt a positive attitude in this Committee for a moment, instead of making speeches about interjections, and that we dwell on the question of legal costs and give consideration to a few possible steps that we can take from this House to limit legal costs.

I want to hasten to say that the public frequently has a wrong impression of legal costs. The legal profession, advocates and attorneys, are subject to very strict codes with respect to their fees and ethical standards. They are not robbers. This evening I want to take up the cudgels and from this House assure the public that they are in good hands if they turn to the legal profession from whatever sphere. And yet, despite that fact, it is true that legal costs increase as do others, and that we are called upon here, for the sake of our people, for the sake of good order and for the sake of justice, to try to keep our legal costs as low as possible without prejudicing our standards. One way of keeping our legal costs low would be to ask our legal practitioners to take the knock themselves, as the Englishman would say. However, we cannot ask them to continually reduce their profit margin, because if we were to do that we would be placing the standards of our justice in jeopardy, since the competent people, or the more competent young men, would then not enter the legal world. They would then go and seek more profitable pastures. Therefore we must look for a way in which to keep legal costs within limits. I want to suggest that we should find that solution against the background of the general idea of time and money.

We are living in an era in which everything is going faster, and if we could save time, we would save money. Then, of course, we also bring down the costs. I therefore advocate that we should aim at saving time, time which would reduce the costs because less of the solicitors’ and advocates’ time would be taken up and we would also save the time of our magistrates. Thereby a very positive contribution could also be made towards solving the staff shortage we have in that connection. There are probably many possible ideas we could put forward here about how we could save time in our courts. In the time at my disposal I want to content myself with two practical ideas. In the first place I notice from the annual report of the Department of Justice that a start has been made by the department on a comprehensive inquiry into the question of the use of tape recordings during court proceedings. At the moment in our ordinary magistrates courts, except in exceptional cases, the position is that every magistrate writes down every word of evidence in longhand. This is a procedure which is probably very frustrating for such a magistrate in the first place. In the second place it has a very adverse effect on the legal representative’s cross-examination. In the third place—and that is what this is about —it takes times. I am absolutely convinced that if we were to ensure that in every magistrates court, or at least in every superior criminal court and in every civil court, tape recordings are made, we would save at least a third of the time of the magistrate, the attorney or advocate, the accused or plaintiff, the witnesses and everyone involved. If we were to do that, we would bring about an effective saving in costs. I therefore want to advocate that an inquiry be instituted to purchase such machines which could be controlled simply by the court personnel and which would eliminate the taking down of evidence in longhand by the magistrate who is a highly qualified expert.

Then, as a practical example, I want to mention the question of a motor accident, and against that background advocate that we do something similar—and now hon. members of the Opposition must not get a heart attack—with our civil procedure as what we are now doing with our criminal procedure, i.e. to introduce a new abbreviated procedure wherever we can. The Secretary for Justice wrote an interesting article a few years ago about motor accidents in which he set out how much time is taken up as a result of a motor accident. If a motor accident takes place today we frequently have a criminal case, followed by a full civil case that goes hand in hand with it. If we could combine these two procedures so that the magistrate could simultaneously hear the evidence of the parties and subsequently mete out the punishment that he thinks should be meted out, and at the same time make an apportionment of damages, we would bring about a tremendous saving in time. I am advocating a new orientation in respect of the saving of time in our administration of justice so that we can thereby combat the cost inflation in the legal profession.

Mr. Chairman, it is always good to listen to an apt pupil. I really must express my appreciation of what the hon. member who has just sat down said with regard to the question of accelerating the procedure in the criminal courts. It is one of the matters which I raised under a Bill a little while ago in this House. I refer to the reorganization of the entire administration in our criminal courts. In that regard I fully agree with the hon. member. I must, however, join issue with him on the latter point with regard to the question of motor accidents and civil claims under the M.V.A., but I do not think this is the time or the occasion to deal with that. Nevertheless it is interesting to know that one can get in the course of a debate of this nature the constructive approach with which members on this side of the House completely agree.

