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.