I want to proceed with the other factor, the question of costs. We all agree that costs should be kept as low as we can keep them. We all know that everything in the country is rising; salaries are rising; rents are rising; the cost of paper is rising; the cost of equipment such as machines is rising. All of these constitute the modern legal office of today. For instance, I know of a firm in Johannesburg, a firm of, I think, 15 partners that is paying a rental of, I think, R6 000 per month in the new Carlton building. We could add the use of all sorts of modern equipment such as electric typewriters and photostat machines. There is no question that we in South Africa are moving with the times. We are moving ahead to a very much higher level than in the past in regard to efficiency. But this all costs money. This leads me back to the problem to which the hon. the Minister should direct much more attention, namely the question of legal aid. I want to refer to certain extracts concerning someone who has had a lot of experience with this work. The hon. member for Innesdal referred to the question of voluntary organizations. We have voluntary organizations that have done legal aid work for years. The Johannesburg Legal Aid Bureau has been the backbone of legal aid in South Africa for many years. It has provided services that were urgently required. Its average has been over 1 000 interviews per month. But this is currently about to close because contributions in money and in kind have fallen away in the face of the Government legal aid scheme. In countries like the United States every assistance is given by the Bar and the Side-Bar to promote legal aid and to ensure, where possible, that every person who faces any criminal trial should have some form of legal aid. This is something we may have to come to and with which we will have to deal in due course. Every person who is accused of any crime is invited to seek that legal aid, more particularly if there is the possibility of a gaol sentence following. In fact there have been some very interesting cases of recent date in the United States. As you know, they have in the United States a very advanced Bar which is operated on the basis of the fusion of the dual system. Tremendous advance has been made in the approach to assist people. At the moment it is reported by people who know—and I will give the hon. member an article by the director who looked after the Johannesburg Legal Aid Bureau—that there is no room for providing legal advice. As I have said, one legal aid officer in Johannesburg can, in the nature of things, be nothing more than a conduit pipe to practitioners handling cases that require litigation. Furthermore, in terms of our system, all legal practitioners are now being paid, which is the correct thing to do. In the States big legal firms take their junior partners and some of their advanced articled clerks and allocate them to play their part in this world of legal aid. These junior partners earn more than some of the most senior people in South Africa because salaries are very high over there. When we bring this to the attention of the hon. the Minister we do not want to accuse him of failing the country on legal aid. We accuse him of not giving sufficient impetus and direction to what is taking place. In addition there is the aspect of finance. The finance is weak. Over the last five years, and including the 1973-’74 provision, only R650 000 to R700 000 has been made available. We have the figures from the Budget statement.

You left out South-West Africa.

I am only dealing with the Republic. South-West Africa at the moment is a mandatory territory. I am not concerned with that. I am concerned with 1 300 000 criminal cases that took place in the Republic of South Africa in the year 1970. It is merely an indication of what is taking place. Sir, now that we have adopted the principle of this system, let us bring it up to date and put it into full force. Let the hon. the Minister call for R500 000; let him have proper legal aid offices. I made inquiries during the recess about five or six months ago, in the Johannesburg office, and I was referred to Pretoria. I must congratulate the Pretoria Director, who invited me to call on him so that he could give me a picture of what was taking place, but unfortunately it was getting towards the end of the year and I was unable to find the necessary time to visit him, but I did appreciate his invitation. This system has been in operation since 1969. Surely the time has arrived to put it into full force.

I want to make one final point with regard to what has been said here in connection with Mr. Epstein. In this connection I want to read out a little poem which I think the hon. the Minister will find of considerable interest. It reads this way—

That gentleman, a former member of the Cabinet and an hon. Ambassador of our country in Rome, took very great issue with the whole of the Government policy with regard to the Nico Malan Theatre. Sir, we did not accuse the Government of changing their policy. [Time expired.]

Sir, I do not want to follow up the hon. member for Jeppe’s argument about legal aid, etc. I shall perhaps come back at a later stage to what he said in connection with Mr. Epstein. But I should just like to ask the hon. the Minister again that attention be given to the idea of increasing the jurisdiction of our magistrates courts, so that they can function more or less along the lines of our regional courts. Sir, bearing in mind that as many as 30 000 or more civil cases were handled by the Supreme Court in the past year, I believe that a step of this kind would contribute a great deal towards relieving the position in the Supreme Court. With the expansion of urban areas, with rapidly growing populations, which are not situated in the vicinity of Supreme Court seats, but which are dependent upon magistrates courts in those areas, I believe it would serve a good purpose if the jurisdiction of our magistrates courts could be increased, also bearing in mind that the value of money has considerably decreased in recent times.

Sir, I am glad the hon. member for Pinelands is here, because I should like to say a few words about a remark which he made here early this evening when he spoke of the “rule of law” and said, if I have understood him correctly, that in their day everyone was tried properly. Have I understood the hon. member correctly?

I did not say a word about the “rule of law”.

No, but that was the drift of the hon. member’s argument. Sir, I am not prepared to accept that statement of that kind. I want to remind that hon. member, who is relatively young, of the days when the United Party had to implement the “rule of law” in this country, when there was a war in progress, and what course did that take? There were members of the Ossewabrandwag who were opposed to the war effort, and some of them were put into gaol for months by the United Party, in whose ranks there are today still members of the Ossewabrandwag sitting here …

Without trial— “because there was a war on”.

Yes, without trial. They landed up in gaol merely on the scant evidence of every Tom Dick and Harry who was willing to go and make a statement to the magistrate.

We acted against fifth columnists.

Sir, these people were not communists.

They were Nazis.

These people were not terrorists. They were Afrikaners who were put behind bars without trial by a United Party Government and I am aware of the fact that clients I represent were put in gaol for six months before a telegram came from the then Minister of Justice, Colin Steyn, to say that the case against them was being withdrawn; that they could be released from gaol. They were set free after they had sat in gaol for three or four months, and I can assure you, Sir, that the health of some of those people, who are still here today, was impaired.

Shame!

That is a United Party’s conception, if it were to come into power, of what the “rule of law” really entails.

May I ask a question?

No, I have only a few minutes at my disposal. If the hon. member wants to dispute this in a speech, let him then do so. But that was the conduct of the United Party. [Interjections.]

Was he a traitor?

There was no justification for that, as little justification as there is for the hon. member for Durban North to ask whether he was a traitor. There was no test of whether he was a traitor or not, because he was locked up without trial, according to the “rule of law” as implemented by the United Party; no norms were laid down.

What of Robey Leibbrandt?

Order! Would hon. members please give the hon. member a chance to make his speech?

But I now come to this shying away, on the part of the United Party, from the statement that was made by Mr. Epstein. The hon. member for Durban Point spoke of “a few unknown Progressives”. I think that was also said by the hon. member for Durban North.

Why do you twist what I said?

Order! The hon. member must withdraw that word.

I withdraw the word “twist”, but may I ask why he does not quote what I said?

The hon. member may proceed.

Why did you “unknowingly twist”.

Order: If the hon. member for Florida thinks he can trifle with the Chair, I shall take action against him. I do not want to hear such a remark again; he must withdraw it.

I withdraw it.

We are aware of the fact that this plea for the release of Bram Fischer is being inspired by members like the hon. member for Houghton, by the Rev. Dennis Hurley, by Barend Van Niekerk of the University of the Witwatersrand, to whom the hon. the Minister has already referred, and by Leslie Blackwell. If I am not mistaken, Leslie Blackwell was the judge who imposed the death sentence on Robey Leibbrandt, and who is now pleading for the release of Bram Fischer. It is a fact that it is always these leftists who come along and lodge pleas for the Mandelas and the Bram Fischers, but now there is also a voice from the ranks of the United Party, which they are now trying to explain away by speaking of the “unknown Progressives”. They ask: “Who is Epstein?” Epstein is a member of the Provincial Council and he has been sitting in the Transvaal Provincial Council for years as an esteemed member of the United Party. He has carried the banners of the United Party in constituencies in Johannesburg for years, and he is still doing so.

I have said that he is not speaking on behalf of the United Party.

David Epstein is one of the leaders of the United Party who is a colleague of, and associates intimately with, the leader of the United Party in the Transvaal, Harry Schwarz. Let us take note of why it is Epstein who said it. I shall say why. It is not a mere coincidence that David Epstein said it, as talkative as he usually is, and speaking as he does before he thinks, because we must remember that he is the M.P.C. for Houghton. [Interjections.]

Order!

Here, in typical vein, we have the transparent politics of the United Party. When it applies to Houghton and when David Epstein, the M.P.C. for Houghton, stands up there, knowing that he must compete with the hon. member here, he speaks in these terms. He then asks that Bram Fischer should be released.

Who succeeded Albert Hertzog in this House [Interjections.]

But then the hon. member for Durban North comes along and says in this House: “Bram Fischer is guilty of deliberately disguising himself in his profession to undermine the society in which we live.” [Time expired.]

Mr. Chairman … [Interjections.]

Order!

We know now that the ghost of Albert Hertzog still walks in this Chamber in the disguise of his successor, the hon. member for Ermelo. I want to ask the hon. member for Ermelo where was he at the time when the O.B. members were locked up by the Government of the day.

Ask Jan Moolman.

Where was he? Was he associating with these very people who were guilty of treason to their country? Was he one of those who were blowing up the post offices, as were others who were found guilty by the courts of this land?

Order! The hon. member must not insinuate that any member has been blowing up post offices.

With respect, Mr. Chairman, there is no insinuation whatsoever. I was merely asking a question.

Order ! The hon. member must not put questions of an insinuating nature.

Very well, Mr. Chairman, I shall not insinuate any further. I want to ask the hon. member whether he believes that the measures which were taken by the Government of the day in terms of the emergency regulations which had been promulgated because of a war in which we were engaged were justified. In that war we lost our own people, our kith and kin, who were killed not only at the battle front, but also here by seditionists, by traitors to their own country. They were killed in their own country by the associates of such people, who belonged to the Ossewabrandwag.

Ask Jan Moolman. [Interjections.]

Were we successful or did we fail in our attempts? I want to say that we were successful and I am proud of the fact that we were successful in dealing with these people. It is no good for the hon. member to come and say that we did away with the rule of law. Here I have a proclamation which was issued by this Government on 19th April, 1973. These are emergency measures which are taken in exactly the same way as those taken during the time of the war by the then United Party Government. What does this read?—

Does the hon. member for Ermelo, who is a member of the legal profession, agree with that principle?

The Afrikaners were the only ones who … [Interjections.]

It was not a question of Afrikaners; they were traitors! We did not take action against Afrikaners, but against traitors. This applies to both Afrikaners and English-speaking South Africans.

Order!

These people were traitors. Afrikaners are South Africans just as I am …

Bram Fischer is also an Afrikaner!

… but they were traitors. [Interjection.] We are not against the Afrikaners!

Order! I want to appeal to hon. members to give the hon. member an opportunity to make his speech without any interjections. This applies also to the hon. member for Florida, who has just as much to say.

I want to say to the hon. the Minister that we succeeded with our emergency measures, and he has failed the country dismally. He has failed to take the necessary action to isolate and to sterilize these people whom he himself has condemned as being traitors to our country. What has he done? He has merely banned them and that is all he has done, but he has not isolated them. He has not removed their influence from the people whom they were influencing and that was exactly the reason why he wanted to remove them. We at least took them and locked them up, but that hon. Minister has failed South Africa because he has not locked them up.

Do you want me to lock them up?

Yes, I want the hon. the Minister to bring them before the courts and to lock them up.

You did not bring them before the courts.

We had an emergency in the country; is there an emergency in the country at this stage? Where there is an emergency, these regulations have been issued to cover that situation. If there is an emergency, let the hon. the Minister proclaim an emergency; he has the power to do so. Let him then act in terms of those emergency regulations. Until such time as he does that, he must act in terms of his own law and bring the people before the courts.

They tell me that you looked after women.

He has failed the country because he has failed to remove the influence of those people from their followers. They are still in contact with their people and, as was said earlier, he has made martyrs of them.

I want to come back to the administration of this hon. Minister’s department. I want to ask him how far he is getting and how many problems he is facing with the administration of the affairs of his department since we amended the Magistrates’ Court Act, and since we have started to implement these new segregated districts. Now we have White magisterial districts and Black magisterial districts. I wonder how much trouble this has brought about. The hon. member for Innesdal says that the employees of the department are happy.

Of course.

I want to say that the hon. member’s speech would have been better made under the Vote of the hon. the Minister of the Interior. I hope he will repeat that speech then, because that is when we will talk to him about what is happening in this department, and not only in this department, but in the Public Service as a whole. I do not believe that this is the place to discuss that. I want to go further. What problems is the hon. the Minister having with the administration of the Liquor Act since the establishment of Bantu authorities and since the control and administration of the Liquor Act has been handed over to these Bantu authorities? The hon. the Minister looks surprised. Does he not know that this …

I am surprised because you are talking such a lot of nonsense.

Does the hon. the Minister concede that the administration of the Liquor Act is now in the hands of the Bantu Governments in the Black areas? The hon. the Minister shakes his head.

Are you referring to Kaffir beer?

Order!

Except in the Transkei, where it has been all along.

And KwaZulu?

No.

Well, then I wonder why the Secretary for Justice wrote to me on the 4th December last year and said that the National Liquor Boards could not consider an application for a liquor licence because it fell within the purview of the Government of KwaZulu. Now the hon. the Minister nods his head and concedes it. Now he agrees that it is so. Will the hon. the Minister, when he gets up to reply, tell us, if he knows, what difficulties he is having in his department with this administration? We have had a discussion here today about the application of his regulation regarding bilingualism. Just before I come to that, however, I must ask the hon. the Minister a specific question in regard to this matter. He concedes that the control of liquor matters in the Transkei has always been under the Transkei Liquor Board, and I agree with that, but will he now, before the Aliwal election, please tell the people of Matatiele what is going to happen to them? Will the people of Matatiele still continue to be controlled by the Transkei Liquor Code or are they going to come under the Republican Liquor Act, under the control of the Pietermaritzburg Board?

Coming back to the Minister’s regulation regarding bilingualism I want to know what is happening in the Black areas. How is it being applied there? What is bilingualism? The hon. the Minister told us just now in his reply to the debate that he defines it as a knowledge also of the other official language. How is this being applied in the Transkei? Because they do not have another official language. They have two other official languages. Which are being applied? Is it Xhosa and Afrikaans, and in KwaZulu is it Zulu and English, or is it perhaps Zulu and Xhosa, or is it Xhosa and Sotho perhaps? Which is being applied?

I will reply.

We look forward with interest to the reply of the hon. the Minister in this matter.

Unfortunately the hon. member for Potchefstroom is not here. This is a member for whom I have always had a very high regard, but I must say that I was disappointed in him this afternoon.

Why?

Just as a person.

*This afternoon he spoke about bilingualism in hotels, but he did not speak one word of English. He never even referred to the English language; all he spoke about was ensuring equal rights for Afrikaans. The hon. the Minister went further and admitted this evening that these regulations were introduced because the people had not been doing justice to Afrikaans. I am deeply disappointed. We on this side of the House do maintain bilingualism among our people.

†It is no good the hon. the Minister shaking his head and going off in a hump, because we have demonstrated here repeatedly that we are bilingual and that we are prepared to speak the other man’s language. I believe we are the living symbol of bilingualism in this country.

*I should like to hear from the hon. members on that side of the House on which occasions they express themselves in English, particularly the hon. member for Potchefstroom. He has never spoken English in this House. I want to repeat that I was deeply disappointed in the hon. member for Potchefstroom this afternoon.

Mr. Chairman, I do not think it is necessary for me to deal with the matter which the hon. member, who has just resumed his seat, raised in connection with Matatiele, but I nevertheless feel that it is essential for me to remind him again of the words which the hon. member for Kroonstad used here this afternoon. He is not listening now, because he has no answer to the standpoint that was adopted here. Hon. members will recollect that the hon. member for Kroonstad referred to the statements that were made by Judge Snyman with respect to the question of restrictions. He has quite probably had something to do with the law and is quite probably aware of how difficult it is to distinguish between preparations, acts and attempted acts, i.e. when an act of preparation becomes an attempted act.

It is quite significant that the hain Opposition attack against the hon. the Minister of Justice has specifically been the question of restrictions. It is also significant that not a word was said about this question of restrictions during the Second Reading debate. This was probably because they were “zipped” at that stage and could not say anything that had any bearing on the Schlebusch Commission. It is strange that the hon. member for Durban North is now kicking up such a fuss about the fact of restrictions. I just want to remind him that when the restrictions were imposed, the reaction of that side of the House was fairly mild. I want to remind hon. members of the reaction of their hon. leader, the Leader of the Opposition. According to Hansard of this year, col. 1490, he said—

Secondly, he asked—

The hon. member for Yeoville only asked what the provisions of the restriction order were. At a later stage (col. 1509) the hon. member for Yeoville said he was somewhat unhappy about these restrictions. He said that the reason why he was opposed to these people being restricted, was because he is satisfied that they are not communists. He nevertheless said in col. 1509 that their attitudes and patterns of behaviour were in line with similar patterns of behaviour of the South African Communist Party in London. He went on to say (col. 1513)—

He also said—

I just want to refer hon. members to the définition of “communism” as it is given in the Suppression of Communism Act—

1. (a) …
2. (b) which aims at bringing about any political, industrial, social or economic change within the Republic by the promotion of disturbance or disorder, by unlawful acts or omissions or by the threat of such acts or omissions or by means which include the promotion of disturbance or disorder, or such acts or omissions or threat; or
3. (c) which aims at bringing about any political, industrial, social or economic change within the Republic in accordance with the directions or under the guidance of or in co-operation with any foreign government …

The hon. member for Durban North again mentioned here the well-known “addage”, as he calls it: “Justice must be seen to be done.” This is a statement that is frequently made here by them. I want to ask him whether he agrees with the other very well-known and much older statement that the security of the State is the sovereign law. The question now is, since it has been proved and since members of their own party are also convinced of the fact that these people want to overthrow the existing order by methods that cannot be reconciled with democracy: “What do they say should be done with these people, who are at this stage still engaged in acts of preparation and whose actions have not yet become attempted acts?” As has also been said here before, these people are still able to live their own lives and to earn their bread and butter; they are now simply being placed in cold storage and being kept under observation. What, I ask hon. members of the Opposition, is wrong with that under circumstances in which it has been found that they are contemplating these evil deeds in South Africa? They have been treated in complete accordance with the provisions of the Act. These steps that have been taken are preventive steps. As I have said, they are being placed in cold storage to think over, for a while, their diabolic plans, ideas and attitudes. For the remainder they can, to a large extent, lead their normal lives. It is also possible to still make certain concessions to them if they ask for them and their requests are reasonable. But I want to emphasize that one is dealing here with the idea of the creation of disorder. They are the disciples of chaos, and what fairer treatment can they get than this cautionary measure that they should behave themselves and that if they do not do so, they will be dealt with further.

Unfortunately the hon. member for Houghton is not here. She mentioned the fact that she is in favour of mercy being shown to Bram Fischer. I wonder whether she is at all prepared to state whether mercy should be shown to Rudolf Hess or not. Hess is being kept in prison in Europe under similar circumstances.

The hon. the Minister has explained to the hon. member the case of the Bantu who was hanged and the White person whose sentence was mitigated. The hon. the Minister gave a very full explanation of that. That question was most probably aimed at overseas consumption. However, the hon. member neglected to mention the Vontsteen case in which the man was hanged and the woman was granted a reprieve. We had the case in Harrismith where the woman was hanged and the man was found not guilty. I have personally acted in cases of gold theft in which the Whites were given a sentence of ten years or more with corporal punishment while the Indians went scot free. The fact is that every case has its own merits and must be judged according to the circumstances that apply in each specific case. The insinuation the hon. member for Houghton made is uncalled for.

In the short time at my disposal I just want to say something about the Liquor Act. I notice that in the report of the Department of Justice nothing is said this year about any amendments to the Liquor Act or whether there is a new Liquor Act on the way. However, I know that attention is being given to amending the Liquor Act. I know it is an enormous task, but I nevertheless want to ask the hon. the Minister to give attention to investigating certain oppressive elements of the Liquor Act. I want to mention, for example, the question of all new applications for the renewal and transfer of liquor licences, etc. The forms that must be completed in that connection are very cumbrous. I am certain that a large degree of simplification of the forms is possible. I would be glad if the hon. the Minister would give attention to that even if it means that the Liquor Act as a whole will not yet be amended at this stage. I want to mention, for example, the question of the quantity of liquor which a bottle store licence holder may keep on his premises. The Act provides that six kinds of wine and eight kinds of brandy may be kept in the bottle store. When he is acting on a temporary licence at a function, he must do the same. [Time expired.]

Business interrupted in accordance with Standing Order No. 23.

House Resumed:

Progress reported and leave granted to sit again.